We entered Peru through the most remote border we could find, and stumbled onto Mike and Jason who we had met in Medellin rocking the old Honda dirt bikes, and their evening conversations of “Did you fix your panniers, adjust your valves or sort out your intake leak?” “Nah, checked my tyre pressures and drank some beer” were a good laugh!

The boys found a petrol station that was being built where we could camp, with a motocross track next door!

We took in some epic roads:

We saw some old bricks as we walked around the ancient site of Keulap, the official at the gate laughed that we would be the only people at the site, unlike at Machu Pichu, where there would be 4-5thousand

Before finding some more epic roads:

We wanted to head to Canyon del Pato, so we crossed some cool desert

Where I decided to have a nice crash when my front tyre blew out at 75kph on rough gravel

It did a number on my bike, and turned my right knee into patella pate, but we pressed on:

The following day, we planned to do a loop around the Cordillera Blanca mountains.

My GPS got a little ambitious, and we soon were crossing rivers

Passing pumpkins

We discovered, as the trails gradually vanished beneath us that we had found a walking track, we were forced to turn around as we couldn’t fit our bikes on it any more.
We headed towards the coast, and to Lima. Lima didn’t really appeal to us, outside of it housing mechanics to fix the steering on both of our bikes, once that was done, we headed off.
We headed south to Pisco to catch up with Mark and Andre

Took in the delights of a typical South American market

Some work was done to the bikes

(police siren)

(grafiti)

Off to Nasca, where we found a terrible spot to camp:

And then we went to watch the Dakar rally competitors come in!

(the trucks being particularly cool)

You could get (surprisingly) close to the vehicles as they rushed by

The next day, using a little charm, and a whole lot of the “act like I should be here”, we blagged our way into the Bivovac, for a tour around

and a free breakfast

Now, its off to Cusco, and Machu Pichu.

We arrived into Ecuador late, and the next day made our way to Quito, a very nice colonial city where we had to get some work done our motorbikes before we planned to head to the beach to join fellow motorbikers Mark, Andre and James for Christmas. On leaving Quito, I noticed that Tim and Glenn who were following me had Houdini’d themselves out of my mirrors, so I turned around I found them on the side of the road having a polite discussion with some of Ecuador’s finest.

Glenn explained to me that they had pulled him over, and were going to impound his bike and give him a fine because his license plate ended in a 9, and on Friday’s all vehicles with license plates ending in 9′s and 0′s were not allowed on the road to alleviate congestion.
If the police officers weren’t so serious, the situation would have been quite hilarious.
Then we discovered both Tim’s and my bikes license plates ended in 0′s.

They wanted to impound all of our bikes, but first have us ride to the local police station to get fined. We collectively decided to go on strike, and I got my book out and had a good read and watched the entire Ecuadorian Police force come to see what was up with these crazy motorcyclists that weren’t obeying their instructions (I counted 11 police at one point, and I think there would have been around 20 different officers that were needed at some time or another to keep us crazy travellers at bay). Eventually a big-wig came in the back of a police 4×4 and common sense prevailed, we got let off without a fine or impounding our bikes.

We were also given a nice little leaflet advertising that we couldn’t ride our bikes

Off we headed to Montañita, the beach town Mark and Andre had picked out, the road there being quite impressive – the locals inform us that their current government has been very progressive in furthering the infrastructure of the country (are you listening Honduras and Venezuela?)

The coast line was also very picturesque

We found Mark and Andre, and James joined us a little later.

We had a great time with them all, Mark and Andre cooked some great beef and fish, and Montañita is a really nice little tourist town, could happily spend a couple of weeks (or months!)
Boxing day came, and with larger stomachs, Glenn, James, Tim and I planned to head up to Lago Quilotoa, a Lake in a volcano crater, 4000m up (~13000ft), and on the way there we thought we would share with Glenn and James our typical navigational wizardry – which is, get the best maps and GPS tracks, and then go down roads that aren’t on either of them.

We encountered the typical cows:

Villages

Well paved roads:

And fires:

My bike also revealed its party trick of luggage distribution to everyone too, cementing the death of my laptop and my camera lens – and it did so in spectacular fashion, on hitting a pothole it launched my rear box off my bike, into the back of my head – richocheting off my helmet onto the road in front.

Did a good job of bending my bikes rear frame in the process

Pretty sure the extra strong bolts I bought for the frame just paid for themselves though.

We made it to the Lake, then across to Baños (a town, not a toilet!), it was here that Tim and Glenn swapped bikes briefly and discovered an issue with Tim’s steering (which apparently has been there since Nicaragua!)
We headed to Cuenca to celebrate New Years, and get it fixed.

Before watching them attempt to burn the city down

and the nice parade the following day

James caught up with us in Cuenca, and we all decided to head to Peru together, while enjoying a nice roadside Pizza, a Dutch couple, Daan and Mirjam that are riding around the world rode past and stopped. We caught up with them later that day and rode together.

The next day was the border crossing, its fair to say we were crossing at the “less travelled” border

Daan and Mirjam both had a tumble in the mud, we symathized by getting out our cameras

And now we have Peru (and the Dakar!) to look forward too!

We are in Montañita, Ecuador, a great little beach town with 4 other motorbike travellers; Mark, Andre, Glenn and Chris for the next couple of days. Its nice to have a place to kick back for a little, and even better to have some great friends to share it with.

Will be thinking of you as we have the traditional summer Christmas BBQ.

Our usual parking affair of, ride the motorcycles into the hotel lobby

The next day at the import office we met a bunch of Venezuelans riding to Tierra del Fuego as well, almost all on BMW´s, nice guys.

The roads here were quite typical

But still beautiful

Columbia, it was good to be back!

We took our usual array of detours.

Some of the detours more adventurous than others…

Inquiring with the military as to camp spots, they pointed one out. Unfortunately we had to pay a lady for the right to do so, which went completely against our inner frugal principles, but we did it.

It was worth it. The military were camped in the shed in the background of the photo, and we shot the breeze with them all night, stumbled over their machine guns they had left laying on the ground while trying to go to the toilet, and in the morning their commander offered us breakfast, the most amazing arepa, eggs and hot chocolate. Unfortunately no photos, they politely declined.
Also in the morning, the husband of the lady we paid last night came for a chat, he asked what we were doing, and on explaining it he was curious what we thought of Columbia. ¨Beautiful¨was our response. He didn´t seem to care about what we thought of the scenery, and asked ¨what about the people?¨, I found it fascinating that he was interested, and gave us a look of relief when we told him with sincerity that the Columbians had been the friendliest people we had met thus far.
He demanded we accept a refund for our camp fee, and it was not the first or the last time we were taken back with their generosity.

We rode on to Guatape, where a big rock sits

We climbed it.

And took in quite the view.

Tim and I agreed that this was the first place we had been on this trip where we felt we could genuinely live on a permanent basis. It was beautiful.

We arrived in Medellin

met 2 cool dudes from Tennessee who were riding down on 1974 Honda dirt bikes. Only people I have met carrying a spare piston!

Fitted a new chain and sproket to Tim´s bike along with some accessories (Columbian Police Siren)

I really liked Medellin for a city. Reminded me a lot of Melbourne.

We also met a couple of photo journalists from the states, Nish and Todd. THEIR BLOG and rode south with them for a bit

Met a nice couple, who invited us to their farm for coffee, which ended up being an invite for lunch, dinner, a bed and breakfast the next day. We had to head south, but stayed for lunch, and Nish stayed around for the evening.

They had some nice dogs too.

Further south to Salento, where it was really beautiful

with amazing coffee

and decidedly more rural.

and found some more interesting roads

Through coffee fields

Armadillo´s for purchase on the side of the road. Photo time!

And our preferred kind of eating establishments

In Cali we caught up with Glenn, whome we had met previously in Guatemala and decided to ride south together.
Our infamous good luck brought him a flat tire in the first 10 miles

Which we then pinched the tubes when replacing them.
Later in the day, flat number 2

Then flat number 3

Roads and scenery were stunning however

In the morning as we headed for the border, flat number 4 for Glenn arrived… right next to the police.

Who promptly jumped in, picked up some tire levers and started to help.
We rewarded them by letting them go for a spin on our rigs.

Just before the border we stopped by an impressive church

In an impressive location

The usual paperwork, and lines:

brought us to the end of Columbia.
Impressive scenery, amazing roads, but that all pales into insignificance when we look back on the friendliness of the people we encountered there.

A coffee truck turns over on the road… what do you do to clear it?

Thats right, burn it.

And cause traffic to back up…

For 10 miles.

Henry doing some weight testing on his motorcycle with his standard kit.

Crossing the Orinoco River was a particular highlight. It is the second largest delta in all of the Americas (behind the Amazon)

With Henry

And some other new friends

We were treated to quite the spectacular sunset

We arrived after an hour and forty five minute trip across the river (yes, its big!) to the other side in darkness. We asked the local military where we could camp. Right here you say?
Sure!

Other campsites consisted of people who offered their farms:

Roadside spots

Beaches with coconut palms

And herds of cows

The price of fuel never got old.

(A little under 10c for almost 10l)

Venezuela, it was pretty nice.

On our return from Angel Falls, we were struck with the landscape here, we had to do more. Mount Roraima. A 2800m high mountain, or tepui, that inspired the book, “The Lost World”, and is the corner of Brazil, Guyana and Venezuela was not too far away. Lets climb it!

It commenced… with a day wait… I understood the Venezuelan national sport to be baseball, but my experience suggests that strikes is of higher importance… a 4 day mining strike that blocked the only road from Venezuela to Brazil, and our only way to the mountain.
The road opened, and a 9hr ride in a Landcruiser, our driver doing around 90mph (145kph) through villages at 2am…

We finally got within eyesight of the mountain, and began our 5 day trek.

Lunch was BBQ Chicken, local Indian bread and chilli… made from termites. Was delicious.

Off we went…

The Flora on the way was particularly nice.

And our trail up became more and more ¨adventurous¨

And once we made it to the top, the mystical scenery unfolded.

And the amazing Flora kept up…

With incredible landscape

Cool frogs too.

Pity the views were terrible…

On the hike we also met 3 crazy Brazillian guys, circumnavigating the globe… on bicycles. Cool dudes, hope to see them in Aus in the future!

Local police were hard at it.

We went to the import office as we had 3 days to get our motorbikes out of the country… and discovered that extensions for our permit were not feasible, and if we were caught over-staying them, our bikes would be repossessed! We left Bolivar immediately; with around 1500km´s ahead of us… it was good to be back on the bikes after 10 days off them however…

And we headed through my kind of places, farming areas… you don´t need to be too worried about being shot, kidnapped or having your camera stolen when everyone is bum-up in the fields digging potatoes. The reactions too from the people we spoke to changed, instead of the general look of äwe¨ you frequently get when you are explaining your travels, it is replaced by a general look of confusion, as they are perplexed as to how you spend your time on a motorcycle, and make it back home to shear the sheep for summer.

Roads also progressed to be more enjoyable.

We swung through Merida, a really nice town, as we also discovered that we were crossing the border on Sunday, which apparently is when the office that stamps out our bikes was closed. We didn´t like our chances of staying another day and overstaying our limit just to get our bikes stamped out when the possibility of repossession loomed over our heads… so we didn´t stop at the Venezuelan border post, and just left… not sure I will be allowed back soon. Pity, I really liked the place.

The usual border hoo-hah ensued

That is, until we got to the Venezuelan side. We can’t come in apparently… everyone is on strike. (“everyone” being the people that import our bikes). We push, and push, and after some walking around find a friendly security guard with keys who seems to know what stamps to use.
We enter the very elaborate building, which is shared just by us

And his majesty.

After almost 5hrs, we are in Venezuela
Not long before we hit snag #2, or should I say, strike #2, someone else is on strike, and they are blocking the only bridge from the border. We are stranded for our first night.

After some fine talking from Henry, a lady rides off on a motorcycle, and 30 mins later we are allowed to pass, the locals not.

So far Venezuela has looked very poor, the roads terrible, and they are filled with old 70’s and 80’s American cars. I feel like I should be in the Blues Brothers.

We hit Maracaibo, and things change instantly, there appears to be money here, and a lot of it. Oil.
We also discovered that Venezuela is substantially more expensive than its neighbors, at the official exchange rate cheese is almost $50 a kilo. Which brings me to one of Chavez’s little tricks, the exchange to the currency is pegged at about half what it is actually worth, you have to stock up on US dollars prior to entry, and exchange money with people on the street (almost everyone will)… thanks to Encho for giving us this advice before hand.
His other little trick is gasoline prices.
Less than 1c per litre, or about 3.5c for a gallon… and it has a smell of C16 race gas. I still can’t get over the fact that it would be a $1.50 to fill up my old F350, when often I paid 100 times that.

We find some more “scenic” routes

I am further impressed by Venezuelan’s choice of vehicles, F-Series and Landcruisers (not the soccermomobile ones, the weigh it down to its bump-stops, cross the Sahara 5 times before changing the oil models…).

Do some road side tyre repairs

We found a road north to Puerto Colombia with Henry showing us how to scrape panniers in the corners

We make it to Playa Grande where we make camp on the beach, impressive scenery

And sand flies

Met a crazy guy, 57yrs old, climbs five 35ft+ high coconut palms each day, not sure if his safety gear is Occupational Health and Safety compliant.

We skipped Caracas on accounts of it being a large city, and one where the propensity to be shot and mugged was higher than normal (it is considered the most dangerous city in the world I believe)… and moved onto the beautiful Venezuelan coast line.
Now, this motorcycle caper… often it has been mentioned to me that its dangerous, my response of “well, it isn’t if you don’t crash” I always felt had some solid merit, and up till now my motorcycling crashes had been not much above walking pace.
Not so much now. Coming around this corner, in the patch of shade, was also a patch of oil.

I was doing about 50mph (80kph), but bike and me are fine. Henry also hit the deck in the same patch of oil, fortunately he and bike are also unscathed.

Typical Venezuelan hospitality ensued, a local walked off to get us some banana’s, cold water and some potatoes for us to cook. He accepted no money, or anything in return.

More beautiful beaches followed, I thoroughly recommend this coastline east of Puerto La Cruz, the scenery and roads are just incredible.

Found a good campsite and called it a day.

We headed inland, checked out some impressive caves and stopped at a small town for dinner. We inquired as to local camp spots, and the owner pointed at the floor beneath us, between the local lady selling DVD’s, the blaring Carnival music, and the guys who were drunk on homemade liquor. We inquired if something quieter was available, his garage was next door, we became an instant hit with the local kids.

And slept on the roadside stall owners roof…

We stopped in Cuidad Bolivar, with hopes of seeing Angel Falls, the highest waterfall in the world. It takes a plane ride in a Cessna, a boat ride, a hike, another boat ride, and another hike to get too… typically taking 3 days in total… Niagara Falls it is not.

Our boat (a canoe with an outboard), which we went up rapids in the dark…

A sleep, and we awake to this…

More walking…

And a closer view…

More waterfalls…

Even some you can walk behind… quite a rush.

More to come…

From Panama to Columbia is impassable (well almost), the US has placed political pressure on Panama to keep the “Darien Gap” closed to restrict drug trafficking from the south, and it is the one break in the Panamerica highway for its entire length. It is now one of the most untouched jungles in the world, filled with wonderful wildlife and Columbian paramilitaries, so even if you can make it through, chances are that you won’t be alive on the otherside. Boat it is then:

Expect the moto boots and shorts look to be in next summer’s catalogue

We shared the boat with a few backpackers, and a bunch of other motorcyclists, Jess and Jesse whome we had met previously, Stefan a Canadian living in Panama and Rogier and his girlfriend riding 2-up.
We had an enjoyable journey, the San Blas islands are gorgeous Caribbean paradises

With some of us enjoying the view

Others…
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Arriving in Columbia, and discovering that Cartagena is one of the most beautiful colonial cities we have visited, albeit touristy, we formed a moto gang and headed to import our bikes.

Jesse taking his role as moto gang member to intimidating heights

We also met Carole and Laurent there whom we had met previously, and Henry, a Polish/Australian who was riding the same bike as ours, and testing the bike to the extreme with his luggage volume.

Cartagena

Venezuela was close, and I didn’t know anyone personally who had been there, which was reason enough for me to go check it out. We headed east.
We had to buy some new rear tyres for the bikes, and in Barranquilla (home of Shakira!!!) we found some for $65 each. Bargain. In Santa Marta, a bit further up the coast we ran into Henry and his bike that he has converted into a truck and agreed to head into Venezuela together.

It seems that since the drug trade has died down, Columbia has had to look to new opportunities to gouge gringo’s of their hard earned, we found it, their national parks. After forking over fifty something dollars for both of us to enter, we were able to enjoy the views

We chanced into Stefan again, who was riding with a wonderful Columbian lady, Natalia, and next day went to check out the local waterfalls

Purchasing some illegal Venezuelan gasoline from a 12yr old, we continued up to the desert area of Columbia

We continued north as a group

We were stopped by what can best be described as “goop” and sent a few of the bikes onto their sides.

Some had more fun in it than others however

We parted ways with Stefan in the morning, and left for the border as they headed south.
Venezuela to come…

We stayed in Leon for a few more days as we wanted to climb a volcano and see lava, first we went down and to check out the local beaches:

Then off to climb a volcano, first boarding various forms of local transport, collectivo:

The infamous chicken bus:

And then off on our own, not long before we spotted our victim

Eventually making it:

In the evening, the bright red lava was great, the photos of it, not so much.
Sunrise was quite a delight as well

We left Leon in the direction of Estelli, taking the “scenic route”:

Estelli is the major tobacco growing area, producing cigars for the US market, we checked out a cigar factory in Cuba, but I hoped to see another. It was a world apart, the place in Cuba cost us $11US for a tour around an old building with a floor of around 400 people yelling at each other, as they roll cigars and steal them to sell to tourists, cigars were for sale at the front at a substantial premium. Estelli on the other hand had a dozen people rolling cigars in a relaxed environment, we got a free tour, and when asked about purchasing cigars, the rolled us 4 fresh ones and gave them to us!

On the way to Matagalpa, the main coffee growing district, we spot a couple of hundred guys digging optic fiber cable in by hand. An interesting dichotomy

And also wonder where the closest “County School” is.

Staying in Matagalpa for the evening, we then head to Granada, with hopes of catching some other bikers we know that are going to be there, but first a friendly visit from your local corrupt Central American police.
I would like to introduce you to Jose’ and Juan:

We were entering Managua, when while stopped at the lights amongst a group of other moto’s, one pulls up and taps me on the shoulder, I turn, it’s the police. He points straight ahead, I assume he is telling me which way to go, give him a thumbs up and we head off. Two lights further, red light again, again he pulls up, taps me (although much more furiously), and points over to the side of the road… ok…
We pull off, and so it begins, Jose’ speaks a little English, which doesn’t help our cause, as pleading complete ignorance won’t pass. First they want to book us for not following police orders, then it is for speeding, then for lane splitting (as motos do the latter 2 straight past us). They begin the good cop/bad cop routine, so I return the favor and have a mild tanty as Tim acts gentile to ensure we aren’t executed on the spot. We continue for almost an hour, which in hot sun in bike gear is not all that pleasant. They proceed to confiscate our licenses and want to book us at the police station 3 blocks down the road (apparently) and for us to follow them there. I decide to go on a movement strike. Eventually they decide it isn’t worth the hassle to book us but they still want money for their troubles, so when Tim isn’t being incredibly devious taking photos with his Go Pro, he waved US$4 in the air for everyone to see, and handed it to them.

We went to another volcano, which was cool as you could drive up to the top

In Granada, while unsupervised, Tim used all his talents to return both of our bikes to their preferred seating position

That evening, we managed to catch up with a bunch of bikers, including a French couple doing Alaska to Argentina on a bicycle (yes Mum, there are people crazier than me!).

We then went with Kerman on a short jaunt to a local lake inside a volcano crater

And then for a short boat ride, where we had monkeys invade our craft

Met an alcoholic Macau

And had a nice sunset

The next day, the usual fun of navigating the streets gave way,

We were headed to Ometepe island, set in Lake Nicaragua (the largest lake in Central America), it is the combination of 2 volcanoes that have emerged from the surface and is quite beautiful.

After my socialistic bike finished sharing my luggage with the locals

We dumped our gear, and decided to circumnavigate the island

The next day, we climbed another volcano on the island, which has a lake in the center, and seals my desire to not see another volcano again, ever.
We climbed up rocks for hours through rain, to get such a great view:

And that was it for Nicaragua… we enjoyed it here.

Costa Rica began, and instantly I found the place harder to love, gone were the colorful and charming chicken buses and overloaded mopeds used throughout the rest of Central America, and in their place the western world cocoons, cars and SUV’s. American chain fast food establishments lined the roads, the supermarkets were up market, expensive, and selling goods from all around the world. While Costa Rica is far better off than its neighbors by almost all western standards, the people appeared to smile less and came across with less genuine friendliness than their neighbors. I felt guilty that these people live a higher quality of life that other countries aspire to (and eventually will obtain), and here I was thinking less of them, this internal debate raged for a while and I couldn’t tell you what the scenery was like, and it wasn’t until that evening that the answer to this quandry came to me, I am lucky to be able to do the trip now.

Over the next few days day, we went for some nice rides

Saw some nice beaches

And eventually we made our way to Cahuita, a part of Costa Rica that appealed to me much more than anywhere else I had seen, less tourists, more beauty

Nick and Ivanka, a lovely British couple riding two-up from Alaska to Argentina joined us on the second day, and we hung out, swapped war stories and card games. There blog is located here: http://www.bootsboatsandbikes.co.uk/

We didn’t have a whole lot of time till our boat sailed from Panama, so south we go!
We encountered one of our preferred border crossings:

Note the yellow sticker on the customs window? Our sticker! I like the Panamanians already!

Some more scenic detours and we made our way to Boca del Toro

On the way to the boat, we met a local guy on the same bike as us,

We thought it would be a good idea to join forces and ride through all the road blocks together, the police would have less chance of stopping all of us

We needn’t have worried, on the other side the police would routinely give us a thumb up, and tell us to do a wheelie for them!
We made it to our boat, and loaded our bikes on for South America, SOUTH AMERICA people!!!