Pan-American Highway
Expedition
Description of the Route
The journey will start in Buenos Aires and descend south to
Ushuaia and then go north overland to Alaska, reaching either
Dawson Creek or weather permitting, Anchorage or Fairbanks about
7 to 8 weeks later.
Pan-American Highway
This will start in Buenos Aires, head south to Tierra del Fuego,
cross the Magellan Straits and the Beagle Channel to truly start
the ride from the southernmost capitol in the world, Ushuaia.
At 54°47' south, only a degree and a bit from Cape Horn
and the northerly edge of the Drake Passage, it's position like
Timbuktu and Samarkand, is almost thought to be unbelievably
faraway, but this is not so. With the right riding schedule
you can ride the length of the Pan-American Highway and onto
Alaska in less than two months. Other companies do operate along
this route but their starting price is nearly £19k, does
not include flights and takes nearly 6 months including over
40 rest days averaging a mere 1000 miles a week. If that is
the type of gentler and easier trip you require, do not fill
in the application form on this site. If you want a journey
that truly challenges you, this is for you. With appropriate
training and counselling from Nick and riders who have ridden
with him for years, you will find you can ride better and more
skillful than perhaps you thought possible. Have a read from
the book Parallel World….
A quote from the book Parallel World
"Leaving Argentina is not difficult.
Customs and passport control are integrated with their respective
counterparts from Bolivia and both sets of officials deal
with entry and exit procedures together. The stamping of passports
and flourish of important signatures take minutes, and soon
I am riding across the bridge that spans the dry gulch separating
these two friendly countries. Up the road a policeman stops
me and demands five Bolivianoes for my peage or ticket, a
road tax that will in some way contribute to the building
of a road one day. The policeman tells me to be careful, that
there are bandits. That there are men with guns and I must
not stop. "Son ellos pequeños pelligroso ("are they little
bandits?")," I say in Spanish that would crisp a paella, "or
mas pelligroso?" "Pocito," he says, "but do not ride at night."
The road is a dirt track with corrugations. After riding across
the Nubia and then the Didi Gugalu Desert, this track is gentle
by comparison. The sun is low and casts long shadows. I am
over 3,600 metres above sea level and climbing. The vegetation
is stunted by the altitude. There are no trees and no buses,
just the most wonderful views of the Andean Cordillera upon
which this part of Bolivia is built.
All day I ride out of the plains, bit by bit ascending to
the higher altitudes of a mountain range that stretches from
southern Chile to Bolivia. The landscape changes quite suddenly
from the flat to steep-ridged rock faces, pricked by an ice-blue
sky. Roads as straight as a horizon change into broad sweeping
bends that penetrate deeply into red-ochre sediment, and which
by the late afternoon soak up the light from the gently decaying
sun.
Although the transition from one country to another does not
respect the precise definition imposed by a country's border,
the faces of people here are Bolivian, austere and tough.
The women start to exhibit the bowler-hat headwear that has
become something of a cliché, but what I really enjoy is their
swarthy attitude with which they broker no nonsense. Likewise,
their skin is the colour of earth."
You will see this. You will meet these people.
'Journeying over the Andean
Cordillera is one of the highlights of this adventure
so a triple traverse is three times the amazing experience.'
The major route along the Pan-American Highway will start
with a party in one of the cool places in Buenos Aires, one
of the most sophisticated cities in the Americas. This is
a world adventure but it is also important to know that we
have time for fun. Play hard but work very hard. The long
ride down to and across Tierra del Fuego gets us only to the
start point. Once we have visited Ushuaia we head back partly
the way we came and then over the Andes, the first of three
crossings and into southern Chile. Riding north on the Highway
we will pass though beautiful cities such as La Serena and
then back into the mountains to desert gems such as San Pedro
de Atacama. At 15, 000 feet, the Alto Plano is an arid landscape
of unsurpassed beauty. The light at the end of the day is
magic time and a delight for cinematographers. We are in the
vicinity of the Cordillera de la Sal or the Valley of the
Moon, so called because of its true similitude to that of
the lunar landscape. Likewise, Valle de la Muerte or Death
Valley is a do-able option if we have time.
The route will continue via Calama and back into Argentina,
so crossing the Andean Cordillera once again. After an overnight
in Tilcara, the journey will head north to cross into Bolivia.
The roads in Bolivia are hard but bumpy. There is little loose
gravel and whilst it is technically 'off-road' needs little
experience when ridden carefully. The route through to Turpiza
and Uyuni is extraordinarily beautiful and in all my riding
I rarely have had the privilage to be in such a fantastic
landscape. I know a fabulously friendly small hotel in Uyuni
where we can relax, have great food and drink, and fettle
our bikes before we head into the highest city in the world,
La Paz.
At this point we return over the mountains for our final crossing
and descend to the coast. The coastal route along Peru is
amongst the finest routes in the world. At once skirting the
waters edge, it swoops back up to the mountains before exchanging
hard craggy outcrops for sandy desert terrain. At Nazca we
will stay in a hotel with a pool, where the beer is cold and
where an optional light aircraft can be hired next door to
fly over the famous Nazca Lines. While most of the accommodation
is mid-range, sometimes bunk-house or hostel style, occasionally
you will be spoilt with some of the hotels as a richly deserved
reward for all your serious hard work.
'If you accomplish this journey
at the level I want to operate it,
you will return home a great adventurer.'
So far so good. But we can't hang about so we will
head up through Peru to Lima where we will stay with Jorge,
a world-biker friend of mine who I met during my last visit.
He wants to take us on his boat for a days sailing, we will
see, but suitably refreshed we ride into Ecuador and to Cuenca,
the centre of which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The hotel
here is to die for - quite one of the most beautiful I have
had the pleasure in which to stay. This project may not be
as expensive as the others - it's actually 60% cheaper - but
where it can, it tries to keep the riders refreshed and rested
in incredibly friendly places so we can safely tackle each
day.
At Cayambe, we stay overnight at a beautiful hacienda right
on the equator. The owners are friends of mine and bikes will
be parked in their courtyard. Let me impress upon you once
again, that locations like this are almost secret but once
found are never forgotten. Once again, the accommodation is
superb. When we are in areas where there are no hotels we
will have to camp, but when we can, we try and get great deals.
Colombia is thought to be a safe country in which to travel
and my own experience 100% bears this out. It is mountainous
in the south and extremely beautiful. The people are tremendously
courteous and at Bogota we board a plane commissioned for
the sole purpose of transporting our bikes and luggage to
Panama. This is a family run operation and everything is done
quickly and efficiently. Transportation time should take about
48 hours.
From Bogota, the main group continues north, traversing the
colourful countries of Central America. We will ride through
Costa Rica and into Nicaragua to stay in the colonial city
of Granada. It's a short distance across Honduras and Guatemala
before we enter Mexico.
After staying in great cities like Oaxaca in the south and
Cuenca further north we cross into the USA. This is the final
leg and we will ride to see all the famous natural monuments
you will have heard about in Utah and Nevada where all the
great desert wind-forms cluster. In the north-west we will
pass though the Banff and Jasper national parks before crossing
into Canada to start the Alaskan Highway at Dawson Creek.
The weather will determine whether we can go further north
and if we are able, we will. At the end of this massive enterprise
we then ride across Canada to New York where your bike will
be shipped home. Can you handle it?
If you think you are ready for this, then fill in the application
form and send it off a.s.a.p. Places are limited to around
15 hand-picked riders, personally selected by myself. If you
think you want to do the hardest motorcycle tour in the world
and ride with some of the most experienced riders on the planet,
then get in touch with me.
Nick Sanders
Ride with Nick Sanders -
Terms and conditions to follow shortly
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