Part II: Another Inca Trail

The Machu Picchu trail so far: I had been subjected to five hours of shouted inventories in the guise of indigenous song. I ate with the flies in a sleepy little shithole. I had been stuffed in the back of a station wagon with the watermelons and cumquats. Then I was released, and left by the side of the road...

I pulled out my notebook and tried to reproduce the map the driver had drawn on the back window. This was the first of several hand-drawn maps I used that day. In terms of utility, they ranged from utterly useless to incredibly misleading.

This was about 2 in the afternoon. I had started the day at 5:40 that morning, and it had taken every wool garment I owned just to make it to a taxistand. We had dropped some several thousand meters in altitude and now I had a ton of wool in my ever-heavying backpack, and I was sweltering in the mid-day sun.

I took the road less traveled, as it was the only option that made sense at that point. About a half-hour down that dusty road, a sign appeared pointing up a nearby mountain. "Inca Trail" it said. I knew it wasn't The Inca Trail, but at least it was an Inca trail. Close enough!

This particular Inca trail went more or less straight up, a slender path through mesquite, cactus, and about a hundred kinds of plant and tree that I couldn't recognize. About 40 minutes into the hike, I stumbled upon an adobe house, guarded by ducks, chickens and cats in equal measure. Grateful for the break, I sat on a bench outside the abode and talked to the ducks around my feet. Maybe they knew whether this was the right trail or not. The proprietress, a smiling old woman, came out of the house, supplied me with a Coca-cola and then laughed at my map.

She took pen to paper and drew an entirely different map, and she wrote "Casa de Monos" (monkey house) and "Perez hacienda" (Perez family ranch) at different junctures on the map. I was to follow the monkey, then find the ranch. I gathered that if I was faithful in my quest, the town of Santa Teresa would be revealed to me.

She pointed up the hill, and I was off on my search for a monkey house. I was wearing my Indiana Jones hat, I just wished I had the whip, too...

Within the hour, still ascending, sweating furiously, I stumbled on two houses set in the hillside, one slightly above the other. Ducks and chickens again, then a very old man sitting in front of the first house, who responded to my inquiries about monkeys by pointing me up toward the other house.

Indeed, there was a monkey sitting in a tree - actually attached to the tree - in front of the second house. I had found Casa de Mono"! A nice couple with a cute little boy ran this household, and they offered me sustenance and rest. I bragged to Lorenzo and Maria that I had made it up the steep hill without too much trouble - a lot of sweat, but no problem, pretty good for a 52-year-old. They thought that was nice, and had I by any chance run into Lorenzo's father at the other house? Who is 103 years old? And who could kick your lily-white American ass?

Well, that last part was implied, but I have no doubt he could...

Lorenzo looked at the maps I was carrying and after a good chuckle, drew me a new one, more of a topographical map. I saw that by his reckoning I was more than half-way up the trail, thank god, and upon reaching the top part, was going to go down, then across, then up some more, then way down, and I would find the road to Santa Teresa. Given the length of this new map, I began to worry about getting to Santa Teresa before dark.

Equipped now with three hand-drawn maps, each one supposedly better than the other, I departed - but not before taking a picture of these cutie pies, also members of Casa de Mono...

What the hell are they?

Well, up and down I went, seeking the Perez Hacienda and further validation that I was on the right trail. Then, I lost the trail. It was there, then it wasn't there. I backtracked down a very steep patch but couldn't figure out how to move forward. Then I saw a house in the distance, and made my way toward it, thinking it was the Perez Hacienda. I had seen no other evidence of human life since leaving the monkey house close to an hour ago.

The house was dilapidated, partly unfinished, maybe abandoned. Not much of a hacienda. As I studied the ruins, I heard a dog barking far off, and getting closer. I yelled "Ayudame!" (Help me!) and "Perdido!" (I'm lost!), hoping the dog understood Spanish, or he may have a master handy.

Sure enough, emerging from the thicket came a man, completely covered - gloves, hat, mask, and carrying a steel can, trailing this toxic bug-killing smoke. He asked if I had not yet gotten stung? At that exact moment, I felt this incredible pain in my shoulder, and I writhed in pain. He immediately doused me in the smoke, suggesting that I not breathe for a minute. He checked the sting location, and said I was lucky that the stinger was not lodged in my shoulder, as they were difficult to remove. I asked what kind of bug bit me, a bee, or what? But the name he gave was not bee or wasp (abeja or avispa) so I have no idea what the thing was. I asked if I was in trouble health-wise, and he said no. He said some people felt that this sting actually was good for your arthritis. Did I have arthritis, by any chance?

The insect-killer walked me to the proper trail, pointing out that I should stay on this two-foot-wide trail, and stay off that two-foot-wide trail. Easy as pie, no matter that they were completely indistinguishable, and that they crossed at times. He said he wasn't sure of the Perez Hacienda, not having been there himself. He said he kept to himself. You keep to yourself, do you? I thought, as I looked around me - no other person, road, house, or building of any kind for as far as the eye could see...

Buena suerte! (good luck!) he said, waving his smoking can. You're going to need it, he implied...

Stay tuned for Part III, the near-conclusion of Does Doug Even Make it to Machu Picchu, or Is He Eaten by a Puma?

Machu Picchu in three days or less. Part I

My Favorite Inventories

Everyone will tell you the only authentic way to get to Machu Picchu is by the Inca Trail, a grueling four-day trek over Andean mountains and through verdant jungles, guaranteed to make your nose bleed, your knees ache, and, eventually, your pride swell.

Unfortunately, you have to make a reservation some four to six months in advance, as access to the Inca Trail is limited to something like 2000 people per day. Otherwise, in high season, you'd be standing in line all the way from Cusco to Machu Picchu, and it would take far more than four days.


Well, this reporter is not capable of purchasing a ticket to an event in another country six months later: as it is, I have little knowledge as to where I'm going to be later today.

There are, for slackers like me, a few "second best" ways to get there, including the Salkantay Trail, rated as more difficult than the Inca Trail, or the Inca Jungle Trek, or a combination of mountain biking and hiking, or bus and hike, or taking the train and the bus, eliminating hiking altogether. (Actually, if you wanted to go via skateboard and kite-surfing, a travel agent in Cusco will no doubt arrange that for you.)

According to a friendly Argentinian fellow at my hostel, who became my adviser in all things adventurous, the only way to go was a three-hour mini-bus ride would take me to a little village named Santa Rosa, from which I could hike two or three hours to Santa Teresa, overnight there, then a pleasant two or three hours to Aguas Calientes, the staging area for Machu Picchu, which I could tackle the following day. This route, promised the Argentine, would be inexpensive, easy, and completely independent. This sounded like as good a plan as any.

But first, the minivan: I had to be at the bus station by 6 am, and hustled to get into place in time. Of course, I had forgotten the golden rule of all parts south of the US border: for god's sake, don't hurry! We spent the first 45 minutes of the journey stuffed in the unmoving van, waiting for enough people to want to go to Santa Rosa that day. I thought that since there were already more people than seats, we were adequately filled. I was wrong...



Once we got going, the driver tried to make up time by driving as fast as humanly possible. He made sure the route was cleared for him by honking almost constantly throughout the five-hour trip. I guess his theory was that everyone on the road - other cars, bicycles, pedestrians, cows and alpacas, etc. - would be able to gauge the distance and speed by counting the honks. And get the fuck out of the way...

In order to make the ride more pleasant for the 15 people in the 9-passenger van, the driver blasted his favorite CD on the speakers. And I mean blasted. I dug out my earplugs, which reduced the volume down to 100 decibels or so. The chosen music was of a variety of indigenous music that consists of a three-beat rhythm, a female singer shouting her ass off, and a sort of list. The first song, the shouted lyrics included: "Lima!", "Cusco", "Arequipa!", "Bagua!" and on and on, the names of cities and towns in Peru. Somewhat enlightening, I guess, if you were studying for a local geography test.

The next song, three beats, shouting "Peru!", "Argentina!", "Bolivia!", "Panama!", "Ecuador!", and so on. Again, if there was a test coming, we'd all be ready.

The next song, I swear, three beats, and it was "Cuba libre!", "Pisco Sour!", "Tequila sunrise!", "Martini on the Rocks!" and on and on and on.

I kid you not: shouted inventories in three-beat stanzas for five hours. Even when we took a break on the side of the road, the driver was kind enough to leave the engine running and the music blasting, so that we didn't miss a list.

This helped us take our minds a bit off the furiously fast, reckless driving, on the curvy wet cliffside roads. As a further diversion, I talked the guys in my row to bet on when the woman in front of us, obviously road-sick, was going to begin vomiting. I had "within the hour", the guy to my right had "one to two hours", and the guy to my left had "two plus". (Careening off the cliff was grounds for cancellation.)

The woman kind of cheated, however, when she disappeared into the bathroom for twenty minutes during the rest break. I couldn't convince anyone in my row to ask if she had tossed her cookies in the bathroom, and if so, if she had noticed the exact time...

Hours later, we arrived in the quaint little shithole of Santa Rosa, where the rosa had bloomed long ago, if ever. Having missed breakfast in order to get to the bus on time, I had to eat something, so tried to decide: do I pick the place with the least flies, on the theory that there was better hygiene there, or the place with the most flies, on the theory that the food there must be delicious?

Say what you will about packaged, processed foods, but I would have given my left nut for something in shrink-wrap at that moment...

I ended up picking the place with the quietest music, the shortest inventories... "La Paz!", "Quito!", "Montenegro!"...

After lunch - by the way, I'm no longer a vegetarian or pescetarian, I'm a flyatarian - I was told that in order to get to Santa Teresa, I need to take a ride to the trailhead, to avoid long hours on a narrow dusty road. So I put my fate into the hands of the local Transportation Broker - every little town has one - and she eventually put me with a family in a fully-loaded station wagon. Remember station wagons?

Given that there was no more space in the seating area, I was directed to fold myself into the back with the weekly grocery haul, and to be careful not to squish anything. Sandwiched with the fruit and vegetables, pressed against the window, rocked by every gut and rut in the nasty, rocky, dusty road, I began to wish for the minivan: "Avacado!" "Tomatoes!", "Green Beans!"...

Abruptly, we came to a stop, in the middle of nowhere. I was pried out of the back of the car, trying to hide the squashed grapes and tomatoes stuck to my feet and ass. The driver kindly drew a somewhat complicated map of the trail to Santa Teresa in dust on the back window. Then he wished me luck, got into the car and drove off, the map and any sense of where I was to go disappearing in the dust...

Pretty Old, but Very Pretty: Cuzco, Peru

I landed in this delightful city in mid-September, and was immediately enchanted. One word ran through my mind: Charming, charming, charming.

It helps immensely that many of the winding stone streets are too small for cars - I guess the Incans didn't have the foresight to envision dirty, honking, smelly, polluting, dangerous motorized vehicles destroying the community. Too bad!

Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of roads that cars can use, and they do. But one can wander all over the San Blas district, for example, and never see one car or truck. Or the street I live on, Pumacuerco, which means "Spine of the Puma". Not a lot of cars attempt this road, as it goes more or less straight up. I guess the puma in question is on his hind feet...

The first photo is up my

street, the next here is down the street. Climbing home is no small feat... Anyway, it's up or down in almost any direction...

And so, I've been wandering the streets, taking photos like a tourist,


running into the local wildlife,

not to mention llamas and alpacas, which I know are different. I just don't recall which is which...

I'm having a good time here in Cusco, taking Spanish lessons and preparing for my trip to Machu Picchu and other ancient architectural marvels. I'll upload more pics here, and in my next post!

A few more pics from Quito

As I gather my possessions, sprawled all over my room - I've been staying on the sixth floor of a modern condo building in Quito - I want to share some pretty pictures from my time here:

Maybe I showed a photo of this mountain already - Cotopaxi mountain just outside of town. It's so cool-looking, I thought you might want to see it again.

This is me abusing the local animal stock. Mercifully for Garnacha, I had eaten a rather light breakfast that day...

The angel guards over the southern part of Quito (background). To give the angel a little help, people plant broken glass on top of their fences (foreground).

And of course, you have your dog-and-llama yard protection and grass monitoring services...

This last pic is of my host Ceci in the back of a taxi. As is her wont, she's working at the absolute last minute - we're on our way to a grant-awarding agency and she's putting the finishing touches on her grant application. She runs a physical therapy non-profit and is always looking for income sources...

Altogether I've been two months here in Quito. I figure that means that I've listened to 2,489 car alarms, 14,235 honking horns, and maybe 200,000 barks from that poor German Shepard trapped in an 8=foot square pen next to my building.

This is what I know for sure about Ecuadorians: when they get behind the wheel they love to honk their horns: to signal turns, to signal going straight, to signal their love for the new Smurfs movie... Taxi drivers are the worst, honking for pleasure, honking the time of day, honking their availability, especially at foreigners, who they guess are more likely to want a cab...

I learned to keep my collar up and my hat down. Eyes on the sidewalk. Leaning toward the street, even looking up while on the sidewalk sets off the cacaphony. God forbid if I want to cross the street: looking to see if it's clear brings taxis from all directions screeching to my feet.

And then: the fuggin' car alarms. At first, I thought I had rented a room next to an alarm-testing facility. As far as I can figure, they're some kind of status symbol: Listen, everybody, I have a CAR!

Private auto ownership is rare here: there are 63 cars per thousand Ecuadorians, by contrast there are 265 cars per thousand Mexicans, 690 cars per thousand Italians, 863 per thousand Americans.

So they have to make up for the lack of volume with volume... And strangely enough I've seen people driving around, the presumptive owners of the vehicle they're occupying, their alarms blazing away. Either that or a lot of necktied businessmen steal cars at three o'clock in the afternoon.

They also have the house alarm here. In the nicer neighborhoods, you can signal to all your neighbors that you are leaving the house with a push of a button - I watched a prep-dressed schoolgirl coming home from school push a fob on her keyring and an entire condo alarm chirped off. That must be nice - any movement at all in a five-story building, and a hundred people are reaching for their keyrings...

The other motivation for alarming everything you own is - get this - the US dollar. Ecuador adopted the American dollar as its national currency in the year 2000, following a major banking crisis and recession in 1999. This served to stabilize the Ecuadorian economy. (I have no idea why that worked, but why don't we start using Deutschmarks just in case?...)

According to the people I talked to here in Quito, an unwanted byproduct of the change to dollars was the influx of Bolivians, Columbians, Peruvians, Chileans, Brazilians, especially those with malicious intent. The attraction of the US dollar, presumably more easily attained in Ecuador than say Miami or Phoenix, brought every shyster, pickpocket, con artist, and smooth talker in South America to Ecuador.

This resulted in, according to both local and internet sources, widespread petty crime, and "the spread of organized crime, drug trafficking, small arms trafficking and incursions by various terrorist organizations..." (http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_1106.html) and, inevitably, more car alarms...

And house alarms. And bars on windows, electronic gates everywhere, businesses that are locked all day (you want to buy something, you ring the bell), armed guards everywhere (my favorite is the armed bakery guard with the bulletproof vest...), and if there's no money for security, you can just put up the "no gun" sign and hope for the best...

I'd post more pictures but it takes more than 10 minutes each to upload one photo with my underpowered little netbook.

Bye, bye, Quito!
Next post: Cuzco, Peru, one of the most spectacular cities in the world...


Even though there is supposedly this great influx of cons and shady operators from other countries, when my pocket was picked, it was by a bona fide Ecuadorian.

(T'was at a bus station: a cleaning lady bowled me over and her accomplice the station agent pocketed $20 US. All very local...)

One Year Homeless

As of today, I've been on the road for exactly one year. Twelve months of living out of a suitcase, and one thing overwhelmingly strikes me: I've really gotta do my laundry...

Thanks to my hosts over the last year: Anthony and Fernando, Carol and Peggy, Ceci, Felix and Tamatha, Jolea and Ray, Judy, Karen, Matt and Kitty, Phil, Sungmi, Tiffany and Al, Thomas. Did I miss anybody?

Some highs and lows from a year of traveling:

Best spot to sleep outdoors: Lodgepole campground, Sequoia National Forest, as long as don't mind brown bears for alarm clocks.

Best spot to sleep indoors: Tiffany and Al's guest bedroom. Quiet, separate, clean, luxurious. It's nice to have a doctor in the family.

Worst place to sleep, indoors or out: the Santa Monica Youth Hostel, in the ten-bunk room. The smells, the sounds, overwhelming. Not to mention getting your stuff ripped off; not to mention getting your computer hacked and your motorcycle fucked with. Double the price of all the other American Youth Hostels: welcome to LA.

Most beautiful scenery: Too many to list in a year of traveling. Two strike me right now: The mountains surrounding Quito, Ecuador awe me every day. The view from the top of the Continental Divide in southern Colorado will be with me forever.

Most heartbreaking scene: A tie between the wildfire devastation in eastern Arizona and little caged dogs in Guadalajara: dogfarmers regularly patrolled the streets with ten to twenty puppies in a cage. Most of the time, not enough room for the pups to stand up.

Most heartbreaking scene, honorable mention: Opening the door to the trailer, my home for the next month, in Nara Visa, New Mexico.

Best place to drive a motorcycle long-distance: The Cuota (toll-road) throughout Mexico. Clean, smooth, straight, mostly empty. My kind of road. Worth every peso.

Worst place to drive long-distance: through the towns and villages of Mexico on the non-toll roads: pitted, crowded, poorly maintained and full of speedbumps, some of them unmarked, some of them so tall that you're guaranteed to bottom out. Often next to muffler repair shops.

Worst city to drive in: Phoenix, Arizona, home of the no-look, signal-free triple lane change. Home of the driver who thought it would be funny to open his car door in order to clip a motorcycle. Vehicular homicide, always good for a chuckle.

Best town to leave your keys in your motorcycle: Mazamitla, Mexico, where they assign a boy to guard your bike until you return.

Best place to fall off your motorcycle: Anywhere in Mexico, where the bombaderos will perform first-aid on the spot at no cost, no tipping allowed.

Longest trip I've ever taken on two or four wheels: 8000 miles from San Francisco through central Mexico, and then back to Texas, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona. Long live Suzuki!

Most fun four-day weekend: Trip to Puerto Vallarta with my schoolmates Emily, Luke, Matt, and Alain.

Best moment on that trip: Frisbee on the beach, natch!

Worst moment on that trip: Paying $18 to the local police for the privilege of urinating.

Least missed: Top of my head, I can't think of anything I don't miss about San Francisco. H's cigars, I guess. The ambulances coming and going outside of Sungmi's apartment.

Most missed: Well, now that it's in storage in Tucson, I miss my bike. But I miss everything and everyone in San Francisco. I miss Sungmi. I miss Midnight, who I will never see again.

So we ended on the most maudlin subjects. Sorry about that. On the positive side, I expect to have a first draft of my thesis project within the month, and the whole thing wrapped up in October or November. So I'm coming home soon, after Peru and Brazil and maybe Argentina.

See you every day in my thoughts, soon in real life.

Love from Ecuador, Douglas the Vagabond

Gasping for oxygen in Quito

Hello, folks. I'm in Quito, Ecuador, a city of more than a million people, way up in the stratosphere, surrounded by mountains.

The mountain in the background, directly west of the city, is Pichincha, very close. Pichincha is very big here in Quito. You can get your money from Pichincha bank, eat Pichincha pizza, get a Pichincha haircut.

This mountain, Cotopaxi, is just south of Quito. It last erupted in 1877 and it is currently emitting gas, so the mountain and I have something in common. (That we don't erupt very often. What were you thinking?)

I've been in Ecuador for a little less than a month now, and I've not adjusted to the elevation yet. I wonder if I ever will... Quito, Equador is some 9200 feet above sea level, about one and 3/4 miles up in the air. For comparison, Northstar-at-Tahoe peaks out at 8610 feet, Diamond Peak, 8540. In the Tahoe region, only the tippy-top of Heavenly is higher than my sixth-floor apartment in midtown Quito.

So the act of just sitting around takes more air sometimes than seems to be available. It's a weird feeling, not being able to breathe all you want to breathe. I fight down the panic, I breathe deep, I survive.

Strangely enough, walking around, getting mild exercise, not so much a problem. More strenuous exercise, however, and you feel like you're gonna die. I live on the seventh floor of a condo, and sometimes I go up the stairs just to see how long it takes me to breathe normally after.

I live at a place called Spanish Immersion House, which is in reality a nice two-bedroom apartment with a Spanish teacher/entrepreneur named Ceci. She runs three businesses as well as cooking every day. Makes her own soy milk, the best stuff I've ever tasted.

The "Spanish immersion" part of the deal is that she speaks to me in Spanish, then I respond in such poor, mangled Spanish that she finally gives up and uses English to get her point across. It's a great program!

I went to a five or six Spanish language schools here in Quito, looking for a good place to learn. For whatever reasons, I think cheap labor among them, they only offer one-on-one classes. Just imagine, four hours a day of direct, unrelenting lessons from about three feet away. Nowhere to hide, no relief as the teacher picks on other students, no escape from the steady, intense, and frequently disappointed gaze of El Profesor. Maybe better for your Spanish, but hard on the psyche!

I like group lessons, not just for the opportunity for some slack in the classroom, but also a chance to meet and hang with other expats. Back in Guadalajara, there was a big group of expats at the IMAC Language School, and we'd go to lunch or sightseeing or free concerts throughout the city. At the end of the third week at IMAC, my roommate and I hosted 16 students and friends at a lunch at my apartment in Guadalajara.

But here, there is not the opportunity to rub shoulders with expats or others, and I walk alone for the most part.

Well, not totally alone. One of Ceci's businesses is a facility for children without means, in an economically challenged neighborhood of Quito. I moved here with two weeks to go in their summer school program, and I got a chance to volunteer at a couple of events.

This first photo is of a bunch of us on the way to the Quito Zoo. The second photo is one of the zoo population taking a snack break. We counted the children over and over that day...

I'll be in Quito for a few more weeks, if not longer.

I'm finished with the 300 or so essays for my masters' degree, by the way. I have only the thesis project, a green business plan, to go. Currently researching a business idea I've tentatively names Hydrogen for the Home, but I'm a bit out of my element. (Really, no pun intended.)

More later!

What happened to July?

In our last installment, you may recall that our hero was planning his escape from Nara Visa, New Mexico: a barren wasteland, yet free rent...

Sorry for the dead silence for the last month. I kinda lost my groove there in New Mexico. And then here in Ecuador (real time), I've had some difficulty having a consistent Internet connection...

As July began, I got the hell out of the charmless little town of Nara Visa.

Bye bye, horsie neighbors!

Bye bye, wildfires from 400 miles away blotting out the sun!

I turned the bike east and north. I told her to seek higher ground, not to stop until the temperature dropped to the 70s.


I ended up in Eagle Nest, New Mexico, named more for its high elevation rather than any capacity for cradling eagle eggs. It rained that first afternoon. I got off the bike, took off my helmet, and turned my face to the sky, raindrops mixing with tears of joy.

No shit.

Hello, cool pines!

I stayed in alpine country for the next few weeks, Eagle Nest, Red Rock, Taos in north central New Mexico, and Pagosa Springs in southern Colorado. I hiked the mountains of the continental divide in Colorado, I soaked in sulfer hot springs, I left my environmental studies and the notes from Phil's book in my saddlebags for most of the month...

Of course, I couldn't get away from environmental degradation. I had to plan carefully to avoid the record-setting New Mexico wildfires, and later, the record-setting Arizona wildfires.

Looking closely at the New Mexico forest, you can see how many trees are dying - this from the western pine beetle. Warmer temperatures have extended its range dramatically. I was told by a forest ranger that New Mexico has lost 85% of its pinon tree in the last two years. Soon they will have to choose a new state tree.

Then up on top of the Continental Divide in Colorado:

There was no escape from the nasty wildfire smoke coming up from New Mexico...








Then Albuquerque, a pretty cool city, to repair my sandals, find a Sprint store, make some adjustments on my motorcycle, get in a game of frisbee, do some laundry, get some Thai food, swim. All the stuff big cities are good for.

The frisbee was at University of New Mexico. Due to the motorcycle injury earlier this year, I couldn't run well enough to play in the game, but I got a good hour of throws in. The students were polite and called me "sir."

Sir. Well, you turn fifty, these things happen. I guess I can start calling younger people "son" and "filly" and "whippersnapper."

Then: Arizona. Time to get off the bike and get serious about South America.

But first I had to drive through the aftermath of the largest fire in Arizona history.


On the way to Tucson to drop off my bike, I stopped in Phoenix to see family and friends. 110 to 115 degrees every day. Lots of swimming, either indoors or at night.

Thank you, Matt, for finally turning on the pool light. Made all the difference.

Tucson was not always in the 100s. Woo-hoo! The monsoons came in and occasionally made things tolerable outside. I even recall one afternoon when it was actually pleasant during the day. Yeah, stunning, I know.

I hung with my friend Judy and the wonder wiener dog Abigail, then stripped the bike of its battery and gasoline, turned in its mirrors, and sadly put the cover on. A great bike...

Except for falling off the damn thing that one time (well, falling under it), the bike trip - all 8000 miles - was one of the best parts of this last year. I can't say enough good things about my undersized Suzuki Burgman 400. I had zero issues out on the open road, through five US states and two countries. I was going to sell it once I got back to Arizona, even bought a "for sale" sign, but... Now I envision coming back to San Francisco the same way I left. Some day...

But first: I'm going to Ecuador! In fact, I'm already here. I'll take some photos of Quito, and get right back at you...

Stay tuned.