Motorcycle Explorer December 2014 Issue 3 | Page 34

Pacjked and good to go
M
ore fine times were to be had in Ecuador
but it all ended with the pair of us loaded on a
pallet they slung a net over and tied us down.
Next minute we’re high up in the air, getting
banged about in the belly of a Boeing only to
land in some hot steamy place they call Panama.
B
ut the next few months were warm, fetid,
wet as we rode north through Central America.
Gone were the brown and yellow highlands and
with it my little cold-start problem but the lush
greenery of the countries we now visited cloaked
some pretty memorable sights. Blood-red Pacific
sunsets over golden beaches; yellow road signs
warning us of serpents and armadillos up ahead
and everywhere lovely people.
T
he road continued to challenge; I rode all
sorts of stuff; mud & earth, brick & concrete, a
spectra of substrate ranging from bad-bad roads,
good-bad roads, bad-good roads and then the
good hard-stuff like home… Mags and I were
both in the same groove; we’d ditched a heavy
load both physically and metaphorically and life
had never been so good.
S
ome bad news from home; we hooked up
with the Joaquin, one of the Mexicans we’d met
in Argentina, and were abandoned in a haste of
sorrow. I spent a year in his house along with the
other fella and Joaquin’s twelve other bikes.
There was a little guy came ‘round to wipe us
over every day and Joaquin would fire the
engine, kept me ticking over until Mags returned.