Into Bolivia - Corumba to Sucre....

We made it across the border from Brazil to Bolivia safely, saying goodbye to all the Brazilian paperwork but hello to the bribing culture of Bolivia! The border officer in Bolivia happily told us that the computer system would not work on saturday but with a small fee he would manage to turn the computer on the get our motorbike visas organised, so with that we were on our way to do the 525kms to Santa Cruz.


The first leg of the journey was on the best sealed roads we could ever dream of but this quickly changed about 12kms after a lovely old Jesuit Mission town called San Jose.


The dirt road offered every imaginable off road condition, from mud, rocks, sand and bull dust. About 100kms from Santa Cruz in the worst bull dust any of us had seen Dave unfortunately came off his bike. No injuries sustained to Dave luckily but the pannier frames took a hammering and needed some welding done in Santa Cruz.
The good thing that came as a result of this tough road was that Matteo finally came up with a name for his bike... ´Roberta´. Named after a tough old horse he had in Kenya growing up, and also cause she is tad like Roberta out of the Australian TV series Underbelly, tough and obnoxious...not a bad name for a KLR650.

All of us were tired and worn out as we finally completed the 350kms of road in 10 hours, and rolled into Santa Cruz in darkness, something none of us were comfortable with. Luckily a great guy, Juan, on an Africa Twin drove up to us and escorted us through all the hectic traffic. The kindness of people whilst we have been travelling has never ceased to amaze us.

We stayed at a hostel called Jodanga in Santa Cruz which was very accommodating of the bikes, and was a great place for R and R. We spent 4 nights in Santa Cruz whilst we saw the sights of the town and made the repairs needed to the bikes and some new tyres for Roberta. We were all amazed with the westernised items you can get in Bolivia as there is a very good importing culture, so the bikes were easily serviced with all the brands we wanted.

From Santa Cruz we went to a little town full of ex pats called Samaipata. It was a very scenic 120kms drive, however we joined a lot of traffic heading from Santa Cruz to the little town for the Easter weekend. Samiapata will be remembered for the great food, a fantastic animal refuge and a truly beautiful day hike in Amboro National Park.


We were recommended a road called 'Ruta del Che' to take to get to the capital of Bolivia Sucre (although this is hard to confirm as people from Sucre think it is the capital, and the people from La Paz think La Paz is the capital... strange to say the least )


The Ruta Del Che is in significant in the history of Che Guevara as it was the area where he and his men hid in the mountains and tried to start a revolution in Bolivia against the military dictator. Two towns along the mountainous passes are of great importance. Valle Grande where there is a small museum with some photos and his clothes and La Higuera were he was shot at the local school.

In the little town there is a small shop owned by a lady who claimed to have smuggled food to Che when he was hiding in the mountains. She made us a fantastic lunch and we had a great bottle of warm beer. We also spent the night at La Higuera at a beautiful posada called Casa de Telegrafista.


The next morning it was only 280km to Sucre but all of it was dirt bar 70kms but most of climbing and descending like the previous day. The scenery was amazing from dense greenery to cactus ridden, spaghetti western style landscape. We rolled into Sucre, once again in the dark and found a great hostel with safe parking for the bikes called Wasi Masi.

Sucre is a really beautiful center of town that is UNESCO world heritage listed. We spent 4 days relaxing and enjoying the sights of the town. The highlight has to be the mirrador cafe where we spent hours lazing in the sun, playing cards and eating amazing food. Not a bad way to spend some time. Motoservi, a really nice moto shop fabricated a 15mm aluminium spacer for Roberta's rear shock to stiffen it up a tad. They did a great job on the lathe. The next stop was Salar de Uyuni, the world’s highest salt flat.

Corumba and the Pantanal...

Our final destination in Brazil before heading into the much anticipated Bolivia was the border town named Corumba. From here we where able to sort out a few last minute things with the bikes and also head out a night out into the Pantanal. The Pantanal is the largest wetland area in the world, and is home to a massive variety of flora and fauna which definitely spoilt us during our visit.




We all opted for the much cheaper option of sleeping in hammocks, rather than the air-conditioned hotel rooms during our stay in the Pantanal. Good meals where also included in the price as well as a variety of tours, with horse riding and jeep tours being our preference. Both where good fun and we where able to see a nice variety animals. One of the main highlights was a friendly Toucan which came and shared breakfast with us in the morning around the campsite.





Corumba itself wasn´t too exciting, so after getting the bikes all sorted we took of for the border and the nearby Bolivian town of Puerto Suárez. Here Simon and Blair would again split from us too catch the train to Santa Cruz and we hit the road with the aim of reaching Santa Cruz within a couple of days...depending on the road conditions...but at this stage we were all very excited about the prospect of a new country, with new cultures and the fact that we no longer had to worry about speaking Portuguese.

Bonito and the muddy road there...

It took us three days to reach Bonito after leaving Brasilia. This was mostly due too a section of road about half way through our journey. The relentless rain fall this night before we hit the road had caused the dirt road to turn in to a nice slippery, muddy one. And seeing as though we were still running with our mostly road tyres on it made our task even harder. Dave had picked up his new set of more knobbly tyres two days earlier in Brasilia but was carrying them until the Bolivian border before putting them on (too get the most out of the existing tyres). But he soon found himself and the bike lying sideways on the mud twice in one hour, and both times braking off the panniers cam locks. Its quite frustrating seeing these nice off road tyres strapped to the bike when all you want is for them to be around the wheels. Good fun none the less.



Apart from the muddy road, we made it to Bonito too meet up with Simon and Blair without too many other hassles. Bonito is a lovely small town with one main commercial street. Very similar to other tourist town we have been too, meaning that there are lots of nice restaurants, bars, and Internet cafes. But what make Bonito so special is not the things found in the town is whats around that pulls in the points.






There are a number of freshwater rivers, with the clarity of a glass of mineral water in which you can snorkel. There are a huge number of fish which surround you as you drift effortlessly down stream. Such an amazing experience. It is so strange to think that we are in the middle of all this farming land and here we are going snorkeling in water which would rival that found somewhere like Fiji or Samoa.






Next stop is Corumba and the Bolivian frontier!