What happened…

Andrew writes: I just couldn’t get going today. When Nature’s alarm clock started crowing at pretty much 0600hrs on the dot, I wanted to just cover my head with a pillow and go back to sleep. Except then I remembered how I felt about this hotel’s pillows. Ugh. I decided to try making breakfast with just the Trangia (alcohol) stove, and it was a great success! 500ml of water for oatmeal boiled in about 8 minutes. We’ll see how it does with another litre added in for coffee tomorrow. I have our MSR Dragonfly, but especially when I’m inside cooking, I prefer the simplicity and silence of the alcohol burner. So with that said, we were out the door by 0730hrs. Somehow, drinking coffee must add another 30 minutes somewhere, because we’re out of coffee and look how quickly we got our day started.

The ride out of Playa Azul to Lazaro Cardenas was pretty simple, and there were lots of cyclists and runners using a bike path in the middle of the divided highway. We gave it a try too. And then, despite it being a “big city”, we were in and out of LC in no time flat. Thank goodness. It’s a hole. It just seemed really dirty, and the air quality around us cast a pall on the horizon. This put us on the cuota, with a nice wide shoulder for a number of clicks. Alas, it wasn’t meant to be, because the cuota would keep going but we had to turn onto Hwy#200 and take the libre towards Zihuatanejo. It was lunch time at this point and I was pooped. We had already ridden for 50km, and all I wanted to do was lie down on a park bench at the rest area and have a nap. I settled for a Sprite instead. It’s the most expensive soft drink I’ve had in Mexico, since the vending machine ate my $10MX. So I’m feeling a little haggard, I’m pumped full of sugar, and ready to brave the libre. Fortunately, the libre had the same wide shoulder that was on the cuota, which made the ride nice and easy.

I didn’t really pay much attention to the traffic until we got to a small town a little bit further down the road and pulled into the Pemex for water. There was only one pump working, and there was a lineup of about 30 cars waiting to fill their tanks with gas. Meanwhile on the highway there were several vendors selling empanadas. While this is normal in Mexico, it isn’t normal for a town of this size. Oh, that’s right. Today is the first day of Semana Santa, or the Holy Week.

Easter in Mexico is a two-week holiday consisting of Semana Santa (The Holy Week, beginning on Palm Sunday and ending Easter Saturday) and Pascua (Starting with Easter Sunday and ending the following Saturday). Semana Santa is undoubtedly the most important holiday in Mexican culture. Schools and often businesses in Mexico close during these two weeks and many Mexican families go on holiday during Semana Santa and Pascual. Pretty much everyone who lives in-land heads for the coast. We had thought that the craziness wouldn’t start until Wednesday, but it looks like we’ll be riding in rush hour for the next few days to Acapulco. After a big can of beer and some snack food, I was ready to try and tackle another hour on the bike.

When I saw the sign for Playa Saladita, and there were pictures of people surfing I didn’t care that it was 5km off the main road, I just wanted to escape the traffic and go! I was hoping that the beach wouldn’t be too busy since it’s a) Saturday and b) Semana Santa. Luckily, it seems like this sleepy surf town has been spared at least for a few more days. There are plenty of signs in English, and American license plates, so this must be a really popular place. The campsite where we ended up has a couple who sold everything and live in their van travelling around Central America. How cool is that! I keep asking Amanda to get a van, and she keeps reminding me of our mission and our passion. After a boogie-board session with her, I’m happy to be cycling, but more importantly just happy.

Amanda writes: Leaving early like we did today was awesome and I’m reminded of why it’s so good. I think if we did it more consistently it wouldn’t be so hard to get up that early. When it’s barely 12 Noon and you’ve already tackled 50 kilometres, the rest of the day seems manageable no matter how much further you’ve got. This morning I noticed while packing up that Andrew’s bear bell was missing and we determined that he must have lost it the other day when his bike fell over. I’m hoping that maybe after losing his bell that he’ll be more inclined to accept my offer of help when he needs to stand up his bike. Here’s how it normally happens … we both have a kick stand called the ‘click-stand’. Andrew has already been through two and I’m not sure if it’s because his load is heavier than mine or how he uses the stand; it usually doesn’t work. So he’ll lean his bike up on the click stand and then walk away. This of course is after I’ve offered for him to lean his bike against me because I’m always staying with the bikes anyway. He typically declines my offer for help (for what reason I have no idea other than he’s stubborn). So then I get to watch him struggle with standing up his bike with the stand and then I get to watch all 80 pounds of bike and gear crash to the ground. We figure that yesterday when it fell it must have popped off the bear bell which is on the outside of his front pannier and we didn’t notice. Okay so you’re probably thinking … who cares about the bear bell; you’re in Mexico! Well we’ve continued to use the bear bell everyday as a security measure. When we lock up the bikes at night time we affix the bell to the outer most bag of all of our belongings so that if anything moves, the bell moves. That way I wake up (I’m a light sleeper) and will be alerted to movement of the things. I guess now we’ll have to try and get a cow bell off of some of these cattle we keep passing.

The place we set up our tent was nice and while there were some English speaking surfers I didn’t really feel tons of love from people. Maybe my standards were set too high from San Carlos when every person we met in that community was talkative, welcoming and just downright awesome. Andrew is pretty outgoing and even when he tried to strike up conversations with others, they were pretty short lived. It was a reminder for me of how incredibly lucky we are to have met all those amazing people in San Carlos.

Oh ya, as Andrew mentioned … crazy traffic today. People honking, getting impatient, standing in line for gas for a half hour. Reminded me a lot of the July long weekend in Canada and the USA or Labour Day weekend. Cars packed sky high with all their kids beach belongings and coolers and anything you can strap to the roof. We gotta get out of here!

Today’s Photographs