The final push.

So I guess we are officially backpackers for the rest of the trip. That is a strange concept to absorb as we bump along on the magic bus towards Tulcan. The ride should be about 6hrs maximum with a cost of $6/person, the bus is comfortable and similar to a Greyhound. This is actually a refreshing change from riding as we can chat freely, watch the scenery and take in what we are seeing without worry of crashing into something. By the time we arrive in Tulcan we decided to carry on across the border into Pasto, we have a friend in Pasto who is expecting us and didn’t mind that we would be arriving late. We just stepped off the bus and a nice little lady asked if we were going to Colombia, and if so would we like to share a taxi to the border. The actual border is only 10km from the bus depot and a $3.50 cab fare, we decided quickly to share the taxi and chat with the couple along the way. They were trying to be helpful with the border process as well but just didn’t understand that it is a different process for foreigners. We need multiple copies of our passports and entry stamps so while we are waiting for copies they are already stamped out of Ecuador and across the bridge into Colombia.

Helpful biker pushing the truck as the mechanic sleeps in the chair.

Vendors come on the bus at stop lights.

Cute little girl in front of us, she was so well behaved.

We on the other hand are now standing in line and waiting for service, then we are sitting in the penalty box as they sort out our passports. It appears that when we entered Ecuador the officer pulled up our names in the computer but did not update our passport numbers. This has caused problems more than once, I am not sure why we get new passport numbers when we renew our passports, it should be like a driver’s license, one number for life. But I digress. Eventually we are given back our papers and we are free to go across the bridge and start the Colombia entry.

Looking back across the bridge at Ecuador.

To our surprise, Canada has imposed an entry fee for Colombian visitors into Canada, thus Colombia has reciprocated with a $65USD entry fee for Canadians. Payable in cash only, despite what I later read online. At the time it made a significant difference because we did not have $130USD on our person, we had $22USD, some Euros, some Peruvian Soles, and some change from various countries. The money changers were more than happy to give me a less than desireable exchange rate for all this which allowed me to get my fee paid and passport stamped, then I jumped into a cab for the 10km ride into Ipiales to get more money, then back to the border to pay Brenda’s fee. All the while Brenda sat patiently in the secure area of the immigration department. One more plan change, it is not too late and we are too tired to carry on to Pasto so we stop in Ipiales for the night.

Dealing with the money changers.

Stopping for the day is rarely a bad decision and we are treated to a modest hotel room and breakfast. It is cool in Ipiales at night and as most buildings do not have central heating the cold weather is managed by numerous heavy wool blankets, the floor is still cold as ice but that is what shoes are for. After what seemed like a ten minute knap it was breakfast and a short walk to the bus depot and off to Pasto. A short and very curvy 2hr ride later and we were in Pasto.

Our friend Armando asked us to call him if we were ever in Pasto so we found a Claro outlet and bought a SIM card ($1.80CAD including 200MB data and 15minutes of local calling), wow do we get ripped off with cellular plans at home. The rest of the day is spent getting settled at Armando’s house and a quick tour of his city. It was nice to catch up on what has been happening in his life, last year he was on his way to Bahia Blanca Argentina to see his two boys and their mother. That visit was very important to Armando as he does not get many opportunities to spend time with his children. Armando also understated his love of music, his house is adorned with guitars, keyboards, woodwind instruments including a flute, clarinet, and saxophone, and what band would be complete without a drum set. He is self taught and like Brenda’s parents plays music “by ear”.

Armando on the Sax.

We enjoy our time in Pasto and not having the motorbikes with us changed Armando’s plans a bit but did allow us to take a tour of the nearby lake and a short lived dirt road tour looking for his friends house. Aside from that he also took us to the local dirt track to attend the first race of the year. The race was for trucks and the course was a mix of a speed loop and an MX root. It was very entertaining as the competitors are all amateurs and some were using what looked like their family vehicle.  

This is also the track where Armando hold the speed record in the motorcycle 450cc class, as it turns out he was a successful racer until a bit of maturity and fear factor caught up to him. Of course the whole weekend was filled with good food, as Pasto has a diverse selection of restaurants to choose from, and laughs. We teased Armando about coming to Canada for a ride, he is thinking about it.

All this fun and friendship winds down as we once again head to the bus depot for the last overland travel of our trip. The 16hr bus ride from Pasto to Bogota. Our bus is a double decker style with the luxury seats on the lower level and the regular seats on the top level. We bought tickets for the lower level which worked out well as the leather seats fully reclined to allow for a more comfortable sleep after watching a movie on the 46” plasma screen TV. The driver must have nerves of steel driving these mountain roads in the dark, and from what we could see, in the rain as well.

We arrive in Bogota at 1pm and go straight to the airport, we have 12 hrs before we fly out but are not interested in seeing Bogota while packing our luggage around. It is a long wait for the plane after the bus ride but it a nice airport with lots of shops to look through and a few good quality restaurants. Finally we get to check in for the flight and shortly thereafter we are on the plane. Ah crap, we got put in the emergency row which means no reclining seats for a 6 hr red-eye flight. Such a first world problem. Then it is tackling the Houston airport with it’s 5 terminals and train system. From here Brenda goes to Phoenix where her parents will pick her up so they can spend some time together in Yuma. I will be heading straight to Calgary so I can collect the bikes from the airport and get to work for Monday. My summer will be busy this year fixing the bikes in preparation for the next leg of our world tour, wherever that may be.

Back to the business of shipping bikes

After a little bit more internet research we feel comfortable that Pacific Air Cargo will be able to help us and work as our cargo agent. Our contact person is Belen Castro, she may have been chosen as she speaks English, very hard working and accommodating to our numerous questions. The process is very similar to when we shipped from Canada with the exception that we need to crate the bikes. So while Belen is gathering all the information needed for a shipping quote and working hard to find a carrier that will accept the motorcycles we are contacting bike dealers in Quito looking for packing crates. I figured they would be the best place to start as they would receive new motorcycles in crates from the manufacturer. We contacted BMW, Harley Davidson, Kawasaki, Honda, and Husqvarna (they make more than just chain saws). Things were not looking good as one by one we got responses that they did not currently have any crates, then Sebastian from Pro-Racing replied that he had two crates available but would need a couple of days to uncrate the bikes that were still in them. This was fine with us as we still had not heard from Belen about flight times and such.

Sebastian giving us the tour of their dealership. This is the service and storage area. The showroom is upstairs.

They don't look like much but they need to be made of certified lumber or Canada will not allow them into the country.

We wanted to confirm the crates in person so we hopped on the Trollebus to the dealership, Sebastian was there and showed us the crates as well as their dealership. Pro-Racing is a multiline dealer selling Triumph, MV Agusta, and Husqvarna. They also have a full service shop for all types of bikes, while we were there they were working on a KTM, Kawasaki, Honda, BMW, and a big side-by-side. This is a very capable shop with trained mechanics, not some backyard guy with a dirt floor and homemade tools.

In any event the staff were very friendly and it looked like the crates would work for our bikes even though they were made for 250cc dirt bikes. Yay! One less thing on the to-do list.

We have not heard back from Belen yet so we wait anxiously going over as many details as we can, trying to get them into some sort of priority. The four day holiday is trying our patience, it is more of an inconvenience than actual hardship, but we cannot do anything about it so we make the best of it and take in some of the carnival activities. There is a big procession at the main square in old town.

After a bit more email correspondence and 7 days, we find out that the crates will be acceptable to the airline plus all other criteria has been satisfied. We can now move forward with crating the bikes. The airlines were nervous about the crates because the wood used has to be in accordance with international softwood regulations. I explained that the crates made it into Ecuador without issue so they should be able to leave. In any event it was back to Pro-Racing where Sebastian arranged for a friend of his to take the crates and us to the cargo warehouse. Once there we proceeded to weigh the bikes and get them disassembled for crating.

The crating process is simple in theory, make the bike fit the box. The smaller the box the less you pay. There is a break-even point where the volumetric weight is less than the actual weight, the ideal size is for these two numbers to equal, thus giving you minimum size for the maximum weight. Our bikes with luggage and riding gear weighed in at 189kg and 190kg. The volumetric weight of the crate is 183kg so we will be paying for the actual weight which should be about 230kg per bike including the weight of the crate. So the next steps involve removal of the front tire, letting the air out of the tires, strapping down the bike enough to compress the suspension.

The easiest way to get the front tire off when the you cannot use the center stand.

That looks a little better.

Then we have to stuff bits out of the luggage into the nooks and crannies of bike and then packing the bigger pieces into the larger air spaces around the bike. Strap it all tightly so that it does not move, and trial fit the sides and lid of the crate. The first try revealed that the luggage rack was still too high so a couple more bolts needed to be removed so that the luggage plate would rest on the rear fender. That extra inch was all we needed to fit the lid without touching the bike.


 It is now about 5:30pm so we head off to the bus depot for our two hour ride into Quito.

Up early and down to the breakfast place. Two fried eggs, coffee, fresh juice, and a cheese bun for $2USD, then onto the 2hr bus back out to Tababela. Today is a bit more organized as we are crating the second bike, it is nice that nobody is in the warehouse to bother us and we manage to cut the crating time in half. Belen is once again taking very good care of her Canadian customers and insists on buying us lunch. The gesture is appreciated and we enjoy the typical Ecuadorian lunch of soup followed by a main course of rice, meat, beans, salad and fruit juice. Also, $2USD a plate.
By 4pm we have everything completed, tomorrow we take the bikes to the airport and customs will do their final check before the crate is sealed and tagged for shipment.

From this.

To this!!

Back on the 2hr magic bus, supper at the Shawarma place because they have 1liter beer for $1 and a very good garlic sauce, plus the other customers are very entertaining. Tonight there is a birthday party and the teenagers are singing and drinking but not eating.

Our appointment with the customs is for 11:30am so we need to be at Pacific Air with enough time to have the bikes loaded into a truck and drive the 10km over to the airport. This is all good, we arrive at 10am and the bikes are already in the truck, however, Belen tells us that the customs departments needs a detailed, itemized list of everything in each crate. The previous list was not detailed enough and there is a risk that customs could simply refuse to accept the bikes or confiscate anything they cannot reference on the list. Oh boy, this is going to be fun. Strip everything off the crate except the bike, open all our bags and list each item within. 

Brenda’s bike is fairly easy as she has the bigger bulky items like tent, tent poles etc. My bike is packed with all the mechanical bits, plastic peanut butter jars stuffed with electrical parts, bearings, wires, fuses, electrical sensors, wrenches, and of course the borderline acceptable Kolpin container otherwise known as a gas can. We do not want to draw attention to the GAS CAN so we call it by the brand name Kolpin. Needless to say, the appointment needed to be bumped to 2:00pm or maybe 3:00pm because the truck driver needed to eat at 2:00 instead of driving to the airport, or maybe eat earlier would have been a good idea, but this is South America and that is not how they roll down here.

If you can’t beat them join them, so after lunch we take the bikes to the airport, only now the customs office is almost closed for the day so they are not interested in looking at the bikes. They claim that the crates can only be inspected 4 hours before flight time, which is not until 6am. They were nice enough to accept the bikes off the truck into the airline warehouse for the night, at least we did not have to come back for that.

Customs lady. She seemed very serious concerned about the time of day.

Applying the shipping stickers. We like stickers.

More South America factor. The loading ramp is 6inches to high for a standard truck.

Airline cargo  warehouse.

Look Boss da plane.

Back on the 2hr magic bus. We take supper at the Chifa place tonight, big plate of mixed veggies with chicken, shrimp and pork. One plate is enough for both of us, $5USD and a frozen chocolate covered banana from the little store for $0.30.

The plan is to be ready to leave Quito in the morning as our bikes should be on a plane when we wake up. Oh, and the bikes are going to Calgary via Amsterdam as KLM airlines does not have any direct flights to Canada. At 9am, Belen emails that the flight has been bumped to 11:40am but the bikes are already in the plane so it is very unlikely they will get removed from the plane. This is enough confirmation for us, we check out of the hotel and head for the bus terminal, next stop Tulcan. 

Some touristy stuff in Quito

I noticed that the previous three post are in the wrong order for some reason.
They should be: Cuenca, Ingapirca, A small twist in plans.

I suppose if we have to be laid up somewhere Quito is not such a bad place to be. We have at least four days to spend exploring the city. There is 2.6million people included in the 2014 census that call the valley home. The urban sprawl can be seen from any vantage point, they even built a new airport outside of the city and turned the old one into Bicentennial Park. Sounds like Edmonton. Quito is one of the first two cities declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1978, Krakow is the other one. Quito has one of the largest and least altered historic centers in the Americas making it a wonderful spot if you like architecture.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quito

Tile Mosaic artwork

Looks like tile but is painted brick wall. Commisioned by the city.

The next few photos are all of the Cathedral.

Brenda's stairmaster workout. Ten times up and down, almost every day.

Flag raising ceremony in the central square, done every Monday around 10am.

Quito has numerous churches, all within walking distance of each other in the old downtown area.

It is not all concrete and old buildings. There is a huge park overlooking the city.

Although site seeing is a sideline activity to keep us busy, our main purpose is to get the bikes onto an airplane.