Argentina, End Of The World, February 8, 2005

     We turned east from Chile and again crossed the Andes into Argentina.  Bad food or a reoccurrence of Greg’s malaria from year’s ago dropped Greg like a bag of hammers in Bariloche.  Fortunately for Donna-Rae the picturesque town of Barlicohe is a shopper’s oasis.  While Greg sweated and repeatedly teared into the porcelain throne in a hotel room Donna-Rae made friends with numerous souvenir shop owners and the Argentine postal system.  Five days later the Argentine postal system was $160.00 richer and Greg was five lbs. lighter as they pointed the motorcycle south and across Patagonia.

     The winds were blowing at 75 miles per hour, sideways, as they swerved back and forth trying to keep from being blown off the road and into the ditch over hundreds of miles of ugly gravel roads as they crossed Tierra del Fuego (Land of Fire).  This was no easy ride as Donna-Rae suffered from not only the bumps and potholes jarring the over loaded motorcycle, but also from the constant dust under her contact lenses and the freezing cold winds.

     It was a happy duo that rode into the town of Ushuaia, the southernmost city on the continent of South America.  Leaving the last 20 miles to the next day, they spent an evening sharing road tales with two other Americans they met in Ushuaia, both also riding motorcycles, one from Cleveland on a Norton and the other from Pasadena riding a Kawasaki.

     On February 8 the “Riding The Dream” team of Donna-Rae and Greg reached the end of the road.  They had now tagged Deadhorse, Alaska, the northernmost point they could ride on the North American continent, and the southernmost point on the continent of South America, the end of Route 3 south of Ushuaia.


     The end of the road at the end of the globe. 

We could tell some more road tales, like how we were arrested and thrown in a smelly jail with no water or food for three days, or how Donna-Rae fought off two attackers who wanted to rob her of her credit card, or how Greg was captured by Inca Indians and made to marry the Chief’s daughter, but those tales are best left for around a campfire when we return to America.  And there they might really be tall tales.