After only 5 days in Tabuga, it became apparent that I needed to invest in a mode of transportation that rivaled my beloved Lada back in my New Zealand-traveling days. I found a willing co-investor in Jason, who after nearly seven months of using the local Ecua-buses for such difficult tasks as buying the weekly/monthly food needs for the reserve he manages was ready to put down some money into a more independent mode of motorized travel.
What we needed was a moto-taxi. We kicked around the idea of a motorcycle, but I pushed hard for a moto-taxi due to the myriad ways of using the truck bed. Also, while Jason, single and desperate, had many reasons for wanting to look cool ripping around on a motorcycle, I had no such concerns. After a couple days of deliberation, he agreed on a moto-taxi and we decided to go in together on a purchase and that there was no reason to waste time. We hopped onto a muggy bus to the town of Pedernales, which for us living in Tabuga is the 'big city'.
The first place we tried had a sleek black moto-taxi with white accents that we'd drooled over while passing it on the bus to Tabuga a week earlier. We'd gone in recently to ask how much they were selling it for and had received a roundabout answer of $2200. Ecuador being Ecuador, we hoped to get them down around $1800, if we liked the vehicle. Jason reckoned he'd be able to go in 1/3rd to start, and work his way up to ½ ownership within a month or so, so we pulled out the necessary cash and walked over to the store. This store was a bit of a smörgåsbord of things, as most stores in Pedernales seem to be, so we found the first salesman stocking a microwave into a wall of kitchen appliances. Once Jason had him outside by the moto-taxi, we quickly deduced two things: that the $2200 price was fairly firm, and that the engine wouldn't start. Also, upon closer inspection, there were quite a few negatives about the bike that we couldn't see from the bus, including lots of engine and brake rust and busted lights in the back. We left the store as two of the salesboys were pushing the moto-taxi down a hill to pop-start it.
Two blocks further down was another “everything store” which had evidently also decided to get into the lucrative field of motorcycle sales on top of its usual small-appliances-and-large-rubber-bins business. They were selling a mototaxi for $2100, new, provided one could pay cash – they'd charge 10% more for a credit card. Looked like a much better deal, but it had become evident that we weren't driving a moto home today, and Jason needed to get back to work, so he took off and we planned on coming up with the cash and lowballing them at around $1500 at a later date.
With Jason gone, Andrea and I set off to do some more errands in the dusty bustling metropolis of Pedernales. While we were walking back from the Lavaria Jessica, our laundry lady, we chanced by a motorcycle shop named after its proprietor, Johnathan. There was a shiny red mototaxi out front, and Jonathan proved to be a genuine-seeming man with a slight Arabic cast to his Ecuadorian features. He answered our questions helpfully about the moto, never seeming too much like a salesman, and when we balked at the high price tag (this one was $2900) he volunteered that he had the very same model, except one year older, at his house and that one was for sale for $1550.
We set an appointment for two days hence to go to his house and check out what would become La Gran Bestia. Duhdunduuuuunh!
Two days later, Jason, Andrea and I made our way back to Jonathan's store. He gave his address to a mototaxi driver, said his wife was at home, and we took off. His house was on the outskirts of Peders, up a few dusty dirt roads, and was surrounded by puppies, as his dog had just given birth. We made our way through the pups, met Mrs. Jonathan, and entered the gated back yard which housed a couple mototaxis. One was really terrible, but the model he'd told us about looked pretty good, and was the right price. We called Jonathan, and he showed up on a motorcycle shortly thereafter with his mechanic, Christian, who was notable for his large, toothy grin. Christian checked the bike out – it hadn't been driven in a month or so – and then accompanied us on the testdrive.
So how was she on the test drive? Well, the brakes were terrible, her paint job was faded and had the previous owner's name scratched into the gas tank, the turn signals didn't work and she didn't have break lights. She also didn't have rearview mirrors, and the speedometer, odometer, and gas gauge were all nonfunctioning. So, she was perfect for us, given her price. We drove her home that night, after getting some paperwork from Jonathan that said we were silly gringos, Officer, no need to check for our license and registration.
It'd taken all day to make the purchase, so we unfortunately had to drive back to Tabuga in the dark. With a very weak headlight. And no goggles. I couldn't go faster than around 25 mph without being completely blinded by dust and wind, which was fine because the headlight didn't illuminate much further than 15 yards or so. Jason and Andrea crouched uncomfortably in the truckbed, and helpfully screamed in terror every time a car passed in the other direction. A wonderful ride.
But we made it! We were exhilarated to be safely back to Tabuga, and Jason and I dreamed of all the awesomeness that we'd get up to with a mototaxi. That night we decided to name our bike La Gran Bestia, 'the Great Beast', in honor of a specialty shot at a bar in Canoa (made from tequila marinated with scorpions, centipedes and other creepy crawlies) which is named Una de la Gran Bestia, or 'nail of the Great Beast'.
The next morning, flush with the excitement from our purchase, I tried to start the moto. No dice. It had a kickstart, and trying as hard and long and quickly as I could kick produced nothing but fitful coughs from the engine. Shit.
As Jason and I struggled to start the engine, the town president of Tabuga happened by on his motorcycle. He's called Enginero, as he is an engineer, and since he was on a motorcycle we figured he could help. He tried what we'd been doing, said something about the spark plug not producing a spark, and took off. Double shit. I hopped back on, kept kicking the kickstart, and was finally rewarded with the kickstart cracking in half. Triple shit!
By this time both Jason and I are sweating profusely in the morning heat, and Jason needs to get back to Pedernales to get the shopping done for the reserve. We hop on the bus to Peders, and figure we'll see if Christian can come by bus to Tabuga to fix the moto.
No dice. He explained quite rationally that if he came out, and was missing a vital tool, then the whole trip was a waste. We'd have to pop-start the moto.
A couple days later, we successfully pop-started the Gran Bestia and drove it into Pedernales. The ride was far better in the daytime, with sunglasses, though on curves I was definitely reminded why 3-wheelers were banned in the US due to the high percentage of rollover accidents. Don't worry folks, I take it very easy on curves in the LGB.
So, now in Peders with the moto, we decided that we may as well just put in an automatic push-button ignition. Christian went with us in a mototaxi (not the LGB), and directed us as we bought a battery, some oil, some rearview mirrors, some breaklights, and I'm sure some other things I forget now. We figured we may as well fix as much as possible all at once. He said it'd be done by late afternoon, but when we went back and waited for a while it was apparent that it wouldn't be done until the next day. Shit.
At some point, I feel like I'll have to through in a “long story short,” but I'll try to soldier on. As you may gather already, LGB has had a long and tortuous history in her short time as our mototaxi. It must be noted that due to Jason's time constraints at the reserve, and Andrea's smoothness in talking to mechanics, we've usurped far more of her time than we have any right to. She's been understandably frustrated, but continues, for some reason, to help us out far beyond the call of duty. Buena mujer!
We finally picked up the moto a couple days later, and of course I wasn't even able to get it out of Pedernales. I called Christian in a panic, as I was unable, after 20 minutes of trying, to get the engine to start. He showed up in a mototaxi and started it on the first try; apparently I needed to leave a moment between when I pushed the starter button and gave it gas. Shit.
What next, what next. I believe LGB ran great for a couple of days, during which I got more comfortable with her and began to let Jason drive. He said he'd had a small motorcyle some 7 years ago, but didn't really remember how to drive a manual engine, so I went with him on a couple rounds through town until it seemed like he picked it back up. Not so, not so.
He took the mototaxi to Peders a couple days later to go food shopping, and after holding in the clutch down every hill, and stalling the engine out in fifth gear going up hill, burned the engine out upon entering Peders (he recounted this all to me later). Shit. He called Christian, who came and towed him to the garage and fixed the problem for only $20. At least our fuckups are cheap. Upon his return, a chastened Jason admitted that he needed to go back to crawling before he could walk/run on the LGB.
Jason, Andrea and I needed to drive to Canoa the next day, so we set off to do so, crossing our fingers. We apparently didn't cross them enough, because the engine shut down (sounded like all the gears were burned out or something) about 45 minutes outside of Canoa, in a place without cell phone service. We decided to have Jason go on ahead to Canoa, get a friend or towtruck and come back to get us. Andrea and I settled ourselves nervously on the side of the road as it began to darken. She didn't think there was cause to worry, but that the side of the road was probably the worst place to be, safety-wise. Shit.
We kept messing around with the moto, and figured out that in reverse the moto would run... so we got on and went in reverse, backwards, towards Canoa for approximately ¾ of a mile (in the dark) before that gear blew as well. We had dramatically improved our situation, however, as we were now under a streetlight on the northernmost outskirts of a little pueblo named 'Dry Stream' in Spanish. Andrea befriended the elderly couple who came out to see the crazy gringos that had just arrived in front of their house driving a mototaxi backwards in the dark, and whatever nervousness we may have had quickly dissipated.
Jason showed up an hour or so later with two beers and a guy driving a pickup truck with a wooden bed. The pickup didn't look nearly big enough, but the driver said he'd put a mototaxi in his bed a couple months earlier for a six hour drive, that the hard part was getting it up there. He had a couple of boards to roll it up, and yes, it was very hard. But we got it up there. Andrea and I jumped in the cab with Radolfo, our driver, but there wasn't space in the cab for Jason, who had to sit on top of the mototaxi, which was tied to the back of the truck, with the front wheel of the moto hanging off. In such a manner we entered Canoa a half hour later with LGB for the first time, and Jason remarked as he clambered down from the top of the teetering ensemble that it had been one of the scariest experiences of his life.
Our main man in Canoa, Pete of 'The Surf Shack' fame, told us not to worry because he had a great mechanic in San Vicente (the next town past Canoa). This mechanic's name was Gordo, which translates to 'Fatty.'
When we finally got Gordo to take a look at the moto, which was a trial in and of itself, he found that the gears in the shifting mechanism were completely stripped. New gears and 'mano de obra' (handiwork) ran us 40 another $40. Jason had to take off early in the bus to get back to work, so it was left to me to get the bike back to Tabuga. It only made it about 25 minutes out of a 1.5hr ride before the engine made a sickening bang while heading up hill and refused to go further. We got Radolpho to come pick us up again, and we entered Canoa on the LGB for the second time with her in the back of his pickup truck. This time, we said fuck it, we had better things to do, and headed back by bus.
Only a week and a half later or so we were able to get back to check out how LGB's Canoan vacation was proceeding. Something to do with the compression of the motor had exploded, and we had to pay another $100 to get her running again. Would she make it back to Tabuga this time, or would I simply drive her directly into the ocean? Luckily for her, she made it back to Tabuga like a dream, the dream that we were originally having before she started blowing up.
Of course, she still didn't have brakes. So, she's now in Pedernales, waiting on a brake installation, after which she promises to be entirely dependable for the rest of my stay. That'll be nice of her, eh?
