Alberto Granado his and Guevara's trip around South America. Granado has a brief cameo following the epilogue of the film. Alberto Granado Alberto Granado Jiménez (August 8, 1922March 5, 2011) was an Argentine–Cuban biochemist, doctor, writer, and scientist. He was also the youthful friend and traveling companion of Che Guevara during their 1952 motorcycle tour in Latin America. Granado later founded the University of Santiago de Cuba School of Medicine. He authored the memoir "Traveling with Che Guevara: The Making of a Revolutionary", which served as a reference for the 2004 film "The Motorcycle Diaries", in which he was played by Rodrigo
The Motorcycle Diaries (book) Guevara's older friend, Alberto Granado, a biochemist, and Guevara, decided to take a year off from their medical studies to embark on a trip they had spoken of making for years: traversing South America on a motorcycle, which has metaphorically been compared to carbureted version of Don Quixote's Rocinante. Guevara and the 29-year-old Granado soon set off from Buenos Aires, Argentina, astride a 1939 Norton 500 cc motorcycle they named "La Poderosa II" ("The Mighty II") with the idea of eventually spending a few weeks volunteering at the San Pablo Leper colony in Peru on the banks of the Amazon