Category: Pictures

The Dalton Highway in Alaska is a bucket-list dream ride for adventure motorcycle riders. I had been reading about the Dalton in magazines, reading the ride reports on AdvRider and watching the YouTube videos and the Instagram posts since 2011. I knew I wanted to do this someday, and I’m so happy that it finally happened in 2026.

I guess I should start with this aerial drone picture on the Atigun Pass – credit to Praveen, a rider in our group. BTW all of the nice photos in the post are copyrighted to the riders and the amazing drone photos are copyrighted to Praveen, so please do not use without prior permission.

With this stunning picture I hope I was able to grab your attention, and so I guess I can begin.

The idea for Dalton 2026 came from my friend Vijay. He had always wanted to do it, but kept putting it off like me and the others. But one fine day in February he says he has booked his trip to Alaska and asked if anyone wanted to join. I quickly checked the dates with Shruti it would work out fine! It was the week of Anushka’s birthday, but luckily I would be back in the Bay Area in time. The plan was to fly into Fairbanks, Alaska, rent the motorcycles there, ride out to Prudhoe Bay and back and then fly back home.

I invited a couple of my friends – Shobhit and Suraj, while Vijay invited a few others – Shahab, Praveen and Jithu. Eventually Jithu dropped out, so it was 6 of us finally – Praveen, Shahab, Shobhit, Suraj, Vijay and me.

Vijay had arranged his motorcycle rental from “Last Frontier Motorcycle Adventures” in Fairbanks Alaska. James Yogi was the name, and he had a bunch of bikes available to rent. Shobhit, Suraj and I took Kawasaki KLR650s – the Gen3, Vijay took a Gen2 KLR650, the carbureted one, Shahab chose a newish Honda Transalp and Praveen chose a Yamaha Tenere 700. There were a lot of emails flying back and forth, money exchanged over Venmo and Zelle and finally around March, we had confirmed reservations for our bikes. James was very disorganized in the communication and approach to business, and often confused bikes with riders, e.g. giving me a short seat height KLR650S, while giving the regular to Shobhit.

I booked myself on Delta Airlines, flying out of San Jose to Fairbanks, Alaska, connecting through Seattle. Suraj booked the same flight. Vijay, Praveen and Shahab flew out of SFO, and then we were all on the same flight from Seattle to Fairbanks. I got a nice picture of Mount St. Helens on the way to Seattle.

We had a quick beer at the Seattle airport “Mountain Room Bar”. I wanted a hazy IPA and the server recommended one, but it was way too milky for my taste, especially at 10 in the morning – lol.

We landed in Fairbanks, picked up our bags and took 2 taxis to our hotel – the Westmark Fairbanks Hotel & Conference Center.

One of the taxi we hailed was a pick up truck, an older guy running his taxi by the name of Badger Cab. We asked the guy to take us to the motorcycle rental place which was about 18 miles South East of Fairbanks in North Pole, AK. Shobhit, Praveen and Suraj actually sat in the bed of the truck as we drove to North Pole. This small town leans heavily on the Santa Claus theme – candy cane light poles, Christmas trees and a giant Santa. While riding in the back of the truck, Praveen’s glasses flew off in the wind onto the side of the highway. Amazingly, Shobhit and Praveen were able to ride back to that same spot and pick up the glasses that were still in one piece.

By the early afternoon we got to our motorcycle rental place, the Last Frontier Adventure Motorcycles, and we met the famous James Yogi. He had all the bikes prepped up and ready to go waiting out front. We go over the bikes, the luggage, the accessories, the tools and tubes, etc. Everything looks like it is in good condition, and we hand over our deposits (in the form of a $2500 check, each) and off we go.

We only realized later that we never actually signed a contract with James or his company. More importantly, he never mentioned that we had to return the bikes in the same condition we received them: cleaned up after riding the Dalton Highway, which leaves them pretty muddy & dirty.

We got back to Fairbanks, and went to a late lunch at the only Indian restaurant in town – Hari Om Cuisine Of India. The food was great (+ we were hungry) and Praveen even asked the manager to pack us some samosas for the trip. We picked up a few bottles of whisky from a liquor store next door. Had a few drinks and then turned in for the night.

Day 1, July 12th 2026: Fairbanks to Coldfoot

On Day-1 we started off from the hotel around 9 in the morning. We gassed up the bikes near by and took Alaska Highway 2 (Elliott Highway) North towards the Dalton highway. The weather was perfect, sunny with high 50s to low 60s and remained beautiful for the rest of the day. There were a few spotty clouds, but there was no rain for the day.

The Elliott highway meets the Dalton Highway (Alaska Highway 11) at a small town called Livengood. The 80 miles from Fairbanks to the Dalton are mostly fully paved. The tarmac is rough in a few places along the way, but the road is nice and twisty, a great easy “street” introduction to the Dalton. We made quick work of this stretch of road and took our first break at the start of the Dalton.

As soon as I pulled off my helmet at our first break, a swarm of huge mosquitoes attacked my face and started biting me all over. I had never encountered such a large group of mosquitoes in my life! I had ordered a mosquito net from Amazon, but that was so long ago that I actually forgot to carry it to Alaska. Thankfully Vijay or Praveen had an extra mask and gave it to me, I put it on and that gave me instant relief from the mosquito attack.

The Dalton highway sign is just a mile from there and we stopped for a few pictures.

From this sign post the road is mostly gravel till the end of the highway near Deadhorse. Since this was our first taste of the Dalton dirt, we were all taking it easy.

About 55 miles from the start of the Dalton we came to the Yukon River Crossing. This is a really tall bridge, that is a scenic outlook across the wide expanse of the Yukon River. Although this was not recommended, we did stop on the bridge to take some photos. The surface of the bridge is made of these wooden floorboards, and I guess they use wood there because of the extreme weather. Interestingly, the bridge is built with a down slope in the northbound direction. So we came across a couple of big rigs barreling down the bridge from south to north across the Yukon river. They were going pretty fast for their size and I just thought to myself that if these trucks need to stop for any reason like in an emergency, they are not going to be able to stop and something is going to go over that bridge.

Across the bridge on the northern bank of the Yukon River, is the Yukon River camp, where we stopped for a break. There is a restaurant and some lodging accommodations on site, there is also gas available.

We had a nice long, relaxed lunch there, walked around the property and took some pictures along the Alaskan pipeline. There was a large European expedition truck there that was also refueling. It was either a Renault Kerax 4×4 or a Mercedes Unimog, I don’t quite remember, and they were a European couple coming back from Deadhorse.

At the Yukon River camp we met a popular Alaskan YouTuber by the name of Silas Hessler. This guy is pretty famous for riding a KLR650 up and down the Dalton Highway. Here is a video he made, one can see our bikes specifically at 26:00

After gassing up, we slowly made our way more North, taking breaks along the way. Mosquito nets were needed at every break.

About 60 miles north of the Yukon river crossing is the Arctic Circle sign. We start there took some pictures and had a couple of Samosas to eat. There were a surprising number of tourists there, mostly families in lifted SUVs and over landing vehicles, traveling across Alaska.

Finally we rode the last 60 miles from the Arctic Circle sign to Coldfoot Camp, which was our stop for the night. Along side of the road there was a constant bloom of wildflowers of various colors. I stopped at one point and took some pictures of these beautiful pink flowers. Gemini identifies them as … “These magenta-pink flowers are Fireweed, one of the most iconic wildflowers in Alaska and northern climates”. I didn’t know.

Coldfoot camp is approximately midway between Fairbanks and Deadhorse. That makes it a convenient night halt along the Dalton Highway. There is a restaurant serving some good food and beer. There are motel rooms and a post office, etc.

I had originally booked a twin motel room for Shobhit and me. These rooms are pretty expensive, at $260 a night. I thought that Shobhit and I will share a room but when we saw how small the rooms actually were Shobhit decided to get a room for himself. There were lots of other motorcycle riders is going up and down the Dalton, but I’d say a majority of them were tent camping.

We had dinner at the restaurant, a few drinks also, and turned in for the night.

Day 2, July 13th 2026: Coldfoot to Deadhorse

We started the day off with rain. It was not very cold, probably in the 50s, so we were comfortable with the rain gear that all of us had on. The rain was light, but the road became muddy and slick. Especially slick in a few places where they apply Calcium Chloride to the compact the road and keep the dust down.

Here is a pic of the Coldfoot parking lot. Lots of trucks there, also a couple of helicopters in the background. We saw them fly out at the start of Day-4.

The first stop of the day was on “the Chandelar Shelf”, which is about half way up the Atigun Pass. It wasn’t much of a climb, literally a couple of miles up the road from the valley. But the road was muddy, it was getting cold and we had to take it very very slowly.

Not a bad time for a samosa.

We were quite muddy by then.

From the Chandelar Shelf, it is again maybe just 3-4 miles to the top of Atigun Pass. A fairly steep climb, but nothing remarkable really. I have been riding motorcycles in the Sierras and the mountains of California for long enough, that this felt like a fairly benign pass to traverse. It was just very cold up top, probably is the low 40s by then. The road is rough, not BDR hard split levels, but one needs to be careful. We could see snow on the sides of the mountains.

The way back down the other side of the Atigun is also short. We had to follow a pilot truck through the construction zone for about 5-8 miles. We were going slow, but the muddy terrain made it quite tricky. None of us actually dropped our bikes, but I’m sure we all came pretty close to that.

The weather cleared up completely on the other side of the Atigun pass, and would remained clear for the rest of the day. The scenery is absolutely dropdead gorgeous on the other side of the pass. We stopped for lunch by a creek, and ate a packed sandwich lunch that we had picked up at Coldfoot camp. The skies were clear the temperatures were mild, and the weather was perfect. We had an excellent relaxing time and it more than made up for all the soggy weather that we had had earlier that day.

From here onwards it was easy going to the end of the road in Deadhorse. We took a few breaks along the way. There is no real deadline to arrive in Deadhorse because there is sunlight 24 hours a day.

We crossed lots of trucks along the way, most of them hauling equipment to and from the oil fields in Prudhoe Bay. The last 60 miles of the Dalton into the town of Deadhorse are perfectly paved. Nice wide road, mostly flat and straight. Surprisingly all 6 bikes, including the 3 KLR650s, were able to make it from Coldfoot to Deadhorse on a single tank of gas.

As we pulled into town, we first went to the Prudhoe Bay General store for the customary and congratulatory photo opportunity. Cell phone signal is pretty strong there, so I was FaceTiming with Shruti – triumphant about having conquered the Dalton, reaching the end of the road!

Our hotel for the night was the Eagle Lodge Hotel in Deadhorse. All the hotels in this town cater to the temporary workers who fly up to work in the oil fields. Most of the workers have a schedule of three weeks on and three weeks off, working 12 hour shifts seven days a week for the three weeks that they are on the oil fields. The roads in Deadhorse are not paved, they just have a deep layer of gravel, probably because of the severe weather during the winter. Because of all the dust that is created, hotels required shoe covers while walking inside. Interestingly, the cafeteria at the hotel was self-serve and required everyone to wear plastic gloves. The manager on duty told us that because of the high traffic in and out of the area, it is very easy to transmit infectious diseases there like the flu or Covid, and that’s why they enforce wearing gloves in common areas like the cafeteria.

The rooms were clean, spacious, and had plenty of space for our gear. In the cafeteria, they served traditional American fare alongside plenty of vegetarian options, plus a few refrigerators stocked with grab-and-go items like fruit, eggs, snacks, and sandwiches. The staff, including the manager and cafeteria team were very friendly and often stopped to chat about our trip up to Deadhorse. Interestingly, hotels in Deadhorse typically don’t use room keys; you can lock the door from the inside while you’re in, but there’s no need to lock up when you leave for the day.

Praveen got some nice drone footage of the town of Deadhorse

It’s crazy to see how far I was on this location pin.

Day 3, July 14th 2026: Deadhorse to Coldfoot

We started our day with a tour of the Arctic Ocean. Most of the land around Prudhoe Bay is leased to oil companies and so accessing the Arctic Ocean means going through private lands. We had to buy tickets to a tour from North Alaska Tour Company – at $80 per person it was quite an unusual experience to go visit a beach.

Our hotel manager gave us a ride in his truck to Deadhorse Camp in the morning. We waited there for a little bit till everyone gathered. The tour company then took our IDs – very high security apparently – and checked everyone off the manifest. They put us on a small bus and drove about 12 miles from Deadhorse Camp to the “East Dock, Arctic Ocean”. We were repeatedly told that the oil companies take security very seriously. As we entered the private oil, security briefly checked over the bus and gave us the go ahead. The tour bus driver asked us to keep our phones away and not take any pictures and he also asked everyone to wear safety goggles. It was a bit hilarious, especially since the bus itself was stalling out every few miles with a weak battery.

The bus operator and his assistant gave us a historical account of Prudhoe Bay, the various companies there and the life they all live there. Fascinating stuff. We saw a little bit of wildlife there even – an arctic fox and a moose.

It was a warm 52F and a fully sunny, absolutely gorgeous day. We could not have been luckier. Just the day before, it was in the 40s, cloudy and raining.

We got to the beach in about 20 minutes and dipped our feet in the cold arctic waters. The gave us towels. Shobhit and I got into our undies and took a full body dip in the water. Yes, we have pics, and no, I’m not going to post them here. The water was cold for sure, but not quite freezing. Maybe a touch cooler than a California beach, but nothing extreme. I feel that flowing cold water always feels MUCH colder than still water, having felt that many times in Yosemite. The dip was enjoyable and peaceful. A culmination of a journey to the northernmost point I will probably ever go in my life. It did feel special and I will remember this day for a long time.

We got back to the hotel by about 11AM. We had lunch at the cafeteria, packed up our bags and gear and made our way back towards Coldfoot.

The ride back towards Coldfoot was uneventful and easy. The weather on the Atigun Pass was cold and wet, so we were all geared up. It was rainy for most of the distance between the Atigun and Coldfoot, so we took it easy. I was able to exchange my bike with Shahab, so I got a chance to try out the Transalp. Wonderful bike I say, it was like a luxurious and smooth Rolls Royce compared to the KLR.

Here is a nice pic of Suraj as a truck is passing, a well timed shot by Shobhit.

At one point along the way, I suddenly noticed that my shifter is jammed and I cannot downshift into any gear. I stopped and looked down – there was a small rock jammed exactly between the shifter and the frame.

We saw some muskox along the way.

Somewhere between Deadhorse and Atigun we saw a guy on fully loaded Harley Pan America 1250 go down in the gravel. That bike is almost 600 lbs and he easily had 150 lbs of stuff on him – luggage, fuel and more. He was shaken up a little, we helped him gather his stuff and he was able to make it on. We chatted with him and his buddy at a later stop along the way.

Along the way we also met a couple of interesting folks. First was Elias Perez (@parapentrix on IG) an Argentinian rider who was coming up from South America, going to Deadhorse and then eventually going to Florida. He was riding a Chinese F800 BMW clone (“VOGE DS900X”) and he was carrying less luggage on his 4 month trip than most of us! Argentina was playing England in the FIFA world cup semi finals the next day, so he was excited about that, and the possibility of a second consecutive World Cup title.

At the top of the Atigun Pass, we met another Argentinian rider on a Honda XR250. Didn’t ask his name, but we should have. He too was making his way up from South America, and he had even lesser stuff on him than Elias. He probably had just a couple of clothes, a few tools and some basic camping equipment. The XR had a big gas tank, so he could probably do 300+ miles on a single tank.

We made our way to Coldfoot camp in good time. We had packed some food from the Eagle Lodge cafeteria, so we had that for dinner. We then went into the bar at the camp for a few drinks and chatted with a couple of Brazilians from Southern California. They were excited about tomorrow’s game.

At Coldfoot camp we also came across this German guy Wolfgang on a DR200. He was originally from Maine, but lived in Washington now. And he made it to Deadhorse and back (500+ miles) on his little DR in 1 day. Impressive. There were a lot of impressive folks there.

Day 4, July 15th 2026: Coldfoot to Fairbanks

This was the last day of the trip, and thankfully everything went by uneventfully. As we were leaving Coldfoot the helicopters there were out flying.

The ride was smooth sailing from Coldfoot to Fairbanks. It was raining and muddy the whole day, so we took it easy. There were a couple of pucker moments, coming in a bit too hot in a muddy section, but none of us went down thankfully. We were all pretty tired by that time and the constant rain was taking its toll. We were riding in pairs mostly, to keep company and not fall back alone. Praveen was exhausted and riding slowly so Vijay was staying with him. Suraj and I were mostly together, while Shobhit and Shahab were leading.

As we reached the outskirts of Fairbanks, my KLR started to overheat. The radiator was completely caked with mud and as I picked up speed on the highway, the temperature light came on. I pulled over to the side, cleaned off some of the mud with a stick and waited for a little bit for the bike to cool.

Eventually we made it back to the rental place in North Pole, AK. All 3 KLRs overheated and needed a short break to make it back.

When we got to Last Frontier Motorcycle Adventures we had a bit of an altercation with the owner. James Yogi was not there, it was the other business partner and he was expecting us to wash the bikes before we return them. The Dalton leaves these bikes VERY muddy, and it would be a huge job to pressure wash them. We were not told of this requirement when we picked up the bikes, so at the end of a tiring 4 day 1000 mile adv trip, we were all super irritated. Tensions rose and few sharp words were exchanged. Eventually we did take the bikes to a nearby pressure washing station before turning them in. Vijay’s carbureted KLR had a hard time starting after the wash, but it eventually did run and we were OK. Nonetheless, this incident left a bad taste at the end of such an amazing trip. I DO NOT recommend Last Frontier Motorcycle Adventures – terrible business!

From there we took Badger Cab back into Fairbanks. Dinner and a few beers at Red Fox Bar & Grill and we were off to the airport for a 1AM flight. Shahab, Vijay and Praveen stayed on an extra night in Fairbanks and took their return flights the next day.

Looking back at the whole trip, pushing through 1,000 miles of gravel, slick calcium chloride mud, freezing rain over the Atigun, and swarms of giant mosquitoes was a genuine test for all of us, but it was also an incredible adventure. Dipping in the Arctic Ocean at Deadhorse after decades (haha) of reading about the Dalton on forums and watching YouTube videos was a huge personal milestone, and sharing the road with a great group of friends made it an awesome experience. I am so glad I finally made this trip happen and checked it off my bucket list. That said, I can safely say I won’t be doing it again. The physical toll, the non-stop focus needed on those unpredictable roads, and the sheer grind of the route make it really a once-in-a-lifetime ride. Beyond that, I just feel an immense sense of gratitude. It feels great to be alive and to have the health, time, and resources to pull off an adventure like this, along with full support from Shruti to let me head off to Alaska and chase a dream ride. It was an unforgettable trip that I will always look back on with a lot of pride.

On Sunday May 17th 2026 I rode my ST1300 from Fremont to Downieville. This was the weekend of the Sheetiron 300 organized by the Oakland motorcycle club and a bunch of my friends were doing that ride. I was not able to make that dual sport ride, so I wanted to make a street ride of that weekend, at least a day ride. It was a lazy Sunday and I had a late start, left Fremont at about 12 noon.

On the way to Downieville, I stopped by Bullard’s Bar Reservoir. Cool little place.

I rode the bike on Marysville Road, which was a new one for me, nice flowing road with very good tarmac. Then I hit Highway 49 towards Downieville, which is always an excellent road for motorcycles. It was a lot of fun, and as I got into Downieville, there wasn’t much going on in town. There were just a couple of other visitors, I had a couple of tacos and beer and the only open Mexican place in town – “La Cocina de Oro Taquería“.

I then got gas at the local gas station in Downieville, and then made my way back to Fremont, but this time using a slightly different route. I rode on Highway 49 in all glory. It was a windy day so there were lots of fallen leaves and a couple of branches but nothing major. From Nevada city I then cut across to interstate 80 at Colfax on Highway 174. That was a pretty nice road also. From Colfax it was a straight shot home.

This is a 400+ mile route route that is really possible only because of the ST 1300. It’s quite casual to get up onto the touring bike ride a few hundred miles in the later part of the day and not feel anything at all. Supremely comfortable and capable in the twisties, I really like this bike.

Planning and Preparation

The original idea for Ecuador was born while talking with my friends Ayon and Vijay. They had been travelling internationally on a motorcycle recently and somehow we got talking about Ecuador, Peru and Columbia. A little bit of research on the Internet showed that Ecuador was probably the easiest of those destinations, especially with a few companies in Quito catering to Americans who want to rent bikes or book adventure riding excursions. We contacted a couple of these companies, and some of this was simply sending a message on WhatsApp, but then decided to book our rental bikes with the biggest of them – Ecuador Freedom Bike Rental.

Ayon was the first to book his flight tickets to Quito and Shobhit & I followed suit the next day. Mahesh joined in on the plan a few days later, but Ayon decided to cancel his tickets and instead take his family to Ecuador later in the summer. So eventually it was just three of us – Shobhit, Mahesh and me. Shobhit booked a BMW G310GS, I booked a Yamaha XT250 and Mahesh booked a lowered Suzuki DR650. Interestingly these reservations were made on Saturday Jan 21st 2023, while my employer announced layoffs on Monday Jan 23rd, 2023. Thankfully I was not impacted, but the timing for such events always ends up a little surprising.

A month or so before the trip, the Freedom Bike Rental guy emailed us saying that the XT250 is out of service and is going to be replaced with a Hero Xpulse 200. The DR650 was a bit tall for Mahesh, so I ended up riding it for most of the trip, while Mahesh took the Hero. So here we are, three North Americans of Indian origin, riding Indian made motorcycles in South America. The BMW is made in TVS Motor Company’s Hosur plant in Tamil Nadu, while the Hero is proudly made in India, I just couldn’t figure out in which city, Hero has so many plants.

From the get go, the plan was to do an adv ride, mixing in good amounts of off-road riding. Somehow my interest in pure street-oriented touring has waned and I’ve focussed on more off-road “adventure riding” over the last 3-4 years, as the contents of this blog will attest to. With focussed off-road riding in remote places, a GPS was a must, so I picked up a used Garmin Montana on Advrider. This simple (though ancient) device was worth its weight in gold! The Garmin saw heavy usage on every single day of the trip and routed us through completely unmarked terrain. I developed a new appreciation for the ruggedness and reliability of Garmin GPS’es while at the same time developing a maniacal hatred for the Garmin software.

Between February and May, the three of us had several Zoom calls where we discussed the route, the hotels to stay, and other things to pack. I planned most of the routes myself, and I used basically three resources (1) Ecuador Freedom Bike Rental has self-guided tours that describe routes and destinations, (2) Noraly, aka Itchy Boots had ridden through Ecuador in Season #6, I watched all those videos and (3) General content on Google about roads to take and places to visit. Garmin Basecamp makes it easy to plan routes, especially off-road, so I created a day-by-day plan of all 6 days and shared it with Shobhit and Mahesh. Shobhit bought a new Garmin Zumo XT, but he was not able to load the South American off-road maps in time, so his unit was not usable. Mahesh has a similar Montana to mine, and he was able to navigate with ease on this trip.

Ayon & I signed up with Duolingo, the free language learning app and started to learn Spanish. I ended up with a 90 day learning streak, which was a great help on this trip. I could form simple basic sentences, and had a vocabulary of maybe a 100 Spanish words. In more complicated situations we would end up using Google Translate, which also worked very well.

I decided to carry my Alpinestars Halo Drystar Jacket and Pants. The weather forecast for Ecuador showed rain off and on every day, so I was thinking about taking the waterproof Aerostich suit, but packing it into my hand-carried luggage was not an option. The A*Star suit could simply be worn on the plane, while the rest of my gear was packed in my waterproof Wolfman Expedition Duffel bag.

Our helmets were equipped with Sena communicator units and they came in handy while riding. Unfortunately Mahesh’s unit took on water on the second day and he was not able to use it to communicate for the rest of the trip.

So with such a long introduction, here we are at SFO waiting to board our plane.

Day 0: Flight from SFO to Quito

We were booked on JetBlue, SFO to Ft. Lauderdale to Quito. The flights were uneventful and comfortable, with just a little turbulence over Panama. We had a beer at FLL and arrived in Quito at around 10:30PM. Immigration was a breeze, no forms even, and we called an Uber to take us to our hotel. We noticed a lot of smog in the air that night.

We checked into our hotel – La Casona de La Ronda Heritage Boutique Hotel – a wonderful quaint little hotel just a couple of blocks from Plaza de Santo Domingo and Independence Square (Plaza Grande) in the historic part of old town Quito. It was past midnight by now, so we called it a night.

Day 1: Ride from Quito to Mindo

In the morning, we explored the hotel a little, had a great omelette breakfast and decided to walk around the historic town of Quito.

After exploring the area a little, we checked out of the hotel and took a taxi to the motorcycle rental place. It was about 20 minutes away and we got set up pretty quickly. The bikes were ready to go, cleaned, lubed and gassed up. They set us up with a prepaid cell phone for emergencies and a bunch of tools, like wrenches, tire irons, tubes and a pump.

We left Quito in heavy traffic, weaving in between cars and trucks. Our first stop for the day was the Ciudad Mitad del Mundo (Center of the World) – a monument constructed right on the Equator. We walked around the little village they had made there, took a few pictures and climbed up to the top of the tower.

Lunch was pretty good there, we had Llapingachos, Ecuadorian style potatoes and other veggies.

After lunch, around 2pm, it started to rain lightly as we made our way to our destination Mindo. Our first off-road jaunt of the trip would be from the highway to the a small village called Nono. This was about 30 kms of off-road and the easy terrain helped us get confident with our new bikes. I noticed that the DR650 severely lacked both front and rear brakes, something I got accustomed to over the course of the this trip. We made it to Nono in the light rain, but as we were leaving Nono, the rain got very heavy. In the huge downpour, we were lucky to find a cafe for some coffee and the owner there spoke English. It turns out, he is an Argentinian, lived in Switzerland for a few years and then moved to Ecuador about 13 years ago. He told us stories about the quaint rural life in a small village like Nono.

We left Nono when the rain reduced, but it never completely stopped for the rest of the day. As we got to the town of Tandayapa, it was getting to be 6pm or so, and we decided to skip the rest of the off-road section and ride to our destination on the highway. Sunset is around 6:15PM in May in Ecuador, and it gets very dark by around 6:30pm. The highway decision was a good one. It was pitch dark and rainy. The DR650 headlights were dimmer and weaker than any bike I have ever been on, I could barely see anything, so I asked Mahesh and Shobhit to lead. We rode slowly, with our rain gear and made it safely to our hotel in Mindo – CasKaffeSu. This was a decent hotel, and after a hot shower we went to the main street in Mindo for some pizza and drinks. Shobhit bought a full bottle of Chivas Regal from a store there, and at first, I was wondering if we would ever finish a full bottle. Turns out the bottle was over in less than 24 hours 😀 I wasn’t surprised at that either. Over pizza and whisky, Mahesh told us the amazing story of how he met his wife. His wife is from Bulgaria. Mahesh also told us that he recently lost his job, just a few days prior to the trip. Silicon Valley layoffs were hitting everyone, sadly. But overall, Mahesh’s mood was up, his spirit was not shaken and we tried to not dwell on jobs & careers too much.

Our hotel for the night.

Day 2: Ride from Mindo to Chugchilán

We got up early. Sunrise is around 6AM and the sun comes out bright and shining. Not quite like the Bay Area where morning are always cloudy and foggy. After another egg breakfast, and we were on our way.

We rode out to the highway from Mindo and stopped for gas. Full service gas in all of Ecuador and the price of the regular gas was cheap (~$2.5 a gallon). Ecuadors largest export is petroleum and petrochemicals. We rode through the town of Los Bancos and crossed the bridge on the wide Esmeralda river. This river flows into the Pacific and is not part of the Amazon. In just a couple of kilometers we hit our first off-road section of the day. Surprisingly, this road was gated, and we had to pay a small toll (25c) to enter. The guard at the entrance collected our toll, noted down our names and raised the gate for us to enter.

This single lane road was excellent. For the next 60 kilometers, we rode through many small towns, lots of farms and plantations and alongside amazing scenery. Many times were we literally riding through the clouds. The terrain not too technical and not too easy, just right for us to have a good time.

Riding through the clouds

Somewhere on this road, Shobhit and I were leading and we lost sight of Mahesh. So we pulled over, waiting there for a few minutes, hoping he will catch up soon. A few minutes turned into 5, into 10, and that point we turned back to go look for him. We are never 10 minutes apart, generally just a few minutes between us all. So I was starting to worry a little as we traced our way back, but luckily we found Mahesh in about 3 kilometers. It turns out that he lost the spring to his side stand while riding. He obviously could not ride with a floppy side stand, so he used a string from his helmet bag to secure the stand to the bike. We found him just in time to help a little, but thankfully that was the only issue.

We pressed on, taking many breaks along the way, and while 60 km may not seem much, riding that distance off-road was strenuous. We exchanged bikes for a little bit while I rode the Hero. It seemed like a decent budget bike, not very powerful and not very good at off-roading, but a good budget entry level adventure bike. We stopped a few times for a sip of whisky!

We got to the highway right around lunch time, and it started to rain just then. We found a roadside “dhaba” for a simple meal of rice, beans, salad, potatoes and eggs. A nice beer to go along and we were fueled up.

At this point it was still raining a little, so we decided to take the paved highway to our destination for the night – Chugchilan. We rode the Hwy E20 to the Pan-American Highway (E35) and while there was a lot of commercial truck traffic the twisties were very nice. This was a recurring theme for the trip – very good twisty roads for sporty riding. The Pan-American Highway is at a high altitude there and we were riding around 11-12,000 ft. We stopped for gas at one point and got a nice view of Volcan Cotopaxi in the background.

We got off the highway at Via Sigchos and took that road inwards towards Chugchilán. Of all the twisty roads I have ever ridden, Via Sigchos ranks up there with the best of the best. Excellent tarmac, beautiful scenery and amazing curves for sporty riding. For a moment it felt like riding in the Swiss Alps, the Sierra Nevadas and the rural Indian countryside, all at once.

Here is a beautiful view of Iliniza Sur from Via Sigchos. This whole road was superb, about 80 kms of pure bliss. Mahesh commented to me that he missed his BMW S1000XR, it would have been amazingly fun there.

Sigchos is a nice small town with a hospital and university. With a population of 1200 it was one of the larger towns we rode through. You just don’t see too many people out there and not too many vehicles either. Strangely, even in the smallest of Ecuadorian towns, I noticed many roads are designated as one-ways. So if a town has 4 roads, 2 of them run one way, the other 2 the other way. This would often confuse the Garmins and a couple of times we rode through the wrong way to get across town.

We made it to our hotel – Hostal Cloud Forest – by about 7pm. This is an awesome little “hostel” catering mostly to European backpackers. It was very affordable at $51 for two extremely comfortable double rooms. Shobhit and I took one room, while Mahesh took the other. We went to the dining room and enjoyed a communal dinner of corn soup, quinoa, veggies and beans. The banana bread and chocolate was also pretty good.

Before turning in for the night, we played around with our Garmins, mapping out a shortcut for tomorrow. With ~300kms of off-road tomorrow was going to be a long day, but using our paper maps and Google maps on our phones, we found a shortcut that would reduce the off-road distance by about 30km.

Day 3: Ride from Chugchilán to Salinas

We rose early and headed to the dining area for breakfast. After an awesome breakfast of pancake, fruit and yogurt, we took a quick picture in front of the Hostal and were on our way. This was to be our longest day with about 250km total, and it turned out great.

Our first stop was Quilotoa Lake, about 20 minutes south of Chugchilán. I’d seen this in lake in Itchy Boots’ videos so I knew sort of what to expect. I also knew where to ride our bikes to get a perfect view. The lake was beautiful, stunning, especially when the cloud broke and sun shined brightly. Dissolved minerals in the water give this lake a green color and it looks especially vibrant when the sun hits it at the right angle.

Shobhit wanted to fly his drone here and take some pictures, but there was some issue with the firmware and app on the phone that prevented that. Nonetheless, we took in this magnificent sight for some time, and decided to ride on. We were able to find gas in the small town of Zumbahua and then got on to the highway E30. A short distance later we turned off the highway towards Angamarca and the road turned to dirt soon. Again, in terms of the best dirt roads ever ridden, the road from Zumbahua to Simjatug via Angamarca remains my top one of all time. We saw a bunch of Andean camels along the way, both the wild ones, guanacos and vicuñas and also the domestic ones, llamas and alpacas, seen here.

Ecuador has some amazing roads!

We crossed Angamarca, a small town with maybe 5-8 streets total and rode through “downtown”. There was a busy market in progress, native people buying and selling all sorts of stuff. We wanted to stop and take a look, but with all the electronics on our bikes and our passports and luggage we didn’t feel safe stopping and walking around the crowded market. Here is the town of Angamarca in the distance. We stopped for a casual break and Mahesh dropped his bike on the soft grass as he dismounted.

With all the rain, the roads were wet in some places. Wet and often very muddy. Mahesh came in a little too hot into a corner and fell down in the mud.

Shobhit also dropped his bike a few kms down the road. Thankfully none of these were major incidents, just minor drops.

We got to the town of Pinllopata and took a shortcut towards Simjatug. A few kms down the road we stopped for lunch, a nice egg and tomato sandwich packed for us by the Hostal in Chugchilán.

There is something about having a sandwich on a trail while riding a motorcycle through the clouds!

We took a break again in maybe 50kms, after passing through Simjatug.

Rural Ecuador has lots of dogs, country dogs that chase behind motorcycles, barking viciously. Not all of them were vicious through, this fella came by and quietly sat beside us as we took a break.

We made it to our hotel – Hotel El Refugio, Hostal de Salinas – in good time. Thankfully we hit rain for the last 5-10 kms only. I had reserved this hotel by chatting with the department of tourism of the province of Guaranda on WhatsApp. They put us up in this hotel, which seemed decent but was a few hundred meters outside the main town. Not a big deal, but the rain was coming down heavy now. I went in for a shower and realized that the hotel had no hot water. There was some problem with the water heaters, so in the middle of this huge downpour, we transferred to another hotel – Hostel la Minga. At $15/night per person, it was a great deal. They had a small garage at the back where we could park our bikes.

After a hot shower, which was only luke warm, but anyway, we headed to a pizza parlor across the hotel. Pizza is everywhere in Ecuador. After a lot of whisky, pizza and general fooling around we called it a night. It was pretty cold that night, probably in the 40s, and the hotel only had a central fireplace for heating. The fleece blankets kept us warm and we slept well.

Day 4: Ride from Salinas to Chimoborazo

After three days of riding off-road non-stop, today was a bit of a rest day. We didn’t have much ground to cover, so we’d planned on walking around Salinas to explore the place. Our hostal was right in the town square, and since today was Sunday, they were getting ready for a town market.

We walked down a couple of blocks to the local chocolate factory. It was not operational because of the weekend, but we could stop by, check it out and buy some chocolates.

This small little hilly town is very picturesque and it was such a pleasure to walk around.

From the chocolate factory we walked down to the cheese factory. It was a mid-sized operation employing about 30 people part time. We bought some local cheese at the store.

We walked back to the town square then and visited the Church. Everything is about a 5-10 minute walk here. The Church was pretty!

And our final stop on this walking tour was a football (soccer) manufacturing “factory”. This was about the size of our dining room, on the second floor of a dilapidated building. Coming from California, this really gave me some perspective, on how parts of the world live. We talked to this girl for a few minutes who showed us around her uncles factory. We didn’t end up buying any footballs because we had no space to carry them.

Lots of domesticated farm animals are used for labor in rural Ecuador.

It was about noon by now and after the relaxing morning, we decided to gear up and ride on. It was only about 50km to Chimborazo, but we took some interesting dirt roads and stayed off the main highway. We gassed up in the town on Guanujo and took this dirt road that the Garmin showed us would lead to the Chimborazo highway. We must have missed a few turns, but we ended up at a dead end, where the road led to a recycling facility and a single caretaker house. We talked to this family and they advised us a different route to Chimborazo – over a steep hill.

The hill cimb was steep but we all managed. We were now riding in the Chimborazo national park, which we later realized was not permitted. The trail there was not very well developed and probably did not see much use. In a few places the dirt was very soft. Shobhit and Mahesh both lost traction at one point and their bikes went down. The Hero was so underpowered, that it was not able to move it’s own weight in the sandy area. Eventually I was able to help them both ride through some very soft dirt and thankfully we made it out of there on to the highway.

Riding a motorcycle at 14,000 feet on the volcanic plains of Chimborazo is an experience I will never forget!

The DR was really bogging at 14,250 ft. It was cold up here and were in and out of the clouds.

When we got to the highway, it was a little tricky to get off the dirt and on to the pavement. The water channels (gutters) on the sides of the roads are typically deep in Ecuador. With so much rain, they are designed to be about 2 feet deep, so it was a little tricky to jump our bikes on to the pavement.

We got our first glimpse of this majestic mountain when the cloud broke. We decided to ride around the mountain for a few kms, before we hit our hotel.

It’s hard to describe the grandeur of this mountain, it looks very big and imposing when the clouds clear.

After riding around Chimborazo for an hour or so, we arrived at our hotel for the night – Chimborazo Lodge.

This was a beautiful property, situated right at the base of the mountain. We had a couple of excellent double rooms booked, and the property offered dinner and breakfast at the beautifully appointed dining room. The owner of this hotel, Marco Cruz, is a famous mountaineer and has apparently been up Chimborazo several (hundreds) of times.

The only other guests at the hotel were a couple, a lady from Munich Germany with her tour guide, a local Ecuadorian naturalist, Manuel Jacome. We got chatting with them before dinner and shared some whisky. Mahesh talked about how Bayern was playing in the Bundesliga and the Champions League. A lot of whisky was flowing, and so the opinions on football were getting strong.

Before dinner we also hiked up a short path towards the mountain. Walking through the herd of alpacas, in a remote but stunning place like this … was special. I will never forget this view of the mighty Chimborazo.

Dinner was cream of broccoli soup, some roasted carrots and a poached pear for dessert.

After dinner, we walked outside to view the sky. It was crystal clear with stars shining brightly. It was also very cold by then, probably in the mid 30s. Shobhit was chatting with Manuel and he recommended a hotel in Misahuallí to stay and explore the Amazonia. We made a note of that hotel and decided to ride out there the next day. There was no cell phone signal or WiFi anywhere at the hotel, so that evening we had to ride out a few kms to a restaurant and update our families that everything was ok.

Day 5: Ride from Chimborazo to Misahuallí

Manuel the tour guide had recommended that if we wanted to visit the Amazonian part of Ecuador, we should stay at “the Jungle Lodge El Jardin Aleman“. Our original plan was to ride to Volcan Cotopaxi, but given how cold we all were, we were ready for some warmth. But first we wanted to see. ifwe could get to the basecamp of the mountain. We set out after an early breakfast, and rode to the entrance to Reserva de Producción Faunistíca Chimborazo. Our original plan was to ride up to “Carrel Refuge”, the first mountain cabin that hikers use to summit Chimborazo. Unfortunately, the only way to get up there was using a sanctioned tour operator. We couldn’t ride our bikes up there and plus it was very very cold indeed. After a couple of quick pictures, we were on our way.

The ride from Chimborazo to Misahuallí was mostly uneventful. It was fully paved, and we were riding the main highways that connect the towns along the way. We descended from 14,000 ft to 1,500 ft in about 4 hours, and the temperature went from freezing to warm and humid. The roads were very nice, twisty and scenic, but there was some traffic along the way.

Somewhere along Highway E30, between Banos and Puyo, we encountered a huge traffic jam. There was a mudslide on the highway blocking the flow of traffic in one direction. With one way controlled traffic, there was a traffic jam for 6-8 kms in each direction. Being on motorcycles, we could go around the cars and pass through it fairly quickly. However for the cars and buses stuck there, I’d imagine this was easily a 3-4 hour delay, but they were all filed orderly in one line, obeying the traffic control and not passing on the double yellow. Impressive! This level of traffic discipline is rare in India.

We got to the hotel early afternoon and were immediately struck by the beauty of this place.

The natural surroundings were completely different from the high Andes. Everything was lush green, tropical, warm and humid. The owner of the hotel, also a German, was not available in the afternoon, but greeted us later in the evening. We decided to head into town for lunch. Misahuallí is a vibrant tourist town where the tributary Misahuallí merges with the Napo river. The Napo river is huge, easily 2 km wide here. It flows into Peru and in 1,400 km becomes the Amazon river.

Misahuallí is also the last developed town in Ecuador, when going eastwards in the Amazonia. Anything East from here is mostly developed for petroleum and related commercial enterprises.

Lunch was more rice, potatoes and lentils.

We also took a short boat ride down the Napo river. The currents were strong. The Napo river and it’s tributaries rise in the Andes and they always carry sediments along. This is why they are relatively eutrophic and they look muddy and dirty because of the stirred up sediments.

The boat captain took his son along. No lifevest, no safety gear. The kid was about as old as my son.

We ended the relaxing evening with some pool at the hotel pool table. Mahesh is an expert pool player! He beat Shobhit and me easily in all the games we played.

Dinner was some fried broccoli, potatoes and beets. It’s amazing how simple the food is in Ecuador, so much different than the typical American dinner.

I slept very well that night. I turned on the ceiling fan in the room, and with the warm weather I was able to sleep soundly that night.

Day 6: Ride from Misahuallí back to Quito

This was the last day of our trip. We woke up late and had a lazy omelette breakfast. There were a couple of macaws on the hotel property and we took some pictures with them.

This parrot was happy to sit on the shoulders of hotel guests for a picture.

Shobhit also got his drone working and flew it over the hotel, taking some pictures of the property and river.

This is the Misahuallí river.

A quick poolside photo at the hotel and we were on our way.

The ride back to Quito was uneventful again. All highway riding, again through some amazing twisties. We dodged. afew mudslides again, climbed back to 13k ft and made our way to Quito.

Typical mountain highway in Ecuador. We took many short stops along the way.

Getting to Quito requires crossing a mountain pass, at 13k ft. Shobhit stopped for a quick picture while it took Mahesh a good 20 minutes to catch up on his Hero.

Nonetheless, we made it in good time and returned the bikes to Freedom Rental by about 3pm. The return was smooth and hassle free, and having survived the last 6 days with simple but bland food, we are all craving for some spicy Indian food. We took an Uber to Sher-E-Punjab, where we had some amazing Indian food. We also met the owner, Satwant Kangura, who spoke fluent Hindi and chatted about his life in Ecuador. He was a great guy and made us feel special and warmly welcomed in his restaurant.

This was the end of the trip and we had a couple of hours to kill before we had to go to the airport. So we found a massage place – Happiness Spa – and got a nice relaxing back massage. This helped with the soreness of riding a motorcycle on and off-road for 6 days. The flights back to the Bay Area were fine, I slept most off the time.

So Ecuador 2023 was a more than just a fun motorcycle ride. We experienced the amazing geographic diversity of the country, the friendly and warm nature of the people and the simplicity and authenticity of the food. It was an amazing trip overall and I wouldn’t hesitate to go back there again.

Here is a short video from Shobhit’s Insta360 camera:

Gear Review [coming soon]

Helmet: Scorpion EXO AT950

Jacket: Alpinestars Halo Drystar Jacket

Pants: Alpinestars Halo Drystar Pants

Gloves: Klim Dakar Gloves and Cortech Super-Sonic WP Gloves

I thought I’d should post about this – I rode the W650 on some dirt roads, near Pescadero, with Mahesh on hiis Scrambler. The dirt section wasn’t too long and it wasn’t particularly difficult. The W handled it beautifully, looking classy all the time 🙂

This is around Reservoir Road, Artichoke Road and Hill Road near Pescadero

In April 2022, the kids were off from school for Spring Break and we decided to take a trip to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. We had never been to North Carolina or Tennessee before and we really enjoyed the vacation there. The roads in and around the park are truly spectacular and I can see why it is such a motorcycle riding hot spot. On the final day of our trip, I rented a 2014 Honda Valkyrie from Wolf Creek Rentals in Townsend, NC.

I picked up the bike from the rental place in the morning while it was still pretty cold. They rented me a jacket, gloves and a helmet. I took some awesome roads there – Foothills Pkwy over to Happy Valley Rd and then finally US 129 “Tail of the Dragon”.

The dragon itself is a decent road, but not very different from Hwy 9 or the local roads in the Bay Area. The turns are relatively tight and the riding is pretty slow. I rode with Anushka behind me for about half of it, and then switched with Valmik for the rest of the dragon. They both enjoyed the ride tremendously, which was a little spirited for them.

I took a brief stop at the Dragon Resort, looked around the Tree of Shame, took a few pics and moved on. There wasn’t much of a crowd, it was still early in the morning and relatively cool. From there we rode down to the Historic Tapoco Lodge Resort and had lunch.

Shruti and the kids were tired with the winding roads there, so I decided to ride on towards Cherohala Skyway. I took Joyce Kilmer Road to Cherohala, stopped there for a few pics and chatted with a couple of riders from Ohio. I then road a few miles out on Cherohala and back tracked my way to the restaurant. I enjoyed Cherohala Skyway the most – it’s a great free flowing road with nice high speed sweepers. There were gradual elevation changes, excellent pavement and superb views – what more could one ask for? I was tailing a few ZX14 riders on the Skyway and it was a lot of fun. I could ride there for days on end.

I loved the Honda Valkyrie. I’ve been interested in a Valkyrie for a while now, ridden the older one many times. It has a lot of power – the goldwing engine makes more torque than a Busa. With five gears only, the last gear is a true overdrive. The bike has a super smooth engine with no buzz or vibrations anywhere. It also handles great, for being a cruiser. It’ll scrape pegs if you ride aggressively but for the most part it turns very well. It hides it’s 700lbs weight very well, while not being tiring to ride at all. It was definitely comfortable for the 400 miles I put that day.

The only issue for me really was that I think it needs a slipper clutch. It’s easy to skid the rear wheel when downshifting, and that can get scary on such a big bike. Obviously, the looks are a bit… polarizing… to put it mildly. Used prices are high – compared to a Ducati diavel or Triumph Rocket. Otherwise a fantastic bike, Honda reliability, awesome fit and finish, and best of all – 32,000 mile valve check intervals, only oil changes needed for a long time.

On March 25th 2022, Mahesh (Ducati Scrambler 1100 Sport) and me (Kawasaki Versys-X 300) rode into the mountains of Carmel Valley towards the Tassajara Zen Mountain Center and Chew’s Ridge.

We started the day by meeting for coffee at Sue’s Gallery Cafe in Saratoga.

We rode up Hwy 9 through the SC mountains all the way down to Santa Cruz. It was quite cold through the mountains and by the time we got to Santa Cruz my fingers were frozen. We stopped for gas near Moss Landing and I swapped bikes with Mahesh till Carmel Valley.

We then started the ride towards Tassajara – the road was mostly hard packed dirt with a few ruts here and there. Nothing very difficult and we made it up to Chew’s ridge quickly.

The gate to the lookout was locked, so we did not ride our bikes up there, but walked the last quarter of a mile. The views from the lookout were amazing. The weather was perfect, and the visibility was great.

From there we rode a few miles towards the Zen center and stopped by a picnic bench for a beer and a sandwich. It was a very peaceful camping spot. We met a forest service ranger there who was laying irrigation lines for the service mules. We had a nice long chat with him.

From there we decided to turn around and head back to the Bay Area. Riding noisy motorcycles down to the Zen meditation center seemed like a bad idea, lol.

We rode on Carmel Valley Road, and then up Hwy 101 through Salinas and it was incredibly windy. The long freeway ride was tiring, but all in all it was fun.