A Travel Story by Bjoern and Ines Bundschuh
Ines & Bjoern met each other 1998 during their studies. During and after their studies they travelled quite a bit through Europe, Africa and Asia. In most of their trips they used motorbikes to get around. They also spend a couple of years in Barcelona and a year in South Africa.
Each of our 4 Pannier boxes offers 35 litres of packing space. In addition Bjoerns bike carries a stuff sack of 50 litres. The biggest item is our camping gear. Tent, mats and sleeping bags fit in the stuff sack. All other material has to go into the pannier boxes. Cooking equipment and tools share one box. Each one of us has a small stuff sack of 10 litres for individual clothes. Everything from underwear to pullover has to fit in those bags. Bags and a pair of sandals share another box. The third box carries the rain gear, documents, toiletries, electronics and medical stuff.
Before starting the trip we asked a few companies, if they were interested in supporting our activity. In return, we offered to but their link on our blog and to write about their product and its use.
As mentioned before, we bought two brand new Suzuki DR650SE in Los Angeles. The Euro to Dollar exchange rate was quite favourable in the middle of 2008, so this option was way cheaper than shipping our own bikes.
After arriving in LA we place our tent into the Prado Regional Park close to the dealership in Corona. The mild weather offfers a good opportunity to test our camping gear. At 9:35 on monday morning we set foot into Corona Motorsports, the dealership where we bought our bikes. Surprisingly, Fred, our contact person greets us with "you must be Bjoern and Ines". Ok, Bjoern talked to him quite frequently on the phone over the last few months. Fred shows us around. And really, the bikes and all parts are there. Registration is also done in a couple of minutes.
The Preperation of the Bikes took two full days. The third day we received a few missing mounting parts for the happy-trail pannier boxes and bought our Mexican bike insurance from AAA. The rate for more than 40 days is much cheaper from AAA then from all the other insurers. At the end we took a six-month policy and paid $80 per bike.
Wednesday evening we spend with Ines Cousin in Santa Clarita, about 90 miles north from Corona. There we received some of our sponsored Equipment. The Sonim phones and PacSafe bags.
The street from Mazatlan to Durango is called the devils spine. A few thousend curves wind their way through the mountains.
Groessere Karte anzeigen
Although first we were in doubt if it was a good idea to start our trip in the middle of the Mexican winter, Dezember is actually the perfect month to ride through Mexico. in 30 days we did not have a single day of rain. In the mountains of Durango and Puebla it was chilli but actually fine with proper gear. On the Yucatan peninsular it actually was too hot and humid to ride. Visiting the Maya ruins of Pelanque, Edzna and Chichen Itza the heat was actually unbearable. Fortunately we were always able to leave our clothing at the bikes.
Entering Belize from Mexico was quite easy. We handed our vehicle permit back on the mexican side and had the vehicles registered in Belize. That we still do not have a License plate was not a real problem. Suggesting to fill the Frame number into the form was sufficient for the guy at the customs desk. The only small hickup was, that the mexicans had not stamped the entrance date into our passports at the Tijuana border. Strangely the Belizian immigration wanted to see that stamp.
Driving down from California to Panama and doing some detours on the way, our odometer shows about 6800 miles (11.000 km). So it is really time to change the rear tires now.
We had found some decent tires in San Jose, Costa Rica, where lots of motorcycle parts where available. We didn't feel the urgency to buy tires there as the tires would easily last another 1000 km and we were told that in Panama prices may be much lower. This was a mistake.
There are many different ways to cross from Panama to Columbia. One of the most difficult is to stay on the mainland and cross the jungle. There are some reports that it has been done by motorbike. The first time, some guys did it in 1975. Recently, I only heard of some hikers doing it. There seems to be a small path through the jungle. One has to join some local drug dealers or guerilla to walk with them so it may be extremely dangerous.
In Quito we were looking for some front tires (90/90-21) for our Suzukis.
From Ecuador we crossed through Peru without major difficulties. On the way we looked at the well known tourist highlights of the country.
Bolivia made it well interesting for offroad interested motorcyclists again. Entering the country through the border at Copacabana, using the ferry over the lake Titicaca we turned north towards Sorata to do a very special offroad section.
After going from Bolivia into Chile and zig-zagging down to the south crossing the Chile/Argentina-border several times we end the motorcycle section of our trip in Buneos Aires.
We had put the bikes for sale by posting them on HU just 3 weeks before going to Buenos Aires. The idea was to continue trvavelling for another 4-8 weeks if selling took a little longer but we were surprised about the responses we got. Finally we sold the bikes a little earlier than planned.
Concerning our trip we published a book in German:
Um den Lesern der Webseite und weiteren interessierten Motorradreisenden die Erlebnisse dieser Reise noch besser näher bringen zu können, haben wir diese nun zu einem Buch verarbeitet.
Eine ungewöhnlich problemfreie Motorradreise durch Lateinamerika auch ohne Fahrzeugpapiere
