A Destroyer of Motorcycles (Volcan Baru Adventure E4)

Seeing Jose and then later Gary turn back didn't make me feel like I was a better rider or had a superior motorcycle. It only meant I was the most determined. Maybe it's a bit of leftover programming from basic training. But when I give myself a mission, I don't intend to stop until it's complete and I return home safely. I kept falling down, wrestling the heavy bike back on its wheels, and I kept going. I guess there's equipment up here. At one point it looks like they tried to pave this road, but all the cement is broken up and it's almost worse. Little spots like that really take it out of a guy. After getting past that tricky spot, I noticed my forks were looking a bit wobbly. I didn't have a cotter pin holding the nut in place, and it had been rattled enough to come loose. An adjustable crescent wrench and tire irons were the only tools I had brought along, just enough to fix a flat tire. I used the wrench to tighten the forks and continued on. No! We knew this moment would come. We knew this would be a real adventure. In every adventure, a man should have to grit his teeth and keep going. I could hike the rest of the way. I could try it a few more times. Come on. Almost halfway. When the bike falls like that, part of the reason the bike falls is because you're already so tired you can't fight it. Then it falls and it starts leaking gas. You're sucking wind and you're breathing those gas fumes. It makes you want to throw up because you need air and you're getting fused. There's a small shack down there where I've heard a lot of people camp. So I head back there. I'll camp, and early in the morning I'll hike the rest of the way up. I don't know what it is. This road is too rocky. It's too loose. And I'm out of juice. After falling down and lifting the bike over and over, I was completely drained. I was so close to getting the KLR on another strip of cement, and it was just one more turn to the top of the mountain. The section that finished me wasn't all that different than what I had been riding all day. But it was 5 o'clock, and I had been riding since 8 a.m. The altitude had become a huge factor as well. I couldn't catch my breath, and it was hard to focus on what I was doing. The small mistakes I was making was leading to me dropping the bike more and more. So I decided to turn the bike around and slowly rode down the hill to where I would camp for the night. Next time on Half Drop. Why do I have a giant machete inside my bag? Because I'm in the middle of the jungle. I don't know what's going to come around the next corner. If there's going to be a jaguar coming at me, I'm going to have to slit its throat, skin it, take it home, and make a rug out of it.