Well, whoever is following these posts has surely noticed that I have been very quiet in the last two weeks. The reason for that was that, as you have seen in the last articles, I've been very busy enjoying a journey from Germany to Greece with my two ladies: my wife Lily, and Saphira, my new motorcycle.

This post is all about a journey log. I am trying to tell day-by-day what we did, how we felt and how it was, together with showing a little of the beauty of the places we passed by.

It all began in the last article, when I arrived to Germany to get Saphira from the dealer I bought it from, and traveled to Vienna in Austria to meet my wife. That was Saturday the 8th of August, I arrived after 700 Km of riding to the Park Inn Hotel in Vienna, and my wife was supposed to arrive at in the Austrian Airlines flight  from Tel Aviv at 19:00. But the flight did not arrive. It was cancelled due to two broken toilets. People from Austrian Airlines in Tel Aviv told my wife to go back home that they would call her to reassign her to another flight in two hours, and she could be waiting until today, because nobody called. Since it was a Saturday in Israel, there was nobody to call as well.

Luckily, when the Universe is at your side, everything aligns to make things go right. That wasn't really an Austrian paid flight (what would lock me with Austrian), but an United mileage flight with a Star Alliance airline. So I called United in the US, explained the situation, and in 5 minutes they changed Lily's reservation to a flight by Aegean Airlines, leaving Israel at 4 am in the same night, and arriving Vienna at 10 am, after a connection in Athens. Using the reservation number, I already checked her in to the flight, and used Google Chrome's Cloudprint feature to print her boarding cards at our home printer, so she had them immediately. At 10 am Lily was landing in Vienna. Since we had planned a full day there, we only lost an evening and half day visiting the city. Our schedule, however, was not modified.

Some pictures of Vienna (as usually in this blog you can always click the picture to see its full version in big size).

Well, here I am after two days in a VERY HOT Germany.

I travelled in the night between Wednesday and Thursday (August 5th-6th), in a Turkish Airlines flight from Tel Aviv to Istanbul and then Lufthansa from Istanbul to Frankfurt.

After arriving in Frankfurt, I travelled directly to Darmstadt and to MCD (Motorrad Center Darmstadt) to begin doing with them the paperwork that would allow me to drive the bike in Europe. First we did the temporary insurance and license plate for the bike, and with the two of them ready, we went to their transportation authority to have the license and certificate of property printed. 

After that, to the customs office, in order to print the EUR.1 form for the export. There I had a first surprise (not a good one this time): it comes out that the itinerary for the trip that I planned to Greece could not be done. The fact was that Serbia and Macedonia are not part of the European Union, and I could not travel there and then return to the EU in Greece. So I needed to prepare an alternative trip plan that included only EU countries.

With that in mind, I finished the process with them, and then went to finish the whole thing there at MCD offices. After 3 hours from the moment we began, we shook hands, and the girl was mine. 

Last February I took a a decision that it was time to step up and change my 2002 BMW R1150RT to a 2014 BMW R1200RT. Same model, 12 years newer.

The RT above is the 2002. It is a bike that marked my move from the big scooters to the motorcycles, and within that, to the BMW tourer world. I must say that I enjoyed every minute of riding with it, but since last year in the Pyrenees, when I had a rental 2014 RT, I was thinking that it is probably time to move on.

Since you can't find 2014 for sale in Israel (whoever has them hold them tight), I decided for buying it abroad and doing a personal import. More than that, I decided that I would personally go and bring the motorcycle to Greece and put it on a ship to Israel. If not for the price difference, then for the adventure of doing that kind of import experience (and all the expectation that comes with it) once in my life.

So I began looking for the dealers' websites in the internet. It didn't take much, just some conversations with friends on facebook, until someone pointed out a website called http://mobile.de which aggregated the sales of a very big number of german dealers. I began to look there and try to find the bike of my dreams.

Here I must make a stop and comment: Israel is a difficult country for personal imports. First, the motorcycle must be maximum 2-years old, but not from first licensing, from production day, at the moment it comes into the country. Considering that it takes 6-8 months from production to first license, this ruled out most 2013 bikes - specially the 90-Jahre special edition that I wanted much. Besides that, you need to get the import license BEFORE you ship the bike. This means you need to find a dealer who is willing to keep the bike for you for around 3-6 weeks while you have paid a first down-payment and can still withdraw from the deal in case you don't get the license for any reason. Third, you have to prove that the bike complies with all the European standards and some additional local requirements to get the license.

After some months of writing back and forth with some dealers, I came up to this beauty at MCD - Motorrad Center Darmstadt:

June 19th. Two years of waiting since our last motorcycle tour in France and Italy have finally come to an end. Lily and me are again on our way to the Ben Gurion Airport, from where we will take our flight to Barcelona.

At the airport, we meet our friends and partners to the adventure: Shmil and Louiza, who were together with us in our previous trip in France and Italy, Eitan and Anat, who were with me four years ago in a tour in Austria, Arik and Rachel, who are old acquaintances, but with whom I am travelling for the first time.

Our first stop is in Barcelona, where we will spend our first afternoon and night, and to where we will return at the end of the trip. 

The first evening in Barcelona was mainly for arrangements and rest from the flight. We bought local SIM cards, Arik visited the Harley Davidson store in Barcelona to order some parts to take back with him to Israel, we set the schedule for the next day during a dinner at the Rambla, and went to enjoy a good night of sleep, important after waking up at 5AM in the beginning of the day.

In the next morning, at 9:00, we left the hotel with all our things, in order to receive the rental motorcycles: three BMW R1200RT and one BMW R1200GS for Eitan, who is too tall for the RT. It took time until we managed to finish installing all the equipment in the motorcycles and organizing our luggage in the side and top boxes - it is a really obscure science, in which a box which looks completely full now may look empty in two days, so the secret is to bring the "two days" to now and take advantage of every spot in which something can be put.

At the end, at the time of 12:30, we were ready to go. First destination: Blanes, in the Costa Brava.

During my last business trip I’ve had the opportunity to visit Quito for the first time.

Quito is the capital of Ecuador, and located in the North-Center of the country, in the province of Pichincha, of which Quito is also the capital city.

The city height is 2850 meters, and it is located some dozens of Kilometers from the place in which the world is crossed by the Equator line (thus the name of the country Ecuador), dividing Northern and Southern Hemispheres.

Quito surprised me for its development and beauty. As most of the Latin American cities that I have visited, it has its beautiful (and rich) parts and its ugly (and usually poor) parts. But in general, it is a beautiful city, a great place to visit, to walk and to travel around.

Below you can find some of the nice experiences I have had there caught on camera. Click on the images to see them at their full size.

There weekends ago I had the chance to make a visit to Portobelo, in Panama.

The first thing that caught my eye was still related to the way. After the radius of 50 Km from Panama City one feels he has entered a different country, much less evolved than the Panama in which we were before. The wide roads disappeared, we get to a narrow road, with some rustic houses around it, and a lot of waste leaks in the road.

As you approach Portobelo, the rustic houses become mixed with vacation condominiums for the rich. You ride the road with the seashore at your side, and enjoy many kilometers of beautiful beaches. And at the end, you arrive to Portobelo.

First thing you see is the fortress,  or what is left of it...

From the beginning of this year, I have been travelling a lot to Panama, and while I was expecting some regular Central American small republic, I have found a stunning country, with a lot of life, a lot of business, a lot of fun, and mainly, natural beauty that is not easy to find anywhere else.

In the image above, you can see a panoramic view of the Pacific Coast at Panama City's shore.

Panama has it all: a capital, Panama City, which is the center of government and business, a very active lifestyle, a completely American culture (though they all speak Spanish - and in most cases Spanish-only), malls based on the American model, and with prices which can be compared to prices in the US, excellent restaurants, shiny hotels with great service, and much more. And - how can we forget - the Canal, which guarantees to this fast-growing country an income of millions of dollars per day.

The Panama Canal, and a large cargo ship going through it. The characteristic of the canal is in the fact that there is a height difference between the Pacific and the Atlantic oceans in this area, and the canal compensates this difference by using closed floodgates in order to lift or lower the ships according to the direction they are going.

Around 1 month ago I bought my new motorcycle, a BMW R1150RT. Nearly one week after that, with much sorrow in my heart, I put my old Suzuki Burgman 650 for sale.

Why do I say much sorrow in my heart? Well, there are plenty of reasons for that. I must say that this mega-scooter that you see in the picture taken on its first days with me in 2007 brought me a lot of happiness to life.

First of all, it was my really first serious two-wheel vehicle, after a Java 350 in the nineties and a Burgman 400 from 2005 to 2007. Differently from the other two, this one made me feel a real rider. And as a rider, during these 6 years that it was with me, I managed to run a remarkable number of 130,000 Kms with it.

Secondly, it brought me to meet the most wonderful group of people in Israel: the members of the Israel Burgman Club. A remarkable group and organization which today hosts around 60% of my personal friends.

So I had all the reasons to be sorry for putting the Burgy for sale. I had also one main reason to be worried: the market for Burgmans 650 in Israel is a very difficult one. I should be expecting some months of awaiting until I managed to get it sold.

Well, it seems that in the same way that the Burgman brought me much happiness while it was with me, it has decided to bring me happiness also in the sale process. After 3 weeks from first announcement, the megascooter is sold. Not only sold, sold to someone who I've seen his previous scooter and know he will take good care of this one, and also someone who is almost my neighbor (two buildings apart), so I will continue to see it around the neighborhood.

That actually proves that saying that "when you give love, you receive love back". Also with motorcycles. I've put a lot of efforts in keeping that mega-scooter well, and it returned love to me by being an astonishingly reliable transportation tool, the best entertainment and hobby I could ever wish for, and by selling easily when I needed it to be sold.

So farewell, Burgman, so long and see you around. And please take care of bringing only happiness to your new owner.

Helio

Nothing can be better for opening a family blog site than the announcement of a new member in the family:

This is it, this 2002 BMW R1150RT with 75,800 Km is joining the family, substituting my Burgman 650, which is now waiting to be sold.

Welcome!