A great night for a ride! At the last moment I found out that there was a car show and chicken barbecue at the Orleans County Marine Park not far home. So, Sharon and I jumped on the bike and headed to the show. There was a very nice turn out and some beautiful cars to boot. It was a beautiful evening to take a ride along the shore of Lake Ontario.
Friday, June 27, 2008
A Great Excuse For A Bike Ride...as if I needed one
A great night for a ride! At the last moment I found out that there was a car show and chicken barbecue at the Orleans County Marine Park not far home. So, Sharon and I jumped on the bike and headed to the show. There was a very nice turn out and some beautiful cars to boot. It was a beautiful evening to take a ride along the shore of Lake Ontario.
Saturday, June 21, 2008
Part 3: Argentina By Bike
In the final instalment of his three-part adventure, Mike Carter travels through the Valley of the Butterflies towards the home of South America's most famous biker Che Guevara
Mike Carter
guardian.co.uk,
Thursday June 19, 2008
Gaucho country ... on the road in Argentina. Photograph: Julia Sanders/Mike Carter
The Argentine conscript border guards were as charmless a bunch of fellows as you'd expect to find dispatched to a deserted road on top of a freezing cold mountain. I imagine they are still there, which makes me feel better.
Shortly, we were plunging down again, every 100-metre drop bringing air more syrupy and rich; every degree of temperature raised bringing back the real prospect that one day I might be able to straighten my fingers again. I was breathing extra gulps just for the fun of it.
We pulled over at a cafe for coffee. Having coffee in Argentina after being in Chile should be the first thing one does, like the Pope kissing the ground at the foot of the aircraft steps. For coffee in Chile means a sachet of Nescafe and tepid water producing a lumpy gloop of extraordinary vileness. Great dogs, rubbish coffee.
In Argentina, it involves a loving process of alchemy with freshly crushed beans and warmed milk and an end product of such ambrosial ecstasy that you instinctively close your eyes as it slides down your throat and sigh loudly.
As in San Pedro de Atacama, things felt like a Paramount set. Gauchos tethered their horses to the hitching post and walked past us, ponchos and all, raising a finger to the rim of their cowboy hats, Cuban heels click-clacking on the ancient wood floor as hard as granite. Chevy and Dodge pickups circa 1930 filled up at the single pump, its dials whirring round.
We spent the next few days riding through north-west Argentina. First down intestinal tracts of roads – the kind of roads that fill bikers' winter dreams – that wound their way around bald, crumpled hills that changed colour at every bend – green, pink, yellow, even aquamarine – like your TV being on the blink. Then along arid valleys of sandstone, with fluted columns like giant organ pipes and eroded rocks forming fantastical sculptures.
We rode along the Valley of the Butterflies, millions of them forming fluttering clouds that we passed through, like riding in a kaleidoscope.
Down from the mountains, we hit the plains. Mile after mile of vineyards, then brilliant yellow tobacco crops, their leaves drying on the walls of the pueblos we passed through, each with a whitewashed church and a dusty football pitch, the twin obsessions of Argentina. In the middle of nowhere, we passed processions of devotees, walking who knows where, carrying aloft the Virgin Mary. And always the waving and the smiling. Surely, if there was a country to steal your heart, this was it.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Part 2: Great journeys: motorbike mayhem in the Andes
This is a very interesting, three part series of articles, that I discovered while reading my “Google Alerts” that I receive every day via eMail. A group of British riders on “Holiday” riding across northern Chile and Argentina.
In part 2: Mike Carter hits the great gringo trail into the High Andes
Pictures: http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/gallery/2008/jun/17/southamerica.roadtrips?picture=334985869
We flew across the Chilean Alto Plano until, like the world had been bleached, there lay ahead of us nothing but white. We hit the salt flats, riding fast, which felt very wrong, as our senses looked at the big slab of white and told us it had to be slippery, treacherous, no place for a motorcycle. But the tyres bit and gripped as sure as on concrete, and the crust crunched under us. Flamingos looked on.
We passed through the Valley of the Moon as the light faded and the sun went through its valedictions, washing the rocks vermilion then gold then ochre. In the distance, a string of cartoon volcanoes, perfect calderas, and beyond, like a chimera, the High Andes, the brilliant white bonnets fading to grey.
We rolled into San Pedro de Atacama, kicking up a trail of dust. San Pedro was once a major staging post for the great cattle drives of yore, but is now a staging post on the great gringo trail. It's the Dodge City of one's imagination, a Paramount backlot come to life, albeit with internet cafes and poncho shops. Upon entering a door I was surprised to find that there was actually a restaurant beyond, and not just wooden joists holding up the walls.
We ordered some food. Tamales and llama steaks and beer that came in litre bottles. I was loving South America. In the middle of the room was an open fire. Above it a large circular hole in the ceiling, through which we gazed at the stars like diamonds. I asked the waiter what happened when it rained. It doesn't, he said.
I spoke to Dave, who was on the trip with his wife, Liz. Dave worked in a Lincolnshire warehouse and had been saving for five years for the trip. It had been a fantastic introduction to riding in South America, he said, what with Globebusters taking care of shipping the bikes and visas, and next time he thinks he might be confident enough to go it alone. Mike, who was retired, had taken a few trips like this and loved the camaraderie and support. Similarly Resh, formerly known as The Raggedy One, who ran a care home for the elderly. Paul, from Coventry, worked for BT. His nickname was Gargoyle, he said. I asked him why and he stuck out his chin and held the pose. He looked a bit like a gargoyle.
Most on the trip are Bambis – Born Again Mid-Life Bikers – returning to two wheels in middle age when family constraints and budgets allow.
Very early the next morning, we headed off to see the El Tatio geysers. They pop their boiling spumes at exactly the moment the sun rises over the mountains, as surely as someone dropping Mentos into Diet Coke bottles, the physics of which was explained by our guide, but which I didn't fully take in owing to the fact that it was minus 50 and my brain had frozen.
Then we were off to Argentina. Climbing slowly at first, more llama, then some weird-looking rabbits the size of wallabies, and then some things that looked like alpaca but with a certain skittishness. As if they might jump out in front of you and get you repatriated before you could say vicuña. Vicuñas are not a good thing, as I had learnt on day one. I gave them a wide berth.
Still climbing. Then suddenly there was nothing. No scrub, no cactus, no vicuñas, blessed be to God. Just an endless plain with the High Andes cradling and looming over it, like a proscenium arch. My ears popped. The motorbike's console flashed alarmingly. Minus two. Minus four. Minus six. That's the ground temperature. At 80 mph on a motorcycle it's more like minus 30. I lifted my visor to squeeze my nose. My gloves almost fused to it. I had my heated grips on, but I could have been clutching vials of magma and still I wouldn't have felt them.
Still, it could have been worse. At least the asphyxiation-by-helmet I was suffering as we went over the 4,600-metre Paso de Jama took my mind off the cold. To fight off oedemas and to keep myself from slipping into a hypothermic coma, I repeated my mantra: "This is not a holiday it's an adventure; this is not a holiday…"
The border with Argentina lay somewhere up ahead. I just hoped that they had the space blankets ready.
Tomorrow: Into the Valley of the Butterflies
Getting there
Globebusters' High Andes trip lasts for five weeks and costs £5,895pp. The price includes all shipping rates and accommodation. The next High Andes trip runs from 21 April to 25 May 2010. For details of this and other Globebusters guided expeditions, including their 135-day Alaska to Patagonia trip and North and West Africa, see globebusters.com; 08452 304015
Part 1: Great journeys: motorbike mayhem in the Andes
Great journeys: motorbike mayhem in the Andes
In the first part of his three-part adventure, Mike Carter rides with the condors across the Chilean desert.See images of Mike's trip in our gallery
Mike Carter
guardian.co.uk,
Article history
Long way down ... Mike Carter takes in the spectacular views of the Valley of the Moon in Chile from a precarious vantage point. Photograph: Julia Sanders
I watched them ride along the corniche, headlights blazing through the swirling dust and the fading light. I started counting. I'd been alone in Arica, an out-of-season beach town on the Chile/Peru border, for over two days. Counting motorcycles felt like great excitement, all things considered.
There should have been 10. There were just eight. By the time I'd left the beach and walked back into the hotel lobby, the riders, caked in grime and sweat, were presenting their passports to reception in the careworn manner befitting those who'd been on the road three weeks.
"Where are the other two?" I asked a man.
He looked tired. "Crashed," replied Brian, for that was his name. "In Bolivia. One hit a police barrier. Almost decapitated. Ducked just in time, but smashed his sternum and two vertebrae. The other one hit a vicuña. Broke his shoulder and his arm. Both repatriated."
Decapitated. Repatriated. Now there's a couple of words.
"What's a vicuña?" I asked. It was an odd question, really, but the first thing that came out.
"A kind of alpaca," he replied. "Very skittish. Watch out for them."
"What room you in, Ribby?" said another man. His riding suit was torn to shreds, like somebody who'd been in a comedy explosion in a fireworks factory.
"Ribby?" I said.
"Oh, hit some sand. Fell off. Broke two ribs. But I've got good painkillers," said Brian/Ribby.
"And you?" I asked the raggedy one.
"Lost it. First day in Argentina," he said. "One minute I was riding along at 80mph, the next I was on the Tarmac. "
Great. I confess I'd been a tad nervous about joining my first motorcycle expedition in South America, planning to stay with them as far as Cordoba, Argentina. But now, surrounded by a cast of extras from Casualty, I was, to use the technical term, bricking it. Suddenly an out-of-season beach resort in northern Chile seemed like a good place to put down some roots.
Kevin Saunders walked in. Full-beam smile. Kevin owns Globebusters, the company that runs the tours. I'd first met him a couple of years ago when he taught me to ride at his training school in Wales.
"Sounds like quite a holiday so far," I said to him.
"It's not a holiday, Mike, it's an adventure," he replied.No shit, Kev.
The next morning, we set off. I was riding Kevin's wife's bike. She took up the pillion seat behind Kev.
The group fell into their established riding pattern. I followed at the back, scouring the landscape, like Eagle-eyed Action Man, for vicuña. Of course, I had no idea what a vicuña looked like.
Wednesday June 18 2008
Great journeys: From Chile to Argentina by bike
Mike Carter hits the great gringo trail into the High Andes
Mike Carter
guardian.co.uk,
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
A very sudden end to Eric Cleaveland's trip
Due to personal family matters, Eric has ended his journey from Ushaia, Argentina to Deadhorse, Alaska just short of his goal. Read what Eric has to say here.
Americade
One of the vendors that I wanted to talk to was Garmin. I recently had a problem with the Garmin Zuno 550 GPS that I bought THREE YEARS AGO. One of the buttons on the unit has come out and I've had to put it back in with Silicone to keep from loosing it. Well, the short story is, I spoke with the Garmin representative and explained my dilemma, and he quickly gave me his business card and told me to email him and he would see to it that I received a NEW Zumo 550! Now that's what I call customer service! I wish they would have done that when I had the problem with the brand new Zumo cradle, in South America, but that's ancient history. Way to go Garmin! Thank you.
Back to the trip. Late Friday afternoon, we went for a ride and wound up in the quaint town of Poultney, Vermont for dinner. A local gentleman directed us to a local eatery called Perry's for a good meal. After a nice meal we headed back to the campsite which was near Schroon Lake, NY about twenty minutes north of Lake George.
The following day, Saturday, dawned bright and sunny so we planned to take a ride to the new Adirondack Nature Museum in Tupper Lake and then find a motel. The Nature Museum was worth seeing once, but it did have some very nice large fish displays and the location of the museum was very nice. After the museum we headed to Long Lake and found a motel. The Black Flies where still out in that area and Sharon got eaten alive. Me, not one bite!
Sunday was another great day for riding which made the trip home very enjoyable.
Sunday, June 8, 2008
Now lets talk about the Town of Lake George, N.Y.
This is a warning to future goers to Americade.
The town of Lake George, New York hosts the Americade Motorcycle Rally each year, and the town of Lake George takes in somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 Million dollars (an estimate from a volunteer of Americade) from the people who participate in the event. People spend their money in Motels, Restaurants, Gas Stations, Stores, Campgrounds, Super Markets and many other places in Lake George, I'm sure. Still, the town has come up with another way to suck money from people. During Americade there are thousands of motorcycles in the town and many of them park side by side on the main street, as far as the eye can see. Along the main street, there are parking meters. In each parking meter space there are usually five or six motorcycles parked side by side. Now, the Town of Lake George has seen fit to hand out parking tickets to every motorcycle that does not display a "Pre Payed Parking Sticker". No Warning, No Signs announcing you need to feed the meters during an event as big as Americade. When you come into the town during Americade you see thousands of bikes parked along the curb and anyone would assume that you don't need to pay the Quater for Fifteen minutes, but that's not the case. You would think that the Town of Lake George would allow free parking for the bikers that hand over some $40,000,000 , but it looks to me that the Town of Lake George is too greedy to do that.
Welcome To ALASKA
It's been a long ride, about 17,000 miles to be exact, but....Eric is in Alaska!!!!!
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
Bear with me on this one! YOU MUST READ THIS STORY!!
This comes from Eric Cleaveland's blog. I was so moved by the ending ,that I had to let you read it here. What a GREAT story!
Eric writes:
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
Looks like Eric likes Canada
Back to Chile
In preparation for this trip, one piece of equipment that will be accompanying me on my adventure to the "End of the Earth" will be the "SPOT Satellite Personal Tracker". This is a small GPS device that can save your life should you encounter a problem in a desolate part of the world where there is no other means of communication. This unit is capable of alerting rescue authorities in the event you need help, or loved ones to let them know you are alright. Go here to watch the videos and learn more about it: http://www.findmespot.com/home.aspx It's really quite a fantastic little unit.
Monday, June 2, 2008
This is Americade Week! in Lake George, N.Y.
This is the week that many motorcycle enthusiasts wait for all year. The long awaited Americade Motorcycle Rally in Lake George, New York. Held each year in one of the most beautiful surroundings you could ask for, the Adirondacks Mountains of northern New York State. It is one of the largest rallies in the country. If you've never been to this event, you must go! Motorcycles of all types as far as the eye can see, lining the streets of the beautiful town of Lake George, right on the edge of the lake by the same name. Sharon and I are planning to hitch up the motorcycle camper to the Beemer, and head up there later in the week, so I will be posting pictures and commentary of our trip.
The weather this week threatens to be perfect for a nice ride up into the Adirondacks. So what are you waiting for? Click on the Americade logo above, or visit the web site HERE.
Sunday, June 1, 2008
Beautiful Yellowstone
About Me
- Robert Guzman
- United States
- Born in Santiago, Chile and living in western New York, USA