May 3, 2010

Goodbye Rick.

Gosh, I’d had so much fun with him…he was great company–easy to be with, an awesome rider, and an instigator like me and we kept pushing each others’ envelopes. We’d had a great time together, but since we were headed in opposite directions (him North, me South) it was time to say goodbye. A break in traffic outside the hotel and I was off.

Need to make a call?

I had to show all the bike paperwork here for the nice policeman.

Bad piggy!

Pavement ends, back to ripio…

Yeah baby, I forgot to mention my Bolivian luck…Air Hawk found out that I was riding all these miles on a STOCK SEAT, and they sent me a cushion to La Paz. Yeah! salvation for those achey buns!

Wow. Serious landslide.

Uck. rain. Off and On all day. I’m soaked, even though my gear is supposed to be waterproof.

Miserable, I stop in Monteagudo. A strange little town that has all sorts of mining supplies in every little store…also selling lots of alcohol. Why alcohol? (Like the sterilizing kind.) I ask someone, and am told, in case they get cut or want to drink it! Oofa.

My hotel had a girl working that didn’t care too much. I bumped and banged into all the lobby furniture to get the bike inside–she was too busy watching her soap opera to help me.

I’m not happy with this place…there are two people in the hotel an they manage to put us right next to each other. There is no divider at the top of the wall, so I get to listen to my neighbor snore while the TV blares it’s evil noise. Just when I hit the REM sleep, his alarm goes off. WHAT?!? He get up, lights on, get ready and leaves. Phew Thank goodness. I just hit the REM sleep again when he’s BACK, this time with 114 kids and a woman that yells at them constantly…