Any recommendations for budget motorcycle tour using own bike? I plan to start from USA southern border and end in Santiago, Chile by end of October 2023. Solo female 50-something rider seeking experience riding companions (male or female) or low budget commercial tour. Will ride my own bike. Experienced road riding for 40+ years. Moderate (where essential) off road. Bike will probably be a CRF250 or similar. Any recommendations welcomed.

Welcome to the Hubb.

Learn to speak Spanish. Enjoy your ride.

Saludos

mika

You won't find a commercial tour which covers your entire planned trip, if that's what you're asking. Sometimes there are multi-country tours available--notably in Colombia--but I've never heard of one that could be called "budget."

My experience has always been that attempting to organize riding companions long in advance via online forums is not a profitable use of time; plans change, budgets change, schedules change, stated interests and priorities change... Even shared departures which do come to pass tend to fragment--sometimes within days, certainly weeks. It's hard to find people who travel well together under most circumstances, and harder still when riding.

It's not too difficult to meet other riders at routing choke points or along the road, joining up for a while before (almost always) going separate ways. But Latin America doesn't actually have too many of the sorts of places where travelers converge--it's not like Africa or Asia in that respect--and some of those which used to exist have evaporated during the past few years. I'm thinking, for example, of the Stahlratte and Dakar Motos, but it does seem likely that others will or have already emerged with the recent resurgence of travel.

Still, if you maintain a presence in the usual online forums--here, ADVrider, iOverlander--you'll find connections almost at will wherever you go. I just wouldn't expect them to last very long on the ground.

Edit to add: with respect to Mika's post above, there's no denying that advanced Spanish language skills are handy, but they're definitely not essential. Depending on where you go, Portuguese, English, Dutch, French, and/or various indigenous languages can be at least as useful.

Don't know if that's discouraging, but I hope it's helpful.

Mark

Good moto choice, light, nimble.

well, three old guys are leaving the US on Jan 16th., destination Rio. Message me if you are interested