adventurelog COLOMBIA
By Shawn Thomas #91122 “WHOA!” I
YELL
into my helmet. “Ha-ha, WHOA!” I’m laughing, at
least on the outside. Somehow I feel that making the frantic weaving through
Bogotá traffic sound “fun” will have a soothing effect. It seems to be work- ing on Hailey, who is sitting quietly in the passenger seat and listening to my comm chatter, but I’m nervous as hell. Traffic in urban Colombia is intense. People drive on the same side of the
road and generally use the same street signs and lane markers we’re accustomed to, but where the good ol’ USA calls for strict adherence to road rules, in Colombia they’re more of a suggestion. We are leaving town, and the bumpy two lane road is stuffed with traffic four cars wide. We’re lane-splitting, but not by choice; no one lets a two-wheeled vehicle have a lane to itself for long. Any openings are quickly filled with moving metal. As the speed fluctuates between 5 and 40 mph, I look to find no more than six inches on either side of my bike. That’s a tight fit, hence my nervous banter. It’s our first day in the country, and we
are exhausted from the flight in. Micho, our Elephant Motorcycle Tours guide, says into the Comm, “Normally, I’d give you a day to recover, but we’re on a tight schedule, and there’s A LOT to see!” Three years prior, I had met Micho at the MOA Rally in Salem, Oregon. He was peddling motorcycle tours for his company, and we became fast friends. He insisted I come to Colombia and see the sights, but I wasn’t convinced it was such a good idea. Colombia had a repu- tation for all manner of nefarious shenani- gans, I had politely argued, and was probably not a good place to be on a motor- cycle. “Nonsense!” Micho insisted with
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BMW OWNERS NEWS March 2017
discovery
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