South America by Motorcycle

Finally we are packing again. In few days we will be back at sea. Oops,! No, sorry, not at sea. This time on the road.

This time we will be riding our motorcycle, our KTM 990 Adventure.

Destination South America, again!

30,000 wonderful kilometres of curves, hairpin bends, holes, bumps, dirt roads winding their way trough lakes, rivers, waterfalls, mountains, caves, landscapes out of (our) time.

The last 8 years spent sailing along the coasts of Central and South America had already introduced us to this world and, as unrepentant bikers, we dreamed of raids aboard our motorcycle.

As always, fate favours the bold and the time to venture by land as well as by sea in this splendid continent has finally arrived.

The preparation was long and not only that relating to the bike and equipment, but also that relating to what to see and what to give up, where to sleep, where to do maintenance.

During this year with the help of two gurus of the LC8 engine, we have prepared our KTM in the best possible way.

Umberto Cicoria and above all Francesco Ciruzzo, have provided us not only with advice and parts, but also with distant coaching for the assembling of various components:

We installed a Guglatech fuel pump kit, complete with filler neck filters and pre-pump filter. We changed the water pump impeller with an oversized one by 4K Parti Speciali;

4K Parti Speciali was also the supplier for an additional fan radiator and for their special Rally Kit.

We got rid off the enormous and brain teaser KTM original airbox, to install the easy, light and simple to maintain ITG air filter provided by Ciruzzo.

Francesco Ciruzzo was of priceless help in reprogramming the ECU, providing the new maps and a patient superlative assistance over the phone.

During the 4 years we spent circumnavigating South America by sea, more than once we felt the regret to not have been able to visit the continent.

Time has come to remedy these regrets.

From Belize, we will reach Panama, where we will fly our motorcycle and ourselves to Bogota'. From Bogota' we will start our way south through Ecuador, Bolivia, Chile and Argentina, returning after 6 years to Ushuaia.

Than back north, again through Argentina, Paraguay, Brazil, Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador and Colombia, where we will fly back to Panama and from there back home in Belize.

Almost 30.000 km voyage around this amazing continent.

We will be sharing most of this adventure with other two couples.

Franco & Paola and Juan Carlos & Zulema.

We met Franco & Paola almost two years ago, when I took my KTM to Belize and I was looking for a place to keep it, since we were still living in the Island of Caye Caulker.

A mutual friend suggested me to contact Franco whom, being a biker, could help me in my research.

So I contacted him and two minutes later, he offered to keep our motorcycle in his garage in the City.

Since than we have done various trips together in Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, Salvador and Mexico.

He had plan a trip to Ushuaia in 2020 with other friends, which was cancelled because of COVID, so when he knew about our plans, he decided to join us.

Franco's trip to Ushuaia was planned with other 2 couples, one of them being Juan Carlos & Zulema, from Chetumal, Mexico.

Juan Carlos & Zulema are old time friends of Franco and they have share various trips in Central and North America.

Juan Carlos usually rides an Harley Davidson, but for this trip he purchased a CF MOTO 700CL-x Adventure.

The preparation for this trip has been quite demanding.

It is going to be a long voyage, in countries where spare parts, especially for my KTM, will not be easily available.

We will face extreme climate differences, from the extreme heat of the tropical and subtropical regions to the extreme weather of the High Andes and Patagonia.

Quite often we will be forced to camp and again in different climate environments.

So, traveling two up and considering all this preamble, we are going to be quite heavy but no overloaded.

I have carefully weighted and organised our luggages in order to have a well balanced motorcycle, with weights positioned as lower as possible and definitively below the workload capacity.

Stay tuned for this new chapter of The Lifetime Cruise.