With the help of the Motorad Dealer in Wellington (special thanks to Brandon, Michael and Ben) the bike got all boxed up nicely to be transported to Auckland on Friday. Then it has to go through the 'Dangerous Goods Certification' in order to be airlifted and through customs. Keep fingers crossed, she will be on the plane on 5 January and arrive in Chile just one day before me.

 Now it really hits me - its all happening! Two more weeks to go... Still heaps to do...

Once you start spending money on bike upgrades there seems to be no end and terms like "bottomless hole" pop into mind. Anyway, thought its better to be safe than sorry, so I added the following items:

• new chain
• new sprockets (front and rear)
• new brake pads (front and rear)
• Continental TKC80 tyres (21" front and 17" rear)
• Touratech radiator protector
  
• Touratech Handlebar Raisers
• Touratech hand protectors
• Touratech rear suspension protector
• Scott oiler

Not much else I could think of, really. Hope it will do the trick!

Once you get into the whole discussion of 'useful bike upgrades' you'll find that there are tons of websites with suggestions on what to modify and what not. But basically it comes down to how deep your pockets are - the sky is the limit! There are some companies (most of them are German - funny that) that specialise on motorbike equipment for adventure rides - such as Touratech, Wuedo and Wunderlich.

I ended up opting for a centre stand  (makes it so much easier changing a tyre), some decent crash bars (just in case), a good old New Zealand sheep skin (with 15,000km in front of me maybe a good idea, no?), and some larger foot pegs (to make it more comfortable when riding in a standing position on gravel and dirt tracks).

I am so glad that I had the opportunity to do a  number of 'practice runs' over the last couple of months or so. I took the bike out for a spin whenever possible. After one of these I noticed some green liquid dripping down the front of the bike! There was a pin hole in the radiator. At closer inspection of the radiator it turned out that it was pretty bend (see photo) and suffered some irreparable damage.  (Wasn't me!). A small part with a big price tag! Believe it or not, but they cost more than NZ$500 at your friendly BMW dealer! But hey, the good thing is that it happened now here in New Zealand and not somewhere in Patagonia with no BMW dealer for the next 2,500km or so.