28 January 2018 – I back tracked my way out of town to the
highway which took me to the border. Blanche took me right to the border and it
wasn’t more than 4 Miles / 6 Kilometers away. I was motioned off to a side
parking lot. Customs / Aduana wanted to talk to me. I exchanged all the
Columbian Pesos for American Dollars so I was good to go there. I got my papers
and headed to the Customs / Aduana. I gave the guy all my paperwork. He was
shaking his “head wrong papers, wrong papers”. Finally, he gave up. He told me
to go to Immigration and get my passport signed. So, I walked around the
building and what I saw made my eyes pop out of my head. The line of people
waiting to go into the building was something I’ve never seen before.
Conservatively speaking there must be more than 300 people in front of me and
growing. Unbelievable!
I went to the end of the line thinking this will be a 3 or 4
hour wait. I was standing in line for about 30 minutes and this young woman came
up to me and said that people 65 years or older can go to the front of the
line. Wait, you mean there is something good about being old? But this didn’t
just happen: there was a lot of cell phone translating go on. Eventually, a man
offered to show me where to go. So, I followed him and he showed me the door to
enter. Security asked to see my passport. After he did the math he let me in
the door and showed me the window where to get my passport stamped. I felt
sorry for all those people still standing and waiting in line. I went back to
Customs / Aduana and they told me to wait while a decision is made. Uh oh. Actually,
they were quite nice. Nicer than I thought they would be. 10 minutes later the
door open and I was invited in. Imagine being invited in to Customs / Aduana.
They asked to see my passport and all my paperwork. I spread
it out on the table and the new official looked at all of it and then went to
his computer for a second or two. He turned around and said I could go! I was
expecting him to say go back to Bogota, Columbia and get the right paper work.
I quickly gathered my paperwork, shook the guy’s hand and got out the door. I
wasn’t waiting around for him to change his mind. I don’t believe I spent more
than 2 hours at Columbia’s border. I went back to my motorcycle and pulled off
my sweater in case I have to do a lot standing in the sun.
I left Columbia and entered Ecuador. I stopped and took a
couple of pictures of the Welcome to Ecuador sign and continued on to Customs /
Aduana. I was motioned off to the side and told to park. I took a look at the
line waiting to get their passports signed. It was again unbelievable. I was on
the side that went in to building. Then I walked around end of the building and
continued walking along the other side of the building to almost the end. I was
mortified. How long will I be in this line? It was a giant fish hook. I believe
I stood in that line 5+ hours. I didn’t know at the time but my face and ears
took the worst sun burning in 30 years. I forgot I didn’t have hair covering my
ears. I was pretty red by the end of the day. I was thankful it was a cool day
because I didn’t have any water and I had my red AeroStitch suit on. It would
have been quite a sauna if the temperature had been hotter.
I met a family from Arkansas who were missionaries. It was a
husband and wife and two sons. I put the age of the boys at about 6 and 12. I
figured if I needed to use the latrine or get some water, I’d ask if their
oldest son could stand in my place while I was gone. I never needed that, thank
God. They were very nice. Another guy sought me out. I was surprised. He was
driving a newer Kawasaki KLR 650 and needed a rear wheel sprocket. He said he
didn’t have any teeth on his rear sprocket and was wondering if I had a
sprocket to give him. He probably looked at my motorcycle, saw the spare tires,
and figured I might also had spare sprockets. So, I asked myself this: if the
rear sprocket didn’t have teeth on it, how could the chain or the front
sprocket be any good? I didn’t give him my sprocket and felt guilty about not
helping the guy out, but I brought that in case I need it on the trip, and
there was no way to get another one.
I was about half way to the door to get into the building
when an Immigration Official came around and was writing numbers on everybody’s
wrists. The reason for that was people where cutting in line in front of people
who had been standing for hours. Your number was checked as you entered the
building. If you were out of sequence or had no number, you waited your turn.
As fate would have it, I eventually did make it into the building and while
waiting to get my passport stamped I took a couple pictures of the people who
were still 5 or 6 hours out waiting on the opposite side of the building. It
was a horrible wait. I got a drink of
water from a guy from Venezuela. His name was Alex. He spoke some English and
he did some translating for me. A nice guy. We parted ways after we got our
passports stamped.
After I left Immigration, I went to Customs / Aduana to get
my motorcycle processed in to Ecuador. Guess what…….problems right off. My
passport was stamped incorrectly. I had to re-enter Immigration and get my
passport stamped correctly. Can you imagine that? I asked myself whether it was
intentionally done or was that an honest mistake. I walked back in to where I
had gotten the incorrect stamp, and before I said anything, the woman who
stamped my passport was motioning me to her window. She fixed the mistake in
ten seconds and I was off. I went back to Aduana and the lady there was now
happy. 
She proceeded to fill out my paper work on my motorcycle. She must have
been interrupted 5 times by the same guy with some kind of problem. She typed
in all my info online and took a picture of my motorcycle and license plate.
She printed out a form with all my motorcycle info and asked me to double check
it. I went through it all and in the VIN number, there was a mistake. I showed
her that and she fixed it and printed out a new form. I double checked that one
and signed it and another form. Whew, I was done with Customs and Immigration /
Aduana and Migration. Free to enter Ecuador. Praise the Lord.
I immediately headed to the bathroom and got a drink of
water. My stomach was screaming for some food so I walked over to the nearest
ice cream stand and ordered an ice cream bar. That soothed my growling stomach.
I went back to my bike and a guy from Whistler, British Columbia, Canada wanted
to talk to me about my motorcycle. We had a fun talk about our experience
riding the Pan American Highway. I then typed in the GPS Coordinates for Hotel
Lumar in Tulcan, Ecuador. No problem; Blanche accepted them. While I was doing
that there was a growing ruckus with the people in front of my motorcycle.
First someone tried to talk to me in Spanish about my motorcycle. I told them I
didn’t understand. They were laughing about that. Then a guy who spoke English
asked me about my motorcycle and I answered all his questions. Then he told me
that one of the girls in the crowd wanted to travel with me when I left. I told
him to tell her I would love to have her come with me on my motorcycle but she
would have to ride on the handlebars. He told her that and the crowd erupted in
laughter. So I started my motorcycle and all the guys wanted to listen to it. I
let them listen for a moment and backed out. The girl was watching me real
close and I kissed my hand and blew her a kiss. The crowd again erupted in
laughter and I drove away.
I headed up the hill toward Tulcan, the city where my hotel
was, and Blanche was acting weird. I pulled over and re-entered the GPS
coordinates of the hotel. She took them without a problem, but something was
wrong. The screen was orange brown. I was mystified. I continued to follow
Blanche’s direction and she took me right downtown. I was lost. I parked my
bike and asked two guys sitting there under a canopy with a computer. They knew
where the hotel was but I didn’t understand Spanish. So that was no help.
Finally, one of the guys said I should get a taxi and have them show me where
hotel is. So that’s what I did. The taxi cab driver requested to be paid in
advance. I paid her and asked her to drive slowly so as not to lose me. She
agreed. So off we go and she showed me the general location. I was probably 100
yards from the hotel when she took off. Another taxi cab driver showed me the
hotel as he was driving by. I thank him for that.
I parked my motorcycle and feeling somewhat tired, I headed
for reception in the Lumar Hotel. There was a room available with secure
parking. It was a nice room, with hot water and good wi-fi. I unloaded my
motorcycle and asked the receptionist if he could show me where the secure
parking was. He walked down the street and he pointed out the location for me.
They were waiting for me when I arrived. I parked my motorcycle, marked my
location with Spot, and covered my motorcycle. I talked to the lady some with
my cell phone translator and then left. I walked past a small grocery store and
bought a few items to eat for the night. I came back and ate 5 sandwiches, with
meat and peanut butter. The day all of a sudden started looking up.
I talked to Mary later in the evening and told her Blanche
is acting up again. I told her the screen is orange brown and the cities have
no streets, no hotels, ATM’s or gas station. Something is amiss with Blanche.
Mary told me she would check into it tomorrow. I took some pictures of the
screen of Blanche showing the colors, cities and route completion flag. Also,
the container the S/D card came in with the part numbers, SKU numbers and the
receipt of purchase. I also gave her Blanche’s identification number for when
she calls Garmin.
Now it’s a waiting game to see how Garmin will react to how
Blanche is acting up. Will they be able to solve my problem? I went to bed being glad everything went well at the
border today and worrying how will I navigate if Blanche is on the fritz.
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