Two hours later and my worst fears were proving grounded. Without the use of special software there was nothing that could be brought back from the dead. Ah well, it was worth a try.

With the bikes loaded it was time to leave. We hadn’t been going for more than 10 minutes when the heavens opened. Julian was on his scooter ad leading us out of town. In Jeans and a jacket he was soaked in seconds, to be honest we weren’t fairing all that much better in our riding suits. The fast, fun twisty road we’d enjoyed coming up yesterday was now a different story. Greasy and slick. We were down in second and third gears braking gingerly to temper our gravity driven speed.

By mid-day things were looking up and the rain had at least eased. Even the road surface was decent. Smiles had returned to our faces.
Our surrounding countryside was simply spectacular…soooo green! We had the Cordeillera Occidental mountains to our left and the Cordillera Central range to our right. This was the Colombia I’d come to see. Impenetrable green.

The rain had now stopped but our chances of escaping the cloud base were small. We were at altitude and riding into the clouds…literally. With the two huge mountain ranges on both sides the clouds base like us, was being pushed North. It had nowhere else to go.

The humidity hanging in the air from the last rainfall felt stifling. You could actually smell the heat. A pungent musty, earthy tang, lingering in the air. Lisa reminisced that the smell reminded her of the times she first visited the hot-houses in Kew gardens. It was great to hear the excitement in her voice when she admitted that she never thought that one day she’d actually be here for real…!!

Strange, we’ve ridden through more than our fair share of areas that were known to have an edge. But we’ll confess Colombia and its notorious reputation are hard to ignore. We’d read and researched as much as we could and reminded ourselves as we rode, that in spite of all its allure and beauty this particular area had its dangers. This is rural Antioquia and the advice we’d been given…stay on the principal routes. Here the two mountain ranges provide easily hidden strongholds for the various guerrillas and paramilitary groups. It’s a different world and one to be taken seriously.

Mid afternoon swung by and the 5 or so young men in military green were waiving us to the side. With the usual questions asked and answered the mood lightened and soon turned to normal chat. That said our encounter still had a few surprises in stall. It was my time to ask questions. “How much do you get paid”, I asked? “How long do you spend on duty”? “Do you get bored”? “Is your gun heavy, how much does it weigh”? I continued. With that the young soldier, threw the automatic, folding rifle off his shoulder, unlocked the safety and thrust in into my hands, whilst throwing rapid fire Spanish in our direction. So there I am, sat on my bike trying to handle this lethal weapon like I have a clue (which I don’t). “Go ahead and fire it off, it’s very strong” our new friend offered enthusiastically. I politely declined his offer. Two minutes earlier we’d spoken about how one of his military comrades, stood not to far away had accidentally shot another friend in the foot. Three months off duty hadn’t been funny. I handed back the weapon, thanking him for the…er…opportunity. Bizarre, even by our standards.

The GPS was showing our slow progress; again the winding mountain roads were taking their toll. As darkness descended we were still in the mountains, this didn’t feel good. To make matters worse the rain had come back. Steamed glasses underneath rain soaked visors were making visibility a nightmare. This is not how we wanted to enter one of Colombia’s biggest cities…at night.

We rode onto the fast dual carriageway that would hopefully lead us to the centre, all the time aware of the insane traffic around us. The bright reflected light from the oncoming traffic wasn’t making things any easier. We were desperate to get off the bikes.

This wasn’t working. Try as we might we’d not seen a single sign to the ‘Centro’. It was time to change tack. Off the bike I’d waived down a taxi and explained our situation. We needed to follow someone and we needed to avoid certain parts of the city. We’d already been told countless times over that Medellin was only recently knocked off its throne as the ‘World’s cocaine trafficking capital’. A couple of tired and wet biking tourists straying into the wrong areas had ‘bad news written all over it.

‘Bless ‘im’, with only a few pesos charged our new guide had brought us to the centre. The Grand hotel on Calle 54 No.45-92. It was big, plain, and clean and best of all had secure parking complete with gun toting parking attendants. Oh c’mon when was the last time you saw your everyday car park attendant with a semi automatic stuck down his pants? Honestly these guys do.

With our jeans thrown on we needed to stretch our legs. We confidently waived to the reception staff as we headed out into the street. We’re experienced travellers…we can handle a little city life. We promptly came straight back to the hotel. Experienced or not you didn’t have to be a physic to feel the vibes this place gives off…distinctly unsafe in the area around this hotel.

Once again the room was full of wet motorbike gear!

We’d left Medellin at a reasonable time, desperate not to get caught in the morning rush hour madness. For once our early morning was paying off. We’d not got snarled up in the usual smoke-belching traffic.

By mid morning the ever climbing twisty road was peaking out. We’d been skirting the side of the Cordillera Central Mountain range all morning, well, for that matter since Popayan actually. Lush green plantations could be seen disappearing down into the valley on our right. Doing battle with the oncoming coaches and trucks was proving to be terrifying. The normal rules of common sense (even the South American ones) and even preservation just don’t apply here. The rules are simple…move out of the way or die. Absolutely everyone cuts every single corner and head to head chicken seems to be the accepted standard.

To our surprise we’d reached Caucasia earlier than we’d thought and with Julian’s advice ringing in our ears (Tolú is beautiful and only 1 ½ hours North of Caucasia) we pressed on. 2 ½ hours later and we’d not even seen a sign post for Tolú, let alone reached it. Our speed had been steadily increasing. If this carries on there’s no way we’ll reach it in the daylight.

Sure enough our last 40 minutes of riding was in the pitch black. We’d taken the small badly marked left hand turn just before the town of Sincelejo and had bounced down the pot-holed track that would lead us to the Caribbean coast and Tolú.

Having ridden through the centre of this small coastal town we’d found a small hotel

We didn’t have far to go. By our standards a short hop up the coast 160 km’s…’mass or menos’. We’d both been excited to visit Cartagena complete with its ancient walled forts and colonial walled city. The idea of a bit of sun and maybe even a beach, right now also had its appeal. We’re just tired of being rain drenched and soaked each and every day.

The Ruta 90a had been repaired in places and we were even getting a little more used to the ‘Russian roulette’ style of driving. An hour in we were at yet another army/police check point. Documents had been handed over and the usual questions answered about where we’d come from, where were we going, did we like Colombia, aren’t the North Americans terrible people (no love lost here in Colombia) and of course the mandatory…how fast does the bike go and how much does it cost?

The stops were getting frustrating. Not because of any undue hostility from the automatic gun swinging military but because any and all traffic we’d worked hard to get past earlier was now slowing cruising past us at the check point. The rain had been coming down hard for a while now and both the bikes and ourselves were covered in a brown grey spattering of shit, water and road grease spewn into the air by the heavily laden trucks.

Pressing on and again we’d been forced to half our speed. Slick diesel drenched roads were slippier than normal and bends were becoming scary, especially when the ‘dick’ behind you is cm’s from your rear tyre and trying to over-take on the blind uphill corner.

With so much rain, even wiping our visors was now becoming redundant. No sooner had we wiped them then they were saturated again. The trickle of water running from my back down to my armpits and then down to my hands via my arms, confirmed that the Gore-Tex inner suits had given up any pretence of trying to be water-proof.

Things were getting worse.

We’d reached the outskirts of Cartagena and had taken our place in the queues of traffic trying to get in. The roads were already awash with water. For Km’s at a time the two inside lanes were unusable. A line of flashing hazard lights could be seen sparkling into the distance through our sodden helmets and visors. A mish-mash of various cars stopped at strange angles by the curb sitting in foot well deep water, all beaten by the water, engines, electrics or both had simply given up.

An hour later, we’d made little progress. Our next impass had presented itself. A gentle downhill left hander had become a lake. Several more vehicles had become stuck, making things worse and as cars slowly entered their wheels completely submerged. Shit this is getting deeper. Idiot tossers in bigger 4X4’s weren’t helping. In a desperate bid to out do the cars and show off their 4x4 prowess they were entering the water at speed from an a-joining road and sending tidal waves of water over the window sills of cars already making their way through. We had no choice but to go forward. We certainly couldn’t turn.

We knew without looking that the tool boxes and the bottom of the panniers were submerged. There was nothing we could do about that now.

Well, this is how things continued. Our Gore-Tex socks (Sealskins) had been doing a great job, well, up to the point where we were knee high in water. Now our feet had their own private swimming pools.

We’d taken a small turning into Cartagenas ‘old town’, a labyrinth of tightly laced colonial streets. Even the taxis were now battling. The rain hadn’t eased. More deep water saw us swimming knee high, revving the bikes hard to ensure water didn’t disappear down the exhaust pipes. Bouncing off water-hidden curbs and submerged concrete posts normally used at traffic calming measures, wasn’t helping. We been around three times and so far had seen one small hotel, without parking. It was time for an executive decision. “Fuck it”, I yelled at Lisa angrily. “C’mon we’re going down to Bocagrande”. We’d researched a little and already knew that the cuter less expensive hotels were in the old town, Bocagrande complete with it’s up -market hotels, Hilton included, was way, way out of our budget range. Right now I didn’t care less. It was tantrum time.

With the bikes parked up, I’d completely ignored the smartly dressed security guard, who’d been insistent we move the bikes; I’d left Lisa and stomped into the reception of the Hilton, leaving a trail of dripping brown water. “I can speak English…YES”, I’d barked at the bemused receptions staff. “Yes sir of course” came the polite answer. “Good”! “DO you have a double room and how much is it”? I demanded? This was it, sod the price, I need to be warm and comfy if only for a night.

“Yes sir we have a room for you and the price in dollars is…$247.00. “shit” I thought…”that’s £130.00 per night”??? I could already feel my tail going limp and sinking rapidly between my legs. “OK, muchas gracias, I’ll…um…I’ll, just go and have a quick chat with…with um…my wife..”??? I answered sheepishly. I knew that no matter how uncomfortable, how soaked or how tired I was, this was out of the question. I gave Lisa the bad news…she’d already expected it.

Lisa had been making friends outside and had already formulated a back-up plan. The immensely smaller ‘Hotel Oceana’ right across the road was new and tremendously cheaper.

15 minutes later and inside the air-con reception we were checking in. Our bags had already been taken to room 306.

With food courtesy of a small burger bar a block down the road, we settled in, whilst our bags, clothes and kit, slowly drip-dried, hung over the back of chairs and every other surface we could find to utilise.

We’ve spent a little time walking the colourful colonial streets of Cartagena’s old town, a wonderful collage of old stone buildings, each with it’s own intricate balustrade skirting an ancient and worn balcony. Dulled yellow, reds and startling blues coloured the streets. Touts tug at your shirt sleeves for attention keen to coax you into one of the many jewellery shops, whilst young kids run in front of you eager to sell you a rugby ball sized avocado or some other piece of brilliant fruit.

We’d been on a mission since yesterday and by this afternoon had spent way to much time in taxi’s browsing Catragenas motorbike shops. Our Gore-Tex suits had seen better days and certainly hadn’t faired well in Wednesday torrent of rain. We needed to buy a couple of cheap and basic over suits. Every rider here seems to carry one. Simple heat sewn rubber suits. A jacket, a pair of trousers and even nifty little rubber boots to keep our feet dry.

We were experiencing two problems…1- finding the suits was proving more difficult than we’d expected and 2- those shops that had suits had nothing to fit me. I was getting frustrated…”Oh c’mon everyone and their dog has one of these bloody rain suits”, I exclaimed to Lisa loudly. She wasn’t having fun either.

By 7:00pm it was pitch black and we were visiting the last of the few small shops we’d not yet been to. This was the dodgier side of town. Dodgy yeah, but hey, hey they had what we needed. We are now the proud owners of two rubber rain suits. Mmm..that does sound a bit S& M?

Back at the hotel Lisa’s was giggling with a mental image I’d thrown at her. “Mmm, it’s alright for you”, I said “you’re a girl”. “Can you imagine how difficult it’ll be for me, riding down the highways of Colombia in the pouring rain, covered head to toe in a rubber suit, battling an erection…you know what with the rubber an’ all”??? That was it, she was off. The giggling stopped after about ten minutes.

The winding coast road was easily found and led us out of Cartagena and would stay with us all the way up to Santa Marta. If we were lucky we’d push on and hope to reach Riohacha. That said, distance here in Colombia is no guide to the amount of time a journey will actually take.

Small towns came and went and to our surprise we were making reasonable time. We’d managed to keep a reasonable average speed. The lack of tightly winding mountain routes was making things easier. By late afternoon we’d skirted Santa Marta, found some semi-decent fuel and had pushed on. The earlier lush green jungle views and waterways were slowly being replaced with a more arid landscape.

Dusk was falling by the time we’d reached Riohacha and our overnight stop, Hotel Girama. Largish, basic and horribly over priced at almost £22 for the night. To be honest we were too tired and too sweaty to look elsewhere.

Yet again, the best laid plans drown in a puddle of shit and sweat. We’d planned to get an early start and had hoped to get to Maracaibo, a good way inside Venezuela, and so by 7:30am we’d loaded the bikes and were already saying adios to Riohacha. The decent tar was already helping our progress. We’d reckoned on about 45 minutes to the border, an hour for paperwork and money changing and then we’d crack on to Maracaibo. Guess what? It didn’t happen.

Passports were stamped and carnets signed on the Colombian side. OK, Here we come, country 48! That was as far as we got. On the Venezuelan side we were already getting the ‘shifty eye’ from the officials who’d incorrectly assumed we were North Americans. The pissed-off passport guy grunted at me and with an arrogance born of officialdom waived me over to him, whilst he leant on the building wall. Mumbled Spanish was tossed at me, which translated to…you can’t come in the Aduana is closed on Sunday, go away and come back tomorrow. Asking for him to say this twice to ensure I’d heard correctly just pissed him off even more.

20 minutes later and I’d not found a solution. Oh shit, this is ridiculous, we’d not read this little bit of info anywhere, not even the Colombians had bothered to mention it as we were being stamped out!

By now the over-whelming heat and humidity were already getting to us and our sweat ridden riding suits were getting heavier.

So here we are…in a small dodgy hotel, right at the border. We had to get our passports stamped back into Colombia and we will try again tomorrow. Lisa is so pissed off.