Baja
I've spent the last few days busing and cycling down the Baja peninsula. In San QuintĂn, as I was checking into a hotel, I finally met Dominic, a cyclist that I started hearing about through the cyclists' grapevince just before I got to San Francisco, and we had a beer and some tacos together, chatting about our experiences on the road.
The next day, I rode to El Rosario, waiting a few hours at the bus station for the bus, chatting to a couple of German sisters who had rode from San Francisco to San Diego. Although they hadn't actually ridden their bikes yet in Mexico, they were thinking of trying to sell them and rent motorcycles instead, apparently scared off by some of the stories they'd heard about cycling the highway. Later, Dominic joined us, and we discussed the fact that you can't really trust most of what people tell you. We'd both learned that lesson over and over on our trips.
Although I've only cycled a couple of short sections of it so far, I actually find the transpeninsular highway much better than many of the roads I cycled in the US. There is less traffic (at least this time of year) and in general the drivers seem saner and more courteous.
I'm in Mulegé now, a very charming oasis town, after riding from Santa Rosalia this morning. Santa Rosalia is an atypical Mexican town, a former French mining settlement with a variety of interesting buildings of a style you normally don't see here, including a steel church designed by Eiffel.
Earlier today on my way to the beach, I met an old Mexican fellow with only one leg on a tricycle, which he powered with hand cranks. He was selling fruit breads from a box behind the seat, banana and date pancake-like things, and I tried one of each, talking to him for 5 minutes or so. He told me he had ridden his tricycle all around the area, once riding most of the peninsula from Ensenada to Cabo San Lucas, which took him 16 days.
I'm spending the night at the "Hotel Squid", which I was allowed to stay at even though I wasn't wearing any visible spandex. Maybe the helmet was enough, since I haven't seen any Mexicans wearing them.
I'm planning to spend the next few days cycling along Bahia Concepcion and on to Loreto, then hopping on a bus to La Paz to do a loop of southern Baja from there.
The next day, I rode to El Rosario, waiting a few hours at the bus station for the bus, chatting to a couple of German sisters who had rode from San Francisco to San Diego. Although they hadn't actually ridden their bikes yet in Mexico, they were thinking of trying to sell them and rent motorcycles instead, apparently scared off by some of the stories they'd heard about cycling the highway. Later, Dominic joined us, and we discussed the fact that you can't really trust most of what people tell you. We'd both learned that lesson over and over on our trips.
Although I've only cycled a couple of short sections of it so far, I actually find the transpeninsular highway much better than many of the roads I cycled in the US. There is less traffic (at least this time of year) and in general the drivers seem saner and more courteous.
I'm in Mulegé now, a very charming oasis town, after riding from Santa Rosalia this morning. Santa Rosalia is an atypical Mexican town, a former French mining settlement with a variety of interesting buildings of a style you normally don't see here, including a steel church designed by Eiffel.
Earlier today on my way to the beach, I met an old Mexican fellow with only one leg on a tricycle, which he powered with hand cranks. He was selling fruit breads from a box behind the seat, banana and date pancake-like things, and I tried one of each, talking to him for 5 minutes or so. He told me he had ridden his tricycle all around the area, once riding most of the peninsula from Ensenada to Cabo San Lucas, which took him 16 days.
I'm spending the night at the "Hotel Squid", which I was allowed to stay at even though I wasn't wearing any visible spandex. Maybe the helmet was enough, since I haven't seen any Mexicans wearing them.
I'm planning to spend the next few days cycling along Bahia Concepcion and on to Loreto, then hopping on a bus to La Paz to do a loop of southern Baja from there.
posted by Matt at 19:26
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home