We came across a magnificent road from Mendoza, Argentina into Chile and had flurries of snow as we cleared customs at 3200m but then the race was on as Gareth and I left the others for a speedy ride to the Santiago hotel “Atton” where he had promised to be available for a radio interview. […]
Archive | Up the Andes
Up the Andes
Riding the World’s most dangerous road
Riders: Gareth Morgan, Jo Morgan, Dave Wallance, Tony Armstrong,Brendan Keogh, Chris Stephens
Motorcycles: BMW F800GS
Distance: 16,856km
Countries: Peru, Bolivia, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Brazil
Trip description: A ride from the Alto Plano of Bolivia and Peru to the frozen tip of Patagonia; on the world’s most dangerous road, where the stakes are high, on to Argentina’s fabled Ruta 40, where the steaks are large and cheap.
Across salt pans, into mud holes, up the Andes and down again; past the ruins of the ruins of Macchu Pichu, and finding themselves on the edge of the epicentre of the Chilean earthquak
Blogs from the trip
Across the Andes for the 5th Time – Ruta 7
Time to head out of Argentina for a bit – to Santiago for some bike servicing and to sort out whether we can ride south on the west side of the Andes to Osorno, Chile’s lake district. With the aftermath of the quake being public disorder in the southern towns, stories of it taking 48 […]
Key Man Award
We were in the small town of Villa Union (about 200km North of Mendoza, Argentina). On the street I came across Miguel a key cutter, working out of the back of an old combi van, sounds pretty normal until you look at the setup. He was also living in the van, and when you opened […]
Shakin’ All Over
What a beauty! here we were in this rather understated hotel in Villa Union, Argentina last night and earlier over a few cervazas been talking about robustness of the structure, typical of many it looked like the Big Bad Wolf could blow it down without much effort – when at 3.30 am the whole place […]
team work
Gareth often had stupid ideas but this last one was too much. But I went along with it anyway …. for the good of the team. After afternoon break when we all wanted to be finished for the day HE suggested that I get out in front, and PRETEND I had had a crash to […]
The road to Cafayate
The day started with the navigation of the one way system of Salta and the morning traffic rush. Soon we were on the outer ring road which lead us on to highway 68 the main road south from Salta. 40Kms down this road we turned off onto highway 30, the start of a 160 Km diversion […]
And so to Salta, Argentina
We wound our way down the Andes and overnighted at a smallish town called Purmamarka after a dream road. We descended nearly 2000m in 12 km and had 32 switchbacks as well as lots of sweepers to relax around. Surrounded by red sculpted cliffs and marvelling at the engineers who designed this masterpiece I longed […]
A day in the wops of Bolivia
We left our little mud hut home-stay in San Juan before the others and after wandering a maze of tracks through the desert, following a gps arrow to get a “near enough” direction, thought we were lost. After no sign or sight of any life for an hour, then we saw an adobe mud cottage. […]
Just a little salt
We awoke to a great view and the Sun rise of the Bolivian Salar. There had been a lot of debate over night regarding the much needed diesel and oil mix that we needed to apply to our bikes. Jo and Gareth had relayed their stories 8 years ago on riding across the Salar on […]
Always a Sad Day
The day always arrives on these trips when the brief sojourn of having wives and families along comes to an end, they return to NZ and the real expedition ride resumes. No vans to follow us around any more, no local guides to point out the best routes (although too often they’re completely wrong on […]
