Day 22: Out of the desert altiplano and down to the fertile lowlands. I left Real de Catorce and rode across the hot desert for most of the afternoon. I eventually began winding through twisty mountains again to the east and emerged 5000' lower into humid farmlands.

I found a nice cheap hotel in the village of El Naranjo ("The Orange") which is well situated for tomorrow's swimming hole trips. I stayed up talking to the owner at his bar next door, who spoke Spanish I could understand very well. He told me a lot about the outdoors stuff to see in the area -- El Cielo, a national preserve just to the north, has bear, jaguar, and crocodiles. (Crocodiles!)

I went to my room for the evening and had my first encounter with my own terrifying animal, a 3" long cucaracha (not counting its 4" long antenna). It was very agitated when I turned on the light. I let it scurry around for a few seconds to find whatever hole it came out of, and instead it decided to go into one of my shoes on the floor. After that I took all my clothes, shoes, helmet, bags, off the floor and piled them on the sink. I didn't want any surprises when I was getting dressed in the morning!

10 hrs earlier...

I hiked up out of the town of Real de Catorce, and explored the mining town ruins above. I'd been approached by probably 8 vaqueros (cowboys) in town asking if I wanted to rent a horse to go up there. Apparently it's the tourist thing to do, because there were about 300 head standing saddled up, waiting to receive their payload, just outside of town.

Far from the dream of riding fast through the desert brush, wind blowing back your hair, you just sit on the back of the beast and a vaquero walks the horse to the top, bridle in his hand. So I walked up with my own two feet. I went probably twice as fast as the clusters of horses, tourists, and cowboys.

The ruins were nice, and I got a great view of the town nestled in its valley. I hiked up to the highest peak nearby, with the local radio antennas, and the wind was HOWLING. It was hard to stand upright. It was becoming early afternoon, and time to move on, so I made my way back down.