The Nevada Colque Cruz in the Peruvian Andes is breathtaking. The views of the glacier-clad summit are sublime, but more than 16,000 feet above the sea the scant oxygen in the frigid air means even small movements leave a person gasping. It is a brutal place to build a road.
The work zone crosses about 35 miles of one of the highest reaches of the $1.3-billion InterOceanic Highway project now being built across Brazil and southern Peru. When completed in 2010, the highway will create a 3,100-mile paved connection between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.