Local NewsMarch 25, 2012

Commentary

Carl Jensen
ABOVE: Each small town we motor past offers a different specialty in their roadside marketplace. This one has a colorful display of a variety of fruits and vegetables. BELOW: A man leads his donkey, loaded with bananas for delivery, up the highway.
ABOVE: Each small town we motor past offers a different specialty in their roadside marketplace. This one has a colorful display of a variety of fruits and vegetables. BELOW: A man leads his donkey, loaded with bananas for delivery, up the highway.Carl Jensen
A man leads his donkey, loaded with bananas for delivery, up the highway.
A man leads his donkey, loaded with bananas for delivery, up the highway.Carl Jensen
ABOVE: Teenagers on bicycles hitch rides up the steep, winding road in the Ecuadorean Andes. BELOW LEFT: Once in the clouds, visibility was near zero. It was hard to see the other motorcycle, just 50 feet ahead.
ABOVE: Teenagers on bicycles hitch rides up the steep, winding road in the Ecuadorean Andes. BELOW LEFT: Once in the clouds, visibility was near zero. It was hard to see the other motorcycle, just 50 feet ahead.Carl Jensen
One of the first things we noticed when we came out of the clouds was the green.
One of the first things we noticed when we came out of the clouds was the green.Carl Jensen
Once in the clouds, visibility is near zero. It's hard to see the other motorcycle just 50 feet ahead.
Once in the clouds, visibility is near zero. It's hard to see the other motorcycle just 50 feet ahead.Carl Jensen
One last ride at the end of the world
One last ride at the end of the world

Dear Reader,

I think it's time you and I went on a ride.

For five months, you've been with Jesse and me as we examined subjects ranging from farming to funerals. Today I want to take it back to simplicity. Today we're not going to look for anything but the joys of life from the road, a journey for which we're long overdue. Let's go.

The morning air is crisp and damp when the motorcycles first rumble to a start. At 7,000 feet, elevation is a factor, and the bikes take a little longer than usual to find their pleasant, familiar idle. We, too, can feel the air is different here. At this height, the clouds aren't quite so dreamlike - their normally surreal perfection having been violated by our entrance into their realm - and we can feel the vapors entering our lungs. We'll have to breathe deeper as we climb. We're in the Ecuadorean Andes just below the equator, and 7,000 feet is just the beginning.

For the first hour, our passage is slow going. The rainy season is coming to an end and the road is in rough repair. In places it has been washed away entirely, and road crews work furiously to reshape, resurface and restore the battered route. Teenagers on bicycles take advantage of the slow truck traffic to hitch rides up the steep, winding road. One hand holding tight to the trailer of their choosing, they use the other to flash a thumbs up and a smile as we pass.

An hour later we're really in the clouds. Visibility is next to nothing and we have a hard time seeing the other motorcycle just 50 feet ahead. Rain doesn't so much fall here as settle onto our arms, chests and legs. It's invigorating, and as slow as we're moving, it's hard not to be excited at the wonderland through which we're riding. There is no scenery save passing vehicles and flashing yellow lines, but something about the opaqueness of it all lends excitement to the nothingness. After all, in the hectic pace of modern life, it is sometimes nothingness that we most long to experience.

We spring from the clouds as suddenly as the entrance was gradual, and the first thing we notice is the green. It is a green that soothes the eyes like a balm and mellows the soul, like the first glimpse of winter wheat in the spring. The rains have been kind to the pastureland - if not the roads - and cows, fatter and healthier than those we have seen the rest of the journey, move leisurely across the steep, verdant slopes. Pasture, crops and wilderness press against each other in perfect, symmetrical patchwork, and despite the clearly human-made order of it all, the green throughout makes it feel virginal, fresh and natural. In a way, it is. Out here in the countryside and the highlands, people seem to blend with nature in ways that city life just won't allow.

As we continue to descend, this rural way of life becomes ever clearer. Every small town we pass proffers a different specialty in their road-side marketplace, and local farmers, ranchers and gardeners earn and trade off reputations cultivated in quality of craft.

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Here a region is known for its citrus and advertises via pyramids of oranges and crates of limes. The next town may offer milk or bananas, pork or coffee, yogurt or bread, but whatever wares may be on display, the vendor/producer must be prepared to stand behind his product. Often it is consumed on site, and feedback is instant and honest. To many around the globe, it is perhaps the greatest curiosity of the United States that we withhold honest assessments to save the feelings of others. To me, it is one of the greatest misfortunes of our modern world that our farmers no longer have this kind of connection with those who consume their products. Realistically, those days are past. Wistfully, we move on.

As the day stretches on, we see more of the simple life in snapshots and drive-bys. A man leads his donkey up the highway with bananas for delivery, hunch-backed old men carry bundles of oats for miles at a time, and the boys - those who hitched a ride up the mountain on the backs of semi-trucks - now roar down the other side at breakneck speeds. Miles float past and the sun sinks lower.

Our ride is coming to an end, but it's clear that here, in the mountains, tomorrow will be much the same. For you and me, it will no doubt bring something else entirely - no more or less exciting - just different, and as we look forward to what will come, I want to thank you for coming along this far.

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All of this week's photos were taken from the motorcycle along the Panamerican Highway on a day's journey between Quito and San Rosa, Ecuador, either at the side of the road or on the move.

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Jensen is a 24-year-old Genesee native who is writing a weekly column about his trials and tribulations during his motorcycle journey through the United States, Mexico and South America, along with his friend, Jesse Ford.

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