We head on down the road from the Honduras border into Nicaragua…….
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On to a dirt road toward Matagalpa
I have no idea what these guys are hauling. They are doing a good job of sweeping the road with it though.
The ever present Central American road construction.
Good time for a mug shot………..
Then we pulled into our place for the night near Matagalpa. Its about 4000 feet so its a nice cool climate.
It was a really cool joint with cabins and a restaurant around a pretty little lake.
The next morning we were up early to start the 300 mile journey to a place out on the Caribbean coast known as Puerto Cabezas, Bilwi.
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We got an early start because we had a long day ahead of us.
As usual we ran into plenty of road construction. Instead of waiting, JC decides to shoot the gap and try not to get scooped up by the backhoe.
In the morning its pretty fun riding on fast dirt roads. We have many miles of dirt road to tic off. Some of this road is nice, smooth, and fast. However, much of the road is covered in sharp rocks, whoops and washouts and can be hell on tires and tubes. Its about as tire friendly as the road from Puertecitos to Gonzaga Bay in Baja, but it goes on for 250 miles.
This road is hell for truck and bus drivers. You will see so many trucks and buses on the side of road with various types of problems all related to rough sections and sharp rocks. I think this guy as been driving this road for a while. He knows what essential equipment is when you have a breakdown.
Of course we don’t always agree on the direction to take.
I’m pretty happy about the whole experience.
At least in this town its pretty obvious which way we need to go.
I’m having a good time and riding way faster and harder than I should.
This is the only route from the interior of Nicaragua directly to Puerto Cabezas, so it sees plenty of vehicle traffic and goes through many small villages.
Lots of animals on the road the whole way.
Moooooooo!
After getting plenty of air time earlier in the day on some whooped out section of road, I noticed a noise coming from the swing arm. The metal bracket of the rear aux fuel tank had gotten badly bent on one of the jumps, had pulled the brass inserts out of the tank and was now gouging into the aluminum swing arm and rubbing on the chain. So we had to do a little surgery on the side of the road.
Since it also pulled the threaded brass inserts out of the plastic aux tank the mounting bracket was completely useless to me. My aux tank is now held on by bungee cords that JC had in his pack. Pretty easy temporary field repair since JC had the bungees.
Anytime you stop near one of the villages, these big bikes always draw a crowd. Folks just dont see many bike of this size come through so they are very interested to talk to you. “How many cc’s? How fast? How heavy? How much does it cost? Where is it made? You actually rode that bike all the way from the U.S.?” Its always the same routine. I must have answered these questions 14,327 times since I left home.
Official village bathing and clothes washing area.
Actually as hot as it was, these rivers looked pretty inviting.
We crossed lots of little bridges like this.
Cheeken Boose!!!
This guy had a rough morning. Actually, seeing people passed out drunk is a pretty common sight in Central America. We stopped at this little tienda for some cold sodas and the music must have been cranked up to 11. It was so loud that you couldn’t hear yourself think. It didn’t phase this guy though.
Here is the village school. The local school board must not have much political pull for funding.
The girls blew out a sidewall on one of the truck tires and were now without a spare. So, we would follow them the rest of the way to Bilwi. It was very slow going following the truck. The last 50 miles would take us about 4 hours. We would stop and take a break for a while to let the truck get ahead, then catch up to them and repeat until after dark.
KTM posers……..
Some of these little whoop sections were fun.
Some of the bridge crossing would prove to be interesting. Mario barely pulled this one off. He couldn’t see the missing planks until it was too late, so he had to pin it and pray. He warned JC and I so we wouldn’t wind up wadded up in a ball.
This really could have turned out badly. You can never let your guard down and get complacent when riding down here.
It was getting late and would soon get dark. There is one river crossing that requires a ferry. We had found out that the ferry stops running at 9 pm so we really needed to get the truck moving along so we wouldn’t miss the boat, so to speak.
We made it to the ferry with time to spare.
This turned out to be about a 14 hour day for us, so we were pretty worked by the time we hit the ferry. This kid behind me was looking for any opportunity to grab anything off the bike. The people here are very quick. After the ferry it was only another 20 miles in Puerto Cabezas. Most areas of the town are actually pretty sketchy at night. After dark, you dont see many people out of their homes. When we pulled in around 9 pm, the streets were deserted. There’s probably a good reason for that.
JC is pretty worked as well.
I was damned happy to be off of that bike and into a hotel. Once we got settled in the hotel, we were going to venture out and find something to eat and drink. The night guard told us that under no circumstances should we be walking around outside after dark. So he wound up calling a friend of his to round up some food and beer and bring it to the hotel for us.