Two Moto Kiwis Arctic To Antarctic May 2012...

Am I reading this right? Should I say "Welcome back to Canada Ellen" ???

Andi...you know that I don't drink much but sometimes it is good for stress levels to sit in front of a bottle.Put on your hat and......Anyone down there that wants to do that to him, get him shitfaced on "I think" some good scotch....I'll buy and even Paypal you the $$$$.

Heya Pierre

Yeap she is in Montreal now.... we just can't get away from Canada eh , ironically she is only a coupla hundred km away from Maya!!!

Took care of the stress problem, bought a 1.75 L of Bombay Saphire .... chics drink but I love it ... actually I like most grog

Now I can update all the trip reports, prepping Hobbit and Chiwi for sale giving them a clean up ... Hobbit looks nice now ... I might have to lowball myself with an offer

Gin for the Dutchie!.....tell Ellen to bring back some of that "De Kuyper Geneva Gin" the old guys like to drink up there. Nowhere else in N/A do people drink that, acquired taste but nice label... Good as a grog with some maple syrup.



One of them KTMs for sale in Kelowna, too rich for my taste. But Ken said that he knows where there may be a couple DRs....

Oh! Welcome back to Canada Ellen!

I'm in

So you have had enough time to splane yourself, but no, you just keep us waiting and guessing so here's the questions I've been waiting to have answered. (unless I missed them)

Where did you find Maya and how did it unfold so quickly.
How are you getting the bike transported to you or are you going to get it and ride it back?
How much of your existing gear can fit on the new stead and how much will be shipped home?
What's the status with the injured M/C (Chiwi) are you going fix her or just sell her as is?
How about Hobbit, hows the progress with selling him, or are you putting him up for adoption?
How about Ellen, is she for sale? Just kidding Ellen!!!

Take care and hopefully I'll see you on the road either in N/A or NZ. for a few

Eh! I have the same questions,no rush snowing here. Give him time to finish the Gin, he needed that and more....!

I think one bottle of Gin should see me through ... although that depends on when these daman truckers pick up Maya.

Heya David, nice to hear from your mate, answers are

Andi, that photo titled 'In through reception' had me thinkin' hmmm... Salicia Gardens tonings... :) Nice!

Got my own little rant with Wells Fargo and their rather large service fees to get money out of their bank machines in AK last summer. Good luck... And very nice bike BTW, had some time and checked the thread in the flea market. Maya ROCKS !!!

Dammit....hard to find a well set 650 up here to go catch some sun in February/march/april. I'd seriously consider one of yours but too far and no time for the import business.

Need a quick spec from you. How low can you make one of them DRs to see if I could fit that inside the tintop? Alutop in my case. Could I go down to 40" or so?Removing parts wouldn't be a problem....even a temporary wooden front wheel to gain clearance, had to do that once on a much bigger bike but that was just so we could move it, the steeltop back then was big enough.

How about a good book or 2 to go with the grog? No need for a reply.....

Eh....wanna see the innards of that yellow Ducati?

Classic ... yeah brings back memories having 7 VTR 1000's in the lounge

Heya Pierre

We can store it for your easy enough ....anything can happen.

The DR from bottom of the bashplate to top of handlebars is 39 inches including the 30 mm risers so if you rotated the bars a bit you could easy gain more space.

We took off the back wheel, front wheel and forks and fitted the both into the back of a ute to bring them out of Mexico, easy as.

That report will be out tomorrow and you will see what happened.

Good to hear you folks doing OK. I understand some folks have had issues with the subframe on the SE's. I think, though, these folks are also doing some seriously hard riding with alot of weight in the side bags. (jumping?) I know some folks have a bit of reinforcing and have been fine. Hit up Craig at CJ Designs if you need anything for Maya. He's a good guy and has put a few miles on his 950 ADV.
Hope you folks have a great Christmas and New Years.

mmm Andi had better make this stronger then.

Thanks mate, yeah I think most will be riding their SE's the way they were meant to, we won't be looking for 6 ft jumps with two and house and contents on board but will still take proactive moves to avoid damage if we can.

.... we won't be shaggin on it mate!!!, BTW that blowup sheep you ordered arrived today

Is it as nice as yours?

Our plan is to get back to the US and get sorted to continue on one bike ..... what can possibly go wrong???

We employed a fello and his good lady with a ute to bring Chiwi and Hobbit back to the USA as Ellen could not ride.

We left Lo De Marcos, 7.00 am sharp so 8.30 Mexican time... hmmm what happened to 7.00 sharp?? a n y w a y the trip was uneventful, we arrived at Navajoa and got a Hotel at midnight after clocking 1000 km of our 1600km drive.

Following morning we set off at 9.00 am sharp, 10.15 am Mexican time ... hmmm what happened to 9.00 am sharp ... there is a pattern forming here.

Only 10km out of Navajoa BANG and the left front of the truck drops to the road amidst grinding and thumping sounds, our driver to his credit held it straight and bought us to a stop, we all bailed out, we just past a road cone on the side of the road so I ran back and placed it 100 metres back from us in our lane.



Upon returning back to the truck we had established the bottom suspension ball joint had failed (mostly cos it was fncked to start with) and bailed out of the swingarm and the whole lot had gone to ground, it had hit the tire and gutted that wide open too.







The swingarm was ground down and torn open so was stuffed and they had to find a replacement.



We were there two minutes when a couple of mechanics pulled up, they organised the tow truck (uh ouwh ... here we go again) and we were on our way back to town.







So here we are right back at the beginning of the report sitting waiting for parts to turn up, we are supposed to be in Nogales tonight crossing to the US tomorrow.



The guy for the shocks turns up, yes the RHS is yesterday so he takes off and gets a new pair, he comes back, argh wrong ones, hmmm, ok come back 1 hour later and has the right ones, but only one has rubbers and washers .... WTF.

We sit and wait another 1 and 1/2 hour.

This is how Mexicans can two a 2 hours job into a 6 -7 hour job so easily and as usual the only time we DO have something organised like our pick up in the USA at Nogales this shit happens and we to simply sit around and wait for others for the most of it seemingly simple shit.

For the most of the time we have no timetable or organised deadline as this seems be the only time when shit happens and it stuffs things up.

See what happens now.

We finally hit the road again some 7 hours later and drive into the night to Hermosillo, we ended up staying at a love Motel and we had to be out at 6.00am which enabled us to get a good start by 7.00am, we carried on to Santa Anna for breaky which was very nice.

Upon finishing breaky we continued to Nogales to the border, to get out TVIP back turned into a bit of a drama as the bikes were loaded front first ....where the VIN numbers are, the (huge) lady wanted us to unload them completely ... we managed to get the manager across an shuffled things around enough to read them and get our deposits back.





We carried on to the border and had to fill out an I94 and pay some money to extend our VISAs in order to get sorted again.

We met up with Neil a fello ADVer who offered to come and pick us up, very kind indeed, also a HUGE thanks to his boss Al Jesse http://www.jesseluggage.com who gave Neil the time out to come and pick us up, in this harsh world there are still great people around, you guys rock!!!.

The bikes were unloaded from the ute and reloaded on to a trailer after a carpark reassembly job







Neil in action



Both bikes loaded we were ready to do the finally leg to Phoenix so time to say goodbye to our driver Manuel and his good lady who we will catch up with again when we head south.



Now we are in Phoenix, re grouping, ordering replacement gear and selling bits and pieces off and playing the waiting game with Maya and here arrival.

Not much to report other than slowly waiting.

Nah mate we bought the deluxe model bahbahbah

Dick and Diana Hubbard from New Zealand just completed their top to bottom Ice To Ice trip.

Well done you guys you make us Kiwis proud.

Take a look at their blog, very entertaining indeed.

http://www.ice2icebymotorcycle.blogspot.co.nz/

Love to all

Cheers Andi & Ellen