Soy un Gringo…….
Climbing purifies the soul, or at least I would like to believe this as Guatemala has given me exactly what I expected–lots of big hills!!! Since San Cristobal de las Casas my mood has swung wildly. I was debating for three days on how I should make my way towards Guatemala. The options were, one, do the smart and safe thing and catch a bus to meet my friend Jaime in Xela, Guatemala. My reasoning here was if I were to be robbed while solo, like my friend Chris, the trip would be over–or worse. At the very least I would have to call it a day. The chances of this were so remote that I was strongly considering the second option, which was to ride the whole way solo. In the end I made the difficult decision to play it safe rather than sorry and I got the bus leaving San Cristobal early in the morning four days ago. As fate would have it, I would actually not have to ride that far in the bus before a really great opportunity presented itself.
I was let off the bus about ten kilometers before the border with the plan to ride over a small mountain to the other side and enter Guatemala. There I would catch a bus to Xela and arrive in time to have beers with Jaime. As I was getting off the bus I saw another cyclist across the road and very shortly we got to talking. His name was Celso and he is on a Central American odyssey of his own with his buddy, Omar. Both are from Michoacan, Mexico. They invited me to join them and, without a moment´s hesitation, I bailed on the bus plan. That evening, we rode over the border and entered a complete new world…one that I have been waiting to see since I left Alaska some 250 plus days ago.
It was crazy. The frontera was a huge bustling Mayan street market and we were climbing through crowds of people towards the border. Rickshaws, livestock, and the hoard of brightly dressed humanity were all competing for the narrow strech of mountain road. As we rode past the sea of people they would part to watch the circus roll through. The actual crossing was painless as the immigration officers were pretty preoccupied with a Van Damme kung-fu flick and they didn´t seemed too concerned with the “Gringos”, as everyone has ben calling us (even Celso and Omar, which kills them!!!) Before we knew it we had ducked under a flimsy wooden yellow crossing arm and were officially in Guatemala. The experience reminded me of how funny it can be to see how quickly things can change crossing an imaginary line drawn on a map.
This decision has turned out to be one of the best I´ve made on this trip. Guatemala has been absolutely unbelievable on bike. At times I´ve found myself reminded of Nepal, of all places, maybe because of the climate (it´s actually been cold) and these mist covered monstrous valleys that we´ve been riding up. On the sides of these steep mountains I watched a speckling of tiny houses precariously perched high on the cliffs roll by and also the most unimaginable farm fields I have ever seen. I actually don´t know how they would farm these fields because they were at incredibly steep angle apparently without roads going to and from. The only way to get materials in and crops out would be on a porter´s back, which I´ve been seeing plenty, as of late. The funny thing is is that I have actually traveled in Guatemala, three years ago, but on bike it was a whole new experience.
We have been climbing like locos since crossing the border but the scenery is so magnificent that I have hardly noticed. We followed a mountain river as we wound up the canyon for the first day to Huehuetenango, and the next day we cranked up a never-ending hill to a town called Pologua, high in the Guatemalan highlands where we stayed the night. That was last night, and it was so damn cold that I actually has on all my cold weather gear. When we rolled in, we had ridden into the clouds so everything was covered in fog/mist. The empty, muddy streets and the eery glow of the street lamps in the fog gave the town a real strange, other-worldly feeling. We stayed in one of the nicest hotels I have ever stayed in for the money spent–the only hotel in town– and it cost a little over four dollars. When I woke this morning the city had been transformed and all the streets were filled with vendors selling everything from cheap plastic Chinese made trinkets to severed goats´heads. Celso, Omar, and I walked through the market all morning taking in the scene. Traditional Mayan clothing was being sold next to pirated DVDs and boat loads of every type of produce known to man. I´ve seen a lot of markets but this one was easily one of the most fascinating that I´ve come across.
Well, I have been speaking nothing but Spanish now for three days with Celso and Omar and for the first time on the trip I really feel as if I am able to speak without thinking. My comprehension is even coming along and it feels really good to not stumble around in the conversations as much (but rest assured there is still plenty of tanterias–foolishness–spoken!) Interestingly enough, in the area that we´ve been riding through, Quichè is spoken so Celso and Omar don´t understand the majority of what´s being said. A couple of times I would be listening to conversations and barely following along (hearing enough Spanish to keep me in the conversation) when I realized that the speakers were speaking in both Quichè and Spanish at the same time. This is when I really knew that my mind was blown. We´ve found that in most of the markets Spanish is a second language and a couple of times Celso and Omar couldn´t communicate with the vendors! So last night, over dinner at a comedor (eating establishment) in Pologua, we asked to learn a few important Quichè words from the woman working the kitchen (for example “Tiosh”–thank you.) Unfortunately, most of them I promptly forgot! I suppose that working on one language is difficult enough.
So this morning, we rolled into Xela and have been hanging out in this cool city all day. Tomorrow we head towards Lago de Atitlan and further towards Antigua. Guatemala has been a real treat so far and I have found the general atmosphere here much different than in Chiapas. It´s definitely more foreign but I don´t feel as unwelcome as I did there. Who knows.
Matt
My trip ends in San Cristobal de las Casas
I’m amazed at how fast my mind changed and decided to return home.
I had diarhea in Palenque, and didn’t eat much the day we climbed to the Cascadas de Aqua Azul, and I had a scary bout of heat exhaustion. My lips, toes, and fingers all had pins and needles. But after recovering for 20-25 minutes I knew I had to continue riding, as the area we were in was not safe. When we got to the Cascadas about 30 minutes later (downhill, thankfully!) I went for a wonderful cool swim and afterwards, as I lay down on my ground-cloth “beta testing” my tent site, I felt this amazing bliss. I was thinking nice thoughts to counter the scare I’d had that day, and many of them centered around returning home. I have a hard time not actualizing such thoughts, and after pondering a return for three days, I decided to “make it so”.
I’ve had a great ride thru Mexico. I’ve met many wonderful and generous people, and eaten a lot of good food. I plan to bring my parents to Durango and Mexico City and Vera Cruz sometime soon.
Without Matt there’s no way I would have arrived here, and I’m eternally thankful to him for the trip I’ve had. I feel bad about putting Matt in a situation of having to decide to carry on solo, but I must take care of myself. He’s a very strong-willed and independant fellow; he’ll be fine.
Hasta la vista!
Scot
New developments for panambikeride…..
Arrived into San Cristobal de las Casas about two days ago and some crazy stuff has gone down since. Just before we entered the city Scot said in passing that it would be the end of the road for him in San Cristobal and I brushed it off as a joke. Over dinner that night he brought it up again and I realized how serious he was about quitting the ride. This has rocked me to my foundation, as it came out of absolutely nowhere. The days spent in San Cristobal, so far, have been trying to figure out what to do next as I am nowhere near ready to quit. For me, not only am I still enjoying the ride but I also have put so much energy and passion into this endevour that I simply have to see where it leads me next. The experience gets more and more amazing everyday, espcially now that we have arrived in Chiapas and the Mayan areas, but there are definately very scary aspects to this part of Mexico.
The ride from Palenque here was a real ball-buster, which we were expecting. It was through the Zapatista controlled areas and there were many painted murals and a lot of graffitti along the road dipicting the struggle against the government and the “imperialists.” It was a constant reminder of where we were and some of the circumstances under which the people of this area live. It is very much a very poor and problemed part of Mexico. We were only averaging a little over 50km a day due to the constant climbing and descending along the jungle covered winding roads, and we had one day of well over 4,000ft gain. All the days were brutally hot, and the humidity high in the mountains was so thick that they were constantly shrouded in a haze that made it impossible to see very far into the distance.
We visited a really cool Mayan site outside Ocosingo called Toniná and also the Cascadas Agua Azul, just south of Palenque. I thought that Toniná was almost more interesting than Palenque, mainly because there were so few tourists and the huge pyramid was built on top of a hill overlooking the surrounding Ocosingo countryside. When we arrived we were invited to join a group of Mexican women on their private tour which turned out to be really fun AND yet another lesson in Spanish comprehension! The site was very beautiful and I highly recommend a visit if you are in the area. Chiapas has definately lived up to it´s reputation as Mexico´s “precious” region.
Chiapas´s other infamous claim to fame is highway robbery and this region in particular has been one I have been concerned about since leaving Alaska. It turns out that our fears were not misplaced. A good riding buddy of ours was robbed for nearly everything he had in Chiapas, tied up, and thrown in a ditch. This happened a few days ago while he was coming to San Cristobal to meet us. He is safe but had to abandon his trip for now with the plans to return in the next few months. Scot and I also had a minor incident along the road from Palenque but managed to avoid any trouble by moving quickly. This is a story for another time so as not to get my friends and family worked up, but it illustrates some of the risks traveling by bike in this area. I will definately be on guard as I continue down the road.
Well, panambikeride will be a solo effort from here on out so things will change a bit for me. I wish Scot all the best and he has been the best riding partner I could have asked for on our trip. Write me whenever as I will try and check the site as often as possible. Oh yea, we finally have pictures up under “Mexico—-Baja.” Take a look and let me know what you think.
One last thing I almost forgot, we went over the half way point (estimated) of 8,000 miles in route to San Cristobal–it´s all downhill from here on out!!!!!!!
¡Adios y hasta pronto!
Matt
Sounds like a Pyramid Scheme to me…….
Welcome to the Jungle, us!! Ten days ago, while we were still in Puebla, Scot and I decided to stop messing around and make some miles towards the Mexico-Guatemala border after we had started worrying about the coming RAINS in Central America!!! It´s been in our minds that we are heading into a hot, wet time of year here and it has got us a little anxious to get moving. We were about four days out of Puebla, and had been climbing in remarkably cold weather for this part of Mexico, when we crested the top of a long climb and started a crazy-fast descent into a whole new world. It was as if a switch had been thrown and Mexico changed.
We had been in the desert and arid campos (farmland) for the last twenty-five hundred miles and when we crossed this small range it was lush Jungle as far as we could see. It was a real shock, let me tell you, having the climate change so abruptly. I guess in my mind it was just going to slowly become more and more humid and overgrown! Scot and I did indeed drop the hammer and took a couple of detours in route.
We turned north towards Veracruz and hit up the Gulf of Mexico (probably the only chance on this trip to see the “other” ocean) and we rolled through Catemaco, a cool city where they practice a special Mexican “Witchcraft”, which we regrettably didn´t get to see. The previous day, we had ridden dirt backroads through endless sugarcane fields to go visit a very out-of-the-way museum with the largest Olmec head ever discovered (45 tons!) I found that the ride was far more interesting than the actual “head” because we got a chance to see a very rural Mexico. We were sharing the rough roads with grossly overloaded sugarcane transports and even got the local tour from some new-found friends, also on bikes. Further down the road we stopped by the ruins of another important Olmec site, called La Venta, that was an important Pre-Mayan ceremonial and cultural center before Christ! Very wild.
Well, temps have been soaring and the wet heat is far different, and more debilitating, than the dry heat. We have been cranking out the miles to arrive in Palenque and now that we arrived we´re taking a couple of days off. We found this very cool–cheap–place to rent a cabaña in the Jungle right outside the entrance to Palenque that someone likened to the Mexican version of “Burning Man.” You´d have to ask Scot about that as No Conozco. It is really cool and we have been meeting travellers from all over the world here.
This morning I visited the site and Scot will go in tomorrow, as he wasn´t feeling well today. I was impressed by the site but almost had a heat stroke as temperatures soared to 103 degrees!!! I had completely saturated the t-shirt that I was wearing but it didn´t keep me from climbing as many of the structures as they would allow. In the past I have visited the Mayan sites of Copan (Honduras) and Tikal (Guatemala) and I must say that Palenque was every bit as cool as both of those. Also, the museum here has preserved better–in my opinion–the glyphs and artifacts uncovered from the site than the other two sites.
Finally, time and again Scot and I have been amazed at the generosity and interest that the Mexican people have shown in our trip. Giving us food or even a place to stay for the night, we have so many people to thank that I couldn´t even begin. We´ll be leaving Mexico soon and this is a country that has truly been a pleasure to travel in. I guess I didn´t know what to expect upon arrival but this is one place to which I will absolutely return. Adios all, and we will finally have pictures to show VERY SOON!!!!!!!
Mateo
Talking Turkey in Cholula
On Monday night we camped within sight of the Temple of the Sun at Teotihuacan. It was a pretty cool campsite - Matt’s campsite finding ability comes thru again, but I have to take credit for betting there’d be camping so close to the pyramids.
Last night we were in Calpulalpan. Rain was just spitting down a little bit every once in a while, and the sun behind us was about a hour up in the sky, shining thru red clouds dumping virga. I was mesmerized by the lightning and the sky - I’m unaccustomed to seeing clouds in Mexico. And I was so high on riding that I was barely worried about camping in the rain. But Matt was concerned about camping under lightning, so his campsite sense led us to get a very nice $18 motel. I cleaned my socks and stitched my shirt. I’m dedicating my shirt stitches to my Dad for his birthday. Just think, I saved $2.50 and got 1/10th the quality of the patch that was put in my pants in Tequixsquiac.
Tonight we’re in Cholula. We rode down a brand-new toll highway that saved us many miles, much traffic, and brought us over a mountain range without much altitude change. And the views were terrific. That brought us to Tlaltenango and another long highway thru flat farmland to San Miguel Xoxtla. From there it was small brick factories and turkeys all the way to Cholula.
Matt discovered he can make the turkeys gobble back at him. I was gonna give him grief for being able to talk turkey until I learned I can do the same thing. It works about half the time. Some day I’m gonna have a pig, four turkeys, 10 chickens and a small flock of sheep. Or maybe I’ll just visit them on somebody elses farm?