Go with What You Got

Tahverlee [00:00:03]:
Welcome to the Bike Life podcast by Warmshowers foundation, where we will be sharing knowledge, experience, tools, and stories of touring cyclists and hosts from around the world. I'm Tahverlee, the woman behind the scenes at Warmshowers foundation, the leading platform for cyclists looking for hosts and to connect with a passionate international community. Find out more by visiting us at Warmshwers.org. Now, onto the show.

Jerry Kopack [00:00:40]:
Hello, and welcome to bike life. This is Jerry Kopack. And if you don't recognize my voice yet, I'm the new host taking over the reins from Tahverlee. But don't worry. She's still here as our executive director, but she's focusing her time on making your experiences as hosts and travelers even better. A little bit about me. I've been the finance guy for Warmshowers for about 5 years now. And when I'm not building spreadsheets, you'll find me hosting other bike travelers at my home in Breckenridge, Colorado or maybe somewhere else on my own little bike journey somewhere in the world.

Jerry Kopack [00:01:10]:
Go with what you've got. This is the advice from Chris Clinch with the age of 56 and without a ton of experience or fancy bikes, set off with his wife from their home in England on a big bike tour through Europe. Hey, Chris. Welcome to bike life.

Chris Clinch [00:01:24]:
Hi, Jerry. Thanks for having me on. Great to talk to you.

Jerry Kopack [00:01:27]:
So I gotta ask. There's probably a lot of people who are out in the world, maybe listening to this show, or maybe pondering, even fantasizing or dreaming about a big bike tour, but might feel a bit intimidated because, well, maybe they don't have an expensive bike or all the right gear. I think I understand this, but tell me what you mean by go with what you've got.

Chris Clinch [00:01:46]:
Yeah. Well, thank you. Yeah. It it's and you're absolutely right. You know, there's so much, information out there, on social media or just generally, you know, you can Google a location or whatever else, and immediately, you've got some some person on a fancy bike with fancy kits, and and they've got all this know how, and you've gotta have this, and you've gotta have that. And really, where I'm coming from is is the kind of opposite of that, really, in as much as there never is a kind of a good time to do anything like this because, you know, we've got the work life balance. You know, we've got family. We've got we've got businesses or jobs.

Chris Clinch [00:02:29]:
Oh, there's health or, you know, you just don't know where to start. And, you know, my my kind of thrust really, I suppose, is that, there's never a perfect time, and you never have all the right kit, and, you know, you never can plan enough. So, you know, you've really just just start with what you've got, and certainly, for me, in terms of the equipment, we had that that we had I went with my partner, Helen, and we had 2 bikes. 1, they were both recycled in as much as one was pulled out of a a skip, which is like a dumpster, for nothing, and I fixed it up. And the other one, came really cheaply, like less than a £100 again, and I just kinda fixed it up with really just old bits, from my from my bike share that that I've had for for many years. Really old stuff. And the kit we took with us, it was just really our attempt we had from, you know, the occasional camping that we did, and and we didn't really have much specialist kit. We just used what we got and and and recycled what we had.

Chris Clinch [00:03:49]:
And, and in terms of, like, the planning or, you know, that kind of thing, it it's it's kinda hard to plan something, for us. It was a it was a journey through South America and, you know, we had some key points and some key places we wanted to go to, and the line seemed to naturally go from the north, to the south. But the really, in terms of the planning, it really was just let's find a cheap way to get to South America, which was Bogota. And then Colombia.

Jerry Kopack [00:04:29]:
Right? Really, it

Chris Clinch [00:04:30]:
was yeah. Yeah. Colombia in the north. But even, you know, kinda weeks before we set off, with with our bikes and our kit, we decided to go to start in the Colombian Caribbean in in Cartagena, which is, you know, in this case, a a day's bus ride away. So things were still unfolding as as, you know, as we as we were literally going, and that continued to be the case as we as we cycled our way our way south, really. And in terms of timing, we Helen and I both had our own small businesses. Helen has a is a physiotherapist, and I had a a small property maintenance business, and and we had loads of work, and, and there was never really a break, and people were keen for us to do work. And, and in a way, we we could really not see a gap in our calendars.

Chris Clinch [00:05:34]:
And we just had to make a decision, really, if we wanted to do this, to just go because we we couldn't find a way to make a break, but we both knew we had we were really enjoying our work and we got good feedback, but, we just needed to try and find a way to do this a little bit more differently. We were finding we were giving perhaps more to our jobs than we were getting back, so we just had to try and work in a different way. And we tried, but we couldn't really find that way. So we thought, well, maybe we just need to make a clean break and Yeah. Find some time and space. And so, hey. You know, a a a longer holiday in your very compass would be great. Yeah.

Chris Clinch [00:06:22]:
In terms of, like, never in the terms of, like, family life, that wasn't easy either. I have, an 85 year old mum who's great, but she was she's aging. And, we we also had had some challenges, in our in our family lives and as much as Helen had just lost her mom to cancer and was struggling with coming to terms of that. I have 2 teenage daughters, that sadly, I have lost contact with, and that's quite difficult to, to, you know, to kinda deal with emotionally. And so there was, like, a lot going on, and we were, like, a little bit overwhelmed, I think, and about what was going on at home. And, as crazy as it may seem, it just seemed like, a bike trip or or a trip away would maybe try and give us some headspace to do that. So, yeah, that's kinda that's kinda how it all started, really.

Jerry Kopack [00:07:26]:
Yeah. So that definitely paints a good picture of go with what you've got. The fact that you pulled a bike out of a dumpster and

Chris Clinch [00:07:34]:
Yeah.

Jerry Kopack [00:07:35]:
And made it work and put it together. And Yeah. And we'll we'll get to later in our talk about, did you have any issues with it? But I I like what you said about being able to to make a break from work. There's never really a good time. And someone said this this quote to me years ago that stuck with me, and it goes like this. Nobody on their deathbed ever said, I wish I would have worked more. And that has been a really powerful message in my life. And I'm not saying that everyone can just step away from their job and go take a bike to the South America, but I really like the fact that you guys were able to just figure it out, go with what you've got, carve out some time, and just make this happen.

Jerry Kopack [00:08:21]:
Now in addition to maybe not having all the right gear, you had something else to consider. You had, some health issues. You live with type 1 diabetes. Now last week, I talked to another guy who also was living with type 1 diabetes, an accomplished mountaineer, climber, all these things. He was in his sixties, I think. How has this diagnosis changed your life? Or how about when were you diagnosed?

Chris Clinch [00:08:48]:
Yeah. Well, it it's still something that's evolving, in as much as, I was diagnosed with type 1, just before my 50th birthday. So, yeah, I've had it, like, you know, 7 years now. So it's still evolving, and I'm still learning to live with it. Mhmm. But, yeah, that was a big question mark. And, certainly, it was an added added dimension to to consider in terms of equipment. And, the diabetes in itself is you you have to administer, your insulin dependent.

Chris Clinch [00:09:29]:
So you you have to administer, insulin. Your body can't make it. And so, you have to I have to inject insulin every time, I consume any carbohydrates, so any kind of food, really. Sure. So, obviously, on a bike, I'm I'm using a lot of energy, so I need to consume a fair amount of, of of fuel to keep me going. So, and I I didn't know what I would be able to get in South America or indeed where I'd be able to get it from. Of course, South America has a population of diabetics like any other continent, but I wasn't quite sure of what, insulin I'd be able to get, what equipment I'd be able to get because there's a a variety of, equipment and insulin types available. So I ended up, collecting together and paying for a year.

Chris Clinch [00:10:19]:
So I got a year's supply of insulin, which comes in in the form I use it is little. They're like pens, like sort of large pens that you write with. And so I took a year supply of that, and then obviously a year supply of monitoring because I have to monitor my blood glucose. So I have to take another monitoring kit. In addition to that, I'm also asthmatic, which means I have to take an inhaler. So, anyway, to cut a long story short, I had about 10 kilograms of equipment, and it was probably That's a lot.

Jerry Kopack [00:10:49]:
I

Chris Clinch [00:10:49]:
don't know. Maybe 30 liters worth of space. And as you know, Gerry, from you know, you're a bike traveler yourself, the things you try to reduce when you when you're traveling by bike is is weight and also try and, you know, keep stuff to a minimum. So that was like a bit of a head scratcher. The other thing about insulin is you've got to keep it below 5 degrees centigrade. Certainly, there was many times when we were, you know, in excess of I mean, you know, we started in the Caribbean. It was, you know, up to 40 degrees plus centigrade. So keeping that cool was was a challenge.

Chris Clinch [00:11:28]:
But, it I just you know, what I would do wanna say is that I, was able to do that, and that there were times when I struggled to get the right diet, because diabetics really need, a relatively unrefined low sugar diet, and in a lot of places, it was, the the local taste is very sugar centric, certainly Colombia. Yeah. And and another and yet another facet to this is that Helen and I are both vegetarians, and Colombia is a very meat centric, very sugar centric, but a fantastic part of the world, and I would recommend it to anybody. But, the diet was quite a challenge. But, hey, you know, I did it. The insulin, contrary to all the advice I got from, the medical experts and also the guys who manufacture this stuff. It survived for 12 months from, you know, temperatures down to 0 and temperatures above 40 degrees. I was managed to keep it cool, in little gel packs, which work really simply, and it was fine.

Chris Clinch [00:12:51]:
But, yeah, the the diet, finding a diet, that could fuel me in a way that didn't spike glucose and that wasn't also meat based was a challenge. I would say probably finding a vegetarian option in many of the more, remote, areas of South America was probably as much of a challenge, really. But, yeah,

Jerry Kopack [00:13:13]:
I would.

Chris Clinch [00:13:14]:
Anybody who is, you know, diabetic or asthmatic or vegetarian or whatever else, you know, you can manage these things. And the great thing is that, as many diabetics will know, if you exercise, then, the body finds a way to deal with and, take in, the fuel you need, and therefore the amount of insulin you need to inject is reduced is reduced significantly. So, actually, for diabetics, cycling is a great way to travel because, you know, you need you can reduce your insulin dependency significantly. And I would say towards the end of my, 10 months in South America cycling, that my insulin dependency had reduced significantly. So it is it's it's for those diabetics out there listening, it's a great way to travel, and, I did find I was able to get insulin should I needed it. It shouldn't be a barrier, really, for for people wanting to do this kind of thing. So and we traveled to some very remote areas. Traveled some you know, we went up to 5,000 meters in the Andes, and, it was cold.

Chris Clinch [00:14:35]:
We spent a lot of time, in very hot places, you know, like, you know, like the Colombian Caribbean, and on the Pacific, we dropped down to. So it's fine. You can do it. There's always a way. You know? It's it's possible.

Jerry Kopack [00:14:51]:
I love that. And so the takeaway is is that this can be managed. You can live with type 1 diabetes. It doesn't have to require you to stay home. Like, you were able to get a year's supply of insulin and keep it cool through the hot places like Colombia and Ecuador. That's incredible.

Chris Clinch [00:15:11]:
Yeah. Yeah. No. It was, I was really, doubtful at the start whether that this, whether this would work. And so I was kind of resigned to be needing to buy stuff. So really from the start, I was searching out places to get insulin and understanding where I could get it from, but, the my blood sugar was relatively stable, using the insulin I had. And I'm sure it went the temperature significantly exceeded, you know, the 5 degrees c. So Yeah.

Chris Clinch [00:15:45]:
It was great. It should it shouldn't be an it shouldn't be an issue, either getting hold of it or traveling with it. And I'm gonna there's a a product I use called Frio, and it's simply it's really simple. It's just silica gel that you soak in, and the evaporation process just keeps a bit like when we sweat as humans, the sweating process keeps us cool. The, the the, when it evaporates, the same thing with this with this product. It's super simple. You just soak these gel filled little sacks again, and off you go, and they're great. And I've used those, successfully.

Chris Clinch [00:16:24]:
So, yeah, great.

Jerry Kopack [00:16:25]:
I think this is great information for anyone who might be listening, who might be considering a trip, of this nature that there are options out there no matter what the climate is. Absolutely. So I have another question here. Was this, was this your first bike trip? Because it sounds like you pulled bikes out of the dumpster. So maybe you're not real are you not avid cyclists?

Chris Clinch [00:16:47]:
No. We I think we have we have cycled before. We enjoy cycling. We we love we love the we love the outdoors. I'm talking to you from from the Lake District, which is in the northwest corner of, England. It's a national park. It's a small national park, and we love it here. Helen's originally from North Wales, which is a very similar, type of environment, and a national park also.

Chris Clinch [00:17:11]:
So, no, we like the outdoor we like the outdoors. We walk. We do a bit of running. And we we have done some cycle trips, but really nothing, nothing significant, nothing for more than a week or so. We've we've cycled, the Scottish Islands, literally a couple of hours drive from here. So it it's very easy for us to go up there, and we cycle using the ferry system. And so we have cycled a bit, but, no, this was far and away, the most significant cycle tour we've ever done. And so, yeah, everything was new.

Chris Clinch [00:17:47]:
Everything was new from, like, what do we take? Because, we we we we didn't really know what the climate was gonna throw at us. My geography is not brilliant, but we we set off from Cartagena, which is in the, Colombian Caribbean in the north. So we're setting off in a in a Caribbean climate. It's very hot, very humid, on the coast. And then we you climb through the foothills of the Andes, heading really for, for Medellin, which is arguably the 2nd largest city probably in in Colombia. And, you know, they're, you know, probably a couple of 1,000 feet, so it's cooler. It it's damper. And we we followed the Andes.

Chris Clinch [00:18:34]:
The Andes was really, really off to our, our right for the majority of the trip. So we knew we were gonna be going up high, and so we took with us, a range of equipment from, you know, like, something to swim in to, you know, to down equipment and stuff to to keep us, safe in the mountains at 4, 5000 meters. So we took a heck a lot of the stuff.

Jerry Kopack [00:18:59]:
And all the gel packs.

Chris Clinch [00:19:01]:
Yeah. And the and 10 kilos of gel packs. But we soon learned what we needed and didn't need. And, and, you know, as you'll know, you actually need very little. And I think we ended up giving away about, well, one pack. We had a rack pack, which is a pack that sits on top of your panniers at the back, which is about 30 liters. We ended up getting rid of that amount of stuff each and then giving it away each. Yeah.

Chris Clinch [00:19:29]:
30 liter pack each. We gave that and just left stuff, and gave it to other cyclists who needed it. Yeah. And we ended up, living very and I think one of the things, I've come back with is a realization I don't really need much, you know? You know, I don't really need much in terms of equipment. So, yeah, it's nice to have all this kind of fancy stuff, but really, you don't need much, and we, you know, we we cooked, we had, you know, we had stoves, we had cooking equipment, we had the 10 sleeping bags, and, you know, but maybe I had like 2 shirts and a couple of pairs of shorts and a down jacket, and, you know, it was, life on a, on a bike is, is, it's kind of very liberating because, you know, you don't need much stuff. You just need something to eat and drink, and and, you know, you just need to think about somewhere to sleep at night, which always presents itself. It does. But we were able to, like, it's it's very, just a very simple life with not much much stuff.

Chris Clinch [00:20:42]:
And, like, you realize actually, not only does stuff cost money to buy, but you've kinda gotta maintain it, whether it's a car or whatever. And it's nice living simply. I think I'm gonna say it's almost primeval because you're just looking for food, drink, and some shelter. You know? And, it's very liberating. And, you know, as a result, we were able to to kinda think about and and process some of the the issues that we were unable to at home, you know, because of our busy lifestyles and commitments and stuff like that. So it was, yeah. It's it's it's great. It's it's a really you know, you got a lot of time to think on a bike.

Chris Clinch [00:21:26]:
It's great.

Jerry Kopack [00:21:27]:
I, I couldn't agree more. It's definitely a very simplified way of living. And so I'm curious, were you always a minimalist, or did this bike tour make you minimalist, or did it make you more of a minimalist?

Chris Clinch [00:21:40]:
No. I wish Helen, well, Helen will listen to this, but I wish she was here now looking over because, no, she, I am, I I was and still out to a little bit. I have so much clutter. I have we call it clutter. I have so much stuff, like I think anybody else, has, but I will say that the stuff is going, that I certainly, can see the value in in not needing as as much stuff. Yeah. So I would say, yeah. I think Helen will probably still laugh when I say this, but I think I'm moving towards minimalism.

Chris Clinch [00:22:22]:
I mean, certainly, if you've got something that you've that you've not touched for 12 months, it's sitting in your loft or garage, then do you really need it?

Jerry Kopack [00:22:30]:
Or just having multiples of things. Right? Like, you've got maybe 2 down jackets or 2 rain jackets. Like Yeah.

Chris Clinch [00:22:37]:
Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Jerry Kopack [00:22:39]:
You you offloaded 30 liters of gear. Yeah.

Chris Clinch [00:22:42]:
It's crazy, isn't it? Each. Each. No. It's crazy. You you you realize you don't need much.

Tahverlee [00:22:51]:
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Chris Clinch [00:23:38]:
Well, hey. I think what I have come back with is a realization that, certainly in Europe, we're under a huge amount of pressure to to consume and and, you know, it's there in in kinda in the background on social media. You know, certainly in the press, it's, you know, it is sell, sell, sell, and and, you know, there's a lot of very clever people out there working for businesses, you know, trying to get you to buy stuff. So, yeah, do I'm not I certainly feel lighter, when I get get rid of stuff. But, yeah, I think I can under I I understand the minimalism movement, and there's a couple of guys in in the US, isn't there, who are going around talking about minimalism, and they've done a couple of books.

Jerry Kopack [00:24:23]:
Yeah. I've seen those.

Chris Clinch [00:24:24]:
Yeah. And it certainly is the way I think it's it's the way to go. I certainly think there's a lot of overconsumption, in the west going on. So yeah.

Jerry Kopack [00:24:34]:
That's a whole another story in itself right there. Right? Yeah.

Chris Clinch [00:24:36]:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely.

Jerry Kopack [00:24:39]:
So you guys live in Europe. There's all kinds of urovelo roots going through Europe. Why'd you choose South America? Whose idea was this?

Chris Clinch [00:24:48]:
Yeah. Good. It's a very good question. It certainly, logistically wasn't the easiest option. Mm-mm. And you're absolutely right. And Eurovelo is, is very high on the list of what comes next. But I think, certainly, we there's a there's a couple of things about Europe that is an issue for certainly people living in the UK.

Chris Clinch [00:25:16]:
So we're not part of the UK is not part of Europe, certainly from, a passport and visa perspective. So we can only stay in Europe for 3 months, and then we have to come out again. Okay. So South America, there are, you know, a number of countries in South America, all which are fairly easily accessible for 3 months, at a time, with a UK passport. The difference is that I can say travel through Colombia for 3 months across the border into Bolivia or Venezuela or or, you know, in Ecuador, and then go straight back into Colombia again. I can't do that in Europe. I have to come out for 3 months and stay out for 3 months and then go back. So there's some visa there's some visa challenges.

Chris Clinch [00:26:05]:
It's certainly very easy to travel through South America. It's it's certainly very cost effective for European. And the price of living in the north, is very, very, good. In Chile, southern, Argentina, it's more expensive, more like Europe, but certainly, in the north northern reaches, it's it's very good. I think culturally, Helen and I were lucky to have traveled to, Peru before and and did a just, like, 2 weeks, inevitably did Machu Picchu, out of Lima, and we were struck, with the culture. Certainly, South America culturally and historically is somewhere that's always interested us. So, and I enjoy following cycling, and competitive cycling and the tours, like, the European Grand Tours

Jerry Kopack [00:27:04]:
Sure.

Chris Clinch [00:27:05]:
Tour de France, and the Giro and the Vuelta. And, Colombia has an incredible cycling history. Yes. It's it's, yeah, I'm gonna say it's relatively recent, maybe, you know, from the fifties, 19 fifties, almost. But they've produced a number of Tour de France winners recently, and the culture there is incredible. For anybody who's like cycling, Colombia is has an incredible cycling recent history and, and success. And so I certainly wanted to try and see some of that. And so, yeah, it was just a combination, but also, as I say, our although we had a rough idea of we didn't have a route as such, although we knew we were going, from the north to the south, we just had a number of places in in South America that we like to that we like would have liked to have seen.

Chris Clinch [00:28:02]:
And so it really started off this idea of going to South America for a longer period. It started off, during the COVID pandemic, I think, with the frustration that everybody felt about being restricted. Sure. And and then just to kind of a a list being drawn up of, like, oh, well, I'd love to go, you know, to here. I'd love to go to Cartagena, and I'd love to go to Bogota and and Medellin. And then, oh, well, we'd like to go to Quito. I'd like to see the Ecuadorian Amazon. And then, yeah, we definitely wanna go to Bolivia and the the salt flats around the Iyuni and, Mendoza, and yeah.

Chris Clinch [00:28:41]:
And you end up, you know, you end up with all these points in South America. And we we ended up going as far as, as the south of as well as far as you can go, really, in, in Argentina. And but that was never really the plan. We were just sort of joining up a load of dots, really. And so the the bike the cycling aspect only because we thought, oh, we'll just go and and fly or bus or or do something, use a variety of transports. But the cycling thing only came in towards the end, really, and we just thought, well, hey, if we're gonna go there, we're, you know, we're gonna be spending a lot of time and money, you know, using transport, which is not particularly environmentally friendly. And, you know, we don't really we wanted to see and experience culture, and you don't I don't think I've ever been able to do that just hopping from plane to plane or station to station. So we, in my experience, cycling relatively slowly through country is the best way really to see the culture and to and we wanted to talk to people and and understand and maybe try and learn from them about ways of doing things differently because, we certainly couldn't get the work life balance or there was something not quite working for us in the UK.

Chris Clinch [00:30:07]:
So, we just wanted to see how it all worked in South America, and and we're blown away. And, by the hospitality, which is legendary, certainly, in places like Colombia, where people were literally begging us and pulling us off our bikes to come and stay with them. It was incredible. And that really continued all the way through South America. But, Colombia, particularly incredible, incredibly hospitable people, people who sometimes have nothing, but, should they just want you to stay with them and we'll give you anything and just make it happen. It it was incredible. Nine times out of 10, if we asked, we arrived up in a village somewhere at the end of the day saying, hey, where can we camp? They'd often say, well, right here. You know? And right here could be literally in my garden or or a shop, you know, where we were buying some supplies for the night.

Chris Clinch [00:31:04]:
We often stayed in in the back of, gardens of shops. So, one family, one Colombian family. We stayed with, like, 3 different branches of the family as we traveled south. It was incredible. Yeah. Incredible hospitality, incredible people, and, certainly, having come back now to the UK, we, we wanna pay that back, that hospitality we received, and so we wanna do a Warmshowers. In fact, we're registered with Warmshowers as a as a host. Good.

Chris Clinch [00:31:40]:
Good. Thank you. We wanna pay that back. No. It's important. We really wanna pay that back because without that, we would have been, in some difficult situations at times. So it's it's nice to be able. We call it paying it forward rather than paying it back, paying it forward.

Chris Clinch [00:31:57]:
So, yeah, we'll be looking forward to doing that. Yeah.

Jerry Kopack [00:32:00]:
So you you mentioned that without someone's hospitality, you may have been in kind of a pinch at some point. So I like to ask this question. So here you go. With any trip of this length, things inevitably can and likely do go wrong, especially if you have bicycles that you pulled out of a dumpster. Was there ever a moment that you looked over to Helen and you said, oh, man. How are we gonna get out of this one? Was there ever kinda like just like, oh, no moment?

Chris Clinch [00:32:30]:
Yeah. There were. I mean, we we there were, but we managed to adopt, a kind of I'm gonna call it a South American attitude that, like, whatever because, you know, we we in the name, we travel through some very remote. We spent the majority of our of our 10 months out there above 3000 meters in in the Andes. And so we were a lot of the time, we were in very remote situations. And a lot of the villages and the towns we travel through, they're very isolated, and they're kind of self sufficient. And they kinda make it happen. Regardless of what the issue is, they kind of they they work it out.

Chris Clinch [00:33:07]:
And so initially, when things did start to go wrong, with bikes or routes or weather or or transports. We did panic, and but I think as time went on, we we kinda, we adopted a a more relaxed attitude of just, hey. Just waiting, and just let's let's try and think about this. Let's just take some time because we work in a very time pressured environment, I think, in Europe, and where we kinda something happens and we expect an immediate response. But I think we took a we've taken a more, kinda laid back, approach to stuff now. But, yeah, certainly, we we had in northern Argentina, we'd been in the desert for, like, 3 weeks, and we were faced with another 3 week stretch of desert. Mhmm. It was incredibly hot.

Chris Clinch [00:34:06]:
Climate change is affecting everywhere. And, you know, the arid places are even more arid and dry. And, it's a combination of temperatures and, you know, sand, and just the discomfort of it. And so we decided to take a bus. So but our the bikes, we had to take apart and kind of bundle together as best we could and put under the bus in the bus. And then but the bikes and us got separated. The bikes arrived, and there were parts missing, and there were bent parts broken. So these these bikes had gone on a long journey somewhere else.

Chris Clinch [00:34:45]:
And so yeah. And we were kinda struck stuck in the middle, of nowhere really at at in a in a bus station. So, and it was we literally had parts missing. But with the help of of of local people, we we were able to find some parts, you know, and we were able to, like, you know, put the bikes back together to get some distance down the road and then to get to a bike shop. So that was one time where we literally we literally couldn't go anywhere, because the bikes, were were kinda were broken. Yeah. The cyclists and dogs don't really work in as much as they wherever we went. And I think this is common.

Chris Clinch [00:35:40]:
It's a common cyclist thing that dogs just their nature, they just want to chase people on bikes. And this was the case in a lot of parts of South America. But we adopted a technique which, helped us deal with dogs 9 times out of 10. If you just stop, they eventually go away. And but in, we, we were in the southern part, of, Argentina. And, yeah, sadly, I I was just cycling out of a town. It was a Sunday. This little scrap, he was really like, it wasn't I'd like I wanna wanna say it was just like it was this ferocious dog, and, like, he chased me and we battled.

Chris Clinch [00:36:25]:
But it literally came out of nowhere and bit to my left calf and went down to the bone. And there was a lot of blood, and it was a bit of a mess. And we just so we did a bit of a first aid aid on it. But it was it was quite a mess, and I needed stitches. Oh. But and it but it's Sunday. Small town. El Chalten.

Chris Clinch [00:36:47]:
So, you know, it's in Patagonia. It's a beautiful, beautiful region, bit of a climbing mecca, but not a lot in the way of services. It was it was a quiet Sunday. Sunday is, even in the tourist areas, quite religiously observed still, and so there's not a lot open. So I was lying on the side of the road bleeding. And this guy literally just pulled alongside in the car. He just said, get in. And Helen stayed with the bikes.

Chris Clinch [00:37:20]:
And we anyway and he just took me to a health center in the nearest town back in that was shut, but he managed to get, somebody to open it up, and then they managed to get an, a nurse and a doctor to come. This is Sunday. And they, yeah, they stitched me up and sorted me out, and then, you know, took me to a cafe where I could recover a bit, and then took me back to the took us back to the bikes, which were fine. They were just there on the side of the road. You know? It wouldn't this would not happen in Europe. Wow. And, and and then, yeah, and we and then we got, everything back, and then we had to take a couple of days out whilst, my stitches kinda just, kinda, you know, sorted themselves out. And then we were back on the road again.

Chris Clinch [00:38:05]:
But and, you know, and that is so typical of of South America, that, you know, it's Sunday. Everything shuts. You know? But these you know, this guy just scooped us up. You know? We couldn't give him anything. The medical services, I you know, they didn't want any money. We couldn't help you know, literally nothing. It was amazing. And and so that's again a, a situation where, the locals just helped us out, you know, without even asking.

Chris Clinch [00:38:32]:
You know? It's just Yeah. You know? It's absolutely amazing. And it really does, it it really is incredible, the hospitality in South America. And this this was the case all the way through. And so we we definitely wanna be more open and more supportive. You know, I think going going forward with with travelers, so we hope to start posting soon.

Jerry Kopack [00:39:01]:
Oh, wow. I love hearing that. And I and I've had similar stories about hospitality and kindness for no other motivation than other than just just to be kind, good humans. So I I love hearing that. So Yeah.

Chris Clinch [00:39:15]:
I I

Jerry Kopack [00:39:15]:
think that's a takeaway. Go to South America. Right? Get on your bike, travel.

Chris Clinch [00:39:19]:
Yeah.

Jerry Kopack [00:39:20]:
And if you can spend the time, go go see what the rest of the world is doing.

Chris Clinch [00:39:25]:
Absolutely. And, hey. You know, we we ended up, take you know, kinda AMR in a year, but we were 10 months. But, you don't have to go for, like, a long time. You know, we, in, in Chile and Argentina, there's something called the Caracara Austral, which is a famous cycling road which is a road, a rough road, and we met and we met loads of people who were just there for 2 weeks. They'd flown in country and were just cycling for a couple of weeks. And, it you know, you don't have to go and you don't even have to go, like, far. I mean, you can literally go from your front door and just go and and see what happens because, you know, as I think everybody on who've who goes on the bike will tell you, a bike is a great way to make people.

Chris Clinch [00:40:10]:
You're a low threat. Everybody wants to help you. Most of the people we met in South America thought we were so poor, we couldn't afford motorcycles. So, hey, we've gotta help these guys out. You know, they could only afford bikes, you know, and they've gotta still stay in a tent. Yeah. So it was incredible. Yeah.

Chris Clinch [00:40:25]:
Everybody we met. No. It was fantastic. And there's a great community out there of cyclists.

Jerry Kopack [00:40:30]:
There is.

Chris Clinch [00:40:31]:
You know, and hosts.

Jerry Kopack [00:40:32]:
And hosts.

Chris Clinch [00:40:33]:
Guys. Yeah. You know, play such a key role. It really is an incredible community. So, yeah, get out there, guys.

Jerry Kopack [00:40:41]:
Yeah. If you're, if you can travel, travel. If you can host, please host. Let's try to connect to everyone and make this world a little bit smaller. So Absolutely. Go with what you got. I love that.

Chris Clinch [00:40:53]:
Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.

Jerry Kopack [00:40:54]:
Thank you so much for taking the time today to talk to me. For all the people out there who are listening to my conversation with Chris Clinch, I hope you enjoy the show. If you did, give us a like, a share on your social channels, or just tell your friends. These stories hopefully will inspire you to set off on your own journey and maybe make the world feel a little bit smaller, 1 pedal stroke at a time. My name is Jerry Kopack, and until next time, keep riding.

Tahverlee [00:41:22]:
Thank you for joining us, and we hope you enjoyed the show as much as we enjoyed making it. Wherever you are listening, please leave us a rating and a review as it helps us reach more cyclists and hosts around the world. Visit us at Warmshowers.org to become a part of our community, or on Instagram at warmshowers_org. If you would like to be a guest on the show or submit a question, please make sure to email us at podcast at Warmshowers.org.