After 25,000 miles I got rear-ended by a 68 year old woman in a Hyundai (with insurance). I’m not sure if the bike is totaled or not, I’m guessing they will have to take it apart to see if the frame is bent. I was traveling North on US-93 towards the Hoover Dam at about 50ph (still accelerating from merging onto the freeway) and the Hyundai hit me from behind. It seemed like she was driving at a fairly substantial speed. I heard a very loud bang and then I was sliding along the pavement. Two minutes before this I had taken off the top part of my suit so I have some road rash on both arms. The Sidi boots and the Aerostich suit protected my legs very well. Without them I think I would have fractured my femur, fibula/tibia, and ankle. As it is I have been crutching and wheelchairing around Las Vegas with my cousin and friends. My left leg is very sore and tender but the right leg is fine. I guess something had to go right… The doctors at Kingman Regional asked me for a piece of the lucky rabbit foot they thought I must have been carrying, they could not believe that I hadn’t broken any bones. They took a lot of x-rays (all digital nowadays) to eliminate the possibility of breaks. I had someone from Enterprise pick me up from the hospital still wearing my gown. They gave me a PT Cruiser and some Oreos. I headed back up US-93 to the tow yard to pick up all of my luggage (including my clothes) and then made my way to Las Vegas. I also took pictures of the crash scene, you can see the grooves my bike made in the asphalt. There were a couple of my business cards, my headlight switch, and a bar weight still in the dirt that I grabbed. One of my Pelican cases exploded on impact with the front right corner of her car which is where all the business cards came from. The nice people at Rosie’s Diner across the freeway all ran over to help me out. There was an off-duty paramedic who checked my spine for injury before letting me take my helmet off and someone from the restaurant sent over bottled water.

In defensive driving they teach you that there are no accidents. I could have waited longer before merging (even though I could see no cars) or I could have checked my rear mirrors more often. I had just been thinking that for my next trip I wanted the new BMW F 800 GS but I didn’t know how I’d make the switch. Funny how things work out…

The past week or so before the accident I drove from Tuxpan, MX to Houston in 18 hours (800 miles), stayed with my friends Will and Ben, and drove West from Houston towards Phoenix. There were some huge lightning storms just after El Paso so I stayed at a little Western-themed hotel called Eleven Inn. I’m still trying to figure out if I can get to Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Reno before I go back to Seattle.

I’m going to try to stay with my family in Bullhead City while I figure out the insurance claims. Hope you all had a better happiest day of the year than I did. As I’m writing this someone from an insurance company commercial just said “most accidents happen on Fridays between 3 and 6pm” which is when mine happened. If you’re a rider please be safe… I think I lucked out in terms of injuries. This woman hit me in spite of my yellow helmet, yellow luggage with SOLAS reflective tape, and reflective tape on my suit. Next time I will try attaching roman candles or road flares to the back of the bike.

Got up early and tried to take a shower but there was no hot water left. I guess all you get is one. That seems to be one more than many places I’ve stayed at down here though… I checked out and told the woman at the front desk “todo excelente!” I hope their hotel does well.

I headed into Quetzaltenango proper and immediately got lost. On Google Maps the city looks very simple but in reality it’s a huge maze of one-way streets. I decided I needed some hashbrowns when a McDonald’s popped up on the horizon. Once inside I had a conversation with a man, Donald, and his wife, who invited me to eat with them. Donald also offered to lead me out of the city and once I saw the route we took I was very grateful. It would have taken me hours to find.

The road led up and out of the city and through a mountain village and a large valley. Everything was lush and green and I had a fairly easy time staying on track towards the border. At the border I acquired a helper who didn’t have much to do because when I left Mexico I got my double entry stamp. The border was a breeze but at first I tried to cross with all of the truck traffic. Apparently that’s not allowed and I had to find the civilian border crossing.

Once across I drove towards Tapachula and sat in traffic for a little bit while a flagger directed one-way traffic due to construction. I bought a Coke from a woman on the side of the road and a man picked up the change that I dropped and handed it to me. Once traffic got underway the roads were a welcome change from the ones in recent memory. Newly paved, two lanes in each direction, and nearly empty. I made good time West. At a Pemex along the way I met a group of four guys who were all interested in the bike and we had a conversation that I did not understand half of. The one on the left in the picture below is apparently a chemical engineer, though, and was excited when I gave him a card. Just after meeting them I got lost getting through the town and a man on a 150cc moto led me through to the highway. There were only a few hairy moments when the road surface abruptly changed to gravel or I hit a speed bump at 50 miles an hour and became briefly airborne. I reached La Ventosa just after dark but there was no hotel there so I had to head a little farther West. I’m at an older hotel but the room (and the price) is nice and they have secure parking and free wifi. I’m just finishing uploading pictures and listening to the Lakers/Celtics game in Spanish. The Spanish announcers are much more exciting than the regular ones, I think. Can’t wait to be asleep.

Today started out great. I got up on time and went to see the ruins at Copan. They were everything everyone said they’d be—I’m really glad I went. I saw two motos in the parking lot, one from Florida and one from Australia. I left business cards on both of them. I also met a photographer with an old view camera (I think) photographing the ruins, her name is Lisa Elmaleh and you can see her work at her website. After the ruins I downed a Gatorade and went to the Internet cafe to plan my route. I headed back to the hotel and packed everything up and drove the 12km to the Guatemalan border. The El Florido border is the best I’ve experienced—there were no “helpers” to “help” me. The one snag was walking back into Honduras to get copies made—a long, hot walk uphill. The copy guy told me the copies were free though, probably because I looked like I was going to drop dead at any moment.

The Guatemalan stage of the ride started out fine, lots of mountain roads though they were well-maintained. In Guatemala City I stopped to fill up (at a self-service pump, the first in months!) and ate some snacks inside. I noticed an older gentleman looking at my bike and talked to him when I went outside. He offered to guide me to the exit to the freeway West; I’m glad he did because it was labeled “Frontera El Salvador” for some reason.

After Chimaltenango the mountain roads were constantly under construction. There were some good patches where they had finished but during one in-progress patch there was lots of mud. As I went through it at 5mph a semi was also making its progress through in the other direction. As I passed its front wheel on a banked curve the semi began to slip down the slope towards me. I had to hurry through the mud to avoid being flattened by him. I didn’t look back to see if he went over the edge or not, I was concentrating too hard on not falling over.

After that I endured more mud, gravel, sand, rocks, bumps, and holes. It took me so long to get through this stretch that it began to get dark, and as I climbed higher it also began to get foggier. In many places both directions of traffic were squeezed into two lanes where only half of a set of bridges had been built or a landslide had closed the road. At one point there was a fresh landslide and everyone had to turn around and cross into the other set of lanes. One impatient SUV driver high-centered on the tall median strip. I tried to drive through a drainage gap but it was too tall for my engine guard. About 1km back there was a place to cross that worked. Soon after the landslide I saw the lights of the Quetzaltenango below. I was very relieved. It was dark by this time and the oncoming traffic kept blinding me with their brights.

I finally wound down out of the mountain pass and took the road into the city. I asked for a hotel at the gas station and they directed me to the Hacienda Grande Hotel. It’s only been open for six months and everything looks brand new. I asked if there were other guests and there apparently some upstairs but the place seemed empty. The three employees working were all very anxious to see that I had everything I needed and offered to carry my bags in. The price was $22 for the night and the water in the shower was very hot.

I’m going to pass out now. A guy I talked to online a few times, Ben Edser, is doing the same kind of trip as I am and he’s in the same city as I am. Unfortunately he had a crash recently and won’t be continuing on his bike, you can read about it and see pictures here.

I made it all the way to Copan today. It was much longer than I anticipated, maybe 350 miles. There’s no freeway that goes straight across the country so you’ve got to go Northwest all the way to the top and then Southwest back down to where Copan and the Guatemalan border is. The drive was good but very tiring. It was mostly sunny but I got some rain through the mountains. The last 30 minutes were in the dark, for about 50 miles to Copan Ruins there’s nothing to see, it’s all just mountain roads and pastures. The city itself is very hilly with the added bonus of cobblestones everywhere.

At one point along the drive I stopped at a high point in the mountains with a view and a horse and donkey who were hanging out together and eating grass. A family drove up and I talked with them a little bit and gave the dad a card, he liked my motorcycle.

In Tegucigalpa I fueled up and a cop came over to look at my bike; he tried on my helmet and gloves unsuccesfully too. I took a picture of him with the bike. I’ll try getting pictures within the next day or two.

After talking to the guys at the Nicaragua/Honduras border about the Amatillo border I decided I’d rather have a root canal than go through it again. I’m in Choluteca right now and I’ll head up to San Pedro Sula and then down to Copan. I’m going to try and see the ruins as everyone tells me they are great.

This morning I left San Jose at 9am after a free breakfast of Froot Loops at Kap’s Place. It seems to me like they’re the best possible hotel you could stay at in San Jose, especially in that price range. I got on the freeway North and after a few minutes passed about a hundred bikers, most on Harleys but there were also two BMWs, a KTM, a Triumph, and a Honda that I noticed. After we all went through the toll booth they started to line up on the shoulder to regroup so they didn’t lose anyone and I stopped too near the front. Everyone nearby came up to shake my hand and ask where I was from and where I was going. I gave out a lot of business cards. I believe the group was the Costa Rica Steel Angels. I took some pictures of them that you can see below.

I also ran into to another, smaller group of Harley riders a while later. I didn’t get their name but they all had matching leather jackets and very nice bikes.

Two well-equipped motos passed me going South and I was very curious about who they were, they were a couple of hours apart so I’m guessing they were both solo travelers. Another well-equipped moto passed me going my direction; I tried to follow but lost him after a minute or two. He was passing on corners and driving fairly fast.

I got the first speeding ticket of the trip just before Liberia; I got radared just after passing a semi truck and so was going pretty fast. The officer wrote me a ticket but I said “Apagar ahorita?” (Pay now?) and he was very pleased with that arrangement and asked for 30,000 colones ($60 USD). I thought I might get out of the ticket because he motioned me off the road and the spot was fairly slippery, I fell over to the left and the moto fell over onto me downhill. The cop was nice and helped me pick it up and was generally very pleasant. He wished me good luck on my trip and I gave him a business card.

At the border to Nicaragua I met some nice guys who had been in Costa Rica mountain bike racing, the one whose name I got was Marco. I told them about my trip and gave Marco a card. I also acquired a border helper after finishing the Costa Rica side of the border. He was nice and didn’t try to scam me too badly. He tried to skim an extra $10 on the insurance portion so I didn’t tip him as much as I would have otherwise. One of the employees told me he was a bad kid but he seemed nice enough. He kept calling me “mang.” “Les’ go mang, les’ go.” At one point the employee came over to yell at him about the insurance price and he was a little bit terrified. He had to be all of 14 years old. I paid some even younger kids to watch my bike. Two of them asked me but their friend joined them later and also expected to be paid. The employee who inspected my bike was also the first border employee to ask to see inside my luggage, when he saw the effort to open the first one he was OK with me just describing what was in the rest. I think the frequency of inspections may increase because drug smuggling operations probably operate by bringing drugs North to the USA rather than South to Panama.

Just before Rivas there were thousands and thousands of tiny mosquitos in the air. They covered my newly washed suit, my mirrors, headlight, and windshield. Apparently they can be quite corrosive so I took the time to wash them off of everything painted and everything metal.

Coming into Managua I stopped at a nice Texaco store for snacks and dropped my small Canon into the restroom toilet after unzipping my suit. Oops. I think it will be fine when it dries out, I already rubbed it down with antibiotic gel (twice). After getting back on the road I saw a rider I had seen a few minutes before who had given me a thumbs-up; he motioned me to get up next to him and asked me where I was going in English. I told him Managua and also told him to pull over so we could talk. He was riding a Yamaha Virago 1100 and you can see him pictured below. His name is Carlos Portocarrero. We talked about riding and he told me about the local bike club. He’s planning on buying an F 650 GS Dakar and also has two fully restored Urals (sidecar bikes). He owns an auto shop in town and works on restoring cars and bikes. He was also a motocross champion for two consecutive years in ‘70 and ‘71. The hotel he led me to is great, it’s called Hotel El Almendro. It’s mid-range in price but it feels very fancy. I think it’s most frequented by business types. They have very secure parking for the bike.

I told Carlos about the speeding ticket and he said I did the right thing by paying the cop—if you take the legal route they hold your license until you go to the police station and go through all the formalities. It’s supposedly a very big hassle. This is also apparently why people use international drivers’ licenses—so that you can give it to the police and not worry about picking it up again.

I thought briefly about going to see Copan and avoiding the Amatillo border at El Salvador but it’s just too far out of the way and the freeway system in Honduras doesn’t have a direct route there. Live Maps tells me to enter Honduras, then enter and drive through El Salvador, and then enter Honduras again to get to Copan from here. No thanks. Tomorrow I hope to have a two border day, Nicaragua to Honduras and Honduras to El Salvador. I also still have to write up the story of Dane and I getting separated on the way back from Panama City.