New directions

With great effort and determination we forced ourselves to abandon the tropical paradise of Bocas del Toro and continue our journey southbound; our destination Colon and, finally, an answer to the question "will we be able to get to Colombia?". The journey to Colon was itself took almost 10 hours longer than the 5 hours estimated by one of the local firemen working at the station we had left our motorcycles; winding mountain roads, thunderstorms and road works delayed us so long that we had to stay overnight in Santiago and continue the trip the next day.

The second day of our journey to Colon had another surprise in store for us, our first speeding ticket! Shaun was leading and, although the speed limit was 80 km/h on a four lane highway, we were doing what we usually do and follow the example of the local traffic doing about 100 km/h. Despite going the same speed as local traffic, a motorcycle police officer hiding in the shadows of a tree just after a hill decided that we alone were speeding, pulled Shaun over and proceeded to write him a $75 ticket. Deciding that we didn't want to get another ticket that day, we agreed to go exactly the speed limit, regardless of how many cars honked their horns at us as we slowed the rest of the traffic down. Not more than 5 minutes later though, another member of the policia pulled us over again and told Shaun that we were doing 90 km/h; he must have had specially calibrated eyeballs because he definitely didn't have a radar gun with him. Lucky for us though, he decided not to give us another ticket after we showed him that we had just got one from his mate down the road.

When we finaly arrived in Colon late that afternoon we were surprised with what we found: a decrepit city with sewage clogged streets, crumbling colonial buildings and an overall feeling that we were not welcome there; if Panama City is the mouth of the canal then Colon is aptly named as the other end.. Still, we had made a committment to get to Colombia, so we had to stay there and see what we could find out the next day. In the light of a new day we began our enquiries with the hotel reception but the only advice they could offer us was that it wasn't safe to walk around the town. Not to be deterred, we put on the steeliest gazes we could muster and set out on our quest to find a boat to Colombia; after several hours of walking and asking people though, we were still no closer to finding a way there. Feeling a little dejected, we dodged the crowds running through the streets and returned to the safety of the hotel in order to decide what to do. We had come so far, it felt unfair to be stopped by something that seemed so simple; if only the ferry we had planned on taking before we embarked on the trip was still running! Disheartened, we decided to ride to Panama City and discuss our options.

And so here we are, after much discussion (and some examination of our bank accounts) we have decided that it is not economically feasible for us to pay the extra $1000 each it would cost to fly with our motorcycles to Colombia. Do not worry though dear reader, although the dream of riding to Brazil may be put on hold for now, it doesn't mean that the adventure is over. We have decided that we will change our plan and take our time riding up the Pacific side of Central America, in to Baja California then back up through the US, with a brief sojourn into Canada before finishing back where we started; 15000 miles, 4 months and every country in continental North America later.