Corners, cows and carburetors!
The roads were like this the whole day and next!On a map it doesn't look that far from Cuzco to Nazca, home of those weird lines in the desert. But try riding it one day when you're early risers like Mike and me. Actually for once, we're not that late in starting, I think we managed it before 9am somehow. But as usual, days just don't turn out how you plan. Especially when you throw in an entire day's riding where there is only one stretch for about 2 km, that doesn't involve a corner - most of which were hairpin bends. The rather 'detailed' map shows a relatively straight road, thanks alot!
Fortunately, for a rare occasion, I'm in 'the zone' for going round corners, thank god, otherwise I think Mike would have left me after the first 50. I manage to keep up, but that probably has something to do with the fact that he was taking them a little slower, realising that around every other corner there would be a cow, standing, blissfully unaware of her surroundings, in the middle of the road. Not only did I loose count of the corners, but of the amount of times there was livestock, being hearded, grazing, or just mooching about for one reason or another and sometimes for no reason at all, in the middle of the road. Obvioulsy wire fences aren't big in Peru.
Oh and did I mention that my bike started to stall again. Quite usefully as I was going around some of those rather tight corners. The carb was getting blocked again. That guy in Cuzco was probably as much a mechanic as I was. Although I was cursing him for most of the afternoon, thinking that I'd been ripped off, I have to apologize and state that it could well have been the dodgy new fuel filter that was now broken. We replaced it later in Lima with a fancy new one and I haven't had any trouble since.
So needless to say we din't arrive in Nazca that night but had an interesting ride into some hick town about 2 hours short, riding in the pitch black, freezing cold, around hairpin bends still watching out for cows.
That night I dreamt that I was riding around corners, all night! (Like when you come off a boat that you've been on for a while, and you still think you're gently rocking on the water when you lay down) Only when I woke up in the morning, I had another two hours of them. God, what I would have given for a straight bit of road!
Fortunately, for a rare occasion, I'm in 'the zone' for going round corners, thank god, otherwise I think Mike would have left me after the first 50. I manage to keep up, but that probably has something to do with the fact that he was taking them a little slower, realising that around every other corner there would be a cow, standing, blissfully unaware of her surroundings, in the middle of the road. Not only did I loose count of the corners, but of the amount of times there was livestock, being hearded, grazing, or just mooching about for one reason or another and sometimes for no reason at all, in the middle of the road. Obvioulsy wire fences aren't big in Peru.
Oh and did I mention that my bike started to stall again. Quite usefully as I was going around some of those rather tight corners. The carb was getting blocked again. That guy in Cuzco was probably as much a mechanic as I was. Although I was cursing him for most of the afternoon, thinking that I'd been ripped off, I have to apologize and state that it could well have been the dodgy new fuel filter that was now broken. We replaced it later in Lima with a fancy new one and I haven't had any trouble since.
So needless to say we din't arrive in Nazca that night but had an interesting ride into some hick town about 2 hours short, riding in the pitch black, freezing cold, around hairpin bends still watching out for cows.
That night I dreamt that I was riding around corners, all night! (Like when you come off a boat that you've been on for a while, and you still think you're gently rocking on the water when you lay down) Only when I woke up in the morning, I had another two hours of them. God, what I would have given for a straight bit of road!
posted by Michelle at 3:07 am
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