Ed's Gone South

Z's Rear View -- Take Two

Zelie has left me (and you) with some parting thoughts until her next venture south of the border in a few months. Her eloquence is astounding. Enjoy!
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Z's Rear View

I left you all in central Mexico, before my buns finally did get tired and my head filled with the flu. But the sights and sounds are still wonderful from the back of the bike so here is a bit more of Z's rear view:

Sailing down the center of Mexico, there are unfinished homes everywhere in various states of construction, destruction or simply abandoned to the forces of nature. Those that stand completed are of every color: the brightest oranges, blues, yellows and greens. Sick and dying dogs drunkenly sway on spindly legs, certainly no man's best friend in these parts. An old campesino stands in the middle of an ankle-deep river joyfully washing himself, naked in front of God and everyone but for the crumpled cowboy hat on his head. Pickup trucks with heightened rails rattle along dusty roads, packed with Mexicans standing from one destination to another. Coca Cola --an apparent sponsor of Mexico-- is everywhere: La Vida Tiene Sabor. Life has flavor. A garage worker with a high-powered spray gun washes a tractor with paint thinner. No glasses. No gloves. No mask.

New Year's Eve and the streets are filled with all out warfare, though of a consensual kind. People of all ages and background lob eggs, spray soap and laugh for hours. When we walk into a bar early New Year's morning, a group of young Mexicans burst into applause and chants for ´La Huerita´ (the little white girl- that would be me.) and her bravery on the battlefield. It takes days to get the "celebration" out of my hair.

Moving south we leave desert for the lush mountains and plummeting temperatures of the state of Chiapas. Men and women in sweaters and blankets try to ward off the chill of clinging fog; crops of flowers amazingly grow on the hillside; Tzozil indians stand in front of churches that aren't theirs, praying to Gods that mean little to them. A new highway cuts into the mountain leading to San Cristobal, right through a family's field of corn.

The struggle for land rights and autonomy is still clear in the villages and on the faces of men and women in the fields. La Lucha Sigue... The Zapatistas, armed revolutionaries who hit the world stage nine years ago this January, have been quiet for some time now but their presence is still strong. And though not everyone agrees with the group's tactic of armed rebellion, there is no one who will say they do not understand. As one wise campesino we met over tacos so eloquently put it: "Una mujer cuyos hijos tienen hambre es capable hacer cosas inimaginables, cual quier cosa." "A woman whose children are hungry is capable of doing unimaginable things. She is capable of anything."

Through clouds of black exhaust, we make our way to Guatemala, the older sister of Mexico's poverty. She is more developed and set in her ways. Smiling children and the explosive colors of huipiles (traditional dress) can make you forget the abject poverty, but only for a moment. More profound are the images of shanty wooden homes built on mountaintops, held together with bailing wire and spent tires. Idigenas bent in half, hauling huge bundles of wood strapped to their forehead up hillsides and along highways. The acrid stench of coffee beans drying and that sacred bean's yellow stain on grown men's hands. And so many children spending their days and nights pushing to purchase, everything, anything, or something, please.

Weaving through poorly paved highways we learn the rules of the road: A branch in your lane means trouble ahead. A single sandbag can tell you the highway has collapsed. Pepsi is the sponsor of this country, and can be found in everything from babies' bottles to religious ceremonies and everything in between. It appears at every roadside stand.

Arriving at Lake Atitlan leaves me speechless. How can you describe what it's like to stand in the cradle of three huge sleeping volcanoes? Blue water a thousand feet deep collected from rains of time. There are fifteen volcanoes in this country; thirty five in neighboring El Salvador.

Across the lake in every pueblo, God's soldiers have left their mark: Dios te Amo and Cristo Salva painted on every door and every wall. The missionary's early directive to leave no child behind. Here God is good and apparently so is tourism. "The town used to be small but now it is very big," says a woman of her town of San Pedro, population maybe one thousand. She has been selling fruit smoothies to tourists for seven years. Heading onward past acres of cabbage and broccoli. A huge pile of carrots obscures a group of women gathered to rest in a grassy field.

We go to Antigua following our north star: the enormous plume of smoke from that town's erupting volcano. For four months now El Fuego has been reactivated
after nearly thirty years of calm. Only at night can you see red hot lava bursting from it's cone; in the daytime, smoke and ash fill the air.

I try to keep my eyes closed as we crawl through Guatemala City but can't help notice the concrete jungle behind a thick blanket of smog. On the outskirts are car cemetaries: piles of crumpled autos, twisted metal and broken glass. A sobering reminder to be grateful for every minute of every day.

By the time we arrive in Copan, Honduras, to see the great Mayan ruins, our faces are black with soot and our lungs filled with exhaust. But Honduras is lighter in every way. The hills are green and the faces are brighter. Clearly life is easier here. Soon we will go to a beach.

It has been raining for two weeks, they tell us, despite the fact that December ends the rainy season. I think, ´It´s been raining for two weeks. How much longer can it rain?´ (insert laughter here). But if there is anything one learns in travel, it is to be patient and that nothing is ever quite what you expect.

(Editor's Note: I heard it stopped raining the day I left the island...)

Photos -- Guatemala to Honduras

FINALLY! Some more photos from the road. I'll be a few more days in Honduras and then south to Nicaragua by week's end. More travelogue stories coming soon now that I've found $2/hr internet.

Current location -- Tegucigalpa, Honduras
Days on the road -- 45
Miles from home -- 4,800
Ratio of insane drivers in Honduras compared to Guatemala and Mexico -- 5:2

The Sunday market in Chichicastenango (God bless you!), Guatemala is reknown for its incredible crafts and mystic feel.

Some of the textiles for sale in Chichi.

I almost had this kid down to 5 bucks for one of the masks, but he held tight at six.

Zelie fell in love with this 30 lb. quilt at the market. Although it would not have even come close to fitting on the bike, Z had the woman down to around $25. Something like this is literally MONTHS in the making. Twenty five bucks...

The church in front of the market has a small fire burning in front of it all the time. Many people stand in prayer swinging a burning votive for hours. One man was swinging a votive the entire time we were at the market that day -- at least six hours.

Panajacel, Guatemala sits of the shores of the Lago de Atitlan, an enormous lake at 6,000 feet (maybe more?) above sea level in the crater of an extinct volcano. The lake is hundreds of feet deep in the middle, and is surrounded by 10,000 ft. high volcanoes.

We took a water taxi across the lake to the small pueblo of San Pedro for a night. Zelie really liked the bowman's butt, and took a "picture of the volcano" for us.

And you think I'm crazy! We ran into a German couple who was driving this 40 year old German fire truck that was converted into a "Winnetank" through Central and South America. The thing weighs 7.5 tons, will drive over 30 VW bugs laid end to end, and sleeps two people and two dogs quite comfortably, they said. They were on the road for "seven years or so." They had just bought land near San Pedro to build a house in the meantime.

And you wonder where coffee comes from. This 15 ft. high pile of coffee bean skins was on the side of the road in San Pedro.

Before roasting, peeled coffee beans must dry in the sun. Every spare patch of concrete across Guatemala seems to be used for this purpose. We saw coffee drying on basketball courts (what 5 ft. tall Guatemalans play basketball?), on the shoulder of most roads, and on roof tops. A 40 lb. sack of beans goes for around the same price as a tall Mocha Latte at Starbucks.

In Antigua, Guatemala many of the old colonial buildings are painted brilliant colors giving the entire town a radiant feeling.

No Mom, that is definitely not a volcano smoking 5 miles away outside Antigua. Nope. We didn't see lava spewing from it that night either. Uh uh, no volcano here.

I don't know where they get their information, but someone at the local paper pulled a fast one on all of Guatemala alerting people about violent eruptions on Volcán Fuego outside Antigua. The same one we didn't see erupting the night before.

If you feed them enough sweetbread, even wild Macaws will hangout for a while. A few years back two Macaws decided the entrace to Copán Park in Honduras was a good place to settle down. Now there are 12 Macaws perched there to greet and eat.

The ruins at Copán are evidence of a complex and highly successful civilization of Mayan people that stretched throughout much of modern day Honduras, Guatemala, Belize and southern Mexico. I hear they used to sacrifice people on the steps...

The grounds at Copán are lined with "stelas" such as these. Aside form being portraits of Copáns rulers, the stelas contain a heiroglyph language that archaeologists have used to determine much of the history of the Mayas. Sounds a little "subjective" to me...

A safe landing in Roatan. We shipped the bike out to the island on the ferry. It took 6 guys to unload it once we arrived. On the way over, the ship was pitching so violently in the high swells that we nearly lost it off the side. Once I felt the boat rocking I ran out back to check on it, and three guys were holding it down while another tied it to the railing. Uh, sorry sir. Your bike seems to have rolled off the boat...

Here's why it took six guys to unload it. Note the deck level compared to the dock -- about 4 feet up. Getting it back on the ferry when I left was even more fun. It almost tipped over and into the bay as we were loading it.

Seaman Hector Luis Rodriguez. The fine gent who saved my bike on the way out, and kept an eye on it on the way back. He gave me his address and made me promise I'd send him this photo as soon as I could. I told him I'd be home by March 2004.

Enjoying nearly 10 straight days of rain in sunny Roatan.

A little sunshine the day before Zelie left. We stayed in this Cabaña for most of our time on the island.

After picking up our laundry one afternoon in Roatan, we stopped in to check out the Happy Hour scene at a local watering hole. When we finally got home at 1:30 blind drunk after dancing on the bar for four hours, we were missing half of the laundry -- all Z's stuff. Later that week, her only remaining pair of socks had to be dried for the flight home. Z's solution was to fry them on the stove. Unfortunately, the socks were acrylic and the pan still has black plastic sock prints burned on to it.

Goodbye dinner. Home cooked lobster with melted garlic butter. Life doesn't suck, except for the fact that I've lost my co-pilot... Come back soon, Zelie!

Mexican Reflections

Location: Panajacel, Guatemala
Miles from Home: 3,800

We're on the road now over three weeks, and so much has happened it's hard to recount. We've selected a few gems among the rubble, however, we hope you enjoy. I know it's a lot, but take it in bites...total reading time -- 10 minutes.

Silent Night, Holy Night

It's 6:30 Christmas Eve as we roll into Playa Azul -- almost night fall. Seven hours in the saddle has earned us some down time. Strangely, Playa Azul is the only Mexican town we've been through to date that doesn't have a main Zocalo or Plaza. In fact, the main road just dumps us onto a mangy main drag along the beach.

Playa Azul is not quite the beach hamlet we had envisioned. After looking for a minutes for anything resembling a nice inexpensive hotel, we get flagged down by a shirtless smiling guy named Shortie, although he pronounces it "Chortie."

Beer in hand, he asks in his best English, "You need room? You come my house. We have room." After a round of questions to ensure it's on the up and up, we idle down the road after him to check things out. The room is more of a converted chicken coop than anything else, and the hole-in-the-ground-toilet is quite enchanting. Now we're not prude travelers or anything, but with a smile and wink we tell them we'll look around and come back.

Fifty yards down the road we run into the only other two gringos in town, a couple of an undetermined European origin. We ask them if there's a decent cheap hotel in town. He seems not too happy with his accomodations and says they're staying in the only real Hotel in town, and it's 30 bucks. I ask him what the beach looks like in the daytime, and he replies, "It's sort of like Beirut after the war."

We may not be prudes, but we're cheap as hell so it's back to Chorties place to try our luck. We "check in" and pay our $5 for the night. Not trusting the slat board walls or checkerboard quilt partition between the room and the bathroom, we lock all of stuff up with a cable around a post in the middle of the room. "Trust everyone, but brand your horses" -- it's a little piece of wisdom we return to often.

Heading out to find a little Christmas dinner, the father of the house asks if he can come along. He promises to lead us to a nice place for dinner, and fifteen minutes later we're halfway across town sitting at a taco joint ordering huaraches. He makes pleasant conversation, peppering the exchange with alarming comments about his three boys that still live at home. They all (includung Chortie) like the bottle, but the oldest one, Alan, he gets a little crazy sometimes. Z and I exchange raised eyebrows across the table.

After a pleasant walk around the unpleasant town of Playa Azul, we head back to settle down for the night. As we doze off, the oldest boy comes back home from the bar and commences an impressive run of wreches by the door to our room. Twenty minutes later, the town seems to be engulfed in war, as every child under 8 lights off M-80 sized fire crackers for two hours until midnight. "Beirut?" I think, as I give Zelie a goodnight Christmas kiss.

In the morning instead of presents under the tree, we are awakened by the father using the toilet just on the other side of the quilt wall from our heads. He has quite an impressive array of sounds to share himself, rivaling those of his eldest son last night.

As we pack up to leave, Zelie and I agree that this is probably one of the most memorable Christmas experiences we've ever had. I can't help but hum Silent Night to myself as we drive out of Playa Azul before 9 am.

Don't You Have Change?

Mexico is currently undergoing a drastic shortage of loose change and small bills. This must be the case at least, as every store or restuarant we venture into asks the question, "Don't you have change?" In Oaxaca, the problem in reaching epic proportions.

We're at the market for a little dinner at one of the food stalls, and go to pay the 46 peso tab. "Don't you have change?" says the clerk as I hand him a fifty bill (about 5 bucks). After showing him my empty pockets, he runs out of the market, around the corner, and half way down the block to break the HUGE bill I gave him. Five minutes later, he returns with an annoyed look on his face, and gives us our change.

The next morning as we have breakfast on the way out of town, we run up a 32 peso bill at the corner restuarant. We're obviously the first patrons of the day, so I feel well assured that the cash drawer they've prepared for the day is full of change. Not so. It seems the concept of a cash drawer has not quite percolated south of the border. No, they start out everyday with an EMPTY cash drawer, waiting for faithful patrons like us to fill it. So, we wait for more customer to come in, have breakfast, and pay before we get change for our 40 pesos.

¿Estamos Hablando Español?

Sometimes I wonder if we are really speaking Spanish or not. By the way people look at us, give us the wrong food, or just generally smile and nod, I sometimes wonder. At breakfast, Zelie clearly orders Huevos Rancheros -- it's hard to miss that one. It's a simple egg dish with tortillas and salsa. The waitress looks at her blankly and says, "Scrambled eggs?" "No, huevos rancheros," Zelie repeats. "Sunnyside up?" "No, HUEVOS RANCHEROS!" "Oh, you want Huevos Rancheros, ok," she replies blankly taking down the order.

A few days later, I order the "Oaxacan breakfast," a feast of eggs, empanadas, hot chocalate and more, clearly using the words "desayuno Oaxaqueño." "How do you want the eggs?" asks the waitress. "Mexican style (scrambled with onions and tomato), please." When the eggs come out, I go easy waiting for the rest of the meal to come. After five minutes, I ask "Isn't there more food?" "Sure," she replies. Five more minutes go by, the eggs are gone, I've wolfed down my hot chocolate, and still no more food. "Excuse me, but wasn't I supposed to get more food with the Oaxacan breakfast?" "I'm sorry, you didn't order that." I look at Zelie with amazement as she assures me she heard me order it.

I'm convinced we are either speaking our own gringo dialect of Spanish, or everyone just enjoys messing with our heads. Either way, we enjoy the friendly mishaps as part of the experience.

Oaxacan New Year

After missing Oaxaca for Christmas (see above) we decide to pass the New Year there instead. We pull in for a three day stint on the 30th, and find a nice cheap place four blocks off the plaza. From everything I've heard, Oaxaca has a crazy New Year's scene. Parties all night. People dancing in the streets. Veritable parades at the break of dawn. We are very psyched, indeed.

Many people say Oaxaca is the cultural center of Mexico. Thousands of artisans bring their wares to market here, and the city has its own distincy style of food -- rich moles of chile, chocolate, tomato and other rich flavors. As we step into the Zocalo (plaza) in midafternoon, the city feels alive. Thousands of people crowd the busy street market, children run and play, and rich odors waft into our faces. This is a distinct and welcome change after nearly ten days running from one lazy beach to another. After dinner in the market and coffee back on the Zocalo, we turn in early hoping to conserve our energy for the New Year.

By 8 pm on the 31st, we've seen most of the city and still made time for a short siesta back at the room. With a few more coffees we'll be ready to rage with the best of them all night. At 8:30, the Zocalo is surprisingly quiet. A few bars and coffee shops we had scoped out during the daytime are closed up. Strangely, quite a few restuarants have there doors shut as well. We ask a local what gives, and she explains that New Year's isn't really that big of a deal here. Most people make it a family night, or party with friends, so we had better find a place to eat quick because everything will surely be closed by 10 o'clock. Frantic, we run up the Alcalde and find an Italian Bistro still open, filled with similarly confused gringos.

A 9:00 before we sit down, fireworks fill the sky for about five or ten minutes.
For those five or ten minutes, the streets are filled with an air I would think in keeping with the spirit of the New Year. People pour out of their houses and from the few open restuarants for a glimpse, but as quickly as it comes, it goes. The frenetic moment has passed.

By 11:30 we're rolling out of the restuarant, and down to the Zocalo. There are people about, but not in the numbers we had expected. As the New Year approaches, children run through the Zocalo selling eggs filled with confetti or flour, supposedly for throwing in the air after the ball drops. They also sell cans of what looks like shaving cream, but it's used instead to spray into the air like confetti. They call it "spuma." Things are looking up, me thinks, as it starts looking like a crazy Mexican New year might turn out afterall.

As the clock on the Cathedral approaches midnight, there is no countdown, or even a bell. For about five minutes, people have their own little New Year celebrations according to their watches or once they notice other people doing so: couples kiss, kids smash confetti eggs on each other, and firecrackers go off.

With a flash, the scene changes. Eggs start flying, cans of spuma get sprayed and even larger homemade firecrackers go off. I can tell some of the older folks are getting edgey as they back off from the plaza to find shelter in the surrounding cafes. Within ten minutes, egg wars have broken out, gringos are running madly from bands of laughing Mexican kids wielding cans of spuma, and people are generally having a great time.

Far from mean-spirited, the ensuing two hours of all-out insanity in the streets of Oaxaca are filled with hugs and laughs. Being conservative old people (and me toting an expensive new camera) Z and I try to stay out of the crossfire for as long as we can, but soon we too are engulfed in the egg-spuma wars. Soon, Zelie's entire head and torso are covered in white spuma foam. Spunky gringas are especially beloved targets, I suppose. After a few hours we are wet, exhausted, and having the time of our lives. Later, after the madness subsides, and the spuma cans have all run dry, the Zocalo looks like Broad Street in Philadelphia after the Mummers Parade -- a little reminder of home.

Later, we find a late-night poetry and acoustic guitar jam in a bar made for 15 people. By 4 am, we've been inducted as honorary members into the secret society of "Jacobs," a bunch of college kids from Mexico City, and begin the walk back to our room.

I can't say for sure whether or not people actually poured into the streets at sunrise, as our source had indicated they would. As all of our other expectations for a Oaxacan New Year were wrong, we didn't wait up to find out. We greeted the day at noon instead.

Photos -- San Blas to Oaxaca and the "Rear View"

Happy New Year from Oaxaca!!

Hope you enjoy a few more pics from the Road, as well as some of Zelie's vignettes from the back of the bike. We have a more detailed travelogue in the works, so stay tuned...

Dry Stats as of today:
Location: Oaxaca City, Oaxaca State, Mexico
Miles from Home -- 3200
Days on the Road -- 19 (omigosh, is that all?)
Number of Mezcals tasted on New Year's Eve -- 12

Some tacos are better than others. We ate three meals in a row at this lovely street taqueria. Best tacos in Mexico for 4 pesos each -- about 40 cents.

The "Christmas Tree" in San Blas. It's all relative...

El Cabroncito with his guts all hanging out midway through the water pump rebuild in San Blas.

When you get our messages, imagine us writing them in an open air Cybercafe like this one in Barra de Navidad -- a one minute walk to the ocean... ;)

The children of Barra de Navidad performing La Posada, a reenactment of Mary and Joseph's search for shelter in the days before Christmas.

Away in a Manger... a look inside our lovely digs on Chirstmas Eve in Playa Azul, chamber pot bucket, quilt wall and all. Now imagine puking, farting hosts on the other side of the quilted wall, and M-80 firecrackers going off all night. Silent Night, Holy Night...

Z, El Cabroncito, and our little friend hanging out in front of our Christmas crashpad. Our room is just left of the bike.

Close Quarters. Sometimes it's better to just invite El Cabroncito in for the night. Note Z's lovely disco afro...

Easy living in Playa Ventura with Zelie's friends from Cuernavaca. The water is just 50 yds. to the left.

A view from just next to the tent looking out to the water.

Las Sirenas del Mar -- Zelie and Marisela at Playa Ventura.

Sunset in San Agostinillo on the Oaxacan Coast near Puerto Angel.

A friendly old man jerking his beef right in front of some roadside baños.

Nuestra Senora de la Soledad. Inside Our Lady of Solitude Cathedral in Oaxaca City.

"Acteal se no olvida" -- Acteal is not forgotten. Graffiti on the streets of Oaxaca commemorating the 5 year anniversary of the massacre of over 45 Tzozil Indians in the village of Acteal by a paramilitary army (supported by the Mexican government) on Dec. 22, 1997. The indigenous people of southern Mexico have been resisting for decades in an effort to retain control of their lands -- lands that are being clearcut by outside interests at an alarming rate. The response to their resistance has often been gruesome. The victims were attending Catholic Mass when the shooting began.

Inside the market in Oaxaca -- the taco stands. From one vendor you purchase veggies and salsa, from another your meat which they grill on the spot in one of the booths you see in the photo, and your tortillas come from yet another vendor down the hall. Quite a process for some not-so-good or cheap tacos. We miss San Blas...

A pet Tucan hiding out under our table at a restaurant in Oaxaca.

Fireworks on the Alcala in Oaxaca just before New Year's -- and just before my batteries died for the night.

And now, a few of Z's visuals from the back of the bike.

For all of you who have expressed concern over the fate of my derriere, I thank
you. I'm actually doing quite well in that area. My lower back also seems to be
holding up. it's my knees that may never be the same. Don't know if I failed to
adequately break in my thick leather riding pants or if the gear is a bit defective, but I've taken to stuffing socks into the knee pockets and letting my legs dangle off the pegs to release pressure. Still, if it wasn't for an extended stop in San Blas (which I will refer to as San Fleas until the welts on my feet subside)I'm not sure I'd be walking now.

Otherwise, the view from the back seat has been amazing and fun, particularly
now that we've entered the tropics. Mountains of green, lush jungle remind you
of what Mexico must once have looked like, long before agriculture and other
development began its destructive creep.

Edward has been a fantastic driver and has made my initial sheer terror melt
into garden variety never-ending fear (a requisite for any rider).

While E keeps his eyes glued to the road, images of the Mexican countryside and people help the hours pass by for me: boys no older than ten hunched over fields of drying red chile plants; tired women wandering dusty roads; cotton spread over miles of highway blown from nearby factory bags; Mennonite families in simple dress speaking their own otherwise unrecognizable German dialect; dense pine forests reminiscent of the Gila in New Mexico and vast plains of yellow grasses; crops of corn growing on the sides of mountains so steep you can hardly imagine climbing, much less cultivating; ornate cemetaries dotting otherwise barren valleys; garbage wherever there is roadside space (largest collections under signs reading 'no tire basura', meaning don't throw your garbage); plumes of smoke from burning fires in every town and village, consuming everything from paper and plastic to tires and other toxic materials; winding coastal roads and idyllic beach coves; the underbellies of passing pelicans; trees ripped apart from recent
hurricanes; barren patches of mountain shaved clean of any tree or shrub and
the dozens of surrounding villages the timber industry built; random individuals walking on long stretches of highway, appearing out of thin air and seemingly heading nowhere; curves, curves and more curves, interrupted only by the thousands of topes (major speedbump) dotting every Mexican road that have made our driving life hell; animals wandering on every road and every town, and the beautiful faces of Mexican women, men and children living, working, eating, playing and watching the world go by. They are joyous and curious, hard working and tired. They are some of the most generous, kindhearted and fun-loving people I've ever encountered.

There's another observation I've made:
I've decided that all Mexican men (and possibly all men, though I haven't
completed the research) want to have a motorcycle, with or without a cute girl
on the back. This lends itself to a few too many unnecessary road stops where
twenty something boys with big guns poke and prod the cool moto equipment under the guise of "inspecting". But for the most part, once their curiosity is sated, they have been entirely gracious and haven't asked for any bribes -- yet!

Happy Holidays to all.