Mexico (the first days are the hardest days)

 

Well that's what I thought, its from a Grateful Dead song, Uncle  John's Band. The next line is "cause when life looks like easy street, that's when there's danger at your door".

 

The first day was very good. It took about an hour to get into Mexico itself. The border customs for Mexico all spoke English, my permit for my bike $30, the permit for me $23, both for 30 days. They asked if I had a credit card for the bike permit, I just went along with everything not knowing, and said yes. This going along with everything can get to be quite expensive as I learn later. So they put it on the credit card, if you don't turn your permit in on the other side when you leave, they will charge you import tax for the full value of your bike, very expensive. So you need to turn this permit in as you leave the  country and you'll get that $30 back. Unless you use a credit card, they just keep it. This is what I was told at the border upon leaving, "oh you paid by credit card, too bad".  Lessons learned.

 

 

I do have to say something about Brownsville Texas before I move on. When I think about  travel, the hard stuff that one has to deal with, mainly ones own fears of other people, situations, and the unknowns, that do come with it, especially when traveling abroad. And often the pre-judgements we make about others and their situations, which sometimes helps keep us separate and safe I suppose in our own heads, or maybe just makes us feel better about ourselves gets confronted time and time again as I travel thru a place like Central America.

Not speaking the language well, standing out on a bike, I am in ways continually being put into situations that can make me uncomfortable, or feel that I am threatened in someway, even though I'm not (my spidey sense would tell me if I was!). It on some level is my ego that is being threatened. For someone like me who is rather self conscious at times, and likes to keep a low profile (when my ego's not in charge), not attracting attention to myself, this trip I soon realized will, on a continuous basis test my resolve, and also will  provide opportunities to maybe look at myself differently, as well as others, and get beyond some of my preconceived ideas and judgements. Which to me personally is one of the great and constant obstacles this world faces on a daily basis in finding our common ground and being able to understand each other and be able to work together. The "they and us" philosophy, only keeps us separate and a barrier to understanding each other, and being able work together to begin with. Often a way of thinking that keeps conflict and also the possibility of war in place. As someone once put "separation from self, others, or god is the source of all suffering." And to me understanding a powerful tool for overcoming these separations. And travel a great path to understanding. And in the final analysis as any good spiritual teacher will tell you, there is no such thing as separation. Any separation is an illusion of self, we are all one. That is a constant reminder to me as I travel to different places, and again a constant challenge to be felt and seen in so many different ways as one travels.

I miss opportunities everyday here to meet new people or share something of myself and culture. To ask a local to take my picture, or stop when someone waves to me and just say hello, even though we may not understand the words, the feelings are universal. The opportunities many, some days I will just try to wave to a hundred people maybe, or be open to that one time where we can break down some boundaries and share common ground. But I first have to be aware of this separation, and push my lazy side to stop and see. To not just go, go, go, ignoring what is going on. ( a guy who rode his motorcycle around the world in 16 days, and slept in ditches comes to mind!) Or to react out of fear simply because someone is different, or I don't speak their language.

As Dr. Greg Frazier said who has been around the world 5 times on a motorcycle, what he remembers most and what its about, is the people. Connecting with people.

Oh yes about Brownsville ( I just needed to say all that because some , me included, wonder about the sanity of this trip at times), in this case my prejudgment (which I'll be dealing with the whole way trip), was that it was just a dirty border town and a place to just get thru. Well I found it very clean and a good place to rest up for awhile before going into Mexico. And while I'm not a big fan of strip malls and chain restaurants, for a tired traveler needing to find things quickly with limited time, familiarity is a good thing. Add the pleasant weather (in the 70's), the gulf coast near by, and things like the wild life preserve and San Padre Island, I did find it a nice place to rest and spend time.

So onward. After getting into Mexico and going thru customs, it was not too hard to weave my way thru Brownsville's neighboring Mexican city Matamoros and begin heading south. Now this did seem like  a dirty border town. With a lot of traffic, pollution and rough roads. And like other parts of Mexico, it looks like nothing new has been built, or even painted for 50 years.

So I avoided cattle grades that were in the road, one having a 6 inch wide section with an apparent bottom less hole to avoid which would have crushed my bike tire and sent me sprawling. I found the main route 180 and 101 out of town and headed south into the interior of Mexico.

I had heard there were check stops within a 30 mile range of the border. Sort of a filter to catch whatever customs didn't I suppose. There were 3 of these police check points. The first one checked my passport and vehicle permit for the country, the officer was very professional, spoke English and told me to have a good trip. At the other two stops they just waved The area here was very flat, there was a huge single engine plane that was crop dusting out in the field, probably corn, but I didn't recognize a lot of the crops in these fields. In fact a lot of the fields looked freshly tilled with nothing in them. Later this farmland gave way to more of a high desert look with wide rolling vista's but with nonstop vegetation and undergrowth, but no sage or tumble weeds, probably 3 or 4 foot high. It looked impenetrable, like you couldn't possibly do a hike to any of the surrounding ridges or bluffs. It also in ways looked a lot like Montana or the western U.S., except for this thick blanket of vegetation that covered the ground.

 

 

Out here too, there were very few side roads and no place to pull over to take a photo or just rest. I was to find most of Mexico like this. Not set up for us Tourista's at all, especially out in the country. If your looking for a rest stop with all the amenities, or like I said, a place to just pull off and rest or take a picture, their very few indeed. Often just to take a picture I would have to risk stopping in the breakdown lane, take a quick picture and get going again. These lack of places to stop, anywhere in the country, influenced a lot how many pictures I took and of what. And many of the roads in this part of the country were just dirt roads heading out into the middle of all this wide open land. I thought if I knew the language better, had a different bike designed for gravel roads and such, and the time, exploring these nameless roads in the interior would be an adventure in itself, and probably quite dangerous. There are definitely  places to avoid down here.

I filled up with gas about a hundred miles in at Mexico's state owned (I imagine) fuel stations. Gas is priced by the liter, but I think it came out to about $2.50 a gallon. Gas in Texas was down to $1.93 a gallon! They are called Pemex, and they are everywhere in Mexico. Not knowing the language they were sort of my life line across the country. There I knew I could always get my gas and water, and maybe a snack or two. There was always one or two attendants waiting to fill you up. I have yet to run across a self serve station. So far finding gas has been easier then finding water. Water has been a constant problem since I left Mexico. Since you can't drink anything out of the tap, everything has to be bought in bottles. And with the Pemex chain, or some of the other chain stores in Mexico like Oxaco, you get a feeling that no one has tampered with it. The health nurse who helped me with getting all my immunizations told me she had order a bottled water at a Restaurant on Easter Island one time, and the lid was not sealed, and she drank it anyway and then had to go to a hospital in Australia for several days she was so sick. So as I noted earlier I'm not a big chain store fan, but down here the chain stores usually offer some kind professionalism and security. Of course that was in Mexico.

Also in Mexico there are armed military personnel everywhere. Sometimes doing traffic stops, checking for drugs and weapons, or even stolen artifacts I am told. I have yet to be stopped, they just wave me thru. But it is a little unnerving to pull into a gas station that has 10 armed soldiers standing everywhere and have to pull my bike right into the middle of them all, get off and walk thru them to go the bathroom. I'm not sure if a greeting is in order here, they never say anything to me, and I just go on my way. And again I'm not sure what they are guarding against. But the reality is most countries in the world have a much more involved military presence in local areas then the U.S.

I drove till after dark which I didn't want to do but did find a hotel that was just out of a small town about 120 miles north of Tampico, one of the large gulf coast cities in Mexico. It seemed reasonably clean and away from things as to be safe. If I can I usually try to find a hotel just outside of town as to avoid leaving my bike out where there is a lot of foot traffic. Most hotels down in Mexico and Central America either have a garage for your car to be parked in or like the one I'm at now, have 3 armed guards walking around with shotguns guarding everything. You feel like the president walking outside and always having security by you. I am still not sure what they are guarding from, but maybe I don't need to know. Anyway while this hotel had neither a garage for my bike or armed guards it was safely out of town. It was 280 Pesos for the night. 10 Pesos is worth about 75% of a dollar as far as I can tell. So if you pay 100 Pesos for something it is about $7.50 American. Or in this case if you multiply 280 by .75 you end up with about $21. This $20 to $25 range is what I paid most of my way across Mexico.

 

 

Hotels in Mexico all had t.v., some with cable some not. Most had air conditioning, or at least one that blew air and looked like it might work. Some had toilet paper, some had hot water, all had towels and soap. Some had door locks, some had actual garages which was your entrance to your room as well, having to close the garage door to secure yourself for the night. And no that didn't lock either. All were basically clean with usually just a bed and few furnishings. No pictures on the wall, nothing that could be stolen. Few had remotes for the t.v. They were all just very basic rooms, clean, usually safe, and not all that cheap really, but lodging is a constant adventure so stay tuned.

Another phenomenon of Mexico and Central America is the practice of burning. Often entire fields along the highway,  or ditches are cleared of brush by burning, using the road your on as a fire barrier. Usually the undergrowth is green enough and probably not going to get out of control, often you would drive into a cloud of smoke from village to village. Or one time I could see smoke from miles away, a big fire out on the plains. By the time I got there it was a huge brush fire, scorching acres of earth, stopping at the highway I was on. And of course not a soul in site. I guess it would burn out eventually, there was simply nothing out there to destroy, and there would have been no way to stop it had they wanted to anyway. I wanted to take a picture, but of course there was no place to pull over.

The first day I drove about 250 miles into Mexico and had I not left Texas about noon that day I could have made better time. The roads for the most part were very good except one 10 mile stretch of construction, I was able to drive 60 or 70 mph most of the way. At this rate, I thought I should be in Guatamala in few days. But then again, "when life looks like easy street, that's when there's danger at your door".

 

 

 

 

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