Radio 1
Listen to the latest from Mark's Peruvian adventure in yesterday's interview with Radio 1's Greg James.
Archives for November 2009
Peruvian Update
Watch the latest video from Mark's epic journey. Now in Peru and back in the arid desert, he is pushing towards the capital Lima.
Remember to keep an eye on twitter for an instant snapshot of Mark's journey.
Ecuador and Peru in Pictures
The latest pictures from Mark's journey are available on flickr. The arid desert landscape of Peru is part of the focus from the latest collection of snaps as we catch a glimpse of Mark's new world.
Anyone notice something odd about the composition of this photo re sunset and where the bike is?
Find the full set from Ecuador and Peru on Mark's flickr photostream, and if you are new to the journey why don't you take a look back at the full collection of pictures from the beginning of the journey.
You Did It!
A massive thank you to everyone who took part in this year's Children in Need appeal. It was a fantastic effort from everyone involved, cycling some huge miles and raising thousands of pounds for Children in Need in the process.
You more than caught up with Mark. We counted 21,079 miles cycled by Scotland, and £4,946 raised for BBC Children in Need as part of the challenge!
Well done!
Radio 1
After spending a few days in the Peruvian desert Mark caught up with Radio 1's Greg James earlier this week and told him about the latest events in his epic adventure.
Catch Mark For Children In Need
BBC Children In Need night is this Friday, 20th Nov 2009.
If you have been sponsored to cycle miles for Catch Me If You Can then now is the time to send in your totals so they can be counted. Email your total miles to Pudsey.
Thanks from Pudsey to everyone who has completed miles and raised money so far. If you're in Scotland, tune into BBC One on Friday to see Mark live and find out if he's been caught!
You can find out more about Catch Me If You Can from Mark here.
Radio 1
Listen to the latest update from Mark with Radio 1's Greg James.
A Testing Introduction to The Andes
I arrived in Ecuador less than a week ago and for a few days happily pedalled through mile upon mile of relatively flat banana plantations. The ship I arrived on from Panama was here to pick up 4000 tonnes of the fruit to be shipped to the banana loving Europeans!
Banana Plantations, Ecuador
In fact, bananas are Ecuador's biggest export - but by no means the only one. Yesterday (Thursday 12th) I was filming at a coffee plantation and giving the local brew a thorough quality taste test! Ecuadorian 'Cafe Altura' (coffee grown at high altitude) is some of the best in the world despite everyone being more familiar with neighbouring Colombia's famous cuppa. However, to get to the coffee plantation has been one of my toughest challenges yet.
Mile upon mile of gravel roads winding up and up - welcome to the Andes!
As soon as I headed inland, the road reared up and for three days I have been crawling upwards. Many sections of the road to Loja are gravel and dirt, which reduced me to little more than a walking pace. Cycling from dawn to dusk I could only cover about 40 miles and was left shattered. An added challenge is that I haven't found enough food in the last week. Aboard the ship, meals were very small, and even when I asked for seconds this meant a meal a fraction of what I normally need - so after a few days rest I got back on the bike with very low energy. This was not the fault of the ships crew who were very kind to me, it's just that they don't need enough food to cycle all day every day! In Ecuador I still need to discover the best food, which is frustrating as everyone who has been here tells me how amazing it is!
Reaching the higher ground after two days of tough climbing and being rewarded with some amazing views.
When I did reach the highlands I was rewarded with some of the most incredible views - making all the frustration and effort well worth it. I was welcomed to stay over in the village of Olmedo, at 4500ft, with a coffee growers family. This was welcome company and really put my Spanish to the test! In the morning we visited the crops before making fresh coffee. First we took the grains and crushed them with a big bat before fanning them to take the husks off. Next we made an open fire and dry roasted them for about 20 minutes - the smell was wonderful. Then the grains were cooled and put through a hand mill before straining boiling water through to give the freshest cup of coffee I have ever tasted. I loved filming all this but am slightly embarrassed that everyone will soon have to watch and hear my appalling Spanish conversation!
Hand grinding our freshly roasted coffee beans.
You can see more pictures from Ecuador on my flickr site.
Today I will cross into Peru and hopefully find some better roads and speed up, or else I will be hard pushed to reach Aconcagua in time...
Mark
Family On Bikes
Mark is set to take around nine months to complete his journey down the Americas, a good pace of around 70 miles a day allows him to experience life all along the American Cordillera. There are many travellers on the Pan-American Highway, and there's even one whole family of cyclists who take pride in the fact that they are taking their time in the journey from Alaska to Ushuaia. Nancy, John, Davy and Daryl have been on the road for almost 18 months and have pedalled over 10,000 miles in their quest to reach Argentina.
With 11 year-old twins on board it's a truly remarkable challenge for the Vogel family, and it's not the first time they have hopped on the bikes for something like this - visit their website to find out more. When they reach their destination, the boys will have earned the Guinness World Record as the youngest people to cycle the Pan-American Highway.
Nancy has kindly written an article about their tales from the road for the blog, this is their story...
Family on Bikes
by Nancy Sathre-Vogel
One might expect a strong, young, single male to take off to ride his bike from one end of the earth to the other, but a family? A life on the two wheels may not be the expected route for raising kids, but it's a whole lot more fun!
In June 2008 my husband and I climbed on our bikes along with our kids, (then) 10-year-old twins Davy and Daryl, to cycle halfway around the globe - north to south - along the Pan American Highway. The day we pedalled southward out of Prudhoe Bay, Alaska on the shores of the Arctic Ocean was one of those crystal clear arctic days and I felt like I could see all 18,000 miles of our journey ahead across the grassy tundra. All four of us were excited to finally be on our way - the whole earth lay before us like some kind of massive red carpet welcoming us to a life filled with adventure.
Radio Scotland
Mark caught up with Radio Scotland's MacAulay and Co earlier today, it's his first chat with the team since entering South America, and thankfully there were no communication hiccups this time!
Notes From an Ocean Voyage
For two days I have been at sea aboard the Crown Opal, a 152 meter cargo vessel from Colon, Panama to Guayaquil, Ecuador. I am now south of the equator and have taken my first steps on South American soil.
Back in Panama, my bike and pannier bags were perched on the back of an open harbour boat for the ten minute dash out to where the Crown Opal was anchored in the bay. As we approached we were dwarfed by her immense hull. Once broadside, a rope ladder was lowered and a rope thrown down. It was a vertical ascent to safety and we bobbed about for a few minutes as first the bike, then bags were winched aboard. I was left with my film camera in one hand as the harbour boat captain gestured for me to start climbing. Quickly disassembling the camera and stuffing it into my pockets, I hoped it wouldn't fall out.
As soon as my feet were on, the harbour boat shot off, and I dangled over open water. Clambering up I was met by a mainly Russian crew, who seemed as unsure of my sudden appearance as I was of my new surrounds. There were no introductions as I was led between the mountains of containers and up lots of ladders to my cabin, next to the bridge (control room).
My crew have turned out to be very friendly after my initial concerns, but it is undoubtedly a tough life aboard these vessels. The twenty-one men who run the Crown Opal are on board for six months at a time away from friends and family. Seeing this reality has put my insecurities of such things into perspective. In the last few days we have been through an emergency drill, checked the whole ship is ready for a cargo of four thousand tonnes of bananas destined for Europe and made it safely through the Panama Canal.
The Panama Canal is one of the most impressive spectacles I have ever witnessed. The lakes in the middle of Panama are above sea level, meaning locks are needed to raise the water level and then lower it again. Imagine a set of stairs up one side from the Atlantic and down again to the Pacific. We made these first three steps in daylight and I was juggling two film cameras, a stills camera and my phone (for twitter) all the time to capture an amazing story.
The last steps, back down to sea level were in the dark and this was even more impressive as massive locomotives tethered our ship at each corner to allow us to inch our way through the narrow canal without damage. In one of these locks we passed a ship that holds 5000 cars going the other way. It was all of the 32 meters wide and most of the 250 meters long that the locks would allow. An utterly staggering scale.
Since then we have been on the open ocean, about 80 miles off the coast of Columbia heading south. The main hazard out here is tiny fishing boats that are too small to show up on the radar. Earlier today we also passed some whales, but I wasn't quick enough to get the shot!
I feel great for the brief rest before the challenges of South America. To be honest I am raring to go and feeling quite couped up on board without any exercise! Apart from getting me where I need to go, this voyage has been an amazing adventure and an insight into a tough life at sea.
Thanks to all the crew aboard the Crown Opal and those who have made this part of the journey possible.
Radio 1
Listen to the latest update from Mark on the Greg James show this afternoon.
Nutritional Needs
The daily challenge of clocking up major miles takes a huge physical effort but catching food poisoning, a stomach bug or something even worse could have a substantial impact on the journey. So it's important for Mark to take advice and consider what he eats and drinks in the effort to consume the 6000kcal he needs each day.
As Mark is about to cross into the southern hemisphere we thought it would be a good idea to get Sport Nutritionist Ruth McKean back on the blog for some valuable advice to help avoid a giddy belly in South America.
General Food & Water Considerations in South America
by Ruth McKean
The risk of food and water borne disease, causing mild or serve diarrhoea and/or vomiting and abdominal cramps, is common and not always preventable in foreign countries, especially those that travel rough and are adventurous in their eating habits. Mark will have no choice but to be adventurous when food is scarce.
However as Mark enters South America, if he is observant to how food and fluid (water from the tap should not be drunk) is prepared and presented this may help avoid obvious causes of food poisoning or traveller's diarrhoea. The latter typically occurs during the end of the first week of arrival and is often self-limiting, lasting three to four days.
The End of the Road in Central America
Panama has been a beautiful but challenging country to cycle. Having been getting regularly soaked for over a month I am used to this, but the rainy season seems to have reached a new intensity in the last week and the afternoon storms have often forced me to stop cycling. The visibility drops, roads become rivers, trucks carry on regardless and it is no place for a bike! It has also played havoc with my cameras and other electronics.
My only time off the bike in Panama came soon after the border when I spent a day visiting a howler monkey sanctuary, seeing an Ngobe-Bugle Indian village and then going on a night hike in the rainforest to find snakes and tarantulas. It was a wonderful experience, and to see the native culture and also wildlife in such close quarters was a real privilege.
After the rainforest visit I was given a tough target to reach a boat by Monday, only to find that this schedule was changed, so in a classic 'hurry up and wait' I have raced to Colon only to have two days off - which is a welcome break!
There is literally no road that joins Panama in Central America to the South American continent. The formidable jungle frontier of the Darien Gap is nearly impassable. A few have made it and lived to tell the tale!
The other challenge is that my journey will continue in Ecuador and not Columbia, so I need a way to get there, preferably without taking a flight. Therefore, I am about to join a cargo boat, carrying fruit, from the port of Colon on a 60 hour voyage, through the Panama Canal and down the Pacific coast. This will be a great adventure and a brief rest for the legs before the big and very mountainous miles of South America.
Night at the Station
The weather conditions have been pretty torrid over the last week and faced with a night of wild camping on Friday, Mark received some welcome hospitality and shelter from the local fire station.
He was joined by Mike and Alanna, who he met for the first time in the United States. The pair interviewed Mark as part of their documentary called Going the Distance, which featured on this blog two months ago. The couple are on their own epic journey from Alaska to Argentina in the name of love!
Mike, Alanna & I at the fire station
I spent a very random night in a fire station. Mike and Alanna are a couple who are doing the same route but on an Ural (motorbike and sidecar) who I first met in Utah. Our paths have crossed a few times now and they also kipped down in a bunkroom with the firemen!
Find the full set of pictures from Central America on flickr.
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About this blog
World record breaker Mark Beaumont cycled from Anchorage, Alaska to Ushuaia in Southern Argentina. Following the line of the mountain ranges which form the American Cordillera, he also climbed the two highest peaks Mount McKinley and Aconcagua, on foot. Recording the adventure on this blog and for a BBC One series, The Man Who Cycled the Americas.
Cycling the Americas videos
Don't miss out on the great videos from Mark's journey.
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Mapping the Route
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