Ricardo Rocco continues with his voyage for PEACE and against drug abuse from Argentina The Ecuadorian motorcyclist initiated in Buenos Aires, Argentina, a new voyage around South America. Rocco starts this way his return to Ecuador after having visited the southern end of the continent during the first months of the year. Invited by the Rafaelan Association of Motorcycle Meetings, he was present at the VI International Motorcyclists Meeting in Rafaela's city, in the province of Santa Fe, where he was rewarded with the trophy the motorcyclist that most distance rode to the event and he also got the distinction for the Prize to the Sports Effort. Continuing with his tour, he visited the city of Cordoba, where The Voice of the Interior newspaper interviewed him and realized some business visits, to return to the city of Buenos Aires, where he has been invited by Juan Jose Barufaldi to test one of the racing cars of the Barcelo Competición team, a Mitsubischi Evolution 4, considering a possible future participation in the Argentine Rally's championship.
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Dear Sponsors and Friends:
I´m leaving the immense city of the Great Buenos Aires. The system of modern highways takes me, moving away, out of the traffic of the city. An 8-lane freeway leads the light Saturday morning north-bound traffic (June 16). I feel chilly, especially on my hands, in spite of being them covered by thick leather gloves. After passing by the peripheries of the giant city, stuffed with malls and advertising signs, it is an almost a relief to watch the first patches of green pasture of the countryside fields The cold is increasing intensively, penetrating inside the Aerostich jacket trough my neck and freezing my hands, I decide to stop to wrap up myself a bit. Phase One, I joke to myself. I extract the bulky cold weather gloves and the polar neck and put them after replenishing my thermos with boiling water in a service station. In this country, where the herbal mate drinking is more a tradition than a custom, in every gas station exist warm water dispensers always available. After about an hour of riding, I am feeling very cold. The meteorological forecasts were predicting a front of Antarctic wind invading the continent, and they were not wrong. After a abnormally hot week of pleasant weather, the austral autumn is making its presence felt with pronounced decreases of temperature. The contrast produces shivers to me. I enter Phase Two. Another layer of clothing for the legs in the shape of thick wool sweat pants, a light pullover, bought in Cuzco last January and the thermal Aerostich jacket connected directly to the 12 volts of the battery of the motorcycle. Anyway, I feel plenty of cold and tremble with the pace of the vibrations of my 4-stroke engine. As I cover kilometers of highway, my resolution to arrive today to Rafaela city, in the province of Santa Fe, is weakening. It is very, very cold in spite of the radiant sun and the limpid sky of the early autumn. When I come to the road crossing that leads to the city of Rosario, in the shores of the mighty Parana river, I decide to change direction towards the west, to Arequito's village, where my friend, fellow motorcyclist, Guillermo Brown lives, who I know only through the Internet, and to whom I owe a visit for a long time. Upon arriving in this small town located in the center of the Soya zone from Argentina, I am received with the hospitality that only the friendship and the camaraderie motorcyclists can understand. Guillermo is a experienced motorcycle traveler that has crossed great parts of Argentina and Brazil in his trips. I spend the night in his house, sharing a delicious dinner and a very agreeable party with his family tinted with innumerable stories of trips, photos and anecdotes of the road. I head to the north in the morning, after Guillermo fills my tank of fuel in his service station and orientates me towards a series of secondary dirt roads to retake the route to Rafaela. The day is almost perfect. The radiant Sun illuminates the morning, but a persistent cold freezes the bones. At this pace I will get to Rafaela by mid afternoon, I think. Not so fast!. There can always be surprises in the way. I travel the whole day, looking for the best route in my map, through the intricate system of provincial highways. Upon decelerating entering a toll station the engine of the motorcycle sputters and quits not to start again. After scratching my head wondering what could it be, I check for spark. It sure has a good spark. I change spark plug, in spite of it being new. I check the fuel flow to the carburetor. Its Ok. When I am getting ready to take the bike apart to check things further, one of the guys that work at the toll booths offers to take me in his light truck up to nearby village, where he says, there is a family who owns a gomeria (tire repair place) and who likes to help travelers. I think it is a great idea so there we go. We get to a "gomeria", all the doors are close and it seems nobody is there. But the door of the humble house opens and an older gentleman with a grouchy face comes out. Nevertheless, he decrees that they are going to help me out and that we can get the motorcycle off the truck. He says: " you gonna have to wait for a little while since we having our Father day lunch ". "Sure, no problem , I go, i´ll wait right here . Oh, yes, today is Father day. This happens to me for not being with my children today, I reproach myself. After a moment the same gentleman comes out again, and with an obliging gesture he invites me to share the family lunch with them. Suddenly I find myself siting in the table of a nice family, answering their innumerable questions and savoring a delicious meal, and devouring later on of the most exquisite home made salamis I´ve ever tasted in my life. After this unexpected, but welcome invitation, we go on to the workshop, with the younger son, and begin to poke in the motorcycle to see that happened. After a couple of hours of meticulous work, and of cleaning a carburetor that seemingly was not so dirty, the motorcycle is ready to go. The whole family gets together in the workshop of the gomeria to say goodbye and to wish me luck, photos are taken with me and the young mechanic man gets to keep one of the two sweaters that I´m taking as samples, to sell in Cordoba. Business is business. It turns out that to finance my adventures, I had to resort to inventiveness. I have turned into "smuggler" of Ecuadorian crafts. You probably would³ve love to see me arrive into the Ezeiza Buenos Aires airport with 11 huge duffel bags fuul of heavy wool sweaters plus my motorcycle equipment. And I was not imprisoned thanks to the influences that my friend Juan Jose Barufaldi has in the customs of the airport! In an instant I cover the fifty kms. to Rafaela, city famous for its oval 500 miles racing track a great racing tradition. Here threy celebrate the motorcyclists annual meeting, to which I have been invited. I suspect that most of the events will be over by now, since the meeting began last Friday and I´m arriving Sunday, late in the afternoon. When I get to the main square of the nice city, I see many people standing in the sidewalks of one of the avenues that ends in the square. Something is going on. I see a bunch of motorcycles coming my way, I park and watch the show of hundreds of bikes caravaning trough the streets, I wait ´till everybody passes by and then join the ride. I follow them to the square where everybody parks. I dismount, and hang around observing the motorcycling scene. A few people approach asking where I come from and thenm the memebers of the local club which organizers the event come by. Suddenly I turn into a celebrity. "The Ecuadorian has arrived! " is the general comment. A bunch of people is taking photos at and with me, strangres shake my hand and even some people ask for my autographs. The newspaper and the TV press shows up for an interview. Then the policemen come with the Major and more photos are taken and they give me city stickers and pamphlets. Even a couple of beautiful girls express looks of admiration towards me. Uouhou!!!. I feel as a circus artist just arrived in the city!. After all this undeserved celebrity, hey lead me to a very good hotel, where they tell me I can stay, totally for free, for as many days as I want. I was only wishing for a quite palce to camp, and here I am, in luxury suite all for myself! Then, they lead me to the car-racing track, where the center of the meeting is. A huge tent is where everybody is hanging out, since the night has fallen over the city and outside is very cold. There are sellers of all kinds of accessories and leather clothes, crafts, etc. To the right of the circus like tent, there is a great esplanade replete of motorcycles and beyond, the pit boxes of the car-racing track, are full of motorcyclists camping inside. In spite of the intense cold, I go out to walk a bit and observe above each of the pits, the names of several pilots, glories of the Argentine racing scene, as well as inscriptions remembering when several years ago, the 500 mile race of the formula Indy circus was held here, and another one remembering the 80th. Anniversary of this racing track. 80 years! The motor tradition is sure impressive in Argentina! My "host" comes, he is Fortunato "Quito" Blanco, in charge of the public relations of Rafaelan Association for Motorcycle Meetings (Association Rafaelina de Encuentros Motociclisticos), and it is " Prize to the Sports Effort " and consists of a beautiful leather vest. And guess who earns it? The Ecuadorian motorcyclist who is riding around the world for peace. People yell and applaud and somebody passes the microphone to me. " Errr. I am grateful to you all ....... viva Argentina !" People go crazy, they keep applauding and shouting: " OOOle, ole, ole, olaaaa, Rooocco, Roooocco, Ole, ole, ole, ola, Eeeecuador, Ecuador ........... " What is this, a football match? I descend from the stage and they all congratulate me. Bearded types dressed in black leathers approach and hug me, congratulating me, the women throw flowers (ok, ok, I think one of them threw a single flower to me), my friend "Quito" rescues me of the multitude and leads me to the back, where we sit to talk for a while. The truth is, I still can not believe it. I came to this nice city a coupe, of hours ago, as a perfect starnger and now the these people shouting my name and that of my country. Mad things of motorcycling!! By midnight, I sit down really tired and decide to leave, go out and look for my bike among hundreds of motorcycles parked out. I tie all my prizes to the motorcycle and go secretly towards the city. If I say goodbye they are capable of retaining me in the party and I´m not feeling very well. The intense cold and the rigors of the day, are inspiring a killer flu. I get up with all the good intentions of travelling towards Cordoba. But I have not had a good night. A persistent cough and a heavy chest congestion have not allowed me to sleep well. Remaining in the warm room of the hotel is a whole temptation. Anyhow, today is a holiday in Argentina and outside still is so cold it cuts the skin. I take the day off, taking advantage of the free hotel room and I only go out to buy medicines in the drugstore and a something to eat in the supermarket With the bright sun flooding the blue sky, scarcely warming the chilly morning, I head to Cordoba, distant 480 km. towards the west. The flu clouds my sight and makes breathing difficult. Every so and then, I must stop to drink something warm and to clean my congested nose. What a nice trip! The monotonous landscapes of the Argentine field are all alike but still beautiful. The farms succeed one after another and occasionally a small settlement appears here and there. By mid afternoon, while I make an obligatory stop to clean my nose, I watch the autumnal horizon, and discover the low summits of the Sierras of Cordoba, that break the plain of the pampas and give a mysterious halo to the landscape. I am standing in a corner of the center of the city, after visiting a store of crafts offering my "merchandise". I am not sure what to do next. A guy approaches and asks me "the questions". He says that he owns has a residential university student hostel and that he can offer me accommodation for 6 dollars a night. Compared with the 20 of a hotel, it is a bargain! There I stay for three days, sharing a room with two students, while I cure the tremendous flu and try to sell my wool sweaters, without much luck so. There are a few reasons for this: A: I am not a very good seller, B: the economic situation in Argentina is not good at all, and, C: the merchandise still is in Buenos Aires. What a fiasco! Anyhow Cordoba does not go so badly, it is an agreeable city and I am useful to spread the message of NO drugs, when they call me from the local newspaper The Voice of the Interior, where I am interviewed by a very beautiful journalist, Angeles Buteler. I use the weekend to go back to Buenos Aires and on the way, visit my great friend Daniel "Cheho" Latimori in Marcos Juárez's city, where I receive once again, with the incredible Argentine hospitality. Checho and his friends take me, invite me and bring me, being a witness of the different kind of life that of the persons in the hundreds of small but prosperous cities of the interior of this country. On Sunday I am already in the house of my friend Juan Jose in Buenos Aires, preparing one hard week of work, which includes seeing my friends of Motoer Bikes, an important concessionaire of motorcycles in the center of the city and to Luis Maria Jiménez, who is preparing to ride around the world in motorcycle in a very interesting project described in http: // www.motodisea.gq.nu/, besides Beatriz and Antonio Castellanos, Eleonora Peters, " the Batichica ", to the famous one "Che Cacón" and so many good friends that I am lucky to know here in this beautiful city. When I should finish my matters here, I will have to decide what route to take to go back to my country. It will be the great Argentine north or the trans - Paraguayan chaco? Don´t miss the next adventures of a humble motorcycle - traveler for Peace. Ricardo Rocco Paz
Alrededor del Mundo por la PAZ
Around the World for PEACE
www.andesmoto-tours.com
PHOTOS and PRESS in: http://communities.msn.com/AroundtheWorldforPeacePhotos
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