Patrick Symmes

There is so much mystery surrounding the life and times of Ernesto "Che" Guevara. His 1952 road trip from Argentina through Chile and up to Bolivia somehow changed him in radical ways. Patrick Symmes wanted to know more about that fateful trip, so why not trace Che's footsteps and take the same exact journey? Che was on a motorcycle. Symmes would be on a motorcycle. Symmes drew not only from Guevara's memoir, Notas de Viaje, as his guide, he was fortunate to have the road diaries of Guevara's traveling companion, Alberto Granado, as well. [As an aside, often times, Notas de Viaje and Testimony: With El Che Across South America would contradict one another. I found it interesting that, more often than not, Symmes tended to believe Guevara over Granado.] Many people will be inspired to retrace the journey of someone else; to follow in their geographic footsteps, but Symmes takes his adventure to another level, searching out the exact places and people Che met along the way. His motto was "Be Like Che." Would these same people remember the vibrant and charismatic young man? What could Symmes learn from them? By doing this, Symmes was able to meet with remarkable individuals, like Che's former girlfriend who could not talk about Ernesto, the lover; Douglas Thompkins, the millionaire who bought up Patagonian land to preserve an ancient way of life; and even everyday people who kept Symmes rolling through the miles and navigating the harsh South American landscape. Symmes learned to tolerate drinking yerba mate and having discussions about Nazis in Argentina. He suffered dog bites, cracked ribs, barbed wire, and road spills. Most importantly, Symmes was able to be like Che. When Che mooches off individuals Symmes is able to apply the same tactics with somewhat similar success. The result of Chasing Che is more than a memoir and a travelogue, it is a love letter to one of the most influential people of the twentieth century.… (meer)

Everyone has heard the popular phrase, “Never judge a person until you’ve walked a mile in their shoes.” Well, many people throughout history have judged those gone before us, especially those who went on to change the course of history. Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara Jr. was one of those people. After growing up in Argentina, he took a soon-to-be-famous motorcycle journey with his friend and compatriot, Alberto Granado, into the deep plains and undeveloped areas of Latin America. During that journey he witnesses abject poverty and suffering of the indigenous people. By the time he returned, seeds of political and revolutionary discourse were germinating in his soul and they would very soon sprout and give rise to the man everyone came to know only as ‘Che’. Even years after his execution by a one-man firing squad, scholars and modern-day revolutionaries alike have attempted to explain and understand who the man was, but very few of them remembered that famous parable above, and those who did remember, didn’t take it to heart like Patrick Symmes.

Chasing Che is a documentary tale of travel, both physical and intellectual, that follows Symmes as he saddles up on his own motorcycle (one a little more modern than Granado’s jalopy) and attempts to follow the exact route those two fellow travelers ventured upon so many years before. Symmes even attempts to limit any and all creature comforts to match whatever Ernesto and Alberto had during their original journey. There are new obstacles, to be sure, and detours must be made, but when they do arise, Symmes rolls with the punches and finds himself transformed into the same road-weathered traveler he is following years behind.

There are many great qualities about this travel journal, but foremost among those is Symmes’ dedication to the quest. At numerous points he could have taken a lighter path, called for more help or equipment or turned back towards more friendly locales, but he continually pushed through in search of the same physical places and people that Guevara and Granado touched on their way through. On more than one occasion, Symmes found himself in conversations of broken Spanish with heavily armed men– some government soldiers, while others were guerrilla warriors still trying to live out some of the mantras Che left behind. One wrong move could’ve landed him in a South American jail or worse, “disappeared” like many opponents of the various controlling regimes. Yet, I believe his saving grace through this was he not going after an ideology, he was going after a man. He made no proposition to learn, live and spread the teachings of Che. Instead what he was after was the true history of the man, good or evil, who would later become Che and change the face of global politics. That objectivity and balance allowed him access through gates many others would have failed to pass.

Two things struck me during the book. First, Symmes continually mentioned the inherent charity of the indigenous people with whom he crossed paths. Time after time he would ride up on his motorcycle, kill the engine a good distance away from a small shanty home and clap his hands twice (to signal that he was friendly and approaching the house). He would almost always find the family willing to give him a small piece of floor to sleep on, or at the very least against the side of the house, and possibly food if they had enough to spread around. The following mornings, many of his new-found landlords would refuse to accept payment, just seeming like it was their duty to help fellow travelers (which many of them are as well considering the great distances between villages and homes). Secondly, Symmes went in the end of his journey to the source, at least, one of the sources; Alberto Granado. Still living reasonably off his notoriety as Che’s wandering partner, Granado granted an illuminating interview and insight into those dusty days on the trail. Symmes had both of Granado’s and Guevara’s original diaries from the trip and he pointed out many of the disparate descriptions of places and actions between them, one moment standing out in particular where Granado and Guevara both credit the other for the heroic rescue of a small kitten. What came from that discovery was that the journey represented different transformations for each traveler. As for the kitten, Granado admitted to laying the heroic banner on Che because he was the one destined for it.

Another factor I found interesting is Symmes was on his travels during the exact same time the government and others were in a desperate search to exhume Che’s body from the hidden dumping ground the Bolivian soldiers left him in. Another writer, Jon Lee Anderson wrote a book entitled, Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life (which I have also read and highly recommend), and in his research for that book he interviewed and received confessions from the very people responsible for hiding Che’s body. It had been many years since the action, so the location information was not entirely specific, but both books ended up tying together in the same place and moment, which made for even more interesting reading.

For those interested in learning more about the man behind the mythology and who that is staring back from the hipsters t-shirts and messenger bags, you could do far worse than starting here. As I said earlier, Anderson’s book is another great find, but a much thicker and in-depth read.… (meer)

I really liked this. Patrick is funny and it reminds me of being in South America and all the good, and bad, experiences a gringo can have including Gringo Fits and being at the mercy of nature. The author is 6.2 and looks like a cast member from the Hills Have eyes so some of the South Americans were wary of him. He did some good interviews that shed some genuinely new light of Che's travels and clarified some errors that they made. I recommend it and if you love South America it well worth the read. It is worth a 4.5 I reckon. The film the motorcycle diaries was interesting but the book was a snooze fest. As a writer I would say read this book before the actual motorcycle diaries as Patrick is obviously a professional and well able to pick out interesting bits and leave the boring bits behind.… (meer)