We prepare to leave Bucaramanga and the GPS sends us along a single lane, mostly paved road that goes steeply up a hillside. Such a grade that would never be allowed in Canada. With each switchback we need to slow to make the corner and the little bike struggles to pull up hill again afterwards. The road, just before reaching the main highway, suddenly has a rope across it as closed. Still on a steep incline, we struggle to turn the bikes around to head back downhill. The view though was totally incredible. The entire city was visible from our turnaround spot.
With the GPS continually wanting to send us back to the same road, I create my own route for a while until we are far enough that it stops liking that road. Now, on the main highway out, we wind our way up and up a mountain. Reaching 11,500 feet, we are now in the clouds with drizzle of rain. Turns out, even though Bucaramanga and Cucuta are both very warm cities, the path between them is a high Andean plateau, and we spent hours riding through the cloud and rain. From a riding perspective, although this ride could be great in good weather, with the conditions we had it was the worst motorcycle day of the trip.
We arrive, cold, into Cucuta (pronounced Koo-koo-taa) and head off to our centrally located hotel. Cucuta is absolutely crazy, with about 20 city blocks almost turned into walking only from all the people at the markets. Cucuta, being right on the Venezuelan border, not only had it’s own 750,000 people but also all the Venezuelan migrants and thousands more Venezuelan shoppers, who would need to come here to buy virtually anything. Venezuela doesn’t have basic necessities, so even the wealthy Venezuelan’s who aren’t yet at the point of leaving the country, still need to dash across the border for things.
We needed to drive right through blocks of this chaos to reach the hotel. Avoiding crowds of people, buses, taxis and other motorcycles. Totally wacky.
Once checked in to the hotel, we go outside and walk around the area for a few hours, taking in the feel of it all before calling it a night back at the hotel. Later on that night, I find my flights to the Amazon for the last part of the trip, and finally have that all booked,.
Colombia Motorcycle Ride 