Road Trip 2005 - North and South America by Motorcycle: September 2005

Tilling the garden for the Swopes... What is this - wait, I remember, its work!

Welcome to the USA

The turtle.

Val and the reptile

View from the time-share...

Mazatlan

Mexican coastline south of Puerto Vallarta.

Cloud forest on pot-hole road.

Mexican highlands.

Where are we?

Don’t miss this...

"They’re Back!"

Or

“It’s Valerie’s Birthday!”

Or

“Sizzling meat, cold drinks and burnt bodies!”

Whatever does it for you, come and celebrate with us. Argentine BBQ, five-star swimming pool, kids, dogs and the venerated master of ceremonies, El Pirate,
invite you to welcome weary travelers home in style. All we ask is an RSVP so
we can supply adequate accoutrements and directions.

RSVP by e-mailing the birthday girl at : valerieswope@gmail.com

We hope to see ALL of you.

The date is set for the 1st of October.

A&V

Southern Mexico

Mexico is an immense country, staggering in proportion to its southern neighbors. Mexico is the the largest expanse of land we have encountered since Argentina. I estimate around 3,000 miles from Cancun to the US border. I now realize we saved the biggest and most challenging country for last.

Mexico has different challenges than any of the previous countries have had: There are more cars here than in all the other countries combined, and everyone who has a car drives it like they stole it. We have already witnessed the aftermath of at least a dozen major accidents and seen as many close calls. The cities are big, congested and not far apart with the main highways often running right through the center of them, making traveling a test of patience and endurance. “Topes”, or speed bumps, are everywhere, even on the main highways, and they come in every imaginable shape and size. Sometimes there are signs warning of topes, sometimes there are not, making driving somewhat dangerous, but always slow. In one 100-mile stretch of main highway Valerie counted 73 topes. Mexico is also relatively expensive. Most hotels in the “budget” category cost at least $25 for two people for the same quality of room that cost $10 in Guatemala. It is also terribly hot here.

Enough complaining. The food is awesome and inexpensive. Valerie and I can often find a great Mexican lunch or dinner for fewer than seven dollars for both of us. As we have been living on a steady diet of tacos, tortas and tamales, this is my first time abroad that that I have not craved Mexican food. The road signs are generally excellent and numerous, making navigation easy. The people are friendly and finding parking at hotels has been easy.

We were unable to find tires in Guatemala for the bike and our tires were getting pretty worn down. You forget how tires should look when you have not seen new tires in 10,000 miles. The front tire featured a bald stripe and it wouldn’t hold air, while the back tire was having intermittent problems keeping itself inflated. We decided to try and get new tires in Mexico even though they would cost us a fortune. BMW’s website lists 15 BMW motorcycle dealers in Mexico, complete with address and phone numbers, but this resource proved useless as none of them ever answer their phones. Even though none of the dealerships we called ever answered we still had faith that they existed. We chose the closest dealer to us, which happened to be in Cancun, and made a sprint up the Yucatan (or yuck-a-tan, as those who have been there can testify) in hopes of them having tires in stock, or at least the ability to get them.

As we made our way up the Yucatan the damage from the recent hurricane became evident. All the trees had twisted and broken off, road signs were bent in half, and we even saw this huge cell-phone satellite structure twisted and bent by the roadside. We also saw other equally shocking sights. After six months in Central and South America, the enormity of the tourist industry in Mexico (especially on the so called “Mayan Riviera”) was terrifying. We drove for 100 miles along a new four-lane expressway punctuated every few miles by an interstate size turnoff into some generic mega-resort, with only the size, shape and color of the massive gates and bold lettering differentiating to the passer by any sort of distinction between them. It was all quite new to us. Dont get me wrong, I would have loved to pull into one of the mega-hotel vacation makers and live in luxury for a week, but we had to buy tires instead. It turned out that we could have easily afforded to stay at any resort in utter opulence for a week for the price of the final bill we got at BMW Cancun.

We arrived in Cancun and managed to find the dealership, intact and open, complete with a phone that even seemed to work. Of course they didn’t have GS tires in stock (the GS line is BMW’s number two selling model of all time), but they could have them delivered within a week for us. The thought of spending a week in Cancun didn’t appeal to us at all, so we decided to put off buying tires until Mexico City. We left Cancun and headed straight across the Yucatan towards Merida. We had made it only 100 miles from Cancun when this horrible grinding/moaning noise started. At first we thought the rear tire had gone flat, but the noise persisted even with full tire pressure. We made it to the next closest town, Valladolid, and discovered the rear main bearing had died. This is a known issue for the GS series and any smart rider always carries a spare bearing with them on a long trip. You can guess that I didn’t bring a spare bearing. When the bearing goes bad on the rear differential the wheel had perceptible lateral and vertical movement while shaking it. A bad bearing is not necessarily going to leave you stranded, but you need to fix it fast. The front tire was also flat. While in Valladolid, I tried to have the leaks in the tires repaired, but it turned out that the tires were un-repairable. The tire guy found five leaks in the front tire and five in the rear tire, which, as he explained to me, were grounds for scrapping them. We called the dealer, tails between our legs and ordered new tires and bearing. They told us it would take at least five days to get the items from the warehouse in Mexico City.

We stayed in he small, hot town of Valladolid as long as we could bear, then returned to Cancun to wait. We ended up finding this great hotel with a full kitchen TV and AC. One good thing we found about Cancun is that it has a Wall-Mart (two, actually) where we could stock up on cheap groceries and other necessities. Valerie took full advantage of the kitchen, and on the first night there we had spaghetti and meat sauce, our first home cooked meal in a long time. We both woke up the next morning with stomach cramps, diarrhea, chills and nausea that we attributed to the Wall-Mart hamburger. We were both feeling better soon since we still had powerful antibiotics purchased in Guatemala.

After a few days of hiding from the dreadful heat and ever present mid-westerners gone wild, we got word from the dealer our parts had arrived. It turned out that the dealer ordered us the correct brand, but wrong style of tires. For some reason the dealer thought we wanted off-road mud tires for our trip across Mexico. I explained to them that mud tires would be practically worthless in Mexico and they graciously agreed to change them for the street version off a new bike. They ended up putting on horrible Bridgestones, the worst tires they had, but since the bearing installation went so well I decided to give the tires a try. I hate the Bridgestones. They slide in turns and spin under acceleration. It is also really hard to do wheelies with them, as they spin when Meltzer’s would grip.

After enduring a week in Cancun we decided to get as far away from the city as we could. On our first day with new tires and bearing we did almost 400 miles and ended up in Campeche, a beautiful city on the Gulf of Mexico. The bike ran smoother than it ever has, evidence that the rear bearing had been dying a slow death, with vibration increasing as the miles piled up. The next day we headed for the ruins at Palenque and on the way we met three bikers heading south. It was really cool to meet them and share stories. They had all sorts of questions for us since we had just done the journey they were starting. They reminded me of Valerie and I when we were just hitting the road, full of questions and worries about the journey ahead. We assured them Colombia was no problem, recommended good border crossings and promised them Mexico was the most expensive country they would travel through. We wished them well and as I watched them ride off I thought of the journey they had ahead of them; how long it is, how difficult, dangerous and at times frustrating motorcycle travel can be. Meeting them reminded me of how far we had come, both as travelers and as individuals from the start of our trip; Nothing is impossible.

Palenque’s ruins are beautiful, studded with amazing statuary and frescos, covered walkways and great temples reminiscent of Angkor Wat. After we had been to many of the pyramids and were almost delirious with heat a thunderstorm suddenly materialized and started to dump rain. It was raining so hard the paths and grounds surrounding the ruins started to flood. We ran for the shelter of the ruins and watched it rain until the guards made us leave at closing time. It was still raining, we were soaked and we had a 10-mile ride back to town. We managed to find a plastic bag for the backpack, and to our welcome surprise some generous soul closed the face shield on Valerie’s helmet on the bike. The ride back was actually fun, although we couldn’t go very fast because of the stinging raindrops. I could hear Valerie laughing as we rode down the twisting jungle road, oblivious to her soaked clothes, enjoying the moment.

From Palenque we headed into the mountains where we soaked in the cold temperatures as if we were trying to store them up for the heat ahead. We had two days of riding along the coast through boring landscapes and hammering heat to look forward to before we reached Oaxaca. When we reached Oaxaca I was immediately reminded of Cusco in Peru, high in the mountains and riddled with beautifully preserved buildings. The cool temperatures allowed us to get out and explore the city and our days rest has been great. We even found a cheap hotel.

Here we are.

Welcome to North America. We could smell the Mexican food from here.

Our hotel room in Valladolid. They were doing some cement work while we were there...

Valladolid, Meico. We waited here for three days for our parts eating cheap tacos and sweating.

Thats the bearing that failed. Big, huh? We gave it a burial on the roadside (tossed it from the bike at 90mph - It made some teriffic noises)

Typical truck wreck on a dangerous highway. Thats the tow truck facing the camera. We were unable to find the driver, so I think I will post this on the roadkill blog too.

Where are we, China? If you can pronounce the bottom sign name for us correctly, Valerie will buy you a beer.

Palenque.

It was so hot at the ruins I almost jumped off the tallest pyramid head first. Valerie talked me out of it though.

Palenque.

Rain and ruins, Palenque.

Give me a break, as if these guys could ever catch anyone... A VW Bug cop car! We tried to get them to smile for the camera, but I think they were embarrased.