To Acapulco

April 9th to 13th 2009

The modern resort of Ixtapa has an older, less well known brother. Just 10kms East in the next bay is the more modest resort of Zihuatanejo (See-wata-necko) where you're more likely to find typical Mexican families soaking up the natural beauty. It's a short ride up and over the hummock dividing rich and poorer...

Zihuatanejo was made famous as the beach escape at the end of "The Shawshank Redemption" where Morgan Freeman's 'Red' meets Tim Robbin's Andy Dufresne after all those prison shenanegans. I can see why they chose it. It's a gorgeous golden sanded bay, with small hotel buildings climbing their higgledy piggledy way up the steep rocky arms outstretched to encircle blue waters....

The buildings are much more restrained and less imposing than the gargantuan resort complexes of polished glass and crome monsters than dominate Ixtapa. It has a more relaxed feel and I like it. We stroll, and eat fish.

But unlike Andy and Red we have to leave and we continue to meander past coconut and banana plantations beside more coastal Edens....

It's a 3 dimentional road and some of the climbs are pretty steep, but never long enough to seriously tax the legs, and besides there are enough palm shacks at the road side to supply a cold coconut to refresh weary travellers. Plus the climbs always improve the views....

Flanked as it is by the huge Sierra Madre del Sur mountain range, this whole coast line is a huge drainage area, and we have crossed countless bridges over broad rivers. The rivers flow even now at the end of the dry season and will become raging torrents in the rainy months to come. Dilapidated buildings hint at their destructive power as they undercut river bank and foundation....

After the small town of Papanoa, the road again turns inland and only occasional glimpses of the blue ocean are offered through thick jungle. The ride becomes hot and dull once more and 2 relatively non descript days of riding pass in a sheen of sweat.

We crawl through the chaotic, conjested streets of Coyuca, the last town before our next destination....

And then we get to understand what congested really means as we approach the grandaddy of all resorts - Acapulco. Yes it truly is loco in Acapulco. The streets are a zoo as we duck and dive along cliff and headland approaching the 7 mile wide bay that was transformed during the 30's and 40's into Mexico's premier holiday destination.

Roads are dominated by blue and white VW beetle taxi cabs and what should be the beautiful suberbs turns out to be a grotty string of greasy car repair shops that toil to keep these smoking relics in business....

We run the gauntlet of these fare seeking psychos as they cleave and carve their demented path through traffic. Pedestrians everywhere are reluctant to twitch or otherwise make a gesture that might cause a tyre smoking U-turn as finely tuned instincts lock in on potential prey. The law of the jungle is alive and well in Acapulco!

Fate smiles and we get to live! We stop at the first hotel we come across and take a few deep breaths....

More Beach Paradises...

April 5th to 9th 2009

We leave Playa Azul and ride out through the jungles of Vietnam....

Well not really, but this is the area where they filmed Rambo 2, and I always get flashbacks when I see this....

After the incredible ride of the last 5 days beside pristine, palm lined beaches, we leave the coast and travel a few kilometers inland. Frankly it all gets a bit dull really, and it's just incredibly hot and humid away from the fresh sea breezes. By midday, we are starting to bake and energy levels are waning, when we stop for supplies and learn of yet another hidden beach just 3 miles down a dirt track.

When we arrive it seems it's not so hidden after all; most of the local village is already there. It's a Sunday and about 50 people have turned out to repair the old and build some new Palapas - a sort of wooden frame covered in palm leaves to provide shade. We form part of the crew and help to carry the mud to make the bricks to build new BBQ stands. It's a lively affair with people coming and going and taking time out to feast on the copious quantities of food that appear from various cool boxes.

And suddenly they all leave and we have our beach paradise to ourselves....

The following day it's a short ride into Ixtapa. 

In 1970, Ixtapa was a nowhere coconut plantation on Palm Grove Bay. Then Fonatur; the Mexican government's tourist department decided that maybe Acapulco was all a bit too 1950's. They decreed that a new Cuncun style resort should be built further up the coast to take advantage of the amazing beaches and coastal islands. After laying power lines and creating a water supply, this cookie cutter replica of all other tourist resorts sprang up out of the palm trees....

By applying market research and listening to what American tourists with fat wallets really wanted, Ixtapa has been incredibly successful at attracting the green stuff. 

It's as much a playground for Mexico's finest as it is for American package tours patrons. It also attracts a disproportionate number of time share vendors with prices in the mid 7 figures. That's dollars, not pesos, and hotel rates can match anywhere in the world.

But we're cycle touring riffraff and we need to find the cheap seats. Fortunately there's an RV park where we can camp right on the ocean a respectable distance away from the high rollers.

Here, bits of the coconut plantation remain and we arrive just in time to see the bare footed "look mum, no harness" style of harvest they have around here. It took this guy less than 20 seconds to shinny up this 20m tree, with nothing but a 3 foot machete to break his fall if he slipped.

And 20 seconds later....

Now that's fresh fruit! And we never had to stray from the tent to get it. 

And check out Sue's cyclista style tanned legs. For the next couple of days everywhere we go we hear mutterings of "dos colores" which means 2 colours in Spanish. Because I have a warped mind I make a note to find out what the Spanish is for "Leg Transplant" and "After the Accident".....

We take some time out to visit islands in the bay and eat fresh shrimp the size of your hand. The water round the island covers a small reef, and we snorkel amongst an array of impossibly coloured fish. They swim so close you can touch them in the crystal clear warm waters. One gets a little too close and takes a tiny chunk of meat from my leg - a piranha wannabe....

Could have been worse though....

This guy lives in a "natural reserve" with lizards and giant iguanas close to the town; about 300m from the beach. It's less a reserve and more a small swampy area right by the main road. There's a cycle path and it goes right over the top on a wooden bridge just 3 feet above where these crocs bask. The chain link fence to the side runs about 20 feet and then stops..... 

I just hope these guys get fed regularly, otherwise that wooden bridge just looks to them like a conveyor belt passing food before their sharpened fangs....

But that's enough sightseeing for us and we're off to the beach with the beautiful people. Looks like the volleyball has just started....

To Playa Azul

April 3rd to 4th 2009

The Mexican Pacific coastline is regarded as "world class". Not sure exactly what that means, but I guess it's something to do with this....

It's just a joy to ride the snake along the coast that is highway 200, as it loops and climbs and rolls inland and back to the ocean once more. In the distance, hazy vistas of whats to come as an array of palm lined headlands form bay after beautiful bay....

A child goes wild with the very brightest crayons in the box and the contrast is vivid - primary blue oceans on oneside, primary green lining the road to the other, colours too bright to be true....

And at last we see our Moby as whales are finally spotted off the coast. Too far out for a picture unfortunately, so we watch the watchers....

In one of those perfect juxtapositions, we find the reading material be the roadside just before we find the cabin and hammock by the oceanside. A perfect day ends....

To beat the heat, days start early now and we are up at 6am with the surfers taking advantage of the morning swells. Aquilas del Mar is a famous surf hangout and we meet 3 "dudes" down from Canada spending 6 months riding the big one....

Another day another perfect view....

 

Roadkill is a problem in Mexico. It's been a constant on the ride ever since we crossed the border, mostly dogs and cats, but also the occasional horse or cow. Regardless of size and shape they all just get dragged to the roadside to bloat and putrify in the heat. You just hope you encounter them zooming downhill at 60kph rather than crawling uphill, breathing hard on the fetid air at 10. On the coast, the roadkill is suddenly different as snakes and lizards basking on the hot tarmac meet a flat end.

Iggy Pop....

This is the first Saturday of Santa Semana, the 2 week festival for easter and highway 200 has become a maniacal dash to get to the beach lounger first. Some have started celebrations a little early and beer cans ejected from car windows line the roadside. Driving becomes more erratic as the day wears on and we need to avoid poor iggy's fate. 

It's a good excuse to be off the road early and we stop at Playa Azul, one of the larger beach towns along the route around midday.

Oh how I'd rather be back in Manchester....

Mexico's Pacific Coast

March 31st to April 2nd

After a couple of days off the bikes spent exploring Colima's fake colonial style buildings - the real ones having long since been demolished by earthquakes, we feel refreshed enough to leave the city. Skirting the last tendrils of the mountain range, we drop the last few hundred metres off the land to the edge of Mexico....

The temperature rises; it's rapidly approaching the warmer days of summer now, something we've been shielded from at loftier altitudes in the sierras and it's way hotter than we're used to. I get a puncture amongst the frequent pieces of tyre shrapnel lying on the road's shoulder, their soft rubber hiding lethal shards of steel binding, and run rivulets of sweat as I replace the tube. Oblivious, Sue rides on for several kilometers before realising I am no longer with her. To assuage her worry, she finds a taco stand and gorges on carnitas and fresh mangos.

And then we are amongst coconut plantations! 

As far as the eye can see..... rank and file of symmetrically planted trees march off in ever decreasing size into the distance

I never knew coconut trees were so prolific. Each tree sports up to 50ish large green football sized fruits, hidden amongst the palm leaves some 20 metres overhead. That's a lot of coconuts mutiplied by a lot of trees, running mile after mile along the highway. It's no surprise then then we start to encounter road side vendors, each with a pickup truck weighed down with produce. 15 pesos (less than a dollar) buys 2 from a machete wielding salesman, who hacks the top off the nut and produces a straw with a flourish. There's about a litre of milk inside and it's delicious. Neatly slicing the drained fruit in 2 and carving a spoon from the woody case, we eat the flesh which is so fresh it is soft and spongy - excellent snack food for passing cyclists.

We finally start to smell the ocean and the road turns, running parallel to it. Several tracks disappear off to the side in search of hidden beaches. At Boca de Apiza we take one and ride 3 miles through banana plantations before once again reaching the sea. 

The Pacific Ocean! 

It's the first time we've seen it since Northern Baja last December and we've got it to ourselves - this beach paradise is totally deserted. Camping Robinson Crusoe style....

The next days ride is simply gorgeous and such a contrast from the austere mountain beauty we have grown accustomed to. Now the senses are assaulted.

Sight -  just so much greenery, vegetation everywhere, mangos, bananas, coconut and papaya.

Smell - the scent of the ocean and all that verdancy, the air is heady.

Sound - a cacophany of buzzing cicades and bird screeches, an aural battering ram.

We leave Colima state and enter Michoacan, reputedly one of Mexico's most beautiful. At a tiny, undiscovered beach town of Maruata we find a restaurant with a view and consider the fish menu....

The next days ride is tough as the road turns in land for a while. Highway 200, so called because of all the 200 metre climbs up and over the fingers of the mountains as they reach and dip into the cooling water. We get occasional glimses of rocky beaches below as the road rides high above them....

Next week is Santa Semana, a huge Mexican holiday where hoards of city dwellers evacuate the hot choked city streets and hit the beaches. In the lull before the storm I negotiate my way into an amazing beach cabin for under 15 dollars; ocean view, private bar, pool the works, and completely empty. 

The sunset from our sun deck.....

To Colima

March 28th to 31st

Leaving our campsite at 4000m by Volcano Nevado, we begin the long descent into Colima some 90kms (57 miles away) and 3500m below us! The descent down the dirt road is massively easier going down rather than up. With a certain relief we reclaim our sack of goodies we hid on the ascent to save weight. Several items are irreplaceable, like spares for the bike and some are just valuable like my laptop and it's content, but given the volume of traffic on this road; 3 cars a day, we thought it worth the risk. 

It is only when I am crawling through dusty bushes looking for the sack that I notice an old set of tyre tracks, which flatten parallel lines in the vegetation, before disappearing off the edge and down, down into oblivion.....

These curves are not to be taken lightly....

The first 60kms are all gently downhill and we scream along at a good lick. Easy riding!

On reaching Queseria, that all changes. Set deep in a valley basin, the town exists to make paper, it's huge industrial plant belching a lung hugging filth into the sky. The surrounding hills help to contain the pollution and once we slow to climb out of the valley, there's no escaping the cloying fog. The road zig zags up the hillside and so do we....  

Vulcan Nevado has a twin; the 3820 metre Vulcan Fuego (Volcano of fire!!) and this one is currently active. In the nearby cities of Guzman and Colima, the central plazas have a traffic light warning system displaying the current status - 

Green :- we're going to live!

Amber :- things are looking iffy - make a will.

Red :- Things are going to get a little warmer round here - RUN!

These are only rough translations - the signs were in Spanish, but I think I got the gist. The lights are currently on amber! The sky is a little hazy as we pass by, but you can still just make out the warning signs above the cone.... 

We ride atop a ridge along a broad valley, and wish we had taken the toll road below. You can make it out running along the nice flat contour diagonally into the distance across the valley floor. The newer toll roads strive to keep gradients to a minimum by following low points in the land and by bridging the chasms that the free road plunges down.

The day time temperatures are really starting to soar now we have left the mountains behind, hitting high 80's and low 90's. Roadside fires are becomming a common sight....

It's been a great ride into Colima, with a total drop for the day of around 3500 metres - that's well over 2 miles in height! In Mexico, it's never that simple though and we also managed over 1000 metres of climbing during the day. 

After the tackling the volcano, we plan on a couple of days recuperation to ease weary legs and bodies, sleeping late and drinking coffee round the lush semi-tropical central plaza....

 

Nevado Volcano

March 26th to 28th

Ciudad Guzman is off the grid! 

Well it doesn't appear in guide books at least; it's a shame and I cannot see a reason for it's omission. Nicknamed "The Athens of Jalisco" it is the birthplace of several artists and intellectuals including Jose Clemente Orosco - the muralist whoes work we saw in Guadalajara. It's has a beautiful central plaza with a cathedral haunted by the souls of victims of earthquake disasters which are common in this region. The cathedral towers have been toppled several times and were last rebuilt in 1985.... 

But we didn't come here for cathedrals and muralists! We came here to tackle the 4240m volcano that sits on the fault lines responsible for all that earthquake activity - Vulcan Nevado. Last time I got this close to a volcano it erupted and I am hoping not to repeat that experience! 

In English, Vulcan Navado means "Snowy Volcano" which sounds too cuddly to cause me a problem and it's name derives from the fact that normally the high elevation means it is capped in white from December to March. Not now in these times of changing climate....

Ten kilometers of gradually rising tarmac, followed by a 17km dirt road take you to the entrance of a national park where you can camp and begin the 4 hour hike to the summit. The tarmac is a breeze. The dirt road is something else....

There is no water supply in the park and we will need 3 days supply, so we are carrying an additional 24 litres of water. Thats 24kgs or just over 50lbs. To gain some of that weight back we stash some non essentials in the bushes and start to tackle the 'road'. We are still riding heavy, and there are 17kms of endless switchbacks and poor surface to go; gaining 1700 metres (over a vertical mile) in the process.

It is without doubt the toughest road I have tackled to-date and that includes all the roads I rode in the Chilean and Bolivian Alps. Sue becomes a hiker a little earlier than planned and gamely pushes her bike for maybe 14 of those 17 kms. She remains cheerful throughout the ordeal and I start to doubt her sanity! 

I intersperse short uphill rides, with downhill hikes to help push her bike. I've used the word gruelling before, but I never really meant it until now. We snatch occasional glimpses through gaps in the trees of the valley floor below, and beyond that, mountains we can now peer over the top of to still more distant ranges....

After 7 hours of constant grunting and grinding, we have made 14kms and it begins to look like we won't be getting to the campsite in the park tonight. We look for a flat spot at the road side behind a stand of trees and call it a day. Coffee, pasta, sleep - in that order; but only just. Lights out - 12 hours of unconciousness.....

The new day dawns hazy as moisture that descended in the night begins to rise from the valley floors. It's a special sight as ethereal mountains emerge ghostlike from the gloom....

With the camp made, we drop luggage and ride light to the national park entrance 3kms above us. The locked gates are a bit of a shock, and we begin to fear the climb has been in vain. However, in typical Mexican style someone eventually saunters out to sell entrance tickets and put our names on a list in case we don't check out later. 

Sue says - "Let me in".... 

 

Then the hike begins! It's an easy path, but the altitude is just beginning to have an effect as the pine forests give way to alpine desert and we approach 4000m....

Ascending the last peak, we finally get to see the cone; four thousand two hundred and forty metre high Vulcan Navado. That's 14,000 feet!

It's not often you get to look down on the clouds without an airplane window in the way! It's a stunning sight that we enjoy in complete solitude. There is no breeze and the world is completely silent. It's an odd sensation - the complete lack of sensation; there are simply no sounds to hear. The world is struck momentarily dumb to gape in wonder.....

But time waits for no man, as they say, and eventually we must drag ourselves away from our reverie. We descend and return wearily to camp. 

Next day the ride down is a world apart from the ascent and the shark toothed pyramid shrinks rapidly in to the distance.... 

And still we ride down..... 

Ever downwards....

We end the day in Colima, some 90 kms away to the south after a day of real contrasts. From an alpine desert campsite at an altitudes of 4000 metres in the morning, to semi-tropical verdancy in a city at 500 metres by night. 3500 metres descent in just one day's ride on a bicycle. 

This is why we cycle tour. But now we need to sleep.....