Day 63

41,502 – 42,046   544 Miles today (19,346 Miles Overall)

Mendoza, Argentina – Zapala, Argentina

I was up quite early today. The mechanic told me he would have the bike ready last night late but that never happened. He sent me a picture of the bike gutted with everywhere being individually checked coming out of the ECU but did not find a thing. But seeing this guy’s work I am convinced he’s the best mechanic that has ever touched my bike. This morning he texted me at 9am and told me it would be ready at 10:30. I packed everything up and left it by the hostel door. I hung out with everyone downstairs saying bye to everyone and was so so sad to leave. Made my way over to the mechanic two blocks away.

He still had the front wheel off and was installing the new bearings. Bikes for 41,500 on it and I got the new chain and sprockets installed, new rear brake pads, new front and rear wheel bearings and I think that’s it. He decided to swap out the rear tubeless set up I have because air was leaking out of the plug from that nail. The hole was too big so he threw a tube in the ewer wheel which I’m not thrilled about because it’ll be a long day when I get a flat in the rear tire one day. I’ll keep the tubed set up until I buy another tire in Chile in a few weeks. He told me he’s pretty certain that my throttle body needs to be replaced and that’s the problem. I called up Pierre who is in Peru. he picked up my throttle body I brought down and left in a hostel in Huacachina and gave him the mechanics address. The plan is for him to mail it to Mendoza to this mechanic and on my way back up from Ushuaia I will stop back here for him to swap out the throttle body. He literally pulled apart every wire and removed the rear suspension to check every inch of every wire and didn’t find anything. I have a feeling this guy is right. He is supposedly the best mechanic in Argentina and I have a lot of faith in him. I guess we will see around New Years when I get back up here and get that TB installed.

I paid the man a cheap $300 and went back to the hostel and loaded up the bike. I had 2 days to get my ass down to Bariloche where I wanted to watch the net soccer game. I figured if I did 10 hours today and 4 tomorrow would be golden. So I said bye to all my friends and I was very very very sad to leave. I hit the road and had a long ride in front of me. It was hot as fuck at 96 degrees for most of the day. The first part of the ride was quite boring with long straight roads. But the views were still beautiful out in the distance.I was thinking about a lot of things on this ride. More importantly, my new plan for this trip. I was going to ship the bike back home from BA in January but I found out in the last few days that I can get a TIP for my bike for a year in Uruguay and a lot of people store bikes down there. I talked to Sameera and she’s cool with me coming back next winter and the one after for another trip. So the new plan is to get to Uruguay and leave my bike there for a few years. This makes me really happy as I don’t have to rush anything on this trip anymore. I’ll see what I see and whatever I don’t I can always come back to. Argentina is way too big and beautiful to rush it like this in one trip.

The roads here were quite empty. I was in the middle of nowhere again. I fucked up and didnt buy any water so I was empty. If I get a flat right now I’ll be screwed. Quite a vulnerable feeling out here all alone but I feel better and better about it as every week passes. More confidence? More trust? More of just not giving a shit? I have no idea what it is but I’m ok with it out here all alone now. If something happens it’ll all work out in the end. And if it doesn’t…..well I guess i’ll have another story to tell. I have too many stories to tell I don’t want to have anymore to tell! Hah

Whenever I got service on my cell I would check in on Lars on the Life360 app and see where he was. The bastard left at 7am and I was hoping to catch his ass at the end of the day. He doesn’t do long days and rides a bit slower. I didn’t stop for any food at all and was only stopping for fuel every 130 miles or so. I didn’t want to skip too many fuel stations in case the next one or two were closed or broken then I would be screwed. I came upon a long 50 mile dirt section which wasn’t great. it was quite shitty and I read some bad reviews about it on Ioverlander but it ended up not being that bad as they said it was. I passed a rider on an older Tenere and made him look like he was standing still on the road. When I got on the road my bike was riding like shit so I pulled over to make sure I didn’t have a flat. I didn’t but maybe the mechanic changed the Psi in the tires. After about 10 miles my confidence was back and I was ripping along on the dirt/gravel.

I came to a town at about 5pm and saw lars had stopped. I was hauling ass to get there. The winds were fucking brutal. 30-40mph cross winds just crushing my helmet into the side of my face. I must have looked like an idiot with the faces I was making whenever the winds got even stronger. The ride sucked with the strong winds but it’s only going to get worse. I got to the next town and Lars kept on riding. I’m gonna kill this guy. IT was another 1:40 to the next town he’s heading to now. I got fuel and back on the road hauling ass. I pulled into the next town and the bastard took off again onto the next. I texted him and told him to stop fucking moving so we can get dinner together but this town was the last one he said. I got some more fuel and rode another 40 minutes and finally caught him. This was perfect because I wanted to ride till 9pm and then camp so tomorrow would be an easy day. I got my own hotel room and met up with lars for dinner. It was nice to stop in one of these shit hole towns with a friend and not be here all alone. We got an ok meal and then went to bed quite early. We had a 4 hour ride to Bariloche tomorrow. What a long day today was. Almost 550 miles. We were exhausted.