We are still riding in the Northern Highlands of Peru, we refuse to turn West and head to the main road, and the coast, which is desert, and for that we are paying the price on distance, but wow, what a ride today.
We tried eating breakfast opposite our hotel, but our order was lost in translation and we got a type of Mielie Koekie boiled inside the mielie leaves, (corn bread boiled in corn leaves)
How is this restaurant for “Abeyance”
We then went for a juice at the caravan:
We left late as Tex needed to repair his one pannier after the tumble yesterday, so while him and Pie played Panel-Beater with a piece of wood and some tools they borrowed from the contractor working on the street and spent time zipping all over town in search of the right bolts and glue the rest of us went back to the Plaza where we knew we could find proper coffee.
While we were having a real Double Espresso the schools came past with another procession, teachers and principals joining the procession.
Below is a video, if you receive this Post by email you might just see a code of numbers, just click on it and it will down-load the video, or, if you are cutting-edge you will see a play-button and not a code:
Eventually we hit the road, there was no other option of roads, only the one road, so I thought it could not be a bad road, but it started in town as a gravel road, soon it was a new tar road with a wide shoulder, but then it changed to a gravel road again, and this is the way it went the entire day, sometimes it was a road under construction but with no workers, the surface was very poor and at stages we needed to do the Hair pins in 1st gear, and going down the mountain again we also needed 1st gear for the Hair pins as it was so steep and you needed the engine braking as your brakes would get so hot it would boil and then you would have no brakes as all, (speaking with some experience here.)
But there was unfortunately also a few sections where they were actually working on the road, and the beautiful singing in my helmet changed to “screams of terror” as you pass the grader who had just turned the hard road over to mushy sand, and the sadistic Water Tanker Driver had just turned that into slippery mud. But soon there was another section of completed road and it was back to singing at full volume. My helmet might still smell like mushrooms, or the material they grow on, but inside the helmet the aquatics are phenomenal.
Lunch was also lost in translation, I was tasked to order, I pointed to the wrong photo. Waar is die muis. Hier is die muis, (rodent instead of chicken.) But this time it came with some crackling, saucy potatoes, rice and onions, Lekker.
Beef with garlic potatoes and cheese, and mielies two ways
As you can see below on Millsy’s GPS, we were still in search of a straight road:
Our route took us over the mountains, again, and it got cold, again, but the green landscape had given way to a much drier vista, soon we were near 4000m above sea level and the bikes were short of power, this high-up the trees don’t grow either as we are above the Tree-Line.
Below you can see this farmer plowing with his oxen on a very steep slope. I often saw husband and wife with their horses loaded with plastic drums on their way to fetch water but did not stop for a photo as I had not navigation and did not want to get lost alone. Why no navigation I hear you ask, my Ducati GPS which I bought 2nd hand (after my real one sprouted a crop of fungi,) was true to its Italian heritage and stopped working when it was rained on and then shook-up on the gravel road for 2 days.)
But as we neared our destination we passed very intensive Gold-mining operations at the top of the mountain, and after that I could see we were on an old tar road which held-up all the way down the mountain into the city, not any high buildings, but a city spread out over many many kilometres, an historic city known for the capture, ransom, and execution of Inca Chief Atahuallpa by the “Conquistador” Francisco Pizarro in 1532.
In 1532 they did not think of laying the city out with wide roads, so our 1st choice of hotel we tried was smack-bang in the market area, chaos`!!!
Then we found a quiet street and got back to asking Proff. Google where we should stay, which turned out to be well positioned on a Plaza, (Square,) but we are now paying more than last nights $8-00.
Below is a photo of Pie, he is not grumpy, he has just ran out of his amount of smiles he had for today, the other day I was photographed sitting on a stone, also not smiling, also not grumpy, just smiled too much the whole day, it happens, and I think I do look much more attractive with my “Thinking Man” look, like Pie also below:
We are heading towards the main road and Trujillo (see above) where we will meet-up with our 6th member Peens as well as Danny-Boy who is coming with a hired-car to relieve his dad on some riding days on the bike, no one told him the best part of our trip has been moved to the next Leg, ag shame, all this way for the sites awaiting us in the desert in the next few days.
This trip did not go according to our planning, mainly because we found out the week before we flew that one can get your TIP (temporary import permit for the bikes) suspended in Peru, but in Bolivia you only get 90 days before the bike has got to be out again, and we could not find any Bonded Storage, and as we are very stingy ($8-00 a night…… I rest my case,) and we refuse to pay any Duty on our bikes when we go over 90 days, we decided to not continue to Bolivia but store in Peru, in Lima, where a KTM Dealer has offered to help suspend our TIPS as well as store and service our bikes, so our route got shorter with 8 days. We have managed to use some of those days with our little extended mountain rendezvous, but we will still have a few days to go south of Lima to see some Inca sites to make up for the fact that the highlight of this Leg, Machu Picchu and lake Titicaca will have to be done at the beginning of leg 21, which we plan for late March and early April so some friends might join us in a hired car.
Go Well All
Fleisch
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