Peru

guess where¿?¿?¿

May 25th - After a combination of a bike ride, train ride and hike we arrived at Machu Picchu at 6 in the morning and enjoyed a gorgeous sun rise over the old Inca ruins without the hordes that arrived around 11. By then we had hiked to the top of Wayna Picchu (you can see the mountain behind Machu Picchu in our photo)..a good workout and we ended the day by hiking back down the mountain. Checked out a few more Inca ruins (in other words piles of square rocks!) before bidding Cusco and its hordes of tourists (and mega grease chicken and fries meals for about $1.50 US) goodbye. Its on the road Sur and onto the high Pampas plains en route to Canyon del Colca. An overnight "bush camp" at over 4300 m was a little cold (our 2 lit water container froze solid!) and the crusty Hondogs decided not to start in the morning until I tossed the camp stove under their motors and got that Peruvian Crude 20-50 lightened up! Some spectacular scenery en route to the Canyon del Colca which is supposed to be the second deepest canyon in the world (the deepest is app. 10 KM south of Colca and is 25 m deeper) It sure doesn't look that deep but after 22 km of switchbacks dropping into the canyon bottom its pretty fair to describe it as a pretty deep crack in the world! Onto some pretty chewed up dirt roads (and one interesting tunnel as using a match would throw more light than our headlights combined) to Cruz de Condors, supposedly the best place in S America to view wild Condors. We are treated to a good air show by the Condors in the evening and decided to camp on site to get a "pre-tourist" view of these splendid birds in the morning. Up at 6 and I managed to crawl within about 20 m of one juvenile and watched about 6 adults fly around before they grounded themselves for the day.
Out next stop was the city of Puna on the Peruvian side of Lake (lago) Titicaca. After a police escort to our hotel (no map, no signs=2 lost touristo's in one hectic city!) we headed out for a visit to the famous reed islands and Orus tribe. Total commercialization is the best way to describe the day...but I guess that is what it takes to survive these days as the Peruvian government wants the Orus to give up their life on the lake (pollution etc.) The next stop was a 2 hr boat ride away to another tribe that lives on Isla Taquile. These folks know how to entertain the hordes of tourists and still have a good time!!!...lots of Cherveza, coca and Pisco (a type of alcoholic drink) had them dancing and playing in the streets with a smile on their faces! Lots of color and action for sure!
That pretty much wrapped up Peru for us. Just over 5000 km's on the motos and we pretty much covered the country with the exception of the Amazon (which we will spent lots of time in when we cross Brazil).
Oh yeah...forgot about the mad-cow episode! While camping at Cruz de Condor some wild cows decided to invade our camp...quick action was called for and I figured pepper spray was the answer. Unfortunately a good wind was blowing (toward our tent!) and not only did the cows get a face full of spray but we got our sinuses cleaned out as well! No more cow problems that night!

cooking on the reed islands, Lago Titticaca

too cute

rocks rocks and more on the road to Colca Valley

long dark tunnel riding - a new experience

riding the southern Cordillera Blanca

graveyard - Wari people south of Nasca

the country so dry here that all the buried bodies just mummified - 1000´s of years old

camping in the desert at Nasca -yes!!

Old Cathedral made of Inca Ruins - Plaza de Armes - Cusco, Peru

Peruvian lady spinning and her llama

Suri Alpacas - Shari this ones for you!!!

look what I found in my soup .... wonder where those feet have been ¿?¿

May 24th - Feels great to be back on the road heading south! The road is straight and fast...not the hot ticket on Hondogs that we ride at 80KMPH (sure get a good look at the country!)! Our road days have taken on a routine...up at 7 and on the road by 8 for a couple of hours...stop for cafe negro and a breakfast of arroz and huevos (rice and eggs) with aji (chile)...taste great and costs about 6 soles (2 bucks). Strange thing is that we are eating rice every meal...more than we ever ate in Vietnam, China etc.!. Ride for a few more hours (lots of the old photo stops) and stop for a gaseosos (pop) and continue until 5 or so and grab a place to stay. The Nazca Lines would probably be kind of cool if some fool with a 4 X 4 hadn´t chewed the crap out of them...some new Toyota lines I guess. We skipped on the flight as I have seen photos from the air and for the most part they are ruined because of recent human activity...none the less the air looks like a WW1 dogfight with all the small planes twisting and turning about! (We did check out the lines from two Miradors (lookouts) so we did see them first hand. South of Nasca we checked out an important Inca archeological site some 25 very dusty km´s off the main road then hit the Nazca Cemetary..pretty neat as the place is full of mumified dead humans still wrapped in their clothes after some 1000 years in the desert. Definitely got our fill of skulls and human bones as the entire desert is covered in chunks of bone and old pottery. We spent a fantastic night in the desert and even the area we camped in had old pottery scattered all over it! When we camp we are up at 6 and on the road by 7. Today our first stop was the tallest sand dune in the world..some 2750 m tall..yup she is big but I think about 20 countries in Africa lay claim to the biggest, tallest, hugest, baddest sand dunes in the world so who knows! The road east of Nazca is fantastic on a MC...major ¨snake road¨that climbs through some of the most desolate, barren country that we have ever seen! The big surprise of my day was finding a group of Andean Condors...they truly are magnificent creatures! Over 4000m we hit pampas grasslands and there a hundred of wild Vicano (relatives of the llama and alpaca) everywhere. Some absolutely gorgeous high Andean country with amazingly green hillsides and cold weather to match. We bush camped again (just love camping!) and after a long second day of climbing and dropping over mountain ranges we arrived in Cusco...home to Machu Picchu AND about a million tourists! More tourists here than we have seen on our entire trip but the town (well, city of 330,000) is really beautiful. The amazing cathedrals that cover the Plaza de Armes are made from ransacked Inca Ruins and really add to the atmosphere of this tourist oriented city!

sorting through the corn

Cordillera Negra

Still Smilin´

Backroads to Huarez in the Cordillera Blanca - 130km took 10 hours!!

May 16th - So rode the coast for while, then turned inland to the Cordillera Blanca at Casma and what a difference - gorgeous snow capped mountains, small villages and a rough dirt road through from Huarez to Huanaco, Cerro de Pasco, and back out to the coast at Lima. Took over two full days of riding to do what we figured from our map would take a couple of hours. 1st and 2nd gear forever. Up and down - Went from 4818 meters to sea level at Lima in a couple of hours. What a gorgeous canyon - amazing - llamas everywhere at elevation. Slept in a small village high in the mountains one night at about 4600 meters and I was so out of breath from the elevation that by the time I climbed up the three flights of stairs to ask about rooms, I could hardly talk.... The following day the weather cleared and we passed across barren high elevation grasslands which are beautiful and the people oh so friendly! Just when we thought the road could not climb any more we started to climb into colorful snow (fresh) covered mountains and over a 4818 m pass. Mining activity everywhere has really chewed up these mountains but the mining towns are really neat looking with rusty tin roofs set against the colorful mtns. and blue sky. We were following some train tracks while we decended this most amazing canyon and I could not wait to see a Peruvian train climb these rails...the grade is about 3X what we have in BC. Sure enough here comes a train..with about 6 cars (probably the max they can haul up these grades) but what is amazing is the smoke coming out of the engine...a solid plume of jet black smoke taints the sky for hundreds of meters!!! (and I missed a picture!) Lima was surprisingly easy to get though although it extends for about 100 kms and contains a majority of Peru´s 28 million souls. Just checked out some fantastic sea bird rookeries with hundreds of thousands of comorants, boobies, terns, gulls, sea lions etc. in Isla de Balletas and tomorrow we head South to Nazca. We are loving the trip...every day is like a new page in a novel that you just cannot put down!!

Riding in Northern Peru along the coast

more northern Peru - miles and hours of blowing sand...

Pre Inca wall carvings - ruins in northern Peru

Okay, here goes with first impressions on our second night in Peru. Northern Peru looks a lot like Mexico (the dry, dirty, dusty, not nice part of Mexico).The first 500 kms or so along the coast are mostly sand dunes, small poor villages with few people and lots of garbage all over. Crossed the border at a smaller crossing east of the main one on the Pan American Hwy and once again no problems – just took time and cost nothing unlike all the Central America crossings. First night we camped off the road down a sand track – had the best sleep we’ve had in awhile – warm, no fly on the tent and a panorama of stars to look at. Today was a boring day of riding – flat, straight roads through brush and sand. I actually put on my MP3 player for the first time this trip to try and stay awake!
So now we are settled in for the night in a beautiful place for 10 soles ( about 3.50US$-the cheapest place so far this trip) and get this – it is a Love Hotel… more about these later. They are just building it and it is not quite finished so that is why the good deal I think. No TV in the room yet, but the mirror is in place…..So now about the ‘Love Hotels’ in South America – they are places where you pay by the hour to rent the room. You drive into them and each room has their own private parking area, blocked off from the outside. So what you can do if trying to be discrete is drive right into the garage, close the door, go into the room and there is another door in the room with a sliding window thing that you can put things through. You can use the phone in the room to order room service and it is delivered through the door slot where you can also pay for the room etc – in other words no one has to have ever seen you….. They have names like Venus, Amor, Fantasia, Las Vegas, Delilah, etc. and usually the only channel on TV that is in English is the porn channel! We have stayed in a few now as sometimes they are desperate and have no transient customers so will rent out the room for the night for a reasonable rate – they are always clean, cozy, and Chris likes to use the covered garage area for working on the bikes and you never know what might happen in a ‘Love Hotel’…..
Hoping by the end of tomorrows riding we will be heading into the mountains and a more scenic part of Peru. The people have been great as usual and we are back in a moto country where a lot of people ride and they are all interested in the bikes (especially the 3 new tires we have strapped on the back. Bought them in Ecuador, but now Chris is going to see how many flats he can get with the old tires can get before he really needs to change them..)

Ecuador

southern Ecuador - Pan American Hwy - who needs backroads¿¿¿¿
Chimbarozzo 5:00 am time exposure
Just can´t stay away from the mountains and snow (even at the equator!)
Riobamba, Ecuador
Laguna Quilota

Parade in Riobamba

Green Parakeets

4800 meters up on Chimborrazo, highest peak in Ecuador

porker in a pan

A day at the market - Hey Joe, I´m feeling a little numb from the neck down....

we use it all

herding sheep in the country

Have been here in Otavalo, Ecuador for a few days now - nice place and a great market. Finally buyint a few things and hopefully mailing them home today. Same as usual though, the mailing costs more than the items in the package. Oh well. Ecuador is beautiful and the people are wonderful. We are just loving South America. It feels so different from Central America. Heading south tomorrow to do some more hiking. Riding is okay here - not as good as Colombia as everyone drives way faster here (could be the cheap price of gas ?), so constantly being passed and very few motos on the roads. In Columbia, everyone drove very slowly - we were the fastest things on the highway believe it or not and there were tons on motos. (Gas there was mucho expensive though)

More to come here at a later date - just lost what I had written - darn computers!!!!

Its been a while since I updated the blog and my memory is fading quickly but here goes! We did some pretty good rough road riding around Otvalo climbing Volcanoes...one piece of advice...Do NOT get a fully loaded SR650 stuck in a big mudhole (unless you have a strong woman along!)

We (or should I say I) sure learned a lesson about wandering off the main Pan American Hwy. in Ecuador! We ended up crossing the equator 4 times...don´t ask- just assume that it wasn´t our best day on the road! However we did get our pictures with one leg in the southern hemisphere the other in the northern! There are NO road signs off the main PA Hwy and way too many roads to ask locals ësta la via a...¨? We then headed out on the Quilota Loop - an awesome dirt road for the first day through some incredible mountain scenery that reminded us of a ¨green¨Copper Canyon. The rural dogs love chasing the MC´s but some geese got into the act and actually chased Lori down the road, honking with wings a flapping! We overnighted at 3800 m at the gorgeous Laguna Quilota and had a great hike happening until the fog set in and Lori (I take no respnsiblity!) got us lost!

The next day we rolled into the gorgeous city of Riobamba and spent a day exploring the town then headed out on a bus to take the famous train ride down the Diablo de Nariz (Devils Nose)...more like the Devils butt! A pretty good ride as the train tackles the switchbacks by going backwards then frontwards! At one point I opened the door and one step out of the train would have been a drop of over 100 feet! I guess it is illegal to ride on the roof (as last year two Japanese tourists were beheaded by a low wire) (unless you buy a cushion for one dollar and the money goes in the conductor´s pocket!!!)

We then headed out of Riobamba and climbed up Volcan Chimbarozzo and climbed to 4800 m on the MC´s (I just about had to push the old 650 up the last few km´s!) then climbed to over 5500 m until we got hit with a major snow storm...yes snow just a few km´s south of the Ecuator (Ecuador..ecuator...get it) We camped overnight at 4800 m and it wasn´t too bad so we are obviously pretty good at high elevation although I admit a crippled slug would have climbed faster than I at 5500m!

Instead of following the Pan American Hwy we then headed into the highlands (as if we were not high enough as it was!) and had our heaviest day of rain to date. She was more than a little cool The people were absolutely incredible and spent several hours running about town getting us some new tires. Lori also discovered broken welds all over her luggage rack (abuse, abuse and more abuse!!! she is a maniac on the rough roads) I ripped the luggage rack off (a pile of pieces, and in literally one minute a local took me to a welding shop. The welder was having a brew but cut off some bolts to use as inserts on the broken pipe and welded up the broken frame pieces perfectly...uno dollar por favor! (we gave him 5 and didn´t say anything about the darn rack costing us 250 dollars in Canada!!!)

The last few days in Ecuador really gave us a taste of some of the untouched jungle that we never got to see when travelling on or close to the Pan Am Hwy. Some pretty impressive thick jungle forests full of birds, a few snakes, lots of corners and clouds and fog. A great time for sure and we were actually sad to see the border! Crossing into Peru was absolutely painless! (as usual in SA..those rip off artists in Central America sure could learn a thing or two about greeting people into their country!!!) The border crossing was slow to say the least! The officials were way more interested in trying (!) to talk to us about our trip, bikes etc. than complete paperwork but they ended up filling out all the required MC forms in triplicate...by HAND (no photocopy machine) which took over 2 hrs. (and there were only a few lines to fill out!) in which time not a single vehicle crossed the border!

Into Peru!!!!!!

Northern Ecuador countryside

Desert Flower

Carved gourds - Otavalo market

Otavalo market color

Otavalo elder

Colombia

Cathedral Los Lajas near the Ecudaor border - Neo Gothic architecture constructed between 1928 - 1944

Nothing exists north of the USA - what happened to us?

Colombian Flag overlooking Caribbean coastal city of Cartagena

Boa - roadkill

Colombian city nestled in the mountains

Southern Colombia along the Pan American Hwy

Patchwork landscape

getting the bikes loaded on to the sailboat - carefully....

getting strapped down and ready to go

San Blas Island paradise

more of the same....

could almost run away and become a sailor......

We made it to Colombia!!! Spent 6 days sailing on the ´Melody´from Portobelo, Panama to Cartegena, Colombia. Spent 4 glorious days on the San Blas Islands. Just amazing - 350 or so small islands scattered about with white sand beaches, blue Caribean water, and coconut palms - the stuff dreams are made of. Spent time visiting the Kuna villages on one of the islands, snorkelling (saw 4 sand sharks, a huge devil ray, barracuda, and the usual assortment of beautiful colored fish), swimming and just soaking up the sun and getting a glimpse into the life of sailing the world from the other sailboats moored near us. Anyway, was an amazing time - glad we held out for this option and didn´t just fly the bikes and us into Bogata. Lori did spend some of the time at sea sick, but oh well... So now we are in Cartegena Columbia - just a beautiful city. Staying near the old historic walled city part which is amazing to see. Have spent three days here, and are leaving to head south tomorrow. Riding in the city is a bit manic, but just taking it slow and easy. (Good thing Lori is along to slow Chris down....)

Two more days to the Ecuador border and over 1200 km on Colombian roads...fantastic people, scenery (especially in the mountains north of Medellin) and some good riding. We have traded in the hot sunny, humid weather for the liquid type and we are starting to pile the clothes on when we climb the huge mountains. Lots of flood damage sure slows down the road trip and its no wonder they have problems with flooding when one looks at the massive deforestation in the mountains! None the less we have never seen a country so green (other than Cambodia) and in the high mountains this country bears some resemblence to Nepal. (except the deforestation is just for cattle grazing not growing crops) The army and police are everywhere (literally spread out every .5 km!) but are super friendly (conscription into the army is mandatory so for the most part they are literally kids) and love the bikes. Talking of which Colombia is MC territory...and no wonder with the price of fuel! Unfortunately there really isn´t much to do because it is unsafe to venture off the main roads and there is no tourist infrastructure because there are no tourists! Cartangena was absolutely wonderful...we loved it and the old city is very beautiful with a long and colorful history. So...we love Colombia! (except we are hating deisel trucks more and more everyday...definitely a major health hazard (might as well be smoking a case of butts a day!) We rode through Medellin, Colombia!!!! Felt surreal to be doing it - very cool.....

Panama

Portobelo forts at sunset

bonding with the animals

gives new meaning to the term ´riding shotgun´

Panama Canal

Panama City church

Colon waterfront

Spanish fort at San Lorenzo

another spider in the garden

campsite at playa Lajas

Playa Lajas

green tree snake

Panama City

Chris spins to the top of Volcan Baru, highest point (3475 m) in Panama

Ye ha...into Panama (our 8th country if you count Canada) and its an easy crossing and better yet cheap! Our first stop is the mountain town of Boquette which is home to more Americans than Panamanians (or it seems that way!) City size lots go for around 150,000 US! Our first trip is a run up Volcan Baru...basically 14 km of rolly rocks! She was a bit of a work out (took the 250) but I made it to the top which happens to be the tallest point in Panama. Lots of fun and I think that the 250 Hondog has forgiven me after I gave it a oil change!

The next day we headed back into the mtns on the 650 and did a fantastic hike called the Quetzel Trail. Most folks do a one way trip on the trail and use a taxi ride to return to Boquette. We decided to hike it both ways (the trail guide says 12 km each way) and it truly is a fantastic cloud forest experience. We also got to find out why they call it a rain forest! After making it to the far end of the trail we got hit with a most incredible storm...the bad news being we had to return to Boquette. In less than five minutes we were totally soaked to the skin...dry creek beds were running bank to bank etc. and we had over two hours of hiking then a 16 km MC ride back to town! We froze our butts off and even the hot shower then into sleeping bags with long johns etc. couldn't warm us up! However it was great even if I still have not found one of those darn elusive Quetzels!

Back to the beach! Next stop is Playa Lajas where we found a huge white sand beach (that we can ride the bikes down) and a neat campsite under the coconut trees. All is good until a group of young residents set up camp within 20 feet of us (and there is close to 1km of camp area) and proceeded to party, scream and basically carry on all night...sleep equals zero. I spent the night thinking of how great it was going to be to fire up the old Hondog at 6 in the morning and let er rip at 1o grand for a while. So here comes the sunrise...turkey vultures are sitting all over the coconut trees scrounging on the mass of garbage our party animals have left laying around, a dog comes over and pisses on one of their tents (good doggie!!!) then...they get up!!!! Tough dudes but I did have some revenge watching them puke!!!

The coast is just to hot for us so its back into the mountains and Parque Torres where we bounce over some rough roads to get into the park and set up camp way up in the mountains where cloud and rain cool us off. The trails are a leg surgeons dream...slippery roots and rocks everywhere and straight up and down...no wonder there are no tracks! On top of that the park rangers do not have maps and the area is covered with old trails etc. Some fun finding your way back out but I did see some neat birds including my first Trogan.

So today we crossed the Panama Canal at 11...feels fantastic to look over this piece of history that cost so many lives and is considered by some to be the 8th man made wonder in the world. We have always dreamed of visiting the canal and what better way to do it than by riding over it on MC's! Spent the day exploring Panama City.. a surprisingly small place that appears to be somewhat run down with some real sketchy looking Ghetto areas. We feel real comfortable around here and will be spending some time getting our bikes to Colombia and checking out the Panama canal and the old city of Panama Veijo.