Compass Expeditions - Highlights of Peru Tour review- Ian Kerr

• 0 Stars.

Highlights of Peru with Compass Expeditions – Ian Kerr

Once you start travelling it is hard to stop, it is like reading the first chapter of a good book, and you just have to finish it. Travel, well there is no last chapter or page, it is infinite, its only controlling factor being time and money.

Nowadays travel is relatively easy with a myriad of companies offering everything from beach to adventure holidays. You can fly, go by road, ship or train, or pedal cycle or just walk, the choice once again being controlled by time and finances.

Over here in Europe we are lucky with a large land mass easily accessible by good air, road, boat and train links, nothing is really a problem to get to quite quickly. Major capital cities, mountain ranges, coastline with masses of climatic variations are not many hours away. Even from the UK a quick hour on boat from Dover, or a train under the English Channel is not too much of a problem or a limiting factor!

Travel though can be good or bad depending or your point of view. If you just want to reach a destination, then it is probably the latter. However, travel by motorcycle is all part of the experience as most touring/adventure riders will tell you.

You are exposed and that makes you accessible to locals who are more inclined to greet you and help you in many ways and of course you get to experience the smells and atmosphere that makes each location/destination unique.

As you gradually work you way further afield you become hooked to the point you probably just want to sell everything, pack your bike up and just go touring the world for a few years. Nice thought, but for the vast majority of us there are restraints like families, business’s etc that make that just an idle thought.  

That being said, that never stops you looking for destinations to put on your ‘must do before I die’ list. If you have one, then a look at the Compass Expeditions list of tours will probably find quite a few similarities with your own.

Like many other companies what they offer is the chance to take time out to reach those locations without the hassle of a years planning, hours on the internet, the hassle of shipping bikes and all the other things that normally go with exploration of some of the those not so close ‘must-do’ destinations.

The last part is what really attracted me, having been on quite a few other trips was the fact they were going to allow me a few ticks on my list, but give me some culture to go with potentially some superb motorcycle roads, but in complete safety with good back-up. Unlike some other companies, the places they go are not one’s that you would want to consider doing on your own without some background support.

It all looked good on the web, but as they say ‘the proof of the pudding’, so emails exchanged, dates agreed on the ‘Highlights of Peru’ trip it was just a case of setting things straight at home as I would be gone for nearly three weeks.

Interestingly, unlike other operators they do not include travel to and from as part of the time spent, so fourteen days is riding time, there are extra days either side not included in the riding tour time, but part of the experience.

First up was very comprehensive briefing pack arriving by email including a useful potted history of South America, all good for helping you understand what you are going to see. In fact I can’t think of things that were not included, so good was the pack, even simple language was explained so you did not feel a complete fool!

Ok, 30 hours travel from blighty could not be avoided, even those inevitable delays, so it was nice when I arrived at La Paz in Bolivia, (our starting point) to find the cab with my name on his card as promised. A 20 minute ride brought us to a pretty individual hotel near the centre of town and a welcome bed.

The following morning tour leader Brendan introduced himself and gave me a rundown on what was to follow including the need to acclimatise to the altitude. A gentle tour of the city had been arranged to help me unwind and get to grips with the culture. The afternoon was spent in the colourful market next to the hotel buying a local t-shirt before quick nap.

Early evening saw all my fellow tour participants meet up in the hotel for a comprehensive briefing and some inevitable paperwork, before we headed out to an excellent restaurant to get to know each other.

After a reasonable breakfast we caught a cab to the BMW GS 650 F bikes garaged on the outskirts of town and again went through a thorough briefing and a short familiarisation ride to ensure we were all happy. Traffic conditions were of course very different to what many of us are  used to, but slow and steady was to be the object of the first day.

Originally we should have headed out and towards the border with Peru and continued onto Puno on the banks of Lake  Titicaca, but Brendan had heard that the political situation in Peru was a little volatile and re-routed us to Copacabana on the Bolivian side of the lake.. (Had you been doing your own thing, you would not have known about the troubles!)

A stop for lunch along the way in the middle of nowhere had us scratching our heads until Leo our back up driver pulled up and tables and fresh food appeared from the cavernous trailer and Toyota. This was to be the standard for most days and it must be said hungry was never to be a word uttered on the tour!     

More surprises were to come as we headed down for the crossing point that justifies the Bolivian Navy’s existence (it is land locked!) The ferry consisted of large barges with planks of wood powered by an outboard motor. Bike security? Well that was down to you, just stand there and hold it!

The drop down to the small lakeside town was just like dropping down to one on the side of the Mediterranean and the hastily arranged hotel was right on the front with stunning views and five star food and accommodation.

The best of it was there was no Barry Manilow singing about the better known location of the same name!