hi folk!

It has been a while since we have written something juicy in the blog, too bad! But we have been doing and thinking a lot of stuff. We have decided to take a break from cycling WAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!! No it's not that bad, everything is alright, Jut a small gap from October to January, (3 months, 92 days, 2208 hours, 132480 seconds without my bike).

As we can imagine or we would like to imagine;) you all are wondering what has happened? Why are they taking a break? Problems with the bike? Health? Family issues?

Let’s start from the beginning, there is more than one reason to do that and even though the trip was thought at the beginning as 'a one go trip' it came very natural the idea of breaking it into 2 parts: North America (Alaska-Panama) and South America (Colombia-Argentina).

So why is that?

wrapping our bikes up for the winter nap

Money.  After 1 1/2 year on the road we started to see the bottom of our piggybank more and more; although we have worked few times, it might be not enough to carry on the rest of the trip with the money we have left, so it's time to work a bit. We found an organic farm for hard, well-paid seasonal job and we took it!

Another strong thought was related with the length of the trip; it is not going to be 2 years as we estimated at the beginning, but more than this, we like to loop around too much :) We lost this class where the teacher explained "the shortest distance between point A and piont B is a straight line". And so our families are starting to feel abandoned (and we miss them too!); they can't afford to come to visit us and either we could go and visit them (unless we earn the money ). So the money we are going to get working, is going to be spent partially in going for Xmas back home to give the biggest of the hugs to our families, before we fly back to our bikes to keep pedalling down South.

Another big plus to stop is that the closer we are getting to the Andes the more info comes about when is the best time to go into these mountains, which is obviously in the dry season, which starts within a month and lasts until May. After being happily soaked during the rainy season in Central America we thought is time to dry the cloth a bit, isn't it? So to our understanding there is no point of going up there when it's cloudy and rainy if we are going to be missing all the beauty of those giant mountains as they'll be covered with clouds. The dry season in Peru starts in May so if we start pedalling from the North of Colombia in January we will be in Peru at the end of April so it makes sense the break in here too.

South of America will take us between 12 and 13 months to cycle it, roughly and it's very important to take this number into account because the gap with reasonable cycling conditions, down in Tierra de Fuego, and is very short. From November to February, the rest of the year is COLD and WINDYYYYYYYY! So if we start cycling in January, we'll get down there just in the middle of their short, but surely beautiful summer.

The next thing we had to sort out was a "nursery" for our babies; where and with whom we could leave the bikes for such a long period of time. Ideally we need a place in the northern Colombia where we will be starting to pedal in January, but to find a spot there turned to be impossible. My mother came up with the brilliant idea of leaving the bikes in an orphanage that belongs to the same organization that she works for; unfortunatelly it is located in the centre of the country, so we took a bus from Cartagena, where we agreed we are going to start to pedal to Medellin, where the orphanage is. It was great to meet the sisters who are going to 'babysit' our bikes and they can't be in better hands. In January we will go back to them where hopefully they will allowed us to spend few days with them while I fix the bikes. 

They actually need quite a bit of work: new cassette, chains, cables, housing, brake pads, tire, truing wheels and perhaps even replacing chain rings if the new chains skips the old ones; new grips too, which are present from our good friends Kasia and Jarek. It's going to be wonderful change for my wrists! Since we left Alaska I've been struggling with bad grips and sore wrist, thanks guys! I know It's going to take me few days :) but they have to run smoothly we go to climb the Andes. I have arrived in Medellin with my bike in the worst condition it has been, flat tire for the last week pumping every few hours, all the inner tubes I had are gone and the last one was losing air from all the patches it has; I guess the glue with the hot temperatures didn’t work. In Colombia there is no way to find a 700 38C inner tube they just don’t sell them I've been in 3 major cities in all the bike shops I found and the same answer in all of them 'try the shop that is .... They may have them' You know what No! They don’t have them! So if you come to cycle anything further down from US, DON’T go with 700 wheels as we did or think about carrying a lot of spares inner tubes as I’m going to get in Spain :)

So my friends that is basically all the reasons why we are taking a break and perhaps if we are around where you will be we could meet up; is been a while since last time isn’t it? And if not we will need to wait a bit longer to give you a big hug:)

Hopefully during this break we are going to be catching up with the blog to have it fully updated for the second part of the trip South America!

Big kiss

r

in South America

The border between Panama and Colombia (which is also the border between North and South America), called Darien Gap, is one of the most difficult and inhospitable border crossing. It is not only that that there is no road; the whole area is covered with thick jungle, steep hills and vast wetlands; if this wasn’t enough it is home to unfriendly natives and a hideout for drugs dealers and Colombian guerrilla. Pretty much not a place where you would like to go to (however some adventure seekers take the challenge).

There are few options to cross the Gap, but the one that worked best for us was to take a 5-day cruise on a sail boat, with 2-day stopover in San Blas. Something we’ve heard of fairly recently; and however not cheap, it turned to be a great experience. First of all, we’ve never sailed before, so that was a great opportunity to try it; secondly, San Blas Islands are just 

BEAUTIFUL! It is one of those places that it is hard to believe they are real, even though you are there. Our only concern (mine much more than Raul’s) was the seasickness. But the motion sickness tablets did their job more than perfect – they knock us down for two hours after taking each tablet. But on the open ocean, let’s be honest, views are monotonous, so a good nap is not bad.

Our cycling adventures in the new continent haven’t started yet. The bikes are having well deserved rest, which is actually good, because they are needy; mine tire must be changed (after cycling the whole continent), Raul’s rear wheel goes flat all the time (with three different inner tubes and the tire and rim being examined back and forth hundreds times). So while our vehicles are waiting for their well-deserved spa treatment, we became backpackers again.

We have long-awaited visitors! My sister and her friend are here! And they brought lots of goodies and present for us. Thanks to all of you who participated in it! Special thanks for the lanterns; it was a beautiful surprise! (thank you Sis for organizing it!) They all flew up to the stars, so surely all the wishes will come true soon! We happy you’ve started to do the dinners again! Hope you will keep it up and invite us once we are back J

So we are spending some time with Ania and Kamila, at this moment hanging out on the Caribbean coast. Us, definitely NOT enjoying the heat and humidity. Unlike the girls, who spent the whole summer in Scotland. J

It´s been a while since we´ve updated here something. It is mostly because, for the first time during this trip, we have a deadline. One that we are looking forward a lot, though. My sister is coming to visit us in Columbia on 11th September an so we need to get there by then. And since we were very slow in Mexico and slow in Guatemala, we had to speed up through the rest of the countries.
The other reason why things won´t be updated soon is that our computer refused working in a very crucial moment (when I was copying the only copy of some pictures from it to a external hard drive) and now some of the writtings we´ve done for blog as well as all the pictures from Nicaragua, Costa Rica and most from Panama are trapped in the broken hard disc. However, there is hope - the guy who checked our computer promised that all the pictures can be saved, but it´ll take like a week. so we just need a week off somewhere and a good IT.

And now the most important - we are in Portobelo, a small port in Panama. From here we take a boat to go to Cartgena, Columbia. That means that the North America is finished!!! 16770 km 470 days and one continent completed!
m.

Hi guys!

If someone was trying to contact us at info@theamericasbycycle.org and we didn't answer, it's because this e-mail seems not to work, so please contact us at our 'regular' e-mails:
Marta marta.tajsiak@gmail.com
raul paraisoscondido@yahoo.es

Greetings from Granada!

Hi folk!

that's the lady you should look for!

If you find your self in Nahuala (its not a great place to visit but sometime we need to spent a night because is late to keep cycling) and you need to spent a night over don't go to any of the Motel or Hotel that you find in town it is a bit of a cheat!. We found this lovely women Manuela Cotiy who took us to her place for an expensive price and even fed us, we had a great eve chatting with Manuela and her family over the table while having dinner.
Her mobile number is (47867439)

Something we won't miss from Mexico...

Topes!
Topes are cyclist nightmare! Speed bumps, 'sleeping policeman', anything to force the drivers to obey 'stop' signs or speed limit. And since Mexican drivers are not too keen on obeying any sort of traffic rules, the creativity of officials as well as villagers (it's a common practice for a villagers to make their own topes) is endless in order to make a car to slow down.
That's a small collection we made on the way:

so-called 'vibradores', the worst ones for us

to pass this ones you have to get of the bike most of the time

a bit worn off

tire one

rope

small 'vibradores' spread over 50 m

a nice one

One year on the road
This 18th of May was a year on the road since we left Alaska, we could not celebrated it as We wanted because both of us got a gentle stomach bug which stopped us from having fun We had a everything planed dinner, cake... but  instead we were lying on the sofa alternating non stop visit to the toilet with movies :) It has been today when we felt totally bounced back, ready to face a big dinner, cake and anything we want to spoil ourselves with