Tour de Mexico…

Day 10 – Pinotepa, Oaxaca, Mexico – 260km

Pulled over by the Policia Municpal…on our way out of Acapulco Jim was stopped by the police, for nothing really.  They tried to milk him for some money, but Jim held his ground and told them flat out he wasing giving them any of his money…after a tense few minutes they agreed to just let him go with a warning.  The federal police all over Mexico have been great and are so preocupied with the drug wars that they don’t worry about traffic violations, but the municipal police are a different story.  They’re just looking for to pad they’re pockets with tourists money.  After a slow start with police, traffic and too many topes through every little small town, the roads and the scenery really opened up in the state of Oaxaca.  A big change compared to being right on the coast, it looks more like the Serengeti in Africa than anything you’d imagine Mexico would look like.  Beautiful landscape, massive trees and cattle, horses and donkeys everywhere.  The people here look much different with a real mix of native mexicans and african americans blended together…many people look almost East indian or Carribean and there are a lot of beautiful women here…think Rihanna.  Lachlan would love it here.  Pinotepa is not a tour town at all, but it has a great local vibe and feel to it…the people are really friendly and more than happy to help us struggle through with our limited, broken, mis-pronounced spanish.  I love being in places where people don’t know english because it forces us to practice and learn more spanish.

Day 11 – Zipolite, Oaxaca, Mexico, 220km

The ride from Pinotepa to Zipolite brought on a whole new landscape.One of rolling grasslands and serengeti like trees as far as the eye could see.As you would expect there was the odd oasis of palm trees and coconuts just to remind you that its still mexico.  We stopped for some pescadillos and Jay mentioned he wasnt feeling to hot so he choose to have a cup of watermelon and pineapple. After breakfast the pace picked up a bit and we put the hammer down so we could find a place to chilly chill for the afternoon. Puerto escondido was our first stop and although it looked like a great location to surf and swim we all agreed it was a tad bigger than what we were looking for. Just 40 minutes down the road we found a little gem tucked away from the mainstream crowd called Zipolite,home of the dirty hippy.It kinda reminded me of baker st just before shambala.People played drums and chanted until the wee hours of the morning but it was fun to sit back and watch the action.br

Jays sickness was getting worse so struick and i got him all settled in and went out for the night and had a good time drinking beer watching the surf come in.br

Had dinner with another Canadien from Quebec,she is down here teaching french just outside Mexico city.After a great night I decided to shut er down and left struick and Isabelle on the beach to gaze at the stars wonder what the next day brings.

Day 12 – Zipolite again…

Not much happened today, it was a planned day off the bike so luckily it gave me some time to recover.  Really just a lot of lounging around at the beach, swimmimg in the ocean and laying in some hammocks.  We ended the day with watching a movie on my tablet “Hall Pass” while this town went off with a huge hippie rave fest.  The beats and hippies are still going as I type this over breakfast on Day 13.  Time to roll on.

Day 13 – Puerta Arista, Chiapas, Mexico – 440km

Hot!  Today reached 37 Degrees!  The morning part of the ride was great with big open ocean vistas, tight twistys and very little traffic or topes. After passing through and Salina Cruz an oil mining/refinerey town I think we entered Mexico’s death valley, so hot and windy with 1000’s of wind turbines and long straight roads..we we’re being cooked right to our bikes.  Puertu Arista has the biggest beach I’ve ever seen, its goes as far as the eye can see in both directions, a nice spot with entirley Mexican vacationers.

Day 14 – Denied!  Tour de Mexico??  Tapachula, Chiapas, Mexico, 300km

We started the day early and rode hard to cross the border today…we easily were allowed entry into guatemala, passports stamped!  Step two import the bikes…Denied!  We were dicked around so much at the border with the vehicle importation office dude and a fixer that followed us through the whole process.  First it was lunch so just wait, then go make some copies of your paper work, then denial.  They wouldn’t accept my ICBC vehicle registration as proof of bike ownership??  Yeah cause im going to sell my bike in your poor country and take a huge loss??  WTF!  So Jim attmpted with his paper work cause you never know.  The border agent informs Jim he’ d have to go to a notary to get offical paper work saying his bike was in fact his?  And the fixer suggested we could maybe grease the wheels a bit with some bribe money?  At this point we’d been fucked around so much our patience was thin…Jim basically told the border agent some unpleasantries about sucking things and told them we don’t want to come to your country anymore!  So Tour de Mexico it is…up close and personal!