Ride into Lima – Last update from this trip. On Sunday we finally arrived in Lima by the same route as all the racers and there were thousands of Dakar fans lining the streets to cheer; like riding in a monstrous and unruly 4th of July parade. At our final fuel stop we had a …
Author Archives: colindotpdx
The Ultimate Endurance Sport – Dakar on a bike. At the top of this update is a piece of the road book that is provided to each competitor as their only instructions on how to navigate the stage – this was “liberated” from a checkpoint where the riders were changing their maps. There is no …
Interaction with the locals Everyone here in Peru is just thrilled to see the Dakar Rally come to their country. The headlines in all the newspapers talk about Peru in the eyes of the world and they all love it. Every time we stop something happens and here are just a few examples from the …
Jan 13th – Back into the desert Leaving Nasca at dawn and heading north you have to stop at the tower to see examples of the Nasca Lines; a world heritage site of pre-Columbian geoglyphs put there by the Nazsca indians in the first few centuries AD. There are miles of lines and dozens of …
Jan 13th – Spectacular Riding We got started too late this morning to be able to catch the Dakar circus but, as a result, we had an almost undisturbed day on one of the world’s most exciting motorbike roads; the Panamerican Highway from Arequipa, up the coast of southern Peru, and then inland to Nasca. …
Guinea pig or llama? Delicious. Here are a few of the food choices with which we have been presented on this trip. In Copiapo, Chile we went to a local restaurant called Munich and were served their customer favourite that translated to something like “Mountain of Meat”. As you can tell from the photo and …
Jan 12th – Arica, Chile to Arequipa, Peru Arica is jammed up against and the border with Peru and it takes no time at all to get to the border full of expectation for a new and exciting day chasing the Dakar across the desert. It then took us almost four hours to get our …
Jan 11th – Robby Gordon having a bad day One more day in the Atacama Desert as we left Iquique for Arica. The road from Iquique (pronounced ee-kwee-kay) clims dramatically up the dunes and cliffs to deliver a fantastic view of the city the ocean. This photo was taken from what looked like the city …
Jan 10th – One less rider Today was a ride from Antofagasta to Iquique but, sadly, Gale was unable to continue with us after a tumble in the desert the day before that banged up her shoulder and ankle. We were very sorry to leave her behind. We are still in the Atacama Desert and, …
Jan 8th – Not sure how to describe a desert We left Copiapo and headed up the Pacific coast for a while before cutting inland through the middle of the Atacama Desert as far as Antofagasta. This is the driest place on earth. We drove past hills and mountains and valleys and plains just like …
Colin's Travel Journal 