We left Globe with almost no idea where we were heading…northeast to do some more sightseeing or north west to begin the real trip home. We finally decided enough was enough and it’s time to head home.

The ride was pretty good as we rode towards Laughlin, Nv.

On the way, we saw a sign advertising homemade pie, we just had to stop and check it out.

I had a slice of hot apple pie with icecream, Randy ordered a slice of banana cream pie I don’t have a picture of mine, but here is Randy’s looked like

Ok, so this is not banana cream pie, but she did realize her mistake and brought a slice of banana cream pie. We finished up the day with a room in Bullhead City across the river from Laughlin.

This morning we took off for Tonopah, Nv, with a quick stop at Las Vegas BMW. Very nice dealership, but they couldn’t get my bike in for the 12000 mile service. Once we left the dealer, we headed up 95 towards Tonopah. The wind was brutal and the tempurature fell from around 68 to 42. The wind caused a huge sand storm in Death Valley, which we could see from the road.
We were thrilled to finally arrive in Tonopah, found a motel, went to the casino for dinner and now are preparing for the final leg of our journey.

Stay tuned. . . .

Yesterday was a tough long mileage day. It started out leaving a our hotel while the temperature was at 50 degrees. The road was long and straight for the most part.

There was not much to look at…

Randy has been coveting my new RKA tankbag since we left home, now I know why, the zipper used to attach it to the bike has a few missing teeth causing him to add it to the pile of stuff on top of his bike.

I call it the Beverly Hill Billy Bike.

And I thought I overpacked. Here is a list of things I brought and never used. One pair of hiking boots,(I brought 2 pairs) 2 long sleeve t shirts (I brought a total of 12 shirts) Two pairs of pants, (I brought 7 pairs) Three pairs of wool socks (I brought 4 pairs).

It was a long brutal day, the temps got up to 90 before it was done and the crosswind was blowing like crazy. Luckily, we checked into a new hotel with good AC and hot water for the shower. We went out, had a good meal of street food and headed back to the room. I layed down on the bed and was done by 730. I slept until 7am this morning. Four straight 300+ mile days plus the heat and wind yesterday, add that to the 6+ weeks on the road and I was done. I got a good nights sleep only to wake up to some bad news. The transmission seal that Randy had replaced in Guatemala has started to leak.

At first we weren’t sure if it was the final drive or the transmission. We had two choices, turn around and head to Monterey MX. That would mean going 400 miles in the wrong direction. Or, change our route a little and head to Tucson, AZ to the BMW dealer there. AZ it is. We rode 70km to a Auto Zone store and Randy bought a bunch of stuff to change the trans fluid. The idea there was to measure what came out to see if the fluid in the transmission was low.

After all is said and done, there is supposed to be 800ml. of fluid in the trans. allowing for what has leaked out and what spilled when we started to drain it, we came up with around 100ml. Our best guess is that the mechanic (?) didn’t bother to measure what he put in, he just dumped an enitre bottle in. We think this may have causes the seal failure. Randy refilled it with the correct amount and we were on our way to Tucson.

We stopped at a little cabaret along our route.

Mother and daughter

The Cabaret act, there was music playing in the background

Under her coat she had a Gatorade bottle filled with Tequilla.

After this bit of entertainment, which cost me 10 pesos, or 80 cents US, we headed on down the road. That’s when we started to see things worth seeing.

No no no, not that…..this

The ride today was great, 331 miles and it was not tiring at all. We got to the hotel,

checked in, wifi, hot water AC. Not too shabby. We walked up the street for dinner the back to the hotel to blog. We are just 2 1/2 hours from the border then a short ride to Tucson.

It is quickly drawing to an end here. We are not sure what will happen tomorrow at the dealer, maybe it will be fixed there or Randy can hold off and have it done at his local dealer…..More to come

OK, first the good news. We took a short day today, only 182 miles. Which means we stopped early, about 2pm. Nice hotel, good price, clean, wifi, maybe hot water, not sure yet. More good news, we found a headlight bulb for Randy’s bike so now we both have new headlights. More good news, we changed the oil on our bikes this afternoon, this was a much needed task we had to complete. OK so now that’s out of the way. We have been on the couta (toll road for four days now. Actually three as there were no tolls today. The coutas here are fairly expensive, yesterday was $24.36 and motos are half price. Needless to say, the toll roads are not very crowded.

First, just a short note on our three previous days. It rained every day. It was cold and drab. Yesterday morning we crossed a mountain on an incredible 2 lane (in each direction) curvy road. We never saw the other side, not sure where that was. It went up for miles, twisting and turning and the same on the way down. Sounds great, but it wasn’t. Not only was it raining, there were low clouds,over the entire mountain and, there was a landslide in the back end which caused a traffic jam miles long, up and down the mountain. Hundreds of huge semi trucks bumper to bumper, add dozens of busses and cars. What you have is a potentially fantastic ride turning into a 2 1/2 hour, frustrating ride from hell. Enough of that

Typical couta, beautiful road surface, at times

We ate dinner here last night and breakfast here today

some of the roads are so straight, you can lock the throttle, put your feet on the highway pegs, lean back and take a little nap.

some signs wishing us well

entering a town…..or city

and then there is this one as we are entering a new state. Also, this one makes you stop and think..is good help really that hard to find?

A quick stop on the side of the road for……

Oil change time….ok, I found the engine

Randy’s got this down pat

We went out for a traditional Mexican Dinner (Mc Donald’s) and on the way back, made a few new friends

Not much to see or write about at 70mph on the couta. Tomorrow we continue to head north. We may even enter the US through Texas this time just for the heck of it…Until then…..

We left Chetumal Mexico Tuesday morning on our way to Veracruz. The brand new hotel we stayed at was very nice, with a twist, it had automobile and truck service bays as part of the complex.

Hotel

Service bays.

The restaurant wasn’t open yet so we went into town to have some “Authentic Mexican” food. Nice statue in the round a bout on the way in. I guess I was a bit far away, but, what the heck.

We found a place that advertised Enchiladas as a special. Went in and ordered that. Not really sure what happened but here’s what we got. When an enchilada is not an enchilada.

Our best guess is that she decided what we really wanted and gave it to us. The good thing is that this chicken stew tasted pretty good.

We went back to the hotel, got cleaned up wrote the blog, lost it somehow, re-wrote it and posted it. Slept real good that night.

We rode 364 miles on Wednesday still on our way to Veracruz, we made it to Villa Hermosa, a big city with lots of traffic. We tried 4 or 5 hotels, one had a vacancy at over $100, the other 3 were more money but had no vacancy. On our way out of town, we spotted a hotel, or should I say George spotted it, so we pulled in. Once in the driveway we found out it was a “No-Tell-Motel.”  The people in Mexico and Central America must frequent these a lot because every large city has a number of them on the outskirts of the city. The price was right, we got 13 hours instead of the usual 12 hours, lucky us. We slept good there also.  Each room has private concealed parking so your spouse doesn’t know you’re in there. Very thoughtful people.

Randy rolling his bike out of our “Love Shack.”  Oh, and by the way, our room had TWO BEDS! Not sure why they have a room with two beds, but let your minds run wild with that one.

We hopped back on the toll road and continued our trek to Veracruz
It’s kind of neat how they painted the trunks of the trees white in the center median.

The weather started to get bad. It has rained on us for the past 3 days. Only once was it heavy, most of the time just sprinkled.

Riding on the Couta, (toll road) was a nice break, not only did we rack up the miles, but it was fun riding over 55mph, the speed limit was 110…kmh.

We stopped for breakfast, good stuff, eggs, chirzzio, frijoles tortillas and coffee.

We stopped a little later on for some fresh pineapple juice (jugo de piña fresca). We each bought a bottle and took off. It was also at this point the destination had changed from Veracruz to Mexico City. Randy and I are both in need of an oil change and there is supposed to be a BMW dealer there. We cannot get any information on it off the internet, I posted a question on ADVrider for info. We’ll just have to wait and see what comes of it.

They take a lot of pride in their large bridges here. Some photos Randy took “On the fly.”  Nothing like flying down the highway at 70+ one hand on the bars and one clutching a camera.  Ahh yes, good times!!!

Some statues.

Our hotel for tonight.  George was back in the swing of things this time. . . .

Our cabana.

We walked next door for dinner, cheaper than the restaurant at the hotel. The place next door is part of a Pemex truck stop/gas station. We didn’t expect much….we were wrong!  The food was great.

So good, I became a member of the clean plate club, Randy did too!

So, Randy asked the guy at the front desk to call the dealer for directions to the BMW shop in Mexico City. We also needed to make sure we could get our bikes in for service. They must be making too much money at that dealership. No time for us! OK, we’ll just need to do it ourselves. That changes plans a little. We will by-pass Mexico City, (have we ever told you we hate big cities) and begin our trip north. We’re not sure where we’ll end up tomorrow but that’s just part of the adventure.

Until next time America. . . . .

Yesterday we visited the Mayan Ruins in Tikal, Guatemala. We got an early start because we tenatively made a reservation with a tour guide there for 7am. We arrived at 7:07 and he was there waiting for us.

Our tourguide, Juan. He had cleared his entire schedule for the day to show us all that Tikal has to offer.

Tikal is much larger than the ruins we visited in Copan Honduras and a few pictures cannot do it justice, but here goes anyway.

The jungle pretty much swallowed up the city and the first order of business was to uncover the temples and the city. 

Here is the after view of the same temple, this is one of the few that you are not allowed to climb on the stairs, that is unless you are in the Group of Fools.

The city was much more extensive with larger temples than the one in Copan.

An interesting fact is that the tall temples are mainly all solid block.  The only rooms are at the top to preform ceremonies. The palace has rooms like this throne room that Randy is sitting in.

We climbed a staircase, approx 200 stairs, to get to the top of a 70 meter tall temple. The original block staircase is being reconstructed because of the damage done by the jungle.

View from the top of the temple.

They say that at one time, all that jungle was gone and crops were planted there. Here, Randy has discovered the spirit tree of Tikal, it is also the National Tree of Guademala.  Once again, this is a dramatization of acts which may or may not of occurred.  (Discretion ADVISED)

George is also enjoying the sights and smells of the jungle, a few times he tried to get away but Randy was too quick for him.

We saw numerous animals during our march. Here is a….ah…um….well, here it is anyway.

And you can’t forget about the crocodile in the pond, right next to the path without anything keeping it away from unknowing feet.

We walked on a lot of paths thru the jungle some easy.

Some not so easy.

The jungle was very dense right off the path and there was always something moving around in there.

We saw quite a few Spider Monkeys.

Even this one….he’s dead right now….we were told he was killed by a Jaguar.  George saying a few words over the departed.

There should be a bubble caption over Randy’s head;  “Hmmm,  it may not be a bad deal being a Mayan King.  I would have someone with a big fan keeping him cool and I could teach them how to make the perfect Chillata.  Ahh yes, it would be good to be King.”

We spent about 6 hours at Tikal, most of it walking thru the jungle. At times it was very humid, but the temperature wasn’t too bad. It cost us $40 each, 20 each to get in and 20 each for the guide. It was money well spent.

We headed to find a hotel about 30 minutes away. Ate dinner, got cleaned up worked on the blog and got a good nites rest. Tomorrow we leave for Belize. Our original plan was to cross into Mexico from Guatemala. Randy had asked Juan about the border and he told us that we would need to load our bikes into canoes to get across the river, no bridge there. So that’s out. We had ridden thru a corner of Belize the day before when we were riding towards Tikal. It was such a short distance that there wasn’t even a border crossing.

Today we got another early start. It took us 1.5 hours to get to the border. The crossing was quick and easy. Less than an hour to clear Guatemala and enter Belize.

Randy and I both were disappointed in Belize. We figure the coastal area must really be something special because what we saw was not very good. The land is basically flat, the houses are run down, the towns are dusty and dingy. Not a very good impression of this country. It took us about 4 hours to get thru Belize, the only stops we made were at the border and for lunch.

Tourists

Lunch

Interesting bridge.

Had to get a picture of the ‘meat shop’.

Can’t forget the “Slammer.”

We finally make it to the Mexico Border. Hooray! We have been looking forward to this for a while now. Being back in Mexico is almost…almost like being back home…not quite though. We love the people, the food and the customs. It’s great to be back.

We found a hotel, got dinner.

Now it’s time to rest. 252 miles today, 3 countries….Guatemala, Belize and Mexico. We will continue north, a while along the eastern coast then more inland. It still looks like 2-3 weeks before we get home. All in all it’s been quite an experience.

Adiós por ahora.

We left our hotel early to avoid the heat of the day when we were to tour the Mayan Ruins in Copan. It was a short ride, just a few kilometers away. We were there before the crowds arrived too, which is a good thing.

The grounds were well taken care of and the information was in Spanish and English, which was very helpful to us two dummies who didn’t bother to learn Spanish before this trip. We vowed we would take Russian in night school before our trip next year.

So here are some pictures of the ruins with little narration.

They rescue these parrots treat them and reintroduce them to the jungle when healthy enough.

Original photo they discovered of how it used to look.  (Tee Hee)

Where they used to hold NFL games.

More carvings located inside the museum.

We left Copan around noon and continued on to Rio Dolce, a place we saw advertised on a travel/tour poster. The good thing is that it was on the way to Tikal, which made it an easy decision.

We crossed a huge concrete bridge over the river and here was the town. Left turn, hotel, secure parking, so far so good! A few things to ask about before we check in….Wifi in room? Yes…check, Agua Caliente? Yes..check,  Air Conditioning? Yes..check, Cerveza fria? Yes..check..we’re good.

Bridge to town.

Pictures of the hotel.

We met a guy named “Ron” from Canada.  This guy was riding a BIG  BMW K1600 GTL (HUGE Touring Bike)  was traveling around the world. He figures it will take him 3-5 years to complete his journey.

Dinner. . . .

View from the restaurant.

Oops, erase one check..the beer wasn’t cold, but not real bad.

Oops, erase second check, wifi didn’t work in room, or outside, just in the restaurant in a certain section. For that matter, not really good at all, I was not able to upload any pictures, so no blog.

Oops, erase third check, no Agua Caliente, just a bit cool, but workable.

Oops, erase fourth check, AC stopped working. After a few minutes the owner got it to work again. Then a few minutes later, it stopped again. They were getting ready to close the restaurant, so there went any chance we had for wifi and for our AC? Mañana. So we slept with the noise of trucks cars and motorcycles for most of the night. At 2am, the local barflies returned to the hotel, woke some of us up, then passed out in their rooms. Not a good night.

We departed early this morning, this time for Tikal, the Mayan ruins in Guatemala. More on that later.

These ruins are supposed to be better than those in Mexico and quite extensive. We were told that there are a number of hotels about 20 kilometers fro Tikal so that was the plan. We rode all the way to the entrance of the park, got some info, turned around and headed back to find a room. We only rode 156 miles today, so it is almost like a down day. We got to the park at around 11am, but it was already in the 90′s so we decided to put it off until tomorrow at 7am. Nice hotel, nice room, good AC. Tomorrow we tour the ruins for four to five hours, then head out.

Internet lento, muchas horas subiendo fotos. . . . .

I think not. This has just proved to me that Honduras really is a beautiful country, the people are nice, they work hard, the roads are a mix of great and horrible and the food is not all that bad….but….we still can’t wait to get back to Mexico where the roads are good and not so good, the people are great, they work hard and the food is the best. Tomorrow we cross the border into Guatemala.

We, or should I say I, have come to the conclusion that Guatemala has the prettiest or should I say most beautiful women in all of Central America. It has been an ongoing task of mine to determine this and even though we still have one country to visit yet, Belize, I have a feeling Guatemala will run away with the honors. Of course, we spent the most time in Guatemala City, which may have something to do with it, so I’ll let you know if this holds true for the rest of the country. It has been a tough job, I have to do it all on my own because Randy refuses to participate. Even when I ask his opinion he always compares them to Michelle, (his lovely wife for those of you that didn’t know).

So, back to today.

We left….wherever it was we slept last night, after a complementary breakfast at the restaurant attached to the hotel. It was pretty good, hit the spot, did the job. We fueled up last night just before getting our room so it was on the road heading to the Caribbean. The roads, again, were very nice.

Our plan was to go to the Gulf of Honduras on the Caribbean Sea, then head to the Ruins of Copan. It took us about 3-4 hours of good riding.

We must be getting closer to the port, lots of trucks and containers.

Local housing development.

I’m just guessing, but I think this is saying something about the hundreds of high voltage wires overhead and the possible danger involved.

We kind of saw the port, we saw the beach and a few hotels, time to head west to Copan…

Hotel along the beach.

One of our rare stops for lunch, just couldn’t pass up a Burger King. These guys are ‘watching’ our bikes, we could have left them running with the armed guards and others looking at them.

All the Central American countries have armed guards at fast food restaurants, banks, supermarkets, anywhere where lots of cash changes hands. Most carry shotguns and sidearms. Now in Mexico and Guatemala, they carry automatic weapons (assault rifles).

Heading to Copan.

This guy in front of Randy has bicycles and junk piled 8 feet high on his little truck, swaying down the road. Couldn’t get past him quick enough for my liking.

Here is another one, this is not unusual in Latin America.

The only thing I can figure out is that this is a realtor open house….

Although this road fell apart quickly, potholes, gravel etc., the scenery was great and where the road was good, it was fun.

Kids are the same everywhere.

Honduran school bus.

….although we may not approve of their type of transportation, they approve of ours!

The road is starting to get bad, there was a point where cars were barely moving swerving from side to side trying to avoid the potholes.

We arrived in the city of Copan, too late to tour the Mayan ruins, so we got a room in a cool little hotel, pics tomorrow on that, but here are some from the town.

Dinner was here.

The food was very good.

Randy was ready.

Local beer.

The bikes tucked away for the night behind a locked gate.

Tomorrow after the ruins, we will enter Guatemala and head north east to Tikal, more ruins then Belize.

Good night Johnboy……..

We have spent two days in Honduras and have run the gamet on riding quality. Yesterday was crap, hot, bad drivers, hot, lousy roads, hot, bad drivers, loooong border crossing, hot, long day.

We stayed in Choluteca Honduras at the Hotel Kali. We stayed here on our way down. We were trying to find a different hotel for the night, just because, but it was getting late (dark) and you don’t ride after dark, so we made a dash for a familiar hotel. A/C, almost hot water, secure parking and just a few blocks from some good street food. We pulled in and were greeted like family. We got the same room, (23.00 total), upstairs, carried our junk up the winding spiral steel staircase, put everything in the room and headed out for food, showers will have to wait.

Got to the restaurant (?) and the food was just as we remembered, pretty good. Headed back to the room looking forward to a good shower after a tough day. We could not get the door to open, Randy tried, would not open, the security guy tried, could not open it. The security guy shrugged his shoulders and started to walk away, Randy was a little upset with him and insisted he call the owner. Here we were, tough day and now we cannot even get in our room where all our stuff was. Finally the owner showed up, told the Security/Maint guy to remove the glass on the jealousy windows and climb in. This he did and after about an hour, we were in. Result of the crap day, no blog, two tired dudes.

But, after looking back at the pictures, there were some nice town pictures.

We have noticed that people in Central America, with limited resources, are very resourceful.

Most likely milk heading to the processor.

Here I am giving a thumbs up, notice my headlight has already burned out, after 7000 miles. Randy told me before the trip he brings an extra headlight bulb because they have the tendency to burn out. I figured out with a new bike, no problems. Thanks Randy for carrying an extra.

Then, we were greeted with this, trucks lined up at the border. Motos, and cars, can pass them up and go to the front, but we still were there for two and a half  hours.

it was getting late, needed to make it to the hotel.

Today, we had an easy start of it, got out of town easy enough, it heated up quickly, but we got out of that just as quickly. Headed up into the mountains on a new route. The nice girl at the hotel last night gave us some ideas on what we should see while in her country. She told us it would be cooler heading towards the nations capital. Sounds like a big city to me… we hate big cities.

Apparently there is a road that bypasses the city. Luckily, Randy found it and we missed all the traffic. Breakfast was good, eggs, chicken, rice and juice.
Not too bad, for $5.00 each. We were looking forward to some cooler temps and some nice mountain roads.

The juice was not what we expected, being in this area with all the fresh fruit you’d think it would be fresh, oh well.

Heading north

Randy’s newest travel buddy, Buzzy the Bee (Randy named him).

We didn’t get any pictures of the road, too much fun, sweepers, (banked at that which is an oddity down here) twisties, way too much fun.

We saw a lot of this all throughout Central America. It seems that they just burn instead of cut the weeds, etc. Also, in the mountains, there are fires going all the time. No need to put it out, there is so much green here, the fire will run out of fuel. Speaking of fuel, Randy saw a guy pouring what he thought was diesel fuel on a fire to keep it going.

There were times the skies were black with smoke. We even think they burn their garbage in some areas.

We stopped at this hotel after about 7 hours, seems like a nice place, good price, $21 each plus a free breakfast, so it works out to about $16 each, well within our budget.

Tomorrow we head towards the Caribbean Sea to San Pedro Sula and then maybe (if we don’t spend time on the Caribbean) back west to a Mayan area, Copan.

Until then, George was not the only one instrumental in picking this hotel……  Just say’n. 

It was nice to take a down day, get some laundry done and do some sightseeing. We are at the same motel we used on the way down, no preferred customer discount though.

We hailed a cab to head for the ferry terminal. The ride was fairly uneventful, full use of the horn and tailgating everyone in front of us. Some sights along the way a lot of these man powered taxis in town.

Local auto parts store.

Maybe next time thru we can stay here….might be cheaper.

Got to the dock, no real terminal and the ferry was still boarding, lucky us, no 2 hour wait.  So off we go to tour Isla Ometepe. . . .

We splurged and opted for an english speaking tour guide who met us at the dock his name is Martin (Mar teen). Very nice guy, has a wife and 3 children, from highschool age to grammer school. He was intrigued with our story of riding our motorcycles to Panama. He wanted to get a moto for the island, but instead decided to get a flush toilet installed. That just may have been the right decision…family-wise. The island has two volcanos on it, one still active (1600 meters) and one inactive (1300 meters). The road around the island is all paved with paver stones. It must have been quite an undertaking to do it, but it looks great.

Here are some pictures of the initial ride on the island.

One of the nicer homes, most are run down.

Island traffic jam.

Taking dried grass for his livestock.

it was time to eat, so we pulled off the main road towards our restaurant. We told Martin we didn’t want to eat at a tourist spot but still wanted good food at a reasonable price.

Randy waiting for lunch.

We both had the same thing, shrimp in garlic oil with rice and fried plantanes.

The owner had two parrots to keep his clients entertained.

And then there were the rest of the neighborhood birds that were interested in what we were eating.

There were a few of these around and some got pretty bold.

Lunch was done, time to head on up the road to our van to continue the tour.

Some monkeys playing in the trees.

Motorcycle and bicycle rentals.

Entrance to one of the towns on the island.

inside of a 200 year old church that is falling apart and is no longer used.

Martin, our guide telling us that both he and his parents were baptised in this church.

One of the carved stone statues used to line a walk or road to the church.

The old church was looking a little rough.

Inside of the new church which is right behind the old church.

We walked around this town for a little while to see what was at the plaza.

Typical colorful bus you’ll find in many of the countries.

Beans and peppers for sale in the plaza.

  Continued around the island a bit more to see what there was to see.

Charco Verde had a very nice hotel and hostel, it also had a preserve.

Typical open air restaurant at the hotel, we stopped there for some fresh Guava Juice.

It was right on Lake Nicaragua.

A few of the rooms at the hotel.

Cabanas

After that, we headed back to the dock to catch the ferry back to the mainland. We caught a cab, had a good dinner in town and back to the hotel where we found out our laundry won’t be back until tomorrow morning….did I hear mañana?

Good beer.

Good steaks.

A part of Rivas we hadn’t seen before.

Back to the hotel, blogs, emails etc..tomorrow, Honduras then a route which will take us on an eastern route into Guatemala then Belize before returning to Mexico and the Yucatan.

No spot link today.  Until next time America. . . . .