Cartagena (finally), and beyond

We arrived in Cartagena, Colombia, in the morning of 2 November (Tuesday) as scheduled. It was raining and the water in the bay was rough so the captain decided to wait until Wednesday to unload the bikes. Three p.m. was the appointed time and after spending the night in the old city of Cartagena, we arrived at the dock to receive the bikes. The captain was nowhere to be found and after we finally figured out how to call the boat, he scurried to the dock to tell us that the storm the day before had caused all the computers at the aduana to crash and we would not be able to register the bikes until Thursday morning – so back to the hotel for another night.


Bright and early on Thursday morning the bikes were unloaded, taking about an hour and a half.






Then it was off to register the bikes, but not so fast, there was a backlog from the computer problem the day before. We finally finished registering the bikes at 2:30 and then proceeded to the insurance office to buy motorcycle insurance for Colombia. We finally finished at 5 p.m. Just in time to enjoy the go home traffic as we tried to ride out of the city.
But the fun was just beginning. We were riding with four others who had escaped the stahlratte. We only had an hour of daylight and a three hour ride to the destination town so the last two hours were on a road filled with potholes, in the dark and some rain just to make riding really interesting. We rode a total of 70 miles in the three hours and were really glad to call it a day.
This morning, Gary and I split from the group and headed toward Medellin. We slowly climbed from the coastal plains into the mountains, through fog, rain and heavy truck traffic on a two lane road. We rode for 250 miles and didn’t waste any time for an eight and a half hour ride. The mountainous areas in Colombia are lush with vegetation – lots of cattle farms. We topped out about 8,000 feet elevation today and expect to remain in the six to eight thousand feet of elevation range until we descend to the coastal plains in Ecuador.