The Radavist

Continuing his journey down the Andes from Colombia to Santiago de Chile, Ryan Wilson travels across the surreal landscape of the Salar de Uyuni and traverses a rarely visited part of the driest desert in the world, the Chilean Atacama.  Read on to follow his final days in Bolivia and his route through one of Chile’s most remote corners…

As Ryan Wilson continues his bike tour south from Colombia to Chile, he crosses a remote stretch of Bolivia’s infamous altiplano.  Follow along as Ryan takes on this harsh yet beautiful environment through volcanic landscapes and otherworldly salt flats.

As Ryan Wilson continues his bike tour south from Colombia to Chile, he runs into the beginning of Peru’s infamous storm season.  Follow along as Ryan has a few close calls in a region that was home to one of the earliest civilizations in the Peruvian Andes.

Over the last eight years, Ryan Wilson has been traveling all over the world by bike on an extended tour and has learned plenty of lessons planning trips along the way.  Below, Ryan dives into some of the most frequent questions that people ask when they’re looking to plan their first bike tour.

After seven years, Ryan Wilson returns to the Peruvian Cordillera Blanca to re-ride some of the roads that inspired him to take up bike touring in the first place and explore some new roads around the tourist hub of Huaraz.  Come along for a ride in one of the most spectacular regions of the world.

With a seemingly endless array of dirt roads scattered throughout the Peruvian Andes, it’s easy to see why it has become a favorite destination for bike travelers like Ryan Wilson.  During his latest trip to the country, Ryan looks to connect the northern city of Cajamarca to the Ancash region along some rarely traveled dirt tracks through the Sunchubamba Game Reserve.  With little information about this zone to be found online, read on to find out how it went. 

Last year, Ryan Wilson met up with fellow bike traveler Joe Sasada to tackle the dirt road version of the Trans Ecuador Mountain Bike Route.  In Part one, they got their feet wet on this classic route, but in this chapter, Ryan and Joe visit the heart of Ecuador’s iconic volcano corridor and run into the trials and tribulations that come with any good bike tour.  Read on for a slice of the highlights and lowlights of their ride across the Andes.

After extensive touring through Colombia, Peru, Chile, and Argentina, the only remaining “missing link” in Ryan Wilson‘s Andean traverse was Ecuador. Last year, he met up with fellow cyclo-tourist Joe Sasada to share miles on the dirt-road variation of the Trans Ecuador Mountain Bike Route, an 850-mile mountainous traverse through the country’s volcanic corridor. Read on for Ryan’s introduction to Ecuador…

For McKenzie Barney, cycling the world was never about chasing a record, or even adhering to all of the Guinness Book of Records parameters to qualify for an “official” time. But after an introduction to bike touring in Vietnam and learning about the 18,000-mile goal post for a “Cycle the World” completion, she was intrigued. For the next few years she planned, scrimped and saved between trips while pursuing her own Cycling the World project. Earlier this year, she completed the project after having ridden 18,000 miles, in 28 countries, and on five continents. Read on for Part 1 of her journey download, where she writes about moving from thru hiking to bike touring, gaining solo experience in Europe, and then putting it to the test on a ride from Cairo to Cape Town with her partner James. Plus, don’t miss the trailer to her upcoming self-documented, self-edited film!

With a visa running out and heavy rains setting in, Ryan Wilson makes the most of his remaining time roaming the Colombian countryside. Following unknown lines on the map through the country’s north-central Andean artery, Ryan’s reportage and photos give a true sense of Colombian biketouring.

I could hear the rain slow to a trickle on the metal roof as I peered toward the mountains from the window of the hospedaje I’d found refuge in the night before. I leaned way over to not smack my head on the door frame that couldn’t have stood higher than five feet.

Rocks slid from above, along a loose slope, showering the dirt road in front of me with a fresh layer. While treacherous in the rain, the locals warned that even an early afternoon breeze was enough to turn this road into a nightmare of falling debris. “Keep your ears and eyes open at all times,” a man in the nearby town of Huambo said as he made a motion imitating someone frantically pedaling a bike as fast as they could spin their legs.

After a few easy days back in Arequipa, I was excited to hit the road again. Maybe not so excited for the long and familiar climb out of the traffic of the city, but it was between me and the Valle del Colca, so I tried to keep my eyes on the prize…

After some indecision over where I’d go following my tour through Southern Turkey, I landed back on familiar territory. I’d originally planned to head for Ecuador or the Western Wildlands route in the US, but once my plans got pushed later into the year, I decided that a trip back to Southern Peru would be more enjoyable than trudging through Ecuador’s rainy season or dealing with the seemingly constant fires in the western US. Plus I’d get a chance to see if the months of Duolingo to shake off my rusty Spanish would pay off in any meaningful way.

When I started this trip through South America almost 3 years ago I had no idea what to expect. My bicycle “touring” experience could all be summed up in a tumultuous three week trip to Perú where I spent half of the time with my head hovering over a toilet while suffering from typhoid and a quick one week trip through Norway that resulted in an emergency room visit with frostbite on my toes that still affects me today. I was working on roughly a 5% success rate. Would I quit my “stable job” of almost ten years only to head off into the Andes all by myself and realize that this just wasn’t my thing? Come crawling back a few weeks later, asking for a do-over? I honestly had no idea and these were extremely realistic possibilities in my mind. All I knew was that I’d regret it if I didn’t try.

The Carretera Austral is without a doubt South America’s bicycle touring capital. No place on this continent sees a higher influx of Ortlieb-clad folks from around the world looking to enjoy Patagonia’s natural wonders. With good reason too. There’s a more advanced tourist infrastructure, bringing more luxuries from back home more frequently along the way (toilets and hot showers are cool). The challenge-to-scenery ratio along the Austral is also extremely generous, and the road surface suits just about any bike you can strap a few bags to. You don’t have to suffer too much to have a good time in nature here.

If you had told me 5 years ago that I’d be riding across a 7-foot deep river in Argentinian Patagonia on a horse with a bike hoisted on top, I would have probably said you’ve gone off the deep end, yet here we are.