February 18, 2016

Arriving in Puerto Natales in the rain, snow and wind, I made a difficult decision to skip a highlight of this area: Torres del Paine National Park. It’s supposed to be beautiful. And I’m sure it is. When it’s dry, or warm enough to enjoy. Unfortunately, with the very strong winds, rain, and snow (and COLD), it wasn’t my time. Puerto Natales was completely booked full. I finally found a small backpackers’ hostel with one available bed in a 9×9 foot room with seven other people. I was numb, and my fingers were beginning to feel like frostbite, even with the winter gloves and the heated grips, so I took it.

The next morning the sun was out but the wind was already blowing hard and it was still in the upper 30s as I headed towards Punta Arenas. My front tire was to the point that I was stopping every ten to fifteen miles to inspect it, looking for any signs that the tire was beginning to fail. The two side-by-side knobs in the center had worn smooth with the carcass of the tire.

I stopped about halfway to Punta Arenas in Tehuelche for a cup of coffee to warm up. Very nice lady in a cafe and I was her only customer. About thirty minutes later a bus pulls up, full of Greek tourists. As usual, they were curious about the crazy Texan on the small motorcycle.

We talked briefly, wished each other “Buen Viaje” and we all took off for Punta Arenas.

I eventually made it, with my tire still intact. Once again, the town was fully booked, but I found a campground just north of the airport. I am completely baffled as to why this campground was totally vacant. Yes, there was some trash there, but not terrible, and not everywhere. I chose a spot away from the trash, with decent wind protection, and set up camp.

Easy to figure out which direction the wind blows here: look at the trees. Then park the motorcycle facing directly into the wind so it hopefully stays upright, and set up the tent so the doors are not facing the wind. And use ALL of the tent stakes.

Notice that the picnic tables only have benches on the upwind side. Nobody wants their food blown into them while eating.

All of the shelters face the same direction, for obvious reason.

In the morning, I climbed out of my tent and looked around. I was still the only person in the campground. Odd. But enjoyable. Definitely no complaints from this hermit.

I headed into town to get new tires. Unfortunately, a bit of searching the day before revealed that tire choices were much more limited than I had hoped here. The Yamaha dealer had nothing but true MX tires; not road worthy. The Honda dealer had one Pirelli MT90 front and no rears. The main guy in town, Alejandro Lagos, is fairly well known in the adventure touring world, and I went there first. He also had no Pirellis; he mainly deals in Heidenau tires for the big BMWs. But he had a couple of Heidenau tires that would fit my bike: a K60 rear (good) and a K76 front (not as good…more of a street tire than off-road). At this point, I couldn’t be too picky. I needed to get to Buenos Aires, and the last of the gravel was between here and Ushuaia (I think). So I agreed to those tires.

My bike went onto the lift and into the air…

Bike up on the lift, rear tire done, front tire being changed. Photo taken just before disaster struck.

I was sitting on a bench just to the right of where this photo was taken. Suddenly I heard a loud crash. When I looked toward the bike, my mind had trouble processing what I saw. My bike was completely upside down, wheels in the air, license plate upside down. Adrenaline kicked in and I ran over to help (in hindsight I wish I had taken the time to pull the camera out of my pocket and take a photo). The bike was still strapped to the lift, and the lift was on its’ side next to the bike. It eventually took three of us to lift the bike enough to get the pannier out from under the lift so we could lower the lift and then lift the bike back up onto the worklift. My GPS was gone; it had made first contact with the concrete, along with the mirrors, the right side of which also exploded on impact. Brake fluid was leaking onto other components from the front master cylinder (that happens when a normally highest-point vent becomes the lowest location on a master cylinder). The right handguard was bent, the exhaust shield was dented, my Garmin gps dock was in two pieces. Things were basically a mess. But of course, it could have been worse, and I kept telling Alejandro that: he could have been under it when it fell. It could have been a $20,000 BMW covered in brittle plastic. Nothing broken was preventing me from continuing my trip. He was very apologetic and clearly felt terrible. I suppose I should have been more upset, but a lot of things have changed since I began this trip. It’s just a bike. It’s mechanical. It can all be fixed. And of course, I’m about as low-maintenance as they come. He definitely got lucky in many ways.

I pulled out the new Garmin Montana that I have been carrying since January, and installed it. Alejandro looked for a replacement mirror, but had nothing with reverse threads (a Yamaha thing). He offered to order a new mirror for me from Santiago, but that would take days and I wouldn’t be here. I still had a left mirror. I could still ride.

I did eventually get a discount on my tire change…probably not as much as I should have considering the expense of the gps dock, but what’s done is done.

After my morning excitement, I decided it was a good day for a day off. I rode out to my lodging for the night…a beautiful place in the woods north of town run by an incredibly nice couple and his mother (of course they are nice…they are Chilean).

Tomorrow I hope to do some sightseeing and relax a bit more before my last two days of venturing south.