Author: StaleFish

Parque Pingüino Rey

February 20, 2016

I left Punta Arenas on the 1pm ferry to Porvenir and Tierra del Fuego. While waiting on the ferry, the weather constantly danced between light drizzle and sunshine. The wind was ever-present of course, but not terrible, at probably 20 to 25 mph. 

Mauricio and Mama at Casa La Escondida. This was a superb place to stay just slightly outside of Punta Arenas, and a big part of the reason was the hospitality, although the accommodation and food was excellent as well.

 

While waiting in line at the ferry dock, I met this couple from israel traveling Patagonia in a rented Wicked camper van (same type van as the Austrian couple I met earlier). They’re just getting started on their camping journey, and I’m pretty sure I’ll see them again in Ushuaia.

The ferry ride is about two hours. As soon as I rode off the ferry and into Porvenir it began raining, sleeting, and the winds suddenly increased to about 50 mph. I set off out of town only to find that the pavement immediately stopped. It was mostly gravel, but in a few places there was no gravel, and it turned to slick, snotty mud. I slipped and slid and managed not to crash somehow but my tires balled up with mud so bad that the bike wouldn’t steer at all. Eventually the rain let up, the wind increased even more, and the mud came off my tires in the gravel and rock road.

I stopped at a place on the side of the road with some big trees thinking it would offer some wind break, but the trees were too far apart. As I stood there, I dropped one of my gloves. The wind caught it and it took off faster than I could run with my bad ankle. After about a hundred yards I managed to catch it just before it blew under the fence and out to sea. My physical therapy for the day complete, I remounted and continued toward the Penguin Park.

My GPS coordinates were for a place I found on iOverlander that just said “grassy spot” and was about a mile past the penguin park. I was hoping there would be a hill or dune or something to hide behind with my tent. When I got to the penguin park there was a guy on a loaded motorcycle there so I pulled up next to him, noticing the German license plate. Ernest was on a beautiful late ’80s BMW R100GS, and had just finished the tour of the penguins. He said the park ranger told him he could sleep in a small “house” up the road and I was welcome to join him. The park was closing soon, and I had planned to visit the King penguins in the morning, so I followed Ernest up the road.

When we got there, it was a tiny building about 7 feet wide by 10 feet long in the middle of the grassy field I was planning to camp in. Inside the building was a metal bunk bed frame (no mattresses), a table, and a stove made out of a cut-down 55 gallon drum. 

We started a fire in the stove, put the air mattresses and sleeping bags on the bunks, and Ernest cooked dinner. It was actually pretty comfortable. Just before dark another couple showed up: a German brother and sister hitchhiking/backpacking to Ushuaia from Punta Arenas. They set up their tent on the less windy side of the building and slept there. 

Nothing for many, many miles to block the wind. Except this great little hut with a stove, table and beds in it. It’s actually for the sheep herders here, but they let others use it when they aren’t. And the employees at the Penguin Park show their appreciation by keeping it clean. If you could see the bikes better, you’d see that Ernest’s BMW is spotless, while mine is covered in mud. He left Porvenir before the rains.

Ernest cooking dinner in the nice, warm hut. Cut-down 55 gallon drum wood-burning stove in the bottom right corner of photo.

The wind finally dropped to probably 30 mph or so this morning. The King Penguin Park doesn’t officially open until 11am, but when I rode up around 9:30, the ranger was very friendly and invited me in early. I spent about an hour walking around watching the penguins. The size and color of these guys is amazing. I wished I had binoculars. In the photos, if you look closely, you can see several young penguins, who aren’t old enough to have the orange markings yet.

After visiting the penguins it was another 30 miles or so of gravel road to the border crossing into the Argentine side of Tierra del Fuego. 

The ghost town of Onaisin. This looked like the school or community center.

 

The entire remains of the town were fairly intact but fenced off. The town was established by English sheep herders in the 1890s, but apparently didn’t last. It sits on the shore of Bahia Inutil (Useless Bay).

 

You see a number of abandoned wrecked cars sitting where they met their demise on the side of the road. This one says “Better Cycling” on the side of it.

As I finished up my paperwork and was just leaving the border crossing, Ian rode up. He’s been to Ushuaia and is on his way to Buenos Aires to ship home. 

It was good to see Ian again. He’s headed to Buenos Aires and home. I hope to see him again in a few months.

The pavement begins with Argentina Ruta 3 at the border crossing, and it’s a smooth, beautiful road all the way to my hosteria tonight in Tolhuin. I’m only sixty miles from Ushuaia, but this hotel on the shore of Lago Fagnano was just too nice and relaxing not to stop at for a night. 

South of Rio Grande on the Atlantic coast: When the tide goes out here, it REALLY goes out. Like about a quarter of a mile.

 

My hotel for the night, overlooking the lake.

Fin del Mundo

February 22, 2016

The last few days have been planned (term applied loosely) around the wind. I left Tolhuin late in the morning after waiting for the wind to die down. Which it did, as soon as the rains came. The rain didn’t last long, but gave me a chance to pack up and hit the road with less chance of getting blown off it. 

The last mountain pass before heading down to Ushuaia…Paso Garibaldi.

 

Looking back at Lago Fagnano from Paso Garibaldi.

 

Entry to Ushuaia. Last town south in Argentina, and claimed as the southernmost city in the world.

Ushuaia is built on the side of the mountain, as the mountains go down to the bay. Thus the streets tend to look a bit like San Francisco in one direction, and then relatively flat and level perpendicular to the shoreline. 

The cruise ships here bring lots of tourism. And lots of tourists. If not for tourism, this would definitely be a much smaller, and much slower town. As it is, there are tour buses and taxis everywhere, and they all seem to be in a tremendous hurry, which can get interesting when you’re trying to get rolling up one of these hills again after the tourists step out in front of you mid-way up. 

There is also a steady stream of tour buses and taxis heading out to the Tierra del Fuego National Park, just west of town at the end of Ruta 3. This is a gravel road, and they don’t seem to care if the dust reduces visibility to near zero, they are still going to drive right on your taillight in the gravel (and mud). 

They seem to be in a hurry to take as many tourists as possible to the end of Ruta 3 at Bahia Lapataia. And oddly, I had to actually get in line to take a photo of my bike with the famous sign at the end of the road, even in the rain. 

The famous sign at the end of the road.

 

I lost count of how many people came up and wanted their photo taken with me in front of the sign. Crazy.

 

As I was leaving the parking lot where the sign is at the end of Ruta 3, I happened to notice the Alaska license plates on this VW bus. Dillon and Tessa spent the past year driving their 1975 VW Westfalia from Alaska, surfing, skiing, hiking, and enjoying themselves along the way. They plan to ship it from Buenos Aires to Florida and start a new journey there.

The hostels in town were mostly booked — at least the ones I could find a place to park the bike in — so I decided to camp at the National Park. I had already paid my $12 park entrance fee to take the photo with the sign, so after that, camping was free for up to three days. Might as well take advantage of it. And after all, the park is beautiful, with lots of trees, rivers, trails, and wildlife.

Three of these guys swooped in and hung out with me at my campsite. Obviously expecting to be fed.

 

Again, I know nothing about birds, but this guy appeared to be the Dad, and stood around not far from me while Mom and the chicks fed. I loved his black boots.

 

Mom watching over the family as they dine. This was about ten feet from my tent. These are very young but not small birds.

It rained a little in the evening, but the wind wasn’t bad. Until about 6am. That’s when it really started howling. I sat in the tent until 11am, wondering if the poles would snap before the fabric disintegrated. I was afraid to try to take the tent down, because all of my stuff was in it, and one wrong move would mean things would get blown into the river. Amazingly, the tent held up perfectly. Another piece of equipment that I will certainly buy again. 

And of course, just after I publish a post about my gas canister stove, I run out of gas while making coffee! (But sure enough, I found two different outdoor stores on San Martin Avenue that sold the canisters, so I have plenty for all of the camping I’m planning to do between here and Buenos Aires.)

By noon I was ready to head into town and try again to find a hostel so I could put my stuff in a locked room, park the bike somewhere relatively safe, and walk to town. I found what I was looking for at Hostel Aonikenk, and after a trip to two ATMs I had enough money for a few nights here along with a tour or two. 

City sign designating the “end of the world” at the bay.

 

The cruise ships were in port. Good for businesses, bad if you’re looking for a place to park, a place to eat, or a place to stay.

 

I always wondered what Jimmy Button did after his motocross career ended…

 

Estancia Harberton and Isla Martillo

February 24, 2016

Today I went to Estancia Harberton (Haberton Ranch), about 50 miles east of Ushuaia. This 48,000 acre ranch was founded by Thomas Bridges, a missionary from the UK in the 1880s, and includes four mountains, three rivers and 40 islands. It was named after his wife’s hometown of Harberton, Devon. They raised cattle and sheep on it for generations, until in the mid-1990s a snowstorm that lasted 21 days wiped out most of the livestock. At that point, the fourth generation family owners decided to stop ranching and the sole source of income now is from tourism, including tours to Isla Martillo, a tiny island on the ranch that has a large penguin colony.

The ranch also has a museum which has a large collection of marine mammal skeletons, including various dolphins, seals, sea lions, and whales from the area, and some penguins and other birds.

Many of the skeletons are mounted on the wall over a corresponding painting of the animal.

 

Whale skeletons, too large for inside.

 

 

Orca

 

Marine biology students serve one month internships here. This one is cleaning the skull of a specimen.

But the big attraction is Isla Martillo. It’s a ten minute boat ride from Estancia Harberton, and they only allow 80 people a day to actually walk with the penguins on the island. They do two morning tours with 20 people each, and two afternoon tours with 20 people each.

Magellanic penguins

 

 

 

Many of the younger penguins were molting, changing to their adult feathers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gentoo penguin. Note the different markings from the Magellanic penguins. Similar size. While the Magellanic penguins go north for the winter, the Gentoo stay here year round.

 

Feed me!

 

 

The lone pair of King Penguins on the island.

 

 

There are 7,000 nesting holes on the island.

 

Chick in the nest

 

 

I caught a short video of this “beak slapping” ritual between two penguins, likely mates. If you listen, in the background you’ll hear what sounds like a donkey braying. That’s the sound Magellanic penguins make. They raise their beaks straight up, puff out their chests, and make this braying sound.

 

From the ranch you can see across to Puerto Williams. I really wanted to go there, if for nothing else because of the name. But it’s a difficult and costly proposition, and the truth is, there’s nothing there. It’s a town of about 5,000 people with little infrastructure. The passenger ferry from Ushuaia (without the bike) is $300 round trip, and it’s only a 30 minute boat ride, plus a 30 mile bus ride each way. The car ferry is from Punta Arenas, and only leaves on Wednesdays, returning on Saturdays, and is a 34 hour trip and much more costly. And with both, there’s no guarantee on the sailing either direction due to the wind conditions here.

These are called Bandera, or Flag Trees. Did I mention the wind blows here? A lot.

 

 

U-Turn

February 27, 2016

After seven months of heading south, I am finally heading north again.

The weather was beautiful as I left Ushuaia; a bit cool — in the upper 30s Fahrenheit — but sunny and almost no wind.

View from my hostel on my last morning in Ushuaia. If you zoom in, and look past the airport runway, between there and the big mountains in the background, lies Isla Martinez. There you go, Zeke.

 

Some of the locals obviously have a sense of humor about their location.

As I crossed over Paso Garibaldi, the weather changed on the other side. The rest of the day was complete cloud cover, with occasional drizzle, and it seemed to be getting colder.

After just a few hours of riding, I turned off Ruta 3 about 15km north of Rio Grande, and drove down a dirt road and out to the beach. There were some small sand dunes here and I set up camp.

The best kind of camping….free. And not a bad location either.

Daniel and Joey were delayed leaving Punta Arenas, and they were headed this way, so we agreed to meet at this spot for the night. They pulled in a few hours later, and as usual, Joey fixed us all a great dinner.

The wind picked up overnight, and the rain started. By morning it was still raining, but the wind was slowing down a bit. We enjoyed a leisurely morning and a late breakfast, and by a little after noon the rain let up and we packed up and went our separate ways.

Camping made better by dinner and breakfast with great people. While I tend to be a bit more minimalist with my gear, I have to admit I’m a bit jealous at times when Daniel and Joey pull out this extra tarp for rain protection and set up the kitchen for a great meal. They’re headed south to Ushuaia, then north. I’m hoping to meet up with them again in Buenos Aires.

I was getting a late start, but still planned to do a bit over two hundred miles, including two border crossings and a ferry crossing. In order to get from this part of Tierra del Fuego, which is in Argentina, to mainland Argentina, you have to cross through Chile. So I crossed back into Chile at San Sebastian, which is also the end of the pavement for 34 miles. After that, a beautiful new concrete road is being built, but only a portion of it is open, so there was another eight to ten miles of gravel road before the pavement took hold permanently and took me to the Punta Delgada ferry crossing and then back into Argentina for the final time.

A series of “lasts”: after finishing the last unpaved road, the last ferry crossing for this continent.

 

Last border crossing for this continent (on the bike, at least).

I rode into Rio Gallegos just after dark. Unfortunately, the campground where I had planned to stay isn’t really a “campground” in the usual way that those of us from the States think of them. In Argentina, many campgrounds — especially the municipal campgrounds — are places where local families can go to relax, BBQ, enjoy their weekend with the family, and maybe even sleep in a tent. The campground in Rio Gallegos fits all of those things. Except no vehicles of any kind are allowed in the campground. Since everyone shows up in the family car, rather than a camper, trailer, or motorcycle, the car is parked on the street, and then you walk through a small gate into a large walled compound. A side street not visible from the campground wasn’t exactly where I wanted to leave my motorcycle. Since it was nearly 10pm, I decided to find a hotel in town rather than spend more time searching for another place to camp. I’ll make up for it over the next ten nights or so of camping on the way north.

Ruta 3 North

February 29, 2016

Ruta 3 can pretty much be summed up in one photo:

Long, relatively boring, and windy. From here, 2536 kilometers to Buenos Aires.

 

It’s the most direct way up to Buenos Aires. There are other ways, such as the way I came south, but it adds a lot of distance. And I now have a confirmed date to ship out of Buenos Aires, so it’s time to cover some ground.

And once again, I stand corrected: I said in my last post that I had ridden my last dirt/gravel road on this continent. Wrong again: as Alfred noticed by looking at my GPS track, I took a “small” detour (about 20 miles) down a dirt road yesterday to camp at an estancia. Not all camping excursions pan out as planned, and in this case I’ll admit that last night wasn’t great. It was still better than a lot of other places I could have been, but I don’t think I’d spend all that time riding down a dirt and gravel road on a bad chain to stay there again. The place had a decent gas stove to cook dinner on (no utensils, pots, pans, etc, but good gas) and hot showers. Okay, that’s it for the good. The bad: the place runs on a generator, from 9pm to midnight. The generator is in the building with the stove and bathrooms. It’s loud. The owner wouldn’t turn it off early, and it turns out that’s because he had company and they were practicing. Yep, the band is louder than the generator. But I was tired and managed to fall asleep anyway. So when I woke up this morning and started breaking down camp is when I realized that the owner’s four dogs had peed on three corners of my tent, and my gas can. Ugh.

So I used his dishrag to clean my rainfly. 🙂

Heading back to Ruta 3 this morning from the estancia. Twenty miles each way. Now I think I’m done with the dirt and gravel roads in South America. I think.

 

I saw this “Patagonian Eagle 150” at a gas station. Does that make it a Turkey Buzzard? I saw lots of those in Patagonia.

I’ve been praising my little 428 O-ring chain the entire trip, but it’s just a chain, and it is a small size, so in the last week it finally gave up. I’ve been adjusting it each day but even then it really needed it twice a day. I will have a new O-ring chain and sprockets in Buenos Aires, but I need to get there first. So today I bought a cheap non-O-ring chain and put it on my old sprockets (yeah, I know, it won’t be new for long like that). It just has to go another 1,200 miles. Hopefully.

Jonathon at the Yamaha dealer in Rivadavia installed my new chain for me. The original chain is an endless (no master link), so I let him cut it off and put the new cheapo chain on. He and Enrique were great to deal with. Really nice people. Total parts and labor: $34. I’ll put a new OE chain and sprockets on in another couple of weeks in Buenos Aires.

 

When Amazing Becomes the Norm

I was sitting at Overland Oasis in Tule, Mexico one afternoon last August, listening to two travelers, Jason and Toby, discuss their travels. Both had been through South America already and were headed north — Jason and Lisa on BMWs, Toby and Chloe in their Ford F150 camper. They both seemed to be suffering from some version of sensory overload, I suppose. They were somewhat lamenting what life was going to be like after the trip was over. I think it was Toby that said he had arrived at the point during their South America expedition that even the most majestic mountains and waterfalls became “just another mountain” and “just another waterfall”.

Then he said it. The line that hit me like a brick to the head:

“You see and do all of this incredible stuff and you get to the point where amazing becomes the norm.”

Wow. Mind boggling. Dangerous. I’ve always been an adrenaline junkie. What will life be like after seeing all of these amazing sights? Then what? Can you accept a daily routine in one place? What will it take to keep you happy? What will provide the adrenaline rush?

I’ve attended seminars and presentations held by people who have traveled the world by car, motorcycle, bicycle, boat, or on foot, and often there is the question of how to adjust to life after the trip ends. Most of the time the answer I’ve heard is the same: they don’t. They go back to work for some time, always with the goal of going again. But are they happy to be doing that? Or has it become a necessary drug to feed an addiction?

After seven months, I’m still fairly new to this, but the thought of how you handle life after amazing becomes the norm has me a little bit nervous.

But not enough to pass up the amazing.

Just a few days ago, I was sitting at a campsite on the beach with Daniel and Joey. They’ve been traveling together for 22 months now. When we last spoke in El Calafate, they were uncertain of what was next for them. They were discussing shipping the bikes home to Germany from Buenos Aires, and taking some time off from traveling. They were facing difficult decisions about starting a family and settling into a “normal” life.

Joey spoke up over dinner at the camp north of Rio Grande, Argentina: “Well, we have some exciting news.”

This sounded a lot like the introduction to “I’m pregnant and we now know which direction we’re headed”. Turns out it was quite the opposite.

She said, “We’ve decided to ship to Africa!”

Wow. Didn’t see that coming.

They said they were basically broke, and didn’t know how they would afford Africa (remember, this is the same Daniel Rintz that left home six years ago with no money to start his journey), but they were going anyway.

And then Daniel uttered a line that became the second time this trip that I had to immediately jump up and write something down:

“The thought of going back to a regular life is more terrifying than facing Africa with no money.”

Truer words have never been spoken.

 

Note: When I first drafted this post, one month into my trip, it was difficult for me to see beyond the amazing sights that I anticipated over the next several months. However, since riding the length of South America, and seeing some truly amazing places, I’ve come to realize that there is enough amazing in this world — even in your own backyard — to last more than a lifetime. If and when this trip ends, I believe there will still be amazing weekend trips to local places that I have yet to discover. 

And that’s more than enough to keep me going. 

I’ve had this fortune cookie slip of paper in my wallet for years. You can see why.

Expense Report: February 2016

February turned out to be a fairly expensive month due to new tires and a number of tours. Even though I had seven nights that I paid $0 for lodging, the expense of hostels and hotels in Patagonia drove the average up. Way up.

Gas: $139.65 (Daily average: $4.82)

Food: $382.60 (Daily average: $13.19)

Lodging: $841.17 (Daily average: $29.00)

Tours, Park Admission: $154.14

Bike Maintenance: $380.36

Tolls, Ferries: $23.95

Grand Total: $1925.21

Still cheaper than staying home…

March will be the most expensive by far, due to shipping and air fare costs, but I was aware of that ahead of time so it’s no surprise.

Ruta 3….Still!

March 4, 2016

This road truly seems to go on forever.

If you’ve ever driven through the King Ranch in South Texas, or up Highway 395 between Victorville, California and Ridgecrest, then you know the feeling of driving a long, straight two-lane road with nothing but desert scrub in either direction as far as the eye can see. Now, instead of that long, straight road going a hundred or even two hundred miles, imagine it going for 1,800 miles. In other words, if you left Raymondville, Texas (near the Mexican border) and drove north through the King Ranch, the scenery wouldn’t change until you got to, say, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. That’s the same distance. With a few dots in the road along the way for towns, but for the most part, nothing and nobody. Yep, Argentina is a big country.

Thankfully there are occasional detours to places that are a little more interesting.

Rada Tilly. I camped here one night at the municipal campground a couple of blocks from the beach. Nice town.

 

Puerto Madryn. I spent a couple of nights at the Ruca Hue bungalows. Reasonably priced, with my own kitchen, good wifi, and walking distance to the main area of town and groceries. Always nice when the staff encourages you to park your bike as close as you want to your front door.

 

Playa Larallde on Peninsula Valdes. Thirty miles off of Ruta 3 heading east across the peninsula, then six miles down a gravel road (the last mile was actually just beach sand). I had the whole place to myself all day and night, with the exception of a few hours in the evening when a couple of fishermen showed up. It was so dark that night (just a sliver of moon) that I was amazed at the stars and the Milky Way in the sky. And for the first time I saw the Southern Cross.

 

Low tide. That big rock sticking out in the water is about 15 feet from the water to the top.

 

Nearing high tide. At high tide, the rock was completely submerged. Made it easy to figure out where to put my tent.

 

Only 771 more miles to Buenos Aires!

 

Tangled Up in Blue

March 6, 2016

Just south of Bahia Blanca the scenery finally begins to change. Things start looking greener. Trees appear. I spend the night on the coast in a public park called Balneario Maldonado. A nice older couple manage the campground, and it’s just me and a guy from Buenos Aires staying there. 

In the morning I pack up late, taking my time. The weather is good — clear skies and temperatures in the upper 60s and low 70s — and my days are getting shorter, both in mileage and in daylight. Today is my last “long” day in South America: 245 miles to Azul. 

South of Tres Arroyos I pass a couple on a Kawasaki KLR on the side of the road. They look like they are in need of help, so I turn around and ask. They are from Buenos Aires, and have been to Ushuaia and are headed home. It seems the KLR has stopped charging and died. He has a small set of home-made jumper cables, and I offer to try to jump the KLR from my XT250. We succeed in killing my battery as well, which is tiny and the KLR is really dead. Fortunately my bike push starts easily and I’m able to get it going again. No such luck for the KLR. I offer to give him (or her) a ride to the YPF service station 15km up the road in search of a new battery, but he insists on waiting for a car to stop that hopefully will be able to jump-start the KLR. They thank me profusely, but I feel bad as I ride away leaving them on the side of the road. 

I pull into that YPF station several minutes later for fuel, and there are a half dozen other bikes there already. They are the Fuser biker club from Punta Alta (just north of Bahia Blanca), and are returning home from a weekend ride. They stand there bug-eyed while I discuss riding my 250 from Texas to Ushuaia and now to Buenos Aires. You can almost see the wheels turning. Most of them are on 250s, with a 400 and a 600 thrown in. Suddenly their world seems to be getting bigger. They can imagine traveling further on their 250s. We sit down and have lunch together in the fast food restaurant at the station, and, as usual, have a conversation in Spanish only. It’s getting easier, but can still be exhausting, probably for them as well, since I have to ask them to repeat several sentences. 

Fuser Moto Club Punta Alta Argentina

After lunch and trading stickers, I head north and they head south. The landscape continues to get greener. Crops appear; corn, soybeans, sunflowers, olives. 

Hard to see, but sunflowers as far as the eye can see.

 

These signs are randomly placed along the highway; not anywhere near the Malvinas (or Falklands) Islands. It seems Argentina wants to be sure to remind everybody who these islands belong to.

For seven months, I’ve been riding with a Sena bluetooth headset on the side of my helmet, but I haven’t used it once. I used it constantly in the States, but in Mexico, Central America, and especially Peru, I didn’t want any distractions taking my attention away from the other drivers. Now, on Ruta 3, I finally feel comfortable that I can listen to music in my helmet again. It seems appropriate to listen to Gotan Project as I make my last days towards Buenos Aires.

As I pull into the campground in Azul, I am approached immediately by a gentleman in a new motorhome. He invites me over for a maté (tea), and wants to discuss travel. Hector and Olinda are from Buenos Aires and have just purchased their motorhome. They are clearly excited about traveling.

Hector and Oly and their new motorhome.

 “Oly” wants to take it to Central America and Mexico. We have a spirited conversation about getting the motorhome around the Darien Gap to Panama, and she begins to make a list of places to see in each country, asking questions about my route. They are not computer-literate, so I pull out my Michelin World Map that I have traced my route on with a black Sharpie, and we talk about where I’ve been, and why I chose to go where I did (and didn’t) go. This couple speaks absolutely zero English. I spend a good two hours with them before I even get the tent off the bike. It’s fun, but at the same time, exhausting. Hector gives me a tour of the motorhome. I am actually amazed at how much space there is and how nice it is considering it’s built in a Mercedes Benz Sprinter. It has a bathroom, and double bed, a nice kitchen with a fold-down dinette, and lots of storage. I tell them that next time I’m doing this trip in their motorhome. 

With all of the time spent talking with others, it’s been a long day. I finally get the tent pitched, and cook the last of my pasta for dinner.

And I had “Birthday Cake” for dessert…

 

My brother and sister-in-law sent me this awesome card for my birthday. I think they hit the nail on the head.

Two hundred and sixty miles left to Buenos Aires. I’ll take two more days to do it, just to make it easy.

The Americas By The Numbers

March 9, 2016

Now that I am in Buenos Aires I have essentially completed the North, Central, and South America leg of my journey. In the future I will likely return to South America to continue to explore areas that I missed this time around. It’s a big continent, and I could easily spend a year here. Perhaps on Lap 2…

So here are some basic numbers:

  • 235 days on the road (115 days on the bike; 120 days off the bike)
  • 29,756 kilometers (18,490 miles)
  • 278 gallons of gasoline
  • 45 nights spent camping
  • 14 countries
  • 38 individual trips through immigration (and another 38 trips through Aduana or Customs)
  • 7 oil changes
  • 4 sets of tires
  • 3 sets of brake pads
  • 1 set of chain and sprockets
  • 2 crashes 
  • 1 tip-over
  • 1 bike “cannonball” off a worklift
  • 1 broken pannier rack (re-welded)
  • 0 flat tires

Aside from some dirty fuel in Argentina, and a leaking fork seal, I’ve had no problems with the bike.