October 4th 2024 – Filadelfia, Paraguay
During our time in Sucre Katrine and I had decided it was time for a change of scenery. To spice up the journey we would leave the Andes for a while. We set a westernly course from Tupiza. We had only just left town when an unsurfaced road was our only option for moving in the right direction. The next 90 km offered some of the best gravel riding I’ve ever done.
The first section was straight and fast. We could maintain a speed that allowed us to float over the washboard.
Then the road started to climb through long sweeping curves. It escalated to tighter turns and hairpins going up and down before we dropped down into a river valley that eventually spit us out on Hwy 1.
Smooth blacktop and an endless combination of fast curves made the last half of the day’s ride even better than the first. The first gas station we hit on the outskirts of Tarija didn’t have any lines and were happy to sell us fuel.
I had booked a room in town. When we arrived at the address, the host had no idea that we were coming, didn’t have a room ready and the announced parking wasn’t available. I politely made it clear that I expected her to solve the problem. Shortly after there was a room ready and she had found space for the bikes in her private garage. She then proceeded to ask for almost double the price posted on booking.com. I kindly refused to pay more than I had agreed to. Which made her accept the lower price if we gave up on the breakfast that should be included. I like breakfast so that one didn’t fly either. In the end we got the room, breakfast and parking even cheaper than the offer on booking and our host seemed to be pleased with the deal. Don’t try to hustle and hustler…
We spent the rest of the day checking out Tarija. It was a charming city with a posh atmosphere.
Tarija is located at almost 2.000 m/6.000 ft and the temperatures were pleasant when we left town the following morning. It was easy riding and we made good progress. The temperatures crept upwards as we lost altitude.
The road turned to shit after lunch. The surface alternated between washboard, soft sand and deep gravel. It was impossible to get into a rhythm and we often moved at a snail’s pace. The road gradually improved and the last 20 km towards Villamonte was a scenic route through a canyon.
It took 3 tries to find a place in Villamontes that would sell us fuel. The town was like nothing I’ve ever seen before. The streets were laid out in a grid pattern with wide avenues. There were monuments, sculptures and parks everywhere. It all looked a bit run down though and most of the town seemed eerily deserted.
We had now truly left the mountains behind and experienced the hottest temperatures since arriving in South America. A nice motel downtown could provide us a room with AC. We were the only guests.
An evening walk in the city reinforced our initial impression. There were a lot of stores (with no customers) and everything seemed geared towards a population that simply wasn’t there. The few people we met were all very nice and there was a pleasant relaxed atmosphere.
We hit the road early in the morning in an attempt to reach the border to Paraguay before the heat became too intense. The road to the border was straight as an arrow with no traffic. Mid morning we pulled up at a shaded parking spot in front of a new air conditioned building that contained all the Bolivian and Paraguayan offices. It was well organized. Under an hour later, all our paperwork was in order and we could commence our trek across The Chaco.
The Chaco is an arid region that covers more than 60% of Paraguay but with less than 3% of the country’s population. It is one of the most sparsely inhabited areas in South America. Heavily deforestation over the last decades has made the already harsh area even more inhospitable.
100 km from the border we stopped to fill up and cool down.
The temperatures soared. Early afternoon we reached 46℃ (115℉). The strong cross wind felt like it was coming from a giant hair dryer. It was brutal.
After 400 km of nothing on deserted roads we finally approached Filadelfia where we had booked a room for the night. 8 kilometers from our destination Katrine’s bike suddenly stopped running. We couldn’t restart it and I had to tow her the last bit into town.
It was too hot to do anything other than park the bikes and get into the pool to cool down while pondering what the problem could be. The engine had been rebuilt only 12.000 km earlier. Oil and coolant level was spot on. The bike had been running perfectly until it stopped so nothing indicated piston or valve issues. I suspected maybe a clogged fuel filter or fuel pump failure.
I’m competent at servicing the bikes and keeping them in good shape but I’m not good at troubleshooting – the result of riding reliable Jap bikes for more than 3 decades. A quick google search showed a couple of motorcycle shops in town. One of them had glowing reviews. I decided to let them deal with it the following day.
Later in the evening we learned that the next day was Victory day – a national holiday that marks an important victory in the Chaco War. It was the bloodiest interstate military conflict in South America in the 20th century, where Bolivia and Paraguay fought over the control of the Chaco region.
For us it meant that we had to wait another day to have the bike looked at.
The town was enveloped in a sandstorm all the next day. It ruled out having a closer look at the bike in the hotel parking lot. The plan had been to only spend 1 night in town so we had taken the liberty to choose a nice place with every amenity that would make dealing with the heat easier. Now that we had to stay longer, we felt obliged to see if we could find cheaper accommodation. There wasn’t much to choose between. The other places in town were a bit cheaper (but not much) and significantly less nice. When our hotel promised us a discount in case we needed to stay for an extended period, we decided to stay put.
With no plans of spending time in Filadelfia, we hadn’t done any research. It turned out we had ended up in a unique and rather interesting place. When we rolled into town we noticed that it didn’t look very Latin American. Most streets and shops had German names. The red brick houses lining the streets looked like something out of Germany. There was a big VW deal on the main street to complete the picture. The majority of the population in town seemed to be tall, pale and speaking Low German.
You have probably already connected the dots – we had arrived in a Mennonite society. I’ll get more in depth about the town later.
After a rest day mainly spent at the hotel, it was time to get Katrine’s bike to Wiens Motocenter a few blocks away. After breakfast I pushed the bike (with Kat on top) to the shop where we were greeted by the owners Ewald Wiens and his son Matthias. I told them what had happened and Matthias immediately started digging into the bike. Initially everything looked good. Fuel pump, filter and injector showed no issues. There was spark and the spark plug looked good. But a compression test indicated something was amiss.
The valve train looked like new. Eventually Matthias got down to the piston and cylinder. Both were toast. Fuck that shit! Not again – only 12.000 km after the complete top end rebuild in Costa Rica!!!
Last time the culprit had been one of the piston rings. This time it seemed to be an overheating issue where the engine oil hadn’t been able to lubricate the cylinder wall sufficiently leading to a catastrophic failure. It will typically be caused by insufficient cooling system performance, reduced oil supply to the piston, poor oil quality and/or wrong viscosity selection.
The cooling system seemed to work fine. There is no oil jet pointed towards the piston in the CRF engine. Splashes from the crank take care of lubrication/cooling. Oil level was at the correct maximum level, so everything should be fine in that regard.
We had 5.000 km on the engine oil and had been running Motul 7100 10W40 since Costa Rica. With a recommended 12.000 km service interval I imagined that the oil was in good shape, but Matthias suspected otherwise.
He told me that engine failure due to overheating is a common issue in this part of Paraguay. The recommended oil viscosity for any bike here is 50 or 60. The extreme heat breaks down oil faster, so they also recommend reducing the oil change intervals significantly – 3-4.000 km was suggested for the CRF 300.
Matthias contacted the Honda importer to order the parts needed to fix the bike. Surprisingly they seemed to have everything in stock with the exception of a couple of gaskets. Matthias said he would find a solution for that. They were used to cutting their own gaskets when OEM ones weren’t available.
The next day I returned to the shop with my bike and did an oil change to prevent the issues Katrine experienced. We’ll both be running 10W50 from now on.
Matthias is a direct descendant from the Russian Mennonites that came to Paraguay a hundred years ago. They founded Filadelfia as the administrative center of the Fernheim colony. The town is considered the capital of The Chaco. The economic base of Fernheim is agriculture and the processing of agricultural products – most importantly cotton, peanuts, beef, milk and dairy products.
Fernheim is like a state within the state. The cooperative has its own healthcare and school system which is considered to be the best in the country. Until recently they even had their own police force.
The Fernheim cooperative owns most of the land both in and around town. They run several businesses and are involved in everything that is going on.
Another good source of information was Clemens that I met in the hotel lobby one day.
He arrived from Germany 25 years ago in search of adventure. He got involved in ranch management and worked his way up until he became a ranch manager. For the last few years he had been working with tourism. He was an intelligent and articulate man with great knowledge and interesting points of view. We ended up talking for a whole afternoon.
The parts for the bike arrived yesterday and today Matthias is busy putting everything back together. I hope it will be ready sooner rather than later, but I’ve made it clear that he should take the time to make sure everything is done right rather than getting the bike ready in a hurry.
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