2-24-06
Woke up this morning and went out to see the bikes. The little hogs were there checking them out.
hogs X
Down the road we passed a guy pulling a trailer delivering beer. These are quite common and they haul everything in them.
hauling beer X
we stopped along the road while Jim did a little adjustment on his bike. It involves unpacking.
Jim repairing X
The road sort of closed up here with the jungle closing in on us.
Jungle Jim on his kow-a-suckie X
When we pulled into this town we saw a store that sold Pirelli tires for motorcycles. I was getting really thin on my rear one after just five thousand miles of pavement. They had a somewhat aggressive Pirelli and I went for it as I really don’t want to have any problems with tires if possible. Jim decided to get one too as his tire had some serious gouges that were caused by the bolts holding on his voltage regulator he had mounted on his rear fender. The gouges had gone into the tire and down to the cord layer. We are both glad to have new tires but darn things were somewhat expensive. When we were in the shop I snapped this photo of their wrecker side hack. They use it to get bikes that need repair. They work on bikes as well as sell tires for them. I really liked this little outfit and it reminded me of the ones that the Harley dealer had in San Francisco when I lived there back in the sixties.
Wrecker hack X
2-25-06
both yesterday and today started out overcast and it was really nice to ride in the cool air. It seems like it always gets hot soon enough and in the afternoon it seems to rain. On our way out of town we stopped and hit a couple of banks before we found one that would accept our cards. After the warm cash was in our pockets, we headed out of town. We both just had to stop and get a photo of this auto parts store.
Auto parts store X
When we were stopped at a gas station we were surrounded like ususal and this guy rides up on a hack with his mechanic tools in it. he was really interested in the big bikes. These little side hacks are very popular here and I have not seen them outside of Brazil.
Mechanic side hack X
Going through another little town Jim passed this guy. I thought it was interesting how similar a load they were hauling. Jim with a 650cc and this guy with a 125cc. I am not sure what they haul in these gray jugs but could be water or milk.
Packing stuff X
I had my jacket off and this guy came down to check it out. I wonder if he could sting thourgh it?
wasp X
We made it only about 350 miles today. We stopped at a gas station and I got some oil as I needed to change my oil. Jim did the same and we ended up changing it right there. When I checked my saddle bags, I realized that one of the main supports for the saddle bag had broken. Those Happy Trails bags have some problems with the mounts. Actually there were two other hair line fractures in the mounts as well as the main break. We found a hotel and I rode back and got it welded up at a pretty tough looking truck fix it place. The guy had an old three phase welder that he just hung the bare wires on the incoming breaker box. All this while standing on a wooden chair in a big puddle of water. the shop was leaking like a sieve in the rain. He searched around and finally found some small rod and with a very small welding shield held in his hand, welded up my mounts. i sure wish i cuould have done the welding myself but it looks like it may hold for a while at least. I have a lot of weight in those bags and i can see how the miles of rough road can be really hard on those mounts, but i would think that that is what they would engineer those mounts for. I suppose most folks that buy those bags dont put them to the extream of the back road over the andes, ruta 40 to terra del fuego and the freaking topes (speed bumps) of central and south america.