All the way south

My trip around the world continues!!  I started another blog about my upcoming trip, All The Way West. I’m leaving Texas and heading West until I hit NYC.

I’m leaving in July form Houston to Seattle via Minnesota and possibly LA.  From Seattle I’m going to ship my motorcycle to Brisbane to tour Australia.  From Australia I’ll ship to South East Asia, take a train over China to Mongolia, then start heading west to Europe via the ’stans.   How much time?  I don’t really know, but I’m sure I’ll run out of money or luck sometime.

Unfortunately my DaveSpan is totally useless in Australia/Asia and most of Europe.  This trip next trip is going to be challenging because not only will I have to fumble around linguistically, but I’m going to be on a tiny Suzuki 400cc Enduro motorcycle.   I’m going to ride offroad and off the beaten path more on this trip.  Adventure!! Excitement!!  Total Chaos!!!  Ok.  Not really.  It is just another trip on a motorcycle.

I can’t wait!!  I really enjoyed the comments that ya’ll posted on my blog and hope that you read my new one. You can subscribe in the pane on the right on the new blog :).

I’m now back in Vaplariaso, Chile, just to the west of Santiago to ship my motorcycle. I’ll be loading the bike into a crate then the crate will go on a boat to NYC. From NYC, it will go to Houston to a warehouse where I will put the front wheel back on and drive the bike back to where I started.

This blog entry was going to be one of those “Final Thoughts” messages where I sound like a pretentious traveler and pontificate about how the world is a small place and how people are friendly. Maybe I’ll do it just a little… try not to be pretentious though, I don’t really have the qualifications for it.

But really, the best parts of the trip were the people. The moments I reflect back on the most aren’t the beautiful mountians or natural wonders that I saw while riding on the motorcycle, but the interactions with the people I met while driving around 17,000 miles (27,000 km) through 15 countries.

Unfortunately, the story that I know I’ll tell the most about the trip is being robbed at gunpoint around Lake Atilan. It should be noted that I try to follow up that story with the fact that a friend who I met only a few weeks before drove nearly 2 hours each way to look for me to see if I was OK the next day.

But other memories were starting the trip with two good friends escorting me to the Mexican border crossing the Rio Grande with a hang-pulled ferry, the friend I made in Belize lent me one of his motorcycles and customs official who invited us to his BBQ, speaking DaveSpan for hours to locals who have the patients to listen and speak s l o w l y to me, dropping my bike as I crossed a mudslide in front of 50 laughing Guatemalans who quickly helped me pick up the bike, hanging out in Antigua, learning that Mañana doesn’t really mean tomorrow, being the translator for my good friend and riding buddy’s charity project in Bolivia, fixing a border guard’s computer in Chile, and of course, spending Christmas with 15 other motorcycle travelers at the end of the world. How’s that for a long sentence? That’s my blog version of a montage. You can turn off the music.

Great times. Really. Why not do today what you could do tomorrow? Whatever it is.. This trip was originally planned as a “30 year old crisis” trip, but I didn’t want to wait any long because you never know if you’ll have the time or resources later. Really, why not?

I had set a few goals for myself at the start of the trip including learning Spanish. While I wouldn’t say that I’m even close to fluent, I am MUCH better than I started. I am comfortable in most situations and can have pleasant and semi-intelligent conversations in spanish if the person I’m talking to is patient. Outside of the MAJOR tourist areas, people in Latin America don’t speak English. I’ve developed a few friendships where we only spoke spanish. Thats much better than I ever thought that I could do as someone who struggles with foreign languages.

My other goals were really kinda stupid and generic. I don’t know why I put them there in the first place. Some of them I really failed like not riding more than 6 hours a day. I think my longest days were around 13-14 hours. Not that I was doing long mileage days, but sometimes there really isn’t anywhere to stop. I’m not even going to address the other ones as I don’t even think they are meaningful at this point. Well, I guess I am happy that I kept up with the blog. Of course there was a significant taper the longer I was on the road, but that is only normal. The blog is going to be something that I’ll keep for the rest of my life– keep it as something that I read and remember the good times as well as realize that I realllly shouldn’t have hit the publish button on a few of the stories and pictures =] Its been fun to write and share the trip with my friends, family, and fellow moto travelers. I know that the reason why I thought I could start this trip was through reading about other peoples’ experiences online. In “normal” life, you just don’t meet people who have the time and interest to sit on a motorcycle for half a year.

Anyway, I look forward to returning the US. Strangely, I really miss my job and of course I miss my family, friends, and flauschig puppy!

If all goes well, I’ll be in Houston at 9am on Thursday. I will then have a couple of weeks to get my life back in order before I start working.

Thanks for reading and thanks for commenting!

dg

I’m getting really lazy with my blog posts now.  Sorry about that.. it is the whole end of trip thing.  Atleast I have something coming online at all@!!

There are the collection of pictures from Theo’s camera.. so they’re sequential, but from all over Argentina.

Ruta 3…

Camping…

We met a really cool dutch couple at a campsite.  I wish I had their contact information as the girl collected recipes from locals and other travelers for the last 9 months that she’s been traveling–  She is making a cookbook!

They started off as backpackers, but switched but ended up buying a VW van to tour Chile and Argentina.

Me trying to get the perfect shot of penguins.

Am I in Texas??

Riding buddies

These are the two guys who are riding their bicycle to Alaska.

The Christmas eve dinner… Look at all those moto travelers!!!!

It was a really amazing couple of days.  Everyone had such great stories and there was never a lull in conversation.  We could always talk about how KMs they got out of their last set of tires…. and why touring the world should be done on a 250 honda….. or how much range you need in Mongolia….. or what did your family say when you decided to take off on a motorcycle.. or.. or…

After driving for hours through the unchanging pampa, I finally encountered some new terrain.

This is exactly what I thought the end of the world would be like!

Crazy looking trees, jagged mountains, and rough roads.  Everything was there except for the rough roads.  It was a perfectly smooth asphalt pista the entire way through Argentina.

Theo’s and my bike happy enjoy the vista.

I’m just showing off with my new camera now.

Theo and I were just sitting around taking photos when 3 very familiar bikes showed up!!  In the lead was Thomas…

Then Andrea!!!

Followed by Olliver and Silke!!!

We met for the first time a few days ago on ruta 3 at a campground.  There we shared wine and travel stories.  They are two really great couples of people!  I was very happy to meetup with them again.  Here are the faces behind the helmets (Silke and Andrea)

Thomas

und olliver!

We were just a few minutes away from Ushuaia.

I made it to Ushuaia!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Here is one of the classic “end of the world” tourist photos.  For me.. this isn’t the “real” end of the world photo.  That is forthcoming.   This was as far as I was going to make it before christmas!

More fun with the sign!

Theo made it to Ushuaia too!!!

Look at all that flare!!!

We went to Rio Pipo in Ushuaia, a campground a very expensive but nice campground at the end of the town at the end of the world.

There was a thread on Horizons Unlimited, the overland travel site, about meeting at this specific campground for Christmas.  Over the two days before Christmas, tons of bikes started showing up.  Well, not tons, but about 15.. and it is amazing to see that many moto travelers in one spot.

There are also lots of bicyclists around Ushuaia.  There were two guys (American and British) who were just starting their trip.  It was fun to talk to them and feel their excitement around the start of their two year trip.

Oh yeah, Ushuaia is overran with tourists buses and ships!!  This was a “Rolling hotel”, aka a rolling chicken coup that was a trailer full of partitions with beds.

Here they were eating breakfast… All Germans!!  I’m convinced there is no one left in Germany as they are all traveling south America.

Rotel Tours — Das Rollende Hotel.  The driver was pretty cool, but I didn’t talk to any of the guests.

… More bikes showed up

Cars and trucks too.  This guy made the GPS maps that I was using while traveling.

International dogs…

Californian surfers

Vans….

I didn’t get a picture of Chucks bike, but I’m going to go fishing with him when he returns to Texas.  He’s a great guy who did the same ride.

Ushuaia was one big 4 day party.  While there isn’t much to see in the town itself, it was one of the best times I had on my trip.  It was really fun hanging out with a bunch of people who think that taking time off from a job and sitting on a motorcycle for a few months is a GOOD idea!

After spending a week in Mendoza, it was time to start the breakneck pace of heading south to Ushuaia for Christmas.

This was the first sign I saw that was indicating Ushuaia!!!!  I was pretty excited=]

Theo is always commenting on German products around the world.

We’re finally starting to do some camping.  My plan was to start camping when things got more expensive such as in Chile and Argentina.  In the rest of the Americas, we were able to get a hotel room for < $15 for a double.  In Argentina, it was usually around $30-45 for a simple room in a good location.  We camped on the Valdes Peninsula.  We got there on a Sunday afternoon and it was packed.  We had to scrunch our tents and bikes in the bushes.

What really made this experience crappy was that someone stole a bag from Theo.  They cut off one of his softbags from his tank paniers.  Very crappy.  Atleast he didn’t have anything of value in it, just the bag itself.

I made cat friends at camp.

Some ozzies who were riding motos.

After leaving the campsite, we started heading south to Punta Tombo.  Here is where one of the largest colonies of Magellen penguins live.  There were penguins EVERYWHERE!

Zoom into this picture and start looking for penguins.

Lots of fluffy fat little penguin babies.

Everywhere!!!

This penguin was in a fight and covered in blood.

Theo’s making friends.  Unfortunately the penguins had enough friends and proceeded to bite Theo on the arm.

Penguins are really very awkward animals until you see them in the water.  It was amazing to watch them swim in and out of the ocean.

Theo gets bit by another penguin.

We continue to head south and I continue to make friends with all the gas station dogs.  I dont know if they know that I love dogs or it may also be the fact that I always give dogs potato chips or whatever I’m snacking on when I see them.  This guy was particularly fluffy!!

We did more camping.

I met a great family who was returning from Ushuaia.  We talked for a couple of hours (only in spanish!!) about the route and family life in Argentina.

Thats where we’re going!!!

There was TONS of oil everywhere.  There were wells for both oil and natural gas as we cruised down the road.

It was so cold that we had to wear everything we brought.  There was a crosswind of about 80 km/h trying to knock us down constantly.  Here’s Theo with a customs official who wanted to be in the picture at the Chile border.

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The ferry to the island of Tierra del Fuego.

Here’s the official start of Tierra del Fuego.  This was a great moment for me.  It was just so strange seeing all these road signs with these places I had only read about.

After spending a couple of days in Santiago, we then left for Mendoza, Argentina.  The pass between the two countries was another one of the prettier and more interesting passes on the trip.  On the Chile side, the road basically twisted its way up a couple of thousand meters in only a few KM.  Or Feet in miles.  I get so confused now between miles and KMs.

Lots of pointy mountains!

In Mendoza, while looking for a hostel I was acosted by this wierd guy asking all sorts of questions about my trip and motorcycle.  I just thought it was some crazy Canadian traveler… It was Brian who is a crazy Canadian motorcycle traveler.  Once he said that he was on a bike, he made much more sense.  Most backpackers don’t care about which road you took to get here.

Anyway, it was great to meet Brian and Marie at Hostel Independencia in Mendoza.  It turns out that Marie and Brian also knew Cecilia who Theo had been emailing for a couple of weeks and was also in Mendoza.

Left is Cecilia and right is Marie.

Mendoza was a great place.  I basically spent my time drinking Malbecs and eating asados.  The Argentinians are my people.  They maintain a nice work-life balance and love to grill.  mmmmm asado.

In the picture above, Brian is using his propane torch to start an asado.  Why use a lighter when you have a real heat source.

The hostel had a couple of asados while we were there– this really added to the exprience as I got to watch professionals at work.

Look at all that chorizo goodness.

Theo and I bought tires in Santiago at MX.  They’re a Kawi dealer who also sells Metzler tires.  I had what I thought was a few thousand Ks left on my tourances and planned on changing my tires to a more dirt oriented grip once I got to Tierra del Fuego.

The courtyard at Hostel Independencia.

I ended up having to get rid of my Tourance because it started to split and I could see metal banding.  I’m pretty sure it was a defect in the tire as I had tons of grip left.  I’m going to write them when I get back to the states.

You can see how my tire is splitting.

More friends in Mendoza.

Theo seems to always be hungry.

Culture shock.  That is was my first opinion of Chile.  I’ve been traveling for 5 months and I’ve not experienced this much culture shock between two countries.

I thought that it was pretty crazy going from Nicaragua to Costa Rica, but trust me… From Bolivia to Chile was basically like returning home.  From the second we crossed the imaginary line (well, fence that we just drove around) between Bolivia and Chile things changed.

This was also one of my least typical border crossing experiences.  But now that I think about it, I’m surprised it didn’t happen earlier.

The immigration guy was reading my entry permit form and started scrutinizing it.  Uh oh I thought.. I’m in trouble.  I had heard that you need to pay US $75 to enter chile and I can just hear the cash register dinging in his head.

He looked up from the form, made eye contact and said in spanish, “Are you a programmer?”

I responded, “Si.”

He then started looking me over slowly and said, “You know about computers then for your job?”.

“Si.”

Next the border guard reached and turned the keyboard and monitor that was facing him to my direction.

Without smiling, he says, “I’m having problems with the internet.  My web pages aren’t loading right.”

I about die.  On the monitor isn’t some important government work but a page with soccer news with a screwed up font.  He wants me to fix his fonts.

Of course I ask  a few questions of what it is supposed to look like, click a few times… and bam.. back to normal.  He stamps my passport without looking through it and I’m now legally entered into Chile.  No $75.

You never know when computer skills will come in handy.

The Chile border was very easy.  First migration then followed by customs.  My one piece of advice for Chile is DO NOT BRING FOOD.  I made friends with the younger guy who was the customs inspector and he did a quick open/shut bags search of my stuff.  With Theo, he made him take out all his stuff and was running his hands all over the place.  They’re searching for any type of food, fruit, meat, and especially coca.  In Bolivia, it is legal to have coca (the plant that cocaine comes from) in leaf form.  People chew it or make tea from it.  I tried it and didn’t really feel anything.  The taste was pretty good though.

After the border we started the difficult 8 more hours of sand/washboard roads to Calama.  Once in Calama, I felt like I was right back home.

Everything was modern, clean, and expensive.  We went from spending under $10 a night for a room to $30-50 for a double.  Every hotel has internet and a breakfast that feels more like Europe than Latin America.

The people are olive skinned with black hair wearing new clothes.  Everything is different.  There aren’t one legged people sitting on the curbs begging.  The women are beautiful with fancy hair cuts and are no longer wearing conservative bowler hats and long skirts.  Road construction is no longer marked with a pile of rocks and cut down trees, but with proper cones, guards with signs, and get this.. FLASHING TRAFFIC BEACONS!!

Chile is nice, but not interesting.

Theo is happy to be back on paved roads.

One of my favorite aspects of Chile are the snacks.  This place knows how to do it.  They have hundreds of varieties of snacks in the convenience store.  Everytime I visited one, I’d pick up a new flavor.  This was my favorite flavor of Lays– Ham flavored!  I don’t know if it is vegetarian or not.

Here are some of the pics from Chile.

We met two Germans who were traveling together on a KTM LC4.  It was having some electrical problems and we tried to help get them back on the road.  After realizing that we were stuck beyond a roadside repair, I towed them 5 miles to the campsite.  This was the first time I’ve towed a motorcycle with my motorcycle.  We were climbing a few small mountians and I barely even noticed him.  I’m still glad we didn’t die though =].

At the campsite we met two Canadians.  Their website is Adventure Quest.  They are the first people I’ve ever met who visited the Guyanas.

They were very cool and are unfortunately heading the wrong way.  They had TONS of camping gear!

This is what a REAL German looks like.  She’s Bavarian.  I keep telling Theo that I wish he was a real german.. One from Bavaria with all the giant beer stiens and lederhosen.

There was tons of rocky coast in Chile.

Just like at home, actually even more developed than Texas– You just can’t chuck a piece of garbage on the road like people do in the rest of the Americas I’ve been in for the last 5 months.  You have to throw it away in seperate bins!

One more thing to note:  ALL THE GAS STATIONS HAVE WIFI!!!!!!!!!  How cool is that?

Wind power

This is example of a photo which most fits the “If only I could have captured the real beauty”.  This was one of the most scenic driving moments of my trip.  It looks very unimpressive in this photo.

My new best friend in Chile.

Chile was annoying because there was grafiti everywhere.  In other countires I’ve visited, there was grafiti, but only political grafiti.  Here it is just vanity grafiti.

Theo thinks he likes the Chilean lifestyle.

After traveling for 6 months, I finally made it all the way south to Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego, Argentina!

Two years ago, I took a trip to Mexico with Gary to Real de Catorce.  There were no banditos.  Nobody wanted to steal my bike.  While my spanish wasn’t very good, I had no problems communicating.  What really happened is that I ignited my wanderlust for Latin America.

Even being away from my life at home for so long I am still enjoying each day.  Unlike in “normal” life, every day is different.  Each city is slightly different than the one the previous day.  Every country is radically different than its neighbor.  It is amazing how imaginary lines in the dirt create such differences.

For me, the draw of taking a long trip instead of just a normal vacation is the continual influx of new experiences.

Although making a trip like this does have its own routine and frustrations.  Sitting for hours on a motorcycle trying to stay awake when driving for miles is obviously difficult.  It is strange feeling when you dread a day of curvy mountian roads.  OK, well, there weren’t many days where I dreaded facing the twisties… but when you’re crossing a 13,000 foot pass and it is raining– curves aren’t adding to the fun of things.  The other annoyance is arriving in a new city and trying to find a cheap but clean hotel.  Uhg.

Uncountably sitting in traffic in Guatemala City is much more fun sitting in traffic in Houston.  There is always something to look at =].

Theo and I rode a couple of hard days through the Pampa (plains and desert) of southern Argentina.  We were averaging from 500-650km a day.  The cross winds were so strong that I had to practically sit on the side of my seat as I counterbalanced the bike into a lean into the wind.  Intead of developing the typical flat spot that you get from miles of straight road like we road, my tire is noticably worn asymmetrically.

About 1 hour before Ushuaia the scenery changed dramatically.  The climate remained the same but the land went from soggy marshy tundra to jagged mountains peaks with bases covered in pine trees.  This is exactly what I thought the “fin del mundo”/ “end of the world” would look like.

Now that I made it to the tip of South America there is nothing left to do but head north.  I think I’m ready to resume my humble corporate life. Plus, I want to see my fluffy puppy!  Oh yeah, my family and friends too…

I’m not sure what route I’m going to take but I have two choices.  I can either take a ferry that cuts the trip down by a week or two to Chile or take the long way that is a few thousand KM offroad.  I’ve prepared for the long offroad trip, but it’d be nice to be on the water for a few days.

Either way, I’ll end up in Vallparisio / Santiago where I am going to ship my bike by air or sea back to the United States.  Depending on the price, the bike will either go to Houston if by air and possibly by sea, or somewhere on the west coast if it is dramatically cheaper.  Then I’ll drive from California back to Houston.

This has been a trip of a lifetime.  My expectations were huge and I was not let down.  There were days where I’d sit on the bike and think to myself, “What am I doing here?  How did I get this far?  This is so wonderful!”

I was asked the other day what are my dreams.  My response was terse:  I’m doing it.  Anyway, I don’t like the term dreams, I prefer the word plans.

yeah, I’m pretty happy to be here!

Since the epoch of my trip plannning, the Salar de Uyuni, or Salt Flat of Uyuni was one of the places that I was looking forward to the most.

Ever since I saw the picture of salt piled up on the lake, I knew it was somewhere that I had to go on my trip.  There was a little bit of contention of even going to Bolivia at all because of the $135 gringo fee and the political issues with the US.  The allure of seeing the salt flats was a significant factor in why I made my decision to “take the risk”, however perceptable it may have been.

Getting to Uyuni was a signifcant undertaking.  As the last post talked about, we had to cut through massive road blocks.  About 100km after Oruro the pavement ended.  I would not see any pavement OR even a street sign for the next 5 days.

The road to Uyuni was pretty clear.  The first 15km was very rough as it was a bypass of the gravel road with a pure sand road.

Neither Theo nor I dropped the bike but it was only because we were being very careful in not wanting to test the local medical system.

The road to Uyuni was absolutely beautiful.  It was a mixture of desert with river valleys so you’d be driving through kms of sand and scrub then all of a sudden there would be a grassy field.  I love Bolivia!

With the road you had two choices.  If you stayed in the middle of the road it was washboard or heavy corrugation.  Uhg.  At low speeds you’re just asking alot from your suspension.  If you go fast enough to gently clip the tops of the washboard to get a smooth ride you had the opportunity to meet only other component of the road:  deep sand.

As a result, we forced to take it easy.  It was 200km of roads like this and it took us all day.  The jeeps, which would periodically pass us at an insanely fast rate, took only 4 hours.

We had lunch with some flamencos.  It was amazing.  This was one of the most remote places I’ve visited in my entire life and it really felt like it.  There were almost no other people and everything felt exotic.  This is my first non-zoo flamenco experience!

The skies were just screaming to be photographed.  Most of the pics in this report are Theo’s, visit his website and check out his “emotionals”.  They’re a bit odd in google translation, but they work.

Thanks Theo for taking this amazing picture.  I think I’m going to print it out when I get home for my office wall.  Yeah, in thinking of what life is going to be like when I return to work, seeing this photo will bring me back to exactly where I want to be.

Uyuni was kind of a dumpy desert town.  There were a few nice streets, but here at the oil change place, they just dump the oil all over the sand.  Thanks guys.

We spent the night at a good hotel as our reward for 8 hours of offroading.  The basin of the shower was brown with sand and dirt.  It was a great day.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Finally, what I had been waiting for my whole trip.  The Salar de Uyuni is one of the most amazing things I’ve ever seen.  It is a completely flat plain of whiteness.  It goes on miles and miles for all directions.  Other people describe it like being on another planet.  For me, seeing the salt flat was accomplishing one of the dreams of my trip.  What another great day.

Once we got to the Salar de Uyuni, we realized we weren’t the only bikes there.

I was able to get my picture!

Here is the rallye sticker for the Fench bikers.  They were so great to meet!

We stopped at an island in the middle of the salt flat that naturally had a restaurant.  Here I left a couple of the Bolivian 4×4 guides sit on my bike and take pictures.

Not me either.

This french guy used a bread basket and napkin to get out of the salar’s intense sun.

We made 45 new friends with frenchmen who  flew their bikes over to ride from Santiago to La Paz on thier new BMW 1200 GS Adventures.  Wow.  It was quite a sight.  I felt like I was in the middle of some TV commercial.  I saw more GSes in one day in the middle of Bolivia as I did my entire life in the United States.

The graitious standing on the pegs on perfectly smooth salt photo.

The next that follow is the game that everyone places on the Salar de Uyuni.  Because it is so perfectly flat you can really mess with perception and depth.  For about 3 hours we procede to try to stand on top of everything we had.

OK.  Enough of that.

No really.

Now we’re just back to bikes on the salt flat.  No more tiny people.

Did I mention I’m happy to be here?

We left the salt flats and were trying to find a cheap hotel.  That isn’t as easy as it sounds, even though we’re in Bolivia.  We didn’t want to drive back to Uyuni (about 30 minutes away).  We tried the hotels that the French Bikers were staying at, but they were 4 star hotels and we couldn’t even come close to affording that.

After learning that we didn’t have the money to stay in a room at the hotel, one french guy started insisting to the front desk that we were elite BMW mechanics who helped fix the rallye bikes.  We were then permitted to sleep in the hamocs of a 4 star hotel.  this is my first 4 star hammoking.

The entire hotel was made of salt.  Pure salty luxary.  Even the floor was salt granuales.  Kinda like visiting the beach, but even more salty.

This was truely a unique experience.

They had a few support vehicles.  It must have been nice to have fresh tires constantly!!

Here is what some of the other salt flats look like.  Most of the ones in Bolivia and Chile aren’t the solid salt flats what you are thinking about.  They’re these salty crusty dried mud places devoid of life.

I’m still happy to be here too.

After leaving the Salar de Uyuni, we were constantly lost, even with GPS loaded with maps.  The problem was that none of the maps that we bought or brought or were loaded on GPS reflected reality.  We could use the names of cities we read on maps to ask the people working their alpaca for a direction, but none of the roads were where they were supposed to be nor even the orders of cities.  We were navigating blind.

The first day we found a hostel that would let us park in their restaurant.  They had pretty good llama too.

Another salt flat…

The ride to Chile was as challenging as the road to Uyuni.  Atleast there were a couple of times whee we were on rock roads high above the salars.

We saw this mine in the distance and went through their perimeter gate to ask them for directions.  They were super nice and told us they were mining sulfur.

We eventually made it to the Chilean border after a tough couple of days of riding.  Bolivia was a great experience.  I’m so happy I made it in.

We left Sajama for Uyuni.  There were a few routes that we could take, but after fighting with loose sand for a couple of days, we decided to follow the paved roads as much as we can.  Yeah, we’re weak adv-riders, but hey, we have a lot of luggage!

As we were starting to get close to Oruro we had to dodge a simple roadblock in front of a bridge.  We were in the middle of nowhere really, still 50km to Oruro, so we didn’t really think much of it.  I just figured it was a few pissed off buses.

As we neared Oruro I started getting very nervous.  There was even less traffic than normal.  Oruro has 215,000 people, so there should be SOME activity.

I got to the tollway and there were buses, rocks, and broken glass spread across the road.  OK.  Now is when I realize there is a serious problem going on in the city.

Every moto traveler talks about Bolivia and road blocks.  My understanding is that they’re just to harass buses and cars, not motorcycles.  I don’t know why they’re OK with motorcycles going places, but there was no way for any other vehicle to get through this road block.

We managed to squeeze through two buses parked next to eachother.  The area was full of onlookers, just hanging out.

The other thing I heard from moto travelers about breaking through roadblocks is that sometimes you’ll have rocks thrown at you.

Lucky for us, this protest seemed pretty peaceful.  Getting through this city was going to be pretty rough.

Every intersection had atleast a bus or microbus blocking the way for cars.  Not only the car intersections, but they had lined up 4 or 5 buses on the train tracks to prevent the train running.  Lets just say I wouldn’t want to be the first bus to park on the track.

I’m not exactly sure what they mean, so I’ll let a better spanish speaker translate that sign.

It was a crazy experience though– It was a modern, well, Bolivia modern with lots of big wide roads, city of 200,000 and it was nearly silent except for the chatter of people.

Don’t mess with the buses.