BikerBoyz Pan-American Highway Tour

Went out to take a picture of the moon and there was a crazy party next door. One of the kids had gone by earlier and felt the need to video-bomb me 🙂

Yaviza, pretty understated end of the road in PA. Oh well, at least we made it this far. Going to take 5 days off with the family, go see some wildlife, hit the beach, visit the canal, and put the bikes on a plane to Colombia.

Indigenous boats in the background on the river running out of Panama into the abyss that is the Darien Gap.

The bikes are actually smiling in this one 🙂 Funny thing about this picture, we actually rode 12,810 MILES to get here!!! NUTS!!!

Need audio for those of you who are fans of the show…

Our bikes in the lot at the end, some other bikers showed up right as I was wrapping this up.

The ride to get there, was very special thanks to Google. The shortest route is not always the best route as you can see in the Helmetz – Costa Rica…

Yes, the hotel had a bar named Alaska for some reason….

This was on our way out of Managua… the first time 🙂 This is the high-def version. I’ll try to use youtube from now on.

It shows just how fast it gets dark… and what the rules of the road are for motorcycles – there are NONE!

This was shot 6 minutes later…

Getting In

Most of the border crossings have been quite miserable. Hot, long lines, and “handlers” that nag you for changing currency, telling you where to go, and giving you really bad information.

Turns out, Nicaragua has some of the nicest and easiest to use facilities we have seen in our travels, the bad news is that they are there to comfort you while you wait for hours and hours and hours…

One of the biggest issues was the drone – they are apparently illegal in Nicaragua??? Well, with some help, we managed to get it across the border on a horse. Yes, a horse!

Getting Out

Well, exiting Nicaragua was pretty straightforward. Go to immigration, get your exist stamp – oh wait, for some reason you need to stop at the shack…

So, get your customs declaration (which had to be signed by 4 separate people on the way in and we somehow always arrive during shift changes that take between 30 minutes and an hour), fill it out and go to immigration. Get your stamp, oh wait, they don’t really do stamps, you also need to have a tiny piece of paper.

Now, to get our permits canceled. Simple, just go to the customs (aduana) and have them stamp and sign, or produce a copy of the cancellation. “b-errrrrr” (gameshow incorrect answer sound).

Of course someone by the scanners in customs was the only person we saw, and she was eating her lunch and didn’t care to speak with gringos. She pointed us to a young man who told us we needed to get the customs declaration signed and stamped by the police. Ok, not problem. Ride our bikes to the police shack and ask them to sign and stamp pour form. They say nothing and point us back to the customs person who tells us we need copies of our passport, registration, driver’s license, and title. No problem, we have those, right Alex? (Alex did not have copies of his driver’s license). So, I get mine done, I head to the customs people to see what the next step is, and Alex convinces one of them to make his copy… Turns out, we need to have our bikes inspected by the young man at the start of the process, so we go back to him, he makes us open all of our bags, looks in one, and then signs the papers. He tells us we need to go inside and get the final cancellation. We walk in the opposite side of the building and past the x-ray scanners to a small window where we get the permits canceled. Finally out of Nicaragua… but not without some drama while we were there….

Someone Lost His Passport

Yeah, we woke up to eat breakfast in San Juan del Sur and a passport had gone missing during the confusing exit and the long ride in the wind and rain to get to the hotel. I won’t tell you who lost it to save them some face, but …

Great news, however… some super awesome Nicaraguan turned in the passport to the consulate – with the tiny paper still inside!!!