Most of the roads between towns and across the country in Paraguay have now been paved. The same is true of the principal roads around the towns and cities, however it does not take long, even in Asunción to find an alternative road surface.
Firstly on those roads concidered not quite important or pricipal enough to receive a coating of black tarmac the suface is often cobbles.
These rough uneven stones must be one of the worst surfaces for driving upon. Unless approached slowly and with great caution travelling across them is a truely bone shaking experience. Fortunatly they are on the whole used only as a coating for roads around towns and can normally be exited within a block or two.
The laying of cobbles does though make sense for councils as uncomfortable as they may be they are as permanemt as tarmac so not requiring regular repairs. Also these tend to be the roads earmarked for tarmacing as the fully paved network slowly expands.
Once beyond the cobbles though things quickly become more natural as the roads become dirt tracks. These strips of red earth winding their way across the countryside are one of the most common and distinctive features of rural Paraguay.
For me these red dirt tracks are the roads I travel from day to day, being 5km from the nearest stretch of tarmac. The one running between the towns of Piribebuy and Paraguari.
The main tracks are wide and well defined. They are considered suitable for almost any type of vehicle. Ox carts and buses, lorries and family cars all have on the whole have no trouble with them. Elsewhere they might be concidered 4×4 territory but in reality with a bit of care there is no reason why a less robust vehicle who not be sufficent for all but the roughest of them.
Being nothing more than compacted soil even the best is never truely flat for any more than the shortest of distances. Heavy lorries bite into the sand and the rains wash them away as water seeking to drain off the land searches out the path of least resistance. Added to this sand displaced and dried forms soft drifts.
This eroding of the ground means that repairs are a never ending business. Sometimes householders will fill in the worst of the holes but generally the responsiblity lies with the council who monitor all the roads in their district and then have a campaign travelling from one to the next returning them to as level a state as possible.
This is always a time of great interest for everyone living near by, and a time of relife as prior to being repaired the road surface would have become quite bad. Then once it starts there is excitement for the children as the great tractors and earth movers do their work. After a few days the road is then looking as good as new and probably just a little bit wider.
Leading off these wide streets are smaller and smaller ones leading to isolated settlements or farmsteads. Many of these a little more than heavily rutted ox cart tracks which are difficult to negotiate with even the toughest of cars and down which lorries and buses can never reach.
Some are so deeply rutted by years of use that only a motorbike could find it’s way up, balancing on the raised ridge between the wheel ruts.
The destroyer of these roads is not the traffic but the rain. In a heavy storm the road can be turned into thick sticky mud. Unsurprisingly during or shortly after a storm few vehicles attempt to go anywhere.
A few days of rain and the tracks will become impassible until the worst of the water has drained away. Even once it has deep muddy puddles may remain for a good while longer.
However though for all it’s troubles an earth road is an enjoyable thing to travel down. A softer, more forgiving surface than tarmac and on that blends into rather than imposing itself upon the nature all around.
I am in no rush to have my local dirt track paved over and even when it gets worn down to rocks and ruts get a pleasure from travelling along it.
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