| laborlitigator |
| In honor of Perk's cross country trip, just wondering if it is possible and if anyone has ever heard of anyone driving from North America all the way down to the tip of South America. |
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| HARDROCK |
quote:
Originally posted by Nanagirl
Here is someone that did it
http://www.well.com/~dreyer/
Great site and it answered a lot of questions I had about such a trip! |
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| DaleB |
| That's a great story! But that's one adventure I'd rather imagine and read about than attempt myself. |
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| csimo |
It's not possible to actually drive all the way. You have to send your car via freighter to haul your car from Panama to Columbia.
I've heard people claim that they've done it, but it's not possible even with an off road vehicle. I've heard people claim that they drove to the canal... another laugh. |
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| G. COLTON |
What ever happened to the Pan American highway. My understanding was that you could drive from Alaska to the tip of Argentina. Not all of it was paved roads nor always through the most civilized parts of the country, but it could be accomplished.
G |
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| laborlitigator |
quote:
Originally posted by csimo
It's not possible to actually drive all the way. You have to send your car via freighter to haul your car from Panama to Columbia.
I've heard people claim that they've done it, but it's not possible even with an off road vehicle. I've heard people claim that they drove to the canal... another laugh.
So there's no road highway system between Panama and Columbia? |
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| Nanagirl |
There is no way to drive from Central America to South America because the Darién jungle separates the southern tip of the Panamanian isthmus from Northern Colombia and no road passes through. Though insignificant when compared with the tens of thousands of miles on both the Alaskan and the Patagonian extremes, the Pan American is missing a critical 200 mile stretch and this gap is quite a barrier.
Commonly referred to as the Darién gap; nature, geography, war and drug-running combine to make this border region phenomenally dangerous. The Darién’s mountains, rivers, and jungle swamps are populated by indigenous peoples and armed groups from all ends of the Colombian political spectrum. Not infrequently, their numbers are supplemented by frightened adventure tourists chained to local trees for weeks on end, anxiously awaiting an international money transfer.
The gap creates a logistical challenge that has meant that few road travelers see Central and South America in the one trip. This is especially true for those who travel in their own vehicle. Indeed selling a vehicle in one sub-continent and buying a replacement on the other can prove to be simpler and at times, more cost effective. Add to that the wide availability of diesel vehicles, black market cash rates and the anonymity of local plates in South America and the argument becomes even stronger. Project Allende has accumulated too much ‘stuff’ to be taken on flights as luggage, too much time and effort has been spent rebuilding the vehicle so we were trapped. We needed to cross the gap with our vehicle! |
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| csimo |
quote:
Originally posted by laborlitigator
So there's no road highway system between Panama and Columbia?
Nanagirl posted a great reply. No way to drive it. Besides the jungle, wars, etc. the Panama Canal Zone is off limits. Some say it's still mined (as in explosives), but since we gave it up to Panama (your tax dollars at work) nobody really knows what's in there. |
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| laborlitigator |
That sucks!
However, based on the info provided, you'd have to use a diesel powered vehicle. It just seems like something cool to do.
Maybe one day when the kids are off in college. . . |
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| csimo |
I've driven all through the Yucatan Peninsula and Central America. Quite a bit in South America as well.
One funny story is when we were looking for some old Mayan ruins and stopped and asked a funny looking fellow for directions (maps are scarce, and innacurate to say the least). He wanted a ride and we let him in. He kept asking us why the "north wind" was blowing. We figured out he meant the air conditioner... he had never heard of air conditioning. He was amazed as if we were gods or something.
The problem was that he had never been beyond the next village and couldn't tell us where the road we were on went.
Ran across a stranded Sweedish girl who had been working in a village trying to get enough money to buy a bicycle. She ended up there on a college trip, all her money was lost or stolen. She was stranded (my Sweedish is zilch and she spoke no English and little Spanish). Maybe 19 years old... said she hadn't washed her long blonde hair in over a month. She begged us, and I do mean BEGGED us to take her with us. We drove her a hundred miles or so into a larger town. No idea what ever happened to her.
In those deep jungles there are people that have only seen a few automobiles in their lifetime. They're all nice and willing to help in any way if they can.
When you drive into many of those villages in a decent looking car the kids come out of everywhere crowding around the car trying to get you to buy something or give them money. Very few intend any harm, but there's just toooooo many to help.
Most rural North, Central, and South Americans are good people who will help you despite their very limited resources. They seem to be happy for the most part. A trip to Mosambique proved to me that it is possible to be so poor, and be in a situation with zero resources available to you that makes it impossible to find happiness. The human suffering there is beyond words. |
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| laborlitigator |
In your travels, were you ever in any danger? Or at least perceive any dangers?
The scariest thing was when we drove from Cancun to Chicheniza. Before we got onto the highway, my wife told me to get gas. Since we had about 1/2 a tank I told her it was too early and that there would be enough gas stations along the way.
BIG MISTAKE.
Not only were there no gas stations, there were no stops. I turned off the A/C half way to the toll stop just to save on fuel. Literally driving on fumes, we made it to the toll gate. When we arrived there, I asked the police for "gasolina" and with a wry smile pointed me to the back of the toll gate. Sure enough, they had a tank for stranded tourists such as myself. He only let me buy like 3 gallons. I asked him if I could buy more but he refused and said that I would make it to the main stations. Sure enough, he was right.
I learned my lesson there. Don't take anything for granted in a foreign country. |
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| csimo |
I've been in many situations that made me feel "uneasy". My policy is to always act like you know what's going on and maintain a level of confidence that discourages all but the hardened criminals. I've been fortunate to evade them all these years.
In a twist of fate story, I'll tell you about the time I really feared the situation I put myself into.
Not long after the fall of the Berlin wall a friend and myself decided to go visit some of those long off limit places. We flew into France and rented a car... headed into what was West Germany and then to what was East Germany, and Austria. We were tracking down as much of Hitler's history as we could. We found the remains of Hitler's Berghoff, found a native to take us through the bunkers, and had a great time doing these things before they became tourist attractions.
On a whim we decided to head over the border to the Czech Republic and see if we could get in. The German border guards let us go and we headed toward the Czech checkpoint... to our surprise nobody was there! We drove on through.
We checked into a hotel in Pilsen. The hotel was an obvious remanant of communist architecture. The innkeeper was an old woman that looked at us with distaste. We went up to our rooms and rested, then headed down to the cafe. It was like a scene out of a 007 movie. Obvious government agents at various tables listening for every word we uttered. The waitress was young and of a different generation... she was anxious to talk with us.
We headed out the next morning not giving anything any thought. We didn't notice the various vehicles that must have been following us. We decided to return to Germany via a mountain pass crossing that was on the map. As we approached the border we came upon road blocks. Suddenly we were surrounded by various police vehicles. Whatever language they were speaking I could understand none of it. We decided to not understand anything they said even if we did understand it. They meant business! They confiscated our passports and told us to follow them. We drove a long way in the mountains and ended up at what looked to be an abandoned gas station. Lots of questions were asked of us, but we really had no clue what they were asking.
They took everything we had... our money, luggage, everything. They searched the luggage and asked questions about what certain items were. We tried to communicate, but didn't have much luck.
At this point in time I was certain we would end up in some Czech prison never to be heard from again. I was terrified!
After a long period of time one cop got on an old telephone and was talking for a while. He then came to me (I was driving) and was demanding something of me, but I didn't know what he wanted. No hand signals, facial expressions, no way we could come upon some common ground of communication. He waived me over to the telephone and handed it to me. The old voice on the other end spoke some broken English. He told me I was driving without proper permits. I asked what the penalty would be and he replied with some large number of some kind of currency we didn't have. After some bantering back and forth they decided to take our German currency. They already had all our money and figured they'd take it all, but they handed us back our money after extracting what they calculated the penalty to be. They then escorted us to the German border. I was never so happy to get out of a country in my life! I really thought we'd stepped over the wrong line this time.
After our calculations of how much money we had left, and given the exchange rates, we determined that the fine we paid was $19.00. Guess it was a lot of money to them, but it scared the living hell out of me. |
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