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Published: September 15th 2009
Pallenque Ruins
Only 4% of the city is uncovered, the rest is still under the jungleSan Miguel Allende is a very beautiful town. Almost Moroccan in style with roof gardens and narrow entrances to opening courtyards with cafés, stalls and shops to explore. However before this we need to get there and the road works means diversions through narrow cobbled (more like rocked) streets in small side towns. Then we need to navigate through San Miguel Allende itself. This took only two attempts. The hotel is indeed an old converted monastery and while basic the rooms surround and large courtyard, now festooned with motorcycles. No luxuries like air conditioning or too much hot water. We wander about the town and head for a recommended restaurant called Mama Mia's, for Pizza. Yes Yes I know but there are only so many tacos, enchiladas and burritos you can have. As Kevin says Mexican food is great but its all the same, the only difference is the way its folded. Karen is unfortunately feeling a little below par and so eats little and I am also not too great so despite a boozy night being on the cards we return for and early finish. After washing the bike and tightening a few loose bolts the following day is spent
wandering around the town. We find the locals market place which goes on and on, with everything from spices to cowboy hats, shoes to fresh vegetables We lunch in a lovely courtyard café and then inspect the cathedral which is being prepared for a wedding. White lilies abound.
Off the next morning in dry and bright weather riding with Max and Christine to Huetjutla. The first 100 miles are dull and then we turn off into the mountains. We have been warned that the road is twisty (good), challenging (excellent) and over the next 125 miles deteriorates with more and more potholes and topes (not good). This proves to be very accurate although also missed out the low cloud that reduces visibility to 10 yards and necessitates donning water proofs. It is a very demanding non stop left right left right run of twists and turns that has us all whacked by the end of the day. We arrive at Huetjutla in drizzle, which is a clue of what is to come. As we stroll into the main plaza that evening with Mass still being said in the church and people queued outside we manage to find no-where to
Welcome to Guatemala
This shot was a couple of minutes from the border when it had calmed down and Karen dared to take the camera out eat. There is a pattern that starts with road side stalls. If there is one selling bananas and honey there are 20 in a mile, and then no more for the next two days. It can be furniture 15 in a stretch of a couple of miles and none for days. So it is here. Mobile phone and ice cream. Neither appeal. We bump into Ed and Lorraine and Kevin and Julia (not difficult to spot as we are the only gringos in town) and we eat at a road side taco stall next to the hotel. They are great, fresh, not too spicy and cheap! Meal for two including drinks £3.50. Bargain.
While mentioning Topes (what are they I hear you cry) lets bring you up to date on Mexican traffic calming. There are several methods but the most popular is the Topes. This is a speed bump in the road. However they come in every shape and size. This can be a gentle rise and fall (unusual) big lumps (fairly common) and very steep 5-6 inch high steep lumps (very common) and then football topes. These are steel lumps the size of half a football in a
Taxi...
Hopefully you can see the rear bumper of the pick up is scraping the ground and the plumes of diesel smoke behind it. This is standard latin transport for anything up to 20 people. Health and Safety doesn't really exist.... line across the the road. To make this more interesting they then put a second line staggered across the road to make sure you can't miss both. Where do they put them? Entrance and exit to villages (sensible as slows the 80 ton trucks to a crawl; At pedestrian crossings (also sensible); At any random point where they have left over tarmac, on dual carriageways, on the motorways and absolutely anywhere they fancy. Some you see and cross at 10 - 15 mph, some you don't and hit at 70 mph and get fully airborne and do your wheels no good at all. Some days 50 of them, some days 500 - ARRRGGHHHHH!
We awake it Huetjutla with a fantastic demonstration of the word torrential. The streets are 6 inches deep in water and there are rivers running off the roof's of buildings and hitting the river, sorry road, with great gusto. The drains are overflowing and the man hole covers are starting to lift. Rain in Copper Canyon appears to have been merely a shower. It is like the rain in old films where it appears that some-one is running a shower in front of the camera. We
set off in full water proofs and the rain continues for the first hour. When it stops we are desperate to get out of the water proofs as we are burning up in the effective sauna that they produce. Negotiating Poznan Rica, a relatively poor city is pretty challenging and we learn later even Kevin took a wrong turn. However onwards we ride into ever more tropical country, with palms and hanging vines. Our destination is a Best Western on the Caribbean Coast. We arrive in drizzle but within half an hour the sun is shining and the sea is beckoning. Any chance of dinner we inquire? The manager may be able to sort something out with the hotel next door. This turns out to be a pre dinner snack of roast vegetables, melted queso (Cheese), and tortillas, and lovely pasta starter and a local grilled fish on garlic with spicy baked potatoes and al dente vegetables All a bit different from the Taco stand of last night.
We are now really in the tropics. The ride to Catemaco is hot sticky and tiring and despite being down the Caribbean coast there is little breeze. We stop for lunch
Chichicastananga Hotel
Courtyard of parrots and plants at a little Cantina run by 6 sisters who are full of fun and do us some fantastic grilled garlic shrimps - Muy Bien. Catemaco is on a lake and we drink at a bar out on stilts in the lake having by passed all the out of season boat men trying to sell trips to monkey island.
Catemaco to Pallenque is our first dull riding day. Largely on Mexican toll roads but only 260 miles to do. The Kin Ha Resort has a great pool and little thatched cottages. We are only two miles from the Pallenque Mayan ruins, which we will save for our day off tomorrow as we arrive in 38C and 60% humidity! Dinner in the restaurant is excellent after a hard afternoon relaxing by the pool. Tough this adventure motorcycling you know. Our day off is kicked of early as we want to be round the ruins before the midday heat. We arrive at 8.30am hire a guide (Francisco - great ingleesh) and spend two hours around the ruins. We then set off into the jungle for a “walk” - This turns out to be an hour trek through the most incredible heat and
humidity to see some of the 96% of the ruins still covered by jungle and canopy. Both the ruins and jungle are very impressive - see photos. Back to the pool for a hard afternoon of ….. not a lot really. With only two more nights in Mexico we are about to tick off our third country with only 10 more to go....
The ride to San Cristobal de la Casas is a short one and so we stop at the Azul Cascades. An unusual waterfall because the calcification of the rocks gives the water a crinkly almost crimpolene effect. Because the rock actually builds up not wears away it also means that there are few channels and the water is spread thinly over a wide area of rock. Bad news today is Gerald has taken a tumble and damaged his bike quite a bit. He is shaken but OK and will have three or four days in the van to recover. San Cristobal is clearly firmly on the Mexican tourist trail. Typical layout of narrow cobbled streets and a large central plaza is different to others as it is flanked with internet café's, restaurants and tour companies. Far
Road to Ruins
Another average day on the Guatemalan roads. from being the only Gringo's in town as we have been on a number of occasions we feel in the majority here. Rain, low cloud and an early start for the Guatemalan border mean we have little time to explore.
Our destination is Panajachel in Guatemala. We leave at 6.30am as a group because we need to exit Mexico and enter Guatemala, and want to do so before it is insanely hot and humid. 100 miles to the border and 140 the other side means today will be a long day. Exiting Mexico is fairly straightforward although it takes 2 hours. 10 minutes to stamp all of us, the rest of the time to export the bikes, which we had had to temporarily import. We then leave the orderly computer driven Mexican offices and ride 2 miles up the road to the border. The process is 1) Pay to get bike fumigated 2) do passport stuff for people, including tourist visa 3) Import bike and get temporary permit and pay 40 quetzels for the privilege A bit bureaucratic but simple enough except that this is all done in a chaotic market spreading from either side of the road. Tuc Tuc's (Three wheeled scooter engined taxis for two officially, although upto 7 can get in if they hang out the side of them) force there way through the market and the chaos, and locals cross the border seemingly with nor formalities just be ducking under the barrier! The change is immediate and tangible. Guatemala is more vibrant more colourful, more chaotic and more interesting. The ride to Panajachel is amazing. We climb on a new half finished road. We climb into low cloud and soon the visibility varies from great to none. The rain is like being under a power shower until it turns to hail. HAIL in Central America. Rainy season has come early and we are getting some of it. We are tracking tail lights ahead to see where the road goes. Where they haven't finished the road it just drops 3 inches to gravel and two lanes with fifty metres warning. Suddenly you are in towns or at junctions with buses (mainly ex USA School buses painted like a carnival float with messages like “Jesus will keep me safe on the road today” on them) and huge trucks beeping and setting off sirens like car alarms which all basically means if I am bigger than you look out. Every-one is bigger than us except the odd scooter or Honda CG125 (normally with at least 3-4 people on board. Aaron teeters off the side of the road while stationary and parks his F800GS upside down in the drainage ditch, but is un-hurt. We pass a truck jack knifed completely off the road and down a bank, and round one corner to see a chap trying to get out of his hatchback that is lying on its side in a ditch. Welcome to Guatemala!
Panajachel we don't see much off until the next morning, when we have a short walk round to the lake front and have a coffee at the same restaurant we ate at the previous evening. The lake front is over looked by three volcanoes that are partially covered in cloud. Our late departure is fine as we have only 35 mile today to get to Chichicastananga, for the Sunday market. We arrive to find what we thought was Guatemalan chaos was nothing. The locals in there brightly coloured dress are on average under 5 feet tall. Karen feels tall and I feel like Gulliver in Lilliput The market is packed and little people just push until you move, and so yo push until he person in front moves. Hawkers try and sell us and the other odd white faces local produce, but the market is primarily food and supplies for locals. Chickens live and butchered can be bought and on the next stall cooked with bananas or corn. We wander for hours and rarely retrace out steps. Our hotel is in the centre of town and is another converted monastery which houses a dozen or so parrots in the courtyards. It also has the largest selection of crucifixes outside Vatican city as every wall is adorned with one, juxtaposed with scary traditional dance masks.
Unfortunately we find out today that the dirt road through the highlands that we planned to take tomorrow has been washed away in a massive landslide in the early rains. Therefore we will ride directly to Antigua Guatemala and spend three nights there. This will not be so bad as we will arrive on the 14th and be there all day on the 15th for Guatemalan independence day, and the 16th to recover from the 15th. At breakfast the next morning we are called outside. There is a huge, 2 hour long parade, to celebrate Independence day with bands, samba music, gymnastics clubs, schools, unions, dancers, etc etc etc. It is amazing and never ending. I run the freshly charged battery on the camera flat!
We leave at 11.30 and ride to some local ruins on the short ride to Antigua. It turns out this is where all the local kids go after the parade as a treat. 20 games of football, none with goals, 50 local carnival painted buses, picnics, Mayan Shamans making offerings in the woods - we are overloaded with the energy and input. After lunch we ride on and everywhere are teams of runners with burning torches running along the roads. Groups of 20 to 30 kids or adults shepherded by a bus or pick up. There parents have clearly said here's some petrol and matches now go and play on the motorway! It is traditional to water bomb with little bags the runners, which in the heat is probably nice. However they have also decided to bomb any-one else including motorcyclists. The plastic bags become buckets, and then hoses. With the runners, the water bombs and the locals driving it is like one big video game!
Antigua is once again lovely and once again in the midst of celebrations with a huge parade that lasts hours as it snakes its way through town around the plaza and back out. This may be one of the poorest countries in America but they can certainly party. It goes on until 10 or 11 and starts again 12 hours later as we wander around town. It is an overload of Latin-ness. Two days off and three nights in one place will be great. As Independence celebrations are in full swing we are off to drink the night away with the locals....
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petra major
non-member comment
hello
Hi both, am off to Sardinia for a week tomorrow, weather forecast dire!!! But still will try to enjoy it, best wishes hope the humidity has dropped. P