Date: 22/08
City: Nakusp, BC
Miles ridden: 14
Cumulative miles: 10916
The rain stopped during the night and we had a closer look around. The whole place looked great and even the trees around the campground had personality, I thought they looked cute.
After breakfast we took our time packing our bikes, had lunch and then went down to the campground where the Horizon Unlimited would be held. Wombat and Val had been there before and reserved a nice spot with shade during the day.
We unpacked the bikes and setup our tents. Wombat had a cover that we put over the bench. During our setup, we saw a couple arriving with a BERLIN number plate. We went over to talk a bit and it turned out that they just came up from Ushuaia. We left it there for the moment, since we had to leave for the toad fest a couple of miles down the road.
The toad fest you ask? Well it is more like a toad rescue with a party after. The young toads try to cross the road to get to the forest where they mature for the next couple of years before returning to the lake. Well, the toads have to cross the road and the cars won’t stop. So people come up each year, put the toad into a bucket before they reach the road
and then release them on the other side of the road. The toads are the size of the small finger nail.
To be honest it was a lot of fun. It was sort of addictive, every time when we thought we are finished a swarm of toads started to approach the road again. So we thought, well, we can still rescue these ones.
A couple of hours later, we finally stopped and went home. It was fun. When we left the mornings campground the owners offered that we could come back and use their kitchen at night, so we left some food in the fridge, came back at night and had dinner there. Below is a picture of a happy toad rescue crew.
Date: 23/08
City: Nakusp, BC
Miles ridden: 0
Cumulative miles: 10916
In the morning we registered for the meeting, we meet Susan, the founder of the Horizon Unlimited, in person.
It was great to see Suzan in person after watching the DVDs with her on it for the last year or so. During the first day, there was not much happening, dinner was at 17:00 and the first presentation started at 19:00. So we spend most of the time talking to people; to the Rumanian couple, Alex and Andrea, whom we had met in Riders Retreat and we talked a bit more with Patrick and Jana (the Berlin couple) about their experience traveling the Pan American Highway. We also met a couple from French Canada; they would start their journey to Argentina after the meeting was finished. We were actually surprised how many people planned to travel to Ushuaia after the meeting. The dinner was great and the first presentation was about one couple traveling with a sidecar through South America, some of the pictures were amazing. One presentation was about Africa, again the pictures where fascinating. For me, it looks like east Africa is not too bad, but West Africa is nothing for me. The last presentation finished at 23:00, on the way back it started to rain. It didn’t last very long, but it was nice to lie in the sleeping bag and listen to the rain.
Date: 24/08
City: Nakusp, BC
Miles ridden: 0
Cumulative miles: 10916
On the second day we were mostly listening to seminars. In the evening we meet the Duvals- Ken and Carol, a couple from Australia traveling around the world for over 10 years. Unsurprisingly, they have a wealth of information. The first time we meet them was in Flagstaff a couple of month ago and with all their tips and information we rewrote our South America trip. The seminars during the day were very interesting and informative, from packing light to a photography seminar to a Sri Lanka guy, living in Switzerland on his 1200 GS traveling around the world and sharing some of his adventures with us. We also talked to Patrick and Jana and they showed us their route on a map and gave us some useful tips about petrol, border crossings and accommodation. The day was over in no time with the last seminar finishing at 23:00, what a great day.
Date: 25/08
City: Nakusp, BC
Miles ridden: 0
Cumulative miles: 10916
This was the last day; we had a choice of more seminars or a couple of hands on session. I went to a hand on session about fixing bikes on the road and changing tyres
Sigrid went to a seminar about bears. That puts me on the safe side, if a bear threatens us, that’s now Sigrid’s business 😀. In the afternoon we watched a slow race and a keyhole challenge, it was quite interesting to see what some skilled guys can do with their bikes.
After tea there was still two interesting session, one person showed some nice pictures from South France and Austria, I must admit it looked very interesting. The next session was held by two brothers who talked about South America, parts of their trip matched our plan and I must admit I’m looking forward to see the Andes. We took a couple of pictures of people we talked to, so below are Jean and Chan, the French Canadian couple, and Alex and Andrea, the Romanian couple who also start their journey to Ushuaia after the meeting. And we thought we were the only ones! 🙂
And a picture from Patrick and Jana, the Berlin couple that made it up from Ushuaia. What I particular liked about their journey was that they had simular starting condition to what we have. They were no dirt bike heroes and they didn’t speak Spanish, so there is hope 😀
The last night Patrick sold his bike and the money went to a charity organisation sponsored by Horizon Unlimited, I thought that was a great move. Below is a picture when Patrick told Grant that the money from selling the bike went to the charity.
So the plan for tomorrow was to pack up and ride for 3 km, back to the Riders Retreat campground, so a pretty short day. It’s amazing how fast the last 3 days have passed.