A Farewell to Mexico

It is virtually impossible to believe, but we are no longer in Mexico. We ended our stay with a bang - 2 overpriced tacos, one last crappy instant Nescafe, and more rain than we knew what to do with. After leaving Palenque we continued on toward the Yucatan. We were planning to go to Merida, but we ultimately decided that it would be better to make a run for the border, so we headed East. Our first stop was Chable, a town that we had been warned against - "I would never stay there ever." It turned out to be, for all we could tell, a very friendly little place, and we slept safe and sound on the police station floor. They seemed to take a liking to us right away when we arrived, and quickly swept and mopped a little area for us to stay in. We even got a shower and the use of the kitchen. Sweet! And then we got to Escarcega. Odd place. It was one of the few cities in Mexico where we felt ill at ease...but we made the best of it watching TV! to our hearts' content in our sunny ( = hot) little room. Oh yes, this room had an interesting set up - a fan that was inclined to behead Eric and a bathroom with very little privacy - the walls didn't extend all the way to the ceiling, and the shower came dangerously close to plunging over the top. But the bed was super comfy, so we slept like rocks. One of our memorable moments along this section of the trip was in Con Haus. We pulled over to ask some people on their porch where we could ask about finding a place to sleep, and they wound up taking us in. We watched telenovelas, drank strawberry soda and slept on a comfy mattress in a house paid for by illegal aliens working in the US. Yup, everything seems to come full circle. Anyway, the southeast of Mexico hasn't been as open as the northern part, so we felt especially lucky to spend one of our last nights chatting with a local family. In the next town we slept in the clouds. Basically fog set in for the evening and never lifted, so we had a damp night on the roof of the police station. The officers were all friendly, though, so we stayed up way past our bedtime talking about all sorts of random things. Speaking of random things: locusts. They are EVERYWHERE and they have a death wish. They were literally covering the road where we were riding, were gigantic, and had a penchant for launching themselves into our spokes. Crunch! Our last stop in Mexico was quite enjoyable. We found a (relatively) cheap hotel with wifi (but just in the lobby) and parked ourselves on the sofa for the vast majority of the 40 hours that we were there doing research on...Central America! And how to vertically true a wheel. We'll let you know when we ourselves find out. Want to know frustrating? In the dictionary it says "Eric's back wheel." Who knows how many flats, who knows how many broken spokes, who knows why the hell Schwalbe marathons take multiple people and way too much elbow grease to take on and off, who knows how fast the tire will go bad because it keeps attacking the fender...arghh!! And now comes the moment when we disseminate our great knowledge of the vast and mysterious country of Mexico. Keep your wits about you, this is gonna go fast.

1. It is difficult to maintain one's prestigious membership to the Solid Stools Club at any given time
2. Asses never cease to be funny - hee haw just doesn't begin to do these sonorific animals justice
3. Asses never cease to be funny - I haven't laughed about shitting and farting in my entire life as much as I have on this trip alone
4. The people of Mexico are downright awesome. Period.
5. Mexicans, my friends, know how to properly use sugar. Coke never tastes good, but Manzana Lift sure the hell does.
6. When was the last time you saw a horse pull up to a gas station?
7. Food, food, food!!!
8. "Salina Cruz is only 12 kilometers away. You'll be there in about 10 minutes." "It's about 100 kilometers to Gomez Palacio, so you'll be there in about an hour."
9. Gender is very important, and people here often stick to their roles. We seem to confuse people. The simple sight of Eric's blonde flowing locks often turn us into a female duo, although there was this one time that I said "Good afternoon" to a gentleman and he responded "Man or woman?"
10. We are foreigners, so therefore we have money to burn. People have tried to sell us, while riding, food, drink, toys, watermelons, taxi rides, caged birds, guitars, etc.

But in all seriousness, Mexico was an amazing place to be. I had no idea that I would be so enchanted by it, and we never could have imagined the amazing kindness that we encountered here. The best analogy that I can come up with is that it felt like crowd surfing. We were passed safely along by the hands of hundreds of people, from those who simply waved or said hello to entire families that opened their doors and hearts to us. We will be working hard for a long time to come, and I mean that in an incredibly positive sense, to put all that good energy back into the world around us. I am excited to see the ways in which that manifests itself. A la gente de Mexico, un monton de gracias! Hemos aprendido tanto de ustedes, y por todo estamos realmente encantados y agradecidos. Que les vaya superbien a todos y que esten de lo mejor!