It was 4.05 am, I had made a cup of tea and I was lying with my hands behind my head thinking. “What are you thinking about” said a half awake Pillion Passenger?
I actually didn’t reply as I had so many things going around in my head that the sun would have risen and set by the time I stopped talking, but the main reason for my insomnia has to do with the plotted course of the next leg of our travels, so diligently plotted the evening before. If you are interested you should be able to click on the link at the end of this blog or cut and paste it, which should take you there! There must be a better way of doing this?!!
If you have managed to open this map, you will see that the road has a lot of squiggly bits. The reason for the squiggly bits is that we are going over the Andes at about the highest point (about 4600m odd) and dropping down the other side into the Amazonian Basin simply because we want to visit the ruins of Kuelap http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuelap I say “drop down”, but to put it in perspective, Kuelap rests at about 1800 metres which is just a little higher than Johannesburg at 1,753 m (5,751 ft)! We have travelled at this height before. On our last leg we travelled for some time around the 4000 meter mark without much trouble, but my Pillion Passenger got sick as a dog when we went from San Pedro up onto the salt flats of Bolivia
The Altitude was not the only thing that was keeping me awake, I am really a bit concerned about riding on our own down the squiggly bits! If you happened to have read one of my old blogs, you would have read that we free-wheeled for 50km into Naska when we were running out of petrol. That trip was undertaken on a beautifully tarred road and had we run out of petrol there was quite a bit of traffic that we could have called upon for assistance. Not this time!
The reason that you have not heard of Kuelap is because it is in the “Gamadulas” way off the beaten track and certainly not on any tourist route! The squiggly bits represent an unpaved road which gives “hairpin bends” a new meaning! If perchance we fall off the bike, have a flat tyre, run out of fuel, or any other minor problems, there could be quite a delay in the interval between my blogs! There will be hardly any passing traffic and very few villages, which is quite understandable really as who in their right mind would choose to live where there is no oxygen? That reminds me I must not forget my Ventalin!
So dear friends and Pillion Passenger, that is why I lie awake at four in the morning, wondering why on earth I choose to leave the comfort of a cosy flat in Taunton or the tranquil rocking of my boat, to explore some dilapidated building that some folk, who I have absolutely no knowledge of, started building in 500 something AD? Crazy….
However, we are off at first light on Monday morning, if you do not hear from us for a while, you know why, we have seen an ad for “A Renovators Dream” and gone to check it out.!
While staying in Taunton
Below is the link!! The whole thing!!
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