As we began cycling north in the Mexican state of Sinaloa we pushed high mileage, for several reasons: the road was very flat, there was not much to see with little variance in the landscape, and there were few towns along the way. Also, we were all looking forward to being back in the U.S. On the first day we rode 78 miles aided by a light tail-wind, despite several setbacks due to Nico unluckily popping three flat tires. The second day, March 8th, we started out in a dense fog which lasted all morning and left droplets of dew on my armhairs, and soaked my shirt, which remained wet all day so that I was quite cool later in the day. Even though we travelled nearly due East on the ferry, the temperature was lower on the mainland, which we attributed to the different geography. We stopped in Navajoa, where I enjoyed getting lost in the huge chaotic marketplace full of vendors selling shoes and clothes and various foods. Towards the end of the day it was evident that my right pedal, which had been making unsettling noises for awhile, was breaking. Sure enough, the next morning immediately after getting back on the road the thing broke off completely. I had to ride 16 miles to the next town while exerting an inward force with my leg to keep the pedal's spindle inserted in the crank, but it actually wasn't so bad and we kept up a reasonable pace. But the fact that a large city was that close was lucky. Even more remarkable was that a bike shop there had clipless pedals (the kind I needed); it was the first place we'd seen them in Mexico. The package was dusty and on sale, causing us to believe they were perhaps the sole pair of clipless pedals in the entire country!
It began raining after we left that city, and we rode maybe an hour and a half in the light drizzle. Since I don't have fenders on my bike I got muddy and my spirits were low. My cycling computer got wet and didn't work properly for the rest of the trip. But the rain let up and we had a nice sunset. Without a stove we didn't cook anymore, so Dave and my breakfasts consisted of dry cereal and baked goods if we had them. That particular morning we had muffins and mixed six combinations of dry cereal. We rode to Guaymas, and while we were having a snack in the plaza we talked to another gringo from Arizona who vacationed there often. Some might say he was a lonely old man, but I sense something genuine in a person who chooses solitaire, or rather finds comfort in the extremes of living - in cold places and the desert. I would prefer a true life alone than a false life in society, equally isolated. But maybe that's all mumbo-jumbo, a young man's heavily-influenced romanticizing of ideals.
We cycled on to a beach outside of San Lucas (we didn't make it all the way in to the gringo town). I tried to enjoy the splendid afternoon, feel the breeze and take in the beauty of the nearby hills - the first landscape worth looking at in a while. I thought, "Before I know it this trip will be over, so I should try harder to live in the moment and commit this to memory." Ahh, if that were possible, to distinguish in the banks of my mind the thoughts and feelings of some particular times of this trip, for they drift away even the same evening. Perhaps I push them away, and am merely trying to put a good light on what is in actuality painful, difficult, monotonous, and sometimes boring! Maybe that's why I was tired that day, which is okay, because the past few days had been boring and challenging, a dire combination. Later I gained a more elevated disposition because we were at a fine place where pelicans dove for fish and a soft sun descended behind spiky hills, where my body and spirit found comfort and rest. Then we wrestled in the chilly ocean. Dave and I drank a bottle of tequila, and I wrote this poem:
Could I live on rice alone?
Sustained by the sun and wonder at the vitality of the earth.
Muffins...contain flour, eggs, sugar. I just wish I didn't care,
That stimulation through my stomach, whether by special food or coffee or alcohol, was not the highlight of a day.
That these wouldn't divert my curiosity from here, now, this place, the sun sifting through the breeze,
So please elevate me above that lowly, sluggish cavern of acids, high above the seas splashing over their container.
We watched the pelicans diving. They float along the wind until spotting a meal ten yards below, then pause mid-air for a moment adjusting their trajectory before diving straight in. They tuck in wings just before splashing in, and resurface almost immediately to gulp down whole their prize if their mark was true. Their long, pointed beaks streamline the impact of the water. At night I looked at the moon through binoculars and thought how awesome it would be to witness a large asteroid strike it - no stream of fire for warning, just a giant mushroom cloud of moon dust leaving a new crater to wonder at on clear nights.
The next morning was pleasant riding, but the rest of the day was not so enjoyable. I got a bad rash from my riding shorts, one of my new pedals developed an annoying clicking, I got a flat tire on the trailer when I hit some of the metal from all the 18-wheeler tire shrapnel on the damned highway, and it felt like we took too many breaks throughout the day, including over an hour at a gas station where we played hacky-sack and Dave took a nap. Still, we made over 60 miles. We opened a gate to a radio tower, and found a nice spot near a rocky outcropping to camp. With plenty of sunlight left, Nico and I took a short hike. We walked through grassy areas with lots of space between the trees and bushes, nice terrain for walking, the type you could cover great distances off-trail. When the land began to slope up to the hill we planned to climb the cacti and brush thickened, and we were slowed to stoop and squeeze around all sorts of poky things. We made it halfway up the slope, and sat down to enjoy the view. We walked back in golden sunbeams, and I wondered at its beauty and the place we were. After dinner we all lay and watched the full moon move behind the clouds. It was still up early in the morning when I climbed the little rock hill above our camp, so that the glow of the sun was before me and the moon behind. It was cold and windy up there.
We cycled into Hermosillo, the capital and largest city of the state of Sonora (which we'd crossed into days before), pausing above the city to note the smog that hovered over it. The city was big, and difficult to navigate. While taking a break in a plaza, we were approached by a reporter. Dave and Nico told them our story, they checked out our gear, and took a picture of us with some high-school girls (which made for some jokes later). (A link to the pic is on the right side of this page. More pics to come). The article was online, and on the front page of the Metro section the next day.
Dave and I found an inexpensive hotel, and Nico stayed with a couchsurfing.com host. I spent the afternoon washing my clothes by hand, since there was no laundromat nearby. The hotel manager was nice and opened up a little room with a large sink and wash-board, and I got to experience the drudgery of the way in which much of the world washes clothing. The second part of the afternoon I cleaned my bike and patched tubes, until Nico and his host, Joel, came by so we could all go out. Joel was a big nice dude in his mid-twenties, and we all got to know each other while I finished patching tubes. Then we got pizza at Joel's cousin's shop, stood outside making jokes, she flashing a bright smile while smoking cigarettes in her apron. We drove around to a bar; I was glad I don't have to drive in Mexico. It was a karaoke bar, packed with talent on a Thursday night. I think all Mexicans are blessed with the ability to whistle and sing. When the microphone was passed to the average Jose or a señorita, he or she'd stand up and belt out a sonata to melt your heart. We went to another place after that with a loud jukebox, and Dave put on "Hey Jude." The box had a TV screen on top which played the music video, and I stood entranced. It's one of my favorite music videos, check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXG83p2nkHw. Later on after some good Queen songs, we enjoyed meeting two more couch-surfing members.
I was so exhausted and slept in until almost 8am (I know, that's so early!). We got out of the busy city and were so happy to get off of Mexico highway 15, onto a peaceful two-lane road, with great scenery as we approached mountains. We passed some trees, real trees, and I felt like they were the tallest trees I'd ever seen, though they were just mid-sized. They seemed to offer copious amounts of shade after we'd previously huddled under a little bus-stop pavilion to escape the noon sun; Nico said, "What a waste of shade." We made the hills late in the day, where there really aren't places to camp, and we had to lower our standards to a short pull-off just by the road, from where we saw and heard loudly the trucks down-shifting, but the stars were nice. Dave and I had a typical meal, one which comprised the majority of our cook-less dinners: tortillas, a bag of beans, fresh-made guacamole, a can of veges, and cheese, and for dessert crackers with Nutella. Even without a stove we still ate like kings.
My rear hub became loose and in tiny Ures we asked around if there was a bike mechanic, and an old man showed us all the way to the hole-in-the-wall mechanic. Really it was the front room of a house, but the fat man helped us fix the wheel, hardly said a word the entire time. He charged us like a dollar. Experiences like that are priceless, precious. Honestly, it's unbelievable that all this happened in a week. How fortunate we were to experience that!
