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Congrats Ellen. It seems you had a nice way to celebrate your birthday :-)
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Happy Belated Birthday Ellen ,looks like you were spoilt for a beautiful location:Beach:
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Thanks for the birthday wishes and yeap an awesome way to spend the day :thumbup1: |
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Cheers for the birthday wishes, we waited around for your present ... it must have got lost :smartass: As above, superb place to spend a special day. :thumbup1: |
Two Years On The Road And The Heart Speaks
3rd May 2012 - 3rd May 2014
Here we are two years into our one and a half year trip with another year to go. So after a swag of stunning destination photos I will bore you with some writing. A few things I have learnt, By two years most of what you have will be stuffed or will have already been replaced from being stuffed already and one year warranties expire the day before something shits itself, also while travelling warranties are worth nothing unless pretty much in the same town or at best in the same country ... rest of the time forget it. At the two year mark the costs for maintenance, repairs and replacements has really hammered our budget, that is the price to pay for long term travel. Our original thinking of getting sorted for the whole trip was logical and would have worked if we had been 1.5 years, also while a medium size bike was great for USA north a smaller bike from Mexico, Central and south America at least down to Bolivia would have been superior. For two up the 950 is great for carrying two peoples gear etc and the long wheelbase adding outstanding handling for gravel roads and offroad as well as comfort space.:clap Clothing takes a beating when you wear the same thing day in day out and at least for us our favourite being merino wool Icebreaker are not readily available or are FOOKIN expensive.:eek1 Forum “Armchair travellers” .... some have said “ouwh you are doing the easy one” meaning the Americas, well I can tell you that buying fuel, food and accommodation is as hard if you don’t know Spanish as it is in Icelandic if you don’t understand their lingo. Same as learning new currency and what that currency SHOULD buy before you find out you have been stiffed by gringo tax. :huh Also riding in different countries with different rules is more difficult with its own challenges and this will apply to ANY country in the world when the signs mean nothing to you, learning Spanish in Central America gives you a basis of understanding which then change further south then you get to Argentina and Chile where they talk twice as fast with a different accent and vocab.....this creates many larfs and well as some frustrations. The Moto, USA down The bike, through the needlessly heavily over bordered Central America and border swapping here in South America I am firmly of the belief a carne is the simpler way to go, get the main paperwork sorted at the front end then everything else from there is easier, we must have copied hundred of useless document stuff that will end up as trash, what a waste to say the least. More on the bikes, we did start on DR650s for reliability and simplicity however this fast became not the case with two shitters, now the KTM 950 Super Enduro has outreliabled out DRs and has had a much harder time than the DRs put together despite what some think, we have had a few things to do with Maya but with 51000 km on her now it is expected that things will need doing. For someone wanting to travel and see the place at similar pace and mileage to us I firmly believe a 400 cc bike is well plenty big enough and for lot of the time a 250, the likes of a Kwacka 250 Sherpa or XTZ250 Yammy with injection makes for an extremely cheap reliable and low fuel use travel bike ....just lacking for those big open road uphills or a stonking head wind, no biggy if you have time ... which we do. :clap Venders, suppliers and general stuff, this is an exercise in management, not difficult but you have to have the ability to look ahead, while most parts are available in one way or another if they are KTM specific they are expensive or if aftermarket then the quality is lacking particularly in Latin America. We have had tremendous support and a few trials and tribulations, Alex at Konflict Motosports Konflict Motorsports & Suspension Inc. stands out as probably one of the most helpful with our shock woes getting a shock from the UK, getting it fixed and sending it to Chile, that is realtime active support, talking around the traps with other travellers we are only one of many that Alex has gone out of his way to help so he does deserve the big thumbs up, onya man, your good work is noted worldwide.:clap:clap As with always there is a winner and loser and CJ Designs would have to have been the worst by a country mile with the CJ stuff failing and costing us a lot of grief and money (noting we bought Maya cos she was kitted with a lot of CJ stuff), on top of that the lack of return communication which we tried by phone, email, pm on ADV etc. Some people (OCers) say times are tight and he is a one man band but I contacted him about 17 “ motard wheels for Maya as well with not a single response so I call BS as that is just bad business with bad attitude, seems he has the pip because of the 700 mile old water pump failure that some Ocers won’t let go of as his gear does not fail ....sure, for me there are plenty of other suppliers to spend my money at who will actually respond (noting Konflict and pretty much everyone else we have dealt with). Parts wise, our DID ZVMX chain stands out as a big winner for RTWing with wear life and well and truly worth the extra money, we know other guys who have greater mileage on the same chain but on an angry 950cc V2 46000 km in my view is good life, our chain was cleaned twice and tightened 4 times, great product when you don’t have to be at it every five minutes.:clap Heidenau tires, our fav for adventure touring, they do nothing special but they do everything nice and they last as well as taking a beating on sharp rocks taking it in their stride. Our lifesaving (Rigid Industries) LED lights are fantastic, although we have no affiliations to them they deserve a shout out for safety (especially in Peru) and their customer service has been outstanding, for power conscious people you can turn off your main headlight giving another 60 watts to GPS, grips, vibrators and other important things. Gear Klim gear, all I can say is yes, outstanding to say the least, it has been crash tested, in seriously hot temps and seriously low temps including snow and for me it has performed to perfection standing up to its earned label of quality. ARAI helmets, what else can I say two years on we are loving them, the padding has taken a beating and is showing signs of wear that could be expected after two years of constant use and to be fair abuse. Forma boots, adventure or quad model, seriously comfortable, flexible enough to walk some distance in and waterproof, for adventure touring I rate them highly. The People For the most of it you will find 99% of people you meet to be straight up honest and friendly who are interested in your travels and tails, there are of course the small contingent who view us purely as money pits and an opportunity to rip you off if possible. Colombians still take the No 1 spot for being the nicest mob and genuinely interested, most other countries we have really enjoyed too, our only ho hum country was Cuba with a lot of them of a daily basis and sometime hourly basis saying “give me money”, like Gene and Neda said it just wears you down and takes the shine off the place. While Bolivia hasn’t been a good start I am sure when we leave the touristy style place of Copacabana it will be better, I hope so as Bolivia hold the most interest to me and I am going in with my positive head on board will a list of places I want to go to, we will do the typical Kiwi friendly approach and if that fails I guess I will have time to write more, we did have a wee scuffle in Uyuni which involved the police ...you will have to read about that later.:evil So far I would say our trip has gone pretty much to plan cos we really don’t have one, we have had our ups and downs, crashes and thrills, activity with the Police but to be fair on a good basis and for the most of it.:clap We are approx 24 weeks behind where we thought we would be from crashes and moto fails etc, something we didn’t really factor in hence we have extended our trip out rather than rush it through just to get to the bottom because. We are lucky to have the time to be able to take this in our stride as we are well aware that a lot of people don’t get to travel for 24 weeks let alone have these as “sick days”. Favourites For Us Northern Chilean desert, San Pedro de Atacama, North Western Argentina and South Western Bolivia, this area encompasses scenery like we have never seen before, a seriously harsh simplistic desert loaded with more colours than a rainbow. Weird photos This one I could not find a reason to post for the fear of upsetting someone but here it is, the dog died snarling at something behind it, it was trapped/wedged between two rocks ... have never seen any thing like it. http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...er/file-64.jpg Thank you to all who have contributed and enjoyed the ride with us, hope this next year coming provides more good times. Cheers and regards Andi & Ellen |
thx
Andi, Ellen
congrats to two years on the road and sharing your great stories and pix .all the best for the rest of your trip john |
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Antofalla To Tolar Grande To San Antonio
Leaving Antofalla after birthdays, hots tubs, Llama ribs and chips .. good times ... it was time to move on and head north, our choice of road was the base along the salar because the top road being a bloody big sandpit.
The base road really didn’t turn out any better and was still a filling shaker, the big event tho is Maya turned 50. http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...la/file-58.jpg Leaving the base road we headed up a zig zig which was incredibly good condition given where it was, the only challenge being the loose corners however these proved to be of little issue. Nice soft corners commanding attention :eek1 http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...la/file-59.jpg Climbing the zig zig we were offered more spendid views of salar Antofalla before exiting up and over to the next salar. http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...la/file-60.jpg The rest of the road was a teeth chattering sandpit laden with corrugations so when we were finally handed the mining road across the salar it was like a little gift, although lumpy in places it was far nicer at least being firm not trying to steal the front wheel from under us. The suspension and tight bolt tester :rofl http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...la/file-63.jpg The salar mining road http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...la/file-65.jpg Tolar Grande, small mining town halfway between Antofalla and San Antonio, overnight stop for fuel and lodging, we were lucky to get a place with a kitchen so home cook was in order. :clap Tolar Grande has some amazing hill formations again luring the noisy Kiwis in, on offer was cool crazy paving and very red dirt mounds. http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...nde/file-6.jpg Again we could not help ourselves with the camera stunned at the cool landscape presented to our ogling eyes----->:eek1 :eek1 http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...nde/file-9.jpg At one stage the road was in a creek bed and much to our surprise there was some water in it ... well it was fair to say we were not expecting this and the sliminess nearly sent us off onto the sideline. http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...nde/file-5.jpg Composing myself cos no-one saw my act of unprofessionalism :evil we continued a little more aware .... and yes you guessed it this paid of BIG time as we struck a flat muddy section (which looked dry), this commanded bulk revs and the V2 singing an outstanding song to stop the ship sinking, we made it but no style points were given. :wink: The following day was a 200 km totally ripio (shingle.gravel road) ((again)). About half way we entered into a valley which again made for great viewing, I don’t think I could ever get sick of looking at this place, ever corner with every angle of the sun presenting something different. http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...de/file-13.jpg http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...de/file-16.jpg And a Dakar racing flat thrown in for fun http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...de/file-20.jpg As soon as this bright red section finishes it is like you are on a completely different road. http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...de/file-23.jpg Stopping at Laguna Seca for lunch (it’s true) ... but not as flash as the race circuit we opted to hide behind the structure to get out of the biting cold wind, all good. http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...de/file-25.jpg We made it into San Antonio mid afternoon staying at a hostel, hot shower ready for the nearly 5000 meter pass the following day :clap... then its all downhill from there. |
San Antonio To Cafayate To Salta To The Bolivian Border.
Tanked, tummied and tuned we set off down the RN 40, turning off from the 51 road we had the place to ourselves, road conditions good apart from the mandatory corrugations that is pretty much standard issue in this part of the world.:huh
The road wound up and up slowly taking us to 4968 meters...just couldn’t crack the 5 unfortunately. Sorry for the shit photo, it was cold, high, miserable fine day etc etc so they are my excuses :rofl and besides you need glasses cos it is clear to me :evil http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...ate/file-8.jpg It was fookin cold with the temp gauge showing just above zero, mind you we are nearly 5 km above sea level, quick photos and on our way. http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...Cachi/file.jpg Cresting the top we came across road works which made for interesting riding as the top 100 - 150 mm was soft and loose, further down many river crossings washing Antofalla off Maya. Again view along the valley down did not let us down http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...chi/file-1.jpg Cachi was a nice wee town with a cafe called Olivers the is owner is a moto rider, we camped up at the municipal ground which was nice and quiet when we arrived, unfortunately that night right next door there was a huge party that went on most of the night with the base beating through the ground and our beds .... not much sleep was had. Clearly going where no moto rider had been before except there guys on this door and all the others on the other doors :rofl http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...chi/file-5.jpg Next day was Cafayate with stop offs along the way, an uneventful day saw us arriving with plenty of time up our sleeves with some cool scenery along the way from abrupt rock formations. http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...ate/file-1.jpg http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...ate/file-7.jpg Our intention were to camp but the wind was up and some ominous clouds were watching us, we managed to bag a good price in a hotel and it had stella wifi which was very cool.:clap While in Cafayate we meet two guys from Italy on two Africa twins so we had a chat with them exchanging info etc. As it turned out the following morning we hit the road at pretty much the same time meeting the two Italians so we all rode together looking at the attractions, we then peeled off to Salta and they took the road to Cachi. The first crack :eek1 .....yeah http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...Salta/file.jpg The twins http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...lta/file-1.jpg Check out our racetrack with a view .. .no more teeth chattering :D:D http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...lta/file-3.jpg The twins and Maya waiting patiently http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...lta/file-4.jpg The Italian lads and the New Zealand dwarfs :D http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...lta/file-5.jpg Massive caverns cut by water over a coupla years :clap http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...lta/file-8.jpg http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...lta/file-9.jpg The rest of the ride for us was beautiful tarmac all the way to Salta apart from the last 10 km when Mrs.Garmin sent us down a wet narrow farm track style road which was the shortest route ...made for interesting riding as it was wet and slippery but it bought us out just up the road from Loki Hacienda, our destination for a few days. I was meant to fly to Buenas Aires to be an expert witness for a high court case in New Zealand however a few days before the case was settled which meant we could step on it and head to Bolivia as winter was chasing us up and hard. We stayed only two days in Salta getting a few things done then B lined it to Bolivia. Taking to golf cart race track the other way it was a leisurely ride to Bolivia allowing us plenty of time to cross the border later in the afternoon with ease. :clap Back To Bolivia ....:clap |
Seams like only weeks ago you posted your first years report .time fly's once again wonderful photographs .I enjoyed your insights at the start of this report.Honda is set to release a 1000 cc new Africa twin ,i think the market they should aim towards is 500cc with similar specs to the 1000 .Anyhoo until next time YDF Noel.:D
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We said the same thing, seems like yesterday and time is just flying by. Yes I think adv bikes are heading the wrong way too, 400 - 500 size is perfect for looking around, economics, handling weight etc. Unfortunately 99% of the market just wonna look cool rather than do it Cheers Andi. |
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You see some weird things when you get to weird places. This guy was wedged but I still am amazed he died snarling, never seen anything like it before and without being morbid I like the photo. Back to being an axle murderer now :innocent: Cheers Andi |
Bolivia, Villazon To Uyuni
Good afternoon all
I was all fired up and ready to do this RR when we got news of Haydens passing which took the wind out of my sails completely. I am trying to look on the positive side so need something to take my mind away from the tragedy, get this done and keep me occupied, it is fair to say it has hit me hard with this tragedy. Huge thanks to you guys for the support, very kind words. Regards Andi Ok, new report. Hotel scraps and police .....WOH HOH Fresh air in low digits was our start for the day Villazon, up the RN9 to Tupiza then left up the 21 to Uyuni. The road was tar sealed for the first 100 km to the turn off to the 21, our map showed gravel road from there on in and 200 km of it to Uyuni. Having served our time in all the Antos sandpits and corrugations for what ended up being 1300km of no tar seal whatsoever we were firstly very experienced and secondly happy to have ticked that box so were hoping the road was going to be more polite. http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...uni/file-4.jpg The valleys and passes allowing good views of our surroundings and standard issue corrugations again, this section of the road still pretty good tho through to Atocha, the river into Atocha proving a little interesting too being slimy. http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...uni/file-8.jpg Back on track now http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...ni/file-10.jpg Quick lunch stop and on our way to tackle the second half which proved to be more than interesting with 100’s of meters of bad sandpits, the dual wheel trucks creating a W in the wheel track making it near impossible to gun it and get it going at speed. Not ideal but paddling was the order of the day here and some sections Ellen had to walk about 300 meters. http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...ni/file-11.jpg http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...ni/file-12.jpg From the sandpits to Uyuni the corrugations chimed in big time again slowing the whole thing down again, we are used to that now. It was bitterly cold and I was watching our digital volt meter drop down to 9.6 volts, as I turned off lights and heated grips it came back up, I hit the heated grips again and the voltage dropped like a stone.....problems somewhere.:eek1 Arriving at Uyuni we found a hotel, wifi, parking, hot water etc so fitted the bill nicely...at least for a while. The main street in Uyuni http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...ni/file-13.jpg We cleaned up, showered, got organized and checked the email for one we had waiting for, after tea we returned as we needed to get hold of a friend on email, asking the people to turn the wifi on they then said no, you only get half an hour and that is it and you used it :eek1, I will add at this point the wifi was less than dial up speed so even checking email was a mission.:huh The discussion continued along the lines “you did not say half an hour when we clocked in”, it got heated with them refusing to turn the wifi on, we tried to reason with them saying check the email only and that would be it but no. :huh Next thing they say get out (i.e. boot us out) :eek1:eek1:eek1:huh:huh:huh and they gave us two minutes to get everything out!!!, at this point we said to each other these guys are nuttas so we would be happy to go somewhere else. We said please refund our money, no they would only refund part of our money because we had a shower earlier, at this point I did not see the funny side of this and said I would get the police....so I did.:clap I rode to the police station, got two policemen, they jumped up, in their truck, following me with lights flashing and the nine yards, the owner of the hotel watching this from the window as we pulled up. The two policemen and I went upstairs and Ellen explained to the officer the whole thing with the owners wife going OFF .... the police kept telling her to settle down.:deal The police explained to the owners that they can’t retrospectively say only 30 minutes wifi and that them telling us to get out in two minutes was stupidly unreasonable, the police went on to say to them these people are our tourists and bring money here and needed to be treated with some respect, we chimed in saying please just treat us normal, no red carpet required however with the owners wife this just threw petrol on the fire and both the owner and his wife were going toxic. :rofl:rofl The policemen trying to hold back smiles of disbelief at the hotel owners unusual behavior stayed while we packed up and they ordered the owners to refund our money IN FULL or they would be in trouble ... more petrol on the fire :lol3:lol3.... the police could not believe it either and they actually called for reinforcements, shortly after another two officers turned up.:clap The owner then accused me of ripping his plants out of his planter (there was five or six leaves on the ground), by this time the police had had enough and started to pull the hard line on them. We did get all of our money back, we left under police escort while the owners wife was still screeching at the top of her lungs...unreal :huh The funny thing is there was some Chinese people there too, Ellen politely explained to them the whole thing and they were pretty uncomfortable about staying too, we don’t know whether they stayed or not.:wink: Talk about have fun, with police backing 100% I really enjoyed myself and was very happy that the police really stood with us, to be fair they had fun too as it brightened up their otherwise cold and quiet night....the things we do to help them.:evil:D Silver lining, we went back to the police station and they helped us find a hotel with normal people (same price etc), no parking but superb wifi ...that we were allowed to use, no parking, no problem, the police said leave the moto here in our office ...done deal. :clap:clap So not an ideal restart to Bolivia be fair but no-one died ... probably wasn’t far off and it wouldn’t have been us.:lol3 A good nights sleep in a normal hotel we were set to hit the salar and enjoy Uyuni, Maya however had different ideas and had no intention of starting at zero degrees with a semi flat battery, charging problem had taken up its place. Back track a few years and half a world away our friends in Wanaka New Zealand used to run tours in Bolivia had emailed us saying if we get to Uyuni go see their friend Chris and if we needed any help he would be the man, our intention where to catch up with him anyway but now it had been bought forward and yes he is THE man. :freaky:clap He took us to an auto sparky who charged the battery enough to get Maya around for a doctors appointment and see what was wrong were her tummy. After much prodding, poking, testing we lifted the tank and he checked the alternator and voltage regulator, turns out the voltage regulator was going south which is a bugger.:eek1 He cleaned all the terminals as best he could, we need a replacement which we have ordered out of the USA because in Bolivia a voltage reg for this bike is a non event. We still have charging but cannot use anything that uses power, i.e. lighting or heated grips etc ... bum, its cold here. Killing this day with fault finding we stayed the night at a hostal opposite (again with normal people) ((and wifi)) (((that we were allowed to use))) and the next morning set off to the salar ..... that next. Maya safely parked up in the good hostel :D http://i1263.photobucket.com/albums/...ni/file-14.jpg |
maya in the cop shop ....
Hi Andy Ellen, just a short little post to wish Ellen a super happy belated 21st birthday & you both a super happy second anniversary on the road, well done :scooter:
Am still following yer journeys, was interested to see your mileage on that chain, gonna have a look at that. Have just bought the tiger800 xc my first chain drive bike in donkey's years, jep have boosted the British economy :thumbup1: .... gonna be the first Irish guy to be knighted by Queen Bethsie for loyalty to the empire .... :clap: Am off tomorrow to go to the Hu meet in Germany & on to Romania run the tiger in :mchappy:Have fun guys keep the rubber side down & catch you when I'm back :Beach: Regards Vince |
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