upwithit

Marge spoke briefly with Dan this evening via satellite phone and also spoke with Helge’s wife, Karen, to provide the following update.

Dan’s wife, Marge, received a phone call from a relative in Hong Kong @ 4:00 a.m. this morning with news of the earthquake that centered about 200 miles south of Santiago, Chile this morning.

Day 45 – February 18 Potosi, Bolivia to Tupiza, BoliviaWe spent the morning in Potosi at a museum whose name translates to “The House of Money.” It was a mint used by the early Spaniards to coin silver before sending it back to Spain (after extracting it from the poor Incas). The museum’s collection—which was…

Cuzco, Peru to Puno, Peru to La Paz, Bolivia to Uyuni, Bolivia to Potosi, Bolivia Helge once again forced us up early, and we headed out of Cuzco in time to beat the Saturday morning market traffic.

In my previous blog, I inquired as to the physics behind the moisture from the Pacific dumping on the eastern side of the Andes rather than the western thus forming the large South American Pacific coast desert. I received the following from Jim Schaefer in my office:

Huarmey, Peru to Pisco, Peru to Nazca Peru to Abancay, Peru We drove from Huarmey to Pisco continuing through the desert on the PanAmerican Highway. This is a beautiful road surrounded by huge skylines and dunes – but not particularly interesting. The road is straight with few curves and we were able to cover a…

Quito, Ecuador to Cuenca, Ecuador to Cuenca, Ecuador, to Macara Ecuador to Chiclayo, Peru to Huarmey, Peru We took the day off in Quito on the 3rd – I caught up on work, and the others went for a tour of Quito. They visited a park which celebrates the equator; you’d assume it is located…

Pasto, Colombia to Quito, Ecuador We left Pasto still a little bit upset about missing Cali and exhausted from driving 360 miles and endlessly reconnoitering locations for next year’s trip. Helge is working us like draft animals – gone is the afternoon siesta.

Panama City, Panama to Bogota, Colombia to Pasto, Colombia Most of this time was not devoted to riding motorcycles but rather to shipping the bikes from Panama City to Bogota. While we waited for the bikes to arrive, we took the opportunity to tour the cities.

Tegucigalpa, Honduras to Managua, Nicaragua to the Arenal Volcano in Costa Rica to Panama City, Panama In Tegucigalpa, we left our bikes under the watchful eye of this guard brandishing a WWII MI Carbine.