Up in the northeast of Guatemala and into the region known widely as the Yucatan, we’ve a day at Tikal, a Malayan site deep in the jungle where once 100,000 folk lived. Formed firstly around 700BC and lasting 16 centuries until around 900AD when, along with many other lowland Mayan city states, it collapsed. It […]
Don’t get me wrong – it’s a great country. We are loving Leon especially – not too large a city and lots of cool folk here doing neat things. Like fellow New Zealander Conor fromGisborne who right now is running this not-for-profit tourist operation, the profits from which are spent on the disadvantaged kids of […]
Half way up Nicaragua now and feeling the effects of the heat. Today it was 38 degrees on the road and with high humidity – the rains aren’t too far away now. It’s debilitating and we savour every opportunity to climb some hills and reduce the temperature. Best to ride early but given its 30 […]
Panama City has a lot of statues – but we can’t find one of former president Manuel Noriega nor, more interestingly one of my distant ancestor (oh yeah?) Henry Morgan, also of Glamorgan in South Wales, the same county my dad was born and grew up in (Peterson Super Ely versus Henry’s stomping ground of […]
Finally, our bikes have arrived in Panama from Ecuador. The normal tortuous bureacracy as every department the government has needs to affix their stamp before we can ride them out of the airport gates. And – lest we forget to mention – another $1,000 US to set them free! So that’s $1,200 US for each […]
Don’t get me wrong, the capital of Ecuador is not a bad city, in fact we’ve grown rather found of it. It’s just that we’ve been here too long – too long trying to line up air transport for the bikes to Panama. And it hasn’t been easy, things are not straightforward here in Ecuador […]
It has been nagging at me for 3 months now – the fact that we entered Colombia with our bikes illegally – no immigration stamp and no certification for temporary importation of the bikes. I wouldn’t normally be concerned but stupidly we forgot when we came in from Venezuela down a lonely back road and […]
Right of the south of Colombia a couple of kms north of the border with Equador sits an amazing cathedral built atop a viaduct that bridges a steep ravine. It’s orgin is thanks to a vision of the Virgin Mary seen on a rock in the mid 18th century, against which now the church is […]
Colombia remains embroiled in a struggle with the insurgents of Left and Right battling for control of its lucrative cocaine trade. As we ride south from Bogota – and we’re only a day or two from the Ecuadorian border now, things have become a bit more militaristic on the road. The army roadblocks, searches of […]
At last we’re in Bogota and on the bikes again – yeee haaa. They’re both intact – although both received new head gaskets in our absence (under Warranty thank goodness). I’m two up for the next 10 days as daughter Ruby rides pillion back down to Quito. Her initiation today in Bogota “touch” traffic was […]
