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This is Bolivia, the mountain biking paradise of the Americas-except that mountain bikers don't know about it yet. Which makes it one of the world's hottest yet most undiscov- ered singletrack destinations. The country's rugged, mountainous terrain has his- torically attracted outlaws (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid), revolutionaries (Che Guevara), drug barons and Nazis. Now, that same terrain makes it an adventure seeker's paradise. Add a rich history of Incan and pre-Incan trail building, and a pre- sent-day rural population that uses footpaths as its primary arteries for travel, and you have an unending web of frontier- style singletrack. Riders in Bolivia can try their hand at cliffside jungle, scree slopes from 18,ooo-foot peaks, and steep footpaths wind- ing into mountain hamlets. The ultimate ride is Takesi Trail, which features negotiating a bike-on-back hike over a scenic 15,ooo-foot pass, then a 9,ooo-foot descent down an Incan trail that plummets through prehistoric villages and ends in steam- ing green cloud forest This tour is strictly for expert riders, but those with less experience seeking a mellower trip (mellow being a relative term here) can take a different tour along Bolivia's extensive net- work of four-wheel-drive roads. Bolivia is poor and largely undeveloped. Although You're on a mountain bike, rocketing down from a thin-aired pass high in the Andes when you see it Where the valley floor broadens, a mountainside rises like a wall for a near vertical mile into a savage cluster of 17,ooo-foot, shark-tooth summits-and carved up its face is a trail. You stop and stare_ It is a horrible, magnificent etching, cutting back and forth upon itself up the impossible_ It is actually an old mule trail that reaches a high cirque where residents chip ice from a glacier to haul down to the nearest market, but all that matters to you then is that it has to be ridden. Muscling your way up the mountain'side with a bike on your back, gravity viciously pulls on your plodding body. The trail beneath your feet, though, is the sweetest slice of plummeting, hai r- pin-switchbacking, mountain-biking nirvana imaginable. economic conditions are improving, expect very simple accom- modations, ranging from basic hotels to camping. Most outfit- ters rent bikes and camping gear if you decide not to bring your own. If you choose to go for the 54,000 feet of descent, you'll be exposed to some of the most remote and radical tra il there . ~.-M ~ :s OUTFITTER GRAVITY ASSISTED MOUNTAIN BIKING, Bolivia Alistair Mathew, owner and chief guide of GAMB, has been exploring the footpaths, wind-blasted passes and jungled ~ ::; ravines of the Bolivian Andes for three years and has uncovered ~ a mind-boggling collection of mountain bike epics. His best finds have been packaged into an incredible 12-day tour. 9 ffi 12 days, $1,250, February to December (call to schedule), 591-2- 15 374-204, www_gravitybolivia.com 28