Day 102 - Bogota Liming

Well, there had to be some reason that so many people come to visit Bogota. I didn't get any sense of it my first 2 days here, but today was quite different.

We spent a large part of the morning trying to source some rear tires for the KLRs. We'll have to go tomorrow to actually see what's available. Our tire of choice (well, Troy's tire of choice), the Avon Gripster, is only available on a 1-week special order for a whopping $COP 375,000 (pesos) ~ $200 USD.

And that's per tire.

So clearly, that's not going to happen.

It looks like we may end up with some Pirelli's. That will have to wait for when we visit the shop.

Just before noon, a new friend that Troy made last night at the pub, May, showed up at the hostel with her friend Elkin. They're both originally from Barranquilla, but Elkin has since moved to Bogota, and May is just visiting here for the long weekend.

Tim, Troy, Elkin, May and myself spent the rest of the day wandering about Bogota. We didn't go to any of the official tourist sites, but simply walked around checking out the city.

We had a lovely lunch at a small restaurant. The soup starter was hearty and excellent, though with a touch too much coriander for my tastes. The rest of the crew had no such complaints however.

We all (except for Tim -- he's hyper-allergic and has a very restricted diet) ordered the local speciality "Bandeja Paisa". It's a full lunch plate with white rice, a fried egg, baked beans, fried plantain, ground beef, and a dumpling-like thing I couldn't handle :)  Excellent overall.

The rest of the afternoon was spent wandering about snapping pictures. There's quite a strong tradition of graffiti in this city. Enjoy some of the pics.. more have been uploaded to my Flickr photostream -- just check the narrow column to the right of this text.

We found a guitar shop and Elkin tested their handiwork.

The verdict? Too 'tinny'

This is bar. Who sits up there?

Elkin testing some guitars. The man can play!

Hi!

 In the evening, Troy and I rode Elkin and May back to Elkin's place where we chilled for a bit. Troy got a chance to play on some excellent guitars.

I can't believe I didn't take a pic. The man had a perma-grim plastered on the whole time we were there :)


We were also introduced to some great music from their home city.

Then we took May to the airport to catch her flight back to Barranquilla. I have never in my life seen such grid-lock. Maybe my friends living in LA are used to it, but last night was ridiculous. It took us well over 90 minutes to do a 20 minute trip.

We did manage to get her on flight just in the nick of time though.

Word to city planners in Bogota and elsewhere -- do NOT rip up ALL of the highways AND major roads at the SAME time. It's just plain dumb!

Temp fix

Coming home from the airport, my right rear pannier broke loose. Troy was behind me, noticed and frantically signalled to me to pull over. The main support bolt that runs through the bike's existing luggage rack is broken, so I'm not sure how this thing is ever going to carry much load again. A quick application of some tie down straps got us back on the road temporarily. I'll deal with a proper fix tomorrow...

Day 101 - Reunited

Reunited and it feels so good
Reunited 'cause we understood
There's one perfect fit
And, sugar, this one is it
We both are so excited
'Cause we're reunited, hey, hey

Today I got my Rebecca back!

Not again!

She was a little bashed up from the flight, but nothing a little banging can't fix..


It's just quite amazing how much we all missed our bikes. It could possibly be considered embarrassing even -- but we don't care. For the duration of this journey, these bikes are almost our entire world.

Maybe that sort of dedication can be transferred to a person when I get back...

Sorted and ready to go...

Tomorrow we buy some new tires..

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Much thanks to those who have pressed the Donate button. You've helped me a lot. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Day 100 - Bogota

So we arrived safely yesterday at the El Dorado Airport in Bogota, Colombia.
No real drama with the Avianca Airlines trip -- though they served one of the worst airline meals any of us have had in our lives.

We checked into The Cranky Croc hostel. It's a really nice place, that's run by an actual Australian ex-pat, unlike the other Aussie-named hostel just around the corner from here.

Almost as soon as we landed, we connected with the Danes again, and walked to a chocolate shop for drinks before wandering the neighbourhood around the hostel.

I have to say, Bogota is one cold city. While we were walking  along I kept trying to just shiver and keep my comments about the cold to myself.

Then we come across an outdoor skating rink!

Tim, Troy, Kyösti, Joachim and ICE!

Day 97 - Panama City

On Friday we rode into Panama in the drizzling rain, trying to beat the clock to reach Tocumen Aeropeurto. We had received a phone call from Kyöstis, the Dane telling us about a great deal he had just negotiated to send their two bikes via air cargo to Colombia. The only hitch was we needed to reach the cargo terminal that same afternoon. It was only an 80 km drive, so possibly doable in the 75 minutes we had available.

Since we knew that to fly the bikes out we would have to empty their gas tanks of fuel, we were trying to arrive at the airport with the fuel gauges on 'E'.

Among the four of us, Troy was best at this as his he had to switch to his reserve tank just as we were coming into Panama City across into  the big bridge over the Panama Canal. Between the gas issues, the rain and the early rush hour traffic of a Friday before a long-weekend, we paid barely any attention to the Canal as we rode on past.

Once we got to the Girag Cargo offices at the cargo terminal, we found the Danes had packed their bikes and were strapping them to a cargo pallet. No tanks needed to be drained, the batteries remain connected and all the panniers and wheels remained in place. Only windshields and side mirrors were removed.

So all that running-on-fumes drama was for nothing.

The Girag folks were extremely helpful in the process of getting the bikes ready for export, and I would highly recommend their services. We paid $751.38 per bike to be shipped from Panama City to Bogota, Colombia.

We'll report on Tuesday if the bikes made the trip safely.





The sad part of the day came as we said our goodbyes to Cory Hanson. He's decided to turn around and head back up to Canada instead of continuing down to Argentina with Tim and Troy.

Saying goodbye at the cargo terminal

Since we are four tough, hardcore motorcycle-riding, world-traveling adventure type dudes, no tears were shed during our brief, but manly goodbye hugs..

As part of the deal, they agreed to let us stay for FREE for one night at a new Eco Lodge the company is building. They plan to offer it to the many bikers they see coming through the area.

The Girag Cargo Riverside Eco Lodge

While the site is gorgeous, and the river it runs beside seems clean and clear, the place is very far away. It was about an hour's drive East of the airport. The building looks very well designed and constructed, but right now it's still unfinished. It's got lots of potential, but I'm not sure I'd stay there again before it's actually completed.

--

Troy finally found a way to stay warm

It's very weird the go to sleep without knowing 'becca is close by...

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Normally the bikes would arrive and be cleared through Customs the very next day, but on this weekend, Sunday is Martyr's Day, a National Holiday in both Panama and Colombia. And the government agencies are closed on Monday to commemorate it.

Martyr's Day on Jan 9 commemorates the day in 1964 when 22 students were killed by while attempting to assert/reclaim their country's sovereignty by flying the Panamanian flag in the Canal Zone. The Zone was wholly under the control of the Americans at that point. Here's one account of the tragedy



Day 98

Hello again!

We head downtown and ask the taxi driver to take us to one of the hostels. There are 22 in the city, and we had done no research on them at all, and so had no opinion on which would be best.
The taxi drivers decided to drop us at Luna's Castle.
As we walk in, we see a very familiar BMW F800GS parked in the lobby.

Cory is here! Now how cool is that?!

The rest of the the day was mostly concerned with futile attempts to find rear tires for mine and Troy's KLRs.






Day 99
We finally got to take a proper tour of the Panama Canal! Very spectacular!
They advertise that the big ships only pass through the Canal between 9 and 11 AM, and 3 - 5 PM

Rebecca, Tim, M, Sharon, Nicole and Troy (doing his patented 3/4 turn) at the Miraflores Locks

We arrived at 4 PM, then watched a short film on the building of the Canal. There's a disconnect in some of the info given in the documentary and printed on the displays in the on-site museum. Both sources agree that as many as 20,000 of the 75,000 workers who built the Canal were Black men from the Caribbean. The discrepancy is whether they came from Jamaica or Barbados.

Perhaps one of my readers knows definitively...

Day 96 - Almost to Panama City

Dateline: 80 kms from Panama City

The riding today was fairly easy. The traffic on the roads was light and fast. The highway passed through mostly lowland plains, where we saw acres upon acres of sugar cane and maize being cultivated.

Coming home from a river lime

The roads in Panama are in excellent condition, and so far we've been fortunate to avoid any delays at the many random police checkpoints we cross each day.

I'm happy to report a significant presence of dark-skinned people here. My Granny Rhoda was born in Panama, just after the opening of the canal. Her father, along with thousands of other Caribbean men came to build the canal from 1904 to 1914.

We're staying at a motel (Hotel Canadian) run by Canadians (they're everywhere!) just off the Pan-American highway. They took us to their favourite Thursday night lime at a restaurant/bar called La Ruina.

We were given a short history of the place which is lined with great old historical photos of the area before the damming of the river to help create the Panama Canal.

As a nice treat, I ordered off the menu and asked for the same plate the owners' son was eating quietly by himself at the bar. A nice dish of white rice, stewed chicken and stewed lentil peas. It looked, and tasted exactly as if it came off my own Mother's stove.

I must be getting real close to Trinidad.

Uhhh.. that's not right!

I had a slow speed dump of the bike while trying to bring it into the hotel compound. The guys are still laughing at the video. I'll post a link to it once it's uploaded.

Sadly, I warped the left side rack, so we'll have to unmanagle it using a vise before I can get the panniers back on.

Crossing the Gap

The southern portion of Panama borders along Colombia. However there is no regular traffic between the two countries along this border. The land is an undeveloped, essentially un-crossable area of dense rainforests and swamp called the Darien Gap.

Years of civil unrest, guerilla warfare and narco-trafficking in northern Colombia have dissuaded the Panamanians from developing any roads through the Gap. Even the great Pan-American highway, stretching from Alaska to the tip of Argentina, takes a 200 km break around the Gap.

So travelers such as myself must either fly or sail around. We had hoped to sail, but the wait for boats is long, and growing. Flying is a faster option to get to Cartegena. But the final decision won't be made until we speak directly with some agents and have firm dates and quotes in hand.

Right now, I'm keeping an eye on costs, and hope to keep them to a minimum. I'm so near the end of the journey, but there are still some significant hurdles along the way...

I need to buy a new rear tire in Panama. I'll need about $1200 to get me and Rebecca around the Gap. And I still have to cross the mountains from Colombia to Venezuela, then traverse that large country and book passage on a ship to Trinidad.

Close, yes. Finished? Not by a long shot.

Still having fun though... :)

Stay tuned :)

Day 96 Bugaba, PA

Getting through the CR-PA border was a 6-hour ordeal yesterday, due in large part to an hours-long power outage if the entire Customs and Immigration centre just before lunch.

We ended up grabbing a hotel about 30 minutes past the border.



Turns out the place is owned by a fellow who does giant installation contracts for the telcos back in Canada. He's the guy Rogers calla when they want to completely wire a new town with new fibre.





The best part of the $43 per night room was access to laundry. My clothes are clean again!!!! You have no idea how happy that makes me -- and the rest of the crew, as well.

Here's the lovely lady, Nilka, responsible for us smelling like humans again.










This morning we leave for Panama City. We'll probably be flying over the Darien Gap and here I'm appealing to you, my Dear Reader, for your support.

I direct your attention to the Donate button in the right-hand side of this page. Anything you can do to help me complete the journey would be most appreciated :)

Location:Panamerican Hwy,La Concepcion,Panama

More Costa Rica

Today's entry is being written from a small beach along the Pacific coast of Costa Rica. I'm not sure about the name of the town, but there's quite a number of little motels and backpacker spots dotted along the coast road.




The sun is coming up to my left, burning the mist off the tops of the rain forest covering the spit of land jutting into the ocean.

Getting to this beach was just a short walk from the Cabinas las Bambu we stayed in last night.


The cabins are smack in the middle of the forest (thank goodness for my mossy tent). About 2 minutes of strolling the path cut through the dense undergrowth, and you'll reach a wide road cleared beneath a stand of coconut trees that stretches 3 kms north to south. Just beyond the far edge of the palm trees lies the long, sandy beach.

In the time it's taken me to write this, two groups of morning jobbers have started their morning runs up the beach. I can still see the first lady, Yvonne and her dog. They've almost reached the far northern end if he beach. The second group of runners, are about 2 minutes behind them.

The cabins we are staying in are run by Yvonne and her father. Mom and Dad ran the place for 23 years, and Yvonne just came back 3 years ago after spending more than a decade in Orlando, Florida.

There are no clouds directly above the beach, or the shoreline, as far as I can see. The sky is bright, and clear. A few miles out to sea, there seems to be a rather thick bank of clouds building, and slowly darkening.

I hope to get on the road, and into Panama before midday today. Hopefully that timing will keep us ahead of the rains as well...

Yesterday we really took our time coming up the road. Initially, the plan was to reach the CR-PA border that day -- a long, but seemingly doable 350 kms. With a late start, lots of traffic, a newly instilled fear of speeding tickets, and just so much lovely scenery along the way ... Well, we just decided to take as much time as needed.

We stopped at a supermarket for lunch and were told by an older man that we were about to face certain doom in Columbia. Cory said we keep hearing that about the "next" country along the trip. Which was apparently not the right answer for this guy. He accused Cory of considering himself invincible, and being foolhardy for not taking his advice. Funny thing is, he didn't actually give us any advice.

The next stop was far more nourishing for the soul. We stopped at the Savegre River, as it crossed under the highway on it's way to the sea.

The river was strong, cold and refreshing.


A half-hour later, our wonderful river lime concluded, we remounted and headed south.

My hostility towards this expensive country is beginning to wane...

Next stop - Panama!