I have to tell you guys about the tollgates here: You´ll love them.
Bikers donâ??t pay, but...... (
why is there is always a but?) you are not allowed to drive through them. The cops who guard the gates and the people working in the booths get very, very upset if you donâ??t drive around. So normally itâ??s a complicated process of crossing over on the left (wrong) side of the road in front of oncoming traffic and sneaking through the special vehicles section that dont pay, or through a narrow gap that bikes can slip through.
We eventually arrive in Piura which is your typical un-sign-posted Peruvian town and got lost in a horde of motor taxis. Cruising around we eventually found this kind chap who was able to help us find the Plaza las Armas.
Once again, the hotel was this great building with fantastic service, all for only S/.114 (R330) for the night.
Ok, we were living it up a little, but we felt we deserved it!
It´s time I showed you roughly where we were going: Here is the first Day.
And here is Day 2 & 3:
Day 3
The next morning traffic was better in Piura, and we enjoyed a relatively peace trip out of town. The plan was to take it easy today as this was the more scenic part of the Peruvian coastline.
Of course we were seasoned travellers by now, accomplished in the art of intimidating other drivers and emergency braking when they won and we didn´t.
The country side outside
Northam Piura made us pine for Africa.
Every town we went through had its own uniquely defining statue on the main â??Ovaloâ? as you come in. Here was Sullana´s:
We could feel we were getting closer to the jungle even though this area was still pretty arid. Here is one of the smaller rivers we crossed. ;D :biggrin:
Of course just when you are beginning to feel â??bokâ? :mwink: pulling wheelies on your GS in front of everyone you meet some hardcore biker with little or normally no ATTGATT using his bike everyday to run his business. :bluduh: No fear..
More Rice paddies, garnished with palm trees
These guys do love their pollo y arroz (chicken & rice), hence all the rice paddies.
As we rolled into hot dry and dusty Talara, we came across lots of donkey carts like this one ;D:
These guys supply municipal water in 44 gallon drums on their carts to the whole town, seeing as there are no pipes. There were lots of them.
Talara is a port town close to the western-most tip of south America. 81 degrees 19 minutes west! It´s also known for its oil reserves both on and offshore.
Here we saw a base structure for an oil-drilling platform in the distance being constructed before it is towed out to sea and planted on the seabed.
There is also an airbase just outside the town.
Of course we have to get the picture of bikes crusing past the oil dippers. :ricky: :ricky: There were literally hundreds of these things dotted accross the countryside.
The twisties wound nicely though the desert, but not all of them are managed well by the taxis.
We had problems of our own. D´s kneepads were pressing hard on her knee, aggravating a previous skiing injury.
Over an ice cream we worked out that when you wash your ATGATT, make sure the kneepads go back into the knee area and the elbow pads into the elbow area of the riding suits, not the other way round! :laughing4:
We detoured to the coast a bit further on to visit the scene where the â??Old Man and the Seaâ? by Ernest Hemingway was written and later filmed.
Awwww :love3:
It was pretty spectacular.
Big Pelicans flap overhead. They have no fear of humans and will grab your arm to get your lunch if theyre on the ground nearby.
We hit the road again and cruised through the famous surfing town of Mancora, with its characteristic tourist traps. Dodgey, sunburnt gringo backpacker chicks sporting dreads troll the streets, looking for sleezy Peruvian surfer wannabes lounging noncholantly in tropical clubs set aginst on the beach, nursing hangovers and hustling snow to suckers from Europe and the U.S. We decide we are too old for this and cruise on for 20 odd clicks looking for a quieter spot to stay.
We meet HEIDI
who has a very deep voice and insists she is from GERMANY. (Don´t mention the war!!) 26 years in Peru, you don´t wanna mess with this manwoman. "You vil paark over zer, next to Hauses, ze best place in all ova Peroo."
Check out the calf muscles. "Its Zelf-catering but its is zee cheapest place in Peru so you get what you pay for..." Actually, she was quite sweet old ducky.
When the four tour busses of middle aged Swedes rocked up and began setting up their camp on the roof of their buses, right outside our window, we decided this was not the spot. So off we went :ricky: Bikes are cool that way- You can up and off in two ticks.
Some of the beach houses along here are pretty impressive.
A few kilomters we found the perfect spot. We were the only people staying here that night. Comfortable, and dinner B&B cost us the equivalent of R250 for both of us.
And we had the beach to ourselves :mwink:
A great sunset ended our day. We had done about 1300km to this point from Lima.
Tomorrow we would cross the border climb up into the mountains and then the adventure would really begin.
Day 4
We learn that crossing into Ecuador is not a simple process at all. For a start, we arrive in Tumbes, the last frontier town of Peru and drive past immigration without realizing it. :deal: Some guy on a truck waved me down and pointed out my error :xxbah: . We go back, battling against heavy traffic. All the while, communters fly past the immigration control post in trucks, busses, bicycles and taxis, some of them walking completely unhindered by the border control official. Ok. This must be a gringo trap. There are a couple of people queing outside a ramshackle building.
I join the queue, and amazingly it takes me to Passport control. Passports get stamped, everything in order, no problem.
"Where is customs?" I ask. I am told its about 3km further down the road.
"I´m sorry my spanish is not great, did you say tres kilometres?"
"Si"
"Well ok then, but what about these other people?"
"Oh no, they all live here." Okayyy then.. :
So off we go. Five kilometers later, we get to what seems like it could be the REAL fontier. This is what we see:
There is no customs in sight. Just a mass of people moving in both directions over this bridge. What the..... Okay then, everyone else is cruising over. Lets go too then.
We are almost under that Welcome to Ecuador Sign on the other side of the bridge when we hear a tremendous amount of yelling and shouting over our bike engines from a guy in casual clothes and a policeman´s cap. We have to go back. :dousing: The cop guy looks really miffed. :-\
***
Sorry guys, its time to sleep again, more on this tomorrow. Thanks for your interest so far. :thumbsup:
