Blogs

Dirt road motorcycle adventure in Brazil

I came to Brazil to start organizing adventurous motorcycle tours, so I needed to get out there and explore. This is the story of how a casual afternoon ride turned into a two day adventure…

End of may 2009 I set out with my brand new Yamaha XT660R, and ended up entering a 4x4 trail that would take me from the BR155 (the road from Barra Mansa - Volta Redonda to Angra dos Reis) to Bananal crossing the Serra da Bocaina, which is part of the “Serra do Mar”, a 1500km long mountain range in the east of Brazil.

I started out just after lunch, and that was a first mistake... At the end of May, it gets dark early, around 6pm, letting few margin for errors or things going wrong. Also, End of May is end of autumn meaning that the winter is just around the corner. Brazil may be a subtropical country, but in the winter period, at higher altitudes, it gets very cold, even freezing.

I took the BR155 heading south towards Angra dos Reis with no particular plan in mind. Just enjoy the ride and see what would happen. I passed the city of Rio Claro and about 14km further south I saw this dirt road to the right that looked very inviting. My bike at that point, was 3 weeks old, had about 1500 km and I figured this would be the perfect opportunity to test it on dirt.

I entered the dirt road and the first 10km were pretty cool, with some gravel but very easy to ride. I was very pleased with how the bike behaved in the circumstances. Twice, I entered a side road, but these all lead to fazendas and I had to turn back...

One of the waterfalls on the first part of the trail.

At one point I made a left turn and started following a road that clearly was of another category. Instead of a gravel road, it became a two track trail with many difficult stretches, like steep, slippery climbs and descents, where I had to maneuver over and around big chunks of rock...

Then I came across this river, and it was clear that this could be the point where I had to turn back.

I decided to take a closer look, took off my boots and waded to the other side... The river was about 80cm deep in the middle and the bottom was full of big, slippery rocks. I decided that, given the fact that I was all alone, about 20km from the main road, I didn't have a lot of off road experience, the bike was brand new... that I would be better off walking next to the bike to get to the other side.

I made it safely to the other side...

I kept pushing further on the 4x4 trail, ended up on another fazenda, asked for directions to get through to Bananal, which nobody seemed to have, got stuck in the mud at one point and had to give it everything I had in me to get free... I was also constantly climbing, and to be honest, the trail wasn't getting any better... I noticed that in the difficult steep climbs, I constantly had to use the clutch to prevent the engine from dying, and decided that the XT660R was not the ideal bike to go 4x4... not in the standard configuration that is...

Another obstacle... a “bridge” made of some branches. Good for cows, but tricky for motorcycles...

Around 4.30pm, I was about 1300m high and, due to many wrong turns and getting stuck in the mud, only 25km into the trail... And it still wasn't getting any better...

one of the fazendas I encountered after taking a wrong turn... Here, people use horses and mules to get to places...

Another wrong turn... I returned, and a little further is where I got stuck in the mud crossing what looked like a small stream, but turned out the bottom was all deep mud

Here is where my clutch finally gave up... This picture was taken the day after...

Bear with me here, grab some coffee and read on... It gets really interesting.

Ok, I don't have any more pictures of that day from the moment that the clutch broke down. I was at an altitude of 1300m, in the middle of nowhere, without cell phone coverage (what else is new) and it was close to getting dark (and freezing cold) so I wasn't thinking about anything else than how to get out of there... Taking pictures was the last thing on my mind...

I had my Petzel headlight, water and some food and enough clothes, but the idea of spending the night next to the bike and having to get back to the road on foot the next day anyway, wasn't very appealing
Also, my wife hadn't heard from me since I left the house, and was probably getting worried already. Not being able to contact her the whole night was simply no option.

After thinking about the situation, I decided to walk the 25km back to the road, or to a point where I would have cell phone coverage (which was probably going to be the same distance ) and contact the people at home to arrange for someone to come and pick me up... My biggest worry was leaving the bike behind unprotected, but the point where the bike was, was practically unreachable, even with a 4X4 so I figured that the chance of someone going there and steal it was virtually zero.

I started walking back, and literally 5 minutes later I see this guy on a horse, making his way across the hills. He also had two big dogs... At that point, it's kind of a double feeling... you hear all these stories about people getting killed, and frankly, if this guy would have wanted to shoot me and take my bike apart and sell the parts, nobody would ever know, because nobody (not even me) knew where I was going to end up that day. That is part of the adventure, right?

I shouted out to the guy and he started coming my way... The two dogs approached me a lot faster than he did and I felt pretty nervous, but I quickly saw that they didn't have the intention to attack me. When the guy was close enough to have a conversation (he never got off his horse) I tried to explain to him what had happened. My Portuguese at that time was horrible, but I think I was able to explain to him that I needed a phone to call my family to warn them that I wasn't going to be home anytime soon. He didn't say a lot, and from what he said, I could only understand about 10%. Also because I crossed the border with São Paulo somewhere along the road, and people have a different accent in their Portuguese.

the guy signaled me to follow him and that's what I did... Him on his horse and me running (yes... Running) behind him, carrying my backpack, my helmet and the bike gear... I wasn't going to let anything with the bike that could easily be stolen, right?

I thought he was going to lead me to his house, where he would have a phone with a landline, but instead he took a really small and muddy path that was climbing even higher... in the mean time it was starting to get dark.
After half an hour of this jungle run, I started to think all kinds of stuff... this guy is going to wear me out, finish me off and sell my bike, was the strongest thought. wearing me out would take him some time, since I can say I'm pretty fit for my age, but he could have a gun in his saddlebags and I'm sure I'm not going to outrun a bullet. I took my leatherman (multi-tool which has several knives ) out of the side pocket of my backpack and held it in my hand, ready to try to defend myself if necessary. After 45 minutes, we finally reached the top of a hill, probably the highest in the area, and the guy got off his horse and started to open his left saddlebag. I immediately made sure I was close enough to stick him with my knife if he would take out a gun. Instead he took out his CELL PHONE... I felt so crappy about thinking such bad stuff about this guy. He explained that, from the top of this hill, I could try to make a call, since there was a good chance that I would have a signal from the tower of Rio Claro... Unfortunately, I didn't have a signal. 45 minutes of running through the jungle for nothing... And now I had to go back down as well (of course).

So, after the guy made a few calls, he got back on his horse and started to head back down. It should have been easier for me than the ascent, but in the mean time it was pitch black, and I fell at least 4 times before we were back at the beginning of the jungle trail. All the way down I was wondering about how the hell I was going to ask him to give me a place to spend the night... I was still thinking that walking back to the road would be the best option, although I started to feel pretty tired now .

When we were almost back at the point where I met him, we saw car lights coming from the other side. My friend made the car (actually, a 4x4 pickup) stop, and after a few words, he signaled me to come closer... In the pickup, 3 guys were sitting in the cabin and one other guy was sitting in the back, which also carried 6 dogs. These guys were coming back from a hunting party, and the most amazing thing was, that they were from Volta Redonda (that's where I needed to go)... and they agreed to give me a ride... How AWESOME is that huh?

There was no other choice than to sit in the back with the youngest of the gang and the six dogs... I don't know if any of you already took a 25km ride in the back of a pickup, riding on a 4x4 trail, in the dark and the cold? It is something else, I can tell you that... I only had one hand to secure myself, because I had to hold my helmet with the other if I didn't want the poor thing to bounce around and get scratched all over. I felt kind of sorry for the dogs too... several times it was as if I was buried under a pile of them

Long story short... by the time we arrived in Volta Redonda, (my behind was totally numb) I had been able to contact my wife, who had sent her father to pick me up. I hadn't eaten since I had lunch that day, apart from some biscuits and bananas I was carrying with me, and after the ride in the pick up, the guy with the hammer finally got me. I felt exhausted, cold and hungry, but Fernanda's father insisted that we would go to his friend's house. This friend had a motorcycle and a 4x4 pickup , and maybe he could help me to get my bike back the next day...

We arrived at the friends house, explained what had happened and the guy called his son, Rodrigo, who knew another guy in the neighborhood (Carlos) who was a mechanic. Rodrigo went to get Carlos and we decided that the two of them would go with me the next day, with the pickup of Rodrigo's father, and patch my bike up so that I would be able to return to Volta Redonda with it. Carlos would take his two small 125cc Suzuki dirt bikes, in case the trail would be too bad for the pick up... In the mean time it was 11pm, but Carlos insisted that we would go to his boss' oficina to get new clutch plates... and so we did. Carlos' boss only had plates for an older XT600 model, but these would be good enough to hold for a while...

the next day at 6am we headed back to the place of evil. Me, a gringo with hardly any Portuguese skills, together with 2 young Brazilian guys... the weather was good and I felt pretty ok...

After 12km in the trail, Rodrigo, who was driving his father’s 4x4 truck, decided he wasn’t going to go any further on one of the steep, rocky climbs, and Carlos and I continued the last 13km, each on one of the small Suzuki trail bikes. It was 10 times easier to ride this track on the smaller bike, and without problems we came to the point where I left my bike the day before... I confess that I was a little afraid of finding out that someone had taken it during the night, but it was still in the same spot, and Carlos started to repair the clutch...

Carlos, repairing the Yamaha... The two Suzuki's 125 in the front are a lot easier to handle in these trails...

After Carlos finished putting the plates in, we had the problem of being up there with 3 bikes and only two drivers, so we went down with my bike and one of the Suzuki’s, planning to come back, two up, on the Suzuki to recover the other one, but when we got down to the pick up, the Suzuki had a flat tire... Resulting in... Right... me riding the xT660 all the way back up there, only, two up with Carlos this time...

This is me, entering the river for the 4th time (Actually, there was a bridge, made of ropes and wood, that I hadn’t discovered , but Carlos said it wouldn't be safe to ride the heavy Yamaha across it...)

Carlos and Rodrigo, checking out my bike... note the flat front tire on the Suzuki...

everything ended well, nobody got hurt and I had my first Brazilian motorcycle adventure to share...

that's it,

Sorry for the long piece of text without pictures, but I think it is a great story and a good way to show how helpful and resourceful Brazilians are when it comes to getting somebody out of a rut... Don't believe it if somebody tells you that Brazil is a dangerous country... I'm sure anyone who really visited this country would agree to say that Brazil isn't no more dangerous than any other place.

Thanks for reading.
Hope you enjoyed it.
Raf