Day 23 Rest day in San Cristóbal de las Casas

---

Distance driven today: none – instead we walked around the historical city center and got some exercise J

Cumulative distance driven: 6,121 miles / 9,859km (11,000 miles to go)

Today’s trip: Hotel in San Cristóbal de las Casas to central market place, to coffee shop, to lunch place, etc.

Artisan masks bought for Christer’s collection: 1

---

After 3 weeks of continuous riding, and some 6,000 miles / 10,000km on the roads of the northern American continent, today was time for a rest day. What better place to do take a day off than picturesque San Cristóbal de las Casas, which is the main cultural center of the Chiapas district in the Mexican federation. San Cristóbal has a great historic city center, with many artisan shops, groovy coffee places, a huge variety of eateries, and a genuine atmosphere. The streets are full of the local indigenous people, called Tzotzil, who comes every day down from the surrounding mountain villages to sell their goods, to unsuspecting tourists, i.e. us! San Cristóbal is also a backpacker friendly city to hang out in, something which in my mind, makes for a great destination to spend a few days in. In addition, the air here in the mountains is really fresh, as the city is located at an elevation of 2,200m / 7,200ft.

This morning we slept in, and had brunch at a local restaurant on one of the several colonial pedestrian streets. However, having a rest day doesn’t necessarily mean that you get to do nothing at all when you are on the PanAmerican highway riding adventure. Today was a great day to catch up with my laundry and repack all the storage bags in the two motorcycle panniers (panniers ar the two big aluminum boxes on the side of the rear rack). I also spent some time preparing the GPS tracks and routes for the trip between here and Panama city, and talked to the customer support team of the Spot satellite tracking service device (the one I misplaced two days ago in Coatzcoalcos) and figured out where I can buy a new one in Guatemala city.

Today was a also the day when I literally dried my riding jacket and pants. Turns out that, after bribing the police officer in Tuxla Guitierez (see yesterday’s blog post in case you missed this highlight on Mexican corruption), we got stuck in rush hour traffic while trying to leave the city and get on the road to San Cristóbal. If you combine that with major traffic revisions and constant go/stop driving, combined with a 38C/100F heat, you get a motorcycle engine that overheat twice. Needless to say that I myself was sweating copious amounts in my heavy riding gear and helmet, to the point that they were literally dripping! Therefore, today I had to spend some time today washing up and drying my riding gear so that it is ready for tomorrow’s ride. Speaking of that, after an entire week’s worth of riding through Mexico, tomorrow morning we will be riding into Guatemala and core Central America. That means more border crossings (hopefully without bribes!) and more currency exchanging.



Within the coming week we will rapidly be moving through no less than five countries; Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama, before reaching Panama city, which also marks the official half-way point of the PanAmerican highway. In Panama City we will be taking most likely a few days off, to visit a school with donated Kindle e-readers, rest, visit the canal, do laundry, replenish a few supplies, and perhaps most importantly, figure out how to get the motorcycle to South America through Cartagena on the Atlantic side of Colombia.

---