Colombian blogger’s world tour on classis Mercedes Benz ends with accident in West Bank

Tel Aviv, Jan 24: Ana Lucia Perez, a 59-year-old photographer and blogger from Colombia was on a world tour by road. She just arrived in the West Bank in her vintage Mercedes Benz but her trip was abruptly cut short as her car got into a crash, leaving Perez seriously injured and her car mangled. She was admitted in a hospital in Jerusalem after the accident that took place outside Kfar Adumim settlement last week, Times of Israel said citing a report in Tel Aviv-based Yedioth Ahronoth, a Hebrew daily. Two other persons were also hurt in the accident, although not as seriously.

The Yedioth Ahronoth report said Perez was in the middle of a journey which saw her driving across South America and Asia and Russia and several other countries in Europe and Middle East. She uploaded photographs of her travel on pages on Instagram and Facebook named 'Lucane and Merce' - the latter being a nickname for her 1960 car.

Last Christmas, Perez shipped her vehicle to Israel's Haifa port to continue with her global travelling but she met with the horrendous accident on this leg.

"At the Kfar Adumim junction, I remember that I turned left toward Jerusalem, when suddenly a car came toward me. I didn't see lights or anything signalling its arrival," she told Yedioth. "I was hit hard and from then on I don't remember anything."

West Bank traffic is known for its notoriety and high number of fatalities in road accidents, thanks to poor enforcement of traffic rules and reckless driving. There was no immediate information about the car that hit the veteran globe trotter.

Perez regretted that her much loved car was destroyed but she also thanked that it was her vintage vehicle that saved her from death. She said even her doctor was surprised to see her being able to walk after such an accident.

Perez had bought her Mercedes three decades ago for $1,500 and the occasion coincided with the birth of her oldest son.