Monday, December 26, 2011

COLOMBIA!


Monday
Well the first thing that could go wrong did go wrong. When we docked this morning Fritz informed us our passports would not be stamped until tonight and our bikes are to remain on the boat until tomorrow morning. This means any chance of an early start for Medellen tomorrow has been nixed. We’ll probably spend all morning getting the bikes imported into Columbia and not get on the road until the afternoon at the earliest!
Castillo de San Felipe de Barajas

We found a apartment, in the old walled city  for the night. $24 for a 2 bedroom with kitchen and living area plus tv. It also has a balcony overlooking the narrow street we are on. We get settled in then go out to find a ATM. The narrow streets here are busy with food and merchandise venders hocking their wares. Once outside the “OLD Town” the avenues widen but still are crowded with traffic and venders. We walk to the Castillo de San Felipe de Barajas, a huge fort built in 1630 to protect the city from pirates. This has got to be the most impressive old fort I’ve ever seen. Unfortunatly they wanted $8 to go in so we opted to view it looking outside in. While walking around it we saw some very poor areas of town and I was wondering that maybe we best hold our wallets close. Watching some little kids play soccer Max offered up what was left of his coconut he was eating and man did they go for it! I thought he might have started a fight but as it goes the biggest, strongest kid of the bunch ended up with it. We didn’t stick around to see if he shared any of it.

The Fritz Gang

That evening we went to the bar Fritz set up to retrieve our passports. It was run by a fellow Austrian who married a Colombian women and set up shop here in Cartagena. We of course got there early and enjoyed a number of cocktails before Fritz and our passports arrived. Then it was good bye to our new friends and back to our digs.

Tuesday Dec. 13
Up and to the docks by 7:30 to meet up with Fritz The Cat to unload the bikes. We all got back on board and headed to the newer part of the city to off load. Cartagena is a contrast in architecture. The newer part is very contemporary with attractive high-rise apartments built on the water while the older parts have building dating back to the 1500’s. We unload the bikes and say our farewells to Fritzs and Toulay. We all then head across town to the customs office to import our bikes. Alex has gone through the routine before and speaks Spanish fluently. He generously offers to act as our handler.
Importing the bikes in Cartagena

The Colombian Customs office is a large official looking building located at a container dock and compared to the previous borders we have crossed looks promising to be a painless procedure. We all head over to the local copy office and make copies of the usual documents, hand Alex our titles and passports and copies and wait. Alex is out in record time! The first words out of his mouth are “Do you want the bad news first or the bad news?”  It seems that all of our passport stamps had been dated 2012 instead of 2011. We had to go back to immigration and get them restamped! Not knowing where the immigration office is Alex and Max grab our passports and get a cab while we wait in the sweltering heat. Fortunately it is a short taxi ride and they get there well before noon. Still they are told they would have to wait until 2:00! After some heated discussion the officer who made the mistake the day before was called back to work and stamped the passports with the correct dates. I shouldn’t be surprised at the incompetence of these government employees but I really thought it would change once we were in South America. With the properly stamped passports in hand Alex marched back into the customs office only to be told the official had gone to lunch and wouldn’t be back till 2:00! I’ll spare you the rest of the details but we finally had our bikes officially imported into Colombia at 5:30. Now all we had to do is get to the insurance office before they close (Colombia requires mandatory insurance. If you are stopped and found to not have the proper papers they can confiscate the vehicle). We were to late. We rode back to the Old Town, found a hostel with secure parking and settled in for another night in Cartagena.

Wednesday

Can anyone remember how our days start? Correct! I have to tow start Max’s bike! But this time I have to do it in very narrow streets with cars, carts and oblivious people all about. It takes two tries but we get it going. After many wrong turns and close calls we find the insurance office again and buy insurance. This was relatively painless but put us in the middle of the city at rush hour. It’s always rush hour in these cities. Dufas does a decent job getting us out of the city.
Gas stop on the road to Medellin

This place is as bad as Mexico City with its traffic, busses and people. We end up in a market are totally congested with buses and the traffic is stopped. I begin worrying about Max’s bike over heating and stalling. I don’t know what I’ll do if it quits in this mess. Finally we make it out of the market area and on to a more open highway. We are moving along pretty well when I look into my mirror and Max is missing! John and I pull over and I exclaimed “where in the %$$# is Max! “I don’t know, he disappeared behind a bus a ways back,” John says. Shit! I wait a few minutes and turn around to look for him. I find him pushing his bike uphill on the highway with a couple of Colombians helping him. By the time I turn back around three people on scooters have stopped to give him a hand (I don’t think you would ever see that in the states). The road is not busy and I successfully tow start him and we are back on the way. It took 1.5 hours to put Cartagena behind us but now we are riding in some really beautiful country. It’s been raining everyday since Arenal in Costa Rica and Colombia is no different. The river we are following has topped its banks in many places and we see buildings and roads under water. The rain in this region is way above normal and is causing mudslides and flooding closing roads all over the country. We are definitely in the jungle now. The trees and vegetation grows right up to the road and we are slowly beginning to climb in elevation. We stopped for lunch at an open roadside restaurant. It’s deferent here in Colombia, the restaurants are big open air places compared to Central America with its small family run shacks that line the highways. While eating our friends Gabriel and Cynthia (from the boat) drive by. We thought it weird they didn’t stop but found out later they figured we’d catch them. We didn’t see them again until the KTM shop in Medellin.
Fruit Cart in Planeto Rica

We got to Planeto Rica (the halfway point to Medellin) around 5 and found a hotel. It’s another “by the hour” hotel but is clean and cheap, even if the roof leaks. We’re all out of cash so we walk down to the city center in search for a cash machine. The Centro area is comprised of narrow streets covered with shade cloth stretched across the street from the building roofs. I’ve never seen this and with the rain hammering down some of the sheets were coming down, covering the storefronts on the opposite side of the street. We made it to the town square, found the cash machine, ate some dinner and retired back to our love nest.

Thursday
We are actually on the road by 6:30. We only have to make 200 miles today but we are getting wise to this time/distance thing down here. Almost immediately the road begins to climb, twisting it’s way up into the Andes. This is the only road that connects Medellin with the East coast port city of Cartagena. This equates to lots of trucks! These drivers are nuts! I mean suicidal! Actually the trucks aren’t as bad as the buses that blindly pass on curves betting on the unlikely fact there won’t be somebody coming the other way. The grades are so steep that most the trucks are laboring up in 1st gear, belching black exhaust and barely able to swing around some of the switchback turns. We spend our time trying to safely past these vehicles, sometimes 4 at a time. The going is slow and we don’t reach Medellin until 4:30. Dufas does a stellar job of taking us through the afternoon traffic and finding the Moto Shop where we will drop off our bikes while John and Max has theirs worked on. I was ecstatic when we pulled into the shop. Hopefully we won’t have to ever pull start Max’s POS KTM again on this trip! Wishful thinking you say? A guy has to stay positive or else the fun stops. We also ran into some other KTM riders there. The four South African 950 riders we met in Cartagena were there and so were Gabriel and Cynthia from the boat. Three of the SA guy’s bikes needed work and Gabriel’s 950 quit running. Seems as though Max’s KTM has found some friends.
We made it !!!!!!!!!

After exchanging condolences we caught a cab to what will be our new home for 6 days.
The Palm Tree Hostel is located on the other side of Medellin, about a 30-minute cab ride. The cab costs $5 so who’s complaining. Our friend Thomas from Skagway recommended this place and was there to meet us. The recommendation is much appreciated, as this place is great. Friendly staff and relatively quiet (other than the live band that showed up this night and played until 2 in the morning!). Thomas introduces us to the Colombian Nation drink, Aguardiente.  Traditionally used for toasting we continued the tradition well into the night!
Max and Thomas showing off a carton of Aguardiente


Friday
We begin the search for the KTM parts that were supposed to have been shipped to the hostel from Texas. Turns out UPS had delivered them but the Hostel refused delivery. According to UPS they have been sent back to Bogotá. After many phone calls to UPS in the states and Colombia it turns out there is nothing anyone can do until Monday. So we change directions and plan our flight itinerary for Cuzco.  Max and I will fly from Medellin on the evening of Wed. the 21st and meet up with Charlotte in Lima the morning of the 22nd.  Mr Briner is staying in Medellin until the 26th and will meet up with Knicki in Lima and fly on to Cuzco on the 27th. A Metro ride to the Motto Shop to drop off some keys, check in with the other KTM victims, a little sightseeing and back to the Hostel for some more toasting to Colombia!
South Africans KTM 950 we saw being loaded up in Puerto Bello
Seems the KTM dealer here in Medellin is doing a good repair business
Saturday
Nothing much but some sightseeing and experiencing the Medellin nightlife. There is a guy that hangs out at the Hostel named Philippi who is the unofficial Social Director. He also is the volunteer bartender and unofficial ambassador for Colombia. Maybe three nights a week he organizes a night out in El Poblado, an upscale neighborhood with 100’s of bars and nightclubs. Tonight is one of those nights. We gather at the Hostel bar for beers and shots of Aguardiente and around 11 Philippi begins to herd us cats into cabs for the drive up to El Poblado. The scene there is unreal! Thousands of young people wandering the streets in and out of clubs, the women dressed to the 9’s. My god Colombia does have the most beautiful women although a great many of them have had augmentation surgery I’ve been told. Around 2:30AM Thomas and I get a cab back to the hostel. Not sure when Max made it back but a good time was had by all. Thanks phillipi!

Diana, a friend of Thomas' , who helped
Max with some Gluten tests

Sunday
A bit of a blur. Watched a bit of Soccer. Went over to the Excedo Colombia, a Wal-Mart like store that sits next to the Hostel. We spot a UPS store nearby so I thought they might be able to help with the missing package.  With the help of my trusty translator (actually he handled the whole thing) she looked it up on her computer and informed us the package was here in Medellin not Bogotá! This was huge because we didn’t think we would receive it before Wed. if it were in Bogotá. Wait a minute….
On another screen it says it is in Bogotá. Anyway the bottom line was she couldn’t help but did suggest we go to the UPS depot in the morning and maybe they could shed some light on this.

Monday

Thomas, Max and I catch a cab down to the UPS depot to see if we can find out where the package is and the best way to get it to us. First a little history…… As you all know Max’s bike hasn’t been able to start on it’s own since Costa Rica. We ordered parts from Texas so we could be sure they would be in Medellin when we got there. Figuring we can leave the bike at the dealer here in Medellin when we went down to Cusco, it would give us plenty of time to get the work on the bike done. But like everything else on this trip it would not be so simple. The shop will be closed from Dec. 24th to Jan. 15 and we are planning to be back on the road by Jan. 6th. So if we can’t get the bike fixed by the 24th our departure date from Medellin will be delayed by a week! So getting these parts is critical.
Thomas, my translator (I mean handler) begins the process all over again and works his magic on the cute lady behind the counter. She starts searching the various screens then makes a phone call. Thomas over hears her say something like “should I tell them to wait”. Could it be? Could it be possible we could get the package today? She tells us to wait and my hopes begin to grow. Not too much though, I’ve become very skeptical since beginning this trip. So we take our seats and wait to see what will happen. Five minutes go by and I see a guy come in from a back room carrying a package! Could it be? He walks over to the girl and she looks up at us with a smile! Our package has arrived!
Our UPS Package Arrives!!!!

Like a medical facility transporting a human heart we run out to the street, hail a cab and get the box up to the Moto Shop. They have already begun to work on the bike and have found another problem, which may explain other symptoms the bike has been having. The auto decompression mechanism on the camshaft has failed. This is a part I replaced before leaving Skagway and has, in the back of my mine, suspected to not be working correctly from the beginning. Fred, the owner of the shop, assures me he can get the new cam by Wed. and have the bike done before they close for the holidays so we leave feeling pretty good about things.

Tuesday

Medellin has a great Metro system that includes two trams that take you up the sides of the valley to where much of the poorer population lives. Before the trams it could take up to 2 hours to get down to the valley where most of the jobs are.
View of Medellin from tram

Now it is a 15-minute tram ride. This will be a field trip today. What an incredible ride through the slums of Medellin. It’s kind of weird riding above these neighborhoods looking down on the porches and yards of these underprivileged people. It feels a bit invasive. The overall view is spectacular. At the top you can see most of Medellin from the tops of the surrounding mountains to the valley floor. Medellin really is a beautiful city. Max and I pack for tomorrows flight to Lima.

Wednesday
It’s off to the Moto Shop to pick up our bikes and put them in storage for a couple of weeks. We found a place right down the street from the hostel, which makes it very convent. When we get there John’s bike is still in the shop with the tank off. This gives me time to wash out my moldy panniers and give the GS a much deserved bath. Max’s bike isn’t done but Fred assures us it will be done by Friday and he’ll personally deliver it to our storage before we return. The one positive thing to say about the POS KTM is that we have been exposed to some really great shops down here. They all go way beyond what dealers in the states would go. Fred has allowed me to keep the GS there at no charge for close to a week. Every morning they had to push the beast out on the street and back in the shop at night. He also offered shop space to us if we needed to work on the bikes ourselves. We took up much of their break room storing our panniers, drybags and helmets. John and I ride back to the Hostel to sort through my stuff on my bike and then put our steeds into storage for the duration. Max and I head to the airport around 3:00(a 1hour taxi ride that costs about $15) to catch our 7:30 flight to Lima. When we get there they have changed our flight to 4:30, which then is delayed by an hour. The timing works well and we don’t have to rush. We lay over in Bogotá and arrive in Lima around 12:30 am. Charlotte had arrived an hour before us and already is at the Hostel and send the girl to come get us. By the time we settle in its 2:00 am. I set the alarm for 4:00am and crash for 2 hours.

Thursday Dec. 22
Up at 4:00 and to the airport for our 6:30 flight to Cusco. Charlotte has a 7:00 flight so it good by for now and see ya in Cusco. I was looking forward to flying over the Andes into Cusco but the cloud cover prevented me from seeing anything. At the airport we end up waiting 2.5 hours for Charlotte. Her plane had been delayed and she didn’t even know it because the moment she got on the plane she fell sound asleep and didn’t realize the plan didn’t take off for another hour! Once we all met at the airport it was off to our hostel. Not! Charlotte lost the paper that had the name. We borrowed a computer from a tour company and she finally found the email from the hostel and we headed out to find a cab. Lo and behold there was a woman with a sign that read “Jewells”. Turns out an airport pickup is included in the price of a room. Cusco sits at over 10000 feet and you can feel it as soon as you walk up some stairs. Our hotel is up the hill from the main square and is situated in a very old building. This is a very cool town, dripping with history everywhere you turn, both Inca and Colonial. I’ll let the pictures describe in more detail what its’ like here. After settling in our room we go out and explore the neighborhood. I immediately find the Norton Rat Bar that sits right over the main square. A guy from Iowa who loves Norton motorcycles started this place. It is defiantly a “biker” bar with posters of old English motorcycles all over the walls. Beer and dinner, some more sightseeing around the square and we hit the sack for a well deserved sleep.

Monday, December 12, 2011

THE PANAMA PASSAGE


View from Captn' Jacks

Tuesday
Tow start the KTM and we are on the rode by 8. I can’t believe the amount of police on the road. There is literally one cycle cop every 5kms along the road looking for speeders.
Captain Jacks Hostel, Puerto Bello PA.

We had one security check where they checked our passports and drivers license. I pulled out my international drivers license for the first time. By now it’s been in my jacket for 8 weeks getting folded, mutilated and wet. Anyway he looks at it as if he’s never seen one before. He didn’t even get to my picture and hands it back with a shrug. He goes through the same thing with Max and John then waves us on. After all the stories of roadblocks and crooked cops we haven’t had to pay a bribe yet. Having 3 of us instead of 1 helps a lot. Plus my helmet cam may play a part.  Anyway we managed to hook around Panama City without getting lost. The next thing we know we are on the bridge going over the Canal with a great view both ways.  A very impressive sight. After crossing we found ourselves on a beautiful jungle road winding it’s way to a big, fast toll road to Colon. From there we turned North up the coast highway to Portobelo. We made it!!!!!!!!!!!
Puerto Bello Street

This is where we catch the sailboat to Cartagena, Columbia and has been in question since the POS KTM started acting up. I was so happy to get here I didn’t even get out of my riding gear before the celebration began starting with beer and ending with a “Don’t Screw with Me”, dark rum and orange juice. We stayed at Captain Jacks, a hostel that I fell in love with at first sight. Bar, Restaurant and private room. Can’t beat that for $11 bucks a night. Talk about a place to meet interesting characters, this little port is a magnet for world cruisers. Not the kind we get in Skagway but the kind that sail their sailboats boats around the world. I met this one guy (of course I forgot to get his name) that holds the Guinness Book of World Records for circumnavigating the globe sailing west to the East. Captain Jack has also sailed around the world living in some way cool places along the way.
Loading 1 of 4 KTM950 to take out to boat
We will run into them later on the trip

Portobelo once was the richest port in the whole Caribbean but now is a very laid back village with fishing and drinking it’s main pastime. The locals seemly are living right at minimal poverty. There is one grocery story, a few places to stay and some of the most impressive ruins I’ve seen. The fort there was built in the 1500’s and most of it is still there. It was built by Spain to house the gold and silver brought overland from the west. Of course this place became a magnet for pirates. This is the place that inspired Pirates of The Caribbean. Pirates destroyed the town at least three different times. Very little restoration has taken place so most of it stands untouched (except the northern portion which the Army Core of Engineers felt necessary to dismantle and use the materials for a breakwater while constructing the Panama Canal). There is also a 2 story customs house still standing that was built in the 1600’s that is being used as a museum of sorts. 
Bummer!

Wednesday Nov. 8
The day has come. Today we load the bikes on the catamaran Fritz The Cat. I have to say I’ve been feeling a little anxious about this. Loading my 600# moto on a sailboat that is moving up and down on a 8” wet plank sloped at 30 degrees has giving me pause. When we arrived at the dock they were in the process of loading another guys KLR. There were 5 or 6 locals “helping” which didn’t do much to help my anxiety. The guy was trying to ride the bike up the ramp and began spinning the rear wheel. It looked bad but with the “help” of the locals they got it on board. I should take this moment explain my thoughts when I first laid eyes on the boat. “It’s too frigg’n small to hold 6 bikes and 15 passengers!”. The boat is 15 mts x 8.5 mts and after loading and stowing all the gear I  still think “it’s too frigg’n small!”
Waiting for my turn

Anyway it’s what we have and I’m making the best of it. After watching the first two bikes get loaded it was Max’s turn. Of course we all know by now it won’t start so they have no choice but to push it up the plank. It went up without a hitch. No screaming engine, no spinning rear tire, no problem. This is a boat that has made this crossing 94 times. I’m assuming they had bikes on it most crossings and each time the poor rider had to ride their bike up the plank. Anyway it was so easy to push Max’s bike we decided to try pushing my fat gal up the plank. No sweat! All that worrying for nothing! They found room to lash all 6 bikes down and we are on our way to Cartagenia Columbia! The captain is a big jolly Austrian with an infectious laugh. He has a girlfriend of 18 years who also helps on board and a young guy named Jose who helps with the boat and cooks.
Bikes all loaded

 Briner has accurately described the boat as a “floating Hostel at sea.” Fritz assigns every one a cabin. Max and Johns cabin is 2.5’x 7’ x 6’ high. In it there is one small fan that works and a 8” x 12” vent hatch at the top for limited ventilation. There are also two beds, an upper (Johns) and a lower (Max’s). The lower one is shaped to fit within the pontoon and feels much like a sarcophagus must feel like if lying in one. They are the lucky ones. I’ve been assigned to a large bed in the salon that measures 7’ x 6’. This bed is to accommodate 4 people! These are not friends, nor family but complete strangers. I decide to take my changes on the aft deck and find a small corner that I can call my own. This works well as long as I can out last our rum-drinking friends on board who use this area as party central.
At sea finally

The boat itself has a mainsail and a Jib and uses a 75hp diesel engine to supplement the wind. It actually has two engines but one seems to have some issue with the main bearings so we will use one for this trip. One is fine unless it quits then its wind power! Slower but quieter.  We have the bikes loaded, gear stowed and all the passports stamped by 15:30 and we set sail at 16:00. We are sailing SE along the Panama coast heading for the San Blas Islands. We reach our first stop in the San Blas at 23:00 and anchor for the night.

Thursday
Sleeping on deck allows me to wake with the sun and I’m up at 6. I can’t believe what I’m seeing. This is an island paradise!

We are anchored in a bay that’s protected on four sides with small islands and a reef with only a very narrow passage to get the boat through. The water is turquoise and there is a tiny island right in front of the boat that has two thatched huts. The family is just getting their day started and you can see a fire going between the huts and a woman shaking out the sleeping mats. I feel like a peeping tom but am intrigued with the whole scene. These are the Kuna people. They are the indigenous people of the area who occupy the San Blas Archipelago. They still live a very primitive lifestyle. Their main income is selling coconuts but they also make and sell different crafts, mostly beaded jewelry and occasionally sell back to the dealers the bricks of cocaine that wash up on their beaches.  Our skipper warns us not to take any coconuts off the islands but to buy them from the natives. The cost ….25c. We spend the day snorkeling around the reefs and drinking rum.

 The food on board is great and we get 3 large meals a day. Fritz was a chef in a previous life and has trained Jose well! Tonight we travel just 4 hours to our next anchorage.

Friday
After breakfast we all go snorkeling. Some of the guys take along spear guns and return with a lionfish. These things have poisonous stingers on their bodies but evidentially are worth the trouble of cleaning because they taste so good. We then moved to another place and anchored up. The snorkeling here was superb with many different types of coral and a huge variety of fish. The biggest I saw was a Stingray about a meter across. Another night of rum and music sleeping on the deck and living the dream….
Kuna house

Saturday
After breakfast a bunch of us took the dingy over to a nearby island to meet some locals and explore a little. While we were motoring across a couple of Kuna women are paddling a dugout canoe (their main means of transportation) out to our boat but when they saw us they turned around and followed us back to their village. The village (an Island about 300 yards long by 75 yards long) consisted of a half dozen thatched huts, three dogs, a few scrawny chickens, a duck (a type I’ve never seen before) and maybe twenty men, women and children. The women dress in colorful skirts and have these beaded strands woven around their ankles and calves. The children and men dress much like we do. They are very friendly and immediately go get their good they sell and spread them out on the sand (I guess we are not the first white people they’ve had visit them).
A Kuna Woman

 I’m bummed I didn’t bring any money; shit I didn’t even have a quarter for a coconut! From a distance these islands look perfect but when you get close you see that they all are lined with plastic garbage that has washed up from all over the globe. They do use some stuff to build their homes, nylon rope, some pieces of roofing and the like but they have little use for the plastic bottles, various plastic shoes (these never travel in pairs) and all other sorts of garbage that doesn’t decompose. So there it all sits along the shores of these beautiful tiny islands. At 17:00 we wey anchor and begin our crossing to Cartagena. The weather hasn’t been the greatest with lots of rain but it so turns worse. Thunder, lightning and relatively big seas take its toll on just about everyone on board. My little corner of the boat becomes the sick bay and I’m out of a home.

The captain has a no hard alcohol rule while out on the open ocean but has little trouble enforcing it, the last thing anybody, including me, wants is a bolt of rum!  Most of the passengers that have enjoyed the privacy of their own cabins have now decided the open air of the aft deck out trumps the privacy of their rooms.
The social area, i.e. my sleeping quarters

Fortunately for me Briner is also feeling a little punky and decides what little space that is left on the aft deck would be better than his and Max’s stuffy room so I grab his bunk for the night. Now that we are underway we all take watch shifts. The skipper has the boat on autopilot and needs eyes out to look for other boats and wake him if we go off course. I volunteer for the early morning shift.

Sunday
 I’m up at 05:00 and enjoy the early morning with John watching out for boats and generally just shooting the shit.  The morning finds little improvement on the condition of the weather and of the people on board.
Sea sick passengers

No one is in the partying mood anymore and they just want to feel better. Around noon the weather improves and the sea dies down allowing us to go up front and get some much needed fresh air. I spend most of the afternoon laying around on the forward trampling (if that’s how you spell it). I also did some map work today and it almost looks doable to get to Cusco by the 23th. That is if all the border crossings go well and the POS KTM holds up. What could possibly go wrong!
Monday
Well the first thing that could go wrong did go wrong. When we docked this morning Fritz informed us our passports would not be stamped until tonight and our bikes are to remain on the boat until tomorrow morning. This means any chance of an early start for Medellen tomorrow has been nixed. We’ll probably spend all morning getting the bikes imported into Columbia and not get on the road until the afternoon at the earliest!


Cartagena!
Fritz The Cat, Caragena CO.
Captian Fritz and his lovely girlfriend Tulay



Wednesday, December 7, 2011

WE MADE IT!!!!!!!!!!


PRIVATE PARKING IN LEON

Monday

We go to breakfast at a great place. Eggs, bacon and potatoes. Good old American eats! And great coffee! Stopped by a local tour office and set up a tour for the afternoon. Took some talking into but convinced Max he needed to get a little history of the area. Then spent some time catching up on the blog. We meet up with the tour guide and did a 2 hour walking tour of Leon. He covered a lot of politico history and then took us to the big cathedral where we spent way too much time. Guess I’m a little jaded when it comes to cathedrals.
Cathredal in Leon
 Maybe too many tours through the years but it seemed to me they all begin to look the same. Don’t get me wrong this was a magnificent building dating back to the 1600’s with the usual stories about miracles and such but I was more interested in contemporary history. After the church he took us to a very bizarre museum. I’ve been to similar museums in different 3rd world countries. This one was called a historical/myth museum. It was in a prison used by the Contras during the 70’s to house Sandinista prisoners. But there was very little info about that except these weird drawings on the wall depicting prisoners being tortured. Most of the displays were these crude manikins wearing bizarre costumes representing different myths of the area. It might have been a little interesting if he described the meaning of the myths instead of just telling us the mythical name of the ugly lady with blackened skin and yellow teeth!
Finally after 2 hours of this he set us free and, without hesitation John and I went for a beer.
Leon Nic.

Tuesday
Adios to our Palestinian hosts, an early breakfast and we’re off to Costa Rica! We made the border by 2, riding on CA2 and figured we’d be exported out and imported in by 3. The exporting part in Nicaragua went well although we did cheat a little and use a handler for part of it. We then drove on to the Costa Rica side and that’s when the paper started flying! First the fumigation, needed papers for that, then immigration, more paperwork and finally the import process! They wanted the usual, original title, passport, drivers license, proof on insurance which sent us to yet another unmarked building 100 of meters away, multiple copies of all documents which sent us to another unmarked building 100 of meters in the opposite direction.
Leaving Hoset Madrid, Leon
After getting all the together the customs guy stamps and hands back my paper work. Cool I’m done! NOT! We need to go to another unspecified building for the final approval. We ride off in search of that place, stopping at 2 other buildings before finding the proper one hidden in a sea of trucks and trailers. Waiting 30 minutes it is finally my turn and I hand over my ream of papers. The man looks at me with a scowl, hands back my papers pointing to the stamp I got at the previous office. “Not signed!”. Are you kidding me! I’ve got to go back just to get a scribbled signature from the dunce who’s only job is to stamp and sign this document. It’s a good thing most people with in shouting distance did not understand English but if they did they would have heard a gringo screaming “you mother $$#%^ &%%$%^$& ^%$%^^$$#^ Son of a %#W$#@ bureaucrats!
They build great Volcanos down!
3 and ½ hours it took so now it’s getting dark and we have 40 miles to ride to get to Liberia and a hotel. Within a couple of miles we hit our 1st roadblock. They check our passports and let us go. Oh oh I forgot I’ve no tail lights. “John stay real close behind me as we leave”. Phew, dodged another bullet.  10 more miles down the road we hit the 2nd roadblock. Same thing and off we go. When we are stopped a 3rd time I’m thinking, “this is excessive”. But no problem and we’re on our way again. We get Liberia around 7, find a hotel and head out to Mongo’s for dinner. Ribs rice and beans! Um um good! I phone Frits and Mayela (friends from the Yukon who live and have a business down here in the Winter) to let them know we’ll see them tomorrow.
What me worry?


Wednesday
Breakfast at Mongos. They do dinner much better than breakfast. Max and I go in search of oil. We find the oil and light bulbs for me. We ride out to Frits and Mayela’s who live just down the road from Nocoya. They have built a restaurant out there complete with a swimming pool, a Tilapia pond and beautiful landscaping. I can’t believe the amount of work that has gone into that place, most of which they have done themselves. Max and I change our oil. Mine took 30 minutes and the POS KTM took 2 hours! After we head down to the restaurant where Mayela cooks up a scrumptious meal of Tilapia and all the fixings. Chuck and Marilyn, the couple that own Caribou Crossing (for those of you familiar with the Yukon area) also joined us for dinner.
Hostel in Liberia CR

They have an awesome house on the same property as the restaurant and also spend the winters here. Great evening with great stories.

Thursday
While changing his oil Max discovered his pannier frame had broken. So after breakfast John and I rode out to the beach and Max went in search of welder. We all were successful! John and I found some awesome beaches, had a great lunch and went swimming and Max got the POS KTM welded up. Last night Frits told us a story about a guy who built his own sailboat and sailed around the world with his wife who lives in the area. This got Max’s curiosity up so after getting the bike fixed he went out to find this guy.
Frits and Maylas House

Max finds him and spends a couple of hours with him and his wife. Sounds like an interesting character. In 1972 he rode a Norton from California to Panama blowing numerous head gaskets on the way. Back in 72 I too had a Norton. Every time I tried to leave town it broke down. I couldn’t even get as far as Santa Cruz let alone Panama!
Dinner tonight is at Chuck and Marilyn’s. Marilyn cooked up Chicken Cordon Blu and it was delicious! Great to be eating home cooked meals 2 nights in a row! While at their house we were visited by three Armadillos. 4 years ago a skinny starving Armadillo showed up and they began feeding it. Since then he and his friends have been coming around pretty regular. He actually plays with you like a dog, they feed them hot dogs and they eat right out of your hand, the big one sitting up and lets you scratch him on his belly.
Changing oil in Frits's Garage
Sorry about the mess!

Friday
We would have loved to stay another couple of days. Today Frits and Mayela open their restaurant for another season and on Saturday the little village near them is hosting 100 horsemen for some sort of celebration. But again our boat beckons and I want to see monkeys and volcanoes before leaving Costa Rica. Our ride today takes us across the North western tip of the Gulfo De Nicoya , East to the Pan American Highway, then Northwest to Canas. Not much to talk about just flat farms and fields. At Canas we turn onto 142 and begin to climb towards Laguna De Arenal. We stop for lunch  in Tilaran then ride down to the lake. We are getting into the cloud forest here and the temperature drops down to a comfortable temp.
Me, Frits and Max at the Talopia Pond

We have to circle the lake to get to our destination, Parque National Arenal. Arenal Volcano is an active volcano where on a clear night you can see the lava flows and is situated in a cloud forest, an area where the moist air climbs the mountains then condenses into clouds and rain. Thus it’s a crap shoot to even see the volcano. While driving around the lake I make a wrong turn which begins a series of events which will haunt us for days to come…..
Actually that’s a little melodramatic. I realize my mistake and stop to look at the map. Max and John come up and shut off their bikes. Well you probably already guessed it. Max’s POS KTM would not start! Now it’s the starter motor.
Frits and Mayla in thier beautiful Orchard

It sounds like it is turning but just grinding gears. Fortunately there is a steep hill right there so Max takes off to try to bump start it. Well it’s a dead end and the bike didn’t fire. So now we have to push the POS KTM back up the steep hill. Now what? We try push starting the bike on the highway but no luck. Then we tried the tow method that never works. Max holds the tow strap in his left hand while holding the clutch in and the other end attaches on my bike. I think “this isn’t going to end well” but Max assures me he’s done it before. Well it didn’t work. As I begin to pull I notice Max is no longer behind me, he’s right next to me on my left! That won’t work and soon both bikes are on the ground! I find a new use for my helmet, pulling it off and throwing it as far as I can. I’m pissed! Opps forgot my camera was attached to the helmet!
Frits and Maylas restaurant

 Then it begins to rain for the first time on the trip! I next ride down the road looking for a possible place to stay or at least work on the POS KTM. The first place I see is a yoga /meditation hostel. I was tempted but continued on until I found a run down restaurant and hotel and thought this would be more appropriate with my mood. It also was down hill the whole way so Max tried bump starting it again. Bam! It started so we continued on to our Hostel at Arenal. It was a great ride around the lake but I couldn’t appreciate it because we were once again fighting daylight and worrying about the POS KTM. We arrived at the Essence Arenal Hostel just before dark. I picked this place based on the Lonely Planet write up. They raved about the food and the rooms were a great deal. It was also located at the top of a very high hill (all the better to start Max’s bike when the time comes). The Essence lived up to the Lonely Planets praise.
Me at Sameria Beach CR

It's all vegetarian with a lot of the food being grown right on the property. They also incourage you to participate in the preparation of the meal (this I generally hide from but in this case it was actually fun). We helped with preparing the dough for a fried bread.  The whole atmosphere and friendliness of this place really helped put my head in a much better space. We immediately decide to stay 2 nights. The clouds cleared a little but not enough to see the volcano top that night.


And then the starter went out....

Saturday
Saturday begins with a 6am hike around the property. Everything is just waking up. Birds, monkeys and even the chickens. This is the best time to be in the jungle. The noise level goes from zero to 100% in just a few minutes with the Howler monkeys leading the way! The hike takes us down to a creek and back up to the hillside where they grow their veggies, herbs and fruit. We see lots of birds, mostly Parrots and get a great view of the lake below. We get back in time for a great breakfast. This chef is awesome!  Then Max and I go into KTM repair mode. Off comes the seat and tank, this has to happen to access anything pertaining to the engine. Then I dive into the starter while Max disassembles the carb and checks the plug. The starter seems to be working so next I take the cover off that exposes the intermediate gears.
Volcan Arenal

There I find part of the problem. The gear is missing 3 teeth! Looking further I find all three teeth in the stator. Fortunately they didn’t make it to the crankcase where they could have done real damage. Now Kelly, one of the owners of the place gets into the mix. He’s famerilar with these bikes and calls the KTM dealer in San Jose (the only KTM dealer  in Central America). They may have a starter and the gear in stock! The other partner happens to be in San Jose and might be able to pick them up for us. It being Saturday this is our only shot. Our hope soars! Only to be let down when KTM calls back to tell us they were mistaken and don’t have the gear. We put the bike back together and resign ourselves to finding other methods of getting the bike going.
Hard at work trip planning

Another wonderful dinner and no sight of the volcano. It has been raining most the day and is not letting up for the night. I sleep uneasy anticipating the ride down the mountain after all that rain. I’m expecting a mud slide all the way down  (8kms worth).

Sunday Dec. 4
  We pack up the bikes (this has gotten so routine we have gone from taking an hour to load down to 20 minutes) we do this like robots, whether we are carrying on a conversation or not. Totally automatic. It’s been raining all night and dosen’t look as though it will let up so we soldier on.
Howler Monkey in nearby tree

Max leaves first, bump starting the KTM successfully! The road out isn’t as bad as I thought it would be and we make it down to the highway without incidence.
Leaving Arenal in the rain

Kelly gave us directions to get to the Coast Highway the “short way”. This turns out to be a tiny road that winds up and down through the mountains, in and out of the clouds. There are lots of small villages but for the first time the signage is good and I make no wrong turns. The first big town we come into is San Ramone. This is where Max stalls the KTM on a busy, flat avenue. After much discussion we decide the tow method is our only option. This time I hook up the tow line to his frame and this works like a champ as lone as he doesn’t brake too hard (jerking the shit out of me) or too soft (winding the strap in his front wheel).  We find a restaurant sitting on a hill (this becomes a common theme because of the POS KTM) and have lunch with a French Canadian who lives on the beach down in Bejuco, on the Pacific side of CR. He’s riding his Harley up to his second home near San Jose. Seems he’s done pretty well manufacturing tanning beds. Now we are riding on the Pacific coast where we will stay until Panama City.
Our Cool Digs Uvita CR

Hoping to get closer to the Panama border, we are once again stopped by night coming on. We leave the main highway at Uvita in search of a eluvsive Hostel by the Sea. We never did find that but we did find a really nice place with individual bedrooms, bathrooms, kitchen and living room. A far cry from what I thought we’d get. This place was the Ritz! Each cabin was built using 4” Cedar logs and the craftsmanship was very good. They are owned by a Canadian and must be hurting for guests because I got it for 40% off without even working them too hard. I cooked up a scrumish chicken stew dinner using a freeze-dried package that was at least 5 years old. At least that’s my excuse for screwing up a freeze-dried dinner. Never could get the consistency right.
Panama Border

 It rarely happens but even Briner complained about it. I had to remind him of our agreement back on the Baja that he and Max did the cooking and I did the route research. I’m not that good at route research but even worse when it comes to cooking!

Monday
Another border day. Max is up early! He cooks up some oatmeal I make some coffee and we all pack up. Now the test…. Can we start the KTM? After numerous unsuccessful
 kicks we set up for the tow method. By now it’s almost routine. It fires right up and we are on the way! We are riding through grasslands to our right and rain forest to the left. The road is good and we are making good time. We arrive at the Panama border at Paso Canaros at 9:30 and get the bikes exported quickly without any handlers help (maybe we are finally getting this thing figured out). Max pushes the KTM across no mans land to the Panama side while I wait for Briner to finish up. We then start the process of getting ourselves stamped in, then our bikes. Once again I could go on and on
"El Fumigator"

 about the how incompetent and unorganized the whole thing is but I’ll just say it took Max and John 3 times to get their paperwork right. Not their fault but the lady typing it up just couldn’t get it straight. We also had to employ a handler because we couldn’t find the insurance office. They all work pretty well together to make the process as hard as possible. The last thing we had to do was to have the bikes fumigated. I was first and no one was around so I just rode into the stall thinking someone would come around. Well it turns out Panama is pretty progressive when it comes to fumigation. It’s automatic! When I rolled into the shed the sprinklers activated automatically! I was sprayed on three sides (right, left and bottom) with some sort of detergent/insecticide. The worst part was I didn’t have my jacket on. On the bright side it relieved the tension of taking 4 ½ hours to get across the easiest border in Central America. Everyone was amused but me. Fortunately, soon after, it began raining cats and dogs and washed off what had gotten on me. It also soaked me through before I was able to pull out the rain gear. I didn’t mention this but the border is at the top of a long hill so when we were finished Max just coasted down and bump started his bike. About 1 km down the road was the final check point. My papers were in order but John and Max were missing a signature! We had to go back! Turning his bike around Max stalled. He bump started and we all went back. They got the papers signed and we were finally out of there! Borders are a bitch when you are in a hurry! Plus we moved into the next time zone which lost us another hour. Now we are back on the Pan American Highway and making tracks. Once in Panama everything changes. We are on a 4 lane highway that is lined with traffic cops every 5kms. Also the jungle seems to close in with every mile. We are quickly riding into dark and not finding any hotels. I’m amazed at how few buildings we see. This seems to be a fairly desolate part of the country with just a few small villages along the road. We finally make Santiago about a hour after dark and find a place well off the road for the bikes sake. Nothing much to write about here so let’s move on.