Pan-American Moto Adventure: The Stahlratte

The Stahlratte was an amazing time. It was not the cheapest option to get the bikes across the Darien Gap but it was the perfect option considering our time constraints. The captions below should tell the whole story. I would definitely do this again.

There she is in all her glory. Though it was not as majestic as I was expecting at first sight it lived up beyond expectations. Ludwig and crew were very knowledgeable, very experienced and very entertaining and accommodating.

Just about the moment we arrived they started prepping the bikes for the boat. We had to remove everything from the bikes, even the panniers.

That is Ludwig himself tying the ropes to my bike. I think he would do everything if he could.

Step two, loading the baggage separate from the bikes. We had to use the dinghy to get to and from the boat.


On our way!

Loading the bikes. To get the boat close enough to the dock they had to run it into the mud. They had to act fast to make sure the boat didn't get stuck. As you can see in the video, they have this down to a science. It took about six minutes to load all three bikes. It was awesome watching the first two bikes going up... but the third one was mine.

On board and ready to sail!

They fed us lunch after loading the bikes but we couldn't stay on the boat the first night. They have a bunch of strange rules about passengers here. We could load the bikes at this port but not people so they sent us to an island for the night.

Everything here was beautiful. But super small. A walk around the perimeter of the entire island took about 15 minutes.

Our place for the night. Pretty primitive but so perfect.

The view from the front of our cabin.

Check out these studs!

I even caught my own fish!

The San Blas Islands are the second largest coconut producer in the region so the coconuts on this island are protected. One of our shipmates tried to crack into one but one of the islanders ran over and put an end to it.

Ryan... being Ryan...

Everything here is so beautiful! It was like living in a postcard.

Finally on the boat! Bikes are loaded, people are loaded... we are out to sea!

This boat entered service in 1903. Then, it was purely a sailing fishing boat. In the 50's a diesel engine was retrofitted and it started other types of duty, including a stint working for Greenpeace. Ludwig spends the summer moving motorcycles between Panama and Colombia and then a few months of the off season moving motorcycles between Mexico and Cuba.

We sailed about 30 miles and stopped for dinner, swimming and snorkeling.

That's Ana in the grey shirt, Ludwig's right-hand man. Very knowledgeable and fun. The guy in the red shirt is Vincent, another crew member. He spent the first two days throwing up and then we never really saw him again. Here we are buying bracelets from Panamanian pirates.