PanoMoto - PanContinental Motorcyle Journey

Back Home

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 10:00:00 +0000

After nearly 3 1/2 years on the road, I'm finally back home with my parents – something I had been looking forward to for quite some time now.

The last few days in New York were pretty hectic – but also very enjoyable, thanks to my lovely hosts Eusebio & Natalie in New Jersey. Time flew past with New York sightseeing during the day, re-packing & preparing the motorcycle for shipping...

...and very unexpectedly some customs problems for the motorcycle: everytime I entered the US from either Mexico or Canada, customs weren't even remotely interested in the motorcycle & didn't want to give me any import paperwork (I did ask!). But when it came to shipping OUT of the country, of course, the customs department asked for exactly THAT paperwork.

Anyway – I only found out about all this once I was already in Germany. But in the end, my shipping agent in NY managed to work things out, so I don't have to fly back over. (Some "good will" by one of the customs officers, I was told...).
The motorcycle will leave NY by the end of next week. (And I'll update the shipping section here, once I've cleared customs in Europe).

Quick news on the photography side of things: The FlickR photo-blog is still stuck in Canada – but I managed to put a whole new image gallery online: Central & North America Panoramas. Hope you like them.

The photo-blog for Yukon, Alaska and Eastern USA will follow soon.

Canada - Beautiful British Columbia

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 23:09:00 +0000

"Beautiful British Columbia" is what is written on every vehicle license plate, here in Canada's most Western province. And it is indeed incredibly beautiful – if it isn't raining :)

At first, the weather was very good – but after leaving Vancouver Island, I had quite a few days of solid rain. Today (12th of July), it's the first REAL sunny day with blue sky & after a short break in Dease Lake I'll now make my way up into the Yukon Territory.

Two days ago, I had my first encounters with black bears, who were playing & feeding next to the road – 5 bears within 200km of riding. I haven't got any pictures yet, but I'm sure it won't be the last bears I've seen & will try to keep the camera ready for a few pictures.

Anyway – Here's the first photographs from Canada: British Columbia, Chiliwack to Dease Lake:

USA

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 01 Jul 2011 21:57:00 +0000

The USA Photo-Blog is now online. You can either view Thumbnails on FlickR, or the automated Slideshow (in the slideshow, click on "Show Info" to see photo captions & descriptions).

Mexico

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 10 May 2011 21:55:00 +0000

The Mexico Photo-Blog is now online. You can either view Thumbnails on FlickR, or the automated Slideshow (in the slideshow, click on "Show Info" to see photo captions & descriptions).

Central America

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 21:53:00 +0000

The Central America Photo-Blog is now online. Lots of small countries in a very small time – as I was trying to get to Alaska for the summer and I'm a bit behind schedule:

Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, Belize.

You can either view Thumbnails on FlickR, or the automated Slideshow (in the slideshow, click on "Show Info" to see photo captions & descriptions).

Colombia

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 21:47:00 +0000

The Colombia Photo-Blog is now online. You can either view Thumbnails on FlickR, or the automated Slideshow (in the slideshow, click on "Show Info" to see photo captions & descriptions).

Ecuador & Galapagos Islands (Oct-Nov 2010)

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 00:23:00 +0000

Another quick photo-blog update, still trying to catch up with everything: Ecuador and the Galapagos Islands.

I had been looking forward to the Galapagos Islands for quite a long time now – and it was indeed absolutely gorgeous. Some information for other travellers reading this blog: I managed to get a real good last-minute price for a 7-day boat cruise. There's a lot of detailed information on other traveller's blogs already, on how to do the islands "on the cheap", so just a brief summary here from my side:

Flight to Galapagos: US$380 (special promotion from TAME airlines, booked in the TAME office in Quito. Entrance fee to National Park: $100. I stayed on the islands for 4 nights, trying to get a last minute deal. There's plenty of offers, but only a few go to the "good" islands (Española and Genovesa, with the best bird-life). I finally found one with the "Guantanamera" boat, 7 days, US$840. Staying in Puerto Ayora (whilst looking for a local last-minute deal) is about $10-15 per day for accomodation, and $3 for a standard lunch. The local supermarket has all necessities for self-catering but prices are about double to mainland Ecuador.

Click on the images below to get taken to the photo-feed (with brief descriptive text). Or click here to see the automated slideshow.

Peru (Jul-Sep 2010)

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 20 Mar 2011 04:00:00 +0000

I finally found the time to do the photo-blog update for Peru. Sorry it took such a long time – but I've been rather busy with some organizational things & also had quite a lot of work on. (Yes, WORK.... since I did NOT win the lottery prior to this trip I have to do some work from time to time :(

Anyway... Not a great friend of words these days, here's Peru in a 'nutshell':)

Absolutely stunning mountain roads with lots of twisties (the best riding I had on the entire trip so far), lots of Llamas besides the road. A tyring but rewarding 2-day hike down and up the Colca Canyon (twice as deep as the Grand Canyon). Lots of "Inka" and ruins of course (Machu Picchu being the most well-known one). A re-encounter with some old round-the-world traveller friends (Holger & Anja) who I had last been riding with in Asia about 1 year ago. A stomach-testing 1-hour-flight above the 'Nazca Lines'. And very unfortunately, the worst accident I had on this trip so far – in the middle of the world's second-highest mountain range (the Cordillera Blanca): broken-off mainframe bolts & rear shock top bolt, but thankfully also a really great hospitality from Charlie at the Llanganuco Mountain Lodge where I could stay until my leg was healed enough to continue the trip.

Click on the images below to get taken to the photo-feed (with brief descriptive text). Or click here to see the automated slideshow.

Atacama Desert Panoramas

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 23:31:00 +0000

The Atacama Desert is the world's driest desert. And its most famous town, San Pedro de Atacama, could easily be retitled to 'San Polvo de Atacama' as the place really is fairly dusty.

The landscape here is simply stunning: lagoons, salt lakes, geysers, volcanoes... really, a landscape photographer's dream. And thanks to my trusted motorcycle, I was able to visit these places individually, rather than the crowded & pricey tourist tours.

I don't think that 'normal' pictures do this amazing place justice, so I decided to upload quite a number of panoramas to the panorama section (Gallery 3), which you can see here. Hope you like the images.

Paso de Jama – Three times...

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 27 Jun 2010 18:52:00 +0000

... Argentina -> Chile -> Argentina -> Chile. I'm soon gonna run out of blank passport pages. Here's a little episode of what was one of the worst weeks I've had in a very long time...

It all started outside of Jujuy, where I got to know Juan, a member of Jujuy's "Horizons Unlimited" motorcycle community. Horizons Unlimited is a really great community of like-minded overland travellers – and I've met some great people through that website. But in this case, I wish I had never met the guy. Don't get me wrong – he's a nice guy and we had a good roadside chat. But his recommendation for a 'nice' route from Argentina to Chile was something I wouldn't even DREAM about recommending to single motorcycle travellers. (Team of two: no problem)

My initial idea was to cross the Andes mountain range from Salta (Argentina) to San Pedro de Atacama (Chile) via the 'Paso Sico'. When I told Juan about that, he insisted I should really take the offroad tracks from Salta up towards 'Paso de Jama', where I would hit good tarmac after just 150 km, and that 'Paso de Jama' was waaayyy better than 'Paso Sico'. Those 150km of gravel, Juan said, were very easy, very compact gravel.... "no hay problema"... and that he's been on that track several times with a bigger and heavier bike than mine. So for me, it'd be even easier.

"OK", I thought, "when in Rome... do what the Romans do". So, the next morning I followed Juan's advised route. (Salta, R40, R38,...) Big mistake! The first part up to San Antonio de Cobres was straight-forward. The following Ruta 40 was OK (though needed full attention due to some hard-to-see sandy patches in-between the loose gravel and deep washboard). Then a left-turn onto Ruta 38, where corrugations got so bad that whatever speed I tried, I just couldn't "fly over" them. Then a few km of deep sand. Once I dropped the bike, I couldn't pick it up again – even after I took all the luggage off.

My heels simply dug into the sand, instead of lifting the bike. After a few attempts, I decided to wait for help. One hour later, I saw the only(!) car of the day coming my way, and together with its very helpful driver (who also got stuck in the sand) we managed to lift the bike. 200m later I was stuck in the sand again, so the car driver came back to push me out.

As soon as the road got a little better, I saw the turn-off for the shortest way that would lead me back onto tarmac. 15 km later, the 'road' was washed away by a river and the locals told me to turn around, backtrack and take the long way back to tarmac.

After a long day without food, about 30 minutes before sunset, I finally left Argentina for Chile. Some 60 km later, I finally crossed the highest point of 'Paso de Jama' (around 4800m), and in complete darkness descended the last 100 km down to San Pedro de Atacama. I was wearing EVERYTHING I had and it was so cold I couldn't feel my fingers or toes anymore.

San Pedro de Atacama brought the next surprise: at the Chilean customs office, I realized that ALL my bike paperwork was missing! I must have forgotten it at the Bolivia/Argentina border in La Quiaca, "just" 800km away! The border crossing was somewhat confusing, with 3 different customs officers dealing with my bike paperwork). Luckily, the Chilean customs officer was kind enough to let me into his country with an electronic copy (photograph) of my paperwork, which I had saved on my laptop. After nearly 13h of travelling from Salta, I checked into a San Pedro guesthouse at 21:45. My old travel buddy Carlos & his girl-friend were already waiting for me so we could celebrate into Carlos' birthday that evening: in a nice & cozy restaurant with warm open fire place and a good botlle of red wine, I could finally relax and warm up from the cold ride.

The next day, I e-mailed my friend Gustavo in Buenos Aires, who phoned up the border in La Quiaca. Indeed: my paperwork was at the border. But they refused to send it on to th Chilean/Argentinean border. There was no two ways about it... I had to go back ALL the way to the Argentinian/Bolivian border. 1600 km in 2 days "roundtrip". (Including a 2h discussion with Argentinian customs to let me into Argentina without any bike paperwork). The good thing about it: I was finally able to see the beautiful landscape around Paso de Jama during DAYTIME for a change. And I'm possibly the only "moto gringo" who crossed Paso de Jama 3 times within a week.

Celebrating 2 Years On The Road

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 19:12:00 +0000

I've recently had my "2 Years On The Road" jubilee, so went through images from the past 2 years. A lot of things have changed since 2008, and travelling for such a long time certainly moved energies and the general 'travel-mood'. I often think back to friends & family I left behind. And in recent months, whenever I went to see a so-called 'tourist highlight', I sometimes felt a bit 'over-saturated' and was missing the "WOW!" experience.

So it was good therapy for myself to look at some of my old images, which brought back some memories of people, places, food and other things. I've rearranged the images into new Photo-Albums & Slideshows. Here's the Collection. And the individual slideshows:

With regards to my current wherabouts: I've been stuck in Sucre / Bolivia for a while, due to problems with the thermostat and waterpump gears on the motorbike. I went for a test-ride yesterday & it all seems to good to go again.

So with a 3-week delay I'll be heading out to the Salar de Uyuni – the world's biggest salt-desert in nearly 4000m altitude. Although it's gotten pretty cold there over the past few weeks, I'll give it a go with camping as I really would like to see the sunset / sunrise in this magnificent landscape.

Images to follow soon I hope ;)

Paraguay

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 22:01:00 +0000

The Paraguay photo-diary/slideshow is online now. Had a very interesting & fun time there: cheap electronics shopping in Ciudad del Este, very friendly people, hardly any tourists, quite a hot ride on the Trans-Chaco Highway, some wildlife and an interesting encounter with some motorcycle-crazy Mennonites in the Chaco :)

Photo-Diary: the new Blog Format

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 00:53:00 +0000

Dear all,

For the 2nd part of this round-the-world trip (South America) I've decided to change the blog-format from a 'normal' blog to a more casual photo-diary, which you can find here.
I often found myself way behind with blog-writing, whilst spending far too much time behind my laptop, trying to come up with somewhat interesting blog-writing.
The photo-diary allows for more regular updates – and I'd like to hope that it's also a little more interesting for you.

Home Improvements

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 14:02:00 +0000

517 days on the road – 52500 km.

Time for some home improvements:

Thanks very much to my mum and my cousin, who helped downsize my camping gear volume. My mum made a little "handle-bar spice-rack" which I'll strap in between the mirrors. And my cousin Jürgen helped to come up with a small-sized cooking solution for my MSR DragonFly.

Thanks to Danielle, I now got a maskot & second passenger, which will look after me on these so-called 'roads': Mr Sockmonkey.

Touratech did a free out-of-warranty repair on my tank-bag's zipper, so I can finally close the t

Icebreaker Australia kindly extended their sponsorship with some more merino wool tops – including a nice '340' series vest which should keep me warm enough in the Southern parts of Patagonia. (I think it just doesn't get any better than merino wool. It worked a treat in Turkmenistan's Karakum desert (50 degrees +) as well as the rather chilly high-altitude plateau the Pamir Mountains / Tajikistan).

Exped Australia did a warranty replacement on the SynMat I've been using during camping: I had made the mistake of leaving the mat inside my tent during a hot day & one of the seams broke when the air inside the mat expanded.

Steve from the Camerahospital gave me an fantastic service (with an incredibly quick 1-day turnaround) on my camera gear: a good clean-up on the camera (and replacing around 10 screws that had vibrated loose during the past 18 months of 'gravel-travel') and a repair on my main lens (24-105).

And finally, I also upgraded & downsized my "electronics bag" and finally found a new cable for my Kensington Power Adapter – the old one had a loose connection since India. (More on that in my FlickR Gallery).

Transit via Europe

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 12:40:00 +0000

Strangely enough, the cheapest flights from Australia to South America were via Europe.

So I took this as an excuse & opportunity to visit family and friends in Germany and the UK.

It felt good to see some familiar faces – even if it was only for a short while. And the two weeks of 'Hotel Mama' & delicious food put new energy into my tired "traveller's battery" – Thanks a lot for everything, Mum & Dad!!

Then one short week in London, and I was off to Buenos Aires / Argentina on the 4th of November, to take a few weeks of Spanish classes before the motorcycle arrives.

Australia

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 13:28:00 +0000

Australia... A vast continent with an abundance of beautiful National Parks, and beautifully remote outback tracks (resulting in another broken shock absorber). Saltwater crocodiles, tent-eating ants, pasta-scavenging wallabies, windy riding-days, kangaroo-crocodile pizza and emu pie, ten-people towns and a pedal-powered washing-machine. Gorgeous beaches. Freezing outback-nights, followed by a perfect climate on the Sunshine Coast & a lovely welcome in Brisbane.

After city-hopping in Sydney, Canberra and Melbourne (+ some more National Parks), I sent the motorbike on its way to Buenos Aires. Initially this trip should have finished in Australia, but there's still a few bucks left in the travel budget. And in times of global recession I don't think I'd find a job back home anyway, so I might as well keep travelling for a bit longer.

Thanks very much to everyone who's spontaneously put me up for a few nights during my 4 months in Australia – be it friends, people I met en-route, or via couchsurfing! (Particularly Tex, Jenny & crew for introducing me to the local biker's culture, a great week-end and helping me with the head bearings!)

See my FlickR photo-blog (with image captions) for more details: Australia Photo-Gallery

Subscribe to my Photo-Feed via RSS. Don't know what RSS is? Click here. If you'd like to leave comments, you can do so on FlickR or below.

Here are some examples:

East Timor – Timor Leste

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 11:56:00 +0000

East Timor... A country still struggling from the aftermaths of Indonesian occupation. One of the world's newest countries, very welcoming people, tais weaving, Portugese heritage and lots of UN presence. Also the place where I needed to prepare & clean the bike for shipping and to meet Australian Quarantine regulations.

Read all about it on my photo-blog (with image captions): East-Timor Photo-Diary

Subscribe to my Photo-Feed via RSS. Don't know what RSS is? Click here. If you'd like to leave comments, you can do so on FlickR or below.

Here are some samples from my recent photo-blog:

Indonesia

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 26 May 2009 15:23:00 +0000

Indonesia....
5000km of riding, great people, fantastic food, bike-crazy locals, lots of ferries and island-hopping, Orang Utans, Komodo Dragons, active volcanoes, and the world's largest Buddhist Temple (Borobudur).

Read all about it on my photo-blog (with image captions): Indonesia Photo-Diary

Subscribe to my Photo-Feed via RSS. Don't know what RSS is? Click here. If you'd like to leave comments, you can do so on FlickR or below.

Malaysia & Singapore

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 12:43:00 +0000

One year into this trip, I've come to realize on a number of occasions that I spend too much time on the photographs, and not enough time on keeping this diary/blog section up to date. To allow for more regular updates in the future, and to make things a bit easier for myself, I'm going to change a few things:

All photos I post on FlickR are in chronological order and most of them have a little write-up underneath them anyway. Hence I feel there's no need to double up on the writing: Have a look at my Malaysia Photo Set on FlickR. If you prefer a more convenient way of viewing the images: here's the same in slideshow format.

You can subscribe to my FlickR images via RSS feed. Don't know what RSS is? Click here. If you'd like to leave comments, you can do so on FlickR or on this blog.

A very special thank you for Malaysia and Singapore go to Matt, who kindly took me out for an evening of good food and beverages. And to Sunny and his son Jin Sheng at Sunny Motorcycles in Kuala Lumpur for helping me with the 'big bike service'! Much appreciated, guys :)

Here's a few samples from the Malaysia collection:

Thailand II - It's nice to meet twice

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 08:21:00 +0000

Now that the rainy season in Malaysia and Indonesia is about to end, I can finally get back on track for my original route – meaning: one last visit to Thailand, to connect from Cambodia to Malaysia.

This time around, the two weeks in Thailand became one big ‘reunion’ and a chance to meet some people I hadn’t seen for a while: It all started in Bangkok, where we had two fairly big overlanders’ meetings with people I had met en-route since the UK. I still can’t believe that there were so many of us in Bangkok, ALL at the same time. And everyone had come to Thailand on their own motorcycle, starting in their home country, often travelling for the past 2-3 years.

I can say we had a great time together, telling stories of what we had experienced since we had met last time, exchanging travel information… and of course the occasional beer to quench our thirst.

Our first overlanders' meeting on Khao San road, from left to right: Me, Holger, Sascha, Rob, Elmar, Guido, Jörg, Anja, Esther

Our second meeting: Me, Guido, Olli, Elmar, Annette, Esther, Graham, Jörg, Rob, Holger & Anja.

And another one clockwise from left to right: Olli, Holger, Anja, Joerg, Graham, me, Annette, Esther, Guido & Rob. (Thanks for the pictures, Jörg!) Annette, Jörg, Elmar and I hooked up with Graham for a few days to go & see the Floating Markets outside Bangkok.

Our further route through Thailand was again mostly about meeting people I had met before: In Ranong we met up with Ulli, a German biker I had previously met in India (Ulli: I’m glad it worked out this time – it was a very nice evening in Ranong!).

Another 200km further down in Khao Lak, we went to visit Jintana, a local woman I got to know through a friend from England (Vanessa: Thanks a lot for introducing me to Jintana!). We had briefly met during my first visit to Khao Lak in January – and I’m glad we managed to meet up again for lunch & dinner, as Jintana is such an inspiring & refreshing character with a great sense of humour.

Last but not least, I went to visit Daniel in Songkhla again. Daniel is responsible for two of the finest culinary experiences I had on this trip: the first time we met, he took me to a fantastic seafood restaurant on Ko Yo; and this time we went to a local restaurant in Songkhla, where I discovered ‘century eggs’ as one of my favourite side-dishes ever. Daniel & I had a great evening together in the pub, with a real character of a host – Captain Carsten from Denmark, who runs a cargo ship near Australia and during his on-shore time runs “The Office” bar, generously paying quite a few rounds for his guests. (Daniel: Thanks a lot for the good time we had, your good advice on Southern Thailand, and for the beverages & moto-taxi!)

All in all, a very joyful 2 weeks in Thailand, and a good example for the benefits of travelling slowly. I’m glad I had the time to meet up with everyone again – and I hope we’ll meet again somewhere some day.

Here are a few more images from the Thailand Album on FlickR:

Cambodia Border Crossing

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 15:37:00 +0000

Those of you whoe been following this blog might remember my border-crossing from Uzbekistan into Tajikistan, together with my (at the time) travel-partner Len: wrong visa date, limited food supplies, camping in no-ones land between borders for 2 days. A little bit annoying, but it turned out to be OK.

It's been a long time since Tajikistan, and I'd been wondering what the next "border crossing gone wrong" would look like. Now I know. This time around, it's my new travel-partner Elmar and I, crossing from Laos into Cambodia (Voen Kham/Dom Kralor border). Total time spent at the border: a record-breaking 4 hours.

Laos Customs: With a 12pm arrival at Laos Customs, we find the whole border department enjoying their lunch-break. Everything's friendly & relaxed, we're even allowed to take some photographs. Lunch-break? No problem! The custom's officer gets up, takes our Carnet de Passages (=visa for the bike), goes to his office and a few minutes later comes back with the Carnet stamped out of Laos. I'm stunned... one of the quickest Custom's procedures I've seen so far (5 minutes ago, the customs officer was officially on lunch break!).

Laos Immigration: When entering Laos, one of the border officers apparently forgot an important stamp. A quick chat with the boss - no problem. After stamping us out of Laos, we get asked for a "stamp fee" (=bribe) of $1. We tell the officer 'stamping is part of your duty', he contemplates for a brief moment, but then agrees and lets us go.

Cambodia Customs & Immigration: This is where it gets a little messy. Immigration greets us with a friendly "Welcome to Cambodia", followed by "First you have to do Customs for your motorcycles". OK. No problem. Then the Customs officer on duty comes up: drunk, cross-eyed, just about able to walk, hand stretched out towards us (no "Hello" or "Welcome"), yelling "Figh lola!". (Translation into sober language: "Five Dollars!"). Bribe-time? Elmar and I look at each other, shaking our heads. No. Let's see where this leads! We follow Mr Customs to his office, fill out the paperwork, and wait for him to stamp our Carnet (bike paperwork). (Which he does, prior to asking for the bribe. A normal (corrupt) customs officer wouldn't even touch the stamp before he's got the cash in hand. But after all, this guy's drunk, right?)

Mr Customs: "Figh lola, stamp fee".
Us: Just stamp the Carnet. We'll discuss the $5 later.
(Custom guy stamps the Carnet) "Figh lola"
We'll pay the $5, but we'd like a receipt.
No receipt. This law Cambodia.
OK. Nice try for a bribe, but: No receipt = no $5.

Well - we've got what we need, and we've already got the Cambodian Visa. Next stop: Immigration.

Immigration: "I can stamp you into Cambodia, but Mr Customs has a problem with your motorcycles. If I stamp you in, you can enter the country. But your motorcycles need to stay here."
"That's our problem. Just stamp us in, please"
(Immigration talks with Mr Customs) "No, I can't stamp you in. Customs wants to check your engine number & frame number with the Carnet."

Elmar and I know that this is bullshit. If anything, the engine/frame number needs to be checked before stamping the Carnet. So it's pretty obvious that the Customs guy is up to something. I'm usually quite together when it comes to border crossings, especially once I sniffed corruption. But for some strange reason (I'm blaming heat & dehydration), the Customs guy gets hold of my Carnet de Passage. And he's walking away from the motorcycles to his office. If he wants to read the engine number on the bike, he needs to walk towards the motorcycle... Not good.

But the guy's drunk. So whilst he's on his way back to his office, I'm trying to remind him that my motorcycle is standing right behind him, on the one and only road - and not behind his office. But obviously, he's not even remotely interested in reading the engine number. He's only interested in keeping my carnet. And that's worth €3000 to me, so to release the bond I paid for it in Germany upon my return there. I follow the guy back to his office. And once we get there, his behaviour changes from 'plain drunk' to 'sulky'. Body language just like a little child: No eye-contact with me, arms crossed in front of his stomach, head turned sideways staring at the floor in front of him.

So far, Mr Customs was wearing a white shirt. Now he puts on his Customs shirt, sits down behind his desk, hammers his fist on the desk, shouting "This law Cambodia". (Still no eye-contact with me). I'm trying to calm him down, and as I've lost literally ALL respect for this dude, point out the motorcycle to him again, trying to talk sense into the guy: You want to read the engine number - THERE you go! Nope - the guy won't move. No discussions. Not even about the $5 anymore! (Seriously, I am not that bothered about $5, I simply thought I'd try it on and at least steal a bit of time the guy has just gone SO sulky, he won't listen, he won't talk. We even try to communicate to him through his (sober & sane) Immigration collegue. To no success.

"Plan B", it seems. No Cambodia. Maybe back into Laos? Elmar goes back to Laos Immigration to see if we can get back into the country. In the meantime, I grab my mobile phone and call the German Embassy in Lao to see if they can help. And whilst I'm making that phone-call, I make sure that Mr Customs realizes that I'm writing down his officers' number (a good thing he put on his official uniform ;). He quickly takes off his uniform - too late.

To cut a long story short: Laos Immigration is more than happy to let us back into Laos. We tell the Cambodian side that we have 2 options: we either get the Carnet back NOW (and then go back to Laos), or: if we don't get the paperwork back, we will pitch a tent in front of their front garden, wait as long as necessary and THEN go back to Laos. Elmar and I hope that they understand that the result would be the same: no $5, and no Cambodia. But as you can probably imagine: it's hard to explain this to a drunken Customs officer. As for the German Embassy: Mr Customs has committed theft. And because of that, the Embassy is going to try sort things out with Cambodian Customs head office.

Whilst we're waiting for a call-back from the Embassy, we decide to take some pictures of Mr Customs and his flash Toyota HiLux (which is standing right next to the hammock he's now lying in). The result: A stone-throwing Mr Customs, who's desperately trying to catch Elmar and get hold of Elmar's camera. At times it's so ridiculous, Mr Customs is even hiding in his hut, so we can't take more photographs of him. By now, the whole thing has been going on for over 3 hours. We've already set our mind on camping in front of Mr Custom's hut, when suddenly his boss comes out of the big office on the other side of the road: he has a brief chat with the (sober) Immigration guy, who translates to us the unexpected: if we delete all the photographs we took at this border, we will get my Carnet back. And we can go into Cambodia. Finally. In front of the big boss's eyes, we delete all photographs, get the Carnet back and we're stamped into Cambodia. And as we're rolling our bikes into the country, the drunk customs guy is still sitting in front of his office, arms crossed in front of his stomach, head pointed downwards - still the same sulky body language as 3 hours ago.

Was it worth it for us? Certainly not just to save $5. But it was an interesting experience. And overall, I think it was the right thing to do: generally, I'm trying to avoid paying bribes as much as I can. By paying bribes, I'm not going to change the way things are in a country. Not paying bribes MIGHT change things on the long run. That said: as a traveller, I'm fortunate enough to have embassy-support in a case like this (stolen carnet). In a corrupt system, the local people usually don't have this kind of privilege, because the police is often just as corrupt as the person they're dealing with.

Although I'm not too serious about it, I still have a personal "no bribes record" (if there is such a thing). It's a bit of a game that keeps me entertained at times. But I'm fully aware that there will be a time when I'll have to pay a bribe: In fact, 1h into this Laos-Cambodia border crossing game, I was prepared to pay the $5. But the rather peculiar setting (sulky customs guy, stolen Carnet de Passage, him throwing stones, no discussions!) somewhat caused a stale mate situation. And the fact that he didn't even say "Hello" certainly didn't appeal to me either. If he had projected a little more authority (instead of just stealing an important document of mine), there wouldn't have been two ways about it.

Apart from the border crossing, we felt very welcome in Cambodia and went to see the "S21" concentration camp on Phnom Penh, and the world's biggest religious site, Angkor Wat, in Siem Reap. Here are some samples from the Cambodia Album on FlickR:

Laos: Handicap International

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 15:54:00 +0000

Our last day in Vientiane turns out to be one of the most interesting ones: Elmar and I visit an exhibition from the ‘COPE’ charity – a really well-made and educational show about Laos’ heritage of unexploded ordinance and their devastating effects on the people. COPE work closely together with Handicap International and UXO Lao, and with a combined effort these 3 charities help to clear sites of landmines, educate the local population and run rehabilitation programmes to help mine victims.

As mentioned in the charity section on this website, I am fundraising for Handicap International with this journey. Making a donation is quick & easy – just follow the link and you’ll get taken to a secure server from a company “Just Giving”. 100% of your donation goes straight to Handicap International.
If you'd like to find out more about Handicap International's activity in Laos, click here.

From one of the ‘COPE’ workers, we get the phone number from Mr Phayabseng, a Prothesist & Orthotist working for Handicap International in Southern Laos, and on our way through Savannakhet we pay him a visit at the local Rehabilitation Centre. Seeing Mr Phayabseng’s workshop, it very quickly becomes clear that even a small amount of money goes a long way here:
The prothesis they produce are very basic, but nicely moulded and shaped individually for each patient, and very comfortable to wear. A lot of people come here to have their ‘wooden leg’ replaced for a moulded plastic prothesis.

(Little side note: considering that he’d lost one leg after stepping into a landmine dropped by the US, it was quite strange (or ‘funny’) to see one of the patients wearing a “Johnny Walker” advertising t-shirt, saying “Johnny Walker – Keep Walking”, covered by a camoulflage jacket with a "US Army" sticker. Very bizarre.)

Laos Part 1: The North

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 15:13:00 +0000

A short 10-minute ferry-crossing over the mighty Mekong river takes us from Thailand into Laos. “Us” meaning: my new travel-partners Holger & Anja, and 2 fellow motorcyclists we met at the ferry-port: David and Mai from Thailand. The visa on arrival for Laos is quick & easy, and within a short time the five of us are en-route to Luang Namtha in Northern Laos.

This is my second visit to Laos, and I’ve been looking forward to coming back here ever since I left this beautiful country with its gorgeous landscapes, its welcoming people, and their relaxed way of life.

The reason why I’m raising funds for Handicap International with this trip has got to do with Laos’ disturbing past (and present): Laos is the most heavily-bombed country on earth, and the tremendous amount of unexploded ordinance (‘UXO’) and landmines are a major problem, particularly in the rural areas, where unexploded cluster ‘bomblets’ are hidden away in the farmland.

The official story: Between 1964 and 1973, in an attempt to destroy the communist Pathet Lao and cut Vietnamese supply lines, the US flew over 500,000 air strikes over Laos. Over 2 tons of bombs were dropped, around 80 million cluster bomblets in total. Between 15-30% of these tennis ball sized bomblets did not explode, leaving up to 24 million pieces of UXO.
The inofficial story is about a US / CIA clandestine involvement, or the ‘Secret War’ on Laos.
Officially, the two countries have never been at war with each other.

For about one week, our route takes us through remote & mountainous Northern Laos, which in large parts is populated by the Hmong minority, and I’ve got to say it was one of the most fantastic and refreshing places I visited during this trip:
Great mountain roads with lots of curves and hardly any traffic; streets lined with natural growth forest/jungle and rice-paddies, and very pittoresque villages with bamboo houses on stilts and thatched roofs. Food was very basic, but nevertheless delicious – most of the time it was noodle soup with egg & vegetables.

Without doubt the nicest part of northern Laos are the people: Whenever we pass through a village, people on the streets start to smile, shout a ‘Sabaidee’ (welcome) and wave their hands. And for the babies, who are too young to realize what is happening, their parents take their hands and wave them together. At times, I wished I was travelling by bicycle, just to soak up all this enthusiasm for even longer.

After this time in the distant mountain areas, the ‘golden city’ of Luang Prabang cames as a little ’shock to my system’ (and to my wallet). Due to its World Heritage status, Luang Prabang now attracts a huge amount of tourists of all ages/budgets. A lot of things have changed since I last came here 6 years ago: the evening market has become much bigger & commercialized, a lot of Heritage Hotels cater for high-end package tourism, and some trendy bars are selling local beer at prices similar to central Rome.

Still, I very much enjoyed Luang Prabang – particularly the relaxed evening atmosphere near the Mekong river, with a yummy baguette sandwich from the market (finally some good bread again) followed by my favourite Beer Lao.

My route takes me down to Van Vieng – a place I was never keen to visit, but hey… I thought I’d give it a try this time. And what a surreal place this is! Imagine a little bit of Ibiza (or Mallorca), place it in the middle of a laid-back, Buddhist country like Laos and you’ll have a rough idea about what Van Vieng is like. People usually come here for some ‘tubing’: going down the river for 4km in an inflated inner-tube. Sounds like fun, but unfortunately the river isn’t really flowing fast or anything. But it’s lined with lots of ‘beach bars’ playing party music. So the ‘tubing’ is mainly about getting from one bar to the next, getting drunk and (once drunk enough to forget about health & safety issues), crawling up a ladder & take a swing into the river from about 10m height.

For those who’re too hung-over to go tubing, the several restaurants offer the perfect hangover-remedy: Literally every 30 meters, there’s another restaurant playing a fine selection of TV-series: Friends, The Simpsons, Seinfeld, Futurama… even Tom & Jerry. All from 8am till late night. And to make sure that there’s not too much human interaction happening at the tables, ALL the chairs and benches in ALL the restaurants point in the same direction: towards the TV.

Believe it or not: because of that stupid restaurant next to my hotel, I went to bed AND woke up to the opening music of ‘Friends’. How sad is this? I mean, there’s so many things to do & see in Laos… why would anyone want to go tubing, get drunk and watch TV all day?

I continue to Vientiane, Laos’ sleepy capital, to get my Visa for Cambodia, and to meet up with Holger & Anja again. In the morning of my birthday they surprise me with a yummy chocolate cake, and after a very relaxing day the three of us have dinner together in one of the Mekong river-side restaurants.
Here in Vientiane, I meet up with Elmar, another motorcyclist from Germany who’s part of a group of three. His travel-partners Joerg & Annette had a problem with their motorcycle and need to have it fixed in Bangkok. So Elmar and I team up for southern Laos. Anja and Holger have already continued their route one day before us – but we’ll probably all meet again in Cambodia or Bangkok.

Have a look through the galleries for a few more photographs from Laos: Full gallery - Slideshow

Thailand (+ Photo Gallery)

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 19:36:00 +0000

I’ve been on the road for about 8 months now. Time for a break, stay in one place for a while, spend some time with my parents and swap my motorcycle for the diving-gear.
Thailand is just the right place for all that: With its well-developed tourist infrastructure, Thailand is easy to travel for my parents; there’s some really fantastic dive-sites; and I didn’t need to break the bank in order to find myself some reasonably-priced long-term accommodation.

The day after I got to Bangkok, I went back to the airport to get my bike out of cargo and through customs – an endeavour that lasted 7 hours followed by a 2-hour ride back to the guesthouse. Central Bangkok during rush-hour (and in hot weather) is not much fun, but at least the cars, tuk-tuks and busses were laning, had a working headlight and were using their indicators… something I hadn’t witnessed ever since I left Turkey.

Over Christmas and New Year’s Eve, I spent a good 4 weeks with my parents in & around Phuket and Phi Phi Island. And this family get-together over Christmas was really nice – after all, I still don’t know how much more time I’d spend on this journey and when I would see them again.

The 4 weeks passed by very quickly. On the relaxing side of things there were quite a few days at the beach, good food, cheap massages, some fun-dives followed by an advanced diving course & another few dives on a liveaboard in the Similan Islands. Plus a few good evenings & beers with Guido & Esther – an overlanding/motorcycling couple who’re on their way back to Switzerland. The less relaxing part & things that kept me entertained: recovery of a broken hard-drive (yes, the one with ALL my photos on it!), re-organizing & backing up photographs (for my parents to take back home), finishing my online tax-return (I’d like to meet the brainiac who programmed that part of the HMRC’s website), servicing the bike (my parents had brought some spare parts from Germany with them) and a Thai Visa-run to Malaysia.

I better explain the reason for this Thai Visa run: The initial plan was to continue into Malaysia, but a brief look at the weather charts for Malaysia, Indonesia and Australia made me change my travel route: in order to avoid the rainy season south of Thailand, I decided it’d be better to take a 5-7 week loop through Laos and Cambodia before getting ‘back on track’ into Malaysia and Indonesia around April. To cut a long story short: my ‘Allowance To Stay’ for Thailand was about to expire, and I had to leave the country (bike included) and get a new visa.

A 10-12h ride took me from Phuket to Malaysia, where I bumped into Sheen, Clement and Helen, a few fellow motorcyclist who’re also doing a world-trip. On the way back to Phuket, Sheen and I teamed up for a few days through the South-East of Thailand, before we went our own ways: Sheen into Northern Thailand, me back to my parents on Phuket. Once my parents had left Phuket, I headed up towards Northern Thailand (Chiang Mai), with short stop-overs in Khao Lak, Ranong and Kanchananburi. In Chiang Mai, I met Holger & Anja – another motorcycling couple on their world-trip, again on BMW F650s: from hear-say and personal acquaintances, in January 2009 there were at least 17 bikers passing through Thailand on their world trip, 9 of them on a F650 Dakar).

With a local BMW dealer nearby, Chiang Mai was the ideal place to do some more bike maintenance – although I got to say I’m not impressed with BMW Thailand: once I’d checked the valve clearances, I found out they don’t even have valve shims in stock. Big BMW Dealership, marble floor, large window shop-front, big bikes inside… but a standard(!) service-part the size of a coin – not available anywhere in Thailand. “45 working days from Germany”. I’m speechless. To cut a long story short: thanks to updated clearance specifications, the valves turned out to be just OK. So the last thing to do on the bike was: once again, new subframe-bolts. This time I had them enlarged & re-threaded, plus the right-hand pannier mount needed some welding done. All for a bargain-price of €10 at Joe’s Bike Team in Chiang Mai – highly recommended.

Holger, Anja and I spent quite some time together in Chiang Mai and ended up leaving for Laos on the same day (albeit on a different route). A scenic route past the Golden Triangle took me to Chiang Khong, where the three of us met up again to take the ferry over the Mekong into Laos.

For more details & images (including comments), have a look at my Thailand Album on FlickR.

The full-screen slideshow version can be found here. (To read the report during the slideshow, click 'Show Info' in the top right).

Here are more samples from the album:

Nepal ( + Photo Gallery)

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 10:09:00 +0000

I had been looking forward to coming back to Nepal ever since my first visit to this beautiful country over 10 years ago. And after this second visit, for some strange reason it now feels a bit like a second home.

Last time I was here, I did a fair bit of trekking in the Langtang region. This time, I wanted to see some of the places I couldn’t visit back in 1998 – most importantly the little town of Lumbini, Buddha’s birthplace. Timing couldn’t have been better: there was a huge Buddhist Festival in Lumbini, and lots of monks had come from all over Nepal. When I rocked up in the guesthouse, I was immediately surrounded by a crowd of Buddhist monks who were all keen to have a look at the bike.
On my first evening in Lumbini, I made friends with one of the monks (Jayzin), who happened to be into graphic design and spoke very good English. We had a real good chat over some chai, swapped e-mail addresses and arranged to meet up again in Kathmandu.

After checking on my e-mails for the first time since about a week, I found out that Bangkok Airport was occupied by demonstrants, with no flights going in or out of Thailand. Not good, as I had already booked a flight for me & the bike from Kathmandu to Bangkok – 10 days from now. The idea was to meet my parents in Thailand and then spend Christmas & New Year together. But with Bangkok closed for air traffic, and me being potentially stuck in Nepal, we had to re-schedule our flights so we could at least meet up for a few weeks.

A 5-hour ride on the gorgeous ‘Siddharta Highway’ took me to Pokhara, a relaxed little lakeside-town I had already visited back in 1998.
Since then, Pokhara has changed quite a bit: streets are all tarmaced now, gears on the rental mountain bikes are actually functioning this time around, and restaurant prices have risen sharply.
Other things stayed the same: bad cover-bands trying their interpretation of “Sultans Of Swing”, street-merchants selling Tibetan handicrafts, regular power-cuts, yes, even the “Himalaya Haircut & Saving” still exists, with the same typo/missing ‘h’ on the shop-sign.

In an attempt to visit some familiar places outside of Pokhara, I spotted a little family-run corner-shop where I’d been back in 1998. As I parked up the bike, I noticed a young girl sitting next to the table. She spoke a little bit of English, and I soon realized that it was the same girl I had photographed back then. And she was more than happy to pose for a second photograph.
As if this wasn’t enough of a coincidence: a few hours later, I bumped into another familiar face – Willy, a Swiss guy I had met on a trek 10 years ago (and never seen again since then). When I first asked him if he was from Switzerland and if he had worked for a tea-company a long time ago, he was speechless. Then it dawned on him and he remembered me as well, said he was here on holiday with his girl-friend Sarah, and the three of us arranged to meet up for dinner & beers that same night.
Just as I was ready to leave Pokhara, the good news from Kathmandu finally arrived: Bangkok Airport was open again, and my flight could proceed as scheduled. So: off to Kathmandu!

Shipping the bike was really straight-forward, and Eagle Eyes Cargo from Kathmandu kept every promise – really fantastic service. (More about this in the ‘Shipping’ section on this website).

After the bike was crated up and sent off to Bangkok, I had another 2 days for sight-seeing in the Kathmandu valley, and to meet up with Jayzin (the Buddhist monk from Lumbini) and his two cousins Dorje and Balden. As it happens, Dorje and Balden are also keen motorcyclists who’ve been around Nepal quite a bit – including a trip into the remote Mustang area, where one of their bikes fell down a mountain track and had to be recovered by helicopter (no big deal apparently!?)…
The four of us had a great evening together, and it goes to show that young people are the same everywhere – Buddhist monks included: even if posing for images, flash sun-glasses and mobile phones might not go with the some westerners’ perception of monkhood & Buddhism.

Leaving Kathmandu by airplane felt a little strange after so many miles of overland travels on the motorbike. And although part of me was glad to have some time ‘out of the saddle’, I would have preferred to keep on riding. Maybe one day it’ll be possible to cross Myanmar/Burma by motorcycle.

For more details & images (including comments), have a look at my Nepal Album on FlickR.

The full-screen slideshow version can be found here. (To read the report during the slideshow, click 'Show Info' in the top right).

Here are more samples from the album: