Cycling South America

Alright, this is the part I always get excited about when it comes to trips — the numbers. What did we actually do, how much did it cost, and what did a normal day look like? Let’s break it down. Money spent Since 2016, I’ve kept a simple habit: I manually log every expense. It…

Day in El Chaltén We finally arrived in El Chaltén. But after the day before, my body and mind were so tense that I couldn’t really fall asleep. I also knew I wanted to wake up early and see Fitz Roy from closer — which would mean an extra 5–6 hour hike round trip. I…

Hard work (?) 6 hours of hiking with 1,700 m of gain followed by 6 hours of gravel riding with another 1,200 m really did a number on my body. I honestly felt like I was back on those first days in Colombia—thighs, quads, calves all sore. Not painful, just… cooked. I guess I’m just…

Rest in Coyhaique We stopped in Coyhaique, our last proper big town for a while — probably around 30–50k people, which feels huge after all the villages on the Carretera Austral. A few other travellers had told us about a Couchsurfing opportunity there, so we decided to go for it. We ended up staying with…

Carretera Austral In Puerto Montt for a day. What a low-key port city — not much is happening, people hustling, tons of malls. I wasn’t expecting that. A lot of thin-walled, poor-quality wooden houses too. Definitely not the most scenic stop, but I’m ready to start the Carretera Austral. Resting feels great. My legs hurt…

First day leaving Chos Malal, I already knew it was going to be a boring one. We had around 4 hours of riding ahead and no services at the end of the day. So I kind of decided to lean into it — to actually sit with the boredom and see what it does to…

Well, it has been a while Welcome back, my dear… I don’t know, 12, 57, 114, 247 readers? I guess we’ll never know. Today we’re covering the last two weeks of cycling through Argentina — starting with leaving Salta. Salta was an amazing place, but, as funny as it is, following Google’s bike directions eventually…

Well, it’s been a while. I feel like time is flying way faster the more I get into the trip. Leaving La Paz Leaving La Paz felt weird. We knew the weather was going to be bad, but not this bad — 3 degrees, rain, and heavy traffic. The road was a double lane both…

Leaving Arequipa So, it’s been a while. More than a week. Well. we left Arequipa, Peru after staying with Felipe’s aunt for a few days, and we were welcomed by a 5-hour climb uphill — most of it uphill — reaching over 4,200 meters of elevation. Although no shade was provided during the climb, it…

Peru Great Divide (PGD) Continuing on the PGD, the next day we finally had our first beautiful one. And by beautiful, I mean we actually managed to climb the whole thing without pushing the bikes. It wasn’t too bad — about 700 meters of climbing — but the pass topped out at 4,800 meters. It…

The bus marathon to get to Peru from Ecuador So yeah, the buses were outrageous. First up: 14 hours overnight, 9 p.m. to 11 a.m. No AC. They turned it on for, like, half an hour total. The rest of the time? Just sweating it out. We rolled into Chiclayo, Peru at 11 a.m., killed…

Day 17 Today was by far the hardest day. We loved staying with Santiago and Ana Lucía at Casa de Ciclistas in Quito, but we left at 10 a.m. knowing we had to enter the Cotopaxi National Park by 3 p.m. — just 50 km away (including 1800 m vertical gain). I thought, okay, 50…

Lessons learned When I was prepping to write the blog for week one, I was slightly hesitant and felt weird. And Phil, as always full of wisdom, told me: ‘a farmer must farm.’ That’s how I felt. And honestly, writing the blog for week two feels so much easier. I guess the best way to…

Okay, where do I start? It feels like I just wrote Week 0, the blog before the trip even began, and now somehow it’s already day 10 of cycling in Colombia. So let’s rewind and talk about how week one actually unfolded. Instead of both of us arriving at the same time, Phil landed 36…

September 20th, 2024. Day 84 on the Continental Divide Trail (CDT) Roughly 1,900 miles in, we’d just left Salida, CO. I liked Salida. It has McDonald’s and Safeway – if that’s not thru-hiker paradise, I don’t know what is. It was good to reconnect with Phil and Gabe after a while apart. The trail leaving…