Peenie Wallie

In the morning, I get up and break camp. It rained a lot last night, but now it's all stopped, and I go out and climb onto the motorcycle, roll it out of the hotel. Technically, it wasn't parked in the hotel lobby last night, as it was not covered. But I have to go through the lobby to get the bike in and out of the hotel.

So I roll it out and I don't need to gas up, so I just head out of town rolling south.

The mountains are just unbelievable. I really wasn't expecting this. To be rolling through the Andes mountains in Colombia. I knew that they made coffe here. That was about it. But it is interesting to me that they do appear to be farming the mountains, even when it's on a 45-60 degree slope. Somehow, they manage to plant and grow crops on the face of the mountain.

I keep stopping to take photos, and, quite honestly, I hadn't really gone very far because I kept stopping to shoot, when these two bikes come by with the panniers on them, and I'm like...there's my buddies! Now, mind you, I have no idea who these people are, and I've never seen them before in my life, but they appear to be doing roughly what I'm doing. Going for a serious motorcycle ride.

Now, in all of Central America, no one could afford large motorcycles, so they all run little scooters and very small motorcycles. Enough so that my motorcycle turns heads like I'm riding a naked woman down the street.

But in Colombia, this is not the case. I see lots of larger, adventure bikes, but always with Colombia plates, and I'm reasonably sure that I've never spoken to any of them, but I just see that they are here, and this is radically different that what I was seeing in Central America.

So, I stop shooting, and start riding with these 2 guys on bikes. Not like I ask permission, or speak to them...I just start riding with them in formation. They're making good time through the mountains, and I really haven't gone anywhere, because all I do is I stop and shoot and ride, and then repeat. Where as these two adventure bikes appear to be going somewhere. So I follow them for a while.

At some point, they go left, and my GPS says to go right. But I make a judgement call, and just decide to ride with them. Like...I have no real plan for this trip anyway, let's be clear. I'm trying to get to Quito at this point. I'm not really clear where they are going.

I motion for them to stop, and they stop. I tell them I'm trying to get to Ecuador. It seems like they are also. So, I tell them that I will ride with them, and they're glad to have me.

So now, I have 2 riding buddies. Meaning, I only rode alone for 1 day really. Roughly for 24 hours.

These guys are riding down to Peru, it seems. Maybe to Maccu Piccu.

So I'm just going to tag along. They don't speak much English, so I'm forced to work on my Spanish.

I tell them that I want to get to Quito, but they're saying that we're going to spend the night in some town in Ecuador, before we get to Quito. I'm like..."esta bien. vamos."

Now, I'm following them, and when we get to the border town of Ipiales, Colombia, they take a turn I wasn't expecting. But Waze is taking me to some random place in Ipiales. I just had it programmed to get me to some random destination in the city. I have no idea where the border is. So now, I'm following my new friends to the border.

At the border, we stop and there's this crazy long line to clear Immigracion to get out of Colombia. Something stupid like a 3-4 hour wait.

So, we park our bikes, and we're standing in this line. Now, Carlos and Charlie are both asking me to do something. I'm not clear what though. Something about money. I'm like...great...here it comes. They're scamming me for money.

But I can't really tell what he's saying. And I can't get Google Translate to connect, so I'm sort of hopeless. I start walking down the line of people waiting to get out of Colombia.

"Ingles? Ingles?"

Some guy steps up and says he speaks English. So I ask him what Charlie wants from me. It turns out, that he's going to get some US Dollars, and wants me to make sure that they're real dollars.

Now, it turns out that Ecuador uses the U.S. dollar also. So, Charlie is converting some currency (Colombian Pesos, presumably) into US Dollars. And he wants me to go with him to make sure that they're handing him real US Dollars. Like...now I'm an expert in US Currency. Nice. I've never really felt like an expert at anything, but now, in Colombia, I'm a currency expert. Classic.

They quote him an exchange rate of like...2,700 to 1, I think. I usually use 3,000 to 1 in my calculations, but I'm not sure what the rate is. I've seen $2,700 to 1 before.

So he gets his money and we leave. I think he got $380 US Dollars out of the deal. I count it and make sure it looks real. It's all in $20 bills.

So now, they have some currency on them.

At 12:30 p.m., we arrive at Immigracion in Ipiales, Colombia. Although I didn't realize it at first, the local citizens line up on the left. People with foreign passports are on the right. So, at one point, my friends and I have to split. Carlos and Charlie go left. I go right. My line slows to a crawl. They keep moving, and process through before me. They finish at about 3:00 p.m., and then go wait patiently by their Yamaha motorcycles for me to finish. I'm finished with Immigracion (I have my exit stamp in my passport) at 4:00 p.m. So, they waited an hour for me. Very kind of them to do this.

Now, I go to the Aduana office, in another building. Basically, I hand them my Temporary Vehicle Import paperwork that they gave me in Turbo, and they take it and say Gracias. So, I'm not really clear that this step is necessary, but it clears my conscience, anyway.

Now, I go to meet my friends, Carlos and Charlie, who have been waiting patiently in the parking lot for an hour.

Now, we roll over across a bridge to Ecuador.

At Ecuador, we park immediately, and then go to get in line for Immigracion. We cut out about 2/3 of the line, by walking up and talking to some other motorcycle riders and strike up a conversation. None of the others in line said a word, and we just sort of delicately merged into the line. It was all very well played.

Now, we get to the covered section of the line, where we have a roof over us, just as it begins to pour.

Eventually, we get inside the building. All they want is a passport, and all they do is scan it in, and then stamp it. The process takes about 60 seconds per person.

I walk out, and now we have to do Aduana. Apparently, all they want is your passport again. I tried to give them a copy of the title, but I don't think they wanted it.

Now, we are waiting for them to type in each person's ID into the system, as they are backed up in keying them in apparently, and then they call your name when it's finished.

It is now 6:30 p.m. Waiting for my name to be called since 6:00 p.m. Now dark and raining. We have a 2 hour ride now in the dark in the rain. I can hardly wait. So, I've been involved in this process for 6 hours now.

Carlos and Charlie both have their Aduana paperwork in hand, and they're waiting on me again. I'm standing at the window, waiting for them to call my name to key in my information, now I try to slip the woman a $20 bill to speed up my Aduana processing. But she gets upset and starts castigating me in a Spanish. Sort of like what it used to feel like when I was married.

The crowd is really starting to get upset. Periodically, a roar goes up in the crowd. Sounds very scary. I'm having flash-backs to when I was in Honduras. People start yelling and screaming and the crowd really scares me. I suspect that it's because people are cutting in line? But I can't know for sure. Reminds me a lot of The Trial by Kafka.

Ostensibly, I'm supposed to be standing by the window at Aduana, to hear when they call my name. But when I look in the window, I notice that my passport is laying on the counter and no one is near it. So, I point out to her that, no one is working on my paperwork because they left my passport lying on the counter. Now, I also hand her my driver's license, which I'm not clear if she needs or not. But I can't just walk away from this. She has my passport and my driver's license. Finally, a woman picks up my documents and starts processing me through. Now, we walk out to my bike and check the VIN number and the plaqa (license plate).

Now she wants to see a document that has my license plate on it, and so I'm trying to think what they even want...finally, I dig out my Colorado registration, and it's on that, at least. So I hand it to her and she seems happy enough. She hands me a piece of paper, and now I'm free to go. I'm cleared into Ecuador with the bike. This took 7 hours. From 12:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. This is easily by far the most amount of time wasted crossing borders in any country so far. By a landslide.

Now, it's dark, and raining. What I want to do is get a hotel room. But, my 2 new riding buddies have a plan, apparently, to ride to Ibarra in the dark, in the rain, which is 85 miles away. So, this is going to suck in a big way. And it's not like I can put them off. They waited for me for at least 2 hours today. So, we take off in the rain.

At least now, I have my $15 rain gear that I bought in Chinchina. So now, at least, I can just ride in the rain, and it's not that big of a deal. I have my CC Filson handbag stuffed inside of a black trash bag, so it's pretty much water-proof. And I have my rain gear, and then my Arctic gloves that I bought just for this trip.

So, I just put on all of my gear, and we ride through the Andes in the cold rain for a few hours.

Even though we're not speeding, it's very dangerous. There are no lights, of course. Just the lights of oncoming cars, and every curve, it's very hard to find the lines on the road. Sometimes the lines are in the middle of the lane. Sometimes no lines at all. Always curving right or left, going up or down. Just very scary riding. I try to keep my eye on the lead rider, so I have something to focus on, otherwise, I have a hard time seeing where the road is at all.

At some point, we stop for a dinner of chicken soup and maize kernels in a light rain in San Gabriel. I really didn't want to stop because, at San Gabriel, we finally drove out of the rain, but while we were eating, the rain caught up with us again. The maize kernels are like nothing I've ever had. It tastes like popcorn, but you're actually eating the roasted corn kernels, though they look like no corn kernels I've ever seen before. Sort of long and skinny corn kernels. Soft. Not cruchy. Delicious. I order another little bag to go.

After dinner, we continue on our journey in the dark, rainy night. Like...it's so dangerous that there aren't words. We're ridng in the rain at night. It's completely dark. The lines are the road are worse than you could possibly imagine. My rear tire is as smooth as a baby's ass. Many time, in the turns, I lose sight of Carlos, and once you lose your focal point, then there's no light, and it's very hard to see the road.

Finally, we roll into town at Ibarra. Now, there is some question of where the hotel is, etc. He says he knows what the hotel phone number is, so I give him my phone, and somehow, he figures out how to call the hotel for directions/address, etc. Now, I tell them that I have to have WiFi. So, now they have another guy here in this town that is their helper somehow. He leads us to a hotel with wifi. I will spend the night here. They say they'll come back for me at 8:00 a.m.

I check in and she tells me it's $10 a night. So, I play stupid and offer her 10,000 Colombian Pesos (we're in Ecuador), and she politely declined my offer. So I hand her a $20 bill, and pay for the room. And get $10 back.

Now, I have a hotel room with Wifi and hot water showers.

And a very tired gringo goes to bed for a short night of sleep.