By Larry and Joan Dolinski
Our second airlift took us from Panama City to Santiago, Chile. We graduatedfrom the Boeing 727 world to an L1011 in hopes that logistics would improve.Alas they worsened. Capacity was still insufficient to have all of the bikesaboard the airplane and nearly 100 bikes (including ours) were temporarilyleft behind, along with all of the support gear (e.g., portable showers,sinks, maintenance supplies & equipment). Due to complicated negotiations,relating to capacity availability, fixing responsibility for the snafu, andconditions of payment, retrieval took two additional days and involved thereturn of the 727 to Panama City by way of a routing through Lima, Peru. Sowe had our stay in Santiago extended by two unplanned days. Most of uswelcomed the unexpected hiatus in Santiago. The city is nestled on a flatplain between imposing peaks of the Andes Mountains.
Until then we thought that Massachusetts held the per capita record for icecream consumption. Santiago, Chile is far ahead. Seems like every other storefront is an ice cream shop...and every 3rd pedestrian has an ice cream cone inhand.
The mercantile layout of Santiago is unusual. Common trades are locatedcontiguously. For example, there must have been 40 bicycle shops along 2 cityblocks on both sides of one street. The same is true of other services.
The terrain continued to be flat over the next several days as we biked Southfrom Santiago. We were on a cozy plateau snuggled between peaks of the Andes,many covered with snow (and it's Summer in Chile).
It is apparent that the people of Chile are fond of Americans, who constitutethe vast majority of our group. We were treated with kindness and warmth inall of our interactions. Along the road, drivers of both trucks and autosbeeped, waved and gave us "V" and thumbs up signals and cheered.
We had an interesting encounter with a couple of Americans (Professionalbasketball players) in Concepcion. Their names are Ken Leeks & Eric Brown.They both played in the NCAA, Ken for Central Florida and Eric for Universityof Miami (Florida). They constitute the allowed American presence in theProvincial de Osorno team in the Dimayor League. When we met them they wereone victory away from the league championship and expecting to clinch in theirnext game. We hope to hear the outcome via e-mail.
Leaving the plateau and proceeding South we began to climb into the Andes,turned East and approached the Argentine border. At this point we may havebeen at our most southern latitude of the entire trip, approximately 40degrees South of the equator (Boston is approximately 42 degrees North of theequator). An unusual (for this time of year) five day rainy weather front movedin. Because of that and the fact that the extra time in Santiago was to causeus to lose a scheduled layover day in Bariloche, Argentina, several of usdecided to short circuit three days in the rain swept Andes and bus directly toBariloche, enjoying a hiatus from bicycling. We experienced one of theloveliest areas many of us had ever seen. The village of Bariloche is both asummer and winter resort. It is located on the heights overlooking a largeand magnificent lake (one of many in the region) with snow capped peakssurrounding the lake. There are wonderful shops and restaurants, an abundanceof small hotels, and lurking everywhere to seduce you - ice cream, pastry andcandy shops. One such shop was larger than a typical Staples store...andbelieve it or not the ice cream was an order of magnitude better than it wasin Santiago.
We departed Bariloche as per our schedule, and of course wondered if our 3rdflight would represent an extension of our logistical difficulties. We werehappily surprised. This time the airplane was a Boeing 747, whichaccommodated all bicycles, riders and gear. We even departed close to thescheduled time. The airplane is one of six 747's owned by (and piloted by) anArab prince from the United Arab Emirates (Qatar). He is a warm and graciousman who maintains an open cockpit policy and invited the bikers to visit himduring flight. I learned that he holds two solo around-the-world speed recordsin small planes, one eastbound and one westbound. The pilot's skills came inhandy because of the large airplane and short runway (This was the largestairplane ever to take off from Bariloche). Because of the runway constraint,the required amount of fuel for the flight to Johannesburg could not be loadedin Bariloche. So they loaded just enough fuel to get us to Buenos Aires wherewe topped off the fuel tanks. Furthermore, the passengers had to be loaded insuch a way as to leave all of the back section empty in order to assure properbalance for take off. Finally, the pilot had to do what used to be done onaircraft carriers...apply full power while holding the brakes on, thenthrusting the plane into the air. We sill had a couple of hundred feet ofrunway left when we became airborne.
This same pilot and airplane has been contracted for our next flight fromCapetown, South Africa to Athens, Greece. The combined cost for both flightsis $700,000.
So the South African phase of our trek is underway.
Please send corrections, additions, comments and praise to
© 1997-2002 CRW, Inc. All rights reserved. Revised: