26th October 2007 - Day 137
Up early for our bike trip around the area we were introduced to our guide and then waited for then to load up the van with our antiquated looking bikes. We started off the day with a spot of bird watching in the cloud forests and some good views of waterfalls then headed up into hills to a town called Jaji which looked a bit like a construction site as Chavez had decided to spend some money re-doing the square! With the bikes unloaded Garvo was rather disconcerted as his chain fell off after trying to change gears and Carly remained optmistic when the helmet didn't even have a clip and had to resort to tying it! The first down hill stretch the guide headed off at a pace on his good bike and we were both glad to have made it in one piece down the road as we were left to try and negociate the hairpin bends on bikes that didn't have functioning brakes. Garvo did manag to overtake a car on the way down though which he was very pleased about. At the bottom the guide took us to the local sugar cane factory which was not operating as one of the machines had broken and it was a Friday so the workers abandoned work and started early on the rum. But to be honest neither of us could have imagined that this place ever operated as a factory.
Back up in the van we headed up to San Jose and our guide certainly didn't get our joke when we kept asking if he knew the way! Garvo certainly was close to losing his rag with his bike struggling up the up hill sections with only 7 gears working. Carly on the other hand was happy on the up hill sections as she did not have to worry about her brakes not working. After a brief pit stop for lunch we then had to endure some uphill sections which was not ideal on a full stomach but we coped better than our guide that was struggling at the back and funnily enough he suggested that Garvo take up cycling because of his height (I am sorry but it would be the end of our relationship if he ever got hold of any cycling shorts).
After all the uphill sections we were rewarded with our fair share of down hill and Carly was a little nervous when our guide thought we were good enough to go down the old road but told us we needed to be very careful as it had some dangerous sections which was an understatement and on the last section Carly resorted to using her feet to slow herself down. Down at the bottom our guide treated us to an ice cold beer which was the perfect end to a fantastic day. More thumbnails ...
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