Posted By gareth on May 14, 2011
Last challenge of the ride has been making my worn out rear tyre last the distance. It’s been down to the steelbelt for a while now and with still 600kms to go the chances of a failure quite high. Problem is locating a tyre this size in Mexico is nigh on impossible so it’s been a question of nursing it to Tijuana at least. Keeping the speed right down and riding like a granny (oops I mean a granny who doesn’t normally ride, sorry Jo) has done the trick and we’ve managed to get all the way through to San Diego.
Got to the US a day early so had to make a decision what was the best thing to do around San Diego. Decided since it was a day off we’d go for a bike ride. A couple of hundred kms later we’re exhilarated having done some miles through the back roads of Southern California – reminding ourselves of what fun our 2006 Backblocks America ride was. The backroads in the US are just great and it whets the appetite to do some more. So we’ve put the northeast US in our “to do” basket for some future year.
Down to the wire & still 600kms to go. Will it make it? Yes!!
Thanks to everyone involved making this “South of the Border” ride happen. South & Central America has been a blast – 40,000 kms of great riding, best people you can imagine – no aggressive behaviour whatsoever, nothing but helpful and fun. We’d recommend this continent to anyone. Don’t believe all the sensational, dopey headlines we get in the West, the place is no more violent than Lambton Quay after Parliament late session. Seriously – the Americans are staying away from Mexico in droves. There are 100 million people here, and they’re not all drug gangsters. Press headlines really are the epitome of the dopey dumbing down of popular perception. And it works. Already today we’ve had at least half a dozen Americans in shock and horror that we’ve been south of the border. How silly.
Anyway great ride and we move on – setting aside the long rides for a couple of years we’re feeling now and knocking off a lot of other projects that have been stuck in the “In” tray for too long. But it’s not over yet, there’s a lot still of the world out there to do by bike an time waits for nobody. Thanks Dave for coming with us again, it was great to be back riding together. Let’s hope we can join up again for another one some time.
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Posted By gareth on May 14, 2011
Fantastic country, wonderful people – this is an economic powerhouse of the future. Forget Baja California aka “Sanitised Mexico” or “Americanised Mexico”, the real Mexico is the mainland and it has heaps of potential. That the country has become the latest victim of the drug trade for rich Americans is a tragedy but it will be fixed. As you’d expect the northern neighbours have over-reacted to the headlines and are staying away in droves, hitting towns like Tijuana hard. But it’s hard not to see Mexico doing well over the next 20 years, the resources, the cheap prices – they just add up to competitiveness.
Speaking of competitiveness, we’ve been back in the US for just a day – but man, at a NZD worth 80 cents US, this economy is so cheap – it makes NZ look like an over-priced Europe. Tyre change today for well under $300 NZ – it’s no contest. NZ is over-priced, things will happen.
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Posted By jo on May 9, 2011
We had a couple of nights in the town of Loreto but found it rather lacking in the style of Mexico that we have come to love. It was like part of America, and the locals seemed strangers in their own town. First world prices with 3rd world service would be how the boat hire to the scenic off shore island struck us. A pretty, vehicle-free square in the old town was a great place to watch the sun set and hoards of kids on roller blades entertained us.
Riding into the desert, we had a temperature rise of 11 degrees in 25minutes (17 to 28) and later in the day, mid 30 degrees, we threw water over our gear to get the wind cooling effect as we rode. Huge cacti and the colours of the rocky up-thrusts, along with occasional views of the Sea of Cortez kept us enthralled as we headed North to Santa Rosalia. The main vehicles on the roads are the huge American utes and the consideration given to you by other drivers is very American, very polite.
This former French mining town is littered with remnants of the mining history, 1884 to 1954 copper was extracted and now the trains and mine equipment and buildings are a huge feature. There is still talk of getting the mining going again with more efficient techniques. The cemetery size indicates that a lot must have perished in the old mine.
The narrow streets and wooden buildings reminded us of Nome, Alaska or Arrowtown NZ, but where did they get wood in this treeless barren desert?
Nearly forgot the famous church made of pressed steel panels and maybe designed by Eiffel (he also made a tower).
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Posted By jo on May 9, 2011
Well this is a bike trip so I suppose we should talk about these trusty beasts that take us.
Gareth’s rear tyre is getting a bit bald, as is he, but we can fix the tyre. Hopefully it will be ok as we only have 1200 km to the end of this ride. Gareth also had the fuel pump issue that was fixed in Nicaragua
I’ve had to do a chain adjustment and replaced my rear brake pads, but that is all. I also had a day where the bike kept “missing” and filling it with fuel helped so next time this happened I rode the tank dry as I suspect there was dirty fuel or a bit of water in there and it fixed the problem. I did run out in the wops and Gareth and Dave went and brought some fuel back, they were nearly out of gas too that day.
No punctures so far, makes me wonder why I have so many tubes in my luggage.
The 10,000km length of this ride has meant we haven’t done an oil change yet. Might do one pre shipping if I get time.
Very happy with the machines.
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Posted By jo on May 6, 2011
We are on a mission to get to Mazatlan and the Baja ferry that will get us to the Baja California peninsular so it has been a fast day with quite a distance on the toll roads. These are not cheap at about $20 NZ for 100 km (for each bike) but the time saving can be great, and they feel a lot safer to be on with a verge to pull on to when a fast maniac tail-gates, no country towns and a predictable surface.
The Baja ferry has no cabins left and can’t guarantee bike space tomorrow afternoon and also has very limited space on the Friday sailing in two days. So we could wait 24 hours only to be disappointed, there is another service 600km away, and this doesn’t get us excited as it is just too big a ride for one day.
I have read a couple of blogs about another freight only ferry and we chance on the office and they have a boat leaving in a couple of hours, half the price and that includes meals and a seat. The blogs I read were not favourable but for 16 hours we can endure anything. So we race to the shop to get some rum and coke and chippies. A complete military check of the vehicles delays the departure a bit, and we are off into the Sea of Cortez. Our 3 bikes and 30 big trucks and the drivers off into the sunset. The food was not great (beans that looked like vomit) but the rum worked its magic.
I string up my hammock and settle in for the night on the deck but should have chosen a space out of the prevailing cool wind as by the time it was dark and I felt sea-sick and cold, I had no energy to change it. I suspect I still had a better night than Gareth and Dave who slumped in chairs all night. Woke to marlin leaping and the morning star glowing in the east.
Onto Baja peninsular and to a hotel in La Paz for a recovery sleep.
Here we leave Dave as he is off to the world Game fishing champs in Carbo San Luis and will leave his bike in LA for shipping a week after us. Well we kept to schedule and got him here on time so let’s hope he catches (and releases) a big one. Good luck Davey and thanks for the company.
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Posted By gareth on May 1, 2011
There are next to no tourists here – well not from beyond Mexico anyway. Perhaps the recent beheadings have had something to do with that. And the police and army rolling through the streets continually with machine guns at the ready loaded to the eyeballs, certainly aren’t what you normally associate with surf turf. But apart from those minor details, this town is awesome. From the swarm of original VWs (they still make them here to the old formula!) which comprise the city’s tax fleet, to the clifftop divers who daily swan off the end of La Quebrada to plunge into a blowhole some 35 metres below, the city may have been the haunt of people from yesteryear – Sinatra, JFK etc – but its shabby beachside hotels are still fun to be based at.
And if you come here make sure you have a night at La Perla restaurant where you get unparalled views of the clifftop divers as they dive from sunset right on into the night. Top it all off with your own swim from Acapulco’s great beach and this is a top stopover. See the diving photos here
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Posted By jo on May 1, 2011
My hero
Acapulco and the cliffs famed for the high diving spectacular have always been my ultimate dream. Not watching but doing……but…….I suspect I have left my cliff diving too late,, that is if I intend to survive it.
We went for the sunset event and settled into the La Perla restaurant with a wonderful close view to the cliffs. There is a little shrine at the top where the divers pray before they plunge into the surging abyss.
These young men delight me with mirrored synchronised diving from about 20 metres and the 35m drop from the top means the reverse summersault is a fantastic spectacle. The angle of the rock-face means the divers have to throw themselves 10 metres out.
We eat drink and watch two more shows with lights and different dives each time
For many years I coached spring-board and high board diving and it was my main sport and interest. Getting to see the Acapulco cliff diving, a dream come true. Photos are here
Jo
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Posted By jo on April 29, 2011
We are really enjoying the Pacific coast of Mexico.
From the hot, scrubby, arid interior of Mexico to Porto Escondido where we lay in the sea’s shallows as the huge rolling surf was too much.
Surfers played in the clear blue briny while we had a day of rehydration and then continued back into the interior of Mexico for a night before Acapulco. It was only 420 km from Pto Escondido to Acapulco but we can only average about 50 km per hour because of traffic conditions and speed bumps, so we did this in 2 half day rides to reduce the time in the over-powering heat.
The little inland town on the main drag was overpopulated by men with machine guns,,,, we discovered this after finding a place to stay. I went up to one of them and asked in my best Spanglish if it was safe for us to be here, and he walked away from the nearby locals and said “No”. We also spoke to the locals who said it was fine there, just be careful in Acapulco. Anyway it was fine and we found a great dirt floored, seafood restaurant with the best food ever.
The 200km to Acapulco took us 5 hours and then an illegal U-turn in town introduced us to the cops, who reduced the fine significantly for cash. Lots of utes cruise by with black clad, masked, machine-gun ready military on the back. A helicopter cruised overhead guns hanging from the open sides while we were swimming this morning. I think the show of might is meant to make us feel safer. Huge problems here with the drug lord wars and 35,000 deaths in recent times.
Missing my friends and family and grand-babies so it is good to be on the home gallop.
Jo
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Posted By gareth on April 27, 2011
Have hit it at last – Mexico’s long coastline of beaches. Seems werid to be watching the sun set over the Pacific but the temperatues of the water (23) and the air (33) are agreeable – especially since we read its raining for Easter back in NZ. In fat i could stop right here, park the bike up and just beach bum from now on. The seaside jaunts are full of US surfies doing just that – the break down here apparently is the finest along the coast so it’s to here they flock. To me the waves look massive and a step wrong would see you crawling back up the beach with a wrenched back or worse. Indeed we saw a few of those – so quite a surfing challenged!
The Pina Coladas haven’t got any worse now we’re on the coast and for some reason they go down even easier at sunset over the bay. Heaven! One thing that this whole South American trilogy – from the Pisco Sours of Peru to the Cappriosca’s of Brazil and now to these – cocktails are addictive on roadtrips.
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Posted By jo on April 26, 2011
It has been a surprise to see the number of children and adults out selling trinkets on the street and the number of elderly who sit palm out begging. This has been of epidemic proportions in some tourist places and is likely to discourage tourists, as you feel constantly harassed.
The adults are a different problem to the huge hoards of kiddies being lead to the streets by parents. Once you can toddle or another breast clutching bundle has evicted you from the back wrap it is street life for many. Tugging on walkers, diners, but mainly tourists is an accepted part of street culture it seems.
It seems to be mainly ethnic groups and in one town a religious minority that live this life. The Mexicans need to look at the price that might have to be paid later, Street crime seems a likely progression for these kids and possible involvement in the drug cartels.
When we were doing an early walk to the clanging tunes of church bells, we chanced upon a queue of bedraggled kids being equipped with their wares from a great bail of imported trinkets.
A young girl, maybe 10, sat alone for at least 14 hours at the door of our hotel on Easter Saturday with a few necklaces and mass produced “hand” crafts. It doesn’t seem right.
In Paraguay, we visited a government and UNICEF project that has had positive impact on the lives of a similar group of kiddies. The price the communities pay for the help with food and schooling is – no children are allowed selling, loitering or begging on city streets.
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