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Published: April 18th 2016
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A kings ransom worth of TLC for the KTM and after a shitty meal in Shifa , a Chinese sort of restaurant, I got home to my little strange hotel to get some shut eye and I wanted to leave Lima before the shit hit the fan.
By that i mean rush hour, I woke up early enough but as fate would have, I , or rather the bike had a flat at the rear and it so happened that my rear was not really up to scratch either.
The bikes leak got fixed easily enough, a new tube and I hoped that my little bout of the Inca quick step would not stop me from leaving Lima.
Even on a saturday morning at six o'clock the traffic is brutal, the Latin machismo is rampant, nobody gives a flying fuck, me first and intercourse the rest.
There are moments when I wish that I had a Gopro camera, but a film from the morning traffic in Lima would be a triple X rated one, horrors galore.
According to my, shit for brains Garmin, I had 547 km to go until Trujillo an allegedly nice little town
2016-04-10 15.33.03
No body in Sweden would paint a house this colour and a seminary at that with a good colonial past.
So twist the right grip and clench and hope for the best, many South American towns look like shit when you enter the suburbs, tons of garbage and loads of discarded building materials line both sides of the road.
Seek out the Plaza de Armas, the square of weapons, the old city center where they would hand out weapons to the citizens in case of crisis, this always found in the old center and more often than not a well kept place with lots of nice olde buildings.
It has it's fair share and luck smiled upon me and I found a very nice hotel with pillars, a fountain,a nice little court yard and a roof top terrace and even a statue of a sea horse. My bike resides in the reception, 24 hour guard. Nobody speaks or thinks about the fire hazard, 25 litres of petrol would make a little fire in the hotel somewhat more energetic.
Then came the big shock, La ley de seca, the dry law, due to elections in Peru they prohibit the selling of alcoholic beverages 24 hours before and 24 hours after
the elections.
But whatever, the Deity that protects travelers, made a few restaurant owners turn a blind eye to the alcoholic foreigners, may they be forever blessed.
So I woke up at 7 am and realized that the last few weeks mad dash up from Humaita in Brazil had taken it's toll, time for some slacking so a bit of walk about some clandestine beer some book reading and some blogging. So i squandered a day, a whole day off the bike, it was quite nice.
From here to the border another good 500 km or so, no breakfast included with the room so I got out of bed, early.
The night watchman was dozing but never the less let me out.
Six am, nice and cool , blue skies and what not, Ecuador here we come.
Slowly the desert got some grass and then some more and then some bushes and all of a sudden a nice lush green forest.
The border crossing took a long time, it's a small crossing so maybe they don't station the sharpest guys there.
All the vegetation has to get it's water from somewhere and
I'm in for some good rain from here to Bogota, in Ecuador the average rain fall was 2087 mm a couple of years ago and in Colombia it's 3240mm, slightly less than 10 mm every day and I've got a feeling that I'll get more than I want , and sure enough it started to piss down.
From the border i went to Cuenca, a nice town with some nice houses and restaurants, lots of US and Canadian expats move to Cuenca for the climate and you get more for a buck in Ecuador than back home. Ecuador is also a lot cleaner than Peru, hardly any garbage along the roads at all.
Any way lots of mountains lots of curves, up the mountain, lots of hairpins, when you get to the top, there's hardly any plateau so you go down into the next valley with lots of hairpins again and then repeat on and on. You go from sea level to 3000m + very quickly.
My Gps didn't work very well in Peru but it's a complete disaster in Ecuador and as the sign posting leaves somewhat to desire.
I got to Quito in the
end, another hostel, another restaurant, another day.
Getting on meant leaving Quito for Colombia, but leaving Quito in a morning rush without any idea about where to go didn't look to promising, but luck was on my side, a guy leaving the hotel at the same time was going north as well so I stuck to his tail like super glue, if it hadn't for him I'd still be driving around looking for a way out.
It so happens that Ecuador has it own GPS maps that are not included in the South American package, bastards.
Any way Ecuador is a nice little country, I could actually see my self living there, if i had to move to SA.
As soon as I got into Colombia the GPS went alright , roads ,towns and all the lovely curves.
Stop over in Pasto, just a run of the mill Colombia town, with an overly salty trout for dinner.
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