5-16-10 Montevideo, Uruguay

Getting to Uruguay was an entertaining ordeal as we took a huge ferry from Buenos Aires to Colonia, about two hours from Montevideo. The ferry was one of the larger vessels I’ve been on and was well equipped with a restaurant, bar and large DutyFree shop. Not long into our voyage we started hitting some rough seas which caused dozens of perfumes, chocolates and crystal trinkets to fall to the ground with each wave.

We were the first off the boat as we’d been the last to park on the lower deck. Waiting for us when we rode off was Sami, who’d taken an earlier ferry the same day. He showed us where to go to get processed into the country. Their customs office was a small Toyota pickup truck with a fat man inside who filled out our paperwork on a clipboard perched on the steering wheel which honked the horn frequently by accident.

It was really overcast and misty as we rode out of Colonia making me wipe my visor frequently. We were happy to be out of the city and relax a bit while riding. BA was great but it’s nice to get away into the country as well. The highway was lined with palm trees, each unusually thick and about 30 feet tall, spaced every 50 feet or so. Thousands upon thousands of them all perfectly uniform, very impressive. After several miles the palms changed to equally well-planted pine trees.
They aren't big on signs here in Uruguay which is somewhat annoying but we were able to find our hostel surprisingly easy. It's not downtown but is located in a quiet suburb with lots of Victorian styled homes, not what I expected at all.

Uruguay is the North Dakota of South America. From what I’ve seen, it has nothing that you can’t see better elsewhere and is simply mediocre and remarkably unremarkable. The only thing that stands out in my mind regarding the country and their inhabitants is that they drink more mate than anywhere I’ve ever seen. What bothers me about their mate consumption is the inefficiency in which they do so. In one hand they have a thermos of hot water. In the other they have their gourd filled with dried mate, hot water, and a filtering straw. If I were to like the lawn-clipping flavored concoction enough to drink it on a regular basis I’d somehow fashion the mate cup to the top of the water thermos as it would free up one hand which would allow for productive things to be done. However, maybe this is all well known to the average Uruguayan and they are thoroughly enjoying the simplicity provided by having both hands occupied.
I saw the nicest memorial yet of South America today. It was a maosoleum of sorts for some warlord general. There was a huge statue of him on his steed, maybe three times the real size. Underneath him was a set of stairs that led underground to a dimly lit room that was spectacular. Dark granite that was spotless with large, back-lit cast concrete letters on the interior walls which spelled out important dates in the life of Sr. Artigas who apparently slayed more than a few uncooperative natives throughout his days. Two sword-toting soldiers were on either side of his urn which was octagonal and adorned with gold writing and placed on an altar of sorts under a beam of light which looked like something Indiana Jones might try to heist.  Perhaps most pleasant was what was missing... no trash, no typos, no bums, no strange smells, no broken tiles and no stray dogs. It was perfect. Felt like I was back in the States for a few minutes.

Later that night we went to a strange indoor market that housed dozens of small BBQ or 'Parilla' restaurants.  They were all out in the open, each with about a dozen stools surrounding a huge fire with a 15'x8' grill over it whose height was adjusted by a series of winches and chains.  Mark instantly recognized one as being from the show, "No Reservations" with Anthony Bourdain so we thought we'd give it a try.  Our order came out heaped on a small, personal grill with various sausages, entrails, steaks limbs and a few non-meat products as well.  All excellent except for what we thought was intestine. Too chewy.

5-10-10 Buenos Aires, Argentina

Getting into Buenos Aires was a bit of a nightmare. We hit the outskirts of town at dusk and didn’t waste any time getting lost. The problem was that the street names changed every few blocks, even on the largest of roads which frequently forked, making us choose at random which way we thought was best.
We pulled over and started looking at a map of Argentina which was too big to be very useful as it showed Buenos Aires as a splotch only an inch in diameter. We knew if we could just make it to the coast of the city that we could take a coastal road north to Dakar Motos, a hostel/motorcycle shop on the northern side of the city.

While pulled over mulling our options a friendly couple came upon us and asked us if we needed directions. We accepted though didn’t have high hopes for their help as to date I have yet to meet anyone in Latin America who can use a map. I showed him the map and told him that we wanted to get to the coast within the city. He paused for a moment to study the map before declaring that we were, “Aqui” while pointing to the center of Uruguay some 1000km from our current location. Close, but not quite.

Several hours later, with my low fuel light on, after riding down the wrong way of numerous one-way streets we rode past an old Jeep with DAKAR MOTOS painted on the side of it, we’d made it. Inside was a bit of a biker utopia. It was a small shop that catered mostly to motorcycle travelers as ourselves. There were several other riders there as well. A few guys from Sweeden, a few Canucks and another gringo.

This was the first time we’d meet up with a group of riders and it was refreshing. None of the usual questions from annoying tourists, ‘Why are you riding that thing? How fast does it go? How much did it cost? How large is the engine? There was a bit of calm there as well as a sense of security. Everybody had their gear spread out which is something we never do at hostels but this was a safe zone of sorts. It was a good spot to swap info on different routes, where crooked cops were, which passes were frozen over for the year, etc.

I swapped out my tires, did an oil and filter change and had the valves adjusted slightly and also had a Helicoil put in as one of the engine head bolts was stripped out.

One of the riders at Dakar Motos was Sami, a Lebanese/Canadian hybrid who we’d met briefly in Ushuaia. I had chatted with him upon arriving at our hostel in Ushuaia a month back while Mark was off unpacking his bike in the dark and didn’t join in the conversation.

I introduced Mark to Sami, who was confused for a moment, “I thought you were traveling with a black guy?” Nope. Mark does look a bit darker these days as he’s sporting quite the bushy beard which is capable of hiding various objects including pens and forks he found out.

Sami informed us that he was going to a soccer game in the next few days and asked us if we wanted to join him. We had heard that these ‘futbol’ games weren’t the safest of things and agreed that it would be best if we all went to it together.

The morning of the Boca vs Hurican game we took a bus over to the Boca stadium where we were told tickets would go on sale at 10am. However, upon getting there, we soon realized that all the tickets had been sold out and but scalped tickets were an option.

We were approached by several guys offering scalped tickets which was illegal, but our options were limited. There were perhaps a dozen other people in search of tickets, but nobody was buying. Sellers would approach potential buyers who would look at the tickets then hand them back and walk off. We watched numerous interactions until we saw some local guys buy some tickets which we took as a good sign as we’d heard the tickets can be fake at times.

$30 later we had three tickets which we hoped would get us into the game that evening.

We arrived early to the game and found a sea of fans and riot police packing the streets. Barricades were erected to herd people through the streets as well as to separate the opposing fans as violent fights are said to break out frequently. The police presence was unreal, hundreds upon hundreds of cops decked out in full riot gear along with armored vehicles and huge water cannons. And this wasn’t even an important game as neither team was advancing in the post season.

Not a drop of alcohol was sold in a wide radius of the stadium in an effort to reduce problems but that didn’t do much to stop people from bringing their own booze with them as the streets were covered in bottles and cans. Also disturbing was when we saw a guy take a box cutter out of his pocket and hide it in his shoe before cruising through security.

We were unaware as to whether or not our tickets would work as we’d heard that many sold on the streets were fakes, but that some of the fakes were good enough to get into the game with. We quickly found out that our tickets were not only fakes, but were also not good enough to get into the game with when the ticket attendant yelled, “Trucha!” and we were busted.

We quickly chatted up one of the other guard/ticket takers and came to find out that he knew somebody who could get us into the game. We waited around for a bit before somebody showed up and sold us another round of tickets that the employee confirmed we could get in with. The only problem was that the tickets were for the visiting team, Hurican, and Mark was wearing a Boca jersey which we were told would be a problem. I took off my long-sleeved shirt and gave it to Mark which covered all but a bit of blue and yellow of the collar. Nothing to be worried about, or so we thought.

We made it through all of the security checkpoints and ran up all the flights of stairs to the very top of the stadium which was shaking gently due to the stomping crowd. The energy of the place was like nothing I’ve ever seen, absolute mayhem.

Being that we were in the visitors section, we had tall barbed-wire fences surrounding us, prison style. Long cloth banners were tied to the top rail of the stadium and were run down the steep stands. These banners were then held onto by dozens of rowdy fans while balancing on handrails throughout our section. There was constant drum beating and chanting of songs that everyone in the stands knew. At one point a few guys unleashed a barrage of whole onions and golf ball-sized ice chunks onto the Boca fans below no doubt doing some serious injury to some unlucky fans.

Hurican scored a goal late in the first half which caused the intensity level to rise to a new level I didn’t think was possible. Absolutely deafening with people yelling to the point that you couldn’t hear individual yells, it sounded all as one, reverberating in my chest. There was more swaying of the stands, as well as another barrage of random objects in the air. Mark and I looked at each other and shrugged as if to say, ‘So this is what soccer fans are like’.

Hurican remained in the lead till part way through the second half when Boca scored. Our section couldn’t have been more quiet while the other end of the stadium celebrated. During this silence, our buddy, Sami, took a few distant pictures of the Boca fans celebrating, and some of the Hurican fans must have noticed.

What happened next I’ll never forget. It resembled the wave that fans do at baseball games, but instead of the wave traveling horizontally; it went vertically, from the bottom of our section to the top. The wave didn’t consist of people raising their hands in the air, but rather people spinning around to watch the 15 guys rushing up the stands towards our location.

The group of hooligans didn’t run past though, because we were their target. The first guy to come up was a thick guy with a shaved head. He grabbed Mark’s collar (as you could still see the blue and gold underneath) and ripped it open, exposing his Boca jersey. “Eres de la Boca!” (You’re from Boca) he yelled and slammed his fist into Mark’s face. I lunged forward towards the guy but received a cheap-shot to my right jaw and another to back of my head.

The next thirty seconds seemed like hours as we were surrounded on the top deck of the stands, each with approximately 5 guys throwing punches at us. At one point both Mark and I were knocked to the ground when a bit of a boot party took place on us. We were kicked in the ribs, head and back. At this point it was as if everything stopped. I realized that if I didn’t do something soon that I’d be dying at a lousy soccer game in Argentina.

I then relied on a bit of advice that my dad, an old Marine, once gave me when we were watching some old war movie together. Basically, when faced with multiple attackers, don’t try to fight the whole group, but pick them off one at a time.

I managed to pop to my feet, fists up and locked eyes on the skin-head that had hit Mark first. I charged him and landed a hellacious left hook to his right eye, snapping his head back like a Pez dispenser. I reloaded and threw another punch, hitting him in his right eye again and he clutched his face and staggered off.

With their skin-head down I then charged the guy next to him, picking him up and slamming him to the ground. This gave me a bit of an opening and I dashed across the top deck of the stands towards the exit where we had come up earlier. There was a row of cops there which was a welcome sight. I also saw Mark ahead of me who made it to the cops first.


What happened next was rather shocking. Mark was behind a cop when two more guys charged him. The cop squirmed out of the way and offered no assistance, nor did the ten other cops nearby.


Mark escaped and we then made it into a calmer section of the crowd where we sat down briefly, adrenaline still pumping. While catching our breath in the stands, another hooligan ran up and kicked Mark in the kidney then ran off. I grabbed a cop and told him that we needed to get out of the stands and he heed and hawed a bit. A paramedic for our section of the stands came over and argued with the cop briefly before he opened the huge gate which led us out into the internal hallways of the stadium.


The paramedic brought us down to the team’s doctor who had studied in Minnesota, Mark’s home state. The doctor apologized profusely for the delinquency of his country as he looked us over.

Sami then showed up, escorted by some other cops. He hadn’t been hit at all, but had everything of value stolen from him..wallet, cell phone, camera, glasses, hat and even his hotel key. He had sought refuge behind some lady during the whole ordeal and got out unscathed.

The cops then escorted us to the police station which couldn't have been any more of a wast of our time.  We sat there for several hours, looking at a trophy case with trophies for 'Efficiency' and 'Valor' neither of which we saw that day from the cops.  Finally a police officer interviewed us but he warned us that if we stated that we had been assaulted, that we would not be able to leave the country before having a court hearing so we just left.
Mark later went in for X-rays of his ribs which showed no fractures, just badly bruised ribs.
The next day we woke up in our little hostel room in downtown Buenos Aires.

“How you feeling, Ben?” Mark asked,

“Like I got beat up” I replied managing a faint chuckle.

“Don’t make me laugh, Ben, it makes my ribs hurt” He said breathing hard.


While there’s no denying that we got beat up, things couldn’t have turned out much better given the circumstances. Anything more serious could have ended the trip. We believe that our bushy beards did a sound job protecting us for the most part, softening and deflecting punches. Mark has a swollen lip and sore ribs, while I’ve got a black eye, a boot-print on my back, a swollen jaw but also some sore knuckles which hurt in a good way.

4-28-10 Comodoro Rivadavia, Argentina

This is not the nicest place I’ve ever been. We’ve been seeing a lot of good stuff in Argentina so I suppose it’s only fair for us to see some of the other side. If Argentina were the US, then this part of the country would be much like North Dakota, central Nevada, or Kansas in its entirety. There is nothing out here worth seeing really. Sure, there are interesting things here and there, but nothing that can’t be seen elsewhere and better at the same time. The only reason people are here is because they don’t know any better. The landscape is nothing but rolling hills covered in some sage brush-like plant. Dead alpacas are seen about every 15 miles. Dead coyotes are every 20 miles. The wind is constant, only varying in direction, intensity and frequency of gusts.


We arrived yesterday around 1pm and found a bike shop that had tires for Mark, but they were closed for their mid-day siesta and wouldn’t reopen until 3:30 so we went off and found a little hospedaje owned by a friendly older guy who showed us around the place. They have a long garage for our bikes which is important as a safe place for the bikes is a prerequisite for a place for us to stay. Our room is a bit barren except for the large painting of eight wild stallions running through water that looks like it has lightning bolts coursing through it. The comically muscular horses have unusually long snout-like faces and extra large eyes. There are four Chinese symbols on the painting as well. It is stunning, thought provoking and of Peruvian quality even though we are in Argentina.

The bathroom is a real treat. It’s set up like an RV bathroom in which the shower and toilet are all in the same area. The design of this place baffles me. The floor plan is the same size as two refrigerator boxes placed end-to-end. Long and narrow. At the far end of the hallway-like room is the toilet. Adjacent to the toilet is the leaking shower head (there is hot water, though!) from the shower head back to the door is about 8 feet of walking space. The drain is at the door as well, so the water has to run down the little hallway before hitting the drain. All the plumbing is done externally thus the shower head could be relocated to an ideal spot in minutes with nothing more than a Leatherman, a garden hose and two clamps.

The kitchen which we were free to use was along the same level as the rest of the place. Most notable was the prison shank sitting next to the sink. It looked like some old sort of machete which had been ground down to a butcher knife size. The handle was impressive, made out of numerous layers of burned and melted plastic bags wrapped around each other.

After the brief showing of our luxo-hotel we rode over to the bike shop where Mark got a new set of Metzlers put on. Argentines have a funny way of pronouncing foreign words as though they are Spanish. I suppose we do the same at times in the US, but not to the extent that they do it here in Argentina. My favorite thus far has been their pronunciation of the word ‘Firestone’. They say ‘Fee-ray Ston-ay’. The mechanic put one of the tires on backwards but happily changed it when we pointed it out.

Upon getting back to our hospedaje the friendly older man was no longer there. In his place was an unfriendly older man. We started pulling our bikes into the parking area when he started throwing a fit, saying that there is no way the bikes would fit and that there needed to be room to walk to the back of the garage. I assured him that they would fit just fine but he carried on protesting with the typical pessimistic attitude that Argentines are known for (it clearly states so in my guide book even).

Mark and I blatantly ignored the guy and proceeded to park the bikes just fine (It would have been too easy to make a comment regarding American ingenuity so I held my tongue). Once parked the guy protested again, saying that there was not enough room to walk past. There was over 3’ of walking room between our bikes and the wall which he said was not acceptable even though his personal motorcycle protruded well beyond ours. “Hay muchas gorditas aca?” I inquired sternly. He said nothing and walked away.

One thing that I’ve learned quite well on this trip is that I shouldn’t always be my normal friendly and polite self as it doesn’t always get the job done. Being frank and somewhat unpleasant is required at times.

4-24-10 San Sebastian, Chile

First off, a few new videos that I've only recently been able to upload due to slow internet elsewhere...
Vilcabamba, Ecuador-
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gf_hcyTjEJA&feature=channel   

Ruta 40, Argentina-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6GchrPjBMU&feature=channel  

Costa Rica-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bOADkk2QjI&feature=channel   

Salar near Iquique, Chile-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2uvdikbO42Q&feature=channel    


We left Ushuaia and were happy to find the roads wet without any ice. Garibaldi Pass had snow on either side, and was cold but the road was just fine. Winds started picking up as we descended from the pass to the point where we had to slow down considerably, Mark was getting battered as usual due to his light bike.
We made it to the border of Chile at San Sebastian and checked out of Argentina though had some confusion as the lady thought that Mark and I were riding together on one bike. No, lady, that’s not correct. At the customs desk to cross into Chile we were greeted in great Chilean fashion by some cranky guy who told us to fill out some paperwork but refused us the use of a pen for a while.

He asked us where we were going to which I replied San Sebastian, which is the little border town. He wasn’t happy with my answer and again asked me where we were going in Chile so I spelled it out nice and clear for the guy, I told him that we were going to sleep 200 meters further down the road at a hospedaje then the next day we would take a ferry back to the mainland then go up to Rio Gallegos. His questions stopped and he went back to work poking at his computer before stamping my passport with more force than was needed.

Mark had a worse time with his customs official than I did, though. I don’t want to handicap his Spanish education by cutting in and offering help all the time so I’ll frequently just sit back and watch the hilarity ensue. Mark got good and riled up and gave the desk a solid kick. Mark has taken on a bit of an Arab look to himself with a stout beard and frequently pulls his balaclava up on top of his head, resembling a turban.


A few yards past the border crossing we found the little hospedaje. They had room for us in a small bunk room which was heated by a cylindrical fireplace which was of poor design and never worked well. There were two dampers on top of it, both the size of a hockey puck with a chimney protruding between them. The top of it was like an old-fashioned cookstove that could be picked up to drop wood in. The problem was when the dampers were opened to let air in then smoke would pour out. When we’d turn the dampers down enough to make the smoke stop then the fire would all but go out. We chose to be smoky and warm with a cracked door rather than completely cold.

This morning we woke up to terrible wind which was shaking the entire house. Mark and I walked behind the little house to check on the bikes and found Mark’s had blown over in the night. We stood it upright and wheeled it to a more protective place as the wind had shifted directions during the night. We found some scrap-wood and braced the bike so it couldn’t fall down again. It’s worked thus far.

The wind was around 100kph according to a trucker we talked to with gusts going well beyond that. He and several other truckers were waiting at the little restaurant next to the hospedaje as they said it was too dangerous to keep going with high winds. On the way down a week ago we saw a semi blown over on the side of the road so we thought it would be best to wait as well.

We’ve had a bit of a boring day, actually. Let’s see, we drank a lot of tea that we warmed on the smoky fire then had a big burger in the café nextdoor. I got caught up on some writing and sorting through photos which we copy to my external hard drive and to Mark’s for backups. I also fixed one of my fog lights whose bracket had broken in a crash in the salar in northern Chile. I used three of the hose clamps that I bought in Guatemala a few months ago and the light now works fine. I also cleaned and oiled my Leatherman, reorganized my gear and ate a chocolate bar. It's been a very, very stressful day.

I also got the chance to do a bit of research on the upcomming towns along the Atlantic side of Patagonia.  My findings aren't that promising, but Buenos Aires should make up for the dismal week we're about to endure.  According to my Lonely Plantet guidebook the towns that we'll pass through are-
 
Rio Gallegos..."Certainly not the world cup of tourist destinations."
Comodoro Rivadavia...."It's a homely city with busy streets and the ugliest cathedral you'll likely ever see."
Trelew..."Is not an exciting city."
Rio Grande..."This bleak and windy town..."

4-21-10 Ushuaia, Argentina....snowed in and crashing

Ushuaia was a fairly touristy town with more gift shops than necessary but also had some good restaurants and one of the best hostels I've ever stayed at.  While there we met up with another motorcyclist, Sami who split his childhood between Lebanon and Canada.  He'd flown to Quito and bought a bike there and plans to head north to Buenos Aires so we'll probably meet up with him again.

We loaded up the bikes with the intention of heading north, back over the treacherous Garibaldi pass and into the forests of central Tierra del Fuego. First, though, we thought we’d take a scenic tour to Tierra del Fuego National Park, about 10 west miles from Ushuaia.

The road was gravel at times and narrow and twisty and it was spitting snow. Upon coming around a corner we were greeted with a snow packed road leading up a hill so I accelerated to around 30mph as maintaining your speed on snow/ice isn’t that hard, but accelerating poses a problem decelerating is even more of a problem.

I was ahead of Mark and was able to maintain my speed pretty well, breaking traction just a few times which caused the back end to shimmy a bit. I made it to the top of the hill where there was a ranger station for the park with the sign we’d been looking forward to taking some hard-earned pictures with. I glanced in my mirror and didn’t see Mark so I dismounted and slid my way over the crest of the hill and was happy to see him on his feet, picking his bike up which was in a little ditch next to the road. He’d spun it 180 degrees while going uphill before sliding off the road. No damage to him or the bike. The video of the crash can be seen  at   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Qe-vpj_9GA

After a bit of pushing and careful clutch-work he was at the top as well where we had a bit of a photo shoot. I’m sure I’ll be looking at these pictures when I’m an old man with sore hips and they’ll bring a smile to my face.

Before heading back down the icy hill I turned on my helmet-mounted video camera as another crash seemed likely in the next few minutes. We started out riding on the side of the road where the snow was fresh and not compacted and gave us better grip. After a few hundred yards I was confident with my snow-cycling abilities and accelerated a bit, passing Mark and pulling onto the main road which was snow-packed, still going slow though. Within seconds I felt my rear tire get a little loose and it started pulling to my right while I kept my front tire facing forward. It was a rather helpless feeling and not much later I low-sided the bike and we both went sliding down the road together on the ice.  It was a pretty tame crash and no damage was done to either of us.

 Upon reviewing the crash on my video camera, a faint whimper can be heard coming from me mid crash which Mark has taken full advantage of, incessantly heckling me when the opportunity arises.

Once back in Ushuaia it was snowing harder and we met an Argentine motorcyclist who’d just descended Garibaldi pass which had accumulated quite a bit of snow on it in the past few hours. Being that we weren’t in the mood for more crashes we headed back to the hostel and booked another two nights.

We spent two days exploring Ushuaia some more but mostly resting. One day we went to the penal colony museum that also housed a maritime museum of sorts. Most notable was a small exhibit about the indigenous people who were typically naked except for body paint that ran wild throughout Tierra del Fuego back in the day. Darwin had done a lot of exploring in the area and spent some time studying these locals to which he described them to be….”the missing link between humans and monkeys.” Probably not going to find that published in a textbook back home.

4-18-10 Ushuaia, Argentina

Arnold escorted us out of town with his Hummer before pulling over and saying goodbye at a fork in the road.  We didn't want to dismount the bikes as we were sure they'd blow over in the wind.  We rode another hour along the coast where the winds were brutal. At times, however, we’d ride with the wind which let Mark hit 86 mph, a new speed record for him. Once at Punta Delgada we caught a 20 minute ferry across to Tierra del Fuego. While aboard we enjoyed some hot dogs in the small lounge area with a few truck drivers who had their rigs aboard as well and we all watched Guns n Roses music videos on a small TV.


We made it to the little village of Cerro Sombrero whose name is a bit of an anomaly as it was pretty flat ground in all directions and I saw no sombreros. We stayed at a little hospedaje run by a friendly old lady who cooked us dinner. She asked us if we’d like dessert and presented us each with an orange and a knife with a big smile. Not sure if oranges are hard to come by down here or not but she seemed quite proud to provide us with them. We pocketed the oranges for a snack the next day. In the morning, breakfast consisted of the usual Chilean fare. She told us that it was 600 kilometers from Cerro Sombrero to Ushuaia which seemed way off, in reality it was about 450 we found out.

The road turned to dirt just outside of town and varied in condition widely. Some places had deep ruts over a foot deep, others were almost like asphalt. On one straight, windy stretch we passed a long semi that had blown over which isn’t uncommon down here we heard.

Half of the island of Tierra del Fuego is owned by Chile, the other by Argentina so we had to do our usual border crossing work in the middle of the island. Upon walking into the customs office Mark pointed to a huge poster and started laughing. On the poster was a giant orange, several feet in diameter with an ‘X’ running through it and some instructions forbidding the import of fruits and vegetables. We didn’t worry about it as we’d crossed into Argentina 3 or 4 times and we know they don’t search luggage and find our oranges. Chile, however, does.

We fueled up in Rio Gallegos, the last town before Ushuaia, some 250 clicks off. As soon as we left town it started getting cold. Not much wind, just a damp cold. The sun started its long process of setting which provided for a good sunset over various lakes and mountain ranges. We didn’t stop for pictures as we were excited to make it to the bottom.

The last thirty miles were the longest of the trip thus far. It ended up getting uncomfortably cold but we pressed on as there was no place to stop. I had 6 layers on, a wool t shirt, a synthetic long sleeve shirt, my heated jacket, my alpaca sweater, my motorcycle jacket and a rain jacket on top of that all. My hands were the coldest even though I had my heated grips on high. I squeezed the grips hard which transferred more heat to my palms though the backs of my hands were still cold. ( I later found out that I had blisters on both palms from the heated grips, but I couldn’t feel it at the time).

There was a bit of an unforeseen obstacle just outside of Ushuaia- Garibaldi Pass, which cut through a mountain range a few thousand feet above sea level. As we approached the mountains we could see a distinct elevation running the length of the mountains where the frost and snow started. I’d occasionally think back to Central America and how hot it was up there but didn’t have time to reminisce much as the road started getting a little icy. We could have taken the road at an exciting 60mph had it been dry but were forced to putt around at 10mph as we didn’t want to go down.

We reached Ushuaia after dark and did a few laps around the town before finding our little hostel. We were exhausted. The hostel was owned by some large Rasta feller who welcomed us with big hugs and saying 'Welcome to the island'. We staggered across the street to a little restaurant and sat down.

“Well, we made it.” Mark smiled without saying anything. No grandiose toasts, no eloquent quotes that we’d been thinking up for the last 17,000 miles, just a nod in agreement.

We spent the next day lounging around the city, taking a few pictures and trying to comprehend our place in the world. The world is not a small place, I’ve come to find out, and I haven’t even seen that much of it.

Getting to Ushuaia was the only real quantitative goal of this trip. Yes, I’m glad to make it down here but it means nothing more than checking a box, really. The best memories and accomplishments happened on the way down.  It does feel good to reach the bottom, though. I’m thrilled that the bike has held up as well as it has which was one of the things that could easily have gone wrong. Should the bike explode, get stolen or slide off a cliff I won’t be all that disappointed as I have finished what I came to do. At the same time I’m excited for the next segment of this adventure, heading north via a different route.

4-15-10 Punta Arenas, Chile

We made it down to Punta Arenas which is the bottom of the mainland, though still north of the island of Tierra del Fuego, our next stop. In town we found my friend, Arnold, pretty easily. His red Hummer truck with an American flag decal across the back window was a dead giveaway in the driveway; it’s the only one I’ve seen since leaving the States.  Arnold and I became buddies while working at a silver mine in Chihuahua, Mexico. We were both on nightshift for a while where he looked after the heavy civil work while I looked after the earthwork.



Arnold's parents are from Portugal and Holland. His dad worked in the oil and gas industry, moving around to various projects throughout the world. When Arnold was young they did a 5 year stint in Punta Arenas then moved to Houston for a bit then back to Punta Arenas. Basically, Punta Arenas became his home by default. At the moment Arnold is working in northern Chile building a port. He works 8 days then comes home for his 6 day descanso.


Not long after getting to his place he took us out to a Chinese restaurant. He opened the door and walked in, still smoking his Marlboro which isn’t allowed and headed back to the kitchen where he gave a few orders to the cooks then helped himself to an armful of beers from a cooler which he passed out to us. The food showed up almost instantly and was excellent, the first Chinese food I’ve had since Colorado. We had a good feast and no bill ever showed up as Arnold’s family owns the restaurant.



We spent three nights at Arnold’s place, the most we’ve stayed in any one place since Colombia and with good reason. He’s a generous and entertaining host and also had good wifi and even maid who did our laundry. The maid also set out breakfast ingredients for us each morning so we could cook our own American breakfast.



Arnold had some pepper trees growing in a greenhouse that he’d smuggled into Chile from Thailand. The peppers were just right, meaning hot, unlike the local ‘aji’ peppers which are tame. Upon leaving he gave me a few peppers wrapped in paper that I still have in the pocket of my motorcycle jacket...”In case it gets cold down there in Ushuaia.”



Arnold ushered us out of town for half an hour to make sure we would made it out safely. Once out on the open highway he pulled over and we said our goodbyes while the wind howled across the plains.



We rode for an hour or so, making it to Punta Delgada where we boarded a ferry along with several other cars and some semi trucks. The ferry was about half as wide as it was long and seemed to be fairly flat-bottomed, making it really stable in the water. We didn’t strap the bikes down as there wasn’t any rocking to the boat. Inside the little waiting room we watched some Guns N’ Roses music videos and ate hot dogs during the 20 minute voyage over to Tierra del Fuego.



Needless to say, we were excited to hit the island, as we were only two days away from hitting the bottom of the world. Mark launched his bike off the ferry as I pulled a wheelie riding up the ramp, almost there!

4-11-10 Torres del Paine, Chile

We left El Calafate three days ago and had to backtrack as our intended route through a high pass wouldn’t work for a few reasons. We were told there were many steps in the narrow trail that aren’t ideal for motorcycles, it’s typically used for hiking or pack animals. Also, there was no proper border crossing with customs and immigration to accept us which would be a problem when we tried to leave the country as we wouldn’t have any papers.
So, we took missed our little turnoff somewhere as they aren't too big on signs down here so we went a half hour too far and crossed into Chile via another border crossing, no big deal. We then rode up to Torres del Paine but not before getting lost again as they don't have signs showing their huge national park. We finally found the visitor center which I used to be highly opposed to due to seeing too many as a kid. I have since learned to like them but this one was severely lacking.
I had a ton of questions for the lady working there who answered none of them. ‘Can we buy food, water, firewood here? Are there cabins available? Is there snow and ice up the road? Lots of 'no se’ followed by a long shrug.
I was amused when she gave us each a little ticket then told us to turn around and hand the ticket to a lady at a desk a few feet from me. She stamped them and gave them back to me and we then returned them and told me to return to the first gal. Classic Latin American inefficiency. This whole time where was some other lady who had her forehead on her table, sleeping while sitting in her chair, loved it.
We rode an hour or so into the park which is centered around several huge rock formations, similar to Devils Tower in Wyoming but better, more jagged with ice, glaciers, snow, and waterfalls.
It was almost dark when we saw a little campsite that wasn't marked and had not utilities with it, just a table and a grill. Being a large gringo I was able to reach lots of dead branches in the trees and yanked them down for firewood. We got a big fire going and made some pasta and soup and tea all enjoyed with BENJAMIN vino tinto. Obviously superb.
We set up our little gypsy tents and fell asleep, waking up at 8am while it was still totally dark. Such a confusing feeling. We couldn't see the sun till about 10 am. It was freeeezing so we made another little fire and boiled up some water from a little stream nearby. We later found that our pristine mountain stream was frequented by a herd of cattle which prompted us to boil the water for longer than usual the next time.
We set off hiking up towards 'El Mirador' which seemed like a good idea. It was to an overlook of some of the rock towers we were told. The trail was 6 miles in, a steady climb for the most part. Mark and I quickly felt the effects of sitting almost stationary for hours and hours every day.
It was supposed to take us 3.5 hours to the top according to our little tourist guide but we were clearly not on that schedule. We were on a 5ish hour track. We're both horribly out of shape. Not fat out of shape, but weak out of shape. We took dozens of breaks for water, tuna, crackers, olives, cookies and granola bars.
At one point we were passed by a group of tourists on horseback, the first lady was complaining about how much her knees hurt while she was riding. Mark and I considered becoming horse thieves but didn't take action.
We made it to the mirador which overlooked a milky grey-blue lake under the huge rock towers with rock fields surrounding us. Very impressive.
The road home was luckily downhill and faster but oh so painful. This is why God made ATVs. We're getting old, it's a fact.
We staggered down and poked our head in the huge lodge near our campsite, $300 for a room, $10 beers on tap and walked out. We walked back to our little camp and ate some more soup and pasta. A huge herd of cattle started roaming around our camp bleating and mooing. Mark and I each executed good shots with golf-ball sized rocks which kept the beasts away for a little. They came back early in the morning and woke us up again.
The second night was colder than the first so being the clever little Boy Scout that I am at times, I made a hand-warmer of sorts to have with me in my sleeping bag. I took an empty jar of instant coffee, unscrewed the lid and poured some hot water inside. I put the lid back on and wrapped the thing in a bandana. I then crawled into my bag and tucked my little cylinder of warmth inside my shirt, quite content as it was toasty. Well, it was very, very toasty I later realized.
I later woke up with a terrible burning sensation in my chest. No, didn't have the lid come off and get scalded, nor did I break break the glass and have glass shards in my chest. I did some investigative poking around and realized that I had two blisters just to the left of my sternum. Not a common place for blisters I don’t think.
A few nights later I awoke in pain again as I had accidentally ripped one of the blisters open with my watch in my sleep. Looking forward to warmer climates soon but must keep going south for a while yet.

4-8-10 Rio Chico Gangster Camp, Argentina

It was obvious we weren’t in Chile anymore as our little hotel was nicely heated and owned by a friendly old lady, something we haven’t had for quite some time. We found a log cabin-styled restaurant where I had a early birthday dinner of pumpkin soup, empanadas of beef and corn, a chorizo followed by a mushroom smothered steak with a syrah and a lager for good measure.

We took off the next morning to make up for the 3 hours scenic detour we made to the north the day before.  We pulled into the dusty little town of Bajo Caracoles for a break as it was the only place for miles around. There's nothing out here, no cars for half an hour is the norm. The previous day while lost we saw nobody for about 4 hours.

I ate some birthday quiche though they called it a ‘torta’, as well as a pizza of sorts. I chatted with the gas station owner who recommended we bed down near Rio Chico as it was a pretty area and would be quiet and 'muy tranquilo'.

We also came to find out that two riders had been killed in the previous month on the Ruta 40. A Brazilian guy crashed an hundred clicks back a few weeks ago as well as a young American who crashed not far from town the previous week. Another reminder to be careful out on the road.

After topping off the tanks to their fullest we hit the dusty road again which we've gotten good at riding. Mark rides in the lead as his bike can take bad bumps/rocks/holes, better than mine. I watch his back tire from about 20 yards off to see if it bounces or does anything abnormal, if it does, then I pay more attention. Often times his rear will fish-tail for a few repetitions signaling sand or gravel in which case I slow down with my rear brake and downshift a gear then accelerate upon hitting the loose material which pulls me through it just fine.

Wind hasn't been much of a problem for us though this section of road is known to be one of the windiest around. There was a slight breeze blowing form our right which was appreciated as it blew the dust kicked up by Mark's tires away from the road so I could see better.

We hit pavement a few times where I took the lead as my bike has better brakes and can withstand hitting critters (as well as Peruvians I found out) better than Mark’s bike. I dodged two armadillos out here. Had no idea they existed down here. Thought they were 'Made in Texas'.

It was getting slightly dark and we crossed the Rio Chico and pulled off to a little abandoned building with no roof and 'No Pasar' spray painted on the side of it.
"Looks like a good spot for a gangster camp" Mark said.

We poked around a bit then rode out to the river where we saw what might be a better spot down the way a kilometer or so.

We found a dense little thicket of willows next to a bridge that was well hidden from the road and didn't have 'No Pasar' written anywhere.

We only had a little firewood left (yes, I've been carrying firewood with me, that does sound a bit strange, I know. It's small pieces, about the diameter of a baseball bat that burn hot for a really long time, great for cooking) so I decided to make an 'Indian fire' with what we had left. This consists of building a small teepee of our good pieces of wood which we then tucked a bunch of wood shavings under. I lit the teepee and let it burn for about 10 minutes before taking each log down from teepee arrangement and laid each one flat on the ground with just their burning ends touching, like a wagon wheel. This concentrates the fire and doesn't burn the wood too fast and also provides a good spot to put a pot of water. As they burn, you tap the ends inward towards the hot coals.

We finished our raviolis and were contently sipping our wine. We each had a 'manly juice box' which had no straw nor spout on it, so a corner was cut off for drinking. Mid sip I heard a diesel truck pull onto the bridge which was 50 feet away from us, on the other side of the willows. We saw a spotlight shine out into the area to our left, then we heard a few rounds crack off from a semiautomatic rifle. Mark and I both dropped to our chests in the dirt. I shoved a pannier in front of a our little fire to block the glow as Mark sloshed some water on it killing the flames. We retreated behind my bike and each took out our knives and grabbed a chunk of firewood for clubbing purposes. We could hear talking coming from the bridge and a few more rounds fired off.
"I've got a tourniquet and some puncture-wound compound in the top of my pack' Mark whispered. "Damnit, I wish I had a gun" (Mark did tours in Iraq and Afghanistan with the Army and is used to being shot at, but not without the ability to return fire).

By this time I had to pee. Bad. Real bad. The occasional round would go off, most of which were directed off the other side of the bridge.  We were still laying on our chests, behind my bike when I decided that I had to relieve myself and did so in a logical manner, like a dog.

The truck drove off, with the spotlight sweeping the wide pampas grass flats but no more shots were heard.
The night was clear and cold with a great view of the stars as there's no light pollution down here.  We heard tons of little critters running around our campsite in the dark as well, one of which ran over of my head which was covered by my sleeping bag.

This morning we woke up and checked over by the bridge where we found a huge pile of ostrich feathers. We think it was ostrich poachers who were shooting last night but don't really know.

4-7-10 Los Antiguos, Argentina

Somewhat lost, but in a good place nonetheless. We took a wrong fork in the road not long after crossing into Argentina from Chile. Looking at our map we saw a fork and thought we should take the left one. Looking back, we shouldn’t have taken it, the proper fork on the map was a few more kilometers off. We saw a sign for Los Antiguos and couldn’t find it on the map as it was much farther north than we were looking, on the shores of Lago Buenos Aires.


The road wasn’t bad, though. Freshly graded in some parts, nasty in others. We didn’t see a single car since crossing into Argentina to when we hit Los Antiguos about a hundred miles away. We saw a good variety of animals- condors, armadillos, ostriches, alpacas and sheep by the hundred. I came around a corner to find a large alpaca on the road that was hemmed in by a cliff face and a river. He saw me and took off running down the road in front of me, legs flailing all about. Alpacas run like uncoordinated girls. I stayed about 20 feet off his rump, not wanting stress him too much and he eventually stumbled off the road and let me pass.

Later on I was riding along when I heard what sounded like steam hissing out of the bike. I did a sweeping glance over my gauges and all looked proper so I pulled over to see what was the matter. Upon stopping, I noticed a mess of twisted fence wire had become entangled in my crash bar and right boot and was dragging on the ground. Luckily it didn’t get caught in the rear wheel as well or I might be looking for a peg-leg and a trike.

4-6-10 Cochran, Chile

We decided to ride to Cochran, which was about 20 clicks south of the start of the road that would lead us to Argentina. A little backtracking would be necessary, but we thought it would be worthwhile as we were hoping for a good hostel with wifi and some good food. We found a little hospedaje run by a sour old lady and dropped off our stuff before running over to the local library which had fewer books than my own collection. There they had the only computers in town, three of them. I checked just a few emails as it was slow. There’s no WIFI in this town either. It’s hard to imagine a life without easy internet access. It might have a few perks, but not many.


Next we shot over to the grocery store. We were hungry. Very hungry. We hadn’t seen a grocery store since Puerto Montt and were happy to see real food again. It was big general store that had old-fashioned irons meant to be heated on a stove, Stihl chainsaws, Taurus revolvers, dutch ovens, 35mm film, cassette tapes, stoves, sides of beef, frozen chicken parts and lots of canned goods. Hot dogs were four bucks for a package of 8! Pan was cheap, a dollar for about a dozen hamburger bun sized pieces.

We wanted to cook something that would allow us to take advantage of the kitchen as we had one at our disposal back at the hospedaje. We found two bottles of Tabasco sauce and went wild. Hadn’t had a good spicy sweat since somewhere in Central America, can’t really recall where. Down here it’s all Aji, a non-spicy pepper that the locals think is devilishly hot. It is not.

We threw 8 dollars of Tabasco in the cart, several packages of pasta and sauce, some hot dogs as there was no chorizo available, cookies, eggs, juice, milk. We were going to eat well.

We pulled up to the inefficient line and were about 6 people deep. We waited for the checker to return as she’d disappeared for a while. Not sure what she was doing. There was a sacker standing all by her lonesome that probably could have done what the checker was off doing, who knows. Finally she returned and started working again.

We opened a bag of cookies and ate them all since we hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast. Coconut crème. I think they were good, don’t really know as I wasn’t concerned with the taste.

‘They take visa here, right?’ Mark asked

‘Yeah, I think I saw a sign out front’

We gave each other a bit of a nervous look.

“I’ll go check” I said

Sure enough, no VISA sign.

I asked the sacker if they took tarjetas de credito. ‘Oh, no’ she said in a condescending tone. Mark had been watching me from about twenty feet off as I asked her and he must have seen the look on my face as he had a horrified look on his when I glanced over him. I instantly burst out laughing.

We were pretty shocked that they didn’t take credit cards as virtually every place this size does, especially since it was the largest store in town. We were low on efectivo, not having near enough to cover our feast so we pushed the cart to the back of the store, threw more than enough coins in the empty cookie bag and walked out to the bikes still hungry. We rode to a papas fritas stand and ordered 1000 pesos of papas, a package of mustard and two of ketchup. Very good fries. Next we found another grocery store that was not unnecessarily packed and got a few essentials. Juice and pasta basically. We went home and had a meager but hot meal.

We met a guy from Wheatridge, Colorado at the little hospedaje. He was a divorced doctor looking for a piece of land down south. He said it was surprisingly expensive. He had exactly the same feeling of the average Peruvian and also of the Chileans which we have become to see as rather Peruvian in nature. He thought they drank ‘mate’ in order to stay occupied and avoid doing productive things. He was also put off by their rudeness at times.

The next morning we woke up seeing our breath under the half foot of blankets piled up on our beds. We walked out to our delectable breakfast which the owner provided. I had asked her the night before what breakfast consisted of. Her answer, “Café, café con leche, te, te con leche, pan, pan tostado, mantequilla y marmelada.”

She said it all with such enthusiasm as if it was a secret family recipe. This is the typical breakfast down here in Chile unfortunately.

Breakfast is one of the things I miss most about home, and I’m not a huge breakfast eater typically. Dennys, IHOP and Waffle House all sound pretty good at the moment.

It was coldest in our room, but only slightly warmer in the little dining room area next to it. She had a heater going in the kitchen which was next to the dining room, separated by a closed door. Don’t want that heat to get to the guests now. Mark wore his blanked over his shoulders to breakfast. She had a stove in the dining room but it wasn’t burning despite a mountainous woodpile outside. Mark debated burning his passport for a little warmth.

We ate all five pieces of bread provided and guzzled the hot water which we flavored with instant coffee. I asked for more hot water but was denied. Mark and I both saw the humor in this batty old woman and decided to leave as soon as possible.

Mark wearing his blanket into the dining room infuriated the old lady.

‘Why is the blanket out here!?”

‘Um, because it is freezing’ I replied, stating the obvious.

‘We almost died from the cold last night, I think it’s warmer outside than in here’

(evil look from old lady)

‘Do you not have cold in the USA?’

‘It is much colder in the USA, but we use ‘califaccion’ (heat)’

Yep, it’s time to go.

4-3-10 Carretera Austral, Chile

We caught an overnight ferry from the town of Puerto Montt, Chile to the ghost town of Chaiten where we started riding the Carretera Austral. This is a famous highway along the coast of Chile that is about 500 miles long but only serves around 100,000 people. It is said to be very similar to Alaska in both population density, the type of people, and the scenery.


The ferry ride wasn’t that bad. Airplane style seating. We were cramped for half the night then a lot of people got off somewhere so Mark and I sprawled out and fell asleep. We woke up the next morning early and took a few pictures when the light was good then went back to sleep. We were later woken up and told that we had to leave as we were in port and our bikes were the last onboard and thus were the first to get off.

The town of Chaiten was eerie. It was condemned by the government after a volcano erupted in 2008 which still has a huge plume of steam and smoke coming out the top of it. The volcanic ash released during the eruption and subsequent pyroclastic flows diverted a river through the center of town and deposited an enormous amount of sediment in their little bay.

We hit dirt about 20 miles outside of town and quickly met Frank, a guy from Papua New Guinnea who has been riding a 2001 BMW F650GS for 8 years around the world. Yikes. He told us of 3 Kiwi guys our age who were further on down the road that we might see.

There aren’t regular stores out here for the most part, most stores are not much more than a living room or front porch of a family’s home. We stopped at one that had a little wooden sign saying, “PAN” and sure enough, an old lady inside had a large basket of fresh bread, basically the size of hamburger buns. We bought a dozen. I asked her if she had any firewood we could buy as everything seemed to be pretty well soaked. She went out back and filled a garbage bag full of freshly split dry wood and dragged it out to us before charging us about a dollar which we were happy to pay. I lashed on the pile of wood to my bike and we set off down the road again in search of a campsite.

Forty minutes later we came upon another little store built onto a home which advertised hot coffee so we stopped, but they didn’t have any coffee. They did have some beer and eggs which we gladly took off the lady's hands. We tucked the eggs into Marks luggage carefully and he then jammed the 6-pack into the chest of his motorcycle jacket as we wouldn’t be going far.

A few more miles down the dirt road I slowed down to look at a potential campsite when I hit a bump that jarred loose a piece of wood from my bike. It fell in the road directly in the path of Mark who hit it with his front tire, jumpin the bike into the air which and then lost his balance and fell off the left side of the bike, landing on his chest. It would have been an unremarkable crash except for the beer he had tucked in his jacket. He let out some loud moans while thrashing around in the dirt, unzipped his jacket and dumped the beers onto the road. No broken ribs, beers or eggs.

There weren’t many spots available for camping as much of it seemed to be fenced off with old wire and logs to keep the cattle in. We did, however, find a little spot near a bridge that wasn’t fenced off. We jumped the bikes off the road and tucked them into some trees and set up our ‘Gangster Camp’ as Mark calls it. It seems to be a somewhat fitting name as we have very little in the way of traditional camping equipment. We’ve got sleeping bags and pads which are a luxury. For a tent we have a piece of plastic we bought back in Argentina. Not a tarp, even, just a big piece of plastic and a length of rope. Cooking is done in various tin cans, the best of which I’ve bent into somewhat of a tea pot. Bowls have been fashioned out of tuna cans. Beer cans are also used widely in gangster camp for cooking operations as there often times seem to be empty ones around. Wine glasses are skillfully made from ripping off the top of a can as well. Oh the class! Our whole mess kit goes in a plastic bag which I tie onto the back of my bike which swings around and jingles quite a bit on the bumps.

I also forgot to mention the hot water heater I’ve created for the bike. It all goes back to when I was sick on the catamaran in the Caribbean. To occupy myself while sick I thought-up a little contraption to capture the heat from the right exhaust header of the bike. It is now finished after gathering parts from five countries. The basic concept is that I have a water reservoir, about 1.5 liters, that has two copper tubes coming out the bottom of it. One tube is short, about 8” and leads directly to a valve. The other hose is about 8 feet long and leads to my exhaust header which it is wrapped around perhaps a dozen times before running to the valve as well. When the reservoir is filled and the bike is running, the hot water will naturally rise up out of the coils around the header as cold water drops down towards the valve where it comes in contact with the hot pipe and is thus heated and rises back into the can. Starting with a cold bike and cold water I can scald my finger in less than 10 minutes. Might need to sell this little contraption to BMW for release on their 2012 models.

Maybe 4 cars passed us the rest of the evening. Had some good chorizos, red wine and bread tonight.

The weather was superb, couldn’t have been better. Cool in the shade and warm in the sun with clear skies which seem to be coveted here. The road is in pretty good shape which we were happy about as we really had no idea what we were getting into. The sun is always low in the sky which makes riding on dirt easier. The low sun casts shadows of even the slightest undulations and irregularities in the road which alert us to potential hazards. The shadows of tire tracks running parallel with the road are the most disconcerting as they are a sign of sand or silt. Likewise washboards are easily seen as are the random rogue rocks that stick up out of the path. With the sun directly overhead no shadows are cast which gives the same feeling of having flat light while skiing.

On account of the equally good weather this morning, April 4, we had a lazy start. I got the fire going again and we cooked up a two sausages and some scrambled eggs in a beer can that turned out fantastic. Also had some mate and chamomile tea as well as coffee and cappuccino. We like our hot beverages.

Around 11am we saw three yellow dirt bikes coming our way, it was the Kiwis that Frank had told us about. Great guys who we exchanged a lot of info with.

We hit the road about 1pm and rode for perhaps 20 minutes to the town of La Junta where we fueled up and ate some cheese, bananas, crouton-like crackers, coffee cookies, apples and trail mix. We also bought some 'CHILE PATAGONIA' stickers.

3-30-10 Gangster camping near Barrancas, Argentina

So, we DID manage to get out of that dinky little town last night where there was no gas. I went and asked everyone I could find, everyone, if they had any gas, er 'nafta' (not sure if that has any relation to north american free...?) So, finally saw a little moto shop in town. The guy sold us 20 liters of racing fuel, 103 octane I believe, which wasn't much more expensive than normal nafta. It was enough to get us out of town and down the road.
After an hour on the road it was getting hot and we were next to a huge river so we decided to go for a dip. Oh so nice! We stripped down and waded out into the river. It took a lot of willpower to fall backwards into the glacial melt but felt great once we got used to it. We dried off on some rocks and gave our cheeks some color as well.
We found some little spot south of Barrancas, just off the highway. We rounded up some sticks and made a little fire and cooked 10 hotdogs on a flat rock which provided some gritty sand for flavor. We watched The Gate Keeper on my laptop which I placed on my aluminum top box which doubled as a superb entertainment center for the night.

We apparently were in some ant preserve of sorts, they were everywhere! They kept to themselves for the most part though I did awake with a bleeding bite on my forehead.

3-29-10 Cholo Malas, Argentina

So I'm in some little hostel in the town of Cholomatas or chotomalas, someting like that. I don't really know. We're in a bit of a predicament at the moment. 'No hay nafta'! Nafta es gasolina aqui en Argentina. So yeah, there is no gas at either station here in town and we are low on fuel. The next station a few hours south is dry as well. So here we wait on the truck to arrive. It *might* arrive tonight. Then again, it might not. This is kinda fun though, as it forces us to take a break that we usually wouldn't and see different stuff, even if it's just a typical small town in Argentina. No tourists here.
So yesterday we got a terribly late start, don't wake up till 10 am. I guess it's due to the time change but even still, we go to sleep at midnight and expect to wake up at 8 but we just don't. We walked about a mile in search of breakfast which was hard as the few restaurants that we found didn't serve 'desayuno' which seems to be par for down here. Breakfast is bread and coffee or mate, not enough to keep our American hearts a-pumpin.

We got out of town circa 1pm and rode for a while through a volcanic flow area, tons of black lumpy rock por todos lados and a huge river as that we crossed frequently. The road was dirt and rough and gravelly at times.

We were having some trouble with this gravel and I was getting tired of it surprising me and getting me all 'puckered up' which is kinda fun, but not always appreciated. I decided that I would learn how to beat the gravel and made a point to ride directly into the deep stuff, zig-zagging back and forth, mocking it. Yes, I faultered some an almost crashed a few times, but I learned quick too. Not a master of it yet but no longer a novice.

Riding dirt is rather counterintuitive to riding street. Let me explain...when riding a motorcycle, if you want to go to the left, turn the bars to the right. This then makes the bike lean to the left, and thus turn to the left, it's called 'countersteering'. It's the very same on a bicycle. At low speed, however, say 0-2 mph you can steer directly, meaning steer left, go left without leaning. So the problem with dirt is when you hit deep gravel or sand that turns your front tire into a rudder and pushes the bike wherever it wants essentially. The only remedy to fix this is to accelerate out of it and steer directly where you want to go. Steering directly on pavement would make you flip over on your side, but being that we're in gravel, the bike kinda slides around underneath and thankfully does not flip.  Countersteering causes the bike to 'lowside' or slide sideways, resulting in a crash. It's an unnerving feeling when hitting this gravel, though, as my initial instinct tells me to slow down and steer normal, but in reality, I should speed up and steer abnormally, or directly.

3-24-10 Mendoza, Argentinaaaaahhhhhh

Had a bit of a confusing morning as we just realized that there is a 2 hr time difference from Chile to here. However... we have a feeling that this time difference was also present in Chile as well, we just didn't know it as time doesn't really matter much to us. We get up when it starts getting light and stop riding when it starts getting dark. In short, we missed our little shuttle out to the vineyards and had to arrange another.


Had a long day riding my bicycle between vineyards and have worked up a sizable hunger that ony a steak the size of my chest can satisfy. Obviously, red wine will be used to wash it down.
We rode quite a ways, maybe 15 miles along various back roads between vineyards, wine museums of other things of viticulture importance. I was particularly impressed with some enormous wine casks made of oak, perhaps 12’ in diameter and equally tall. Would make a great starting point for an unique study or library or perhaps a wine cellar.
Wine wasn’t the only draw in the location where we were. Numerous artesian-style confectionary delights were at hands. Small cheese and chocolate factories were to be enjoyed. We also hit a small distillery where we had a variety of blended liquors, coffee flavor, ducle de leche, rose hips and pomegranate were all superb, the absinthe was lethal though served in proper style with sugar and water. I doubt there are many repeat bottle buyers of absinthe.
We rode to a ‘beer garden’ which in the center of a vast field, all by itself. There was a breezy tent set up with a few couches underneath. Mark and I were enjoying some porters when an Israeli guy at an adjacent sofa said, “You ride a BMW, right?” I agreed somewhat suspiciously of this. “Are you at our hostel?” I inquired. “No, I remember seeing you in Antigua, Guatemala a few months ago, you used to sit in the same seat in the corner café by the plaza and you always parked your bike out front” “Yep, that was me”
En route to the beer garden, I had sprung a flat rear tire a few miles out which slowed me down considerably. The kind hostess offered to call us a taxi to get us back to the city and offered to bring our bicycles back to the rental shop which we gladly took her up on.
So dinner here is just as they do it in Spain, LAAAAAAAAAAATE. We didn't know it yesterday but we ate around 10pm thinking it was just 8 pm which worked fine for us. Dessert is typically served circa midnight.
We are really enjoying Argentina, this place is amazing. All the perks of Europe minus the crazy prices AND they speak Spanish! Lots of fun stuff to do, adventurous stuff, wine tasting, amazing countryside, good food, nice people. I will spend more time here in the future.

3-22-10 Rodeo, Argentina

(Sorry for the delay in posts, been out camping for a while. We're on track to hit the bottom of South America in about a week, weather permitting)

Had a stellar ride today from La Serena, Chile to Rodeo, Argentina through the Andes. We set out after a large breakfast of bread and marmalade at our German-owned hostel and pointed the bikes east. After an hour we started climbing up the huge valley which was lined with vineyards and olive trees by the thousand. The road continued on until we hit the Chilean customs office at about 6k ft elevation. There, we signed out of Chile and were in no-man’s land until hitting the Argentina customs office some 4 hours off. In between was quite the ride. We had heard that it was a high altitude pass and that it was cold at the top but were unsure exactly what that would mean to us. The road was narrow and full of gravel, slowing us down to around 15 mph for most of the ride. We started seeing glaciers above us, then below us and were hit with a little snow squall.


We hit the top of the pass which was over 15,000 feet around 2pm. I was thoroughly bundled up with my heated vest on and was fine except for my hands when I took them out of my gloves, they were instantly cold. I’ve never felt anything like it, but they started throbbing excruciatingly and didn’t stop when I put my gloves back on and grabbed my heated grips. My hands stayed like this until I dropped below 11k feet.

Mark was not doing well at the top. He was a little slow in answering questions and had a glazed look in his eyes. He’d had trouble at 11.5k feet a week before so it was no surprise that he wasn’t doing too well at our current elevation. I had him follow me closely for an hour or so, winding back and forth on the narrow cut in the mountain until we decided we needed a break for some water and bananas. Mark’s bike had virtually no power at this elevation. He has a smallish motor. Mine was dogging up high and his only has 20% of the displacement mine does, making him go at jogging pace for quite some time. Probably for the best though as his reactions weren’t all that crisp. Neither were mine. I had a hard time fastening my helmet even though I seemed fine mentally. I would multiply the numbers on the odometer to keep my mind thinking and I seemed to be doing fine, no slower than usual.

We hit pavement after about 90 miles of steep gravel and were quite content to be on it, despite it having lots of patches and torn-up spots. We made it to a military checkpoint then aduana some 36kms later. We are now at Rodeo, Argentina. OK little spot for Mark’s birthday. Had some pretty good sandwiches for $6 as well as a liter beer for about a third that.

3-19-10 Tocopilla, Chile

Mark was looking at the map in the morning when we saw that the road we'd be taking would skirt along the lenght of a decent-sized salar (salt flat of sorts). This was also the same area that the Paris Dakar Rally was run this year. They stopped doing it from Paris to Dakar as there were angry spear chucking locals en route...The map was poor but we could see that there was a dirt road leading off from our main road about 40 miles from the end of Iquique, where we were staying and thought it would be fun to check out.
We got some water and topped off the bikes and set our odometers to zero so we'd know where the turn was. Sure enough, at 40 miles, there was some random, unmarked road leading into the hills. There were some semi trucks on it with loads of salt from a salt mine down the way. On the tight corners there were always little piles of salt from it spilling out of the truck.
We made it to the salt mine where I asked a trucker how to get through the salar. He kinda paused and said that it was a hard road with lots of bumps. No problem, right? So he pointed us to the proper little track (as there were many) and we set off. The little track was just that, a set of tracks from a few previous 4-wheeled vehicles that skirted along the edge of the salar. Up little hills and down little valleys. Nothing too difficult. We then hit a section of 'bug dust' or 'moon dust' as we call it in the mining indurstry. It's bascially really fine, powdery dirt/sand, the consistency of powdered sugar. So, we both cut through it just fine, but I wanted to go ride through it again as it's kinda fun. Well, some might have called that poor judgement. I hit the powder going faster than I had the first time and the front of the bike got a little squirelly. The dust is deep and the tires sink in to the point that your wheel works like a rudder on a boat almost, strange feeling. In short, I got tossed off the bike. I humped the bike back to vertical and putted out of the bug dust, turned around and repeated the same process, crash and all, this time pinching my foot betweent he earth and my pannier. No damage to bike, sore foot.
We then kept riding and were a little uneasy as to the random little roads leading here and there as we didn't exactly know where to go. Mark's GPS had conveniently stopped working not long ago so we had to rely on our MAN-STINCTS, which were flowing strong this day (not to be confused with Man-Stinks). Basically, there was the ocean, then just inland was the main road heading south, just inland of that was a mountain range, and we were on the more inland side of that mountain range. We knew we had to go west to get out so we tried to go west when possible, which was not often.
We started getting into the foothills above the salar, just under the mountins and had a great overlook of the salar which looks like coral. Lots of big chunks of salt that are all weathered and, well, coral looking.
We thought we were going just fine and would pop over the mountain range when the trail dove towards the salar again, leading me down the steepest hill I've ever been on with that bike. I putted down nice and slow and didn't fall once.  Mark did great as well.
Just a few minutes later we realized we'd kinda dropped off into a bowl, and to get out, we'd have to ride up something as steep as what we'd just ridden down. Riding across the salar isn't an option as the salt chunks are the size of basketballs and are sharp.
I must say, it felt great to be out there. Yes, we were somewhat lost, but I knew I'd find a way out. I always do. We had some water with us, not a lot, and we knew the general direction we needed to go, we just didn't know how to get there. It was one of those times when I was bouncing between being in and out of my comfort zone. I knew I'd look back on it and smile at the time, and yes, I'm smiling about it now.
We found a few spots with steep shutes leading up little ravines to higer elevation and, hopefully, salvation.
The shute we chose had a slight bend to it, hooking to the left then right and had some larger rocks on it. Mark went first as his bike is lighter with better tires. He snaked his way up it and made it without incident.
Next was my turn. I started a ways off from the base of the shute, revved the engine a few times and dropped the clutch, launching forward and shooting a rooster-tail of dust behind me. The back tire started fishtailing a bit but I was able to stay on. About a third of the way up the ramp the front tire hit a grapefruit-sized rock, bouncing the tire into the air. When the tire landed back on the ground I was pitched sideways off the bike, which same to rest on its left side, still running. Mark slid down the hill and helped me stand it up before riding it down again. I chose a slightly different path this time and was able to get some good speed coming up the ramp until the rear end started sliding around, and I crashed in the same manner as I had in Panama, with the bike swinging around and coming to rest perpendicular to the slope.
I tried it again, a different approach yet. This time I started off going slow and was able to slide my way about half-way up before starting to spin and slide again. I was able to keep the bike upright when Mark came over and pushed on the back of the bike as I crawled it up the slope. I made up the steepest part of the shute then accelerated before jumping up onto a little plateau at the top. What a great feeling.
The trail kinda ended at the top so we took off over the rolling dirt-dunes in the general direction needed before hooking up with another little track in what was almost a slot-canyon, really narrow with banked turns everywhere which was really fun until I rode a little too fast on one, ascended the side of the canyon then fell back into the canyon with my bike upside down. It took us about 5 minutes to get the bike stood back up again but we eventually made it.
We kept going until we hit a little trail that was carved into a cliff overlooking the ocean. We could see the main highway beneath us several thousand feet, all we had to do was creep down a steep rocky trail for a few miles before hitting the bottom, we'd made it, so happy to be back at sea-level.

That night we wanted to camp out so we rode to the next town where we found a pirate-like ship in a playground, we thought it would be a good place to hole up where when we saw a circus tent set up nearby with midgets so we asked them if they thought it would be fine if we slept in the boat but were told that there were a lot of drunks around. We then inquired if we could sleep in the circus tent, but they said they'd be working all night taking it down so we hit the road. We found a little road next to some army base of sorts, threw down our bags and fell asleep looking at the stars.

3-16-10 Putre, Chile

I am propped up in my bed in a humble room in the town of Putre, just across the Chilean border at circa 11,500'. Yes, walking is difficult here, especially since we came directly from sea level, arriving here in only 90 minutes.

Today we packed things up and were ready to leave the hostel in Arequipa at 7:15 when we became aware of a slight problem. We'd jumped the bikes up over the curb then dropped down a large step into the hostel when we arrived two days ago. Upon looking at the step leading up to the curb, we realized that it was pretty tall. I asked the hostel clerk if he had a ramp which he clearly did not. I then pried up a man-hole cover to use as a ramp but was saddened to find it chained-down. I then went back to my room, grabbed a wool blanked and rolled it in a tight tube, about 4" in diameter. I then wrapped my blue sleeping pad around the blanked. I then placed this cushy mass in front of the step which made a tiny ramp for us, just enough to launch out of the hostel. I came close to drilling another Peruvian boy who didn't heed Mark's warning when I landed on the sidewalk.

Before riding out of town we walked over to a little market to buy some bottled water. On the way back a creatively-built trash truck pulled up next to us to pick up a pile of garbage on the corner. It smelled, well, like a garbage truck.  It was belching black smoke, honking for no reason and had some horrible music playing far too loudly.  We were happy to get passed the truck which then pulled up alongside us again, picking up more trash.  We hurried our pace though it was in vain. The trash truck followed us the rest of the block, Mark and I laughing as it seemed to be quite representative of our time here in Peru.
While zipping out of town I had a taxi try to cut in front of me which I did not approve of so I kicked his bumper. I looked back and he honked at me and was flapping his arms in anger. Mark then rode next to him and game him a good stomp as well, that's how we do things. We eventually made it to the main road, but there was no road leading to it so we jumped some curbs, cut down some sidewalks and hopped off another curb before we were on our way.

We were in need of gas so we stopped at the first gas station on the way out of town.  Almost every gas station south of the States is full service which seems to be quite a bit slower than self-serve.  We pulled in and asked the guys to fill us up with 90 octane.  He said he didn't know if he had any 90 octane.  There was a pause. I then asked him if he could...um...maybe go find out if there is any 90 octane.  The attendant chirped at two of other workers who went scurrying around the gas station, looking at pumps and darting in and out of the building.  He then told us he didn't think he had any 90. Fine, I said. I'll take 95 octane. Oh, we don't have any of that.  Do you have any gas at this gas station? I asked feeling somewhat frustrated but aslo seeing the humor in it.  "No, we have no gas".  

We were able to hit another station who managed to fill us up and we were on our way.
Breakfast consisted of loma saltado, basically fajita meat. It was edible, served on a bed of rice with a nice cup of hot water and some instant coffee. I asked the lady where the bathroom was and she just pointed towards the side of the restaurant/shack, so I went to exactly where she pointed and relieved myself in the dirt.

We were excited to hit Chile and just as excited to be out of Peru which was not what I expected.  I'd never heard anything bad about Peru in the past, however, most people who travel here to to Lima, Cuzco and Machu Picchu. To say that these three places represent the rest of Peru would be quite erroneous. Lima is alright, another big city and I'm sure Cuzco has it's highlights. But as far as I can tell, the rest of the country is a dump.  That being said, I'm guessing I'll be living here someday if I continue working in the mining industry as there are tons of mines throughout the country which employ a large number of Americans.
We hit the town of Tacna which is the last main town before the border. I asked somebody where the road to the Chilean border was and was told I had to go to some 'passport office' first which I thought was wrong so I asked another person who confirmed my suspision. He also told me that I was headed the wrong way to get to the border and that I had to turn around to take a road parallel to the road I was on, perhaps 50 feet away. "Can't I just turn at the next corner?" I asked and he mutterd then started smashing his fingers together. I repeated myself and he did more sign language, which I interpreted to mean 'one way road'. I rode off shaking my head and made it to the corner, took a right and was on my way to the border where we had one last ordeal with Peru.
We pulled up to some booth with a lazy eyed kid about my age go told me to go to the other side of his little guard shack. I did, he swivveled around in his chair and talked to me on that side instead. Whatever. He then told me to go inside to do my paperwork (no signs, of course). Upon getting inside we were told by some mumbling multi-chinned man to go outside to get some other piece of paper. We went outside, found the guy with the 'cafe' colored shirt and got our paperwork from him. I asked for a pen. He had one next to him, unused and said 'no'. So Mark and I took turns using his little aerospace pen. We were then allowed back into main office where fatso gave us a stamp. One last stop at a 'casita' where some guy reading the newspaper took my paperwork and passport and handed it to the guy next to him without glancing up. We got our last stamps, and rode off to the Chilean side smiling.

Chile was instantly different in a pleasant way, though their accents are difficult. Things work here as they should. We were given some paperwork to fill out. I asked for a pen, 'of course', the clerk said. 'In Peru they don't have pens' I said to the guy and he laughed.
I ran all my luggage through a metal detector while Mark had a dog sniff his. It only took an hour and we were on our way. The road was a steady climb except for little river-crossing dips which were fun, roller-coster like bumps that made my innards float a bit upon jumping into it as well as out of it.
This road was even more deserted. We passed maybe 3 cars in all 90 minutes of riding up to the town. We stopped for a few pictures, including some of wild llamas (please say with Spanish accent  'yamas').

We pulled in to the little town of Putre which is near the border of both Bolivia and Peru.  It was a small, unorganized town for the most part with cobblestone streets with a deep gutter running down the center which we were made sure to keep our tires out of.

We found a little hotel, dropped our things and walked to the nearest restaurant where we had some delicious alpaca pizza. Burrrrrrp! Very good.

3-10-10 Lima, Peru

We stayed a couple nights in the beach town of Huanchaco which was a pleasant change from the dust bowl we'd been riding through.  While there we rented 'caballitos' which are little kayaks made out of reeds that you maneuver with a bamboo shaft cut lenghtwise.  We went out a few hundred yards into the ocean and somewhat rode our way back, catching waves at times. I'm pretty sure there are better riders out there.

We hired a local guide to take us on a tour of a wide variety of things throughout the little town as well as the archeological sites nearby.  Most memorable, though, was the cui we ate. Don't need to do that again. Cui is guinnea pig, a Peruvia delicacy. No, it does not taste like chicken, cui tastes like guinea pig, which tastes exactly like you'd expect it to.  Our guide ate most of the thing happily, incluing the thing's face which he nibbled on tenderly, taking time to spit out the little teeth that fell out of the jawbone.

We got an early start out of Huanchaco, starting the bikes at 6:20, not long after first light.  We hit a gas station on the outskirts of town where the gas attendants asked us if we flew the bikes down to Peru to which I replied slowly with wide eyes, "Planes are for little boys" and we all had a good laugh.

We soon came upon signs for the town of Salaverry.  Oh the possibilities with this one.  I wondered if I could perhaps find a T-shirt that says 'I LOVE SALAVERRY' or how about a coffee mug that says 'MY BOY IS IN SALAVERRY' or a nice sweatshirt with a cui on the front and 'SALAVERRY IS FOR LOVERS' on the back. But alas, I found none of these little gems and we kept going.

We were headed to Lima which was some 8 hours off and were aware that it was a dangerous place.  I had received explicit instructions from a Peruvian friend of mine as to where to not go unless I wanted to continue my adventure via bus.

The ride was long, hot and windy through the desert with nothing for forty or fifty miles at a time. Sand blew across the road and was being cleaned off by crews of men with flat shovels and brooms, a never-ending job.

We came across a little cop checkpoint where a cop waved me over and showed me his radar gun. 78kph. I shrugged my shoulders in indifference. He told me that the limit was 60kph. I told him that there was no sign posted. He countered by saying since there was a small farm road intersecting the main highway that it was in fact an intersection which would mean that the speed limit is 60kph and does not need to be posted.  Our tickets were for around $200 US each. I would have loved to argue with the guy for a while but it was getting late in the day and we wanted to get into Lima as quick as possible so I went to work on the bribing process as that is all they wanted anyway.

"Yes, you can pay here" he said, accepting the notion of a bribe.
"Good, I'll buy you lunch then"
"No, no, a tank of gas"
"Deal, a tank of gas for Marks bike" (3gallons)
"No, no, no, a tank of gas for my truck"
"OK, a tank of gas for my bike, we'll meet in the middle, then and both win"
He laughed and we shook hands as I handed over about $10 US to cover both Mark and me, far more than we probably should have.
"I hope to see you in a few months when I return!" I said

Signs were few and far between and thus we relied on Mark's GPS at times while hitting the small towns, several times taking shortcuts through the sand to get back on the main Panamerican Highway.  We ascended a large mountain which put us in the fog which cleared on the other side, revealing a vast shanty-town.  There were a lot of tarps, carboard boxes and industrial bags and plywood used as building materials. There was clearly no running water or electricity.

We were moving quickly along, gradually getting deeper into the shanty suburb when we started seeing shanty stores and shanty shops. Eventually electricity made an appearance as bare above-ground wires were visible.  Traffic picked up as well.  Lima traffic is legendary and I was excited to get in on the action. They have a different driving style than in Guatemala City, who now takes the silver when it comes to awful drivers, behind Lima.  Here in Lima cars will charge out perpendicular into traffic, cutting cars off before lurching forward, honking all the while.

Whenever I thought of Lima before I always pictured a hilly city at night with people not paying attention to stoplights. I wasn't too far off. The only difference was that it was daytime.  We had each been cut off numerous times by all sorts of vehicles, my closest call was a bus who I exchanged gestures with.  We came to a toll booth area (motorcycles don't have to pay tolls in Peru) but didn't see the ususal sign for 'exempt vehicles' which denotes a free-lane.  A grumpy cop wouldn't let us through nor let us duck under a rope to go around the booths where we were supposed to. Apparently there was a sign earlier that instructed us to pull off the road, into the dirt to go around the booths but we never saw it since we were hemmed in by trucks. The cop made us ride back against the five lanes of traffic then cut across to the shoulder where we were supposed to have gone in the first place. I kicked over a baricade in protest and rode off.

I got into a good traffic rhythm like I usually do where I kinda zone out and let autopilot take over. It's a strange mental place to be in but is relaxing and easy. I'll get in this state and not really remember anything about how I get somewhere.  Traffic was dense, maybe 20 feet between cars as we were moving 40 miles an hour or so. I was in one of the middle lanes of a five lane road with a bus to my right, his bumper about 15 feet ahead of me.  We were cruising along and I had three fingers on the brake lever like I always do in heavy traffic when I saw a flash of color dart out from the front of the bus to my right. It was a guy maybe 16 years old sprinting across traffic. As he darted passed the bus he swiveled his head over towards me. I hit the brakes. The look on his face was priceless. Simply priceless. He stopped then jumped up in the air arching back towards where he came when I drilled him.  He came rolling up and over the brand new windshield that I had made back in Colombia, hit my right handlebar which caused the bike to dart left slightly, then he bounced off my right shoulder. His hat came off and stuck to my chest, the wind holding it on.  I saw him do at least 1.5 rotations and was pushed close to 15 feet ahead  I looked down and was given another priceless look which Mark does a superb job of imitating. He was stumbling to his feet and I saw Mark pointing ahead to which I agreed.  I adjusted my mirror slightly and kept on rolling.

In the US, yes, of course you stop. But this isn't the US. Some people might have a hard time with this but it's very clear in my mind. I did all that I could to prevent it and can't do anything to change what has happened. Just an unlucky day, I guess, for him more than me obviously.  I would, however, like to talk to the guy which Mark and I have dubbed 'Junior' just to see what the hell he was thinking.  Didn't his daddy teach him not to run in traffic?

We rode for a while longer in the city when we stopped at a stoplight where I checked the bike over. Broken windshield, which I yanked off and threw to the side of the road. One of my foglights was facing down a little and I bent it back into position. The fog lights are mounted to a solid bar that protudes out from the bike. If he bent down the fog light it means that he got clipped by the bar pretty good.  There exterior of the bike had a layer of dust on it from the desert except for the right part of the fender and tank which had no dust thanks to Junior polishing it with his ribs.  The bike and I weigh in at around 900 lbs together and were going about 20mph upon impact, so roughly three times harder than any hit in the NFL. Bet he's feeling it today.

Farther on down the road a gringo stuck his head out the window of a truck and asked me to pull over. It was a guy from Delaware who had married a Peruvian girl. They were with the girl's parents and her father was in the process of starting a company to serve the rock crushing needs of the mining industry. We talked for a while and he was interested in my mining and rock crushing experience as well as Spanish abilities and the fact that I was looking for work. Will probably be getting an email from him sometime.  He asked me if we needed any help getting around Lima and I gladly took him up on the offer.  As I get older, I accept help from people more often as it's often a win-win situation. He was happy to help me and I was happy to be helped.  We drove around for a while before finding a huge Yamaha dealership where Mark needed to get some work done and they said they could change my tires and oil too.

Once settled in our hostel I called up my good friend, Juan Pablo, who I worked with at a mine in Chihuahua, Mexico for a while.  He's a native of Arequipa and was working on a project in northern Peru but was on R and R in Lima.  He took us out to some local spots including Taberna Queirolo, famous for their pisco concoctions and bar food, all were good.

3-7-10 Piura, Peru

Near the southern border of Ecuador I saw a bent yellow pipe about 7' in the air, stretching across the road. I shot underneath it and looked back towards Mark when I saw a few military personnel hop out of a little shack and wave me over.  Aparently it was meant to be a road block but wasn't terribly effective. The soldiers were very friendly and inquisitive and also seemed somewhat worried about our travels to Peru which they said was very dangerous.

I assumed Peru would look like this: Lots of little Peruvians in native garb chewing coca leaves while swatting at alpacas with sticks, all in the high mountains. Some blow on wooden pipe things while others are knitting and everyone is smiling.  I came to find out this wasn't the case exactly.

The border crossing into Peru was easy, just had to do some quick paperwork on the Ecuadorian side then ride over a bridge marking the international boundary.  Inside the little customs office there were several men, two of which processed our paperwork.  One man would read aloud our personal information while the other did a hunting and pecking procedure on the keyboard.  We didn't know it at the time, but this would be very representative of the rest of our time here in Peru.

We left the checkpoint and started riding and instantly came aware of the fact that Peruvians love to put things in the road.  There were signs requesting that people please not put rocks in the road as well as signs requesting that tires not be burned on the road.  In addition, there were hundreds of goats, cows, donkeys, dogs, pigs and people running wildly on the asphault.  The roads here are nice, though. They use cutting and filling to smooth the terrain unlike in Ecuador where the natural topography is rarely conquered.

We pulled over at the first sign of life that we saw, a little service station with a restaurant attached.  We throught we'd try the beef as the cows on the road looked to be pretty healthy.  Minutes later the cook brought our food, presenting it to us in a with a little bow which was probably meant to make us think we weren't eating rubbery hack-meat as that's exactly what it was.  There were tons of bone fragments still hanging on to the piece via inedible strands which couldn't be cut with the knives provided.  My pocket knife helped carve off a few edible pieces, the rest we threw to a pack of dogs who'd assembled nearby.  Perhaps they know that when gringos stop by they will get a good meal.

The road soon flattened out and cut directly into a desert with tiny shacks placed sporadically next to the road and were built out of what woven mats, used like plywood and placed over a stick frame.  The holes in the mats were huge, enough to let a bird in.  Trash was everywhere.  We didn't really have plans as to where to stop so we pulled off the highway into one of the first larger towns we came through.  We rode about a quarter mile down their main street, turned around and rode off.  Mark and I were both dry heaving in our helmets as the town couldn't have smelled much worse.  The people gave us blank, unwelcoming stares. Just as we were about to get back on the main highway we had to ride through some sewage that was flowing across the street.  Mark and I looked at each other and shook our heads.

The next town still smelled bad but we'd gotten used to it a little bit.  Pieces of trash were more common than dry leaves on the ground.  We asked several people where hotels were and usually got a shrug or a mutter and a hand wave off in the distance.  We finally did find one, though, for about $3 US each. I could touch the walls with my head and toes at the same time.  There was a small gap between our beds, just enough to walk through.  A huge window opened up to a the street below that was never quiet.

Peruvians honk constantly. They honk when crossing an intersection, when behind cars, when passing cars, when getting passed, when oncomming cars are passed, when bikes are on the road, when people are on the sidewalk, etc.  There is so much honking that the honk has lost quite a bit of respect, obviously.  To combat this, the Peruvians have now incorporated car alarms into their horns. So instead of a honk, they make a loud electronic wailing sound.  A few cars even had police sirens mounted.  I can see exactly what's going to happen in the next 10 years...

While in town Mark and I frequently held down our horn for minutes at a time, even when stopped, which felt good. The horns aren't really a problem, though, it's the lack of respect from the drivers that is apalling.  There are few stoplights or stopsigns so it's a total free-for-all.  Cars will pull out in front of other cars, causing them to skid their tires all the time. 

We unloaded everything and parked the bikes in a secure parking lot, put our covers on them and locked them together before stopping at a little restaurant for a some Peruvian pizza which was good.  We then went found a moto-taxi (three wheeled tuk-tuk), whose driver,'Johnny', we asked to take us to a place where they had pisco sours, the famed drink of Peru.  He brought us to a little place and I invited him to join us. They had no pisco but did have Cusqena, the national beer.  We learned the Peruvian drinking technique of sharing one glass amongst a table, pouring a small amount for yourself, guzzling it, then shaking the foam out on the floor before passing the cup on to the nex person.

We had Johnny take us on a tour of the little city and he enjoyed sharing little bits of information with us.  He needed some fuel, as he'd been driving us around for a while, so we offered to buy him some fuel.  Johnny really liked this and asked me if I would like to drive his taxi. "Si, claro!" I said as I hopped on the 125cc beast.  I kicked motor over and it fired up, burning my foot on the already hot engine.  Steering wasn't exactly crisp, nor was braking but it was still fun to zip around the side streets.  I drove for a while before Mark took over, who got us back to our hotel safely.