Hola from Peru

Ok so I´ve been a while since posting my last blog, sorry about that. I left Guayaquil Ecuador and went to Mancora Peru. Mancora is on the beach. Actually it is a surfers destination. As a matter of fact a couple of weeks before I got there they had a woman´s surf championship there. It really is a great place if you want to hang out by the beach, drink and surf. It is also dleightfully inexpensive, there are lobster dinners for $10.00 I mentioned this to a surfer friend in Hawaii and she said I had just described surfers heaven. I was only there for a few days because if I´d stayed any longer I´d probably still be there. I tend to be a victim of inertia. And actually it was only meant to be a stopover between Guayaquil and Lima anyway. I had an interesting experience on the bus between Guayaquil and Mancora. My beard is about 4 inches long now and in Guayaquil I managed to find a santa hat. I was wearing it on the bus to Mancora and when we got off to go through customs to leave Ecuador an ecuadorian woman asked me why I was wearing the has as it wasn´t christmas yet. I told her that it was the christmas season. Then she asked me for a picture with her and I said sure. Well a few minutes before I was talking to a guy from Ecuador, they were all part of a group, and after the picture he comes up to me with a letter from one of the other people in the group, it was a letter to Santa Claus. In spanish it said something like "Dear Santa I have always wanted to meet you. So I am taking advantage of this opportunity to ask you for everything that you´ve never given me. I expect a quick response to this letter." It was a little more involved than that but you get the idea. I´m going to have it framed when I get home. At any rate, moving right along as I seldom do(copyright Dick Damron) I left Mancora and went to Lima. It was on this leg of the trip that I found the most awesome, comfortable bus I have ever been on. They have seats the same size and comfort level as first class airplane seats and they recline 100% with a foot rest and everything. It even includes dinner. Granted it is basically an airline type of meal but they give you a choice of chicken, beef or vegetarian. It is the first time I have actually been able to sleep on a bus. I was only in Lima for a few days. Lima is a nice enough city but my reason for coming to Peru was to see the Nazca lines and Machu Pichu. I am writing this on the day I am leaving Nazca. The lines are pretty cool, you go up in an airplane for about 45 minutes and the pilot takes you over all the lines. He banks to each side so the people on both sides can get a look. I took a lot of pictures but I don´t know how many will be worth anything so I also bought a lot of postcards. I also visited the Cauchilla Necropoilis. Is necropolis a cool word or what? At any rate is is a pre Inca cemetary with mummies. You get to walk around and look at several graves with mummies in them while a guide explains the significance of the different graves. It was considered a sign of status and good health to have dreads. Imagine that pre incan rastafarians. There is a local liquor here called Pisco. I tried it today, interesting stuff it tastes like a combination of tequila and kerosene. Well that´s all for now, right now I´m just hanging out until my bus to Cusco leaves at 8:00 tonight.
The road goes on forever and the party never ends.
hasta la vista baby
Charlie

Spring time in Ecuador

Greetings from Guayaquil Ecuador. I`ve been here about 5 days and so far I like it. This is the first I have been out of the mountains in a long time. I have been at altitude for so long that when I got here the first time I went out it felt like someone took off 10 pound ankle weights from each leg. I had so much energy I couldn`t believe it. Another advantage to spending a long time at altitude is when you get used to drinking there when you get back to sea level you can drink forever before you start to get drunk. I used to have the same experience when I lived in the mountains in Colorado. (remember that Peter) at any rate this is also the first time I have sweat since I left Santa Marta. The first night I got here I actually experienced a warm wind at night. Boy did that feel good. Moving right along as I seldom do (copyright Dick Damron) here are some impressions of Guayaquil.

Shopping centers.

OK in the states and in Mexico we have supermarkets and they are fine, here they have a HIPERMARKET, it is HUGE!!!!!!!!! according to one person it is 36000 square meters or about 375,000 square ft. This sucker is incredible. Imagine a Sam`s club or Costco combined with a Home Depot in one building and you are starting to get the idea of the magnitude of this place. Just think hsuband and wife could go shopping together and when they meet at the cash register later they are only $1000 poorer. Fascinating place, I love it.

The Malecon

OK in Mazatlan we have a Malecon and it is a nice wide sidewalk that follows the ocean and it is very nice. You ain`t never seen anything like this. This malecon is huge. Large parts of it are 30-40 yards wide. They one section that has a beautiful garden. Another part has an IMAX theater and an anthropology museum on another part is a food court. One part is 2 levels and on the bottom part is a commercial area with lots different stores and such and it goes on for a few hundred yards. There is a sailing ship next to the malecon where you can go on a 1 hour river cruise up and down the river. There is a sports bar on it. At the other end are Mercados Artesanias. There are bronze statues of famous people on it. There are fully equipped play grounds for children. There are fountains. Also there are usually a fair number of good looking people walking around. This is fabulous.

Otras Cosas

All you folks eat your heart out but regular unleaded gas down here is 1.50/gallon. The taxis are cheap and the people are friendly. I am enjoying the warm weather here and am in no rush to return to the mountains. Although this will be a necessity when I go to Machu Pichu. I am debating on whether or not to go to Bolivia and do the death ride. (Sounds pretty stupid doesn`t it? ("Gee should I do the death ride? I wonder) Right now with Morales there seems to be a fair amount of anti-american sentiment there. Also I have been told that a visa for americans is $100.00 Right now I am leading away from it. I think I will stay on the coast and the warm weather. Well that`s all for now.
The road goes on forebver and the party never ends
hasta la vista baby
Charlie

Greetings from the north and south hemisphere

Hola jolly fun seekers. I have been in Ecuador a little over a week. It is a really cool place. Quito is a really nice city. Very european, or so I`m told by the eurpeans I`ve encountered. It is the second highest city in South America only La Paz Bolivia is higher. It is about 2800 meters high. Having wandered around the city I truly believe there are no flat parts. There is high and higher. It almost seems whichever way you go you are going up. There are a lot of cool places to visit. On an interesting note I bought a replica of pre-colombian art in a store beneath a cathedral in Quito, it is a coule copulating. Yep really, imagine the Catholic church approving of such a thing. Of course one of the things you have to do if you are in Quito is go to Ciudad Mitad del Mundo-The city of the middle of the world. This is the spot where the equator goes right through Ecuador. It is pretty interesting there is an impressive monument that marks the spot that contains an ethnographic museum of Ecuador. There is also a planertarium crafts stores and restaurants. Of course there is a line with a sign that says 0.0.0 latitude and everybody stands with a foot on either side of it and has their picture taken, yours truly included. So picture this you go in the park, you walk up this long impressive wide path with busts of all the scientists who were responsible in one way or another for mapping the equator and this path leads to the monument which is probably about 60 ft. high, you go to the north-south quadrant and have your picture taken and then they tell you that with the advent of GPS technology about 25 years ago they found out that the actual line is about 200 meters north. Well, I guess, that`s life. On another note I met an interesting couple in Quito, she (her name is Narcisa) is a holistic practitioner. I am still being bothered by the accident on my bicycle in El Salvador in June. I have been to doctors, physical therapists, acupuncturists, massage therapists. I have taken a variety of pain killers and used a variety of creams and salves etc. Some of it helps a little some doesn`t help at all. As I was wandering around Quito I saw a sign for Narcisa so I went in and talked to her. She worked on my shoulder did a chiropractic adjustment all sorts of cool stuff for about 2 hours and charged me $14.00 and it actually gave me relief for a couple of days. The best result I have had so far. At any rate I asked her if she was familiar with reiki, which is a technique I know and she said she wanted to learn it. So the next day I made an appt. with her and taught her reiki and her husband came and after wards we went out drinking and karaokeing. (is karaokeing a word? I don`t know but if it wasn`t before it is now). Then the next day I left for Cotopaxi Nat`l. Park. It is only about an hour bus ride out of Quito. Cotopaxi is the 2nd largest volcano/mountain in -ecuador at 5900 meters (the largest is Chimborazo at 6300 meters) I wanted see some BIG mountains so I went. The thing about mountains that high is that they create their own weather and are often covered with clouds. So I got a room at a hostel across the street from the entrance to the park. It was a beautiful day when I left quito about 10am but by the time I got there it was raining. So I used the only option I had, I started drinking beer and waited for the weather to clear up. Know that the hostel is at a little over 3000 meters (10000 ft.) at that altitude in Colorado this time of year it is snowing, ask anyone who lives in Leadville. But no snow just overcast and rain. So what did I do, well continued drinking of course. The next day it was overcast but not raining so i made arrangements for a 4 wheel drive tour of Cotopaxi. It is only possible to drive to the 15,000 ft. altitude of Cotopaxi and then, if you want, you have to hike the last 5000 feet to the top. I`m told it requires an overnight camp. Too old for that shit! So picture this: I`m in this 4wd pickup with this local Ecuadorian dude, ostensibly a guide, and he is taking me up to 15000 ft. As we get into the park it starts raining. Having lived in the high country of Colorado for a while I know it is entirely possible to get above the clouds. This is what I am hoping for. Because right now you can`t see anything. So get this, this guy makes his living driving his truck up to 15000 feet but doesn`t have snow tires on his truck. Well several hundred meters from the parking lot which is where we are supposed to be going, he can`t get through the snow. Now several other 4wd`s go past us, a friggin`tourist bus goes past us, but as soon as he hits snow he can`t move forward. ¿Can you believe this shit? He tried for about 20 minutes but he could not move his damn truck forward. Christ what a turkey. Well after that we went back to the hostel and I continued drinking. Other than checking out Cotopaxi there truly is nothing to do at this place which is about 1 mile off the road, so today I left and I am now in Los Baños. It is a cool little burg in the valley surrounded by huge mountains. BUT it is warm and the sun shines most of the time. In case you haven`t guessed, Los Baños is famous for it`s thermal hot springs. Which is the reason I came here. So I am here for a few days to enjoy the warm weather and hot springs then I return to Quito, where most of my stuff is stored, for a couple of days and then off to Guayaquil Ecuador. Guayaquil is the coast. I really need some beach action. From there I think Peru. That`s all for now.
hasta la vista baby
The road goes on forever and the party never ends
Charlie

Funny statues and other stuff

Sorry for the delay in posts, I´ve been having fun. San Agustin is a nice place. It is a nice little mountain town in the middle of Colombia. But it ain´t near anything. The climate is more agreeable than Bogota it rains less and is somewhat warmer. The people are very friendly the women are cute and petite, and friendly. As I said in my previous post the main attraction of San Agustin are the statues, and there are lots of them. They are all located outside of town in the Archeological Park and various sites. The first day here I went on a 4 wheel drive tour of various sites and locations. It was fun, it was an all day affair and it´s only about $15.00 what a deal. The second day I did a tour of other sites on horseback. That was even better. We went places i would not have walked to or been able to take my bike on because of muddy conditions or whatever. It has been years since I rode a horse and I loved it. My guide was the delightful Ana. Remember what I said about cute, petite and friendly that´s Ana. One of the places we visited was called the Chaquira, no not that one her name is spelled Shakira, as opposed to being a statue this is acarving in a rock or carvings I should say. On one side is a carving is a carving of a male figure, facing the sunrise, on the opposite side is a feminine figure facing the sunset. Apparently the site was used for ritual sacrifice or something. But it was pretty cool, the scenery in the area is fabulous. I have close to 200 photos of the statues and of the local area--but mostly statues. I had heard that the statues were like those of Easter Island. I have not yet been to Easter Island but from the photos I´ve seen there is not much similarity. The tallest statue I saw was perhaps 10 feet high (3 meters). All the rest were perhaps 1-2 meters high. Many of the statues were tomb guardians for high ranking people. Variously featured were shamans, farmers, warriors, eagles and women of various social stature. Almost all are carved on a thick flat surface. The skill that went in to carving these statues using stone tools is absolutely incredible.
San Agustin is a nice place but after eating and drinking and possibly smoking weed there isn´t much to do here. The nearest movie theater is a 45 minute drive. Mall surely you jest. While in town I stayed at the Hostal Itaca. The owner is a nice friendly sort. Some of the locals told me to be wary of the guy, and I took their advice, but I couldn´t really see what the problem is. He´ll bend over backwards to make your stay pleasant. He makes an excellent breakfast for $2.00 and is all in all a very pleasant guy. At one time I was in a hammock reading and he comes in with a bud in his hand and says "Do you like this?" Of course I enthusiastically said SI. He said "this is for you if you want more no problem." So I smoked that and asked if he could get me $5000 pesos worth and he said no problem. (5000 pesos=2.50) I wasn´t expecting very much but he comes back 5 minutes later with a 4 finger bag. I was impressed.
Cute women and dope dealing hostel owners are all well and good but it was time to move on from San Agustin. The place sort of grows on you. Land is incredibly cheap. I checked out a couple of farms. I could have bought a small coffee farm (real small maybe half acre) for about $7000.00 I was tempted but then I looked at my stocks and said no. My plan for when I left San Agustin was to go to Popayan Colombia, spend a couple of days there and go to Quito Ecuador. As often happens plans changed. The owner of the hostel talked me out of going to Popayan because it went right through the area where FARC is the strongest. Several other people concurred with him. So instead I went to Mocoa and from there to Pasto. The trip to Mocoa was nice and pleasant but from there to Pasto things got really interesting. When going to Mocoa we were following a valley and everything was fine. To go to Pasto we had to go over the mountains. Soon after we left Mocoa in a full size bus the road turned to dirt and we started going up. This is when it started getting interesting. Imagine a city bus going over the mountains on a 4 wheel drive jeep trail. Yup that was the experience. We were actually above the clouds for a while. Quite a few times when we encountered another vehicle on the road one or the other of us would have to back up and let the other one by. The distance was a little over 100 kilometers yet it took us about 8 hours of driving time to do it. The busses in Colombia have a digital speedometer in the passenger compartment so you can see how slow you are going. We spent an awful lot of time doing about 12-14 kilometers per hour. Even on rare occasions when we got onto pavement we rarely got above 40 kmh. We were stopped twice by the military and made to exit the bus and be frisked. But only the men. I wonder how long it will take the FARC to figure they can have women armed to the teeth and they won´t get frisked. I finally got to Pasto and get a room across from the bus station and go out to have a few beers. There is a disco right across the street.So I go. I´m sitting there and the police come in and tell all the men to get in line to get frisked. It is only on this part of Colombia that I have experienced this. They must be really worried about terrorists down here. I had heard that the gov´t really hadn´t goten control of that part of the country yet. I guess they are right. I am now in Quito Ecuador, I got in at about 9 last night. I will report more soon.
hasta la vista baby.
Charlie

Bogota Update-----Dead nuns

Well I bet that got your attention. Since my last post I´ve been museum hopping around Bogota. One of the places I went was the Banco Nacional de La Republica Museo de Arte. I´m not quite sure what the Banco Nacional is but I think it might be their treasury or whatever. Regardless they have a couple of pretty cool museums in one building. The first is a numismatic museum, a history of the coins and money used in Colombia. It is pretty interesting. But the other is the art museum. It isn´t huge but what it lacks in size it makes up for in quality. They have paintings and sculptures by a number of heavy hitters: Degas, Chagalle, Picasso, Renoir to name a few. They also have a collection by a Colombian artist named Botero. His paintings are very popular all over Latin America. They never did a thing for me. He paints fat people and fat things. Every subject he paints is fat. People, with and without clothes, animals, trees, fruit all fat. I don´t deny the man´s talent but as I said looking at fat people does nothing for me. I imagine if you google him you will find pictures of his art and you can decide for yourself. But I digress, there is one wing of the museum dedicated to------Dead nuns. In fact that is the title of that section Monjas Muerte. It is nothing gross or disrespectful they are all paintings of nuns in coffins. I don´t know what the motivation was for this and as much as I don´t wish ill on anyone after all those years of catechism I can´t say I was sad to see all of them in one place. So now you know the reason for the second half of the title. Another museum I went to was dedicated to Colonial Art. I actually found that sort of boring. Most of the paintings were portraits of people of whom I knew nothing about and cared even less or they were all religious in nature. So no great reviews for that place. The next place was the museum of fabric and clothing. If it hadn´t been free I never would have gone in. Actually it was more interesting than the museum of colonial art. It showed what people wore before the Spanish got here (the natives) and what the Spanish wore and the Colombians have been wearing since colonial times to the present. It was interesting but I´m still glad it didn´t cost anything. Next was the Military Mueum. This was actually pretty cool. The Colombian Military through the ages. Displays of swords, uniforms, guns, airplanes, artillery all sorts of cool stuff. So if you are into that kind of stuff, as am I it is really cool. And it´s free. Then the big one, the Museo Nacional. It is a good way to blow off a few hours on a rainy day, which is what I did. After Simon Bolivar I know nothing about Colombian history. So all the portraits of the countries forefathers didn´t really do anything for me. But the rest of it was pretty good. The dioramas of colonial dwellings etc. There are also some art exhibits. I know I´m not doing a very good job of making this place sound interesting because it truly is. I truly enjoyed it. I think I may be Bogota´d out. I yearn to get back to tropical weather. It has been in the 60s here most days. It also rains a little every day. However they do have hot water here. The first place since I left Mexico. So either tomorrow (saturday) or Monday I am going to leave and go to San Agustin. I don´t know if it is going to be any warmer but it will be interesting. There is an archeological park there where they have Easter Island type of statues. Nobody knows anything at all about the culture that created them. So that is what is next on the agenda. Then from there to Quito Ecuador. So that´s it for now.
Hasta la Vista baby
The road goes on forever and the party never ends
Charlie

(The road to) Bogota

You´ve all heard about the road to perdition, well this is not about that. This is about the road to Bogota. The road to perdition is nothing new, I´ve been on it for years:) It is almost 1000 kilometers to Bogota. The people I talked to said that the only safe places to camp in Colombia were campgrounds. I looked at the maps I have and 1) I didn´t see any campgrounds between Santa Marta and Bogota and 2) The number of towns between Santa Marta and Bogota seemed pretty thin. It did not look good for finding a town within my daily cycling distance and even if I found one there would be no guarantee that there would be a motel there. And 3) I´ve gotten out of shape and lazy. So for these reasons I decided to take a bus. The bus was scheduled to leave at 2:00 so to be sure I got there about one an a half hours early. I got my ticket and was shown where to wait. It wasn´t so bad there was a little store in the terminal that sold beer so I amused myself with a number of beers while I was waiting. Central and South America have a more relaxed attitude toward beer than the puritan U.S. It is amazing that almost anywhere you can buy and drink beer down here, including in the bus terminal. No you don´t have to hide it in a brown paper bag either. AT ANY RATE I got on the bus and settled in for the 16 hour bus ride. I had a book, sandwiches, snacks, and a bottle of rum, what more could anyone ask for? For the first few hours I alternated between reading my book and looking out the window. Also once in a while I would try to strike up a conversation with the young cute large breasted woman sitting next to me but that wasn´t working out so well. So the sun went down and the scenery disappeared the light for my seat wasn´t sufficient for reading and miss big boobs wasn´t talking. What to do, what to do? The answer was obvious, start drinking, which I did. For the 16 hour trip the bus company supplied a snack, about a one and a half ounce bag of peanuts and about a 4 ounce bottle of orange drink. So I drank a little out of the fake orange juice and filled it back up with rum. And every time I got enough room to add more rum I did. Obviously after a while I just ended up drinking it straight, which wasn´t so bad, it is pretty good rum. I got about half way through the bottle this way and decided maybe it would be a good idea to get some sleep. I have never been one of those people who could sleep on a plane or a bus but with about half a liter of rum in my belly I thought I would give it a try. I was starting to relax when it started. I don´t what caused it but all of a sudden there was a huge jolt to the bus that made it feel like it swayed to the side. Then there was another jolt that made it bounce. Know that this is not one of those recycled school busses that are so common down here. No, this is a fairly new Mercedes, you know the kind with the airplane style seats the whole bit. Now you are probably thinking ok but that was it right? NO it wasn´t it. It was only the beginning of it. Some times were worse than others but it never ended, and people were sleeping through this. Of course to top it off the little kid on the other side of the aisle(maybe 18 months old) let out the most god awful, stinkiest fart that has ever been smelled on god´s green earth. Fortunately the assistant driver also smelled it and went and got a can of Glade air freshener (I guess they keep it on the bus for just such occurrences) and sprayed it into the ventilation system. Catastrophe solved. Of course this did nothing to straighten out the road. So you have probably figured out by now that this is a long way of explaining that I didn´t get any sleep that night. The bus arrived in Bogota at 6 am.

Bogota

I got a taxi into town. It was about a half hour trip. After all I understand that there are about 6000000 people in Bogota. I made a reservation at a hostel named Anandamayi. The reviews I read said that if you want a relaxed peaceful place to stay in Bogota this is the place. Boy were they right. This place has more of an atmosphere of a buddhist meditation retreat than a hostel. But that´s ok I was ready for a little kicking back and relaxing. Besides it is close to all the tourist stuff. This place is staffed by angels, seriously. On my first night here my socks smelled so bad that I put them outside so as not to offend the other people in the room. The next day I forgot about them and put on a different pair. When I came back later on that afternoon the socks had been washed, dried, folded and put on my bed. Wow had I known that I would have put all my laundry outside:)
Impressions of Bogota
This city is fabulous. I am staying in the centro historico, funny it seems I usually end up in the historic center of the city. The first thing you need to know about Bogota is that it is very hilly. And steep. They have planned it well, at least this part of town. A large section of the town has been converted into pedestrian walkways, no cars. I love it. They have a couple of different bus systems here. One is the local which run all over the different parts of the city and surrounding area. The other is the Tecmilenio. From what I understand the rush hour traffic runs north-south. This is the direction that the tecmilenio goes. Well it may very well go other ways too but I am not knowledgeable about that yet. These are the caterpillar busses that you may have seen in some cities in the U.S. and cities outside of it. They are the length of 2 busses and have a flexible portion between the 2 halves. They have their own dedicated lane so they are moving while people in cars and other busses are stuck in traffic. I hear everyone thinking "Ok great Charlie, but what have you seen so far?" I am wirting this on the evening of my third day here. A few hours ago I just got back from the Salt Cathedral. This place is incredible. It is underground and it is carved ENTIRELY OUT OF ROCK SALT! On the way in are 14 stations of the cross, each individually carved by a different Colombian sculptor. There are naves off to the side, the main sanctuary can hold 8,400 people, as I said this place is huge. I can´t do it justice describing it if you want to know more about it just google Salt Cathedral Colombia and I´m sure you´ll get a lot of hits. But yes that is what it took to get me back in a Catholic church. The first day I got here I obviously had a lot of time on my hands as I checked in at about 7 am. The first thing I did was take a nap. But obviously when I got up a couple of hours later I still had a lot of time on my hands. There is a church on top of a mountain here in town it´s name is Monserrate. Yeah just like Montserrat in France. The church is nice but nothing spectacular but what is spectacular is the view from the top. You take a train car up a very long steep hill to get there and a cable car to get down. No I don´t know why, it´s just a catholic thing I guess. (I can hear some of you thinking "God Charlie, 2 catholic churches in less than a week what has got into you?) Well to those of you thinking that relax, after today I intend to go back to ignoring them the same way I have for years. I was done at Monserrate at about noon so I went back down and that I would check out the Gold Museum. It is a museum dedicated to pre colombian gold. Sounded interesting so I got a cab and went. I get there and find out it is closed for the months of sept. and oct. However there is a place across the street that is bunch of small stalls inside a building that sell art and handicrafts. I went and checked it out and I bought a beautiful painting. It is about3 ft. long and 18 inches high. The material it is painted on is a combination of palm and yucca fibers or something like that. It is not framed. I figured I could just roll it up in a tube and I could squeeze it in one of my panniers. WRONG! It rolls up but not small enough to fit in a tube that will fit in my panniers. So then I have a brilliant idea, I think to myself "Self why don´t you just send it back to Mazatlan?" So I go to DHL and ask how much it would cost to send. I am informed that in order to do that, since it is a painting, I have to get a permit from the ministry of culture. WELL AIN´T THAT JUST SPECIAL!? So I get there and am given the information I need and the forms and am told to come back on friday between 8:30 and 12:30. Now keep in mind that if I had been bringing this back on a plane I wouldn´t have had to do any of this. So friday comes and I go jump through all the hoops and they say no problems your permit will be ready in 8DAYS. And that brings me to today which I´ve already told you about. So that´s all for now.
The road goes on forever and the party never ends.
hasta la vista baby
Charlie

Part 2 the return from Ciudad Perdida

Sept.17 2008

We get up and have breakfast and take the tour of Ciudad Pedida. The sun is out and it is a beautiful day. We tour the entire area. Much of it is the same as the main area jsut spread out. After the tour we pack our stuff and leave. Paddy Francisco and I start out first knowing the rest will catch up. As we are going down the first set of steps, the wide ones, an indigenous guy comes from behind us and says "Con permiso" ( excuse me) and passes us. While we are gingerly, carefully, going down one step at a time in our hiking boots and shoes he is running down the steps in his bar feet. Yeah that makes us feel real good, you betcha. In counterpoint, Francisco fell on the steps 3 times. Later on in the day yours truly slipped and fell on the muddy trail 3 times. Did I mention that it started to rain about 1 hour after we left? Well it did. Fairly hard too. When we got to our destination for the day I was very happy to take a shower and get all the mud off.

A word about the indigenos, they are generally speaking, short of stature, with broad shoulders and dark skin. These are the people described the conquistadores, the ones who carry heavy loads all day and all they eat are coca leaves. And yes that is what they eat too, coca leaves. While the people in our party were struggling with backpacks these guys have these huge packs that are fashioned out of 100lb. coffee sacks and such. They are bulging whenever you see them. For footwear there are 3 options for the indigenos: Most common are your average every day flip flops. Next are rubber boots with stiff soles that give good traction. The third option is nothing at all-bare feet. I don´t know why bu you almost never see them smile. They all dress the same a white cottom tunic and white cottom pants. They all look like Juan Valdez. Just joking; but not much. The men all have long hair and none of them have beards.

Sept. 18 2008

Thank god I got to sleep on a mattress last night. I think I passed out immediately. I was so sore that I couldn´t believe it. So although I slept well when I woke up this morning my entire body was as stiff as a board. Large quiantities of Traumeel and Ben Gay were required to move. It was a laid back kind of morning for us as we had a three and a half-four hour hike to our next destination and once we got there the day was ours. To refresh your memory this is the place with the toucan and the guy who claps his hand for service. Before we left our guide pointed the tree that is used to make a date rape drug. I guess it is the flower which is used. The flower itself is beautiful, it is about 8 inches long and hangs down from a branch. We had a long climb out. On the way in it was nice because after an initial day of climbing we spent a large part of the day going down to the seconc one. However as today we were leavind the second one and going back to the first one we were going in reverse which means up. I had heard that the first and fifth day were the worst. So during breakfast I used the rest of my cocaine and put it in my coffee. You know some people use artificial sweetener....well this was more helpful. This is paste not powder, you can´t snort it. Ingesting it gives you an entirely different experience. You still get a head buzz but it is a whole different kind. You also get a body rush. It also gives you energy. There are 2 therapeutic uses of cocaine-energy and pain relief. I needed them both. For those of you who criticize my drug use during this trek all I have to say is: You´re right. There are a myriad of reasons why it is a bad idea. Legally, ethically, morally, and health wise. So why did I do it? Well a number of reasons. First of all I have used drugs in the past. Coke was a very once in a while thing for me. Cocaine is a drug that the further removed from it´s source the more diluted it becomes. The chance to try it pure and unadulterated straight from the factory so to speak was too good to pass up. I mean imagine if you had only drunk watered down whiskey all your life and now you get a chance to get a sample at the distillery. I know it´s an imperfect analogy but you get the idea. The second reason as I already mentioned is therapeutic. At 56 it is no easy task keeping up with a group of 20 somethings. The energy was very helpful. Necessary might be a more accurate word. And after a day of work followed by sore muscles the coke when rolled up in a joint (yup smoked weed too) was very therapeutic in alleviating the soreness. So those are my reasons, I make no apologies. However I will say that what happened in the mountains stays in the mountains and I am not about to start looking for any drug of any sort now that I am out of the mountains.

So, moving right along as I seldom do (D.Damron) we left camp and started the long climb out. Yes the coke helped a lot. We made it to our next stop at about 11:30 am. From that point on the day was ours to do whatever we wanted. There is a natural pool there with a waterfall at one end. After we were done swimming we spent the rest of the day smoking a bunch of weed that I had bought and playing cards. It was about one fourth of an ounce for 5000 pesos or about $3.00. Russ taught us a game called president ( also shithead or asshole). That was pretty much how we spent the entire day. When I went to bed I was sore. In fact every muscle felt sore. I couldn´t quite place it until I went to bed that night but even my toes were sore. Leading a fairly athletic life I´ve had my share of sore muscles but never have I ever had sore toes.

Sept. 19, 2008
This morning is pretty casual we have about a half hour climb out of the camp and then it is all down hill. It was sort of a bitch as I´d used the last of my coke yesterday morning. I struggled some but then YES! All the way down hill from here. We made it back to the town at about 11 am and had lunch, drank beer and played cards until 1:30 when they came to pick us up.

The Trek to Ciudad Perdida

Ok this is going to be long. I don´t know if Ihave the time and patience to write the whole thing out tonight or not. However for those of you who have received the findmespots and have written Charlie where are you? Here is your answer.

It is Sunday september 14 and today is the first day of our trek to Ciudad Perdida. We all met at the office at 9 am. We are a group of 5 but rather diverse. Simone is 25 and from Switzerland and a real cutie. Paddy is 25 and from Cork Ireland, Francisco is 33 and from valencia Spain, and Russ is a scotsman who has never lived in Scotland but has grown up in the french part of Switzerland. And of course yours truly. From the office we were transported by converted Toyota Landcruiser toward our destination. The road was paved all the way to the turn off. Let me say that this is not something you could do on your own. First of all there is no marked turn off from the highway and as i will describe the road got more and more interesting as we went. As we continued the road became more and more narrow. The more narrow the road became the further it deteriorated. There were places where there was barely enough room for the landcruiser to get through. Of course this is where the road was severely rutted and tipped toward a several hundred foot drop. After about 45 minutes we arrived at a town. No I don´t know the name of it. It did require going through 2 or 3 rivers to get there though. I guess the most noteworthy thing about the town itself is that after all that time on that horrendous road, the town itself was paved. At any rate we had lunch there which consisted of make your own bologna sandwiches with all the fixins´ After lunch we headed out. It turned out that we have mules to carry all our stuff. THANK YOU gOD! As we started out it was up and down a little. Then the nightmare of every fat out of shape out old man occurred. It went up and up and up and up....well you get the idea. Every time I saw a turn up ahead I would think "This has to get to the top sometime" But no it just kept on going up. At one point the guide came up behind me with a couple of guys who are leading our mules and sitting on a couple of mules themselves. One asks me if I want to ride the mule to the top. I said SI! And thank god because it was another 20 minutes to the top on mule. It would have taken me forever to walk it. There ws some thunder and lightning during the afternoon but not much rain accompanied it. Just enough to make the trail which is all clay into slippery as hell mud. Twice goiing downhill I slid on my ass for about 10 feet. One time when I slid I only stopped when my left foot hit a root. I felt and heard something snap. As of right now it feels fine, we´ll see. We finally got to our first destination at about 4:30 today. Basically it is a house, across from it is a covered platform that has a pool table and a tv. Beleive it or not they sell cold beer here too. It costs 3000 pesos, about $1.80 that is about twice what it does in town. The buildings are next to a river. Across the river is another outbuilding which is essentially a roof with tables and benches underneath a cook area and a place for hammocks which is we will sleep tonight. The owner(s) of the place are an older man, I´m guessing mid 60s and a woman maybe in her 30s. Just guessing. I hope for sake that is her father or father in law and not her husband. When we got there he was really drunk. When I went to buy a beer instead of getting it himself a trip of about 10 ft., he clapped his hands until the woman came running to see what he wanted. All in all the countryside we saw coming in was beautiful and the place we are staying at is beautiful and idyllic.

September 15, Monday

I didn´t sleep worth shit last night. I couldn´t find my first aid kit which has all my pain stuff in it. First I couldn´t get my foot, the one I heard crack, in a comfortable position. Next my right shoulder was spasming all night. It seemed like every few minutes I would feel a sharp stabbing pain go through my shoulder.
Today started at about 6:30 am. We got up. Had some coffee and then one of the local guys took us to show us his cocaine factory. Seriously, no shit. It was about a 10 minute walk from where we stayed.Boy was it off the trail. Kinda necessary I guess. Now you may be thinking the same thing we were. There are going to be guards with submachine guns, people wearing masks and gloves packaging it, you know just like in the movies. Well maybe there are places and situations like that in Colombia but this isn´t one of them. This place was a cleared flat spot close to the river. It was covered by a 20x20 plastic tarp. So get the idea of a huge operation out of your head and think moonshiner. The whole operation looked rather crude. He said it was necessary so that if he saw the military coming he could set fire to the place and run. I never what a process it was to make and some of the nasty shit involved to process it. He explained the entire process to us and demonstrated each step. Some of the chemicals used are gasoline and sulfuric acid. And he even demonstrated the final stepthe making of cocaine paste. The paste is pure unadulterated cocaine. Yes we were allowed to sample it. Yes some of us bought some of the product. So with all of that we were back at the camp at 7:30. We left about 9 am to begin day 2 of the trek to Ciudad Perdida. Today is much the same as yesterday except there was less climbing. We reached our camping spot at about 1:30. Turns out there is another group there that is just returning from Ciudad Perdida. They were all very enthusiastic about it. This gives us all hope for tomorrow.

September 16 2008 tuesday.

Today started MUCH too early. They have people working at the camping area. They were up and about at 5:30 am. As I said much too early. I ignored them as long as I could but around 6:15 our guide woke me up. At least last night i got to sleep on a mattress instead of a hammock so that helped. Also I had my pain stuff so that helped even more. Russ who is our official roller didn´t have time to roll a spliff this morning so we had to go without. Bummer. People had told us that today was going to be easy but in the beginning it sure seemed like we did a lot of climbing. At one point when our whole group took a break I took some coke and put it on my tongue. This isn´t coke as you may know it it is rather a dried paste, it can´t be snorted. I told everyone "Hey the old man needs an energy boost." They all understood. This country is incredibly beautiful. It seems like almost every time you go around a turn in the forest there is another beautiful waterfall of a fabulous valley view or an awesome view of the river. It is truly a pity that access is limited by the presence of cocaine labs and narcotraficantes. While on the trail our guide pointed out a poisonous snake. He called it the serpiente de San Pedro or a yellow tail. It was small, maybe a foot long. After he pointed it out to us he killed it. Later on we also saw something rather unusual, crabs along the trail. Yeah real crabs they looked sort of like sand crabs. We were nowhere near the beach. This is the first time in my life I have seen crabs in a forest.
Today we became amphibious. We had to cross the same river 8 times. The name of the river is the Buritaca. The 8th crossing takes you to the steps that lead to ciudad Perdida. There are 1800 of them. The builders had an interesting sense of humor. You climb and climb and nobody counts. Then you finally see something that is obviously man made and you think "Yes I´ve made it!"You continue walking and then you see it about 200 more steps. and you´re thinking "Damn I thought I´d made it." These are broad wide steps where as the others were small and narrow. These obviously lead someplace important. So you climb those steps and see some more man made structures, you walk across those and see another man made structure with about 30 more steps, this happens about twice more and THEN YOU ARE AT THE TOP. For all the fucking work it was worth it. The view from the top is absolutely incredible. It started to rain as soon as I got here. I proudly brought up the rear. It was just a little at first but now it´s coming down hard enough to discourage exploration around the area. So the rain is not making me feel much like Gene Kelly, I sure as fuck don´t feel like singing in it. This place is 1200 meters above sea level, so all the rain is doing is to make things chilly. It is now about 3 o´clock and we have been here about 3 hours, we´ll see what later brings. It finally stopped raining about 4:30 and I got some walking around and exploring time. This place is fascinating. It is a terraced city. None of the houses survived because they were all made of bamboo and palm leaves. However the foundations were circular and had a stone foundation. They buried their dead beneath the house. That is they dug a whole in the floor and buried them with all their worldly possessions. The higher your social standing the higher up the hill you lived the more possessions you were buried with.
The city was discovered in 1973 by some guy out in the area looking for marijuana. He found Ciudad Perdida instead. Now let me review what it takes to get to this place. You travel 3 days 4-5 hours a day. After the second day the trail deteriorates to the point where mules can´t make it. You cross 3 sheer rock faces with barely sufficient footholds. I already mentioned the 9 river crossings, each crossing is to another part of the trail. How the fuck did this guy even think to look in this area? How the fuck did he decide to walk across three rock faces, how the hell did he know where to dig? etc. etc. That this place wasn´t discovered until 1973 is no surprise to me. Im amazed it was discovered at all. This place is also referred to as the green hell because when Frankie Ray discovered all the gold artifacts he started selling them in Santa Marta. Word got out and people started following him to the site and killing each other for the gold. The gov´t took it over in 1976.

Okay that is it for part 1. I have already been typing for 2 hours and that is enough for today. Look for part 2 the trek to Ciudad Perdida in the next few days.
hasta la vista baby
Charlie
The road goes on forever and the party never ends.

Hola jolly fun seekers. It has been a while since I have been to a computer and much has happened. I left Cartagena on my bike and headed toward Santa marta. The first day I made it to the mud volcano and camped there for the night. Nobody lives at the volcano they all live in the town close by and commute each day. So I got there about3:30 and asked if it was alright to camp and they said sure. Then at 5:30 everyone left leaving me alone. Talk about peaceful and quiet, it was fabulous. I woke up the next day and made it to Barranquilla. Not much to say about barranquilla it´s a city bigger than Cartagena but there is really nothing there to recommend it. Whereas Cartagena is a tourist area Barranquilla is an industrial area. I had only planned on staying there a day or two but a part on my bike broke when I got there and it is only available from the person who built the bike. So I had to take a few days and figure out what to do. I thought of sending the bike back to Mexico and continuing the trip using busses or whatever but I culdn´t find a box. So I decided to go to Santa Marta on bus and just bring the bike with me. I got here and got to my hostel and was talking to the owner and told him what the problem was and he said maybe he could take a look at it. He did and said he know a machine shop in town that could make the part. So we went there and for less than it would have cost to ship the parts from the U.S. they made me the parts I needed and 2 spares so I am back on the road again. I like Santa Marta and will be here for a few more days. I am planning on doing a tour to ciudad perdida on snday or monday. It is a 6 day hike I hear it is very nice. When I retire from there it is on to Bogota and some crisp air. Bogota is about 8000+ feet above sea level. (2600 meters)It has low temperatures of about mid 40s to highs of mid 60s. Sounds like Gunnison this time of year. At any rate one of the great spectator sports in Santa Marta is watching the hookers stroll by at night on the malecon. I wnder how many of them are actually women. No I´m not interested in finding out. I have no use for AIDS in my life. Well my time is about to run out so I better go.
The road goes on forever and the party never ends
hasta la vista baby
Charlie

The road goes on forever and the party never ends

First of all let me thank all of you who responded to my pathetic appeal for email. Sometimes it gets lonely out here and it is weeks before I hear from anyone. I write these blogs and I sometimes wonder if anyone is reading them because people so infrequently respond to them. So once again, THANK YOU!

It is tuesday in Cartagena. Tomorrow I am taking off for Santa Marta. It is 203 kilometers (about125 miles) down the Caribbean coast. Outside of Santa Marta is Ciudad Perdida, the lost city. It is an archeological site that was discovered in 1975. It is a 3 day hike in one day and night at the site and 2 days hike back. I guess it is downhill on the way back. I have heard differing reports about the cost and whatnot. So I will have to look into it when I get there. From Santa Marta I head south to Bogota. It is 918 kilometers about 500 miles. I have 2 options. I can take a route that is fairly flat until about the last 144 kilometers about 80 miles, and then goes straight up and straight down etc. Or I can take a route that more or less gradually starts going up for the last 300 or so kilometers. Colombia is interesting in that in most countries the population centers are on the plains and relatively few people live in the mountains. In Colombia it is the opposite. The result being that if I go the flat route it will be rather distant between significant population areas. Hmmmmmmm decisions, decisions. Right now I am leaning toward the flat route and see how I feel when I get to the climb. I mean God invented busses for a reason right?
On Sunday I had an interesting time. I went to a mud volcano. It is a cone about 60-70 feet high and at the top is perhaps 15 feet across. It is filled with mud. you go about 4 feet down a ladder and just lie down and float in the mud. It is great. It is impossible to drown it is that buoyant. A couple of times I tried to push myself further down and I just bobbed right back up. It is very relaxing and messy. After you are done you go to a marshy part of the ocean where the water is muddy to the point where you cannot see and there are women there who wash you off. They also tell you to take off your shorts and they wash those off for you too. It was fun. Well this is all for now. It may be a while before I can get to another computer. Have a good one.
hasta la vista baby
Charlie

The songbird of Cartagena and other things

Hello jolly fun seekers,I hope everyone is well. The first thing I`m going to talk about is the other things because no one is going to believe me about the songbird part.

First some observations about Cartagena: I love it it is a beautiful city, lots of stuff to see and do. I have done a good job playing tourist here. So far I have been to the Castillo San Felipe which is huge. It was built in 1627 it sits atop a promontory and it occupies one square city block. It was built to portect the city. Cartagena is where all the gold was stored that the spanish got out of central and south america awaiting transport to spain. It`s walls rise up very high and are very thick. There are lots of cannons. There are tunnels running all through it. Those people must have been very short, I could barely stand up without hitting my head inside them. Old Cartagena is also a walled city. A rather large wall 3-4 meters high in most places as high as 7-8 in other places and 4-5 meters thick. It is possible to walk along the wall in many parts of the city it gives you an excellent view of the ocean. For all of this the spanish don`t seem to have been very successful at defending their treasure. I went to the naval history museum here and they have dioramas of all the attacks on the city. Many were successful about the only one that was unsuccessful was a rather large French force that laid siege to the city by land and sea and began to fall to tropical diseases. There seems to be a pattern that the spanish were always playing catchup . Someone would come and beat the shit out of them and they would think ¨OOPS! better fix that hole.¨ For most of the design they used an Italian engineer, maybe that was the problem. I mean look at an Italian sports car, it looks good but you´re always having to do something to it to maintain it. Interesting; Italian engineering is the same all through the centuries. I´ve also been to a number of museums. The most interesting so far has been the Museum of the Inquisition. Yes that is the Spanish inquisition. It is pretty interesting, they have a display about witches and about witchcraft and the nice liberal view the catholic church took towards them. It also described the possible punishments that were practiced upon them when found guilty of being a witch. That was almost 100% by the way to be accused was to be guilty. But then came the good stuff, the torture room where they had examples of the different devices used by the Inquisition to make the victims tell the truth. Yeah right, a little bit of time with one of those devices and I would confess to anything too. Some of the devices doubled as execution devices. How efficient. Other museums visited were the museum of modern art. It wasn`t particularly big but I enjoyed the paintings and sculptures on display. Then there was the museum of gold and Zenu culture. The gold were all examples of pre-columbian art. It is absolutely fabulously beautiful. The Zenu were people who lived around the present day Cartgena area and worked with gold. The naval history museum was primarily a waste of money. Those dioramas I mentioned earlier were about the best part of it. The rest of it seems to be ¨Well we have all this junk that is all naval related let´s put it in some rooms and call it a museum.¨
The women here are absolutely gorgeous. Of course this might be a partial reaction to Panama where everyone looks like they were beat with the ugly stick. I´ve checked out some of the nightlife, one of the places I ended up at was the HardRock Cafe. I went there on thursday because I´d seen that they have karaoke there on thursday and I like to do that once in a while. So I go there and it turns out it is not just karaoke but a competition. It is run in a gong show type of format. The more they like you the longer they let you sing. If they like you they will let you sing half or more of your song. So I was the 4 or 5 person to go up out of about 15 people total. As usual everybody before me and after me sang some sort of slow love song. As usual I decided to rock out. I sang Lookin`out my backdoor by Creedence Clearwater Revival, the crowd loved it. So all of us sang our songs some people got gonged after the first verse. I got quite a way through mine. So at the end there were 4 people left, I was one of them. Beleive or not. The 4 of us all had to sing an acapella song. So I went first. When it was over they judged by acclamation and guess who won? Yours truly! So you may be wondering Charlie what was that song you sang acapella? Well when I introduced it, in spanish, I told the audience that this was a very popular song on latino radio in New York and New Jersey. I then sang the Schaefer beer jingle---in spanish. Yes really. So to that anonymous cuban guy who worked at the western electric warehouse when I was working there in the summer of 71 whose name I don`t remember, thank you for teaching that jingle. Well that´s all for now.

Hasta la vista baby
Charlie

The Odyssey of the Steel Rat

This is LOOOOOONG it may end up being in 2 parts.

The day at Lunas Castle started early. I picked up my watch and looked at it Damn 4:50 the alarm clock didn`t go ogg. The day before I had bought an ararm at El Machetazo on Central Ave. in Panama City to make sure I got up in time. I set it and double checked it before I went to bed. But alas 4:30 came and went and it didn`t go off. Well for $1.60 you don`t expect miracles. I had packed the night before so I was ready to go. All that was necessary was to bring my stuff to the front of the hostel and wait for the jeep. As I got there I saw a group waiting. In all therewas about 10 of us. We were all waiting for our ride to the coastto begin our trip on the Stahlratte the Steel Rat. Out in front confusion and uncertainty were rampant. There was one driver there with what looked like a new Toyota Land Cruiser. He let it be known that he was only taking 4 passengers and that another car wuld be here shortly. Then it turns out his car was reserved for 4 specific people and the 4 people who were already in there were rather unceremoniously removed. That driver finally located HIS 4 people and left. That left about 8 of us wondering what was going on. About 20 minutes later another Landcruiser shows up, however this one is sbustantially different. First of all even the most generous person no matter how hard they tried could look at this car and think it was new. As I later found out it was a 1995. The hood was dented, the windshield wipers didn´t work and instead of having nice new confortable seats for 4 it had 2 bench seats in the back. The bench seats held 8. At any rate he starts loading the luggage rack and there are 2 of us there with bikes which we each paid an extra $10.00 for. He asked which one was lighter and I said that the other one was probably lighter as mine also had my tent and sleeping bag on it. So he takes the other guys bike and puts it on top of the luggage while telling me that mine would go on the next car. Ah thinks I so there is going to be another car they are not going to pack us in there like sardines.......WRONG! The second car shows up and it is yet another aging landcruiser. This one looks even worse than it´s counterpart. There is a small triangular shaped median in the street and I noticed that he backs up until his wheels are touching the curb. After observing the rest of the car I speculate that he is doing that because the parking brake doesn´t work. Of course the biggest is that the car is already full with other passengers. So thick with the realization that yes we are going to be packed like sardines and that the only reason the other reason is here is to pick up my bike we all do a collective sigh and get in our respective cars. The one i get is packed full in the back so I have to take the front seat. The front seat is a 60-40 type of set up and I´m thinking to myself "self you scored. You got this nice wide seat while everyone else is squeezed in tight." It is at this point that the driver informs me that we have to make one more stop to pick up one more pèrson and I will have to share the seat with him...SIGH! Finally we are on our way and the driver informs us that it is 3.5-4 hour trip. Everybody get comfy.As we drive through new Panama city the rain starts to let up. By the time we are out in the country it has stopped altogether and the sky is clearing. On our way to San Blas islands our first stop is at Migracion to have our passports chedked. Our second stop is a few minutes later for breakfast. Breakfast is fried chicken with empanadas and coffee. Typical Central American fare. After spending about 45 minutes at our breakfast stop we continue down the road. The road begins to deteriorate, big potholes become more common and the driver is back and forth across the road avoiding them. The driver had informed us that the road was going to get worse after the restaurant, is this what he meant, it didn´t seem so bad.......NOT! Further down the deteriorating road he pulls off and makes a left turn and gets out and locks his hubs. The road goes up at a fairly steep grade and is turning dirt. In very little time it is up and down like this continuously mile after mile and the road gets muddier slicker and twistier as we go. I am very happy I am in a car and not trying to negotiate this on a loaded touring bike. We continue on like this for about 45 minutes when we stop at a table manned by 2 men along the side of the road sitting under a tarp. We are informed that we all have to pay $2.00 each to continue along the road as it is a private reserve. It is here that we all meet Liliana. Liliana is a spider monkey. Ostensibly a pet of one or both of the guys who works there. She just sort of hangs out in a tree and acts cute when the tourists show up. So we all pay our $2.00 and take pictures of Liliana and continue down the road. The road continues on in its twisty slippery way for about another 30 minutes. We stop at a point where there are a couple of army guys I´m thinking "uh oh what´s going on now?" It turns out this is the end of the line for the cars and we have to unload all our stuff and portage it about 50 yards to the river where some native Kuna with long wide boats are waiting for us to take us down the river to the ocean and out to the sailboat by one of the San Blas islands. The river is wide, beautiful and peaceful. As we make our way down river we pass through a rainforest area and we pass a Kuna indian village. The Kuna are short dark skinned people with broad thick shoulders. I speculate that those shoulders are from paddling a canoe from the time they are old to pick up a paddle. After about a half hour on the river we emerge into the ocean and see the San Blas islands as small dots in the distance. As we get closer we notice a few large sailing ships and speculate which one is ours. As we get closer it is obvious which one we are headed towards, the largest one in the area. The Stahlratte is a 40 meter boat. It is a steel sailing ship with a mainsail, staysail, fisherman, jib and square sail. It also has a 800 liter enging. It was built in 1903 in Germany and went through several transformations as a cargo ship, fishing boat,until 1984 when the current owners bought it and put it to use as a passenger ship. It makies runs from Panama to Cartagena and around the Caribbean. We unloaded our stuff from the boat onto the Stahlratte and as soon as we got on board we were asked to remove our shoes and they have been off ever since. The crew is: Andrew-owner, Ludwig-Captain, Guillermo and Katya-hands. All except Guillermo are German, Guillermo is from Argentina. Altogether they are a great crew. It was explained to us that we would sign in groups of 4 and each group is responsible for making breakfast and dinner one day There are 15 passengers and we are a diverse group. The countries of Japan, Germany, Ireland (the fantastic 4 of fun, Aaron,Sinead, Linda and Dion) New Zealand and the U.S. are represented. I had heard that the price included everything except alcohol. So being the efficient alcoholic that I am I went to the store the day before and bought a half gallon of Panamian whiskey for $8.95 can you say parts cleaner? On the first night after dinner everyone, crew and passengers got down to some serious drinking. My $8.95 whiskey brought me instant infamy. We were all sitting around getting to know each other and getting very blitzed in the process. Earlier in the day the boat went about 4 hours from the San Blas Islands to the Cocoa Banderas islands. We were anchored around several other boats. There are all these little uninhabited islands all over the place. At any rate one of the passengers from one of the other boats came by in a kayak and asked some of us to come back to his boat to party over there. His name is Felix. Instead of going with Felix we invited Felix to join us. Poor Felix, he accepted our invitation. It turns out that Felix and had met previously at the Purple House hostel in David City panama. The entire crew and guests were on a pretty good buzz when Feix showed up. He showed up with an empty bottle of wine he had drank on the way over. So old Felix himself wasn`t exactly sober. Well Felix was a big hit he fit right in. However he made the fatal mistake of sitting next to me and my cheap half gallon of whiskey. He had a metal cup and every time he would turn to talk to someone I would fill his cup. After he got sufficiently wasted we started shouting messages to his boat to the nature of "Send us all your rum and we´ll return Felix" Of ourse yours truly wasn´t exactly sober either. Needless to say Felix ended up 3 sheets to the wind. Of course everyone blamed me. Of course that is probably appropriate. At one point someone noticed Felixs kayak drifting away, this was relatively early in the evening when he still had some motor control left. So he jumps off the boat to retrieve the kayak which he does successfully. By the end of the evening we directed Felix to a chaise lounge and left jim there. Once in a while someone would check to see if he was still breathing. At some point in the wee morning hours the party ended and Felix was left to his own devices on the chaise lounge. Later that night it started----HARD! The storm woke up the captain who remembered that Felix was still outside. According to the captain he had to rock Felix rather hard for a long time to wake him up. Even though it was raining really hard. There are no stairs to the upper deck just rungs coning out from the wall to hold on to. The way the captain tells it it took him half an hour to get him down the 5 rungs from the top deck to the main deck. he had to literally one foot at a time. Once he got him ont the main deck he dragged him into the salon where he spent the rest of the night. The next day he woke up after nearly everyone else and returned to his boat in ignominy and hung over. For me the morning started at 7:00 when I got out of my bunk and started looking for coffee. It was my crews turn to cook. I was the first one in the kitchen and finally found the coffee and started making it. The only coffee makers I found were rather large stove top expresso makers, boy isn´t that a pity. I made enough to fill the large vacuum bottle. So right about the time I`m successfully making coffee the rest of the crew shows up they are : Pat and her (cute) 22 year old daughter Alyssa from NYC, Justin from New Zealand and a guy from Japan and also Guillermo. For breakfast we made a huge fruit salad, luncheon meat cheese, rolls, coffee and fresh orange juice. It was a success. As we were having a barbeque that night included potato salad as soon as breakfast was over we started peeling potatoes. Finally finished with that I swam to the island. It is a small island it is possible to walk the perimeter in 5 minutes but only if you walk slow. The time for the barbeque came and it was do it your self shishkebab, potato salad, boiled eggs, and beer or soda. After the cooking was done we took the grill off and made it into a huge beach fire. Time went on and we ate drank and had a good old time. Some friends of the captain were anchored nearby and joined us. The wife who is probably my age but not too much worse for the wear was walking around offering shots of tequila. In order to get a shot you had to lick the salt off her neck take a shot and then use you mouth to get the lime out from between her breasts. I had several of those shots by the way. As the night went on we all returned to the boat where the drinking resumed and we engaged in various entertainments such as table dancing. The next day arrives and I spend it writing everything you have read so far. That night they served the most fabulous dinner I have had in a long long long time. It starts out with fried fish one for everyone, then came the langostinos, there were enough that everyone could have as many as they wanted. Everyone was so stuffed that there were 4 left over and sacrilege oh sacrilege we through them back to the sea. The sharks enjoyed them. The normal drinking and bullshitting followed nothing terribly exciting happened. The next morning we all woke up to the boat moving back and forth, we were under way. It is 30 hours to Cartagena and I spent the day reading and drinking beer. I was happy I bought dramamine, I don`t think I would have made it without it. I went to bed early and got up the next day and finished reading and hung out until we got to Cartagena. Even though we got there at 11:00 they didn`t finish processing us until 2:00. I found my way to the Viena Casa hostel and here I am.

A NEW CONTINENT!!!

Today is 8/19 and I am still in Panama City but tomorrow I leave for the Caribbean coast for a boat to Cartagena Colombia. This represents my first new continent since I've started this trip. It is on a 40 meter sailboat and is supposed to take 5 days. The cost is 385.00 I checked into an airplane but wasn't able to find anything less than300.00 plus 100-150 extra for the bike. So a 5 day cruise is actually cheaper than going by plane. There is no way of going over Darien Gap which is the land that separates Panama and Colombia. There is no road going directly from one to the other. I understand that during the dry season it is possible to make it but this isn't the dry season. I also understand that it is more expensive than an airplane it takes at least 5-6 days to do it. And on top of that it is supposed to be very dangerous. Supposedly there are lots of drug traffickers and other undesirables using the area.
The country of Panama is nice and Panama City is interesting, it really is a nice modern city skyscrapers and everything. BUT I don't know what happened in Panama every other central American country has beautiful women, lots and lots of them. But in Panama most of the women I see are fat and/or UGLY! I mean sure you see some good looking women once in a while but that's it only once in a while. You know they say that shit rolls downhill right? Well I think that is what happened, all the shit that makes for ugly people rolled downhill from Mexico through Central America and got blocked by the Darien Gap and fertilized the ugly tree. Because of the Panama canal lots of people came from all over the place to work most of them from Caribbean countries. Maybe that is what happened only the ugly people came. I mean I lived in Hawaii for 9 years and people came from all over the place to work there too, Japan, China, Portugal,Puerto Rico,Philippines, Samoa etc. etc. but the result of all that mixing together often results in some awesomely good looking people. So what is the answer, who knows, who cares, tune in next week for the continuation of this exciting saga.
I am very nervous about Colombia. Because of various things I have not done very much riding over the last several weeks, almost a month. Consequently I am in horrible condition. Colombia is not a flat country. I traded information with a guy who is riding his bike the opposite way that I am. He said he went over some 4500 meter mtn. passes in Colombia-----OH SHIT!!!!!!!!! Well I guess the bus is always an option. Well that's all for now.
I don't know if I'll have internet on the boat or not so it may be awhile. So until later-----HASTA LA VISTA BABY!

Greetings from Santiago Panama

Sorry it has been awhile but I haven´t had access to a computer recently. I got to David city and found out that my bicycle seat frame was broken. Also my shoulder was (and still is) bothering me. For the shoulder I decided awhile ago that if it was still bothering me when I got to Panama City I would have it checked there. However I talked to the owner of the hostel I was staying at and she said that one of the best orthopedic clinics in the country was only a few blocks away and a doctor´s visit was only $20 so what the hell. I made an app´t. In the mean time I arranged to have my bicycle seat frame repaired. Of course in order to repair the seat they had to ruin the fabric to do it. So I got the frame repaired and took it to a place to have it reupholstered. The guy said it would be done on tuesday of the following week and this was on thursday. The same day I had my appointment with th e oprthopedist. So I said fine and went to see the orthopedist. He recommended physical therapy treatments for a week and then see what happens. Well I figured I was there until tuesday anyway so why not. What are a few more days....right? Well it ended up being a 10 day stay at the hostel during which time I did no riding. But I drank lots of guinness stout. The result of the therapy is that when I started therapy I experienced pain only in certain circumstances after a week I experience it most of the time. Boy aren´t I glad I went to therapy for a week. To be fair however I have to admit there is some improvement there is no longer any pain when I pump up my bicycle tires. And though there is pain more or less constantly it is less severe than before. Thank god for painkillers. After the Purple House hostel in David City I went to a place named the Waterfall hostel which is about 12 kilometers outside of David city. Beautiful place and yes it does have a waterfall on the premises 4 as a matter of fact. It is run by a couple of young American expats. Fabulous place out in the country quiet, peaceful I stayed there for 3 days. Then I left and continued heading south and boy am I suffering. 2 Weeks without riding my bike is killing me. Basically I lost any conditioning I had and it is like starting all over again. Panama is a very beautiful country with lots of hills. Not good for someone who is out of shape. SIGH!!! So I am in Santiago for a day or two and then on to Panama city. A couple of nights ago I stayed in a little town named San Felix and above the door to my room was a little notice that said there was no risk of Malaria or Dengue I only stay in the best places. Well that is all for now.
hasta la vista baby
Charlie

Leaping lizards, people who cut of their hands

Sorry that it has been a while but I have not had access to a computer for several days. First I want to talk about Max. Max is pretty cool. He is 20 years old and has his own exotic animal business based in Denver CO I met him in the hostel in Uvita, this guy knows all sorts of cool stuff about all different kinds of reptiles, animals etc. He told me about a lizard called a basilisk. The cool things about basilisks is that they run across water on their hind legs. One day I was at the beach at Uvita and saw Max there with a local guy and both of them were using local herbs to attain a favorable state of altered consciousness. He saw me and called me over and of course I joined them. He explained that he had seen a basilisk or many basilisks actually and they were only a little way behind us. So after attaining said favorable state of consciousness we went to where the basilisks were. Man are they cool! They look like tiny dinosaurs and when they are scared they run across the water on the water on their hind legs. Max explained that the way it works is that they move so fast that it creates an air pocket which prevents their feet from going in the water. It is this ability which gives them the nick name Jesus Christ lizards.

Cortes Costa Rica
I didn't go here. So why am I writing about a place that I didn't go. Well let me explain. I was looking at the map in the hostel in Uvita deciding where I was going to go the nest day. I saw Cortes. I asked the owner of the hostel, an American expat about it. He told me I didn't want to go there. When I asked why he said that at one they imported people to work in the sugar cane fields. These people were covered by insurance and when they saw the payouts for things like lost fingers lost hands etc. They started chopping off their hands because they got $5000.00 for a lost hand. These are the descendants of those people. So for this reason I didn't go there.

Panama

I got into Panama yesterday, July 28 and it was raining like hell. None of the shuttles would take me to David City, where I am now.So at about130 in the afternoon I got a cheap hotel about 1 kilometer from the border. Of course as luck has it about half hour after I checked in the rain stopped but what hte hell it was only 13 dollars per night. I love the highway in Panama it is 2 lanes in each direction and it actually has a shoulder. Thank god. This makes riding much less stressful. I can actually relax. They use American currency here in Panama so I don't have to figure out how much something costs in dollars. It is also a lot cheaper than Costa Rica. Beer is only .60 per bottle down here compared to 1.50-2.00 in Costa Rica. Guinness is available here at the grocery store for only 3.30 per 6 pack. Those of you who have known me for a while know how happy that makes me. kSo I am here in David City Panama and will probably be here until the 1st and then start my way to Panama City where I will catch the ferry to Colombia, home of cocaine tea, can't wait.

hasta la vista baby
It has been a while since anyone has emailed me, I sure would like to hear from ya'

Charlie

Greetings from Uvita

I made it to Uvita and it wasn´t THAT bad although it is not an experience I would like to repeat soon. It was 40 km. (25 miles) of dirt road. For the most part it wasn´t any worse than some of the rail trails I´ve been on. At no part was it wash board, thank god. I´m sure I went farther than 40 km. however because of all the weaving back and forth across the road avoiding potholes. Otherwise the road is just what I was looking for, very wide and little traffic. I took me about 3 hours to do the distance, nothing to brag about certainly. When I got to Dominical and finally hit pavement again I was very happy. I went about 25 km. past Dominical to Uvita which is where I am writing from. I am at the Tucan hostel. I knew i was in the right place when I saw the sign with the yin yang symbol out front and a sign that said massage. This was confirmed when I went to the front desk and classic rock was playing and I went to my room and there was a large framed picture of the Grateful Dead on the wall. A very cool place. I decided to stay at least one more day. Maybe go to the beach. Today i am treating myself to a 1 1/2 hour massage. I am going to try one more time as this woman is an american and was trained in the U.S. The weather has been very consistent if it is going to rain it does it late in the afternoon and if the sun is going to shine it does it in the morning. I have been trying to time my rides to get to where I am going for the day before it rains. That´s all for now.
hasta la vista baby
Charlie

Costa Rican vibes

White Water rafting

I went rafting the other day and it was a gas! The trip lasted about one and a half hours and I loved it. There were 4 of us in our raft plus the river guide. We went down the Naranjo river which had a number of class 3 and 4 rapids. At one point everyone but me and the guide got dumped into the river. About 5 minutes later it was my turn. The other passengers besides me were a couple from Denmark and a cop from Brooklyn. Great company and a great time was had by all.

Finca Amanecer

It was actually difficult to leave the place because it is such a cool place. It is in a rainforest, there is beautiful scenery all over the place. The owner, Elena Ross is a fabulous, laidback, helpful, fun hostess. I will actually miss her. However tomorrow she is leaving for Bulgaria to do some spiritual dancing up in the mountains. She had a couple of people working there for their rent when I was there one of whom has since left (thank god) and the other one who is going run the place for a while when she is gone. The first one is:

LOONEY LARRY
Looney Larry is a real piece of work. He is a retired post office clerk. To know Larry is to know how they came up with the term "going postal" The guy is obviously slightly off his rocker. Ever know someone who just took one too many hits of acid. That is Larry. As I said he is a worker and nothing more the owner made that quite clear but apparently he has other ideas. Everything was fine until one time we were talking about massage and alternative health and stuff like that. Elena says that she does some massage and I said so did I. She seemed sort of stressed so I offered her one as she has a massage table. Well all of a sudden Larry gets real weird and he and Elena go into the kitchen to have a talk. It lasts quite a while with the upshot being that he tells her that she cannot receive or give a massage without having sex with the person. Sex was never either one of our goals but there it is. A day later he tells me that if we have sex he is going to chop my legs off with a machete. So it just went on like this until we both decided on detente. Well that´s Larry.

The CARMENATOR

Carmen is a young woman from Colorado. She is also a guide in Alaska. She is going to watch the place forElena for a while when Elena is gone. Her attitude is "I´m the Carmenator I can do anything" I love people with attitudes like that. She is always at work doing something. She doesn´t talk a lot she just lets her actions speak for her. When she goes about her work she does it with a competence and confidence that is a pleasure to watch.

MANAÑA

Tomorrow I continue heading south. I understand I have about 25 miles of dirt road ahead of me. I want to make it to a town named Dominical. I am not looking forward to it. But it is what it is. If I wanted everything to be the way it was at home I would have stayed at home. After Dominical I understand it paved all the to Panama City, so I guess that is not too much to put up with. So moving right along I am going to sign off and start drinking.
hasta la vista baby
Charlie

Greetings from the rainforest.

As much as I enjoyed San Jose it was time to move on. The hostel is absolutely fabulous a and if you ever go to San Jose I highly recommend the Costa Rica backpackers inn. they have a pool, 6 computers, a restaurant that sells beer and also shows 2 movies per night. They have a common with a large tv with cable. The staff is fabulous and it is close to everything. While in San Jose I visited several museums including the National Museum. the national is interesting because it is in an old fort. You can still see the bullet holes in the outside walls from the 1948 revolution. As part of the museum they have a butterfly preserve where are 20 varieties of butterflies flying around.Really a cool place. I also went to the national Numismatic and pre-columbian gold museum. An absolutely fascinating place. Right now I am in a tiny little town named Londres (spanish for London) which is about 10 miles in from a coastal town named Quepos (pron. kaypos) I am staying at a hostel named Finca Amanecer (sunrise farm). It is the opposite experience I had in San Jose. This is not to say that San Jose was good and this is bad, just different. It is owned by an American expat named Elena Ross. She is a fabulous person and a great hostess. She has a 7 acre farm in the middle of the rainforest. The scenery here is incredible. She has given directions to several different destinations one of which was this incredible waterfall. The water was refreshing which is to say a little bit brisk but it was a great place to get naked and jump in, which I did. The place is really remote and I was the only one there. Tomorrow is whitewater rafting which I'm really looking forward to. I will report how that is later. Until then
HASTA LA VISTA BABY!

Greetings from Costa Rica, land of hills and good beer

Welcome to my country now go uphill!

May be it's just me but it seems that everytime I cross a border as soon as I get to the other side I start climbing. Is there some reason for this? Do countries purposely have their borders in valleys to make it easier you know the mountains on that side are yours the ones on this side are mine kind of thing. Who knows who cares tune in next week for the continuation of this exciting saga. Well I've been in Costa Rica a few days now and so far I really like it. There seems to be a pattern here that the further south I go the nicer and prettier the countries become. Nicaragua was really beautiful and now Costa Rica even more so. One difference between Costa Rica and other countries is that here there is a feeling of prosperity that pervades everything. This is something that is definitely missing in all the other countries I have been in. Costa Rica is very hilly especially compared to delightfully flat Nicaragua. There is an awful lot of ascending and descending here a bit more than I would like. The roads are really nice and smooth. But they are narrow with nada, zero, zip for a shoulder. It is also the busiest road I have seen since the libre in Mexico. The Pan American highway is not only the highway through Costa Rica it is also the route through San Jose the capitol. So yeah doesn't that suck. So there are a lot of trucks on the road and no shoulder and they don't usually give you much room. Note to the Costa Rican gov't. PUT SHOULDERS ON THE DAMN ROADS! There, got that off my chest.

Liberia, giraffes, zebras and warthogs

My first day in Costa Rica I spent in Liberia. It's about 50 miles inside the country from Nicaragua. I thought I was in heaven. There were real stores and in front of every store were little decals telling which credit cards they accepted. Imagine they not only accepted cards but a whole bunch of them. There was a huge grocery that sells all sorts of beer and other stuff. In Nicaragua there is a choice of maybe 2. They even have a dark beer here yayyyyyy! My first day in the country and I got rained on not just rain a serious downpour. I stopped at the first motel in Liberia and asked how much and he said $36 which was more than I wanted to spend but it was raining like hell and I was soaked so I said "Why not" of course the minute I got settled in the rain stopped and the sun came out. For dinner that night I ate at the Taqueria Mazatlan. I mean I had to right? It was good, expensive considering, but good. I mean 1 fish taco with beans rice and a salad for $7.00 as I said expensive. The next day I went down the road and came to a place called Africa Mia it is an animal preserve and pretty damn pricey. Basically they take you on a tour and you get to get up close and personal with the animals in the park. You get to feed the giraffes and get close to the zebras and all that good stuff. It was nice, it was fun but it was pricey. That night I ended up in the town of Las Canas nothing special about it but it seems like a nice quiet little burg. From there I went to Puntas Arenas. Basically a sand bar in the ocean. Nice enough place but nothing to really recommend it. It has black sand beaches. I guess I've been spoiled by Mazatlan because I haven't seen anyplace that I would trade for it so far. Well that's all for now, I feel like I'm becoming boring so
HASTA LA VISTA BABY!

Greetings from Ometepe Island

Well I´ve been on Ometepe for a couple of days now and I have to say it is an incredibly beautiful place. It is sort of like Maui in that it is an island with a volcano on either end and strip of land in the middle. It is very lush and green with water falls and beautiful scenery and rainforests. The people are incredibly friendly, I am told that there is no crime here and to make it even more eden like real estate is very cheap here. I looked at a small farm here with a very tiny bulding on it ( I am loathe to call it a house) it is about 10 feetx20 feet basically 2 rooms with an attached bathroom. There is water to the house, a septic tank has been installed and there is electricity at the street. It is 1.75 acres (What they call a Manzana in Nicaragua) it has all been planted with corn, tomatoes coconut trees, grapefruit tree, banana trees and you can buy it for $10,500 U.S. Believe me I was tempted to buy my little piece of paradise but then figured that I would rarely if ever use it as I wouod never give up my places in Mazatlan. Of course no paradise is perfect. And this one is no different. The biggest challenge here is getting access to money. There is only one bank on the island, hence only one atm. The atm has been out of service since I´ve been here. The only way I´ve been able to get is that there is a store here that will run your credit or debit card and give you money and he gets 10%. Today is Sunday and he is closed so I am leaving the island because I am tired of the inconvenience. I stayed in a nice hotel here it is run by an American couple. The room is spacious, and it has HOT water. I have not had hot water since I left Mexico. It is named appropriately enough the American hotel and cafe. I haghly recommend it if you ever get to Moyogalpa on Ometepe Island. That is all for now, I head to Rivas on the 11:30 ferry and start heading south. The next time you hear from me I will be in Costa Rica.

Hasta la vista baby!
Charlie

Greetings from Granada

well I finally got my money and made it out of Managua and am now in Granada. Not much of a distance but a whole other world in experience. Granada is really a nice little place. They are really going after the tourist dollar so it is a nice clean place. They've got a nice plaza area with lots of vendors selling any manner of things. One of the streets off the plaza is blocked off to traffic for a few blocks and has a lot of nice little boutiques, restaurants and restaurants. It is right on Lake Nicaragua and all in all a very nice place I am enjoying quite a bit. Tonight I am going to a free piano recital. So far since I have gotten a massage and also an acupuncture treatment for my shoulder. I enjoyed the massage it was nice to relax and it is the best I've had since I left the states but it still wasn't that great. The acupuncture helped somewhat perhaps it will assist it in healing faster. It seems that each day it is a little bit better maybe the only thing that is going to heal it is time and maybe tequila. I can sleep on it without waking up it's just that it is always there. OH WELL! I went to the local archeological museum today and had my own lovely guide who took me around and explained everything-in spanish and I even understood a lot of it. Speaking of spanish I had an interesting experience the other day in Managua. I decided to do the tourist thing so I went and checked out the museum at the Palacio Nacional and took a guided tour there and when I finished I thought to myself "self what should I do next?" I saw on a tourist map that the archeological museum was nearby (they seem to have in just about any city of any significance) So I got a cab and asked how much to go to the Museo Arqueologico he told me the fare (30 cordobas about 1.50) so I said lets go. Now I'm far from fluent in spanish but people have told me that I speak it well so I was sort of surprised when we ended up at the Centro Nacional Dermatologico (National Dermatology Center.) Of course when I pointed his mistake he said that he had no idea where the museum was. So I said the hell with it take me back to the hostel. Tomorrow I'm hopping on the bike and heading to Rivas and then hopefully find a way to Oemeteppe Island. Spend a couple of days on Ometeppe island and then head south to Costa Rica. So my next find me spot should be from Rivas and next blog from Rivas or Ometeppe. Until then

HASTA LA VISTA BABY!

Feelings about Nicaragua

I am in Managua Nicaragua now, the capital of the country. I will be here until July1 at which point I will head south to Rivas and from there catch a ferry to Ometeppe island. I hear it is small but absolutely beautiful with a volcano in the middle of it. It is in Lake Managua. So I plan to spend a few days there. I would also like to check out Corn Island and Little Corn Island which are in the Caribbean. I´ve never been to the Caribbean so I thought it would be a treat. I will then return to Rivas and continue south. However I think from Rivas I will take a bus to the Costa Rican border, it is only about 30 kilometers. The reason being I have heard that there are bandits in the area that are targeting bicycle tourists.

Nicaragua is a beautiful country lush, green and from bicycle tourist´s point of view delightfully flat. Actually It is only flat where the people live that is flat. There are a lot of mountains here but almost no one lives there. Also there is a verdant part of the country on the other side of the mountains but again, no one lives there. It appears as if 99% of the people live on the flat fertile part of the country.

One thing I like about Nicaragua is that bicycles are ubiquitous. They are used for everything and they seem to respect traffic laws (as much as anyone down here respects traffic laws) and be respected as a legitimate part of traffic. Golly imagine that. Down here there is a work tricycle it, has 2 wheels in the front and 1 in the back. The front part is about 1 meter wide and can be used to carry cargo, my friends in Mazatlan know what I´m talking about. Down here however what they have done is put a bench seat in and make a canvas roof on top and carry passengers. They are called tricycleros, or something to that effect. These guys are even licensed. They are all over the place in Leon and Chinandega but I really have not seem them so far in Managua however I haven´t gone very far from the hostel either.

The Nicaraguan people have been fabulous so far. They are very nice and very friendly. And, thank god, they have figured out that there is a difference between American tourists and their idiotic gov´t. In the time I have been here I have not encountered any outward resentment. Because if anyone has a right to harbor resentment it is the Nicataguans. They have also embraced American culture (Is that a good thing? You decide) All of the fast food chains are down and even out in the country you see a sign if front of a building, a rather crudely written that says "ropa americana" (American clothing).
That´s all for now
Hasta la vista baby

¿How the hell is the mail delivered in Chinandega?

I am here in Chinandega Nicaragua, the 3rd largest city in Nicaragua. It really isn`t a bad place. The rent is cheap and the people are friendly. But what I want to is how does the mail get delivered here? My friends who live in Mazatlan know how frustrating it can be sometimes to drive in downtown Mazatlan because many streets don`t have signs on them at all intersections. But if you know where to look and go a few blocks you will eventually find a sign. Chinandega is 1000% worse! As far as I can tell all businesses use directions and distances from known landmarks such as businesses and churches or whatever. Except for 3 or 4 main arteries NONE OF THE STREETS HAVE NAMES HERE! Yes I am serious. No buildings have numbers on them. It is absolutely incredible! I was given a tourist map and it shows the city laid out in fairly good grid pattern but none of streets are named. It shows attractions and hotels but in order to get there you have to know where you are. And how do you know where you are if you just got into town? Well never let it be said that it is boring finding your way around here. When I got into town I was lucky enough to find the tourist office fairly easily and quickly she gave directions to the place I ended up staying at and how I got there was "You see that blue church? Go there and make a right and go 2 blocks and then go left half a block and you`ll see the sign." I said "What`s the name of the street?" She said there isn`t any sign. As Artie Johnson used to say on Laugh in "VER-R-R-R-R-RY INTERESTING, BUT STUPID!" According to something I read in a tourist guide about Chinandega in 1926 there was a disagreement between liberals and conservatives and the entire city burned to the ground. Now that is a serious disagreement! Maybe when they rebuilt they forgot about street names and buildings because every knew where everyone else lives anyway. Just ruminating here. At any rate it looks like I am in Nicaragua until July 1 when I get my monthly money. I would move on to Costa Rica but at this point I am living on about $25.00 per day and a number of reliable sources tell me that Costa Rica is relatively expensive and that most of my money would be spent on rent. Here in Chinandega rent is $5.00 per day. Tomorrow I move onto Leon and then to Managua until the first.Places in Managua and Leon can be had for $7-8 per day. From Managua I will go to Granada and Rivas and Ometeppe island and then take a bus from Rivas to the Costa Rica border. Well that`s all for now.

Hasta la vista baby

Charlie

Muchas Cosas continued

Well sorry about the last time I started out with a lot to say and just could not keep my eyes open. Part of it was only having a few hours sleep the night before. The other part was being in a nice airconditioned cyber cafe after riding in really hot weather. I went from there and found a nice air conditioned hotel room. At any rate moving right along.

Cheap vodka
The national drink of El Salvador seems to be vodka. It`s a hell of a lot cheaper than beer. Everyone drinks it. There is one brand of vodka Sublime Vodka. At the local grocery store you get a package with one liter bottle and a half liter bottle for the huge price of $3.22 yes that is correct. El Salvador uses U.S. currency so that is the exact price.

Feelings about El Salvador
Overall I guess the people of El Salvador are as nice as anywhere else. But when I think of all the rude people I`ve encountered on this trip literally all of them were in El Salvador. People see you and think "There`s a gringo I`ll ask him for money" yes when you are in El Salvador people think you are el banco del gringo. Now I have to say that much of my negative experience is when I was in the town of La Union. For example one day I was walking through the outdoor market and a guy is pushing an empty cart and stops and says to me "Gringo darme dinero rico gringo" (translation gringo give me money rich gringo) I don`t give money to anyone screw them I`m not responsible for their poverty. Also I feel that it if I don`t it won`t encourage them to ask others.

I`m a star

As I was riding from San Miguel to La Union a small pick up truck stopped ahead of me and as I approached they motioned for me to stop. It turns out they are a film crew for a local tv station and they wanted to interview me-in spanish. I THINK I did alright. At least none of the crew burst out laughing at any of my answers. The interview was about 5 minutes and I had the presence of mind to ask them send a copy to my apartment in Mazatlan. So this is the third time I`ve been on tv so far. Once in Alaska for a German tv station once in Mazatlan for a national tv station and now here. At this rate I`m gonna have to get an agent.

Onto Honduras

I left La Union and not a minute too soon. It is a dirty funky town with nothing to offer anyone who is not Salvadoran. The streets are filthy the people are not friendly if you ever have a chance to go there don`t. At any rate I rode from there to the border and crossed into Honduras a distance of about 25 miles. Honduras is nice the scenery much the same as El Salvador. A lot of lush green scenery rolling hills and mountains. My first day I made it to the town of Nacaome. A nice enough peaceful little town. I immediately started looking for a place for the night. First I needed an atm which I found readily enough. I asked the guard at the bank for a cheap hotel and he sent me to a place just a couple of blocks away. The name of the place is Las Palmeras. I went there and looked at the room and it was nice and I asked the price and was told 220 Lempiras or about $14.00 I thought that was expensive since I had gotten places just like it in El Salvador and Guatemala for 7-8 for the night. For this price all you got was a fan not air conditioning. So I start unloading my stuff and turn on the fan, it doesn`t work. So I go and tell them and they get me another fan. After riding about 50 miles in the heat I am ready for shower. I go to turn on the shower and no water. Back to complain so a few minutes later I have water. Later that night I go to get some water to soak my dentures and again no water. Now all this time there is water for the toilet. Thank God! The next day I rode from there to Choluteca. That is where I started this post. Yesterday I rode from Choluteca to the border of Nicaragua.

Nicaragua

I crossed into Nicaragua and encountered the worst roads I have seen since the Dawson hwy. in Alaska. They are badly paved and then they turn into dirt for about 100 meters and then badly paved again. I am not carrying much cash with me going from one town to another that has an atm. So when I crossed the border I asked where the nearest town is with an atm. The nearest place is Chinandega which is where I am now. It is about 40 miles from the border and is a fairly big city. I was going to ride my bike but when I got to the first little town in Nicaragua I said "screw this" I can`t ride 40 miles like this. I have to say that after about 15 miles the road became decent but by that time I was on a bus on my way to Chinandega. I got here about 1:30 and found, with the help of the tourist office the Doña Maria hotel. I asked them for a cheap place and they came through $5.00 per night. Now it is much as you might expect for $5.00 per night you get a bed and a fan. The bathroom is downstairs. It is still better than camping. Today I am going to try and do the tourist thing. So that`s all for now. As that great American governor once said "hast la vista baby"