Back to Cali

I had done no road work before getting back into the saddle. Before leaving Buga for Bogota in March I had replaced the drive train and brakes and cleaned the bike and gear and there the machine sat, ready to ride, in the dormitory of the Buga Hostel.

I knew it was flat through the Valle Cauca to Cali. I had ridden that way twice before. I figured I would round into shape on the road. A few days before my departure I began to study the elevations and terrain as the Pan American Highway left the valley and south to Ecuador. There was very difficult climbing ahead and sooner than I expected. I would have only three days at most on the flats of the river valley before going up into the Andes. I was going to be tested and I knew there would be pain ahead as punishment for my neglecting to train.

I set out from Buga knowing two days wasn’t enough to get into shape for climbs up to 4000 meters and I was curious just what sort of legs I would have on the 90 km to Cali. I discovered I didn’t have much. I compounded my fatigue by stupidly passing up a comedor that I should have stopped at for lunch. I was forced to ride across 40 km of sugar cane fields until the next roadside restaurant. I bonked hard and only had a single banana for energy but I made it through and at Palmira I ordered the lunch menu and then collapsed at the table. France was playing Spain in the Euro but I hardly had the energy to watch it or even to eat. I rested at the restaurant for two hours.

I took a different route into Cali thinking anything had to be better than the traffic-heavy, potholed, and polluted--taxis and scooters weaving in and around you--way I had taken into Cali in 2010. But this new route was worse. I first had a long, indirect ride on tired legs through more sugar cane fields taking me around the city to the east, and then the road in was just as polluted and trafficked and bad as the other and indeed worse, because I was entering the city far from Barrio Granada on the western edge. I had a long ride back east through some poor neighborhoods and heavy traffic to the centro and then over the river.

I made the hostal in Granada just as the sun was going down behind the mountains. My knees ached and I had trouble getting up the stairs to my room. I showered, ate some pasta at an Italian restaurant I knew on Avenida Sexta, and went to bed. I wondered if my knees would bend in the morning and the thought of the mountains began to really scare me.

The Ninja of Buga

Miguel, Protector of Buga

Prison Hooch

Iglesia Santa Ana in barrio Teusaquillo 

A few days after returning to Bogota I received a message from Diego saying the prison hooch was ready. Before leaving for Buga, Diego had shown me the contraption he had constructed for making "pruno", or prison wine, and had lamented I might not be around to drink it, despite his making a batch of 5 liters. If it was any good he and Antoine, who lived in the room beside him at the boarding house, were sure to drink it all before I returned.

Tube releases CO2 so that the container does not swell or explode,

and grounded in water no oxygen is allowed into the container 

But when I arrived at the boarding house in the Teusaquilla neighborhood, I found that Antoine had left for good and Diego had no one to drink it with. Diego had already set out a bottle for me to take home and he served me up a first glass. The hooch was pinkish colored from the cherries and tasted strongly of the apples and oranges he had also used. We each squeezed in a half a lime for flavor. It was certainly drinkable.

But it was a bit too sweet. This signaled that the fermentation process had not been carried out long enough to consume both the sugar he had added to the mixture as well as the natural sugars in the fruits. It just wasn't warm enough in Diego's room or in the kitchen and there was no sunlight to aid in speeding the fermentation. The hooch was more a mildly alcoholic fruit juice, probably on the order of 5% alcohol. Still, it was enjoyable to drink and the rest of the five liter container Diego planned to let further ferment. The total cost of the hootch operation was 5,000 pesos, or about $2.75.

Water + Sugar + Oranges + Apples + Cherries + Yeast

Preparations

With two days of disassembly, repair and cleaning now complete, the Bike Friday has a new rear sprocket set (including a lower low gear than the prior set), new chain, new front brakes, and a new Schwalbe Plus rear tire. Plan to take it out for a ride around Buga tomorrow and make adjustments. Some brake and shifting problems remain.

Buga

Baile

Bogota Bulletproof

Today in Bogota the sun was out and it was blue and warm, the mountains visible high behind the city and I walked up the calle from the hotel. I took a tinto at a café and then continued through Chapinero past the little shops and restaurants and street vendors, and along the route of the Transmilenio, until I reached Miguel Caballero’s bulletproof clothing store on Calle 71, no 15-28. The door is kept locked and an attendant in a black bulletproof vest opened it for me. Inside the clean, bright shop two women at the counter asked what I needed and I explained I was interested in both motorcycle clothing and bulletproof garments.

A small woman guided me to the motorcycle section where I tried on a number of jackets of a durable synthetic material. These jackets were implanted with hard protection on the elbows, shoulders and back. There were various colors other than black and some fit more snugly than others against my body. She showed me to the mirror and we both marveled at how well the jackets looked on me. All were quite affordable at prices around 300,000 COP.

Then we went into the bulletproof section and I tried on the jackets there. There were many wonderfully designed jackets and pants as well as boots and other protective wear and I wondered if this tiny woman who was assisting me had upon acceptance of employment with Miguel Caballero, donned a bulletproof jacket and allowed herself to be shot in the chest with a handgun. I had read that a condition of employment, including that of his lawyers, was a personal trial of the bulletproof qualities of the garments.

I helped the little woman hang the last jacket up on the rack and I thanked her and explained I would most certainly be returning to the shop. I thought the clothing, all from the design of Miguel Caballero himself, was both expertly made and fashionable. She smiled graciously and told me she would be at my orders upon my return.