Thursday, January 17, 2008

Cycling from one capital city to another.....Bogota to Caracas

Summit....Paso de Berlin 3400m


Sierra Nevada de Cocuy




Up to 4200m, Paso de Aguila, Venezuela










Puerto Cruz, Venezuela



Steve and Gavin's fine endorphin adventure.
Somewhere along our journey we came across some graffiti, which roughly translated from Spanish stated, "We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing."For two guys with young progeny elsewhere on the planet during the Christmas holidays, this quote would appear to, at least partially, justify our desire to pedal off into the wild blue yonder, as free as a couple of aging fathers can be.
The wild blue yonder this time being Bogota, Colombia to Caracas,Venezuela, 1700 kms in 14 days. Or as my companion, Gavin the Brit put it, "like cycling from one end of England to the other and halfway back."This was my colleague's first extended tour and amazingly, after such an intense ride; up to 9 hours in the saddle each day, 4 huge climbs over 3,000 metres, no rest days and a bike that was slowly falling apart, he insists he thoroughly enjoyed the experience (in spite of spitting his dummy on a few difficult occasions) and feels like he's lived two months in the space of two weeks.
Play?? This kind of cycle touring is the worst fun you'll ever have! :)

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