Highway 1, confusion hill, where is gravity?

We would like to thank Tom Tran, Arnold Posadas, Cong Trinh, Tuc Huynh and Paul Wetmore of San Jose, USA, especially Tuc Huynh for organizing.

Thank you!

In most other countries, diesel is often the black colored handle and unleaded fuel is the green colored handle. be very careful in USA where it it the opposite. i nearly fed Hope Too with diesel.

The Highway 1, costal route of north Califonia.

Enjoying the morning breeze and the sunshine.

It is not uncommon to see these friends along the road, trying to get to the other side where the grasses are better.

Highway 1 of Califonia.

A tree house.

Big foot were most common spotted in this area. the above is just a model of big foot.

This is a grandfather tree.

can u see the sea lions lying around?

log house... we did not enter because there was an entrance fee to it but taking picture is free!

the most intresting place we went to is this confusion hill.

look at the above picture, we are stepping on the same level, witnessed by the red water level, both slabs were at equal height.

when we change over, it seems that who ever standing on the right slab will be taller. why? both slabs are levelled.

Another part of the confusion hill, where micheal jackson can do the moonwalk, so can i.

Sam can do it too!

during our USA and Canada trip, we get to be intrested in the Smokey Bear.

To us, thou Smokey is just a cartoon but it helps to educate everyone about fire.

the world tallest chainsaw curving. it's outside confusion hill.

After being satisfied with the big red woods, we went back to Thor's place for a night. Next morning, we set off to the south, towards Los Angeles but we can take about 5 days to reach LA which is about 400miles (640km). our first stop away from Thor's place in San Francisco is San Jose, where we visited the NASA musuem and just hang around. We got to meet Tuc.

Tuc known us from a motorcycle forum and read our blog. We have not seen him before but we recived an email from him that if we are passing by San Jose, please give him a call.

We met up with Tuc in the evening and we followed his car to a Vietnamese restaurant. We were with Tom Tran , Arnold Posadas, Cong Trinh, Tuc Huynh and Pual Wetmore (not in the picture).
Tuc and Cong were bikers too. They were all colleagues. Arnold is from Phillipines and Paul is from USA. The rest of the three were from Vietnam. Over the dinner, Tuc told us story about his childhood where he had to flee out of Vietnam by boat and how they were adopted by international groups. Cong was only 1 year old when his parent flee out of Vietnam. It was a terrible truth and a sad story. After hearing this, Sam and I felt very lucky to be born in other parts of the world.

This is the first time where we had dinner with everyone using chopsticks. Friends at home (asia) may think that it is so common but to us, we had not have dinner with 'chopsticks' people for a long time!

After dinner, Tuc arranged us to stay in a motel (a very good one) and paid for it! We also went to a local coffeeshop. the coffeeshop is like a pub, with music and karaoke, with games machine and sexy waiteress. over there, we had coffee and have a nice chat. This kind of coffeeshop trend was brought over from Vietnam. Since there were a hugh number of Vietnamese community here (demand), then there would be a coffeeshop here (supply).

We do not known them well and they just invited us for dinner and paid for everything.

crippled or handicapped birds?

Along the costal route to Los Angeles.

It would be nicer without the fog from the Pacific Ocean.

It is common to see vegetable farms along the route between Los Angeles and San Francisco. Riding thro, we could smell the fresh vegetables. We saw them harvesting the product. Who are the workers that do all these hard labour? Without the Mexican migrants, the vegetable we ate in USA will be more expensive!

NASA center in San Jose is free of charge. we get a chance to be 'on the moon'.

The 'chopsticks' people!

Red wood park, Giant Trees!

we would like to thank:

Hii Chun Hui (Singapore) and Tuc Huynh (San Jose, USA) for sponsoring the 2 nights stay in a motel at Cresent City.

Thank you, it was raining for that 2 nights and it would be too cold to camp.




Setting off from Harbin Springs, we went north again. i would not want to miss seeing the big trees on this earth. Winter in USA is very busy because there is only 10 hours of sunlight. We have to wake up early (not an easy task for me) and pack quickly else we will end up riding in the dark.

It's so amazing that these trees had been standing there for so many years and the good thing is they conserve it. imagine this place was managed by some business orientated people, they will cut off these trees and sell it, then make this place into some other profitable business property.

Sonia told us that this is the place where Hollywood filmed Starwars and Jurrusic Park.

BIG and TALL.

see the path to the opposite land? we must wait for low tide else ...

one of the nut was stucked on the disc brake and it was rounded. just couldn't take it out with normal spanner. this guy did a great job and he only charge me for US$10 which he think that it is a small job but to us, it is a great relief!

Bad news is another part broke. What to do, Hope Too has osteoporosis. Gonna leave it till we get home.

The drive thro tree!

Thor Anderson, Sandra Chiang and Harbin Springs experience

Remember Sandra Chiang? The Singaporean lady we met in the supermarket in Argentina? She drove 1 hour to meet us in San Francisco, bringing our stomach back to life, fed us with home food!
Sandra also traveled to many places in the world. click on her icon by the side, where our 'followers' are.
This kitchen was opened by an Indonesian couple. we chatted with him and later when we left, he handed Sam 2 plastic bags of home drinks and fruits! AWESOME!

Lime Tree, Southeast Asian Kitchen
450A Irving St. @ 6th Avenue.
San Francisco, CA94122
+1(415)665-1415
http://www.limetreesf.com/

Thanks Sandra for the lunch and your time.




Remember Gerry? We met him the 3rd time on 3 different countries during our trip!

Gerry, me and Thor. they were joking that Sam and I were staying in a old folk's home. It's amazing how Thor took good care of us. Gerry, staying about 1 hour away, rode to Thor's home to see us. We requested Gerry to stay for a night with us and he agreed! by adding their age up, the number come out to be more than 150. Both of them now travel intensively all around the world. one of their favorate place is north Thailand and Laos which they would always fly there during winter to ride around.

Thor is truly a motorcycling legend to me. in the late 1960s, he rode this bike from Saudi Arabia to North Europe. On those days, there isn't internet to find out information. on those days, i don;t think maps were very accurate. On those days, services were limited between towns. How would anyone be so daring to put on a trip without getting much information? What about getting parts? what about gasoline? what about GPS? what about safety? Sam and i had alot of ??? about his trip, that such a trip is really tough in the 60s. This picture was taken by someone he met on the road in europe. Curious what is that shop was selling?

One of my motorcycling hero, Thor Anderson.

Chinese camp during the gold rush period of S.F.

Chinatown in San Francisco. Hope Too stayed outside while we went in to have a dip of Chinese tim sam!

Coming into San Francisco, Sam and I nick name this bridge as the $6 bridge.

Thor knew that his friend, Richard is hosting another RTW traveler from Germany: Katarina and Thomas. When we met them, we realised that we had alot of friends in common! Jacqueline and Richard were also very helpful people+biker themselves! By looking at this picture, Jacqueline seems to be small in size but she had traveled all over USA alone on her bike!

Thor, me, Sam, Jacqueline, Richard, Katarina and Thomas on a chinese dinner, yehhh, chinese food!

Thor hosted us for a few day. Infact, he was waiting for us since few months back that we planned to reach Alaska on June 21, 2009. yes, plans always failed for us.

On the day we left Thor's house, he led us to Richard and Jacqueline's house, where Sam had left our camera at their place 2 nights ago! Then Thor led us the way out of the city to the easy road Northbound, to Harbin Hot Springs. Along the way, we will pass by the famous Califonia grape growing area, Napa valley.

Route 29 took us to Middletown directly but we used the parallel road which was less stressful and calm. few miles before reaching Middletown, the curves weigh Hope Too left and right. I didn't use much brakes on these curves as they were very friendly.

We would like to thank Mark Weeding, USA, Montana, for sponsoring us for the Harbin Springs experience. Thank you Mark.

Entering the property, we would need to stop by the guard house for instructions. Looking at their uniform, it seems that they are like a monk, living without worries. I asked for more information about what this place is about, he said many things but the one that blasted my mine was the sentence: this place is clothing optional. that means you could chose to wear clothes or not inside the property.

we took a sheltered room for US$90. there we understood what is half bathroom and full bathroom.

half bathroom: toilet with basin and WC

full bathroom: toilet with basin, WC and shower.

but we took the no bathroom or what they called the shared bathroom.

the shared bathroom was unisex. the shower door was almost transparent but we could use the WC for private businesses.

This place is very quite, seems that visitor comes here to recover themself from the busy city life. We went into the little grocery store for lunch. Don't expect meat, burgers or fried chicken here. We had good soup, vegi and organic bread. The food in the store were all healthy food.

the rule in this place is simple:

No Cameras allowed.

No Mobile phones allowed.

No Alcohols allowed.

No Drugs allowed.

No Sexual activities allowed in the common pool.

We went to explore the pools. the water came from nearby springs. there were a few pools.

very hot pool: (i donno what was the temperature but i was inside only for 5 minutes)

very cold pool: (i donno what was the temperature because i was nearly electricfied when my toe touches the water.)

warm pool: where most of the people would hang out. I went in alone, Sam was abit shy to join me. I was abit uneasy going in naked with other men and women. after awhile, i noticed that everyone was enjoying the peace and comfort in the pool, ignoring other people's naked body.

Talking was not allowed in the pool so everyone really had absolute peace. There were also 'Watsu' service. It's kind of water massage, relaxation of body in the water by the terapist.

I went furthur to explore the dry sauna. I had really not sweat so much for the past few months. I sat inside with about 4 other person (couple) and the story begans when a lady came in, she laid down feets pointing at me, knees bend, head and body laid back onto the bench, without clothings off course. then after awhile, the she started touching herself all over and made some moaning. she was on my left side and i could see her from my corner of my eyes without glasses on. I could hear the touching as the sweat slicks from the hand. I guess she must really not enjoyed so much after her husband left her 10 years ago?! i took my towels, wrapped myself and walked out to breath some air.

Dinner was at a 'canteen', very similar to a school canteen. I can't find any famous american food on the menu board. mostly were made from green ingredient, healthy vegetarian meal and low cholestrol seafood. Either baked or fresh. Serving was large so Sam and I shared a portion.

Harbin was like a community place. Visitor come hear as a retreat center. many come here to seek for a peaceful place, for a more healthy lifestyle, looking for a place where they can be themselves. there were also long time resident here. There were many activities to join by looking at the time table. The night's activity was a traditional drumming session, headed by a local living behind and these activies were mostly free. Then there would be talks on relationship and improving sex life. (with a fee). then there were many free yoga session. every morning there would be a chanting session.

This thing hits me. chanting? what are they chanting? i realised that there were statues of hindi gods and culture. It's getting popular in the western word to seek for spiritual healing where there would be some Tibetian/Tamil/Hindi named people that everyone will idol upon him/her. Example names like Lakshmi, Paramahamsa and blar blar blar, that had given the western world of buddhism or hinduism had a certain energy of healing and everybody that practice it will reach to be the nirvana.

you need spiritual help? call now...

Wanna be part of them in spiritual healing? it's getting popular and profitable, espicially in the western world!

we find it strange...we respect other religon but...

Sam and I do not like to approach such people or people that practice such spiritual stuff. If u wikiped 'spritual healing', they will relate mostly with christianity. if u google 'spritual healing', you will find things about Aura, energy, chanting, yoga, hindi looking people saying quoting words of 'wisdom'.

i think some had gone too far of using religon to earn money, i am not pointing about Harbin but the people that is practicing it. some people view it as a cult. for us? as long as it saves life or helped health problems, we have no objection to it.

instead of joining them, we went to the library and read some books, then turn to bed early on this quite night.

when i walked into the toilet in the morning, i was really woken up when i saw a 'half clothed' woman combing her hair in the toilet. I did my morning business and went for breakfast with Sam.

Again at the same canteen, we browsed the menu on board, it was all healthy food. we ordered a plate of toufu (bean curd) and vege. I never knew such plain food could taste so well!

As a whole, this place is really a retreat center where we were cut off from the outside world. I would strongly recommand this place to people that had a stressful lifestyle. I would recommand couple to come here to enjoy the company of each other and learn about one another. don't treat this as a relax place and do what you want, shout or yell, act crazy and run around. they have their rules. Check their webpage for activities that you are intrested before booking a place here. If you do not like to stay here, you can apply for a one day pass, use the facilities here and drive back to the town and stay in a motel and eat a hamburger but that defeats the purpose being in Harbin. it is to live there and 'heal' yourself from the stressful and polluted world outside.

we would like to come back to this peaceful place again, maybe to stay for a week or so. there wasn't much place that we would go back in the trip but if there is a Harbin in singapore, we would definately go!

This was the place where we met Duncan, from Santa Barbara. He is one of the weirdest person that we ever met but we found him to be a very sincere and meaningful person. He really reached his hand out when helping people, not just talking but action!

will tell you more about Duncan in our next blog.

This is the only picture we can take in the resort.

how to ship a motorcycle from USA to Australia with high cost

How to ship a motorcycle from USA to Australia. (With hassel and high cost)

1) one has to chose USA as an export location. Many go north to Canada to do a hassel free custom job.

I chose Los Angeles because by looking at the map, it was the biggest city from USA to Down-under, thinking that the airplane would save more fuel. (WRONG CHOICE!!)

2) Ask for quote from Freight company. Airline will not entertain private customers.

when asking for quote, do not take it too hard, they do not mean what they quote. take it as a 'hello'.

even they quote you $1.00/kg, later they will say 100001 reasons for increasing of fuel price from the date of quote to the date of flying. then they will not mean their quote. usually they will use a cheap price to attract you to come to them, making you to put the bike with them so it would be hard for you to take it out even it becomes $7.00/kg.

3) DONT CLEAN YOUR BIKE! do not tear down the whole bike for washing. need not take out every screws and nut, every blind spot, wash with metal scrubs and lots of detergent. instead of using 3-4 full days for cleaning it, RELY on those car wash people or power jet spray. they will make the bike wet, put alot of shampoo and looked like a good shower and they sure know how to put armor all onto the tires. DO not care about the dirt on the bike. when arrived in Australia, the quarentine officer will put your bike into a container, either fumigate it with a HIGH cost or you can chose to destroy the bike with fire on the spot to advoid this fumigation cost. bring your own lighter.

4) DO NOT built your own crate. use the 'pallet' given by the freight forwarder so that the packing guy you were forced to use (US$200) will have an easy task of putting on the bike into the crate. Remember do not take out the front tire! it will take up more space when calculated as a whole volume, it will help the packing guy to ease his job, creating more sales in his company.

.

Imagine i had taken off the tire. How is he going to put the bike on the crate? i did it in Bangkok, the airshipment to Katmathdu.this was the easiest way that he could work. you see the space between the skid plate and the wood, it is a waste of space! by compressing the front suspension all the way down using his tie downs are not 'healthy' for the bike.

DO not take out the handlebar. it will contribute 30% to the final bill. taking out the handlebar will not ease the packing guy's job and might make his day bad. anyway, it's only US$800 bill if you did not take out the handle bar and you can make everyone in that company happy.

by building your own crate will only limit the specification that you know. for example, if you measured by tearing down your bike and put it in a box, the diamension will be 2meters length, 0.7meters width, 1.3m height. BUT if you use their system, they will measure the widest point of the length, width and height, ignoring the pallet size.

***saving money tips here***

ask any grandparents that is walking on the road, that has nothing to do, or someone's little nephew/niece that is having their kindergarden vacation, US$50 for the above 30minutes job.

5) tell the US customs that you had smuggled your bike in because when entering USA from Mexico, the custom officer quoted that you will NOT need any documents to bring your bike in. then when exiting the country, they will say that you had smuggled your bike into usa. BUT the operational manager of the company will be very tackful with this, by convincing the officer. so even when you are not happy with the price and want to bring the bike back and repack, the next time when u want to sent again it will not be easy to 'convince' the officer that you have not smuggle the bike in. so, just tell them you had smuggled the bike in and pay some fine... everyone will be happy.

6) throw away the payment recipt. you do not need any proof to show the company because even you show them the recipt, they will say that the $ has not appear in their account yet, so that they can hold your goods back and delay your plans/shipment.

7) do not give them the address in australia or USA. they will not sent any documents there. you will have to walk 30minutes to a train station, take a 50minutes train, stand on the road and wait for a taxi for 30 minutes with no taxi will appear. then ask someone how to catch a taxi. after 20minutes the taxi had still not arrived and you will have to hitch hike.

there is no need to rush for time to get the documents because the company close at 5pm and the next day is a holiday, nobody is working and you are suppose to fly on that day.

8) after a long journey on public transport of getting the documents from the company, throw away the documents or burn it. (bring your own lighter). the document is useless. really! they just want to see the recipt of payment by scanning and email is useless.

so... how to save money and hassel free shipment?

NUMBER 1: DO NOT CHOSE USA AS AN EXPORT DESTINATION. i believe my travellers agree with this.

but if you have to, then:

1) request for quote from a company.

a) i will need to supply them with estimated specifications. for my Honda Africa Twin 750, i can resize it into a box that is of

200cm length x 70cm wide x 130cm height = 1820000cm cube.

so after packing, compressing the front suspension, pallet thickness, the total height became 135cm, where u can see my left hand is. my chin level is 150cm.

then use 1820000 divided by 6000 (thats the fomular) = 303.33kg which is the volumetric weight.

b) i have to supply them with the actual mass weight also, which is estimated 300kg INCLUSIVE of the crate (metal)!

ask for all the other fees like

a) documention and handling

b) fuel surcharge

c) airfreight charge

d) Hazard / Restricted Goods Handling

e) screening Fee - HAWB

f) DG (dangerous goods) cert

g) security surcharge - HAWB

h) packing / crating

i) airport transfer

j) any other fees that are not on the above!

ask how they charge for the above, by per kg or a one time fee. i was lured into the company because item d,e,f,g and i was not in the initial quote. when i question them about this, they give me unfavourable reply.

2) after selecting the company, i have to choose the crate. the company , Swindle Logistic (not the real name), had finally found a wooden pallet given to them by Qantas. that was after 3 weeks of waiting for their quote for a crate. Duncan of Santa Barbara, helped me to call BMW at Long Beach, LA, USA if they had a crate.

Thanks Duncan.

BMW has a metal crate but it was too huge and it would be about 50kg.

after all, to pay for someone to built a physical crate would be the best, knowing the volumeteric measurements would be limited inside the crate. like my case, i used their pallet, not knowing how they calcalute the volume.

Australia Certified Wood. Heat treated?

before putting the bike onto the crate, both of us went to a bike wash and do some cleaning. Reached home at 1pm and we took out everything like mudguards, wheels, chain, skid plate, fairings, boxes, signal indicators, radiator fan ... for washing. real dirt scrubbing with metal scrubs and kerosene. we use 2 days to clean the bike and on the day of sending the bike to Swindle Logistic's warehouse, we went to a carwash again and clean the bike. during packing of the bike, we have to make sure no dirt sticks onto the tire.

when packing the bike, the requirements are:

the gas tank must not be more than 1/4. (so i drained some away till reserve)

the battery terminal must be connected and taped.

I release both the tire pressure abit as the airplane will fly very high, creating more pressure in the tire.

i let the packing guy witness all these.

but i have a question, if i am going to crate the bike myself, who is going to witness that i had done all these?

the sales person does not know how to do it. he say ALL FLUID MUST BE DRAINED. then he verbally tells me that after i drain the gas, there are still some gas left in the pipeline of the motorcycle and he need to charge me US$50 or more to get another certificate of it.

silly....

after all these, all I need is just an airway bill number or a photocopy/softcopy of the airway bill. make sure to book a flight 2-3 days before you leave the country.

How to clear a motorcycle in Australia.

i had the airway bill. i know it is flying with Qantas. Just log in to Qantas website and put the tracking number and will know where is the bike. then i called qantas if the bike is avalible for collection. i just need to quote the airway bill number.

go down to Qantas freight terminal at link road, near Sydney airport.

S 33deg 55.849'

E151deg 09.950'

(we googled Link Road and found out that it was 1.6km to where we are staying now. so we walked there in the morning and realised that we are in the wrong Link Road, ended up taking a taxi.)

Go to the counter and collect a stack relevent to your shipment. take this stack of documents to the customs house near to the passenger airport, 5 minutes walking distance away.

S 33deg 56.011'

E151deg 09.853'

go into the ticket machine, press the button :EXAMINATION and get a ticket.

(i pressed some other stuff, went to the counter, showed them the documents and they ask me to fill up 5 pages of form. the form includes many technical terms which i have to refer to a big 'bible' on the table to find some related code numbers.

the questions were like:

Owner ID (ABN/CAC) i donno whats that.

Header Valuation advise number. donno whats that.

EFT payment. donno whats that.

Tariff classification number. got to refer to the big 'bible' on the table

treatment code: donno whats that.

preferece scheme type: donno whats that

and many more.

i almost wanted to give up. it's like going to a school examination without doing any homework.

i went to submit the form to the officer. she was nice to explain every little detail to me until the section on supplier's name.

She asked me who did i bought the bike from?

i said from a private owner.

then do u have his address, name or company name, telephone number, invoice of the bike???

i said no. it was because.....

she stepped back and said i MUST HAVE all these info in the form, if not they cannot proceed.
at this time i was very stucked! then i took out my weapon:

The Carnet De Passages En Douane, which Jiawei and Michel helped me to apply for in Singapore.

Then there was a change of situation, i was asked to get another ticket from the button: examination. phewwww.....)

when called, show them your Carnet De Passages En Douane and they will arrange a custom officer to meet up with you at Qantas freight terminal, the place where i had collected the stack of documents earlier.

together with the quarentine officer and the custom officer, they check our goods.

the custom officer checked the VIN number of the bike and stamped onto the CPD, tearing the bottom section part away.

The quarantine officer is satisfied with Hope Too's cleaniness.

(we had 3 friends that shipped the bike into Australia. All of them were caught with dirt somewhere in the bike and was put into quarantine. the officer had to fumigate the bike at a high cost.)

We proceed with the payment to Qantas.

Import Document Fee: A$33.00 with GST

International terminal fee: A$93.72 with GST

Total : A$126.72

we wait outside, the fork lift brought the bike to us. we unpack, throw the pallet and rubbish on site and roll off with my reserve gas in the tank!