Author: StaleFish

David, Panama

September 28, 2015

This morning I walked into Boquete and bought some oil, then stopped at a small car repair shop a block from where I was staying, and asked the owner if I could change my oil in his lot and leave my used oil with him. He not only said yes, but cut a one gallon plastic jug into a drain pan for me and showed me where I could pour my used oil into his recycle drum. Another very nice, helpful local that didn’t hesitate to help out a complete stranger. That seems to be a theme on this trip. While changing my oil, we got to talking a bit, and he asked where I had been.

“Mexico? Guatemala? Very dangerous!” he said.

I smiled and told him how friendly and beautiful those countries had been. It’s still funny to hear how the countries on either side of where I am presently are always dangerous, but not where I am. Now that I think about it, I’ve been hearing that since I was standing in Texas.

It’s also interesting to hear the same theme from the owner of this auto repair business in small town Panama compared to another in Texas. Aside from the language difference, the story was the same: in slow economic times, people either extend their maintenance or do without. They try to go longer between oil changes, but don’t want to spend the extra money on quality oils that can survive the extended use, setting themselves up for trouble and greater expense all because they are trying to “save” money. This of course has affected his business and he is somewhat thankful for the ex-pats that have moved to town and add to his business.

 

I came down from the Chiriqui Highlands of Boquete to David (pronounced Dah-Veed) to try to find tires for my bike before heading to Panama City. David is Panama’s second largest city, and is primarily in an agricultural lowland area. Many things were immediately noticeable: first, the humidity. Phew. Automatic diet plan: just sit and sweat it off.

Second, within a block, I saw KFC, McDonalds, Pizza Hut, and even a Dairy Queen. This is generally not a good indicator of where I want to be.

Third, I was quickly reminded of what I don’t like about Americans (okay, just certain ones), and hostels. The hostel shall remain nameless (but let’s just say, if you ever find yourself in David, don’t stay in any hostel named after a color). The American woman who owns and runs the hostel (I shall also leave her nameless) immediately began asking very inquisitive and I felt rather personal questions before I was even inside the gate. Then she warned me not to walk away from my motorcycle while it was outside of the gate, and once it was inside the gate, told me that my locked aluminum boxes on the bike were not safe and I needed to take anything of value out. (So, let’s see…it’s okay to walk four blocks to the grocery store and restaurant, but my stuff isn’t safe locked up inside your walled compound. Okay….).

As with most places in Central America, if air conditioning is offered, it is at an extra price and only for certain hours. In this case, it was an extra $5 beginning at 8pm. By 7pm I was still sweating profusely and the room was stifling, so around 9pm, I decided to spend the extra money and “rent” the A/C remote controller. I walked in and asked if I could pay for the A/C. “Sure, but that room is so small, it will cool off fast, so you don’t need it yet. Check back with my night clerk after 10pm.”

Uh, let’s see….the rental rate begins at 8pm. I can’t go into the room at 9pm because it’s still too hot. But I am told I don’t need it until after 10pm. Rather than respond and run the risk of more personal questions and observations about my sleeping habits, etc, I went back outside and continued to sweat in the driveway, wondering why I didn’t just ride the 25 miles back up the hill to Boquete where it was 69 degrees already.

So, lesson learned. No more room rentals from American ex-pat former Peace Corps workers with attitude.

Oh, and I never found tires either. But I have a good lead in Panama City now, so that’s at the top of my list.

In the “Very Small World” category, as I was walking across a busy street in David this afternoon, way off the beaten tourist path, a guy on a motorcycle stopped to let me cross, and as I walked in front of him, he said “Hey, stranger”. It was a guy from Oregon on a Kawasaki Ninja that I had met at the Nicaragua – Costa Rica border crossing. I’ve probably passed a couple of million people since then, criss-crossing from the Pacific to the Caribbean and back through two countries, and if I had been five seconds sooner or later, our paths would not have crossed again in David, Panama. Even off the Gringo Trail, it’s a small world.

 

Santa Catalina

September 29, 2015

You don’t get to Santa Catalina by mistake. It’s not the kind of place you stumble upon while driving through on the way to somewhere else. Santa Catalina is at the end of the road, about sixty miles down a road to nowhere else at the end of the Veraguas Peninsula. It’s mostly a small fishing village, but as with others along the Pacific coast of Central America, the surf has attracted a separate tourism industry. 

The ride down from David gets nice as soon as you turn off the InterAmerican Highway. The first sixty miles of InterAmerican Highway (I always called this the PanAmerican Highway, but it seems to have changed names somewhere along the way) are full of construction as they widen it from two lanes to a divided four lane road. After turning off at Tole, it’s mostly twisty road through the hills with glimpses of ocean.

Far background is a large island; ocean between.

 

There must be some serious fishing here, as I pass lots of places with large Grady White and Contender fishing boats with twin Yamaha outboards. Some have matching high-end homes, others are parked next to very meager houses. The boat is clearly worth more than everything else on the land. 

Somewhere about 15 miles before Sona, I ride through a swarm of wasps. The noise of them smacking my face shield and the sudden realization that I’ve been stung in the throat happen about the same time. I immediately think back to the last two times I’ve been stung by bees while riding, and start grabbing at my shirt and jacket to try to keep any that might have fallen down my shirt from stinging me. The pain continues through lunch in Sona (a great carne guisada, rice, beans, and a bottle of Coca Cola for $3.25), but begins to lessen by the time I reach Santa Catalina.

It’s off-season now, and there are only two German women staying at the hostel at the moment (and it’s managed by another German woman — is there a secret Central America movement I don’t know about? Clearly this part of the world has some heavy word-of-mouth advertising in Germany). 

I have a private grass hut overlooking the beach with a shared bath. Hammocks hang just outside the door, and the ocean breeze helps to mitigate the humidity.

 

Home for the night.

Town and a fish dinner is an easy two kilometer ride. Otherwise, I don’t plan to move from the hammock for the next several hours.

Santa Catalina to Anton Valley

September 30, 2015

In the morning I said goodbye to the beach and headed inland once more.

Elli, the German host at Rancho Estero. She makes my little 250 look even smaller. Real story: Her boyfriend runs the hostel, but he’s on vacation right now, so she’s running two places. She owns the Surf & Shake surf shop in Santa Catalina. And she surfs. And she gives lessons. And she rides her bicycle out to the hostel and back with her surfboard under her arm. Pretty cool.

After backtracking 60 miles up the peninsula to the InterAmerican Highway, it’s another 60 miles down the highway to the turnoff at Anton. Parts of this ride remind me of Highway 99 through the Central Valley of California. Divided four lane, lots of farms and ranches, big hills in the distance. It just has a similar feel.

On the way it starts getting very dark ahead. It’s lunch time and looking like some serious rain is headed this way, so I pull off at a Chinese restaurant on the side of the highway. Big, nice place. Good food. And sure enough, it starts to really pour. Lightning. Thunder. Heavy rain. After an hour or so it lets up, and I’m back on the bike headed for Anton, my balding knobby tires performing better than expected for the conditions.

The road from Anton up to El Valle de Anton, or Anton Valley, starts out with some potholes but turns to a nice two lane. It starts in jungle-like foliage, climbs through pine forest, then up to clear-cut. The last climb is sharp and steep, with some switchbacks I can only describe as “quirky”. Just as suddenly the road descends via similarly quirky, sharp switchbacks into Anton Valley, which is actually in the six kilometer wide crater of an inactive volcano at about two thousand feet elevation.

Climbing up from Anton to Anton Valley. Starts tropical…

 

and turns to pine forest on the climb up, before cresting the rim of the crater and back down into tropical Anton Valley. This all happens in a matter of just a few miles.

I’m staying at the Bodhi hostel, which opened about eleven months ago and is doing a good business based on the people I see wandering in and out. Definitely the backpacker crowd, but this place is great for motorcyclists as well as they have a large fenced and locked lot adjacent to the hostel, and directly across the street from the police station. Secure parking shouldn’t be a problem.

The dormitory is huge and there are quite a few guests. I choose a private room with shared bath. The room is on the small side but comfortable.

All the room you really need…

Oreo, the adopted hostel dog, greets me at the door. I’m told he’s a “mountain dog”; he has helped guide lost hikers off the mountain several times. Apparently he helped a hostel guest down from the mountain, and the hostel since adopted him. He’s still free-roaming, but he wanders back every night.

This is Oreo. He walked ahead of me all the way (5 blocks or so) to a Peruvian restaurant (like he knew where I was going), sat under the table on the patio while I ate, sat outside the grocery store door while I shopped, then led me all the way back to the hostel. And never asked for a tip. He’s a pretty cool dog.

Tomorrow is Panama City. I have a few days of projects, sight-seeing, and hopefully other things to do there. The weather won’t be as cool as here in Anton Valley, but I’m beginning to adjust to the heat and humidity of being this close to the equator. Or at least beginning to accept it.

 

Miscellaneous and Random Thoughts (and a little bathroom humor)

I’ve had a bunch of thoughts and photos that don’t really fit into a blog post, so I figured I’d just throw them all here.

Mileage-wise, since leaving home July 27th, I have ridden my little XT250 a distance equal to riding from Los Angeles to Atlanta and back to Los Angeles, and then back to Atlanta again. It hasn’t complained yet. For those that think they need at least a 650cc motorcycle to do this trip, I still disagree. The speed limit on most highways in Central America is between 60 and 80 kmh, or 35 to 50 mph. In towns the speed limit is typically between 30 and 40 kmh, or 20 to 25 mph. You can do 100 kph on small stretches of the InterAmerican highway, but that’s about it. Most of the time, you will end up averaging about 35mph.

There are still several things I haven’t gotten used to:

  • Nearly every male between the age of 14 and 80 walking beside the road is carrying a machete. Those between 10 and 14 are holding a rope attached to a horse.
  • Bare electrical wires attached to shower heads.
  • Open-air construction. Most roofing material does not touch the walls; there is a four to six inch gap between. This allows for good air circulation, good mosquito circulation, and good critter circulation.

Spider on the inside of the shower curtain. Overall diameter (including legs): about six inches. To her credit, the water from the shower didn’t bother her and she stayed put.

 

In the mountains, you get large spiders in the bathrooms. In the forests, you get large snakes, frogs, etc. Along the coast you get large crabs.

 

In my previous life, among other things, I spent time studying and discussing human factors — how humans interact with their environment, products and machinery. So things like this bathroom just drive me nuts. The entire room is three feet wide. I am just over six feet tall. I cannot sit on this toilet…my knees hit the wall long before then. Also, the only way to get to the shower is to squeeze between the toilet and the wall. But that’s exactly where they put the towel rack, as an obstacle, instead of on the opposite wall above the toilet. That wall was reserved for a picture of a tulip. And if there’s a towel on the rack, you can’t sit on the toilet OR get to the shower. There used to be a toilet paper holder to block your path also, but apparently someone already broke that off getting to the shower.

 

Random artwork in a hostel.

Panama City (not Florida)

October 1, 2015

Leaving Anton Valley I saw on my GPS what looked like an interesting small road cutting across to the highway that might save some time. Just a few kilometers from the hostel, I turned left and drove past beautiful million dollar homes on perfectly landscaped large lots. While this area hasn’t really been “discovered” by the foreign tourists and retiring ex-pats, it is a favorite spot for wealthy residents of Panama City who want to escape the heat for the weekend.

Further up this small road the climb became quite steep. Perhaps one of the steepest paved public roads I’ve ever experienced. I kept thinking the front wheel was going to come off the ground with all the weight I have on the rear of the bike. Eventually I crested the rim of the crater and almost immediately came to a security guard at a large gate. It seems my shortcut has been privatized into a luxury resort. I asked if the road still went to Bejuco, and the guard said yes, but it is now private. I smiled, thanked him, and headed back down the way I came.

Just as I got back to the main road out of Anton Valley, it started to rain. And it didn’t stop until I got to Panama City. I crossed over the Paraiso bridge over the Panama Canal into Ciudad del Saber (the City of Knowledge) and rode parallel to the canal past the Miraflores Locks. This area was once the Clayton military base when the United States controlled the canal. It has since been turned into businesses, schools, scientific research facilities, and residences with a focus on improving quality of life for Panamanians. There are still a lot of U.S. citizens living here.

I arrived at my guest house around 2pm, but the host family wasn’t home, and with a break in the rain I decided to head into Panama in search of tires. About ten minutes later, the bottom fell out of the sky, and I was riding in dense traffic in what felt like a waterfall. Since it wasn’t raining when I left the house but was humid, I had left the collar of my jacket open. Now I struggled to close it in traffic. I clearly didn’t get the flap sealed correctly, and within minutes I was drenched. As was everything else in my jacket. Fortunately I keep my passport in a waterproof envelope, but my smartphone and wallet took the brunt of it. I spent the next 45 minutes riding around and around, looking simply for a place to stop under some sort of cover, but finding nothing. I went ot Albrook Mall, a huge shopping center, thinking I would find a parking garage. Nope. People here take buses or taxis to the mall.

Streets flooded. Buses and cars zipped past me, spraying me with additional walls of water. The bike died. Five or six times. It always started right back up, but clearly it wasn’t happy about its’ current status as submarine. Heading back towards the house, I rode through a “puddle” on an on-ramp, and watched the front axle disappear. The water was deep enough that at 35 mph the pressure pulled my feet off the footpegs. I turned the throttle wide open, pointed the bike straight ahead, and hoped for the best. It didn’t get any deeper and I came out the other side and headed for “home”.

I’m staying in a neighborhood where everyone works out….even the children playing in the street are built like Hercules. Or maybe the signs are just a little optimistic.

On Friday the weather cleared and I again went in search of tires, finally locating some Pirelli MT60s near downtown. Not exactly what I had been looking for — considerably less off-road oriented than what I’ve been using — but they should get me well into South America.

My host family invited me for dinner Friday night, and I had a great meal and conversation. They are from Ecuador, and love and miss their homeland. I broke out my Ecuador map and Carlos gave me some great tips on what not to miss in Ecuador.

On Saturday morning, Carlos and Dianna and family left for a weekend island expedition and whale watching, and left me the entire house; not just the small cabana I’m staying in. I am again amazed at the generosity and openness of people. I’ve been here a day, and they give me a key to their house and leave. “See you Sunday!”

My phone continued to dry out for a couple of days, and after some false starts, it seems to work again. I don’t use it as a phone, but it has a lot of information in it, and a couple of navigation apps that sometimes (okay, often) work better than the Garmin GPS in this part of the world. I would miss that if the phone died completely.

I spent Saturday sight-seeing. First up was Casco Viejo, the old part of Panama City. Much of this area was built in the 1700s, and it has a very New Orleans colonial look and feel to it.

Casco Viejo

 

Las Bovedas, or The Vaults. This area was built in the 17th Century as part of the defense system of the old city, and the thick walls also allowed these vaults to be used as barracks and a prison. This area was also known as the Bastion of Chiriqui, and today the Plaza de Francia sits in front of the vaults.

Looking across to downtown from Casco Viejo

 

Looking the other direction at the ships on the Pacific side of the Canal waiting to enter the first set of locks.

 

Bridge of the Americas

After lunch in Casco Viejo, I headed to the Balboa Yacht Club. This is one of several harbors on the Pacific side that private boaters use before transiting the Panama Canal. I had read that the canal requires four people on each boat that passes through, and many solo sailors and couples need to hire deckhands (line handlers, actually) to assist through the canal. I hung around the docks and posted a small ad on their bulletin board to see if I could volunteer as a linehandler. It’s a one-day trip through the canal, and I could ride the bus or train back from the other end. Seemed like a great way to see the Panama Canal, for free. It’s not high-season, and there are few boats here at the moment. I heard there may be a better chance starting at the other end, in Colon, but that would require me either staying in a hotel there for a few days in hopes of getting a ride, or taking the bus each day. So for now, I’m hanging around the docks each morning at a couple of marinas to see if anything turns up. At the very least, I’ve met some interesting characters there.

 

I love this. This is a set of light switches at the yacht club. Notice that most of the switches are labeled as to their function (“techo” means roof). Then note the bottom right switch. Someone took the time to label the switch “No Se” (Don’t Know).

 

Another view of the city from the Metropolitan Natural Park in the middle of town.

I have a few more days of prep before heading out of Panama on Thursday. My Colombia plans are coming together. I’m excited about a new continent.

Goodbye to Panama and Central America

October 7, 2015

It rained heavily again Tuesday afternoon, so I spent all afternoon at the Miraflores Locks Visitors Center learning about the Panama Canal and watching ships pass through the locks. It’s an impressive sight. A huge freighter with only two feet of clearance on each side between ship and canal, being lowered twenty seven feet in six minutes. The speed and efficiency is amazing, from approaching the locks to exiting the second stage of the locks all within less than an hour.

Set of double gates between the first and second stage of the Miraflores Locks. These are the original gates built in 1914 in Pittsburgh. Each weighs 600 tons.

 

Tug guiding the tanker Torm Caroline into the locks. Not raining yet. Paraiso Bridge in the background — I crossed over the canal on this bridge last Thursday coming into town.

 

BAM! Now it’s raining. This is what last Thursday was like as I was riding into town.

 

Tanker in the first stage of the locks. Water height is all the way up and the deck of the ship is quite a bit higher than the edge of the locks.

 

Water pumped from the first stage to the second stage of the locks at over 300,000 gallons per minute. In six minutes the ship is lowered 27 feet.

 

Tanker deck is now at road level, gates open and transferred to the second stage where it all happens again.

 

Next up, the CPO Miami, a large freighter. I counted around 1200 shipping containers above deck.

 

Lowering in the first stage.

 

Passing through the gates. There are six locomotives attached to the ship to keep it in position, with only two feet on each side between the ship and the canal.

 

The only place I’ve ever seen a locomotive go downhill at a steep angle. They have to adjust their height as the ship is lowered another 27 feet in the second stage.

 

One locomotive at the rear on each side. That is one huge stack of containers.

 

My next house: a couple of these “eco containers” and a cutting torch, and I’m well on my way…

 

I’m writing this a bit early, as tomorrow morning I have to load up and leave early to ride a couple of hours to Carti, Panama. Carti doesn’t show up on many maps, and in fact even if the town name shows up, it’s likely that the road to it doesn’t show up, or Google Maps tells you it “can’t calculate a route between Panama City and Carti, Panama”.

I’ve found that a lot of directions in these parts of the world have nothing to do with highway numbers, or street names. Usually it’s something like “right after you cross the second bridge”, or “go past the blue house on the left, then turn right”, or “when you get to the fourth dirt road on the left there will be a guy sitting on a stump. Ask him for the directions to the next turn”. Okay, that last one might be a bit of a stretch, but I actually was given directions by a guy in Southern California once on how to find a place in Oregon that included a line just like that. And it worked. But that’s another story…

In any case, I have to meet the Stahlratte and its’ crew at 11am on Thursday morning to load my bike, along with ten other bikes all bound for Cartagena. In case you weren’t aware, there is no highway connecting Central and South America. The Darien Gap is a 99-mile long stretch of jungle with no road between Panama and Colombia. Yes, a couple of people have traversed it in the past. Literally a couple. And it took them a looooong time.

There are basically two ways to get to South America with a motorcycle: put it on a boat, or put it on a plane. Neither is cheap, and both require you to purchase a ticket to get yourself there as well. The plane goes to Bogota, which is near the center of Colombia and not where I was looking to start my South American travels. It’s quick, but requires crating and isn’t very entertaining. The cargo ships are cheaper, but slow, make many stops, and you can’t be sure when the bike is going to show up. That leaves the sailboat option. The popular route is aboard the Stahlratte (German for “Steel rat”), a 110 year old ship that regularly plies the route between Carti and Cartagena, with a two day stopover in the beautiful San Blas islands. More about that in my next post when I have photos and can describe the trip.

I’m scheduled to arrive in Cartagena on October 12th, and should have wifi for a day or two before heading north (yes, it sounds strange, but I will actually be further north in Colombia than I am in Panama City, Panama). The next several days after that entail a tent and beaches, so no communications access.

Which, in itself, sounds really good…

So, hasta luego until around the 13th.

Panama to Colombia: The Steel-Rat Experience

October 8-13, 2015
At 7am I’m leaving my host family in Panama City and heading to Carti. It’s morning rush hour and I’m on the opposite side of town. I have to split lanes through freeway traffic for several miles before the road opens up. I woke up this morning with an ear ache and it isn’t getting better, and it isn’t helping my balance as I thread between cars. It’s been a few years since living in Southern California and my lane-splitting skills are a bit rusty anyway, but fortunately people here are used to motorcycles sharing the lanes with cars.
About sixty miles from Panama City I turn left onto a small road towards the Kuna Yala lands. These indigenous people and their lands are technically separate from Panama, and about 12 miles down this steep, twisting road I come to a road block where I have to pay my “Kuna Tax” to continue. Another ten miles or so and as I crest a hill the Caribbean comes into view. Not long after, the road ends at the harbor, which is really just a place for the Kuna to launch their fishing boats. There is a concrete pier here, and there are already eleven bikes on the dock waiting. Within a few minutes more arrive. The Stahlratte is anchored just a couple hundred meters away. The 120-foot steel schooner was built in 1903, and has seen several different lives prior to its’ current use.

Arrival at Carti pier, with the Stahlratte in the background.

I walk the pier to have a look at the bikes. There are several BMW 1200GS models, an F800, a Kawasaki KLR, a KTM 1190 Adventure, a Triumph Tiger, a Suzuki V-Strom, a couple of XT600 Yamahas, a Honda Transalp, a Honda Africa Twin, a Suzuki DR650, Judith’s DR-z400, and my little Yamaha 250.  Eighteen bikes and twenty three people, from England, Australia, Canada, the U.S., Romania, Turkey, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy and the Netherlands. Most started their journey in Alaska, and intend to finish in Argentina. A few are going further and/or have been further already. The ages range from around late twenties to mid sixties.

Loading bikes

The crew loads the bikes onto the ship while we take a small boat to our hotel for the night on a small Kuna island about 20 minutes from the dock. The island consists of little else besides the small (20 room) homestay hotel and a short air strip.

Our hotel shuttle to and from the Stahlratte: powered by twin 40hp Yamahas.

Headed to our hotel for the first night. There are several islands nearby that are inhabited by Kuna people. Some of these are densely built out.

 

First night’s stay at Hotel Porvenir while the crew prepares the Stahlratte for sailing. We’ll leave the next morning for the San Blas Islands.

 

Local method of transportation.

In the morning we take the shuttle back to the Stahlratte and have breakfast before sailing three hours to a spot in the San Blas islands. We stay here for the next two days, with a BBQ and bonfire the first night in the islands. The ear drops aren’t working, and I’m a bit bummed that I can’t dive or really do anything in the water. But the place is so beautiful it doesn’t really matter.

Some climb to the crow’s nest for an even more stunning view.

 

There are 365 islands in the San Blas Islands, and only a handful are inhabited. Many look like this.

 

On-board entertainment system: Swinging from the ship.

This was our dinner location. You arrived by dinghy or by swimming. BBQ, bonfire, beer, rum. Very relaxing.

 

Preparing dinner.

 

Sunset from the island.

 

Sunset from the Stahlratte.

 

It’s muggy below deck, so I spend part of the first night on the Stahlratte in the hammock over the bowsprit. The small LED lights on the masts light the water below me just enough to watch eagle rays swimming by. Graceful and beautiful to watch in the dark silence. Eventually it cools off enough below deck and I climb down to go to bed just before a rainstorm moves by.
The next morning is Saturday, and we awake to find our little paradise taken over by Panamanian yachts.

Weekend local party boats. By afternoon they had all cleared out and gone home.

There are four or five islands within swimming distance or a short launch ride. One of these is the stereotypical “stranded on a deserted island”: about 80 feet in diameter with a lone palm tree.

 

Stranded on a deserted island? Life could be worse…

Several of us venture out here one day and within minutes a gale blows in. The rain is blowing so hard it hurts and it feels better to be in the water. It pours but is over quickly.

 

Storm coming…

 

Sudden deluge. The rain stings, but the dinghy arrives to carry us back to the Stahlratte, and the storm passes quickly.

 

Dinner on board our cruise ship.

 

At five o’clock the next morning the 65 year old diesel engine fires up, and we begin the thirty hour trip to Cartagena. At 280 rpm, you can actually count each piston stroke by sound and vibration. Within the first few hours most of the people on board are seasick. Only a few of us have taken Dramamine before heading to open seas, and it pays off. For the next day, people are much more scarce at meal time, and tend to spend more time in their berth or lying down on the deck.
At sunrise the next day we awake to what looks like wafting glass seas and the Cartagena skyline in the distance.

6am: Cartagena in the distance.

 

We pull into the harbor at Cartagena, past the old fortress walls. After breakfast we are taken to hotels and hostels in the old part of Cartagena, where we will stay for a couple of nights while the bikes are unloaded and taken through the Customs importation process.

 

Passing the centuries-old fortress walls coming into the harbor.

 

The buffet boat following us in.

 

Cartagena skyline.

 

In the harbor, we anchor next to the FreeWinds. This huge ship is owned and operated by a church. Can you guess which church owns it? Hint: It’s a “Tom Cruise” ship.

 

My little 250 leaned against a Honda Transalp, ready to be unloaded.

 

Hoisted off the Stahlratte onto a floating platform, the bikes are transported six at a time to land.

 

Taking the bikes to shore. No dock…they pull right up to the concrete boat ramp, then use that wooden pallet ramp and you ride off onto and up the boat ramp.

 

Once everyone is through Customs and Immigration the following day, we are free to ride to our hotels. Here’s the lobby at the hotel where I’m staying.

And just for fun, here’s a YouTube clip of one of my Stahlratte shipmates, from about a month ago, on his first entrance into a hotel lobby on his bike:

The food on the Stahlratte is great and plentiful. This is not a cheap way to ship between continents but it is definitely worth it. The experience of the ship, the San Blas Islands, and the other travelers and crew isn’t found everywhere, and while you could save a few days but spend the same amount of money air-freighting your bike to Colombia from Panama, you would miss out on some memories of a lifetime.

Upper left, above the window: 2RideTheGlobe.com is now part of the Stahlratte experience.

 

A Few Days in Cartagena

October 13, 2015

There are 18 motorcycles on the Stahlratte in Cartagena harbor. There are 23 of us spread around several hotels and hostels in the Getsemani district, just outside the walls of the Old City. This is an interesting place: the odd combination of backpacker tourists and red light district. During the day it feels like most other old Latin American cities I’ve been in over the past couple of months. At night it’s a little different. Not uncomfortable. Just different. 

Entrance to the old walled city.

 

Monday is a holiday in Colombia…believe it or not, it’s Columbus Day, just like in the U.S. Almost everything is closed for the day, and the crowds are non-existent, until the cruise ship pulls up.

 

The pigeons were unaware of the holiday.

 

So were these guys playing dominoes. Longest. Game. Ever.

 

That old Colonial feel…again like the French Quarter in New Orleans.

 

One for Sandy…

 

My sense of humor. Love it.

 

 

Sitting at a sidewalk cafe and happened to look up, and there’s a bunch of the guys from the Stahlratte…

 

Another indicator that a place is too touristy for me…

 

Castillo de San Felipe. This sets a new record for me for the total number of rocks glued together in one place.

The morning after arriving in Cartagena we catch taxis back to the harbor at 6am to begin unloading the bikes. They are taken off the ship six at a time and placed on a large flat barge, then motored to shore. We’re instructed to take only our helmets and boots and to leave the rest of our gear onboard for now. We are headed directly to DIAN (Aduana, or Customs) to have the bikes officially admitted into the country. 

It’s a short six block ride to Customs. They open the gate at 8am and we file in. By 9am we have our bikes inspected and are told to return at 2:30 to sign the paperwork and pick them up. This would take a couple of hours if I was traveling solo, but the sheer volume, combined with the official government work pace, requires a bit longer today. So it’s back to the hotels for a few hours to wait.

At 2:30 we’re all back and within a half hour we’re all officially legally in Colombia and free to go, although we still have to buy SOAT, the mandatory insurance, which costs about $30 for 90 days. It turns out the nearest SOAT office only sells motorcycle insurance between 8am and noon, so that will have to wait one more day. We leave DIAN as a group and head back to the docks one more time, to retrieve all of our gear from the Stahlratte. It takes three trips with the dinghy to bring all of the panniers, tank bags, riding gear, etc from ship to dock. 

We meet up for a couple of evenings at the Mamallena Hostel on Media de Luna street (come to think of it, a very fitting name for the main street through the red light district) for drinks and to swap travel stories. It’s definitely an interesting group, and everyone has a different reason or plan for their trip. Most are traveling much faster than I am, as their goal is Ushuaia — the southern tip of South America — and most only have until the end of the year before they have to return to jobs. A few of us are going further, and the same people seem to be traveling slower. I find that John and Bev (British couple on XT600s) are on a similar pace and we discuss the possibility of shipping to Africa together in March. There is no doubt that several of us will cross paths again on the way south.

Most leave Wednesday morning headed straight for Medellin — a two day ride. The few stragglers that stay behind another day meet up again at Mamallena, and as I walk through the lobby, there are two blue KLR650s parked there. It’s the two Canadians that I met on the ferry to Ometepe Island in Nicaragua, and again in Boquete, Panama. They have just arrived on the Wildcard, a smaller sailboat.

The Gringo Trail continues to funnel motorcyclists through the same areas.

Is This The Road To Mompox Or Not?

October 15, 2015

On Thursday morning, it’s finally time to hit the road. I’ve decided that as much as I wanted to head north and visit a couple more beaches, I’m ready for a break from the heat and humidity of the coast. I ride out of Cartagena and head towards Medellin, but after about an hour I turn left and head further inland toward the mountains. The road is nothing special, and the potholes increase. I’m headed for a small town called Mompox, on the Brazo de Mompos River. 

River bridge on Highway 80 at Plato, headed towards the turnoff to Mompox…I think.

For an hour, my GPS continually tells me to make a U-turn and go back to the Medellin highway. But the Maps with Me app I use on my phone says there is a way across the river and that I can get there from here. I’m not sure, but I’m determined to find out. 

At La Gloria I turn south again and suddenly, inexplicably, the two lane road is nicely paved and the scenery is green pastures. After a few miles, I pass eight policemen on four motorcycles (they ride two-up here) headed the other direction. For the first time, I notice there are orange poles every couple of miles with blue “SOS” letters painted on them, the Colombian equivalent of a CHP Emergency Call Box. This seems very odd out here in the middle of nowhere, on a road that my GPS says is a dead end. I’ve been watching the Netflix series “Narcos”, about the Pablo Escobar Colombia of the 1980s, and this road and the fincas along it suddenly remind me of the show. I’m sure my imagination is running wild. Today’s Colombia is much different. But I can’t explain the call boxes. 

I ride into the little town of Santa Ana at the end of the road, and my Garmin tells me just that: this is the end of the road. I stop and ask a moto-taxi driver if there is a bridge or a ferry to Mompox, and he tells me to go another two blocks and turn left. When I do, I am confronted by a giant, gleaming new concrete bridge over the river. But it’s not quite finished. For now, the tiny wooden ferry under the bridge is still in operation. I pay the equivalent of sixty cents in Colombian Pesos and a few minutes later I’m headed the last fifteen miles down the dirt road to Mompox. 

Old crossing straight ahead; new crossing just above.

 

A bit hard to see, but this is looking across at the ferry. Wood planks across three narrow hulls.

Mompox isn’t a tourist destination, but as I ride through town I spot a couple of hotels. The Hotel San Francisco looks nice enough, and it looks like I can probably get my motorcycle into the lobby, so I stop and ask. The guy at the desk is extremely nice, and asks another guest to move his car slightly so I can hop the curb and climb the step into the lobby. For thirteen dollars, I have a clean room with air conditioning, a ceiling fan, TV, and a clean shower. And always important, secure indoor parking. 

After a shower I decide to walk into town to look for dinner. Instead, dinner finds me. As I step out of the hotel, there is a street vendor at the curb selling patacones, a delicious fried mashed plantain with your choice of meat with veggies. Most likely the best eighty cent dinner I’ve ever had. 

Tomorrow is a long ride down a dirt road before joining the highway south to Bucaramanga.  

Mompox to Bucaramanga

October 16, 2015

I realized last night that I had inadvertently left my Delorme InReach GPS tracker set to record once an hour, which was fine on a sailboat moving at 7 knots, but it doesn’t leave much of a breadcrumb trail at 85 kmh. I reset it this morning, so the tracking should improve again, for those following my “Where am I now?” link.

Leaving Mompox I am expecting 50 to 60 miles of rough dirt road before I get to Highway 45. I am pleasantly surprised to find pavement. Well, mostly pavement. Well, it used to be pavement, not that long ago. There are still nice stretches of smooth tarmac, sometimes for miles, but in other places, it has deteriorated into a mass of potholes and troughs, and I have to pick my way through slowly. As usual, there are large trucks and buses going the other way, and they not only have to use the same tracks through the holes, but they seem to pretend that I am invisible. If we are approaching the same track, it’s not a matter of who gets there first, it’s always simply who is largest. And I lose every time. Often I have to move not just to the edge of the road, but off the road, if they are using a track that leads all the way to my side of the road.

The pavement stops as I enter Guamal, a small town on the other side of the river (there is a bridge this time). It’s odd that the roads are paved up to the towns, but all of the streets in town are dirt. I pick my way through Guamal until I find the road leading out of town. It stays dirt for a few miles, and topes are replaced by large irrigation canal crossings about four feet high. At this point I’m wishing I had a YZ250, with no luggage. These things would make great jumps at speed.

Back on nice pavement after refueling in El Banco. Ahead of me I see a group of six to eight motorcycles approaching. Locals on their way to work. Eight motorcycles and a trailer. Just a trailer. A two wheeled cart, about four feet by five feet, with bicycle wheels. Not attached to anything. Obviously it was attached to one of the motorcycles just prior to now, but it has detached and is traveling with the group independently. It’s moving about 35 mph and so far has managed to stay in their lane. I’m thankful that the builder of this trailer did a good job of aligning and installing the wheels. It passes me, half in each lane, and I continue on.

Keeping in mind that motorcycles are the cars and pickups of Latin America, when it’s the only transportation you have, you carry everything on it. On this day I passed this guy, with the equivalent of 6-foot-long railroad ties on the back. That’s a balancing act, front-to-rear and side-to-side. Yesterday, I passed two guys on a bike, and the passenger had a live pig in a bag under each arm. I’ve also seen guys carrying 20 foot sections of rebar, large spools of electrical wire, you name it.

Highway 45 south is straight and not much to see until I get past San Alberto, where it begins to climb into the hills. Now the road is fun and twisty for the next thirty miles into Bucaramanga, which appears on the opposite hillside as I descend into the valley. Bucaramanga is a much larger city than I had expected, with a population over half a million.

Although the highway goes around town, I end up going directly through the center of it on surface streets in order to get to my destination for the evening. At each stoplight dozens of motorcycles and scooters thread their way to the front of traffic. I do the same as long as my wide panniers will fit. A few riders stop next to me and just stare at me and the bike, like I am from another planet. But more often, riders pull up next to me and give me a thumbs-up, shouting “Bienvenidos a Colombia!” I am experiencing what I have heard about prior to this trip: Colombians are incredibly friendly.

On the south side of town I climb sharply up a hill to Parapente Colombia, a paragliding site high above Bucaramanga. Next door is a hostel with parking for the bike. I pull in, unload and spend the rest of the afternoon watching the large wings float gracefully just above me.

The hostel is “cat friendly” and my roommate for the evening is nearly identical in appearance and attitude to my own cat Dexter, who I miss a lot.

Dexter Imposter. I called him Ed, for Extra Dexter.