KIND COPS AND MANIACAL TRUCK DRIVERS

PENNSYLVANIA: APRIL 8
Forgive me for writing further of danger and truck drivers. My friends in Dallas judged my journey mad or suicidal. They warned of Mexican drivers, of crooked cops and crooked border officials. Mexicans in Veracruz added bandits to their warnings. So I progressed, country to country, each peopled by homicidal truck drivers, vicious terrorists and equally murderous bandits. Chance acquaintances expressed amazement at my survival.
I encountered only kindness.
On occasion, arrogance made me resent the kindness...As with cops in Peru.
I crossed the desert in Peru in a sandstorm. Cops stopped me every twenty kilometres.
“Hey, grandfather, are you okay?”
They were nurse-maiding me.
Me! A survivor of ambushes in the Ogaden, of Russian gunships in Afghanistan.
I felt belittled.
I stopped for lunch at a truck and coach halt and chatted half an hour with the waitresses. Two cops ate at a table against the far wall. They departed. I asked for my bill. The cops had paid. This Blog is my Thank you to the Peruvian police.
And yet, there is a downside.
All drivers in Venezuela are insane.
Most truck drivers in Argentina are bully boys.
Bikers, avoid Venezuela. In Argentina, ride with care.