Pig Slaughtering, the wrong way

About a week ago, we met three other adventure riders, all on the same day, after not meeting or riding with any for over a month—not since our friend Ismail, whom we parted ways with in Nicaragua.

Johnathon, from Maryland, USA and riding a Kawasaki KLR 650, found us in a small, middle-of-nowhere town in Peru and continued on with us. About an hour later, the three of us rounded a corner and happened upon, CJ and John, two riders from Vancouver, B.C. on Yamaha WR250r’s. They were pulled over talking to Stephan, an amazing guy from France who was on his third year of cycling around the world with over 60,000 km under his loose belt.

Aside from Stephan, who continued on at his own pace, the rest of us—5 now—wandered off to find a place to camp, sample a bottle of rum or two and tell lies around a campfire. It seemed like a good idea at the time until the heaven’s opened on us and dumped buckets of rain along with lightening and thunder. Guys being guys, they still managed to persevere and build a great big campfire, around which one of the conversations to pass the time in the rain was what we’d hit and killed on our motorcycles so far. Being a girl, I stayed out of the conversation while the guys explained their point systems for hitting certain things. Who knew I’d become the reigning champion a few days later.

So far on the whole trip since leaving Arizona on Dec. 19, I personally have hit and killed two birds. Dave hasn’t hit and killed anything. A dog once leapt at him after we’d left a lunch spot, hitting the pannier instead and leaving a dent both in the pannier and likely the dog’s head as well. There was a time I thought we could likely smoke into the many deranged dogs that dash out from houses and driveways along the road to chase us, and not feel it much, seeing as the bikes weigh between 500-600 lbs. But you’d be surprised how much a G650GS feels the impact of hitting a baby pig.

We were cruising along a dirt road. This baby pig was the unfortunate one in a half-dozen cluster that decided to shift their migration alongside the road to the middle of the road. I was dodging baby pigs as though steering through pylons on a road test when one little confused guy veered right straight into my front wheel. I felt a jolt and heard a horrible human-like squeal. The poor thing was dragged along for a stretch stuck in my skid plate, screaming its human sounds, until it was ejected from my back wheel and flung into the mud. I didn’t stop or look back, not wanting to see my pig-slaughtering mess. My bike was still hopping back and forth trying to right itself, so I worked at keeping it on the road and sent a prayer hoping a hungry family would find it and salvage some food.

When we next met up with CJ and John and told them I’d hit a baby pig, they were impressed and gave me four points, which is apparently very high on the points scale.

Sorry baby pig ☹