Darkness on the edge of town @ BIKE CHAT

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sagot

Zone Head
Posts: 779

posted December 09, 2004 01:55 PM

Darkness on the edge of town

So Machu Pichu was very cool. I wanted to buy some land up there but they said it was holy or somthing. Just kidding, the place is amazing, they just picked up and left when they heard that the spanish were coming but the spanish never found it. The stone work looks like it was machined from billet rock!
Back in Cusco we met a guy named Martin, from Switzerland, who is riding from Alaska to Ushuaia on an F650 BMW, so we all hooked up and headed off to Puno after a late start (noon) due to a very inept UPS station.
We were ridding as fast as you can on these roads but the 60 km cross wind were causeing me some problems. It seams that the wind was acualy sucking the air out of my open air box (to try and lean out the mixture) and I couldnt go more than 100KMH or the bike would shut down.
We hit a town called Juliaca 40KM before Puno. This town was a frikin nightmare! Peaple and buses and bicycle taxis and three wheelers and chickens running all over the road while you dodge and dive out of the way like a vidio game. The problem is that there are no health packs just arownd the corner!
We got through just as dusk was falling only to find that the main road was blocked with debris from some protest that day so we had to follow the taxis and busses on the sholder till we cleared town! Buy now it was dark.
Any one who has ridden of driven anywere south of the U.S.-Mexico border knows the #1 rule:
NEVER DRIVE AT NIGHT!!
I will tell you this rule is absolutly a must. The problem is that you cant see anything. There are no lines and no cat eyes and the on coming trafic just does whatever they want with ther lights, signals and road position! We will never do that again.
Anyway we made it to Puno and only had to clear two large steps to get our bikes in the hotel lobby.
Next day was a good ride to the Peru-Bolivia border and the crossing was a breeze, nice peaple and free.
So here we are in Copacabana, staying at the nicest Hostal in town for $17.00 US per night! Last nights three coarse meal, including a bottle of wine and a chocolet fondu for desert, for 3 cost 127 Bolivars or a whopping $27.00 US!!! We allmost feel bad paying so little. Oh well.
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