Devr-i Alem ... 1000 Günde Motor ile Dünya Turu !

The bold plan for 1000 days:






Margus. Role: a loving husband. Sometimes too fanatical tho.




Kariina: Role: an enduring wife - for being brave enough to go with her husband.


Origin: North-Eastern Europe, Estonia
Race: a mix of everything - Estonian, Polish, Swedish, German, Russian... you name it.
Objective: to see the world with an open mind, explore ourselves and the world instead of looking down on it from the bad-news-makes-the-news viewpoint of the media.





And off the bike.


The bike:

Well used and abused, well tested and offroaded, well proven 1998 BMW R1100GS with over 50 000 miles on the clock before the beginning of the expedition.

Capacity: 1085 cubic cm
Bore: 99.0 mm
Stroke: 70.5 mm
Compression ratio: 10.3:1
Front suspension: BMW telelever, w/o dive under breaking
Rear suspension: BMW paralever, single sided swingarm with torsional damping
Front suspension travel: 190mm
Rear suspension travel: 200mm
Final drive: shaft (oh yes, ours is proven reliable!)
Final drive teeth pattern: Kingelnberg-Polloid spiral
Final drive ratio: 33:11 or 3.00:1
Top speed: 122mph (never needed it outside European autobahns..., but at least unlike any thumper on the Planet Earth it sings, breathes and is vibey free w/o absolutely any stress @ 85+mph all day long)
ABS: yes.
Alternator output: 700W @ 4000rpm of engine speed
Factory spec dry weight: 224kg
Wet weight with full tank: 243kg
Seats: comfty for both of us.


Measured dyno specs @ crank:

Torque: 103Nm @ 5600rpm (the best low grunt in its age/class of bikes for 2up + full gear)
HP: 60kW (80hp) @ 6900rpm (enough for overtakes and all day long highways with all that weight)





Our expedition has been running for some time now. Has seen it's ups and downs, since we really are on a budget and have to take certain risks. We're very thankful to our readers who motivate us to continue delivering quality pics and reports on the road. Not many people know this, but it's actually a lot of work to produce text, pictures and videos while on the road for a report use - lots of people have askes us if we are travelling for ourselves or for others? Well, since our expedition relies partly on our supporters, we aim the both. We still do travel for ourselves, but at the same time we want to make the best out of delivering our experience to others.

You can support us:



We're sincerely thankful for any kind of support that is given to us.

Hall of our ADVrider heroes includes:

• Alexandru B. (Romania)
• Alexandru M. (Romania)
• Alan B. (IL, USA)
• Allan K.
• Andres, Luiz, Ana & Juan Jose (Mexico)
• Andrew H. (CA, USA)
• Andrew T. (UK)
• Anthony L. (UK)
• Antonina B. (WI, USA)
• Arnaud S. (France)
• Arunas B. (Lithuania)
• Ashley D. (UK)
• Babis (Greece)
• Balaji D. (UAE)
• Bradley B. (USA)
• Bram & Griska (Indonesia)
• boycrusher (ON, Canada)
• Charles H. (GA, USA)
• Charles H. F. (UK)
• Chris J. (CA, USA)
• Christopher Z. (NY, USA)
• Craig K. (Australia)
• Dana S. (NS, Canada)
• Daniel N. (Croatia)
• Daniel W. (NM, USA)
• Dave H. (UK)
• David G. (UK)
• David J. (ON, Canada)
• David L. (UK)
• David M. (ON, Canada)
• David R. & Francine (NY, USA)
• David Z. (NY, USA)
• Dean L. (Malaysia)
• Dean T. (ID, USA)
• Denis B. (France)
• Denis C. (FL, USA)
• Dietrich S. (NY, USA)
• Dimitris (Greece)
• Dinis G. (Portugal)
• Dominick M. (MI, USA)
• Donald U. (TX, USA)
• Donnie J. (MS, USA)
• Doug F. (AB, Canada)
• Douglas B. (NC, USA)
• Ed "The Agent" T. (Austria)
• Edwin H. (Germany)
• Esteban R. (NY, USA)
• Fabrice T. (QC, Canada)
• Florin S. (Romania)
• Funckmeister (Spain)
• George K. (Greece)
• George V. (NY, USA)
• Georges T. (France)
• Gintaras S. (Lithuania)
• Giuseppe R. (Italy)
• Gregory W.
• Guy G. (CA, USA)
• Hannu S. (Finland)
• Hans R. (QC, Canada)
• Harald M. (Germany)
• Heiko B.
• Hidayet G. (FL, USA)
• Hugh D. (RI, USA)
• Ioannis P. (Greece)
• Ivan K. (Slovakia)
• Ivan T. (Spain)
• J. E. F. (WA, USA)
• James B. (UK)
• James F. (USA)
• James S. (UK)
• Jamie R.
• Jan K. (BC, Canada)
• Jean-Francois J. (France)
• Jeff H. (MT, USA)
• Jeff K. C. (CA, USA)
• Jimmy C. (CA, USA)
• Joe P. (QC, Canada)
• Johan K. (Sweden)
• John W. (UK)
• Jon Atli E. (Iceland)
• Jorge R.
• Jørgen B. (Denmark)
• Jose Maria G. D. (Spain)
• Joseph F. (IL, USA)
• Justin P. (UK)
• Kaare A. (WA, USA)
• Kai H. (Norway)
• Karen M. (CO, USA)
• Kari K. (Finland)
• Keith H. (UK)
• Kenneth S. (MT, USA)
• Kim S. (UK)
• Koen B. (Belgium)
• Kristin S. (TX, USA)
• Kurt B. (PA, USA)
• Laurence B. (Saudi Arabia)
• Laurynas S. (Lithuania)
• Leopoldo M. (GA, USA)
• Linas K. (Lithuania)
• Marc S. (France)
• Marcin P. (Poland)
• Marek T. (UK)
• Marinus v. D. (GA, USA)
• Marius W. (Austria)
• Matt F. (AK, USA)
• Matt M. (WA, USA)
• Matthew D. (WA, Australia)
• Michal P. (Poland)
• Michael B. (CO, USA)
• Michael C. (UK)
• Michael K. (VA, USA)
• Michael S. (CO, USA)
• Mike M. (NC, USA)
• Nelson S. K. (UAE)
• Nicky v L. (UAE)
• Nicole B. (Switzerland)
• Nigel P. (UK)
• Oleg M. (Russia)
• Owen L. (CO, USA)
• Ozgun Z. (Turkey)
• Paul DMH (USA)
• Paul B. & Carol (AK, USA)
• Paco S. R. (Spain)
• Panagiotis K. (Greece)
• Paul C. (CA, USA)
• Paul G. (UK)
• Paul K. (UK)
• Peter J. (Slovakia)
• Peter W. (UK)
• Phattanan A. (CA, USA)
• Philip B. (UK)
• Quoc N. (TX, USA)
• Ramey W. (AK, USA)
• Rashad (Yemen)
• Rene S. (BC, Canada)
• Riyaz N. (UAE)
• Richard Ca. (UK)
• Richard Co. (UK)
• Richard O. (OK, USA)
• Richard T. (OR, USA)
• Rob R. (AE, USA)
• Robert C. (Poland)
• Robert D. (Germany)
• Robert M. (UK)
• Robert S. (Netherlands)
• Roellen W. (UK)
• Roman Z. (NJ, USA)
• Ronald D. (Netherlands)
• Ronald H. (MD, USA)
• Sabin K. (Bulgaria)
• Sandis K. (Latvia)
• Scott Cl. (NY, USA)
• Scott Co. (AZ, USA)
• Shane C. (WA, USA)
• Shawn & Shelly B. (MI, USA)
• Shawn C. (CO, USA)
• Shridar R. (CA, USA)
• Silviu S. (GA, USA)
• Steve B. (IL, USA)
• Steve R. (NY, USA)
• Suzanne F. (UK)
• Tage S-K (Italy/Norway)
• Tamme K. (Netherlands)
• Thierry Q. (France)
• Thomas P. (Macedonia)
• Tim K. (ON, Canada)
• Timo M. (Finland)
• Timo T. (Finland)
• Timothy S. (Oman)
• Tom R. (Belgium)
• Tomas B. (Lithuania)
• Tomas N. (Lithuania)
• Tracy B. (BC, Canada)
• Tsompanis (Greece)
• Tuomas K. (Finland)
• Vaidas G. (Lithuania)
• Vesa L. (Finland)
• Véronique B. (France)
• Vitaly P. (CA, USA)
• Wally K. (CA, USA)
• Walton S. (CO, USA)
• Warrick J. (UK)
• William S.
• Wojciech D. (Luxembourg)
• Yauhen R. (NY, USA)
• Yuri P. (ON, Canada)
• Zivko M. (Serbia)
• Zoltan K. (Hungary)
• 2 geeks and 1 nerd (NY, USA)
  
  
  Preparations:
  
  In the beginning, the bike was in white with a 11 gallon plastic tank.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  That was tested to the (rider's) limit.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  And the rider's physique was tested to the limit as he helped his friends to push over 450 lbs bikes in a deep sand.
  
  
  
  Then 8 gallon ADV tank went on the bike and was painted silver for a faster look and color:
  
  
  
  
  
  
  And additional testing was conducted.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The setup worked out pretty well - good range per fuel tank, while being relatively lightweight and nimble.
  
  We were happy with the setup:
  
  
  
  Next step: techie stuff.
  
  
  Bike's technical preparations:
  
  As before any BIG TRIP on an over 10 year old bike, I did the just-in-case mechanics re-check. Started with undressing my little baby:
  
  
  
  Removed the rear subframe for reinforcing and took all the shaft drive assembly off for inspection.
  
  Rear subframe off (a relatively big job):
  
  
  Reinforcement spots on both sides:
  
  
  
  Replaced swingarm and bevel box pivot bearings as "while I was there" job.
  
  
  This went to 100 Celcius sauna with me and the bearings went to deep-freeze. Then they mated fine :)
  
  
  ADVrider Gecko donated me TouraTech twin headlamp frame (thanks Marc! and don't be mad at me coz we didn't get a chance meet in Belgium! 2 ) I put Honda CBR400 headlight reflectors inside. Needed lot of grinding and stuff, but in the end got them to fit.
  
  Honda CBR400 reflectors:
  
  
  Corners grinded off and fitted into TT frame:
  
  
  Now it is possible to use 2x55W H4 bulbs:
  
  
  
  Fuel filter:
  
  Now routed outside the fuel tank - easier raplacement on the road if dirty fuel gets into the tank.
  
  
  Leo Vince exhaust with Lambda sensor hole:
  
  
  
  Stock exhaust is 12.0 kg, Leo Vince is 3.7 kg - over 8 kg of weight savings. Thus the bike can carry 8 kg more stuff:
  
  
  
  Kicked in a random extension pipe that I cut myself, so that it carries the heat away from the pannier:
  
  With the extension pipe it now works much more silently too - really handy for riding long distances.
  
  
  
  Radiator protector. Made it myself out of chavs car tuning grid:
  
  
  
  CPC quick disconnects for the fuel tank:
  
  
  
  
  Shortened the beak (just for a nicer look in my eyes):
  
  
  
  Elastic turn signals, no more broken signals when going down (which inevitably happens a lot on slow offroad speeds ;):
  
  
  
  MiGSel rear footpeg lowering kit - Kariina's now much happier with her position. I had to cut the stock pegs pannier support arm to fit tho:
  
  
  
  Vernatech panniers:
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Installed new steel break lines:
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Garmin eTrex Legend HCx with RAM mount and loaded with WorldMap 4.
  
  This'll be just for the reference and to keep track on our going. We're oldschool navigators by heart, 2 inch display doesn't replace 20" detailed map that you can unfold on the floor and a compass. Neither is the Garmin new Worldmap version 4 anywhere close the ideal, very poor detail, mind.
  
  
  Then I decided that maybe it's better to replace the clutch before we leave:
  
  Stripped:
  
  
  
  
  The old clutch:
  
  
  Appeared to be relatively OK:
  
  
  Specced 5.3 mm, which is about half-worn (new is 6 mm, minimum allowed is 4.5 mm). So with this estimate the clutch would be good for another 140-160,000km. But better to replace it with hard times waiting ahead ;)
  
  
  
  So I noted the position of the old clutch kit and carefully checked the white marking on the flywheel:
  
  
  
  White line markings on pressure plate and cover plate:
  
  
  In order to balance the clutch I had to mount all the three (flywheel, cover- and pressure plate) the furthest away from each other. That'd be 120 degrees, but in some case you can't get perfect 120 deg white line distribution, so I just put them in the best way apart I could.
  
  After finger-tightening the bolts on the new clutch I temporarily put on the new gearbox to use it as a centering tool for friction plate:
  
  
  I gave it couple of rounds of cranks (you can use alternator bottom pulley bolt for giving engine crank) so it centered itself and then tightened (but not hard) from startermotor window:
  
  
  I took the gearbox off, put TDC blocker bolt back on and final-tightened them to 18 Nm:
  
  
  It is important to take off the flywheel blocking bolt after finally putting the gearbox back.
  
  
  
  I put everything back together and I was done.
  
  Then, while I was there I also decided to replace the radial crankshaft seals - they're cheap afterall.
  
  All R boxer bikes after 12/1997 have twin radial seals with vent in between the seal. Pre 12/1997 bikes have a single seal.
  
  My bike is 03/1998 so it has twin radial seals, inner and outer seal in the crankshaft output end. I decided to replace 'em before my big trip along with the clutch and couple of other seals.
  
  So here how it goes after you've taken your bike apart (rear up, airbox, gearbox+swingarm, clutch+flywheel removed):
  
  After opening up my old seal I discovered a slight, almost invisible leak per 81,000km:
  
  
  So the decision to replace the radial seals looked like obligatory, or my new clutch would be toasted soon with oil contamination.
  
  Cleaned all the surfaces carefully, so that I could do clean work on the sealing areas:
  
  
  I had to measure the depth of outer seal. Mine was easy - it was exacly on the surface depth.
  
  Drilled two holes 180 degrees apart into the outer radial seal:
  
  
  It is important not to damage any of the surfaces by doing so.
  
  I screwed suitable bolts into the holes and pulled the seal out (this can be very hard job, like mine was - I needed to use excessive force. As you can see, kicking one end with screwdriver and hoping the other end would pop up didn't work for me):
  
  
  Outer radial seal out:
  
  
  When you get it out you'll see crankshaft vent hole:
  
  
  And crankcase side vent hole above (the inner radial seal is still in place):
  
  
  
  Those holes keep balanced pressure between the two radial seals to effectively avoid any potential leaks coming from high-pressure oil inside crankcase.
  
  While efficient this setup will create its unique set of mounting problems: you must first get the new inner-radial-seal over the vent hole w/o damaging the radial seal itself, and you must put the outer-radial-seal to a certain depth so that it leaves the vent open and doesn't reach any of the hole's corners (or it'll be destroyed soon and leaks will occur if you do so).
  
  Now you know the theory about removing the inner radial seal (prior you don't have to measure it's depth, since its mounted all the way in). Here you must drill holes inside, no other way getting it out.
  
  I had to drill 5 (!) holes to get it out, since the holes kept collapsing on pulling the screws, but it got it out easily in the end since I destroyed the seal's metal ring's integrity (that pushes it agains the wall) with so many holes:
  
  
  
  
  
  This done you could see the metal end of crankshaft:
  
  
  
  After that I started preparing both radial seals by pre-forming them with (fresh oily) fingers.
  
  New seal is flat'n'clean:
  
  
  I did the pre-forming with my finger and oil, going slowly w/o any excessive force first:
  
  
  And after it started to take shape I added additional force with my fingers:
  
  
  After it's pre-formed:
  
  
  While well pre-formed it is still very hard to get it on the crankshaft w/o helping "tools":
  
  So I made a plastic helper sheet from a plastic bottle:
  
  
  Cut all the sharp corners etc, and oiled it well, so it couldn't damage the radial seal's fragile surfaces.
  
  I oiled both the radial surfaces and put VERY little oil on the outer surfaces too to slightly aid going in.
  
  
  I got it going making rounds with this oiled plastic sheet and smartly pushed the seal on the crankcase first, and then covered it with the sheet to get it safely over the vent hole into the seal's hole:
  
  
  You'd need a special BMW tool to mount it, but not neccesarily. I made myself a pusher tool out of a cable-roll holder that had the required radius:
  
  
  And with wood-block to additionally dampen hammer hits and even out the forces over the entire area, kicked the inner seal all the way in:
  
  
  
  Inner radial seal now in place:
  
  
  
  Now preformed the outer seal and got it going on the crankshaft in the same way as the outer seal with a thin (but well supporting) plastic sheet. Added little oil on the outside surface too (not too much or it would just pop out with crankcase pressure).
  
  I just used small wooden blocks to kick the outer seal into the surface depth (half of the block supported itself on the seal, half on the crankcase when kicked in, and I did rounds around the seals to make sure it's evenly pushed in). Job done.
  
  New radial seals fitted:
  
  
  
  Now I needed to put BRAND NEW flywheel bolts (bin the old ones, since they're "deforming" material type of bolts after they're mounted they're useless/dangerous in second-hand use).
  
  Tighthened them in criss-cross pattern with 40 Nm of torque first. Now I needed to angle-tighten them to final 32-degrees.
  
  I made the angle-tool myself. First I made a line in a computer application, rotated it 32-degrees, then put a white sheet on the computer screen and copied the lines from there. And got perfect 32-degree angle. Then I cut a hole in the centre of the crossing point of the two lines drawing the angle sector. Fixed a wire on the wrench to point the angle. Here's my homemade angle-tool:
  
  
  
  Zeroed out the reading by taping the paper in the correct position and in criss-cross pattern 32-degree final tightened each bolt (I marked each bolt after it's done not to confuse anything):
  
  
  
  Job done. :)
  
  
  And I also replaced the gearbox input seal to be sure the newly mounted clutch has a long life expectations:
  
  
  
  Gearbox off (dirty, I mostly ride gravel roads):
  
  
  
  
  Input shaft and seal:
  
  
  
  And after clean:
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Replaced only the input seal for a start, since it's more critical in terms of contaminating my new clutch with oil. If the other end goes, it'll just flush into the shaft tunnel and I'll know about it, and I'll only have to remove the swingarm (instead of the whole gearbox) to replace the output seal.
  
  I had to drill two small holes into the seal and place screws to pull it out. It has to be a VERY small drill and screws, since you don't have much space between the shaft and outer walls, around 2 centimeters or so, and you can easily damage any of the surfaces doing it too rough:
  
  
  
  Seal out:
  
  
  
  
  For push tool I used a pipe for toilet use Only had to reduce the radius a bit in order to make it fit into the hole, and the bigger radius limiter was exacly 6.5 mm I needed. So I just had to kick the new seal in with this pipe. 2
  
  
  
  Add some grease for the inner lips of the seal before you put it on and and yer done.
  
  New seal in:
  
  
  Before assembling back together, don't forget to lube input splines with MP3 ($$$, but you only buy it once in a lifetime):
  
  
  
  I guess with all those pics now I've scared crap out of you office workers???
  
  But that's it! Bike runs like a dream, I'll skip the documentation, campgear etc part to save your time (that technical side would get too looooooooooooooong) - we're now off for the travelling part.
  
  Can't wait to get on the road!
  
  ...on the way to UK.
  
  Just some quickish pics (there's nothing new in Europe anyways), got internet somewhere here in Netherland's hotel (we're mostly wild-camping, it's our first night in hotel!).
  
  2 pairs of our beloved Heidenau K60 tires on the bike (NOT available in South-America still). They work well as crash-bars ->
  
  
  
  Bloody cold Europe. Been 10-16C days, Gerbing heated vests are God-sent here
  
  
  Our loaded moto.
  
  
  
  
  When our paperwork and stuff goes through successfully in London cargo-airfield terminal, then bike and ourselves will be flown to Buenos Aires, Argentina. Can't wait for South-America!
  
  So after many days in Buenos Aires Argentina we've seen most of the highlights. The city has it's charm, but max 4-5 days would have been nicer. The final few days were much better in Dakar Motos where I did some work on the bike and we got a chance to meet other travellers.
  
  Some Buenos Aires point'n'shoot pics (on panoramas click on the picture to enlarge):
  
  
  A girl and pigeons...
  
  
  Modern Puerto Madero part of Buenos Aires.
  
  
  Puente de la Mujer bridge sunset.
  
  
  Recoleta cemetery.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  At the airport they took away our insurance paper, which we found out later at the hotel. So it was additional 2 days waiting (all stuff closed for the weekend) to get a new insurance on Monday. On Tuesday it started to rain+thunder badly (it is spring here) which resulted in one more day of waiting = 12 days of Buenos Aires.
  
  But it was soooo good to be finally on the bike... Till some 200km from BA a copper stopped us and said we had been speeding, 7km/h over limit = 300US dollars fine please sir :eek: . We knew we hadn't speeded, and also the quoted fine was clearly overestimated per local fine standards. So we knew it was a bastid police officer wanting to suck tourists. We used the old recommended method, acting as if we had all day to argue with them (don't try to talk in Spanish, talk in "hazy" English, talk fast, talk a lot...) till they got tired from us (we consumed their precious time to catch other potential payers ;) ), gave back our papers and quickly rode off. jug:
  
  
  Las Palmas park.
  
  
  Another palmy road...
  
  We arrived

  to Puerto Iguazu yesterday to see the falls today and to put our Brazil visa applications in - fingers crossed.
  	Some more analog-camera pics. Patagonian nature, Argentina. We rode decent scenery trail roads through Patagonia, Argentina. Decent gravel in Argentinian Patagonia. Penguins in Peninsula Valdés, Argentina. Magellan penguins with chicks. Beach filled with Magellan penguins, Penninsula Valdés, Argentina. Aconcagua national park, Argentina. Mountains in Aconcagua, Argentina. A weird colour mix in Aconcaguan landscapes. Cliffs close to San Juan, Argentina. Smoking active Chaiten volcano, Chile. Into the atmosphere, Chaiten volcano, Chile. Primal trees in Carretera Austral, Chile. River, Carretera Austral, Chile. A stop on Carretera Austral, Chile. A decent rail road through the cliffy mountains that lead us to Carretera Austral. Lake in Chile. Our good friend, Raúl. Anti-stereotype of an Argentinian. His kindness is unparalleled and filled with positivism and enthusiasm. Abandoned village of San Gregorio, Chile. Abandoned ships in San Gregorio, Chile. Rusted to the skeleton, San Gregorio. San Gregorio, Chile. Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego, Argentina. Ushuaia, the southernmost city in the World, Argentina. A ship in Ushuaia, Argentina. Perito Moreno glacier in detail. Argentina. Perito Moreno glacier. Perito Moreno. Perito Moreno. Perito Moreno glacier from distance. Chilean jungle. A trail in Chilean mountain-jungle. Waterfall in mountain-jungle, Chile. Jungle in Chilean mountains. A stop on Carretera Austral, Chile. Santiago, Chile. Santiago from above. Chile. Valparaiso, Chile. Colours in Valparaiso. Chile. People living in old abandoned buses, Chile. Nature aside the Pacific ocean, Chile. Me, looking to the Pacific ocean. Chile. Workers in the fishing village. Pacific ocean, Chile. A dried out nature. La Silla European Southern Observatory (ESO), Chile. 3.6metre telescope, ESO La Silla site, Chile. New Technology Telescope (NTT), La Silla, Chile. Radio telescope, La Silla. Reflections, La Silla, Chile. A hand in the Atacama desert. The driest place on Earth. Chile. Atacaman hand, Chile. A road through Valle de la Luna ("The Moon Valley"). Chile. Dramatic landscapes in Valle de la Luna. Chile. Valle de la Luna - landscapes resembling the Moon. Chuquicamata copper mine: 3 miles long, 2 miles wide, 1 mile deep. Chile. Bottom of the copper mine. Chile. World's biggest - 600-ton lorries. One tire costs 20,000US$ alone. Chile. Patterns vs colors in Chuquicamata copper mine. Chile. Patterns vs colors in Chuquicamata copper mine. Chile. Salar de Uyuni salt lake, at 3650 meters, Bolivia. Salar de Uyuni in infrared, Bolivia. Reflections, Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia. Salar in infrared, Bolivia. Kariina and GS on the Salar de Uyuni (in infrared). Bolivia. Salar de Uyuni. Patterns of salt cones, Salar de Uyuni. "Road" onto the salt lake. Salt cones in infrared. Bolivia. Train boneyard in Uyuni, Bolivia. Laguna Verde - Bolivian nature at extreme heights - 4600 meters. Water starts to foam. Bolivian nature at extreme heights - 4700 meters. Bolivian swamps. Swamps on the highest parts of altiplano. Bolivia. Laguna Verde flamingos. Bolivia. A ride into Bolivian sunset... Ecuador & Colombia Having been in the mountains for most of the time we came down to sea level before Ecuadorian border and it became bloody hot! The first city on our way was Machala, a self-proclaimed banana capital of the World. Over +30C and humid - something we had forgotten after Brazil. It takes weeks to adapt to, being in motorcycle clothing most of the time, not in shorts. Thankfully we soon headed back into Andes mountains, back into "comfort zone" for us northeners (often a bit cold though, even if you're close to equator line!). Ecuadorian natives are slightly different from the rest we've seen in South-America: Unfortunately lot of wild dogs run around in South-America, and in Ecuador, in the mountains over 3500m one of them came to us. He was very shy, ill, underbred and weak. I started to pity him and gave away a pack of crackers. He started to eat like crazy and didn't even notice when we left: We headed to Quilotoa lagoon, that's a lake inside a volcano crater. Road there was surrounded by some decent scenery. Let me express it in panoramas (click to enlarge each one): And the road away from there was a decent offroad: Also with nice scenery with volcano or mountain tops: Slept in a motel, where usually clients can listen music while doin' the thing: And then came the capital of Ecuador - Quito: Quito old town panoramas It's hard to explain, but we liked Quito - the smells, sounds and atmosphere was very nice there. As you've guessed - Ecuador means equator. The road through mountains was curvy and we crossed equator line 3-4 times. Without GPS it would be hard to know when you're directly on the equator line since in most of the places it isn't marked on the road, i.e. on this picture, the bike is directly on the equator: Only in one spot on the road it was marked. Before Colombian border we wanted to sleep somewhere and headed off into the mountain trails again. Some decent scenery there and cloud-movement was superb. I took a sequence from cloud movements in Ecuadorian mountains, the sound is exacly what you hear in the evening there: Bordercrossing to Colombia was straight forward. No hassles at all. And close to the Ecuadorian border there was the famous Las Lajas Sanctuary. We chose a wrong time to visit it - on Sunday, so there were loads of people around, but I got some good shots nonetheless: Endless number of thanksgiving plates for the virgin of Las Lajas: And the military were everywhere - they have sort of "hidden" civil war in Colombia, so no wonder. From Colombian mountaneous landscape: (click to enlarge panorama) we headed down to the lower grounds of Colombian jungle: And cooked a decent regular meal for us: While Kariina was cooking I shot some patterns in 10 meter radius from this spot: (PS: this leaf was taller than me) Those worms had the thickness my forefinger and lenght of 10-15cm - big ones and loads of them in Colombian jungle: And the Colombian capital Bogotá greeted us - we had friends in the city who welcomed us and their children enjoyed the "ride" on our GS: One of the weird things in Colombia is the Zipaquirá salt cathedral that goes 200 meters deep into the mountain, used to be a salt mine, now a sanctuary: Amazingly high holes and ceilings! One of the domes. This wall was over 3 meters thick for example. We arrived just in time for Easter holidays. But instead of painting the eggs we chose to paint coconuts. They had to be grinded first to remove their "hair": And painted them. Our coconut was inspired by travelling though. Bogota's poor suburbs themselves look like this (click to enlarge panorama): In those pipes they have drinking water flowing... The streets are abused by rain, rubbish, sun and winds. That cross aside the big tree in the hilltop means lot of people have hung themselves up there, ending their life due to poverty, drugs or alcohol, or other problems. This house is for sale. Interested? Kitchen in the house. Poor, but clean. A view to the street. Men playing cards. Some kids don't even have a table for doing their homework - she has to use a plastic chair as a substitute. A boy from a slightly better education programme (see his clothing). Children on the street. Bogota's ghetto gave us a reality-check, not every child has equal chances to start a civilized life... We took a chance to visit Bogota's gold museum that had a decent set of made-from-gold fine crafts from the times well before Colombus discovered America. It's the art of the native american indians: Panama, Costa Rica So we had a mandatory drug search at the Bogotá airport, pretty obvious procedure for Colombia that is no.1 country in the world of drug trafficking: When the check was carefully performed by military personel they planted the bike and wrapped it into plastic: And secured it. And so we crossed the infamous Darién Gap with an airplane. The view to the Darién from the airplane: Someone summed up Darién Gap well: "Jungles, swamps, guerillas and corrupt military - all in the most intense 90km on Earth. You might have wondered if it's possible to drive between North and South America - for surely there must be a road between these two continents! Well, as it turns out, there is absolutely NO ROAD connecting them, and all travel advisories clearly say "Don't Go", even if you feel somewhat suicidal. I am talking about the wild and wildly dangerous Darien Gap." We made it to Panama City and got our bike sorted through the customs. Had a mishap in Panama City mad traffic tho - I turned into a one-way street from the other direction and a cop on a scooter immediately stopped us wanting to fine us. By pure luck there was one drunken alcoholic on the street who came to "chat" with the cop that in the end helped us out - the cop just got bored and returned the documents. That's the guy who helped us: A must in Panama is obviously the Panama canal and we did took a chance to visit it. There was an old train leftover in front of the visitor center. Canal itself is quite nice. Pity we didn't have a chance to see big ships passing through it tho. Canal's service boat. (click to enlarge panorama) Some panoramas from Panama City (click to enlarge each one): In the city there are funky buses: Had a blast on one of Panama's white sand beaches (click to enlarge the panorama): And spent a wild-camping night somewhere in a river bed (click to enlarge the panorama): It was bloody hot and humid though. Couldn't sleep much in that hot hell. Also the moonlight was so strong in the night I could take a pic in the moonlight: A video from Panama: (HQ button plays in better quality) Crossing to Costa Rica next day was relatively painless after all the horror stories we had heard from other travellers about Central-American border crossings. Palm plants greeted us in Costa Rica (click to enlarge panorama): Roads in Costa Rica had been repaired multiple times. And trees fallen on dirt roads blocking the traffic. We got a flat in Costa Rica from a nail: I tried to repair it with the tubless plug kit 3 times, but every time after some time riding it started to leak again :blast : So the only choice was to repair it from the inside in a tire workshop: That repair finally held air in long term.   Central-American countries are so small - you can ride most of them through in easy 1-2 days. Thus, soon enough, Nicaragua already greeted us where we hopped on the Ometepe island formed from two volcanos. Ferry to Ometepe. Port panorama (click to enlarge) Nicaraguan sunsets. "The two towers" - Ometepe island from distance. (click to enlarge) One of the Ometepe volcanoes seen from the island. Left our stuff at a hotel and the Ometepe offroad sessions started: Church in Ometepe. Ometepe villages and landscapes panoramas (click to enlarge each one): Ometepe jungle. Volcano. Ometepe trails. And petroglyphs. Buses in the island's main town had "callers". Streets there: Cowboy. Left from the island to Granada. Nice colonial town. A nice thing was to lift our trusty GS inside our hotel room with some friends' help: How often do you get a chance to have your beloved GS in your hotel room aside the bed? (click to enlarge) Some colonial architecture from Granada: In the same church there was displayed a marriage proposal where it was written: "If you have someting against the marriage of those two people, please notify the church immediately": Women carried stuff on their heads in Granada: And men had siesta time in the streets with that kind of heat :) Honduras What a ripoff border country Honduras is! They asked some over 40USD to enter the country with the bike. This done, we headed into the country that actually looked quite nice with all those pine trees on the mountaneous landscape: Click to enlarge panoramas: Wild-camped in some roadside place. And rode to Tegucicalpa - the capital of Honduras: Italian shoes repair shop. Cowboy at Yojoa lake. Lake Yojoa, Honduras. Vultures. Honduras' Carribean coast.   And then came Guatemala... Panorama from our floating hotel - and the longest bridge in Central-America above (click to enlarge panorama). View from the bridge. Island on the river. And of course we couldn't miss Tikal pyramids in Guatemala. I was humbled by them - they look as if some scapce crafts had landed from cosmos: Click to enlarge the panoramas: Pyramid tips reaching over the Guatemalan jungle (click to enlarge). Gran Plaza of Tikal. Guatemalan sunset. The next morning it was riding in the fog on the way to the country named Belize. Guatemalan village in the fog. A kid playing home with her sister. Much more realistic than playing with a Barbie doll! A bloke eating. Ironing service aside the road - the iron still works on hot coal in Guatemala. And Belize - officially English speaking country in the middle of Spanish speaking Central-America. And Belize also happens to be a Caribbean paradise - just park your bike aside a beautiful tree surrounded by palm trees and have a cold Belizean beer: Belize City rastamon'. Caribbean coast of Belize. Church in Belize. Panoramas (click to enlarge): Our trusty GS on the Caribbean sea.   Mexico Mexico is huge! Yes, after all those Central-American small countries than you can ride through within a day or two, Mexico felt like a true vastness. Riding all day, then looking on the map and realise you haven't moved much forward. As you can see from the map, we looped through the Yucatan peninsula that is packed with Mayan culture remains (click to enlarge panoramas): The famous Chichén Itzá. Magnificent pyramids of Chichén Itzá (click to enlarge to see them in full beauty!) Loads of big lizards running around the place. From there we headed down to the Gulf of Mexico, our tire had to be replaced and a blind guy helped us to do it. He replaced my tire, meanwhile I changed the break pads: Happy end pic - even blind guys can perform the job. Few miles away I smelled fuel and it turned out that one of the clamps was loose, so I performed the job aside the road: With the very basic tools at hand of course. Then due to our own bad parking on loose ground our bike fell on the tent. So the £££-Hilleberg hi-tec pole was broken: Actually there was a repair kit, but it was only for 1 pole section. We had broken two, so we used medicine trick to support it with duct tape, just like on a broken bone case: Mexican villages have lots of Mayan atmosphere in their architecture in Yucatan penninsula, nice thatched-roof houses: And of course we found a decent bush-camp place aside the Gulf of Mexico: (click to enlarge) And nice views to the Gulf of Mexico: (click to enlarge) From there further into the inland Misol Ha (funny name isn't it? :) ) waterfall was a decent attraction: And headed into the mountaneous region of Mexico, where San Cristóbal de las Casas welcomed us with it's colonial architecture and loads of native indians: (click to enlarge panorama) And through the mountains we were on the way to the capital (click to enlarge pics and panoramas): Some nice chocolate-coloured and palm-sided rivers: Till we arrived in Mexico City - 2nd biggest city in the world - 22 million citizens! Packed with skyscrapers. Although our plan was just to ride through the metropol, luckily we met 3 guys on R1200GS ADVs - Andrés, Luis and Juan José - they turned out to be one of the friendliest bunch of people we've ever met! And we ended up staying 3 nights in the vivid capital! One of the guys, Andrés has superb minimalistic home - he runs a furniture distribution company, so no wonder he has a good taste for the interior design: Even the breakfast was served to us by servants - something we aren't used to, but was a nice experience after basically 8 months of "starving" on the road. Andrés had some of those nice things: This one played this tune - anyone recognizes? :) They have a very good Mexican friend, who happens to be a very talented artist while being motorcyclist himself. The result of combining those two was stunning work , one example here (click to enlarge to see the painting): Anyone recognize what GS models are on the painting? :) Visited World Trade Center (that one hasn't blown up yet): What a HUGE building it is: And the view to the 22M city of Mexico from WTC (click to enlarge). Funny thing about being in one of the biggest cities in the world is it has lot of parks - above average amount of city's space is "wasted" for parks and greenlands making the city quite cozy in fact. We liked it! With Ana and Sofia we visited Chapultepec castle - basically it's Europe inside Mexico - it was founded by an Austrian guy. But it had decent views to the Mexico City (click to enlarge panoramas): And of course on the streets there was mandatory hands-cleaning with medical officers - Mexico as a centre of swine flu you know. But mexicans weren't bothered a single bit - they had their siesta time in usual way - sleeping. :) And squirrels lived their own life in the parks... And skyscrapers didn't fall down because of swine flu... In Chapultepec there was a painting depicting a national hero - during the Mexican-American war, a young boy, a cadet at the military school, wrapped himself in the Mexican flag and jumped to his death rather than be captured. He was declared a national hero after that: And of course military school honoured this by everyday's training program running up to the castle and down again, in +30C heat: There is patriotism in Mexico. Museum of anthropology was nice, reminded us a lot of the gold museum we visited in Bogotá, Colombia with Mayan art: On the streets of Mexico City you can get roasted bananas and sweet potato: Tasted good! And native indians played their part on the streets - one example were the "flying indians" from Veracruz state of the country: They climbed into the tower, fastened themselves with ropes, put themselves into rotation till they touched the ground - and they played music while flying! Click to listen my recording of their indigenous "flying music" from here. Back at our basecamp we found a scorpion with children on her back in our bathtub: (click to enlarge to see the smaller ones on her back) With tears in our eyes we had to kill 'em - no place for them in the city :( The sad day came when we had to move on, our fantastic hosts and fellow GS-ers helped us to get through the complex street-structure of Mexico City: And a heartwarming letter from Luis: We got a huge boost in our motivation after that! 2 And they all deserve a BIG thumbs up for their unbelievable hospitality in the very heart of the boiling Mexico City!!! We will be back! Me, Juan José, Luis, Kariina and our trusty GS. Andrés, Juan José, Kariina and me. And our road headed to the mythical Baja California... We needed a ferry to get to the peninsula of course. Not that one tho, turns out the same port is for Mexican crude-oil stuff. And they have a factory there. And nice nature on the inland side.The peninsula between the gulf and the Pacific creates diverse set of environments: hot deserted plains, windy mountains, the humid Pacific coastlines. It was a pleasure to take the small remote trail roads through those places: Loads of burned down cars. Very often, the road conditions weren't the best. A couple of falls included. But nothing stopped us enjoying the fantastic nature on Baja: (click to enlarge) And the cacti - they were the biggest we've seen! Over the mountains down to the plains... (click to enlarge) Strange dead fish on the beach. The best way to demonstrate Southern Baja's nature is through panoramas (click to enlarge each panorama in a new window, then click again in new window to a full size and schroll horizontally): And we headed to the the Central Baja, where everything that grows is bigger and more cosmic: I must say that the main roads on Baja are very nice and in good condition, allowing you to ride through most of the Baja even on a street bike. But the most spectacular views are from small sandy trail roads leading deeper into the remoteness (click to enlarge pictures): And what a bizarre (in a good way) nature greets you there! Just like in some sci-fi scene: Those were the size of two basketballs. And marmelade-looking flowers on the ground. And panoramas from the Central Baja (click to enlarge each panorama): And our friend at our bush-camping place: Usa And so the Burgerdom arrived - McDonalds, Arbys, Wendys, Dennys - what's the similarity between them? They all sell burgers! Welcome to the United States of America! Here's a perfect picture to illustrate it: A custom in front of a burger eatery. We started off with Yoshua Tree national park that got it's name from the special tree growing there. Some nice sandy dirt roads in the park to torque through on a boxer: Quite a decent place to camp, too. That's the Yoshua tree I'm talking about. Loads of them around... Some panoramic examples from the park (click to enlarge each one): And then our route led us to the great Grand Canyon - I guess you've heard about it from somewhere? Some pics to prove "we've been there and done that" and have one of our boxes ticked in our must-see list: Grand Canyon panoramas (click to enlarge each one): And some bugs we encountered there: This fellow didn't want ta take off from my finger, even when I forced him (click to enlarge to see the hairy bug face): He was standing still on my finger: But after some big effort with loads of force (almost crushing him) I got him off and he made an angry face with big teeth after that: Meanwhile Rocky Mountains showed their signs: But soon deserted nature surrounded us - the bliss of California, Utah and Arizona: Some guy has ridden off the axle in bad road conditions - the GS just kept going 2-up full gear Arizonian panorama (click to enlarge). And very obviously - Monument Valley was on the list (click to enarge pics): True Western landscapes... The famous "Mexican hat" that also gave a name to the village nearby. And a long panorama from "cut-out" rocky nature of the Valley of the Gods. It may sound wierd, but just few hundred miles from the desert high mountains greeted us, it was all green and bloody cold again! The mountains get their reddish colour from iron content - loads of mines around. But for a long time we felt like home - the just-got-green trees, chilly fresh air - something we hadn't experienced for a long time. Headed to Denver where the famous Woody's Wheel Works was, since we had replaced 3 spokes at once on our rear rim on the way (BMW specifies you can only replace 1 spoke at the time) so we were afraid that it could get worse, so let them check - the rim was quite badly bent, used and abused with rusty spokes. Rebuild would have cost us over 300 USD, but if we gave our old wheel to them they'll give a new rebuilt one with stainless spokes as exchange for 250 USD - the deal was done: But then the boring part of the USA began in terms of landscape - crossing central-USA is just grasslands, often bad weather including tornadoes etc. Not that much fun... Visited my former English teacher near Milwaukee and in their garage I could do some of the maintenance work, repaint our crash bars that were scratched, bent and thus badly rusty after 30 000 miles of South- and Central-America: Fitted a new rear brake disk since the old one was way under minimum allowed thickness. Repaired GPS power cable. And in Milwaukee we got a good chance to visit Harley-Davidson factory where they make engine's for 'em: 1930-1935 Flathead. 1936-1947 Knucklehead. 1948-1965 Panhead. 1966-1983 Shovelhead 1984-current time V2 Evolution Managed to sit on some of them: Didn't like too much... The best one I liked was this: At least had a proper front suspension instead of boring telescopic forks, and less chrome 2 Miller beer factory was near-by, so obvious "testing visit" was conducted: That vast room of beer get's replenished every 24h - beer consumption in USA is something beyond words! And most of it goes to Chicago! As electronic music fans we visited Detroit: It was quite a "dead" place currently as it is the biggest automotive industry city in the US. Automotive industry does have really bad times currently so no wonder. Detroid just had the highest number of murders per city in the US of A too. But at least we got to see the Star Trek exhibition! Captain Pickard's room. And of course, a mandatory visity to a (vinyl-) record shop was in order: Some decent collection of stuff - loads of Motown 7" singles too. And the worldfamous Motown was also "a must" picture place: Detroit centre looked like this (click to enlarge): And then the highlight of the East-Coast of the USA - the very fundamental reason we decided to ride there over the boring central-USA grasslands was... New York! Through bad rains and storms we arrived to the Manhattan island - and such street picture greeted us, with trees fallen down in sky-scrapers' city: Soon we were under David's and Francine's guarding hand in their Manhattan loft that had a superb view over the city and the mystic sky the just-ended storms had created in the sunset - some pics to illustrate it: Click to enlarge panoramas. City at night: And the next day was a walk-around tour in Manhattan, Brooklyn bridge, famous skyscrapers etc: Click to enlarge panoramas from NYC: The first Apple shop: And NYC's Chinatown: In Manhattan terms - some affordable BBQ: Interesting stuff was for sale in the stores, starting from dried shark fins ending with live frogs... All for eating. And again a records shops visit was in order: Too expensive in NYC tho and didn't buy anything. And one of the boxes ticked - the legendary Blue Note jazzclub: NYC metro worked fine: And the gay-lesbian festival was on the streets: Drag queens'n'stuff. A view to the statue of liberty. An old cementery in NYC. And more skyscrapers: And got up to the the top of Empire State Building with some decent breathtaker views: Click to enlarge each panorama to see Manhattan's wonders in each direction: And 9/11 site - the ground zero: But at least some work was going strong there! Analog gallery MK IV (some South-American residuals) Ecuadorian landscapes. Farming in Ecuadorian mountains - cattle has to live on very steep sides. Village children in Ecuador, just finished their schoolday. Lake Quilotoa - inside volcano crater. Lake Quilotoa Ecuadorian native children playing. Ecuador natives in their everyday harsh life in the mountains. Quito - capital of Ecuador. Quito streets. Santuario de las Lajas in Colombia Easter in Colombia with friends.   Analog gallery MK V (Central-America) Panama City in the horizon. Miraflores gates in Panama Canal. The Canal. The system. Palmy plantations in Costa Rica. Ancient jungle trees in Nicaragua. Ometepe island volcano in Lake Nicaragua. Church in Ometepe island. Siesta time in Granada, Nicaragua. Guadalupe church in Granada, Nicaragua. "Calle la Libertad" - Liberty street in Granada. Yojoa lake in Honduras. Lago Yojoa. Sunset in Hondurian mountains. Kids taking swim and mom washing clothes in Rio Dulche, Guatemala. The bridge over Rio Dulche - longest bridge in Central-America. The longest bridge in Central-America. Mayan pyramid in Tikal, Guatemala. Looks like a landed space ship. High trees in Guatemala. Pyramid in Tikal, Guatemala. The remains of mayan culture. Pyramid. Amazing "space-age" architecture by mayas. Tikal. Guatemalan pyramids tipping over the jungle. Jungle vs mayas. A friendly guy in Belize City. In Corozal, Belize. Carribean sea in Belize. GS smelling the carribean. Main pyramid in Chichen Itza, Yucatan Penninsula, Mexico. Columns in Chichen Itza. Chichen Itza in infra-red. Columns in infra-red. Chizen Itza in IR. Mayan stairs.   Analog Gallery MK VI (Central-America) Steep roadside in Mexico often hides crashed trucks that have run off the cliff - you can see some debris. Finding a wild well hidden tent space between cactii in Mexico. Through mountains in Mexico. Clouds above, ground below. Yucatan. Templo Santo Domingo. San Cristobal de las Casas in Mexico. Siesta time. Beggar in San Cristobal de las Casas. Native girls chattin'. Street pattern in San Cristobal de las Casas. Mexican natives in their everyday life. Flooded rivers. Landscapes in Central Mexico. World Trade Center in Mexico City. Green metropolis of Mexico City. The main street in Mexico City. Mexican native. Banana toast seller. When he opens the drawer there's a nice smell - we bought some well prepared bananas. Landscapes on the west-coast Mexico. Landscapes on Californian penninsula. Doing some sandy tracks in Baja California. Baja California. Some decent riding in Baja California - small sandy tracks give you the best views. Mountaineous trails on the tip of Baja. Bajan cactii in infrared. Bajan coast in infrared. Baja in infrared. GS surrounded by Centra-Baja's flora. Central-Baja's sci-fi plants and landscapes...   Alaskan empire Before really getting to Alaska we got to see some of the best parts of Canada. Highlights would be Banff and Jasper national parks and Alaska Highway in Canada. We got to see a glimpse of the former Winter Olympics host city Calgary. And very shortly after Banff provincial park greeted us. Canadian cliffy Rockies make for amazing scenery (click to enlarge mountain pics and panoramas): The Canadian Alaska Highway features the famous sign post village where you get to see thousands of signs: (click to enlarge panoramas) Here's a walk-through video, skip the first part where Kariina speaks about it, after which she'll go for a walk: Alaska Highway possesses some of the most decent scenery we've seen: ...till Alaska was under our wheels! Just a superb place to be - great people, and most of the bikes in Alaska were BMW-s, unlike elsewhere in North-America where Harley-Davidsons prevail. And Alaska is where our ride "To the end of the World" started - all the way up to Deadhorse, Prudhoe bay. The world famous Dalton Highway. Lots to see on Dalton Highway (click to enlarge panoramas): A lunch break aside the dirt road. While we were eating I heard some hissing noise - immediately I discovered that our rear tire was leaking air. So I plugged it: And another "innovation" on our bike that I haven't talked about is a proper sidestand extension, made out of a hockey puck - works better than the most hi-tec CNC-d wannabe aluminium racing $$$£££€€€ bits, dampened'n grippy 'n all: Roads to Deadhorse mostly look like this: Looks warm, but it's flippin' cold! We rode with our electrically heated jackets on maximum and rain suits on in order to stop the freezing wind from penetrating us. And riding those roads you mostly look like this: Crossed the Arctic Circle. There we met two retired (ex-)bikers. The guy wasn't riding much his old BMW anymore because purely physically he just couldn't get on the bike. Without asking they donated us $10, but the condition was that we would send them a post card from Australia, thanks! 2 Most of the Dalton Highway is escorted by the Trans-Alaskan crude oil pipeline: That is wind, fire and bomb proof. Couple of times per day inspection helicopter flies over it (forest fire risk and anti-terrorist hijack protocol I guess) There were loads of forest fires, with smoky skies: Some panoramas from Dalton Highway (click to enlarge each one): And the polar Sun - always shining, even at 2 AM till early morning so that the landscapes are covered with its mighty golden shine: And fully frozen we arrived to Deadhorse around 3 AM in the morning: Since there was no way back being fully frozen and exhausted, we took the only room available in the Arctic village with 3 hotels. THe room cost us bloody $200 which we bargained down to $150: Our room looked like entering a freezer: Like most buildings on permafrost in Arctic extreme seasonal conditions, the building was on skis: While Deadhorse is mainly a crude oil town, the local fuel costs outrageous money! But to get the refined fuel back there is a big challenge and the next fuel station being some over 200 miles away and your tank already empty, you don't have much choice: Most of the vehicles in the village look VERY Arctic/Antarctic purpose: Even trailers run on caterpillars! Surroundings in Deadhorse (click to enlarge panoramas): Now that we'd seen the end of the World, the only way was to make a 180 degrees turn and head down to warm South again. We really were looking forward to it being fully frozen ourselves - the average summer time temperatures in Deadhorse are from 0 to +5 degrees Celsius! For me the road markings in Alaska are truly inspiring! And with varying luck we rode the Dalton Highway all the way back: In those places there is a chance of being attacked by a bear. It might be a small chance, but still. Even Alaskan beers are bear inspired: We carried bear spray, just in case: Spent some decent time together with Ramey in his home in Fairbanks, and later also with Carol and Paul in Anchorage, after which we headed down to Kenai peninsula. Loads of fishers there: And abandoned cars aside the road: Some Kenai peninsula panoramas (click to enlarge each one and click again in new window to see 'em in full size and then scroll horizontally): What we did not know before was that Americans and Canadians both love to travel in HUGE recreational vehicles (RV-s). Some are bigger than average long distance buses in Europe and carrying another big american car as a trailer, and there's usually only 2 retired people inside that combo: You see all kinds of them everywhere in N-America: From Alaska we headed down to Vancouver in Canada. The road there provided an additional set of environments: Our bike turned 150K meanwhile: One of our wild camp places, couldn't sleep though - loads of animals came in the night to sniff around the tent (click to enlarge panorama): The weather proved to be exceptionally hot while we were traveling through the northern prt of the British Columbia, so as soon as we spotted a nice lake aside the road, we could not resist jumping in. The water was very clear, and very-very cold (click to enlarge panorama): In Vancouver we had to thoroughly clean our bike (in over 40 000 miles that we covered with this expedition in Americas I've only washed the bike lightly 4 times, so it was a big hassle for me to do it in detail for the first time!!!): Drained the fuel, disconnected the battery and pushed it into the crate: Fixed it up properly. Strapped it down and threw our riding gear into the box. And ready it was.After having done the Americas we arranged for the bike to be shipped to Australia from Vancouver. Since we were told it would take around four weeks for the crate to reach its destination, we decided to fly to Australia through Estonia, other than directly over the Pacific, thus saving some cash that we would otherwise had spent on food and accomodation while waiting for the bike in Sydney. So, instead we spent 27 days in Estonia - meeting friends and family, and arranging some things. Having arrived in Sydney we were greeted by an elderly couple (the man was actually born in Estonia and migrated with his parents to Australia after the 2nd WW). We got their contacts from friends back at home and thus we had a convenient base for clearing the bike from customs and getting ourselves ready for the road. Since all this was taking some time, we had a chance to look around in this country that was very new to us. First we wandered around a bit in Sydney: Click to enlarge panoramas: Sydney opera house. But one of the highlights in that area was a visit to the Featherdale Park where we saw many birds and animals that we had never seen before, and that actually only live in Australia. That truly was a great introduction to Australia and its ecosystem that is one of a kind. A kangaroo (the word "kangaroo" in aboriginal language actually means "I don't understand" - this was the answer of aboriginal people when the white people came and asked what strange animal was that). Loads "roos". Some ancient looking bird. The famous koala. An echidna. Australia is home to the most venomous snake in the World. The truth is, however, that only one or two people a year die from a snake bite here, in Australia, which is less than one-thousandth of those killed on the roads. A Tazmanian devil. Looks mean, but is actually on the verge of extinction. But soon enough the fun was over (or, rather, was just beginning) as the bike had been transported to a warehouse and we could begin the clearing process. The customs was easy (with a little bit of running around to arrange the inspection), but the infamous quarantine inspection caused a slight headache. Well, maybe we were worried too much, too, because we only had read about the quarantine horror stories by other travellers after we crated the bike, so we were not entirely sure how much dust and rust there was on the bike. The inspector was as thorough as we had read, checking every corner and hole with his torch, and also checked our riding boots and tent pegs. In the end the bike was prescribed a pressure wash (which, of course, we had done before!) and a 110 AUD bill for it (what a good business!). All in all its is quite true that the destination fees are more or less the same as the shipping costs. We paid 1091 CAD for shipping (plus 375 CAD for building the crate), and then 969 AUD for receiving, 111 AUD for the quarantine inspection, 242 AUD for warehouse fees, cleaning and re-inspection, plus 116 AUD for leaving the crate to the warehouse. An expensive thing it is to get here! Here's the crate that we had to dismantle: After all the worrying about clearing the bike and about getting the mandatory insurance to circulate the roads in Australia (which we never got, even after four days spent talking on the phone - the institutions that should be issuing it to foreign registered vehicles just know nothing about it), we fell ill for a couple of days, and fearing that it might be the swine flu, we even went to the local hospital, but the queues were so long that we quit waiting and got better "having a lot of rest and drinking a lot of fluids" (as recommended by a nurse at the hospital). Just before leaving Sydney, Dorothy and Roy took us to the Blue Mountains. Once again, this was a good opportunity to see the wilderness that we had yet to experience. Well, surely enough there would not be many more mountains in the regions we would be passing through, but the screaming of the birds in the valleys, and the sence of desolation, was surely something we would be excited about in Australia. Click to enlarge panoramas: Foggy valley in the Blue Mountains. The Three Sisters. Something very specific to Australia - gum tree. Banksia tree. But finally it was time to leave. We said good bye to our wonderful hosts, and hit the road! After a couple of days of riding the road nr 1 towards North we realised that it might not have been the best idea, since there was just awfully lot of traffic (which is even worse if these are your first days in left-hand traffic!) and not too much to see. In any case there was no ocean beckoning even far from the road. But maybe it was a bit of unease that is so often associated with the first days of a big adventure (and after this short pause, these really felt like first days) - waiting for interesting things to come your way immediately, and being a bit dissapointed when they don't. But we were trying to adopt the travelling pace as quickly as possible, sleeping in our tent and having Spam for dinner: Views from our camping spot. Our first tourist trap proved to be the most easterly lighthouse in Australia, located near Byron Bay. There were some decent views though. Click to enlarge panorama: But we are actually not very keen on seeing touristy things, it is rather the road itself that motivates us. Thus, soon enough we started wondering if that was all Australia had to offer. Tired of the main road, we decided to change our plans of going as far as Cape York, and turned inland instead. As soon as we did that, the scenery changed and for the first time on road, we felt excitement about being in Australia. The first things that greeted us were the huge bottle trees: But the deeper we rode into the inland, the quieter it was, and by the time the sun was starting to set, there was even nobody on the road. There we were, in the outback, and all alone. In the quest for a decent spot to pitch the tent we wandered into some small track and it was next to this track that we spent the night - it was just so calm and peaceful there that the chance that somebody would come and find us there, was extremely faint. As it got darker, we started to see the stars of the Southern sky again (last time we saw them was in South America), and the moon rising. What a moment! Australia was proving to be very rewarding, and it felt oh so good! The next morning we were still so enchanted that we made a mistake that could have been fatal. Check out the video (don't mind the Estonian subtitles) and see what's wrong: &nbsp &nbsp The ride further into the outback showed us the countryside and atmospheric country towns where it seemed as if life had stopped there a while ago. Barcaldine: A wind mill built in 1917. Longreach: Typical street. Old style. Displays in some old stuff museum: But this road was still too "wide" for us, so we quit the road that goes to Mount Isa, and from Winton we choose to ride West on a developmental road that mostly was only three meters wide. The views were, of course, much more desolated than so far, and we were really pleased with all that. Click to enlarge panoramas: There are loads of abandoned vehicles aside the road in the outback of Australia. But aside the desolation we also found life in that far corner of the country: Some ants' home. Emus are not a rarity here - you see them quite frequently. Once again, found a nice camping spot not far from the road. The traffic is so non-existent there that only one car passed us while we stayed there: The night was windy, and the next day too. When we stopped at some lonely roadhouse (couple hundres kilometres from and to the next settlement) to buy a can of Coca-Cola, a dog befriended us and quite enjoyed Kariina holding him: The house itself looked worn, as all the other buildings around it: And strangely for us, there were camels wandering around: Soon after that we arrived in Boulia, along the last strip of bitumen on our road to Alice Springs. Some cowboys were doing their everyday work there, the cattle seemed huge: We knew that the Plenty Highway was rough, and riding it only confirmed that piece of information. There was both gravel and sand, and the closer we got to the Northern Territory border, the worse became the corrugations. And one more thing to consider - starting from Boulia, the next fuel is 460 km away. Good for us that we have a 32-litre Adventure tank! White surface. Then pink surface. Then the crossing from Queensland to Northern Territory. And then the infinite red corrugations. In many places along the road there are signs indicating that the road is subject to flooding. The indicators themselves have such high water levels marked on them that it is doubtful anyone will read them when there's such a flooding. Boatmen, maybe? The scenery does not change too much during the hundreds of kilometers (the total of this road being over 700 km), but we were lucky to see kome wildlife. Some kangaroos hopping over the road. Ants' nests, once again, but this time much bigger. A strange bug, looking like a piece of straw. Some flora: Here are some shots of the surroundings: Click to enlarge panoramas: And a sandy camping sport right next to the road: When we finally reached the asphalt, this sign greeted us aside the road: Someone must have been really mad at the road conditions there! But to be honest, they were pretty bad, with corrugations beating the last out of us and our trusty bike. We were lucky not to break anything on that road. It was a relief to be on a sealed road again, with good feelings of desolated lanscapes and isolation on our minds. When we stopped next to the road, we saw a strange thing on the ground. Upon closer inspection it turned out to be a ball, or a globe, to be more precise. Of course, we had to take it with us, so that we could be able to explain curious strangers where we're from! Before reaching Alice Springs, the far center of Australia, we once again crossed the Tropic of Capricorn. Here's a proof of that: It ended up being 3 days of busy work for me: Broken subframe ment this (hours of work to get it off): Thankfully Lance had a mate he could borrow a welding set from and he also could weld. I prepared the subframe for him, and just in case I also made reinforcement kits: And let Lance to weld it: Result isn't beauty but does the job. And in one evening Lance came home and prepped us a barbie: Mmm... tasted bloody good! We haven't eaten proper meat since ages being budget travellers it's been can-food fest all the time so far. Whining gearbox ment this: Half of a bike that still stands on it's own. I opened the gearbox up and started to search for the cause of the noise: Didn't find anything wrong in the front so I had to completely rip the shafts off from the box: Shifting mechanism seemed to be intact. And soon the BINGO! moment came: It was a bloody "Made in Japan" (on a German bike!) bearing at the end of the input shaft that was moving like someone had put gravel into the bearing. Certainly too early failure for a GS at 101 000 miles. And then a deeeeeep depression came into me - where the hell do I get a new bearing from? Contact BMW in Melbourne, have it shipped? Could take a lot of time. If they don't have it in stock it'll take ages to get new bearings from Europe. Lance reckoned I should call couple of bearing shops in Kalgoorlie, since it's a mining town and they have very well equipped bearing shops. I got the phonebook and the first company I called and explained my problem answered: "We are sorry, it is Saturday and our shop is closed". The guy said: "What bike are you riding by the way?" BMW I replied. And there was an instant change of mood in him "Oh cool, it's not a Japanese bike!". For a moment I thought he's some mind-reader knowing about my dissapointment in Japanese product quality. He continued: "I really want to help you then. Where are you? I'll start my car, pick you up and bring you to my bearing shop - I should have that bearing in stock." All I got to say was WOW. Our luck really had changed in Kalgoorlie meeting such good people. Otis, the bearing guy who came to pick me up, turned out to be a Triumph fanatic, having 3 of them in the garage. The day he was born he was delivered home on a Triumph rear seat, so no wonder why he's a fan of British bikes. He brought us to his bearing shop where he really did have the bearing I needed and also he had dozens of bearing pullers that helped to get the old one off: Turns out they were exacly the same bearings BMW sells. But like all other automotive manufacturers BMW asks 3 times the price of the original bit - just put into OEM bag. I paid around 30$ for the 2 bearings, from BMW they were quoted well over $100. Otis said it's pretty common on different manufacturers, including Japanese themselves. Giving big thanks to Otis I could start putting the gearbox back together with new bearings on the both input shaft's ends: After loads of work with the heat gun and $$$-costing seal glue I put the gearbox back together: And went to testride it to around Kalgoorlie since we needed aluminium welding to repair the windscreen mount and we got one: Yeeehaa, gearbox whine dissapeared and gearbox didn't blow up after the test ride. So looks like my first ever gearbox repair went successfully! Later we spent a good night out with Lance and his mates in the outback near Kalgoorlie: Next day Lance gave me some sheet aluminium so I could repair my windscreen: From a bike shop I bought a cheap plastic handlebar-mirror to replace the original mirror and most of the problems were sorted! All thanks to Lance. He really is our hero. He's a kart-racer himself with loads of trophies at home: Not only he's a racing champion but also a hosting champion! Lance: The day we were supposed to leave we thought we should see around Kalgoorlie, the city we found so much luck from. Being a mining city there's obviously loads of mines around and everyting else that's related to it. I.e. the World's biggest truck tires that cost $20 000 each, those seemed to be worn tho: The same trucks carry excessive loads in the Super Pit mine, the biggest mine in Australia: A shovel from $10 000 000 costing 3714-horsepower bulldozer: One shovel-full is 60 tons. A panorama of the Super Pit (click to enlarge): And funnily, we saw a llama in Kalgoorlie, familiar to us from South-America: We were on the way to South-Ocean coast from there on. Road to Esperance had some nice nature around it. Burnt forests. Dried lakes (click to enlarge panoramas): And other sorts of flora and fauna: Till we've finally got through the central Australia and the ocean greeted us: With different animals: Esperance had Skylab bits in their museum. It was a 77 tonner US space station that fell down in Australia. So we went for a visit to the museum: Museum in the front. Skylab bits: Titanium sphere to hold fuel for the orbital stability boosters. Hatch. And then the looooong ride from south up to north through West-Coast started... There are incredible amount of wineries aside the roads there. Sometimes there's 2 wineris every miles! Trees get bigger-stronger as well in the South-Western side of Australia: All in all, we Estonians coming from the forest zone really liked it there with the smells of blossoming flowers and fresh air around. Forest panorama (click to enlarge): And you can listen a recording from the same spot. Typical signs. Kangaroo protection on cars. Cape Leeuwing on the Indian Ocean coast. Panoramas (click to enlarge each one and click again in a new window to see 'em in full size then scroll them horizontally): Just some random patterns from there: A bit further North you can see the Pinnacles, strange formations: Panoramas (click to enlarge): Not far away from there the colors of the sands got even more interesting - WHITE sands! And the Indian oceanside there (Click to enlarge panoramas): And there we wild-camped. What a windy night it was, couldn't believe the tent would stand up in those winds, but our Hilleberg tent again proved it's bombproofness. Loads of termite nests around (click to enlarge panorama): And temperatures got horrific even in the shadow: +43C !!! It's just exhausting to ride a motorcycle in that heat and humidity. When you ride you actually overheat in those temperatures. It's like someone is blowing hot air into your body with big massive heat gun. The faster you ride, the worse it gets! Hard to believe? Try it!!! We had to close our riding gear vents - while you sweat like hell it's still better, since it's actually cooler to ride when the air doesn't move so much. And we had to ride slower as well. In Exmouth peninsula there's the World's most powerful VLF transmitter (click to enlarge the pics): And a nice lighthouse. Most of the West-Coast Australia is basically a nice (tropical) beach as well: (click to enlarge panorama) They have tides there, quite powerful. You can actually see water moving away or combing back to the coast with your own eyes. Creating nice sceneries to walk around and mangroves where many species have found their home: In Broome the white-golden sands switch to red again (click to enlarge the panoramas): Creating strange formations on the beaches: With dinosaur tracks printed from the past: The heat has been just getting unbearable since we got further up north, closer to the equator. Haven't been in the mood to go to see any of the tourist attractions anymore in that heat. One evening in Broome, we just picked up a coconut fallen from the tree and drank/ate it: And spent most of the next day just lazying on our mobile sofa: But while the heat was unbearable we had to move on. Through Kimberley: Till we got to Kakadu National Park where I only took 2 pictures: We had come to Kakadu in the wrong time of year. Unbearably hot and nothing to see other than stinking tourists with their vans or 4x4s. So we were off on the way to Darwin - our last destination in Australia. One night we had a giant visitor in our tent: It's size was bigger than my hand! With the help of some clothes I got him/her outside safely w/o being bitten. Some other spiders were around as well: And not so long it took before Darwin was under our tires. Actually our tires were so worn that I could see textile already coming out of rear one. Got a new pair of Tourances from the BMW dealer in Broome (did not have enough time to order Heidenau K60 from Melbourne) with reasonable prices and went to get a shop where to replace 'em. Most of the tire shops were busy, I only found Honda shop who could do the job, but to save the money I took the wheels off and put them back myself. Not an easy job in +35C weather! Thankfully we met Mick in Darwin who let us stay in his place and do some additional work and maintenance on our bike before we ship it to Asia. Paralever bearings were worn, so I had to replace them: Did the complete service and the bike is ready to be shipped to East-Timor: So now we are bikeless for over a week. Mick has showed us around tropical Darwin meanwhile, which is a lot more fun in an air-conditioned car rather than being soaked-swet on a motorcycle (click to enlarge panoramas): Good thing is that in Darwin we received a parcel from Estonia where one guy took pity of us and sent us brand new helmet socks and riding gloves: There are some really good people in the World!!! Only thing we can hope is to return a favour (whether to the same or a different person) someday! Due to somewhat disturbingly high numbers of these foreign nationals in East-Timor, the accomodation prices are, in Asian standards, outrageously high, and the food is not the cheapest either. But the UN pays, and so do the others. After some days in Dili we could conclude that the foreigners enjoy better the company of people like themselves (so there are many bars where no locals go), and you do not meet them on the beach, socialising with the local crowd. When we went to the town's beach to watch the sun set over the bay, we were the only white people, and to be honest, it felt just nice. (Click to enlarge the panorama) We do not speak the local language, Tetun, though, and most of our knowledge about Portuguese (the colonial language) has vanished since we left Brazil, so we only can communicate with our face and body. But the local folk don't really care, our smiles are rewarded with their sincere smiles. The most smiling are, of course, children. One night we just sat down by some improvised football field by the beach and watched the children play, and others do some work like selling eggs or nuts. There is no industry in East-Timor, so most people earn their living through either fishing or agriculture. Be it early morning or late afternoon, you see fishermen come and go with their boats. The UN or who ever better do something quick with the local sewage system (currently everything just seems to flow into the sea) - here you see a narrow canal passing by the rear of our hotel and emptying right onto the beach, so we ourselves were part of the army of pollutants! After a couple of days we were ready to admit that Dili is not one of Asia's great capitals. It is a small place, and you can see all places there are to see in a day or two. But we had more time, so we did plenty of beach walking, watching the people and watching the waves come and go. And cocks, trained for fighting and gambling between village men: And although we are not big fans of climbing somewhere in the heat, we still undertook the tourist trail to the statue of Jesus up on a hill just outside of town. It was quiet there (with only UN-guys doing their morning run on the newish looking stairs to keep themselves fit), but looking at the construction activity below (which includes a huge parking lot), it seems like some serious develpoment is under way. After we had endured all the public holidays and tourist activities, the bike was finally there, and I could push it out of the container. We were ready to hit the notorious roads! What came next was probably one of the most scenic and memorable rides ever. The some 200 kilometers along the north coast to the fishing village of Com were quite good, with some potholes here and there. The main thing is to remain focussed on the road. Sometimes the signs were pretty good, too: But as the first part of it winded through the mountains bordering the coast, it had lots of curves, and the steep edges of the road very often did not have any railings. For our sadness, we found a memorial to a crashed motorcyclist alongside the road, with a helmet broken into pieces. It is a grim truth that motorcyclists are more vulnerable in the traffic, but here, they don't pay too much attention to the safety - often they ride without a helmet at all, let alone other safety equipment. I doubt many of the sons and daughters of this poor country even dream of the fancy gear we're using, with BMW logos and all. We are being stared at where ever we pass, but mostly it is because of our huge bike. Here, a 250 cc seems to be a maximum. But there are some amusing things related to driving and traffic here, too. Outside the biggest towns, the fuel seems to be "growing" on trees, i.e. you can buy fuel by the bottle. Just in case, we never tried it though - would not like to have a broken bike here, in East-Timor. Another fun thing is that in addition to cramped minivans (which are dirt cheap but always packed) they transport people on trucks. Which does not necessarily mean that it is a safe way to go from one place to another. It was interesting to see the remnants of colonial times tucked in the lush tropical vegetation. The old Portuguese buidings are majestic, and look a bit out of the context now that they are not taken care of anymore. In fact, we saw many great buidings that have been abandoned. One of the most striking examples is the former mercado municipal in Baucau. The colonisers went, but their faith, Catholicism stayed, and thus the churches and also cemeteries have had more luck. As we stopped by one small church in a roadside fishing village, we were immediately surrounded by some twenty children. So what do you do, if you have a bunch of kids looking at you as if you were an alien from a crashed flying saucer, but you do not speak a word of their language? The solution came from the kids themselves, and was so simple and almost obvious, that we felt a bit stupid. They asked us in Portuguese what were our names (sure we could understand that as that is the first question you learn in a language class), and we asked the same question from them. It made them a lot of fun and saved us from the unfomfortable silence that we would otherwise have been bound to. Must remember this simple trick for the future! There was also a plenty of buildings the function of which is unknown. Most of them probably date back to the Indonesian times. The people live a simple everyday life in simple huts very often made of natural materials. (click to enlarge pics and panoramas) All the human aspects set aside, the landscapes - ranging from mountain ranges to shady palm groves and atmospheric beaches - are just stunning, rolling out in front of your eyes like candies on a conveyor belt. Or more like artisan chocolates. Click to enlarge panoramas: But even sweeter treats were to come after Com. From there, a road that was in much worse condition went down south to Iliomar. The more south we got, the less traffic there was. And the reason for that was obvious - the more south we got, the less the road reminded a road. Instead, kilometer by kilometer, it started to look more like a track. And a rocky track, that is. It was difficult to steer the heavy bike that was bumbing down the uneven surface, and there probably was not a minute where I did not sorry our poor suspension - it was doing the toughest job since Bolivia, that's for sure! But as always, difficult conditions come with a reward. We rode through pristine jungle and remote villages where there is so little traffic that people would stop what they were doing and look towards the road if they heard a vehicle coming. The kids would all wave to us, and so would many people surprised to see us there. If we stopped, men would come and look and touch our bike, amazed. People seem to be very open here, and very spontaneous. Click to enlarge panoramas: ' From Iliomar we headed west, and the track became so bad that we wondered if we even were on the right track. At one point the road just ended and there was a wide river in front of us. We used our satelline phone to call the UN number for road conditions, and although they said the road was difficult, it should have been doable. So what we had to do was to find a bridge that would get us across the river. After some riding around some smaller tracks we were finally on the bridge, and our journey continued. We saw the beautiful, deserted south coast of East-Timor, and some local fauna - a huge, black bee. Soon (well, not so soon actually, as we were moving pretty slow, some 10-20 km/h) we found ourselves somewhere around Viqueque. The track improved and suddenly we were in a more developed area, with electric lines and wide fields. From Viqueque we had no choice but to head back north - our plan to make a circle around East-Timor had failed due to the information given by the UN that there was a bridge missing on the way further west. And our bike had already seen enough tough roads. What we had seen so far had been just mind blowing, and that was what we were taking with us. The road north went through mountaneous region, and there were some decent views. After reaching the north coast again, we briefly stopped in Dili and headed west, to Indonesia, minds still on this tourist-free wonderland. Today there is basically no tourist infrastructure in East-Timor, so if you do go to some vaguely remote area, be sure to follow the guidebooks' advice and take food with you. Roadside stalls will sell refreshments, but more serious food options are hard to find, as are accomodation options (provincial centres only, where there is electricity for couple of hours at night). Stay tuned for Indonesia! Having arrived in Indonesia we were slightly bored. The first thing we noticed was the higher living standard - the buildings were more solid and the road was in better condition. But it also meant more numerous and more chaotic traffic which we did not like at all. Suddenly there were people everywhere, but nobody waved to us anymore (instead, where ever we stopped people would come and touch our bike, sometimes even lean - or even worse, sit - on it as if it were theirs - we did not like that too much, but even our disapproving looks did not make them change their behaviour). And the landscape - it had become dry as if we were in Australia again - not a sign of the lush tropical vegetation we had met in East-Timor. Maybe it was because we were still affected by the magic of the landscapes and the people of the eastern part of the island that we could not really appreciate what Indonesia had to offer. But that is where we were and we better had to adapt. We realised that this is where the real (or at least stereotypical) Asia would start for us, with overpopulation, crazy traffic and overall chaos. Asia is a multicultural environment, and so is Indonesia. Although it is home to the biggest muslim community in the world, different religions are flourishing in different regions. One morning in Kupang, the biggest town in the Eastern Indonesia, we were woken up by a song coming from a nearby catholic church: .::LISTEN::. In Kupang we boarded a ferry to the island of Flores. Since Indonesia is solely comprised of islands (and has more that 17 000 of them), getting across it will require us to use ferries 7 times before we reach Malaysia. The first leg, from Timor to Flores, is 12 hours long, and also the longest for us. The ferries in Indonesia are notorious for sinking, especially when the seas are rough. Not only is their seaworthiness doubtful, but they are constantly being overloaded. We took tickets to the economy class, which, as we learned later on the ferry, was comprised of small, unfomfortable plastic seats (the business class did not look too luxurious either, with stained mattresses lying side-by-side on the floor). We decided to stay on the car deck with the motorcycle until the ferry leaves the port (once again, there was too much curiosity about the bike, and we would not have deared to leave it there just like that), and then go looking for floor space to occupy with our own mattresses. But that is not how it went. Soon enough we realised that all the people walking around the car deck were actually going to stay there for the ride, and so we too put ourselves down just by the bike, one on one, and one on the other side of it. It was not enormously cosy or comfortable, but it would do for the night. And we knew the bike was safe with us. Here is also a short video about the life on board, and how we were tucked between the bike, the trucks and the crowd. So, in addition to all scooters, motorbikes, cars and trucks there was a whole lot of people down there on the car deck, and some birds and animals, too. At one point, a piglet came loose, which caused the muslim women to panic (in Islam, pigs are considered dirty animals), but most of the people seemed to be amused by chasing and catching the poor creature. Considering all the action we could barely sleep at all, but luckily the sea was calm from the sunset to the sunrise, so we made it to Flores allright. The island of Flores proved to be pretty curvy, so that once I even counted 29 curves in one kilometer. Otherwise it would be no problem, but most of them are sharp, blind curves, and many lorries just don't seem to stay in their own lane. Thank god I installed new brake pads in Darwin! (click to enlarge panorama) That said, Flores offered us some nice scenery. It was cool (literally, otherwise it gets hot as hell during the day here in the tropics) to ride through shady palm groves, but a roadside bamboo grove was something new and very exciting to us. We would hope to see them again somewhere, because it just is so photogenic. Mt Kelimutu is considered to be one of the most memorable sights in Indonesia. It is comprised of three crater lakes, each of which has a different colour (bluish, greenish and blackish) due to different chemical composition of the water. (click to enlarge the panorama and pic) But I think the most awesome sight were the numerous volcanoes dotting the island. They just look majestic, with their tips often disquised by the clouds. (click to enlarge pics and panoramas) And the coastline was nice, too. And the verdant rice fields were a proof of the fact that the rainy season had already started here. (click to enlarge panoramas) The people seemed more relaxed here. They say that some 18 000 years ago the small people called homo floresiensis lived here, until the taller and smarter homo sapiens came and conquered them. What exactly happened back then, nobody knowns, but the today's people of Flores are not too tall either. This is how they live and look like: Having crossed the island in the whole length, we arrived at its western tip in the town of Labuanbajo. Here we could feel a stronger presence of Islam, with imam reciting the Koran in the nearby mosque. .::LISTEN::. After Flores we headed to Sumbawa, which was again pretty dry and did not have any serious attractions for us but the monkeys we met aside the road. We believe it might have been the same species as the one we met in East-Timor - the hotel owner had caught a monkey being lost in the hotel garden, and showed it to us. During another crossing we could see the famous (for the huge lizards) island of Komodo. (click to enlarge panoramas) But we landed on Lombok instead. Its centre is so heavily populated that the towns scattered around the main road through the island just blend, making it an urban (and thus pretty nerve wrecking) ride all the way. Thus we fled to the north coast which was much more rural and relaxed, with nice coastline and rice paddies. We took time to stop to take it all in, and take pictures of people. We were greeted with smiles. It was now time for the legendary Bali. We had absolutely no plans as to what to see and where to go exactly, and we did not have a map either (just the one on the GPS), so we just started riding. We saw plenty of Hindu architecture, and once we even spotted people going to a cremation ceremony, dressed appropriately. What was funny was that the people did not really seem to be mourning - they were laughing and smoking cigarettes instead, and did not mind a chat. But the sun was already setting and we needed a place to stay, so Kuta (with plenty of cheap accomodation, according to our guidebook) sounded like an option. As we arrived, we were caught by a real traffic jam, and we were stunned by the number of tourists. Sure, there are hotels, bars and shopping - what else could a person want? But we felt we were in a wrong place, and when we saw Western youngsters entering a restaurant in their swimming pants (come on, it is a muslim country after all, could you show at least some respect?) we just felt sick. The next morning we hit the road again, having lost hope of finding a calm place on this island. But we did! On the north coast we landed in Lovina where the low season seems to be hitting hard - there are plenty of nice hotels and restaurants, but there are just no tourists (OK, there are some, but it still feels refreshingly empty). The hotel we are staying at has cosy cottages with open-air bathrooms, and a super lovely garden with hindi statues and all. (click to enlarge panoramas) It is so quiet that even a crab came out to see where is everybody. As it seems we found THE place, we just decided to relax here for a while. It is also probably the cheapest (and definitely one of the nicest) place we've stayed so far on our trip, with only some 8 USD a night (breakfast included), so why not. In addition to just sleeping, eating, walking on the beach and writing reports we also went for a dolphin-watching tour. It was not a totally serene experience (we don't know how it is done in other places as it was the first time for us to go on a such tour) as there were some twenty boast circulating the bay and basically harrassing the dolphins - who ever saw them, started chasing them so that the screaming tourists could get good pictures. Our guide was more respectful, though, and preferred to stay away and wait for the dolphins to come to us. We did still get some nice shots. (click to enalrge panorama) We also went snorkelling (basically for the first time as well), which was neat. The coral is not so colourful here, but the fish were nice, and we even spotted a big turtle. Good time here on Bali! A couple of words about the food in Indonesia as well. We were advised before arriving here that Indonesians eat lots of rice, and since we normally try to do as the locals do, we were a bit unsure if we would be able to keep up with them. I mean, rice is good, but to eat it every day? Mostly you eat the stuff directly off from the restaurant "demonstration" shelf on the window where the food has been lying there for a whole day without any protection: Half-eaten and shitted by flys, if you arrive in the evening expect it's already pretty dryed out and quite cold. But in Asian way - still tasty! The truth is, however, that even the most basic of the basics - the nasi goreng or fried rice has been prepared in a different way every time we've tried it. But there are other ways to eat rice. Nasi putih or boiled rice can be eaten with different meat and stuff that we could not identify, but was still good. If only they put a bit less of chilli in their food! In addition to rice, noodles or mieare readily available and just as good. Sometimes the dirt cheap instant noodles are used, but here they know how to make them taste good. Once we were on a boat, we tried an instant noodle soup with some green stuff and egg, and although it looked almost gross, the taste was pretty good. About eggs. As you can see from the pictures from above, since meat seems to be a luxury for too many people in Indonesia, most of the food comes with a fried or a boiled egg. Another good thing we have tried is a noodle soup with meatballs. We ordered one at a roadside place (I suppose it was the only thing they served anyway). It was a simple dish, yet it tasted superb. Maybe it was the green lime inside it... And Indonesian version of bread which is basically a dry rice chip: About desserts. There are no such things as desserts here, unless you consider banana pancakes a dessert. But who cares when there are so many delicious exotic fruit on offer. We have loved the rambutans and the snake fruit. About drinks. Indonesia has one good beer - Bintang. The other one - Anker - is bearable. A good option here is to drink fruit juices, but sometimes there are none, so ice tea works pretty well. And as tea is good, coffee could be much better. It seems that most places brew it right in the cup so that all the ground coffee stays floating. If you ask for "white coffee", what you get is coffee with condensed milk.   There is a Buddhist monastery in the nearby village, Banjar. Exactly, Buddhist, not Hindu. It is amazing how two different religions can exist peacefully side by side. It was a calm and relaxing place with nice views and lots of sculptures. After a bit more than a week on Bali it was time to say goodbye to the sweet Balinese, and move onto the next island - Java. It is interesting to note that Java is one of the most densely populated regions on Earth, with the population density of some 1000 people per square kilometer. Considering that, we were pleasantly surprised to find the eastern part of the island relatively calm and airy. One of the first sights was Gunung Bromo, a volcano which is also considered one of the most breathtaking places in Indonesia. And to be honest, it was pretty magical. We were lucky enough to arrive there on a sunny day while it is actually the rainy season here, in Indonesia. In the national park there were only a handful of tourists, so the place looked empty and even somewhat desolated, as if the time had stopped. Only the clouds were making their way up and down the collapsed caldera, and a couple of horsemen were there trying to sell us a ride up the slope of Bromo. The crater base consists of grey coloured sand, so to get to the volcano we had to struggle a bit with our heavy bike, while the locals were whizzing by on their small bikes like flies. But we made it there, and we could take a peek into the smoking crater itself. It truly was an astonishing experience, to see (and smell) all that smoke and to hear it roar as it makes its way up through the Earth core. You can see Bromo and our riding around the area from the video below. As a background, we used a tune performed by a gamelan orchestra. Gamelan is something specific to this region (mostly Bali and Java). The term itselt does not refer to the group of people playing the music, but to the set of instruments, which have all been tuned to that specific set and are thus not interchangeable. They even say that there are as many different tonal scales as there are gamelans. But there is more to Java than the volcanoes. Once again, since so many people live on the island, you can see traces of human action everywhere. We found the most stunning the sleepy mountain villages featuring modest houses and masterfully cultivated land - it is difficult to imagine the steep slopes that sustain agriculture (not only rice, but also potatoes and cabbages) here. The people are much more relaxed and don't come running to you with the endless "hello misterrrr!". One of the coolest (literally!) experiences was the Dieng plateau, famed for its high altitude and steaming crater lakes. And cool it was - the hotel (rather a homestay) even provided us with two blankets and a termos with hot tea. It is weird how in the morning you can sweat like hell at the lower altitudes, but once you get to 2000 and up, it becomes so cool that you can even see your breath. Dieng is a small village, but there are still at least four mosques. So on many occasions one can hear examples of koran recital. .::LISTEN::. One of these did not sound too good. Our first thought was that maybe a drunk imam had grabbed the microphone, but the Muslims do not consume alcohol, so maybe it was the faulty sound system: .::LISTEN::. So that's about the modest sightings. As you can see, modern Indonesia is truly Muslim these days, but it has not always been the case. There are things here that Indonesia is more famous for, and these are the Hindu and Buddhist temples of Prambanan and Borobudur, respectively. They were built in around the 9th century, and are funnily located so close to each other (maybe some 50 kilometres away, as the crow flies) that it once again makes you wonder how they could get along so well. Prambanan's centerpiece is the platform containing huge temples for the main Hindu deities - Brahma, Shiva and Vishnu. Unfortunately, at the time of our visit many of them were under reconstruction (they were badly damaged by and eathquake a couple of years ago) and thus we are not entirely sure if they are really worth the 11 USD entrance fee applied to foreigners. Borobudur left us a better impression - it just looked cool and contained a wealth of intricate stone carvings. But it was crowded with tourists, many of them locals (who actually pay some ten times less than foreigners), climbing on the precious statues to pose for a Facebook picture and sticking their hands in the bell structures atop the temple to touch the Buddha statues inside them. It felt as if we were in a zoo. I do not know if the temple itself is considered sacred, but something should be done if we want this World Heritage listed site to remain intact. As we reached central Java, the population grew denser, and the traffic just became mad. It is not chaotic, not at all, it is just that different rules apply here that contradict the rules we have been tought. One of them is related to overtaking. According to our experience (observing others), overtaking is allowed (or even better, expected) even if there is someone already overtaking you, in front of you, or if there is someone coming in your direction. Normally it all works out fine (after all, so far we have not seen any accidents except for a couple of trucks driven off the road), but one has to beware of the buses, because what counts here is your size - pure physics - so if you see a bus coming towards you, do not expect it to change lanes. It will flash lights or beep the horn, and you will have no other choice but to get the hell of the road and out of its way! So, yes, the traffic is dense here, and it must be the worst we have ever seen. Through some hundred kilometres we finally arrived in Jakarta, the Indonesian capital. So if Java is considered to be the heart of the Indonesian nation, Jakarta must be the very center of it. The first thing we noticed was of course the mandatory skyscrapers, some of them pretty nicely designed. But below them modern monsters, life works at a different pace, interlaced with religion and bound by other rules. There are mosques and prayer rooms everywhere, starting with gas stations and shopping malls, and ending with hotels. This is how a prayer room looked like in our hotel. Beneath the skyscrapers people live their simple everyday life, wearing flip-flops (even when riding a bike) and smoking a hell lot of cigarettes. There are lots of cats running around on the street, and the architecture is interesting, but reflects the poverty. One thing that caught our attention is that although we sometimes look towards Asian countries as the big consumers and pollutants of the future, today's Indonesian's ecological footprint is for sure smaller than ours, although we pretend to be environmentally aware and so on. They do not use electricity to dry their clothes (rather, they hang it on a rope or place it on rocks so that the sun would dry them), and availability of fresh juices reduces the quantity of plastic packaging. They use a scoop to wash down the toilet and to wash themselves, thus reducing fresh water consumption. Of course, it is not because of their awareness - mostly it is due to the economical and cultural background, but still! One of the highlights for us when visiting Jakarta was meeting a local biker (an ADVrider!) Bram and his wife Griska. When they came to meet us in our hotel, they brought us two jackets with the emblem of a local biking forum, some food that Bram had cooked himself (we had expressed or scepticism about being able to reach his Chinese food restaurant located in the suburbs, so...), and Griska even had a special gift (local style accessories) for Kariina. It was all totally unexpected, because normally it is the guests who bring the gifts. We were even more stunned when Bram took out a sheet of paper which had 28 questions related to our trip. He really is dreaming of doing it himself, so we were extremely glad we could share our experience. Our last couple of days in Jakarta were rainy (it is rainy season after all). So we left Java, taking a ferry (for the last time in our Indonesian island hopping) to Sumatra. As we were leaving the port we could see (too) many rustbuckets standing waitning for their turn there. Really, no surprise that so many of them sink. One young guy caught our attention by trying to swim first next to, and later after the ferry as it was leavig the port - a dangerous thing to do, considering that boats have propellers both in the rear and on the sides (for manouvering in the port). But someone threw him a banknote, so he swam away with it. The crossing was smooth, and the elements of an Indonesian boat ride were all there, meaning the loud Indonesian pop music coming from the pirated CD store set up on the car deck, and surely lots of people wanting to get acquainted with our bike. .::LISTEN::. Finally we arrived on Sumatra which is four times the size of Java, and just a quarter of its population. It sounded like a promising fact, at least we imagined there would be less traffic and more air lo breathe. And that is exactly what our first impression was. Sure enough there were the shimmering rice paddies and sleepy villages that we had already seen before, but somehow the overall atmosphere was much more relaxed, yet more impressive. The air was in fact so fresh that after the madness and congestion (that always comes hand in hand with dizzying exhaust fumes) of Java, and especially of Jakarta, it felt as if we had stepped into another world. We spent our first night on Sumatra in a small town of Kalianda where we probably were the only foreign tourists, and it greeted us in a majestic way, with a thunderstorm, perhaps reminding us that here, more than in many places in the World, life is reigned by the forces of nature. The following days proved us that this island, which has not been frequented by foreign touristed too much after the 2004 tsunami which devastated Banda Aceh in the north, is a true chocolate box. Since we did not have a map, we decided to take random roads leading north, and this is how we ended up riding up the west coast, passig by (once again) picturesque fishing villages. Click to enlarge panoramas: Once we stopped by the road, amidst some coffee plantation, to taste the durian, a famous fruit that the locals love but which is often resented by foreigners. Well, it sure has a strong smell (quite good actually), but the inside is somewhat spooky, visually reminding of rotten eggs. Let's say that if you ignore those associations, it is not bad, but it did not necessarily leave us craving for more. A thing that appealed to us the most at that roadside stop was the weird sound some bugs were making in the bush, which reminded of tehcno or electro music. .::LISTEN::. One day, by late afternoon we stopped in a random village, and as we set off to look for some bakso - a soup most often served by street stalls, we first ended up buying some deep fried bananas from a similar looking stall. We continued our quest through the village, and at some point we heard some music. Soon enough we were invited by some local ladies to join their band, but after they had performed us a tune or two, they asked in a shy way if they could take a picture with us. Our positive answer was followed by a half-an-hour photo session and lots of giggling. We sure looked weird to them, as we are much taller than the locals, and we do not speak much Indonesian. Luckily, one of the ladies was an English teacher at the local school. Here is their music: .::LISTEN::. And here are the results of the photo session: Luckily, after so many deviations, we could find a place that served bakso. Before we reached the centre of Sumatra we passed through some more wonderful scenery - rustic villages, rice paddies, nice beaches and lush jungle, and we really could not be but in love with this island. (A brick factory in Indonesian style - they burn the bricks under specially built building) Typical coastal village street. A restaurant in one of the villages. Sumatran coast (click to enlarge the pics and panoramas) Night fishing armada at the port - click on the pic to see how many lights each boat has! Caught fish: The fauna was amazing as well. We could see many species we had never seen before, and one of the highlights was saving an interesting looking turtle from being killed on the road. Click to see small crabs in detail: And a tiger warning sign on jungle areas we rode through: While in the jungle area, we heard some funny noise, and recorded it. First we thought it was monkeys, but might also have been some birds: .::LISTEN::. The people were ever welcoming and curious about our bike. In fact, their curiosity is never agressive - normally they will gather around you and just stare at you, not intruding into your precious personal space. Its is after you make the first attempt to communicate with them, they will become very lively and ask a hundred of questions about you and your bike. Some of them, though, will not want their pictures to be taken. The children, of course, are not so reserved, but ready to pose for a picture whenever you take out your camera. Everywhere we stopped, local crowd started to gather around our GS for a "close inspection" - most of the people hadn't seen such a big bike in their life (their local bikes are all scooters around 50-150cc): In the centre of the island we were greeted by Padang, the biggest city on Sumatra's west coast. The first thing that struck was the abundance of buildings that are about to collapse. Later we heard that there was an earthquake just a couple of months ago. But more than looking at those ghostly buildings we enjoyed a visit to the harbour which is home to a great number of (surprise-surprise!) rusty boats, which obviously does not stop them from going to sea. The work was going on, so they won't be retiring too soon either. (click to enlarge pics and panoramas) It was also nice to walk along the promenade, and to see local fishermen pulling their nets out of the waves, and selling their fresh catch. Some local folk were very eager to chat with us, so we also had a bit of a cultural exchange. Bukittinggi, some 930 meters above sea level, is the main tourist town of the area. Sure it is situated between three volcanoes, and sure it is a great base for tours and treks in the nearby area, but what's so special about the town itself? It took some time to figure it out, but we did. It has a lively market selling lots of colourful stuff from fuits and veggies to dried fish and produce we could not identify. We also tried some local fruit that from the distance looked like small potato, but the taste of which actually reminded us of rambutan which we really like. It is called longkong. Walking back to our hotel we met some interesting looking people. A singing blind beggar. Another blind woman begging on Bukittinggi street. Local people were very warm: Some ride around on stylish retro Vespas. Locals wanted to pose with the big bike and white skinned tourists: And they were slightly dissapointed when I said I'm married. We spent the night wandering around in Bukittinggi's panorama park which offered nice views of the nearby Sianok canyon and of the volcanoes. We also met a monkey, and a young muslim couple. Views from the city park: And a few moments later when the sun set: