The Misadventures of the Flying Gringo

Buenos Aires, Argentina

2007-03-27T10:02:00.000-04:00

It´s been raining since I got here last night. I left my motorcycle in Atlantida with a member of the local motorcycle gang, who is also on the SWAT team. It should be safe. We spent the morning talking about different trips and experiences. He has me sold on taking a trip up the coast of Brazil.

Then I took the bus to Montevideo, and the boat to Buenos Aires. At the terminal, the Argentine customs agents had two golden labs for drug sniffing. One was inside, at the point where the luggage comes in on the carrousel, and the other was right outside. The one inside decided it would rather play with the dog outside than sniff for drugs, so it got on the carrousel and started jumping over the bags, trying to get outside, even though it was on a leash. After a while, the agent decided to get out a tennis ball and show it to the dog. That drove the dog nuts, it started jumping up and down, trying to get to the tennis ball. The dog outside stuck it´s head through the opening and tried to get the tennis ball. So the agent would touch the bags as they appeared with the tennis ball and the dogs lunged at them. When he realized how ridiculous this looked, the agent let the dog go outside and play with the other drug sniffing dog. They didn´t find anything in any of the bags. I got the distinct impression someone in the Aduana´s office read somewhere that golden Labs are good for sniffing out drugs, but skipped over the part where it said you have to train them.

I got here at 9 last night, and shared a cab with some backpackers from Australia and New Zealand. We went to an area where their guidebook said there was a hotel, found it, and the place had one room. So instead of taking out the guidebook and looking for another hotel in the area that might accomodate me, the female backpacker asked if I was going to be okay. I asked the woman where there was another hotel, and she told me. The female backpacker said, ¨do you understand what she is saying?¨and repeated ¨Are you going to be okay,¨ but not as a question, then they almost knocked the woman at the door over racing into the hotel ahead of me. So I wandered a couple blocks until I found the hotel Bolivar, which was surprisingly clean and functional for $10 a night and cheaper than the hotel the backpackers were staying in.

Around the corner was a pub called the Gibralter, where I met a nice couple from England on an 8 month honeymoon. They have been renting cars and traveling around South America. We compared stories and experiences.

Then it was off to bed and here I am in the pouring rain, waiting for my plane home.

Atlantida, Uruguay

2007-03-25T17:58:00.000-04:00

I rode across Uruguay yesterday, from Paysandu to Valizas, where I spent the night in a rancho, which is a house with no electricity, where you have to pump the water with a handpump if you want to take a shower or use the bathroom. so I pumped water and wandered around in the dark looking for candles. I got there after dark, and went to a restaurant I was at during my bicycle trip in february. because the residents have voted against putting in street lights, the night sky is incredibly bright and full of stars and galaxies. It´s hard to believe this is what the sky used to look like all over the world. valizas was deserted, and the restaurant served five tables all night, but I managed to meet an interesting Italian who has been in Uruguay for 30 years and was surprised I could tell he wasn´t a native.

this morning I rode up to aguas dulces, another beach town, and then hit the autopista back to Montevideo. After three days on the bike, I am sore, and I realize that I don´t take in as much on the motorcycle as I did on the bicycle. I think I will be taking a lot more bicycle trips in the future.

I am going to leave the bike here in Atlantida with a member of the Uruguayan swat team who assures me it will be safe, and take the bus to the ferry to argentina. I should be in Buenos Aires tomorrow.

I had a problem with my atm card yet again. apparently one of the airlines double charged me on a ticket and took out all my traveling cash, so when I got online, I had $2 and change to my name. but I called my bank and was able to transfer enough to keep going.

beside me in the cyber cafe, some kids are playing a game online, and screaming at one another as they play on different computers. It is rather distracting.

Paysandu, Uruguay

2007-03-24T09:04:00.000-04:00

The road to Paysandu is long and paved with adventure. I raced across the bridge and was able to get into Uruguay before the hippies closed the road again. They are doing this because the President of Uruguay got on the news and made statements about the paper plant and the protesters to the effect that Uruguay was going to open the biggest cellulose plant in the Americas right across the river from Argentina, and the Argentines were acting illegally in closing the bridge. There are also a lot of commercials on Argentine TV for Uruguay Natural, the government tourism agency, so the Uruguayans are sending mixed messages.

I have a year and won´t have the same problems I had in Argentina when I go back. Now I´ve got to figure out where to leave the bike.

Yesterday started off cool but bright, the storm had blown through, and the day looked like it might turn out to be warm. Then I went from Ruta 7 to Ruta 8 and found myself in a thick tule fog for about twenty miles. The thin strip of rubber on my left glove got quite a workout keeping the faceshield clean.

Finally I got through the fog and settled in for miles and miles of pampa. Something new is wrong with my bike, because I am getting 120 or 130 km before the fuel runs out, and before I was getting about 160. But it still runs and if anything breaks, I have a year to deal with it.

Crossing out of Rosario into Entre Rios, I saw the effects of the recent rainfall. The lowlands are flooded, and there are cows wandering around up to their necks in water. At the tollbooth, I was given a flier warning me about loose livestock and the road was posted with warnings about it too. I thought this must be a terrible tragedy, then saw a couple of boats made for rounding up cows in the water, so evidently this is fairly regular, and the farmers have prepared for it.

I got stopped by the Entre Rios police for crossing a double yellow line to get around a truck. The first cop asked me if I did, and I said that everybody does, so he transfered me to another cop to collect the fine. The fine was $330 at first. He told me they had a digital photo of me crossing the double yellow line, and asked if I did. I said I didn´t remember. It may have been a truck, it may have been six trucks, three cars and a pickup. He called up the road and someone on the radio relayed back my license plate and description, and that I passed a truck on the double yellow line. Why there was about five km. of freshly painted double yellow line on the long straight stretch right before the police roadblock was a mystery to me. I told him to give me a ticket and I would pay the judge. He said I had to pay them, and produced a form, in triplicate, that looked very official. It even had a stamp on it. Then he showed me one that was filled out, where some idiot had actually paid them almost $100 for something. I told him I wanted to go to the judge. He told me that they were going to detain my bike for 12 hours, and then I could go to the judge. They do this right before the bridge is closed for the weekend, so you are pressured to settle up. I asked where I could pitch my tent. Then the fine was $33. Apparently there´s a 90% discount for cash on roadside traffic fines in Entre Rios. I said I wanted to pay the judge, and would turn myself in in Colon, the next town up the road. He showed me on the form where I had to either pay them, or go to the court in Parana, about 200 miles away. Very good thinking on the part of whoever had the forms made. I said fine, I´ll go to Parana. He asked me if I´d been in Argentina before. I said yes, and he then said, ¨so you know how this works, don´t you?¨ Then he handed me back my documents and I was on my way.

In Colon, I filled up my bike and my spare tank. Every time I check into a hotel, I wonder to myself why they let me take 3 gallons of gas into my room. I wouldn´t if it was my hotel.

So here I am, now I´ve got to cross Uruguay and find somewhere to put the bike.

San Luis, Argentina

2007-03-22T21:57:00.000-04:00

Summer ended today. All I had to do to make this happen was cross the Andes. I left Santiago a little late, after standing out on Catedral St. with my jumper cables hooked to my bike and a pathetic look on my face until someone stopped and gave me a jump. Once the bike got started, I rode around the block a couple times, loaded up all my stuff, kissed Marcia goodbye for now, and headed to the Caracoles, the treacherous curves you have to climb to get out of Chile. That the road is poorly maintained is not enough, to make it more interesting, the trucks coming from Argentina like to pass one another on descent. Makes for some interesting motorcycle riding.

Santiago was overcast and brisk, but once I got out of town the sky cleared and I felt a bit warm. Then I started to climb the Andes, and the further I got, the colder it got, until by the time I reached the tunnel separating Chile and Argentina, I could not feel my fingers.

I chose the fast moving line for a change, and got through customs in less than half an hour, which is fast for this part of the world. By the time I was legal in Argentina, my hands were warm enough that I didn´t feel like I was wearing mittens when I tried to turn on the lights or start the bike.

One of the little games I play as I travel is ¨try to have no money left over from the country you are leaving.¨I have less than a dollar in Chilean coins, so I won today.

The game took on a new twist when the ATM at a bank in Santiago captured my card two days before I was to leave and I had to scramble to get it back. So now I have to keep in mind that I may be unable to get money out of the machine at any time, and have to take out the absolute most I think I´ll need, because I could get cut off at any time, and have a schedule to keep. It will be interesting to see how many Argentine pesos I have left when I leave.

I stopped for gas in Uspallata, and met three RVs full of old Brazilians. The brazilians are the most amable people in the world. They started to talk to me in Spanish about my trip, the road to Chile, and the exchange rate with the dollar. First I replied in Spanish, then started in Portuguese. After about two minutes, it suddenly came to them that I was speaking Portuguese, and they lit up and switched to their own language. We spoke for a few minutes more, then I excused myself. I am sure that if I didn´t, I would be in an RV right now somewhere in Chile.

The sky was bright with sun and big white clouds as I started to descend towards Mendoza, and I thought I was going to have a nice day of riding. I haven´t done any distance riding for over two months, and was looking forward to it.

Then the sky got dark, and the clouds came down and touched the earth around me. The wind picked up and blew bitter cold, and it began to rain. It was a cold rain, but not strong. The ground was mostly dry. In the distance, I could make out patches of blue sky.

The road took a turn, and I was in a black sky, and the rain began to pelt me and the bike. I huddled down forward over the tank and rode on. The Axis bike still runs great, between hiccups and backfires that jerk the whole bike back and then forward. It ran all day at 120 kph, has been unbelievably reliable and I should like it, but for some reason, I do not like this bike.

Once I got to the pampa, the rain lightened up, but the sky stayed dark and grey, and the cold began to penetrate my clothes and then my chest. It was a damp cold and the rain was constant and weak. The pampa is a long flat stretch that seems to go on forever. It runs from the Andes to the ocean, and this is why storms blow in so fast and with such force from the atlantic, then pile up and explode against the mountains.

I rode the pampa out as long as I could, and came to San Luis. I am sure I´ve been here before, even though I don´t recognize any of it. The town square has a beautiful church and one block away is the New York New York casino. There are lots of casinos in this town. Apparently it got hit pretty hard by the rain before I got here, because the water runs fast about half a foot thick in the gutters.

I rode around looking for a hotel, then went to a drugstore to ask about cheap places, as I learned to do on my bicycle trip inUruguay, and got pointed to the Inca Hotel, for $21 a night, breakfast and parking included. I probably could have found something cheaper, but there´s a lot to be said for getting off the bike and into a hot shower when you are cold and tired.

The sandwich I had for dinner was a Lomo completo, grilled new york steak with ham, egg, lettuce and tomato on toasted artesanal bread. It was literally bigger than my size 14 tennis shoe, and hung out about three inches over both sides of the plate. It was $3.50. And it was delicious.

Santiago, Chile

2007-01-17T14:32:00.000-05:00

Wouldn't it be great if the functions of government were privatized? Especially the post office. Can you imagine how much cheaper and more efficient the private sector could provide essential services? Well, that's how it is in Chile. So this is your mail, being sorted in the park by the guy who is going to bring it to your house. And if something's missing? It's probably still in the park.

The weather has been absolutely spectacular, and I have been riding across Santiago on my BikeE recumbent bicycle, in preparation for my epic ride through Uruguay the month of February. I have started a blog where I will be posting trip reports. The site is http://bentgringo.blogspot.com

Los Libertadores, Chile

2006-12-11T14:48:00.000-05:00

A friend and I decided to go to Uspallata for the weekend, because it's a three day weekend in Chile. So we headed off bright and early at about 11:00 Saturday morning for the Caracoles and tunnel into Argentina. For some reason, everyone else in Santiago had the same idea, so we were forced to wait at the Chilean border for about an hour and a half to get checked out of the country. This isn't the actual customs procedure, this is just someone in a booth writing your license plate down on a piece of paper. Then we went to Argentina, where the line was about a half mile long and three cars wide. The Argentine officer managing the line told me that because I was on a motorcyce, I didn't have to wait in line. When I got inside the customs barn, where Argentina and Chile work side by side in what is known as an integrated frontier, the Argentine officer there told me I had to go back to the end of the line. I told him the officer outside told me to come in, so he sent me to the shortest line.

That day was wonderful, with nice hot weather, and lots of Argentine beef and beer. The next day too was great. We stayed at a cabin on the side of the road, and lounged around the pool all day long. That night, it rained briefly, as it often does on the Argentine side of the Andes. Argentina is flat, so clouds travel fast across the country and pile up against the mountains.

The next day was sunny, so we decided to take a short trip to Villavicencio, a town in the mountains with a hotspring about 30 or 40 miles away. The road changed to gravel about half way there, and when we were about 18 miles away, it started to rain. Now I knew about the gravel road, and that the other side of Villavicencio is paved to Mendoza, so I decided to press on, even though the rain was increasing and off in the distance there was lightning and thunder.

My friend had packed a cloth coat and sweater to keep warm, and was wearing tennis shoes. Soon she was wearing my sweater as the road began switching back and forth when we climbed and turned into the lightning. I began to have some trepidation, and looked around for somewhere to take cover. The ground is mostly shale and berift of cover. The road was shale, and slabs of rock. The hail that began to fall made the large slabs of road fairly challenging. The large rocks that had fallen and blocked half the road in places reminded me that it was best to keep moving. We made it to the summit, and began the dangerous switchbacks down the other side.

At one wide spot in the road, I stopped to take pictures and asked the couple that had the same idea where Villavicencio is. The husband pointed to a building at the bottom of the mountain. The town is a lot smaller than I thought it would be. He told me the road back to Mendoza is fine except for the 8 miles where it is gravel.

We went through Villavicencio fairly fast, and I noticed that under pretty much every tree all the way back to Mendoza an Argentine family was having a barbeque. Some of them had strapped mattresses on the car and driven out, others were barbequing an entire goat. Many were sleeping, and under some of the trees peope had over the years built brick parillas, the Argentine barbeque.

We had lunch in Mendoza, then climbed back into the Andes and headed for Uspallata. The weather was hot and I was enjoying being on the bike again, once I dried out. We got gas in Uspallata, and I filled my spare tank, because gas is about 40 percent cheaper in Argentina than Chile, and headed for the tunnel back to Chile. About thirty miles away, it started to rain, a cold, miserable rain. About 20 miles away from the tunnel, we passed an overturned tour bus. About fifteen miles away, the rain turned to snow, and I truly began to freeze. The snow clung to my visor, and I had to raise it to see, and then the snow clung to my glasses. I was happy to see the tunnel, but once through, the snow was waiting for me. By the time we got to the integrated frontier, and three hour line, I couldn't feel my hands. I told this to the Chilean border guards, and they let me park inside with the tour busses and thaw out.

We rode to Santiago to find out Pinochet the ruthless dictator/ savior of Chile had died that afternoon, and the fans of the old rascal were fighting in the streets with the fans of justice and human rights and the police. The police have water cannons, and were clearly winning. The apartment is three blocks from the Moneda, the Chilean White House, which is apparently the best place to gather a mob at a time like this, so the supermarket was closed, the streets were wet and sealed off, and the night was full of shouts and car horns. On every channel, the TV had nothing but Pinochet.

Santiago, Chile

2006-11-23T15:52:00.000-05:00

So You want to open a pet store, but you are lacking a store. What do you do? This enterprising fellow decided not to let his lack of a location keep him from following his dream. And what a happy face he has.

I've been riding my recumbent bicycle through the streets of Santiago, and am surprised at how safe it is, compared to an American city. They do look out for bicyclists here, and will yield the right of way. I was a bit skittish at first, because of the large number of buses, but have developed a system of staying off the roads that have a lot of bus traffic. If the road looks good, comfortable and well maintained, it is to be avoided at all costs. You would be surprised how uncomfortable cobblestones are after the first three blocks.

Speaking of public transportation and the free market, did you ever wonder what it would be like if bus drivers were not paid a salary, but received a percentage of ticket sales instead? If you incentivized public transportation? That's what they do here. The busses fly down the streets, and it is not uncommon to see three at a time dive into a bus stop, trying to snare passengers. If you flag one down, he will stop, even if you are nowhere near a bus stop, which would be nice if you were the guy on the street, but given the fact that he will literally slam on the brakes from 50 mph, can be a bit disconcerting as your body wants to fly forward, the people behind you are experiencing the same sensation and the only thing keeping you from losing your balance is the death grip you have on the handle hanging from the roof of the bus. Of course they don't follow the schedule, and I have seen three of the same route travel in a pack, zooming in and out of traffic, racing to the next stop. Riding one is an adventure. After much deliberation, the city of Santiago has decided to put the drivers on a salary and make them follow a schedule. Apparently there have been too many accidents and banged up buses.

There are a lot of feral dogs here in Santiago, and they seem to find motorcyclists and guys on recumbent bicycles particularly enticing to chase. After an incident with a pack of the beasts one night on my motorcycle and another on the recumbent, I have decided to carry around a bottle full of soapy water and ammonia. Dogs don't like to be sprayed in the face with this solution, and tend to back off. They still bark, but they do stop chasing the bike.

Buenos Aires, Argentina

2006-11-14T09:13:00.000-05:00

I am sitting in a motorcycle shop. They are putting on two tires and changing the oil for $178. They are letting me use the company computer now that the local police officer is done checking his email and viewing porn on it. The mechanic is sipping a mate and talking to a friend. He changed one tire and hopes I am not in too much of a hurry.

Mercedes, Uruguay

2006-11-14T08:56:00.000-05:00

The very clever plan was to tell the Uruguayans how much I love their country, then go up the coast 60 miles and exit back to Argentina. But in Paysandu, I encountered the only Argentine border official who reads english and could tell that the document I presented her as proof of insurance is my registration, and the other one knew enough about motorcycles to know that a Moto Guzzi is not an MuZ, and the card I gave them next is for the wrong motorcycle.

So I'm in a cybercafe in Mercedes, printing up a new insurance card for the MuZ. I will cross back over where I had all the problems, but did not get asked for proof of insurance.

Gualeguaychu de nuevo

2006-11-05T20:53:00.000-05:00

It´s like being stuck in Lodi again... There is a convention of Estancianero owners here. An Estancianero is like a jeep, but made in Argentina, therefore, of course, better.

There is a show on called 48 hours. It is like the american one but instead of trapping sex offenders, they torture soccer coaches. I´m not sure which is more humiliating. Granted, you fare worse after being on the American version, but spend much more screen time being totally humiliated if you lose a game on the Argentine one. So, prance naked through someone´s house to meet their 16 year old daughter while they are out of town or lose a game to Boca? One publicly brands you a total loser your entire life, the other one requires you to register whenever you move after you get out of prison. And I think the Argentine program does last the full 48 hours. A lot happens in soccer. They run back and forth down the field, they kick the ball. This goes on for days, or at least 48 hours if you add up all the games played in all the provinces in Argentina and the interesting foreign ones when they run out of domestic product to broadcast.

When they harrass me, I just ask them if they still have oil and imply that this matters to my government. For reasons I can´t comprehend, this matters to them.

Gualeguaychu, Argentina

2006-11-05T00:53:00.000-05:00

The plan was to ride my bike across the border to Uruguay, return to Buenos Aires with another 8 months to leave the bike there, and ride someone else´s KLR 650 north to the USA. So what am I doing in Gualeguaychu, and why is my bike at the customs office, actually they wheeled it into the Customs office in Uruguay, where it has been confiscated until Monday, when I can go pay a fine equal to a third of the value of the bike and ride it off into the sunset or Uruguay.

I am extremely happy that when the bike ran out of gas today and I poured gas into the tank, some splashed out over the tank and all the plastic above the motor. The border office to leave Argentina and enter Uruguay is in Uruguay. Inside the customs and immigration office, the Argentines have two sections about 10 by 18 feet in shape, between two rectangles owned by the Uruguayos. My bike is sitting in one, stinking and reeking of gasoline.

If you have followed my tales since last year, you will remember when the Argentine protestors stopped me from going into Uruguay to do the paperwork so I wouldn´t be in this mess. I tried to explain to the one honest customs agent in all of Argentina that this happened, he told me to tell it to the boss, and wouldn´t listen to me when I asked if there wasn´t a way to fix the problem there. As much as I dislike him for not realizing that laws don´t apply to me, I do respect his honesty.

The Argentine customs agents gave me a ride to Gualeguaychu, and left me in front of a hotel. We were accompanied by a black Mormon with dreadlocks who only has 10 pesos and is trying to go 200 miles to Buenos Aires. They left him at the bus stop.

While I was there waiting for my new amigos from the Argentine customs office to finish their shifts, one of the Uruguayan naval officers who inspects trucks that enter Uruguay from Argentina let me ride his 50 cc scooter up and down in front of the customs office. The Argentines looked on unamused.

Zarate, Argentina

2006-11-03T17:42:00.000-05:00

Mar 1, 2006

Zarate is a charming little town on the side of the river that separates two of the provinces of Argentina. I have often seen it from atop the bridge crossing the river and told myself I should stop here. It is clean and has a lot of very expensive looking houses on the bluffs over the river. The downtown is vibrant at night, with crowded restaurants and lots of foot traffic. I would definitely like to come back and spend more time here.

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=32277

I was supposed to go to Uruguay today to pick up some paperwork for a venture I am looking into. So I gassed up the bike and headed for the international bridge.

Because the protesters of the Papermills being built in Uruguay had removed the signs to the bridge, I got lost and ended up wandering around for a while, before backtracking and finding the right route. About 10 miles from the bridge, I came across the blockade.

I´ll say one thing for them, the Argentines know how to build a blockade. They have taken a tractor trailer and set it sideways in the road, across a bridge over a river. There is a path next to it wide enough for a semi that they block with a farm tractor. In front of the trailer are two tents, off to both sides of the road are tents, and up the road the police have a tent over a picnic table and what appears to be a camping trailer.

The mood is festive. Once I realized there was no way to ride around the blockade, I planned to charm my way across, told them I supported them, and politely asked if I could cross.

-No, but would you like some water?

The police officers came over and looked me and the bike over.

-Offer him a maté, one said, laughing at the idea of offering a foreigner a maté.

-Would you like a maté?

¨Sweet or bitter?¨ I replied.

That got them laughing. I got off the bike and had a maté with the protesters while the police went back to their tent. The protesters showed me their blockade. They were quite proud of it. One of the tents was a kitchen, with a working stove. There is a working freezer because someone from the electric coop came out and dug up the cable and tapped into it for them, and they have dug a well beside the blockade, so they have fresh water.

On the side of the road, they are building a wooden house, so evidently they are happy there. On the other side they are building a permanent bathroom, so they can stop renting the chemical toilets they are using now.

I was going to suggest putting the bathroom in the house, but I´m sure they thought about it and decided it would be better to have it across the busy international highway. In another tent they have assembled cartoons from all over the world about the papermills, (none are pro-mill), and various media clippings.

I told them I used to go to anti-nuclear protests, leaving out the part that it had more to do with someone named Heather than any real opinion one way or another regarding the wisdom of constructing a nuclear plant on an active seismic fault, and that made them offer me some pastries. I declined, but did enjoy sitting under one of the tents talking to them.

There were five of them, a very elderly man who wore a teeshirt supporting one of the local motels, a guy of 50 who seemed to be in charge, two women in their 40s, and an idealistic kid of 20 from Buenos Aires who had been there for 11 days.

He feels sorry for the Uruguayans.

He showed me the jewelry he made, and was worried that Bush might seek another term. I told him that was impossible. His eyes lit up. Then I told him Bush has a brother. He found this troubling.

The woman who drives the tractor back and forth to allow certain traffic through is fairly fleshy. She told ribald stories about some of the younger male volunteers who had been there earlier.I helped them unload a pickup full of wood.

They invited me to stay for a barbeque, but I told them I had to be moving along.While I was there, the Argentine Customs officers, who work on the other side of the bridge in Uruguay, drove up to one side of the barrier, walked around it, and got in another car and went off to work, after joking with the protesters.

They didn´t let me cross, but I left with posters, stickers, pamphlets, a button and a really neat baseball cap.

Gualeguaychu, Argentina

2006-11-03T17:36:00.000-05:00

Feb 28, 2006

The difference between Argentina and Uruguay when it comes to using the tourism office to secure a hotel...

Uruguay- It is Friday night during the height of the tourist season. Late in the day. You go to the city tourism office. A friendly woman pulls out a binder full of hotels, prices and pictures of the hotels and the various rooms. She goes through them, taking time to show you the ones you like, and then, when you pick one, calls it to make sure there is a room available. You pay her ten percent of the cost of the room, get a voucher with a map and directions, and off you go. When you get to the hotel, the person at the front desk shows you the room, then registers you and there you are.

Argentina- It is early, has been raining all day, and you pull in front of the city tourism office. This is in a town where people go to sunbathe on the beach. It is Tuesday night. The tourist season ended a month ago. The woman at the desk looks like she liked the teeshirt she had on so much last week that she decided to wear it another week. You tell her what you want to spend. She pulls out a map and a pen and proceeds to make dots on the map. She hands you the map.You go to the hotel. The name is not quite what she told you it would be, but a few of the words are the same, and it does correlate with one of the dots on the map. When you track down the owner, you tell her what you want, and that the tourism office said they had rooms.

-We don´t have any. Well, not really, but we could put youin one for 60 pesos instead of 40.

¨But the tourism office said you have rooms. I guess I´ll just go back and have them find me something else.¨

-Wait!

She gets her husband. He looks through a paper, it could be any paper, a menu, yesterday´s newspaper, a laundry list.

-We have a lot of reservations, with deposits.

The place is deserted, the town is deserted. It´s a beach town and nobody is going to go there on a Tuesday night in a rainstorm.

-One night? Okay, I guess you could have it for 40.

After that, he´s my best friend. Introduces me to the neighbor, who offers to let me park my bike in his garage until the morning. Asks me if I am related to Hulk Hogan, tells everyone else standing around outside with nothing to do because there´s nobody in town where I am from...

Rio Cuarto, Argentina

2006-11-03T17:30:00.000-05:00

Feb 28, 2006

After a long time without really moving very far, I went about 400 miles yesterday, and can feel it everywhere. The bike is holding up surprisingly well, considering that I have no idea how to check the oil and at times it is full, then when I go to check it the next day is completely empty. So I just fill it completely every day.

Nothing is quite the thrill that having to switch to your reserve tank while passing a long line of trucks and looking into the headlights of a fast oncoming bus provides. Rio Cuarto is a surprisingly large town alongside a river. I got in late and rode around for about half an hour looking for a hotel, finally settling on the first one I came to. After checking in, I made a quick walk of the immediate environs and found three more,just around the corner.

I was expecting a small farming community, and found a vibrant city center, full of highrise apartment buildings. I found a sports bar and watched a soccer game (surprise), while eating a late dinner last night.

One thing that surprises me is how many of them drag their very young kids into bars and restaurants at midnight. And the kids are wide awake and run screaming through the places.

When I left Santiago it was overcast and cold. Today is overcast and cold, and the temperature is predicted to drop on Friday.

So much for escaping winter.

It has been raining a lot, and so the pampas are lush, the mountains and hillsides green, and the ever-present pampas grass in full bloom. This part of Argentina has a lot of very rugged little hills, and so the terrain has not been as boring as usually when crossing the pampa.

I have been giving a lot of thoughts to the hotdogs down here. Theyare very popular, the people eat them like crazy, and yet they also eat everything we associate the making of hotdogs with. All the really repulsive parts of the cow that you associate with Fear Factor or your Mexican neighbor´s hangover cure. So what´s left? What are they made of?

Uspallata, Argentina

2006-11-03T17:25:00.000-05:00

Feb 11, 2006

I rode here last night.

It is about 150 miles and took about 5 hours.

From Santiago the road goes straight up the Andes through a series ofcurves they call the Caracoles, and gets colder and colder as you climb. The surface is paved, but looks like they drive tanks up and down it on a daily basis. Chunks are missing, and it is full of large slow moving trucks and buses. The fact that they are climbing a steep hill, or descending, doesn´t seem to impede their passion to pass one another. At night it is difficult to see the holes, so it really works a suspension.

Once at the summit, there is a really long tunnel, then you are in Argentina, and because it was late and I am only here for the weekend, the customs agents decided to just let me go without doing the paperwork to import the bike, so I am running around without papers. About 50 miles outside of Uspallata, it started to rain. But the air is clear, you can see the mountains around the town, it and green, and the best hotel is setting me back about $35 a night. So life could be worse. I could be in Ohio awaiting the snowstorm.

Santiago de Chile

2006-11-03T17:22:00.000-05:00

Feb 4, 2006

I´ve been back here a week, and I have made a couple of interesting observations about the Chileans.

First off, they hate all things Argentina.

So dulce de leche, which was invented in Argentina and is called Dulce de Leche in every country in the world, has a different name here in Chile. If you order Dulce de Leche ice cream, they will correct you and then bring your order last, after everyone else at your table and around you has been served.

A very popular salutation in Argentina and Uruguay is Che, they use it amongst friends, and when they want to get someone´s attention in a restaurant or store. Because of the time I spent in Argentina and Uruguay, I got used to using it as a salutation, and still use it frequently. As a result of this, I am pretty well disliked by most of the people around me, and most of the Chileans I know say it is just a matter of time before someone beats me up.

To keep people from tailgating the city buses, they took out the brakelights. It works...

Calingasta, Argentina

2006-11-03T17:18:00.000-05:00

Jan 27, 2006

I cant believe these guys are doctors and I hope I don^t get sick.These are the two thoughts that cross my mind after going on an outing with them and the tv executive.

We rode about 120 miles through the desert, with constant breaks so they could smoke and argue, and ended up in Calingasta. We stopped on the road to smoke, and they saw cars approaching, so they jumped on their bikes and raced off, so the cars wouldn{t pass them.

The first thing they did when we found a store that sold meat was head for the cooler, open a quart of beer, after removing about six and finding the coldest one in the cooler, and share it while bickering with the butcher about the meat. He was taking slabs of beef out of a refrigerator and showing them to the Doctors. I don{t think he washed his hands,and beside the cash register were two plates covered with dead and dying flies.

They finally settled on one, raced off to buy wood, and off we went, with 5 pounds of meat for 4 people, and a loaf of bread.

The houses here are adobe, and we made a párilla, which is like a barbeque, and roasted the beef, while drinking many bottles of wine.Mixing red wine with ice and seltzer still bothers me, so I just drink water and look on in amazement, doing my best to stay healthy enough that I don{t require medical attention.

It is hot and dry here. They bicker constantly and one will get mad and leave for awhile, then all is forgotten and they fight about something else.Unfortunately there is good cellular reception, so I have talked to everyone they know who claims to speak english.The doctors are constantly getting lost, and asking people where they are and how to get where they are going. Tonight one drove past the hotel, and the other almost wrecked getting here.

Last night, in the desert, with only one road crossing it, we got lost about four times, and at one point they stopped the bikes and one of them walked back about a quarter mile to ask someone for directions. I was tempted to offer him a ride.

Something I forgot to mention about the ride through the desert lastnight is that the road was straight for miles and miles, and in the distance I would see lights approach, and when they got closer I realized it was one guy tailgating another with his brights on. Theydo this for miles. On straight roads. With plenty of opportunities to pass. It is the middle of the desert and there is nobody else out there. They also like to hit you with their brights at the last instant, when you can{t do anything about it.

San Juan, Argentina

2006-11-03T17:16:00.000-05:00

Jan 27, 2006

I am in the foothills next to Chile.

It is hot.

Last night I decided to try my ride at night technique, because I was once again in the desert, had 120 miles to go, and it was warm. So as the sun set, I rode on, confident that it would work this time. The next thing I knew, as soon as darkness set in, I was in a marsh, it was pitch black, and ducks were flying across the road.

The road turned again and up ahead I could see lightning flashes. Mosquitos breed in marshes, lots and lots of mosquitos. So I was covered in dead bugs,dodging ducks, and heading for lightning. And there was no town or gas for 140 miles.

At the gas station I met three Argentinians on bikes. We traveled the rest of the way to San Juan, and I ended up sharing a room with one.He is a doctor from Cordoba and a chainsmoker who confines his smoking to the bathroom. We went out and were out to three in the morning, then the other two started calling at about 8 am. So I am not at my best or brightest this morning. Not only that, but I have gone more than a week without laundry service.

Cordoba, Argentina

2006-11-03T17:08:00.000-05:00

Jan 26, 2006

This is the second biggest city in Argentina, nestled in the foothills of the Sierras, which are older than the Andes, and a very popular tourist destination. I spent the night in Oliva, after having lunch in Rosario with an artist I met last year down near El Califate. Because it has been so hot, and there are no deer in Argentina and the cows are kept behind fences, I decided it might be a good idea to ride to Cordoba at night.

Unfortunately this part of the country is like their Arkansas, so I got pelted by bugs and some fairly large flying creatures until I could barely see through the encrustation of little feet and wings. Oliva is an agricultural town about 50 miles south of Cordoba. I was looking for a hotel, passed one which looked expensive and asked the woman standing on the side of the road beside it where another hotel was.

She turned out to be a transvestite working the passing truck drivers. And unfortunately this was the only hotel in town. But everyone at the hotel was nice, and they evidently have a notransvestite policy.

While there, I talked with the guy working the front desk about a bank robbery that is getting a lot of news in Argentina right now. Six guys went into a bank during business hours and told the employees they were robbing it. One of the employees hit the alarm, and the police showed up. The robbers began negotiating with them, and they were trading hostages for pizzas and cold beers for over six hours. When the police finally got in, they found out the guys had gotten out through a tunnel that ended two and a half blocks away, in a house. Last night the police had found another rubber raft in the river. They got away with about 25 million dollars in securities, 200,000 in cash, and the contents of 125 safe deposit boxes. Being Argentina, everyone here hopes they get away.

Rosario, Argentina

2006-11-03T17:00:00.000-05:00

Jan 24, 2006

One thing I learned traveling through small towns is that you can usually find a reasonably priced hotel near the bus terminal. What I learned in this city of over one million is that nobody in his right mind would want to stay near the bus terminal in a town this big.

On the way here, I went through the notorious Entre Rios province, and was stopped by the police. They asked me if I had a fireextinguisher, then proceeded to tell me that there was a law that I needed one and that I was in violation of that law. The officer went into exquisite detail about the size of the extinguisher I was supposed to carry, and was quite officious about the entire matter, taking me into the office, so he could show me the law, on a mimeographed sheet of paper, and then tell me what the fine would be.

The whole thing was quite funny.

Once inside I explained that I didn´t have a fire extinguisher, that I had no intention of getting one, that the law excluded motorcycles, and asked if he intended to ask me for a bribe.He told me that there really was a law, that all the Brazilian and Chilean riders who passed through there had fire extinguishers, and he had no intention of asking for a bribe.

Then he asked me if I had a visa.

I again told him I didn´t, and wasn´t going to get one. At this point he set my documents on his desk, because the law also says they can´t detain a person or his documents without a judge present. I did ask if there was one around, while picking up my documents. He reiterated that he had no intention of asking for a bribe, and watched me ride off.

Down the road I ran into a couple from Argentina and asked if they had been stopped by the police and asked if they had a fire extinguisher. They rolled their eyes and said no, but a Brazilian they had met was. He apparently paid the fine.I wonder how many return visitors carry 1 kilo fire extinguishers on their bikes.

Paso de Los Libres, Argentina

2006-11-03T16:49:00.000-05:00

Jan 23, 2006

I made it to the border with Brazil and then realized I really don´t have enough money to get far enough into Brazil to make it worthwhile. So I´m off to the other side of Argentina. Today a couple of interesting things happened.I was going through a tollbooth and one of the policemen on the other side waved me over, asked to see every document I could thinkof producing, asked me what all the medications I had were, where I thought I was going to get Malaria, things like that, then took all my papers into his office. I waited and waited, then he came out, folding my documents up and sticking them back into my passport. He got to the bike and said, ¨Sir, the bike is stolen.¨ I got rather indignant, and figured he was going to ask for a bribe or something, but he waited a couple of seconds and then started laughing and handed me back my documents.

On my way north, I passed a sign for German Town, and on the sign was a beer stein, so I figured I would take the gravel road the 2 km the sign said I would take to encounter German Town, and off I went.

There was a big sign announcing that the Argentine government had just put new gravel down, and boy did they do a good job. It was thick and slippery, and the bike was starting to wander. I rode on and on, and on, down this lonely dirt road, more than two kilometers, then went around a corner and saw a guy walking towards me. He was very dark, and as I got closer I could see that he had piercing blue or green eyes, and a Seed of Chuckie teeshirt. Meanwhile the sky had started to fill with heavy black clouds. I went a little distant further, then turned around, and quickly passed the seed of Chuckie on my way back to the main road.

San Jose, Uruguay

2006-11-01T21:40:00.000-05:00

Jan 18, 2006

I´m never going to make it to Punta Del Este.

I spent about ten days in Buenos Aires, because a friend left me his apartment for five, and then couldn´t get rid of me for another five. The first two days were stifling hot, then it started to rain, and rain and rain. Finally, last Saturday, I took the ferry to Colonia de Sacramento, taking advantage of a lull in the rain to get onto the boat and across the river.

The ride takes about an hour, and there is a duty free store, so I was able to get some things you can´t find in the stores here, like hot sauce.

Colonia is an old city, and the city center has been preserved. It was the capital of Uruguay when the Portuguese ruled here, and is as close to Buenos Aires as you can directly get.

Normally I would have driven around to the first international bridge and riden across, but the Argentinians have closed all the bridges, because they are protesting a pair of paper mills Uruguay is building across the river.

I figured that because this is the vacation season and it is difficult to get to Uruguay, that there would be a lot more vacancies there than Argentina. So I got to ride in a boat. I then went to Mercedes, where I spent a lot of time last year, and got stuck for another day in a torrential downpour with lightning strikes and thunder.

After seeing pictures of lightning strike victims on one of my favorite macabre websites, I have decided to pass up riding in lightning storms for the time being. From Mercedes, I set out
yesterday for Punta Del Este, and got to San Jose, then hit the first of the toll roads, and this is where it got very interesting.

Because of the recent torrential downpour, the entire road as far as I could see was under water. There were people fishing off the sides of the part that entered the water. Of course I should have known something major was up, because there were three traffic cones set at the edge of the road, just in front of the fishermen.

So I returned to San Jose, about 25 miles back, and was told the road would be open by this afternoon, and that I should stay at the hotel. The guy who told me this actually works at the hotel, and it seemed pretty empty at the time. Now, as I ask more people, who are not in any way renumerated by the hotel, I find out the road will probably remain submerged for a couple of days.

San Luis, Argentina

2006-11-01T21:38:00.000-05:00

Jan 3, 2006

I left Santiago yesterday around noon and came back across the Andes, intending to take a leisurely ride through the Mendoza wine country of Argentina. I am a big fan of touring wine country, having spent many a happy afternoon in the Napa and Sonoma valleys during the harvest season riding from winery to winery, the air ripe with the smell of fermenting fruit.

Touring the Mendoza wine country would be more like touring the Gallo vineyards around Fresno, in the California central valley. Vast expanses of vineyards and fruit trees, and guys in beat up old Fiats on the side of the road selling wine and peaches off a card table. The wine sells for 5 pesos for 5 liters. It is 3 pesos to the dollar, so my first thought was too bad my motorycle won´t run on the stuff.

I´m sure they have a different marketing strategy for the good stuff.

San Luis is in the middle of the route to Buenos Aires, and I know absolutely nothing about it.

The drive into town goes past factories and warehouses, and then suddenly you are in a town alive with people on vacation, three and four star hotels, bars and restaurants full and spilling out onto sidewalk tables. Evidently it is either a tourist destination, if you believe the brochures, or a nice place to spend the night on your way to other places.

Santiago, Chile

2006-11-01T21:34:00.000-05:00

Dec 31, 2005

Needing repairs, I headed back to Santiago, because this is where I had the bike serviced last year and I have a lot of confidence in this mechanic. When he showed me the chain, with broken links, I realized I was lucky to have made it all the way back.

The ride up through Argentina from Malargue to Mendoza wound along a river, tucked up against the Andean foothills, High desert scrub gave way to Pampa, and then vinyards as I entered the province of Mendoza, where the Argentine wine industry is located.

Much like the road from Neuquen to Malargue, there were lots of goats and horses on the road, and the occasional odd creature scurrying across. One of them looked like a cross between an armadillo and a rat. Parrots explode from the trees.

On my recent circle of Chile, I met a guy from Mendoza who said it was a three hour ride from there to Santiago. On the map they appear to be very closs, so I set out optimistically and leisurely at about 4.30 for Santiago.

The road across the Andes is long, twisty, and cold. The highest it gets is about 10,000 feet, and above the road are jagged peaks, many snow covered. There is plenty of runoff from the snowpack, and because the Andes are relatively new, is is full of mud and rocks. Much of it runs across the road in places. There are a lot of tunnels, and relatively few guardrails.

I was a bit conderned after going through one of the long tunnels and seeing a sign that said ¨Welcome to Chile¨ because I hadn´t seen the Argentine border crossing, and it has been my experience that Chile and Argentina like to leave enough space between their two countries to fit their entire armies, should the need arise. While passing through the tunnel, I did wonder how many times both sides have planned to blow it up. Luckily, the Argentines and Chileans
share a building on the Chile side of the line. So I was able to go to window 1, then 2, then 3, then 6, back to 3, then 4, then 5, back to 4 because 5 said 4 did something wrong, outside to have my bike and luggage inspected, then to the guard at the side of the road, then back to 1, then to 2 then back to the guard at the side of the road and off to Santiago.

When they don´t share a building, my experience is that one side will say the other did something wrong, shrug and let you go.

The road down is a lot of numbered very tightly twisting turns, where it is apparently customary for trucks to see who can get up or down the fastest. There is a surprising amount of passing on the road, and trucks so long they have to drift the back end around a corner. And of course, no guardrails. At the top, before you make the descent, there is a pile of twisted cars they have pulled up out of various places, perhaps to serve as an example, but surprisingly,
or alarmingly, no trucks.

If I find the guy who told me it was a three hour trip, he may disappear. After five hours between Melargue and Mendoza, I enjoyed another seven on the bike, and arrived in Santiago at 10.30, exhausted and in need of a shower.

Malargüe, Argentina

2006-11-01T21:06:00.000-05:00

Dec 29, 2005

The road from Neuquen hugs the foothills of the Andes, and follows a river north to Zapala, then continues on through very green high desert, bright red rocks remniscent of Sedona, AZ, and buttes that remind one of the west.

Suddenly the road is gone (this is one of the main thoroughfares in Argentina, Ruta 40), and I was on gravel and sand, and patches of broken pavement where the road was once paved, for 120 miles. It was hot, dry, dusty and I passed about three cars the entire 120 miles. I ran into 6 guys from Mendoza, my next stop, on motorcycles out on this road. They were on their way to La Angostura, the most beautiful town I have encountered so far, the one with the wildflowers that I didn´t know the name of earlier after driving through.

In the middle of this dusty gravel and dirt road, I came across a perfect intersection with new streetlights and pavement going off in all directions. For about 100 yards.

I was lucky when I got to Malargüe, because a hotel was easy to find, and it was about a block away from where they were having a concert to celebrate the new year and announce the candidates for the beauty pagent for the Goat Festival that is coming up. While the idea of possibly getting a glimpse of the next Miss Goat over the heads of the throng of people who will show up for anything free, I hadn´t eaten since breakfast, so I found a parilla, which is an Argentine steak house, and had a nice steak, thinking I had ordered shortribs, salad, and for dessert something I thought would be cheesecake, but ended up being a piece of cheese with some flavored gelatin on it. Definitely interesting.

So it was off to sleep, and then at 3 AM the fireworks display started. Apparently Miss Goat is an important part of the social fabric in Malargüe, and mortars are cheap, because they set off a lot of them, very near my hotel.

Interesting thing about this hotel, it was the first one I´ve ever been in in my life where there was plenty of hot water, but not enough cold.