Altitude sickness / Mal de la montaña / Soroche
Ustedes cruzaram los 4700 m de altitud en Perú. ¿Cómo están haciendo a respeto de los efectos de la altitud?¿Qué síntomas están manifestando? Hay muchos medicamentos para evitarlo. ¿Pueden ustedes hacer una lista aquí? (Por favor perciban qué yo desapruebo el uso de medicamentos, principalmente sin supervisión médica. Yo NO estoy logrando hacier apología de su uso). Hay también una medicina ancestral: la hoja de coca. ¿Están usando ella? ¿Lo qué es mejor para ustedes? ¿Mascarla o tomar su té? ¿Es cara o difícil de encontrar? ¿tienen ustedes informaciones específicas para ciclistas, una vez que ellos infringen las recomendaciones básicas para evitar la enfermedad, como ejercitarse en demasía, hacer mucho esfuerzo, etc?
Nancy's Poem: Climbing over the top
Crawling my way up the highest peak,
I wonder if I can do this.
Can I ride my bike up to the heavens?
Or will I die, will my heart give out,
Will I fall off the edge from the lack of oxygen?
I adjust my height of seat
I mount my metal steed
I pedal up the gentle grade,
I take a breath, I gulp another
I want more but the air resists
I chew some coca, I spit out the spines
Round the pedals turn, ever so slowly
My eyes start to burn, my lungs fight
Focusing on the ground ahead,
Listening to my music
Progress is being made,
My vision becomes smaller
My focus sharpens
Making it to the top is my only thought
I miss the sheep dogs attacking,
Three come from nowhere,
The charge shocks me back to reality
I dismount rapidly in fright
My bike protects me from the circling dogs
I throw a rock at the alpha dog
They back away, they retreat
A 4-year-old child chases them
With a bigger rock then mine,
Gracias, niño,
I crawl my way up to the top,
I fight, I want to cry
No, too much energy
My nose is running wild,
Drule pores from my mouth
As I gasp for another breath,
I leave it, to much energy to fix.
I stop for a rest I have resisted,
The air all seems blue,
Sounds and space is distorted
I wonder if I know
Can I count?
What is my birthday?
What is 4 plus 4
It all comes so slowly
I have to go on.
I yell to myself
Pay attention
No crying,
Get on with it
Obediently I pedal on read more here... lee mas aquí... »
Our highest point yet: 15,400 feet (4700 meters)
Today we crossed the highest point of our journey so far, and perhaps the highest of the trip. After climbing back up into the Andes (the Cordillera Blanca) for more than a week, we crossed over 15,400 foot (4700 meter) Abra Yana Shalla. We had been working our way up to this, climbing no more than 1000 meters per day as we got into the really high places. Nancy really felt the altitude in a number of ways, so we were trying to be as careful as possible. But we made the last push this morning up into the barren peaks. We saw lots of beautiful scenery in the last few days and will try to get the pictures uploaded within a few days.
Nuestro punto mas alto del viaje: 4700 metros
Hoy cruzamos el punto mas alto del viaje hasta ahora, y tal vez el mas alto del viaje. Después de subir otra vez en los Andes (la Cordillera Blanca) por mas de una semana, cruzamos Abra Yana Shalla a 4700 metros. Habíamos llegado a esto poco a poco, subiendo no mas de 1000 metros por día cuando entramos a los lugares altos. Nancy sintió la altura en muchas maneras, y por eso tratábamos de cuidarla todo posible. Pero lo cruzamos esta mañana hasta los picos. Vimos mucho paisaje bonito en los últimos días y trataremos de subir mas fotos en unos dias.
Hospitality for touring cyclists / Hospitalidad para ciclistas viajeros
Más un largo día pedaleando terminando, el sol bajando, la noche llegando. Una ciudad o una pequeña aldea adelante. La duda: ¿dónde dormir? ¿Dónde ustedes duermem en la mayoría de las veces que están en una ciudad? ¿Cómo ustedes entran en contacto con el pueblo para pedirle abrigo? ¿Ustedes piden? O la gente ofrece? ¿Tienes ustedes algún truco que siempre funciona? ¿Hay maneras específicas de hacerlo en se tratando de Latinoamerica? ¿Las personas son desconfiadas con relación a extranjeros? ¿Déjan qué ustedes usen las duchas? ¿Comem un algo juntos, invitam a cenar? ¿Tiene alguna cobranza, o usted proponen alguna plata? Y, por fin, ¿quien (socialmente hablando) hospédelos?
Health, Healthcare, Health Insurance, and Vaccinations for the big ride
People often ask us about health-related issues, so here are some answers.
Health Insurance: Since we are from the US, with an immensely expensive and burdensome healthcare system, we felt that we had to carry health insurance that would cover us there. Although we might be able to cover expenses for most types of events in the other countries of our journey, a single week in a hospital in the US can easily bankrupt anyone. So we carry normal (expensive) major medical, high deductible ($10,000) health insurance that would cover us if we had to go limping home for a major chronic illness or something. But that insurance doesn't cover us outside the US, so if we had a serious accident or something, we could end up without coverage. So we also bought health insurance that covers us outside the US (cheaper by far). Our monthly expenses for health insurance are probably the biggest expense of the trip.
Note that "Trip insurance" is not worth much for a trip of this size, since it is not renewable and typically has pretty serious limitations. It's oriented to people going on vacation, not to people living abroad. What we needed (and most travellers will need) is the type of insurance that expatriates buy. The folks at Global Insurance Net make a specialty of this type of insurance, and we were pleased with their expertise and service.
Health Care: We've been pretty pleased with healthcare everywhere we've been. read more here... lee mas aquí... »
Back on the road, Climbing up into the mountains
Click here for all of our favorite photos from this section
After more than three weeks of not riding we are back on the road once again in Peru. We made a two-week trip back to the United States to see all our family members and are glad to report all are well. It was good to see the family as well it was a delight to see all our wonderful friends.
We returned to Trujillo, Peru and stayed once again at the Casa de Ciclistas where Lucho and his family have offered free hospitality to cyclist for 23 years. Randy and I were visitor 998. While staying there, we meet 7 different cyclists from all over the world.
We have now been on the road for 5 days and are taking a rest day in Caraz. The ride from the coast up to Caraz has been amazing, spectacular, a hard ride on mostly dirt road, some good and some awful. The best part is the lack of traffic which permitted us to enjoy the majestic views of the mountains and the river valley we pedalled through.
We rode for one day on the Panamerican highway south to Chao. The road had a good shoulder, big trucks and a landscape which brought to mind the sand dunes of Saudi Arabia. Huge hills, not really mountains, of nothing but sand dunes. Nothing lived in this region, no houses, no people, no business thrived, no birds chirped, no butterfly fluttered by. read more here... lee mas aquí... »
Randy switches to a BOB trailer... Advantages and Disadvantages
When we came back to Peru I started riding with a Ibex BOB trailer trailer again instead of using panniers as I have for the last few years. It was kind of a return to my roots, since I used a BOB for our first several rides in 2001-2005. So far, I'm happy to be pulling my old friend Bob again. It feels good on the bike.
You may not know it, but since the BOB was introduced, US touring cyclists have often raged at each other about its advantages and disadvantages. As one who has used both the pannier system (front and back racks with saddlebags attached to them) and the BOB, a single-wheeled bike trailer, I thought I could weigh in on advantages and disadvantages.
- I think when you ride with the BOB it's more like riding a bike and less like driving a truck, which is how I feel when riding with panniers.
- The BOB is a bit easier on the bike, since there's one more wheel to spread out the load. The frame of the bike gets almost no strain (and it can get quite a bit going over bumps with the panniers). The rear axle still gets about half the load, but the frame itself gets almost nothing.
- My kickstand doesn't work any more! In general, it's just harder to manage the bike+bob configuration when you're off the bike. I think it's easier to manage when you're riding, but harder when you're off.
