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 This is GonePenguin's wife writing. I am not a bike rider, but I am traveling with one (My husband, Carlo) on BMW F800 GS.
http://gonepenguin.com/
We have been traveling for 135 days and we are stuck in Panama city. Our first hick up of New York to Argentina started three days ago in Costa Rica, after hitting a big hole on asphalt road, and got rained on.
1st flat tire: We quickly took the back tire off right there then, and fix the tube, and rode on. 2nd flat tire: After 20 miles or so, as rain closed in on us, the tire blew again. We were in a small town call Rio Claro, before the Costa Rica / Panama border, stuck in a heavy Central American rain. We decided to stay in a motel, and Carlo went over to a mechanic, (did not have right tube), and walked to Yamaha store, bought a new tube, instal with mechanic, and put the tire back on under the hotel roof.
3rd flat tire: Next day, after 20 miles or so, the new tube blew. This time, in the front of a school with bunch of Nones. They let us park our bike, and we took the back wheel off again, ride a local bus back to the same town, Rio Claro. It was Sunday, bus was packed. As we drove back to the town, the bus almost looses their back wheel, and simply became : service terminated. We took a collectivo cab and continue, and the main road was blocked off as the main bridge was sinking into the river... the detour took over 1 hour additional. The detour was blocked many time since the trucks did not know that they could not pass... there were no direction, no sign, no body directing traffics. (like if the cops ever work on Sundays here!) We finally got to Rio Claro, and the same mechanic from the day before patched up our old tire tube (since there were no bike store open on Sunday), and sent us on our way.
We instal our new ready to go back wheel under a tree in the school of the Nones and we continued on to the border, 27 miles away. The border was rather simple (but annoying as every border, and thanks to Carlo, he handles all the documents and speak to everyone in Spanish), and 1 1/2 hour later, we continued on rainy road to Panama in dark.
4th flat tire: After 5 miles in Panama, the back wheel blew again. This time, in pitch black, no where to see or go, except a little light coming from a small farm house about 500m away. We call and call at gate, no answer. Carlo decided, we will sit against bike under a plastic cloth we have for camping, and wait for the sun light to come out: which was ten hours away. We were so lucky, one of the farmer came home 5 mints later, and spoke to the young farm owner, and let us camp under their garage roof, and insisted of having a plate of his dinner, and a cop of coffee. Next morning, we did same routine again. Took the wheel off, and took a bus back to the border, bought a new tube, and had a mechanic check our tire, and instaled it. We were back at this farm in no time, thanked the farmer with a bottle of Rum we bought at border, and continued on, this time under cloudy, but not raining sky.
5th flat tire: As we hit 20 miles, (I was so worried and keep on trying to watch the back wheel as we drove), I heard a pop sound, and here goes our back wheel again.
Five flat tire in 48 hours. We were done! Carlo hurted his back fixing the wheel at farm, and I do not have enough experience or to know how to hold our big beautiful but heavy bike, BMW F800. I must had such a look on me. A small dinged up car stoped (it was more like a piece of metal with wheels and steel roof attached by hand soldering, and was smaller than MINI), and a Panamanian Semi-Pro-Dirt bike racer name : Eliot came out. He started to help us. His two suggestion was:
1: Put our BMW F800 on top of his car, and drive to Panama City to BMW shop.
2: Put water instead of air on our back wheel, and we slowly drive to Panama City and re-water our wheels as we go for over 320 miles away.
After Carlo and him discussed (My spanish is not spanish...), we all drove on his car to Budget rental car in next proper town, David, rented pick up truck, and he offer to drive us to Panama with our bike, and drive the pick up truck back to David. Carlo figured that the problem of all the flat tires must be in our almost worn tire which had a thumb size whole from all the flats, and some metal fiver must be coming out as wheels heats up inside. We needed to get a new tire.
This Semi-Pro-Dirt bike racer name : Eliot guy, Really? Yes, he really did drove for 6-7 hours just like that without even asking us if he would even get paid, And he was an amazing driver! He knew the road, and he flew. It took us 6 hours which would probably taken us about 10 hours on top of this traffic in this crazy streets of Panama city in evening traffic.
When we saw a bill board with BMW Bike on it in Panama City, we finally felt OK. It was 7:30 PM.
We beg the reception to park our BMW F800 to their repair garage, (as bike department closed early, but they still takes car repair till 10 pm). We asked Eliot to stay with us over night, even though he know the road and the rental truck need to be returned by 1:30 pm next day. We went out for dinner, he gave us (and insisted us) to have a tour of historical forte, stop off to gas up. We paid him $150 USD for his time, and his help, and I gave him a pair of my new driving globes. He left 3 in the morning to drive back to David. He got there on time.
The story of us meeting great amazing people is replaceable. We are so thankful. BUT, one thing I do not understand happened today.
After the rough night of sleep (we both were socked we got to Panama on time, and still worry to hell about our bike), we were back in BMW shop in Panama City, and only to find out that, they do not have anything for bike. No wheels, only three staff, (which one was wearing MINI moto shirt, and we think he does both, MINI and BMW bike), and three hours later, we did not have estimate of our service list we requested.
Please collect me if I am wrong, but the reason I bought this bike my husband recommended for our dream trip is, he told me we will have 3 year guaranteed and have list of proper service office across the continents.
Carlo is very petitions guy. He was cam and deal with all the waiting, and spoke with the one guy who (where very nice and tried to help) helped us with all this. But I started to think, why didn't we not buy Suzuki, or Yamaha, or any Japanese bike that every one knows about in Central and South America?
We could of bought ten of these Japanese bike for the price of one of this BMW. What is the promises the BMW gave us?
What is the BMW list of dealer and mechanics they provide when you spend that money?
BMW in Panama City was not only ready to deal with bikes, they simply did not have anything that Bike shop should have. We walked around for 2 hours, visited every bike shop and accessory stores in that area, and found a acceptable wheel ourselves, and came back to BMW (and they did not even have oil to use to handle our tires).
I complain to the reception after finding out we still do not have estimate for our service request, demanded I would speak to the General Manager of the BMW store in Panama City. The receptions was very professional, made a call right a way, and 5 mints later, told me he is in the meeting and not have time. I started to speak to a car sale woman who spoke English and explain how upsetting it is to find out that BMW motorcycle store is not ready to take bikes, and I do not feel comfortable anymore to take our bike down to South America, if the rest of BMW Motorcycle dealers are like this. She understood me and call the manager for Motorcycle department for me. He came out, apologized, and explain the fact of BMW Motorcycle dealer in Panama City:
1. BMW only provide three staffs for entire motorcycle department, one of who is he, a manager. So, only one mechanic then?
2. BMW Motorcycle and rest of any bike store in Central America is having a hard time finding a motorcycle tire company to purchase tires.
3. BMW Corporation does not approve BMW Motorcycle Panama city to deal and help to get any tires they could get at location. Only the one they can ship from Germany.
So in the result, BMW Motorcycle does not have any tires here.
I have a question to ask: has anyone been to any BMW Motorcycle dealers in South America recently and if so, can you please give me the "know", and how professional they were? We want to continued on our rest of trip, get to Colombia, and keep on heading to the South. And we will be needing some service to our bike, a beautiful BMW F800, and a set of tires... We would love to get your suggestion on BMW Motorcycle dealers in South America, and who we should speak to... PLEASE!
Thank you!!
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