Alrighty, time to get out of this wierd remote border town that is...Ollogüe.
First things first though, we really need gas. I mean we might be able to make it to Callama but it'd be just over 300kms total on this tank. Better not rish it. After breakfast, Dave went out on a mission to find someone in the town who had gas. After being led around the entire town, and finding a helpful old lady, I was led to a back yard with some dogs where we parked the motorbikes and the lady came out with a couple 5 liter jugs of petrol. Awesome! They charged us about 1.5 times what we should have paid, but knowing that we'd make it to the next town made it worth it. Leaving Ollogüe was actually pretty cool. The first part of the road was nice and paved, but they were re-doing it (or more likely....making a real road for the first time ever), so there were many long stretches of gravel and some sandy bits. Always makes riding interesting. We closest town was another 120kms away, so the really understanding the remoteness of the border crossing we took was pretty cool. We gassed up properly in Calama, Dave helped a cute girl start her motorcycle after grabbing a bite to eat, then we kept heading onwards toward our destination for the night...Antofagasta. On the way, we saw some big mining operations, but not much else. Pretty good sized industry stuff going on up there though.
We eventually arrived in Antofagasta after a long 450km ish day. It took us quite a while to find a hostel to stay at (mostly due to the fact we hadnt had internet the night before to research), but we found a place in a pretty good location, parked the bikes, got some food in us and hung out for the evening. There was a mall pretty close so we wandered around there. Turns out they sell cars in shopping centres in Chile, so that was interesting. Prices were comparable to home, if not more expensive, but about half the car brands there aren't available in Canada, so it was kind of cool to explore.
One more fun fact: the police have special police edition BMW GS motorbikes here. At least some of them do. I guess this really is more of a first world country compared to where we've been. Only time will tell I guess.
First impressions of Chile: It's way more clean, the north has pretty much nothing, cars follow rules, and life actually makes a bit of sense for once!
First things first though, we really need gas. I mean we might be able to make it to Callama but it'd be just over 300kms total on this tank. Better not rish it. After breakfast, Dave went out on a mission to find someone in the town who had gas. After being led around the entire town, and finding a helpful old lady, I was led to a back yard with some dogs where we parked the motorbikes and the lady came out with a couple 5 liter jugs of petrol. Awesome! They charged us about 1.5 times what we should have paid, but knowing that we'd make it to the next town made it worth it. Leaving Ollogüe was actually pretty cool. The first part of the road was nice and paved, but they were re-doing it (or more likely....making a real road for the first time ever), so there were many long stretches of gravel and some sandy bits. Always makes riding interesting. We closest town was another 120kms away, so the really understanding the remoteness of the border crossing we took was pretty cool. We gassed up properly in Calama, Dave helped a cute girl start her motorcycle after grabbing a bite to eat, then we kept heading onwards toward our destination for the night...Antofagasta. On the way, we saw some big mining operations, but not much else. Pretty good sized industry stuff going on up there though.
We eventually arrived in Antofagasta after a long 450km ish day. It took us quite a while to find a hostel to stay at (mostly due to the fact we hadnt had internet the night before to research), but we found a place in a pretty good location, parked the bikes, got some food in us and hung out for the evening. There was a mall pretty close so we wandered around there. Turns out they sell cars in shopping centres in Chile, so that was interesting. Prices were comparable to home, if not more expensive, but about half the car brands there aren't available in Canada, so it was kind of cool to explore.
One more fun fact: the police have special police edition BMW GS motorbikes here. At least some of them do. I guess this really is more of a first world country compared to where we've been. Only time will tell I guess.
First impressions of Chile: It's way more clean, the north has pretty much nothing, cars follow rules, and life actually makes a bit of sense for once!
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