Day 33 - Leaving Palenque yesterday I stopped for the night at a hostel on the road just outside of the ruins. They had beautiful thatched huts for rent (with mosquito netting over the beds) for 200 pesos ($16).

I walked down the road a few hundred meters to catch dinner at a restaurant nearby, which I thought was lucky since we were in the middle of nowhere and there didn't seem to be anything around. I was completely surprised and taken aback to find they had a large outdoor seating area, extensive menu, and full open air bar. Even a stage. It seemed like such an anachronism out there in the jungle. There were even a few groups of gringos sitting around eating. I use the term "gringos" to mean white, non-Latino people, though in what was to happen later they were all Europeans -- no Americans.

I sat and had a couple drinks, and as time passed more, and more, and MORE people showed up. Then a live band started setting up on the stage. Before I knew it (those margaritas were STRONG!) the place was completely packed, literally about two hundred people (all European/Australian gringos from what I could tell and what my waiter told me). The band was playing, tour agency booths were set up on the side, people were selling trinkets, etc. What was going ON?!? By this time I was really feeling it too. Around 11pm the band shut down, but the entertainment was far from over! Poi (dancing with flaming balls on chains) and fire-stick performers began in front of the crowd to a second band of bongo drum players. I caught a video here. Finally at midnight I walked back ("walked" being perhaps too generous a word) to my thatched hut up the road and crashed on the bed. So weird! The place was called El Panchan. And on a Tuesday night!

This morning I heading out of the hostel to reach San Cristobal de las Casas, at 7000' in the Chiapas mountains, by the end of the day. The road was winding through the mountains and just beautiful. Watch a video from the saddle of the motorcycle here.

I stopped at a swimming hole called Agua Azul on the way up. It was really nice, and a lot of people were enjoying the beautiful day there. I caught an hour or so of swimming and playing around, and then headed back up the mountain on the bike.

The last hour or so before reaching San Cristobal it started raining, pretty hard. This was the first rain I'd ridden through since entering Mexico. I was pretty nervous (and for good reason), but there wasn't anywhere to stop. I finally made it into town around an hour before sunset, completely soaked through (I hadn't stopped to put my waterproof liners on). Plus, I have been in over hundred degree temps the last couple weeks, and here it is in the mid 50's and raining. What a difference! I stopped at a large hotel and ended up getting the room for 200 pesos, down from the 590 pesos advertised on the wall. The guy agreed to it immediately, without hesitation. It must be their off season :)

Day 32 (afternoon) - A hundred miles from Villahermosa is Palenque, a "medium sized" site of Mayan ruins, which is located right in the front range where the flatlands of Chiapas rise into the mountains behind. It is in a beautiful spot up on the mountainside and commands a vast view of the plains below.

The site closes at 5pm and I got there right at 4 (I spent a little too much time at the zoo I guess :), so they let me in for free. Even with just an hour, I was able to walk around and see most of what is available there, and not roped off. Click here for a video.

Palenque was smaller than I anticipated, but did have the best preserved architecture of the three sites I'd been at so far (Teotihuacan & El Tajin being the others). I'd read that howler monkeys live in the woods surrounding the site and you can sometimes hear them, but I guess this day they were saving their voices because I didn't hear them.

I have to admit though, that something about these sites is a bit underwhelming for me. I know they were built without iron or the wheel, but they had centuries -- thousands and thousands of people over dozens of generations. Perhaps it's because I went to Peru last summer and saw what the Incas were able to accomplish -- their craftsmanship is absolutely stunning in comparison (and Machu Picchu is out of this world beautiful).

Day 32 (morning) - Villahermosa is mostly an industry town in the middle of the hot flatlands. According to Wikipedia, it's a stopover point between Mexico City and Cancun. Or in my case, between Veracruz and Palenque.

Before heading out to the famous Mayan ruins at Palenque, I noticed in Lonely Planet that there is a worthwhile park/museum/zoo in town named Parque La Venta, and I decided to check it out.

I really don't like the concept of zoos for the lives that animals have to endure when caged up, but my 50 pesos ($4) to enter this one wasn't going to change anything. And I thought it might be interesting to see the more "jungly"-ish animals.

The park actually turned out to be pretty interesting, and I spent a couple hours there. It's part zoo, part path through the woods, part outdoor museum with a plentiful number of large Olmec artifacts along the path.

There was a black panther in a large caged area, which was really freaky because it was making loud hoarse noises, but all I could see were its green eyes glowing against its inky black fur. It was sitting in the shade under an overhang not 5 meters away from me, but it was really hard to see. I stood there imagining it stalking prey (including humans) in the jungle, and a shiver ran up my spine.

The toucan had to be the most ridiculous animal I've seen. I mean it literally looked like it had a fake toucan beak strapped to its head. I just wanted to take it off the poor guy! It stood there moving its eye to look at me and I felt so sorry for it having to go through life with that ludicrous thing attached to it's face. I suppose it's normal though and he felt perfectly fine.

There is a large hemispherical aviary that you could enter with a large number of species flying around, plus an underground dark section with big fat bats hanging from the ceiling and some sloth like creature. And on the path in the thick jungle large animals the size of small dogs kept running across in front of me. The information sign called them badgers and said they were friendly. Must not be the same as the MEAN badgers we had growing in Wisconsin!

The Olmec sculptures were interesting, and at the end of the walk is a cage with the "biggest predator in the world", which is a mirror behind some bars. Cute!

Day 31: Today was a big travel day. I needed to go nearly 300 miles from Veracruz to Villahermosa. So I didn't have a lot of time to dilly dally (and don't have a lot to report), but in the morning...

...I headed over to the Spanish fort, San Juan de Ulua. This is where the ending of Romancing the Stone was filmed. I was really excited to see it (it's a famous fort), but it was closed!! It is Monday, and lots of stuff is closed on Mondays in Mexico. Oh well. I thought of trying to talk my way in (not that I'd have any chance of doing so, of course), but saw that they were installing a new bridge to the fort, and unloading it from the trailer. So even if I got through the gate no way of getting into the fort itself :)

I caught a delicious meal of fresh fish, Veracruz style (basically with sauteed red peppers and onions on top), and started the long, HOT (100 deg+) ride.

I was nearly wiped out (financially) by the bloody toll booths! I paid over 500 pesos in tolls to get there, that's $50. It's frustrating they charge my little bike the same as a big SUV full of people. This along with the $30 per night hotel rooms are killing my budget.

C'est la vie.

Day 30: Based on Bruce's suggestion (thanks Bruce!) I headed to El Tajin today, which is a ancient city built by the Totonacs. These people were the first natives encountered by Cortez when he landed on the coast near Veracruz. They had lived here for 800 years and were conquered by the Aztecs just 25 years before Cortez's arrival. Thus they were eager to revolt against the Aztecs and ended up being instrumental in the Cortez's conquering of them.

The city is very different than Teotihuacan, in that it is in lush jungle as opposed to high desert. A short view of the grounds can be seen here.

The 3rd picture above, which looks like bleachers, is a Mesoamerican ball court. I'd come across one of these while playing Tomb Raider Underworld, and always wondered what the heck it was! In this game, which is like volleyball without a net, and using hips only, both the losing players and their fans would be beheaded and sacrificed to the gods. Depictions of these sacrificial ceremonies were on carved sculptures all over El Tajin (as in the rest of Mesoamerica too).

On my way out, I caught a performance of the Voldadores (video here). Four of them climb up a pole and then spin around from a rope tied to their waist as these ropes unwind from the pole. One guy, the priest, stays up top playing a flute and beating a drum. It has an interesting tradition, but I think it's absolutely ludicrous that the training takes 10 years. Seriously.

A sixth guy in costume went around asking for money before the performance. He stood in front of me for quite awhile and gave me a dirty look when I didn't give him any. I might have done so AFTER the performance, but I'm not too eager paying to watch somebody do what I'd rather do myself! I was hoping he didn't put a hex on me. So after the performance I went around trying to find him to give him a dollar but...

...A local girl saw me, and came up asking (in English this time) if she could interview me for a school project. She was with her family, and they video taped her asking me a lot of questions (in English) about who I was, how I heard of El Tajin, which is better -- US or Mexico, etc. So that was neat!

I headed down the Gulf of Mexico along the Emerald Coast (named so because the water is a beautiful green), to Veracruz. I tried to stop by some more burial ruins on the way but they were closed. In Veracruz, it was getting late so I just decided to stay at another... sex motel. This one was really nice too -- honeymoon sheets that spilled beautifully across the floor, nice music controlled by a switch on the wall, tiled wood floor, and the all important A/C.

Day 29: Well, it's time to leave Mexico City! On my way out of town I went over to a BMW dealer and bought a replacement rear sprocket for the bike. This trip is going to be much longer than I thought when I left home, since the idea to go to Guatemala came to me after I'd left (!), and though I don't need it now, I'll need it later down the road. We also topped off oil, coolant, and tire pressure.

And on a positive note, I managed to get out of Mexico City without paying a fine to the corrupt cops which apparently are everywhere. I ran into two other American motorcyclists who had to pay $200. Everyone from Hans to Mauricio at the hostel had warned me about the cops there, so I was glad for that.

I headed to the ruins of Teotihuacan on the outskirts of Mexico City. I find these ruins fascinating -- they were built by not by the Maya, but by people long before the Maya that almost nothing is known about. The Mayans stumbled across their abandoned city centuries later and thought the Gods had built it and left it for them there, so they moved right in. It was a bit hot there though -- not many trees around.

I'm headed to more ruins tomorrow, those of El Tajin, near the coast. I rode down out of the mountains, on another beautiful ride. It started to drizzle a bit the last hour before sunset. It was the first bit of rain I've had to ride through since the day I crossed into Mexico.

At dinner, at a roadside cafe next to a bus stop somewhere in the mountains, a dog came up to me begging. I saw that she was breastfeeding and had pups somewhere. The owner shoed her away with a broom, and I saw that she had a hideous wound on her neck, all the skin was torn away and it was just red, raw. I felt so bad for the dog I grabbed the rest of my uneaten tortillas after dinner and caught up with the thing down the street, and gave them to her. Life sure can be hard here.

Upon reaching Poza Rica, the town near the El Tajin ruins, I only found two hotels -- the first was $100 per night, and the second was $60 per night. These are both WELL beyond my budget, especially from paying $12 the last 3 nights at the hostel. So I went with option 3 -- a sex motel. It was $30 for 12 hours, was clean and nice, had my own garage to pull the bike into, and also a huge mirror above me on the bed. I've never slept like that before! And blessed A/C. It's hot and sticky now that I'm down in the jungle...

Day 28: Today, while hanging out in Mexico City, I decided to walk from the hostel to the National Anthropological Museum, which I'd visited when I was 17 and is internationally renowned. The girl working at the hostel reception told me it was a 20 minute walk, but it ended up being over an hour each way. I wasn't bothered though, as the weather was nice and I enjoyed the exercise.

Some pics are above -- the ape-ish thing is Lucy, that 3.5 million year old human ancestor they found. The depiction of her in the museum was quite weird to look at -- it was just so... half human, half ape! I also filmed a short clip of the Aztec sun stone -- see it here. To be honest I'm not much of a museum person -- seeing all those objects out of their natural environment -- I just can't relate very well. I like it much more when they build sets. (They did have a few nice ones there.)

I spent some time talking with a young British couple at the hostel -- the guy was asking me if there was food other than tacos -- I laughed to myself thinking of the scene in "Brokeback Mountain" where Heath Ledger's character complains about the beans... "It's a little too early in your trip to be complaining about tacos!"

Going to Mexico City was a big detour on my route, and I went expressly for the hope that it would be possible to rekindle relationships with my aunt, uncle, & two cousins that live there. Due to geographical distances I haven't been able to know them my whole adult life. I knew there was a significant chance it would not work out. In the end, I stayed in town for 72 hours, but only 2 of those hours (the first two) were spent with my aunt and uncle.

I am glad that meeting happened at least -- this particular aunt has always been my favorite (of the 4 I have) -- I have always thought she was so adventurous, and also the most beautiful (still). But I was very disappointed that there was no interest or effort on the part of my cousins to meet with me, and that more than just that first meeting for lunch couldn't be arranged. Needless to say this type of circumstance is so rare -- it had not happened in 18 years, and may never again. It shook me up for a few days, and I'm still saddened by it.

Day 26: My aunt ("tia" in Spanish, which I rather prefer to the English word) and uncle ("tio") live in Mexico City -- she for 44 years, since she was 18. I last saw the two of them when I stayed at their house for a couple days when I was 17, which was 18 years ago.

I'd sent her an e-mail a couple weeks ago mentioning I'd be in town and perhaps we could meet. I was very excited when I got a reply that they would be free! We've been coordinating back and forth since my ride down is slightly unpredictable, and it has been one of the things I'd looked forward to the most. This morning was the big day, and I left Jacala at 9am and raced to make a lunch appt with them at 2pm near downtown Mexico City.

I arrived (about 15 minutes late) and we had a marvelous lunch at the very nice restaurant they had selected. We caught up on everything, family, work, life, etc. But then it came time to say goodbye. They left, and I'd been so excited about meeting them, I didn't realize until afterward that I'd forgotten to take out my camera for a picture of us together. :( Also, I have two cousins that live here in the city (my tia's sons) who I haven't seen since I was single digits in age, but although we talked about them, there wasn't a mention of us meeting up, so I guess I won't see them this time either.

I'm going to be here in Mexico City for the next couple days at least, so I have plenty of time to see them more, but that unfortunately isn't going to happen, so I'm feeling a bit deflated at the moment.

Day 25: Puente de Dios, the swimming hole of the gods. It is the best place I've ever swum. I highly recommend it!

After spending the night in the town of Tamasopo, and having a lazy morning with a breakfast of fresh mango, yogurt, honey, & granola, I headed just out of town to cool off in the beautiful waters.

The hole has a healthy waterfall flushing into it, water running down all over the walls from above, and several spots where water flows straight out of the holes in the rock that you can sit under like showers. Plus a gorgeous cave tunnel about 20 meters long with a high ceiling that you can swim through (while in the cave the light from outside makes the water glow bright blue from below). It's over 20 feet deep everywhere, and there are jumps from whatever height you want! Click here for a short video of this fantastic place.

I spent around 2 hours swimming and playing here, before deciding it was time to hit the road again. I met a Canadian guy who is studying in Guadalajara (and impressing everyone at Puente de Dios with his backflips off the wall from 25' up). He whet my appetite for Chiapas coming up next week -- he said it's just like this area but even more rustic and beautiful.

I headed south on the bike, back through Aquismon, to the town of Tamazunchale. The hotel owner in El Naranjo had kept expounding that I must go there. I rode into town through reasonably beautiful countryside, more or less the same as I'd seen everywhere else. I wasn't sure what he had been talking about -- that is, until I headed out of Tamazunchale on Rte 85 to Jacala, high in the moutains.

I went through the most fantastically beautiful riding I have ever done! It was late afternoon with the dramatic colors that brings, and I climbed higher and higher on winding mountain roads next to sheer dropoffs, a broad river flowing thousands of feet below me, speckled with whitewater rapids. The air had cooled off, the road was in great condition (except the one spot where it had completely fallen away -- there was still SOME adventure left), and I went in and out of tiny hamlets every few miles. Off in the distance peaks were hazy and gorgeous with the setting sun, and the sense of expanse was incredible. Tamazunchale is barely above sea level, and the road to Jacala crested over 8000', sometimes on a ridge with vast dropoffs on either side.

I wished for a helmet cam to share this -- I'd considered handholding my camera to take some video, but without a wriststrap it would be too distracting, and I didn't want to be distracted, not with no guardrails :)

Day 24: Today I backtracked a little -- I left from Aquismon back up north. My goal was to see the Tamul waterfall, which is around 100 meters high.

They now (since I was last here in '08) have these highly graphical tourists signs all over the area here, which make it very easy to find the natural attractions, since each sign tells you not only what is right where you are, but has arrows pointing which way to see other stuff in the area. In Aquismon my GPS showed an "unpaved road" as the direct route north to Tamul, vs the long way around on the highway (50 miles longer). The colorful sign in Aquismon, though, pointed the "unpaved road" as the way to Tamul. So I took that, and found it was fully paved, and a wonderful ride through lightly traveled farmlands.

I passed a group of 4 vaqueros, their white cowboy hats shining brightly in the sun, riding atop horses, herding a group of cattle off in a field. I waved at them from the saddle of my own iron horse, and they waved back. I also saw a basketball hoop at what I assume was a religious school, because they were able to make it look like a cross!

I arrived at the river to see Tamul, where you have to pay to rent a boat and they paddle you 4 kilometers upriver to see the waterfalls themselves. I got in with a group of 4 Mexicans, and paid 200 pesos ($16) for my share. There were hordes of people doing this; the river was a madhouse of boats going up and down. When we finally came within view of the falls themselves, we stopped at a rock in the water a considerable distance away. Click here to see us rounding the final corner for the first view of the falls. It was fine for a photo shot, but I wanted to be much closer! The guides let us all take a photo, but then hurried us back into the boat to leave, as more boats were arriving. Needless to say, I was a bit disappointed at the experience. Midway back down the river, we stopped at some crowded tourist shacks, to buy refreshments (I had more mango with chili powder & lime juice, my favorite).

When I left back on the bike, I continued riding up the road towards Tamasopo, where I'll spend the night. I then came across another graphical sign for Tamul, this one telling me of an overlook. "More interesting!" I thought. 5 kilometers down a rough rocky road, I reached a campground. I paid 10 pesos ($0.80) at the gate, and followed a windy trail for 10 minutes, straight out to the top of the waterfall! Literally, you could go stand in the middle at the very top if you wanted. But be careful -- it's a 350 foot drop. There were only 4 people there with me, off swimming in one of the many gorgeous , crystal clear turquise pools. Click here to see a video of the view from right at the top.

Then, I found some rickety bamboo ladders, leading down, which I decided to follow. They lead me right to the base of the falls themselves! There was no one else here, and I had all the time I wanted. What a much better experience! And for 10 pesos, instead of 200...

The face of a boy, glimpsed in passing by the side of the road... who smiles in wonder and delight at the passing Rider from a foreign land...

The boy grows into a man, still smiling, surrounded by his family -- wife and children...

The man becomes old, his face wrinkly, and now sits in a rocking chair by the side of the road, smiling at the traffic that passes him by...

...with no longer any memory of the Rider that passed by, so many years ago...

Day 23: Why do people criticize Americans for speaking slowly and loudly when they aren't understood by the locals? I really wish the Mexicans would do that to me! I ask so many questions with yes or no answers, and instead of telling me Si o No, they prattle off for 30 sec, at a volume I can barely hear. Then we both look frustrated at each other for a bit. Argh. But I digress...

This morning I headed off from town to the swimming hole of Minas Viajes, about 10 miles south of The Orange. It was very beautiful, and had a lot of people swimming and grilling out. I spent about an hour and a half cooling off in the milky emerald waters. I swam over to the waterfalls and went behind them, then swam down through them. What fun! On the way out, I bought a skinned mango on a stick with lime juice & chili powder. YUM!!!

I headed south to the town of Aquismon, where our group stayed in December 2008. I have now come full circle! While of course conceptually I know that getting on a plane and flying somewhere, I travel the same ground as driving, it's different when I actually have DRIVEN here from my front door. I've experienced all the land between there and here, instead of getting into a plane, and getting out of it once I've arrived. Make sense?

Last night I dropped off my luggage in the hotel room, and rode the bike up to Golindrinas cave just before sunset. It's a vertical cave, the deepest cave in the area, popular for watching the tens of thousands of birds that live on its walls, fly out at sunrise and fly in at sunset. At the top is a circular hole about 300' across, overlooking a vertical shaft that drops 1250 feet straight down. It's actually bell shaped, so the ground above is undercut on all sides, overhanging the cave below.

In 2008 there were 3 guys or so that would wrap a rope around your waist and hold you as you leaned over the abyss. Well word must have gotten out, because now there were around 10 guys with ropes, working for tips only. And for $10, they'd lower you 20 meters down and haul you back up. I decided to partake (in the cheaper option), and hung out over space looking at the other world more than a thousand feet below me. It was almost primeval, like looking into the window of a million years ago...

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.

Day 20 & 21: I have finally made my way out of Monterrey and started to wander south. I was at the hostel nearly two weeks and hadn't met anyone like-minded, but as luck would have it, on the last day two Aussies from Perth showed up, 6 weeks into their trip to Tierra del Fuego, at the southern most end of South America. Exactly the trip I want to do some day.

We had lunch together (at the culinary institute). They are not on motos, although they said they wished they were, but instead are going to take buses all the way down (20,000 miles). They intend to take 16 months. I was quite jealous! As much as I'd like to stay and hang out with them for the weekend, it was time for me to hit the road.

I headed out, riding through the mountains south of Monterrey, taking the road up past the Cola de Caballo hotel that we stay at so often for the ACA rendezvous. I'd been wanting to see where that road would lead me ever since I first experienced its winding, twisting, mountainous path with sheer dropoffs in 2005. It didn't disappoint. The road gets narrower and more rough, and leads high over the mountains, hour after hour. It took nearly 3 hours to cross through the mountains to the altiplano on the other side.

I ended up in Real de Catorce, an old silver town high in the mountains at 9000 feet (recommended to me by Hans). The last 10 miles into the town are cobblestone, which is very tricky to ride on the bike -- it was sliding all over the place at 35mph. Then, you travel through a mile long tunnel hewn out of mountain by hand, and you emerge into the town, nestled securely in its high valley. The air is fresh and brisk (cold) up here -- such a difference from the 105 deg it was in Monterrey yesterday. I found a nice hotel for 200 pesos ($16). There are some nice hikes from here to the ruins outside the town -- I'm about to head out and see where my feet will take me.

Day 18 & 19: The last couple days Hans and I spent together in the mountain town of Iturbide, 2-3 hours southwest of Monterrey. We rented the upper floor of a duplex for $26 each night. Yesterday we met up with a Czech guy that Hans knows, named Radko. I at first suspected he was not really Czech, because when I greeted him in his native tongue, he just looked at me funny.

We descended Las Encondidas, which is a series of 12 rappels down a cascade of nearly a vertical kilometer. It reminded me very much of a canyon in the San Gabriel mtns north of LA -- low flow, thigh deep pools at the bottom, lots of foliage next to the waterflow. Radko was a kick -- he is a professor and on the hike back to the top he kept grabbing different species of plants and telling me to eat them -- some tasted like spearmint, another like sugar, etc. Then he'd tell me the scientific name (in Spanish, so none of the names stuck with me), but at least I trusted him that I wasn't eating anything harmful :) It was a pleasant way to spend the day, and the lady of the house was really sweet, bringing us tea and cookies afterward.

Today Hans and I drove to a sculptor's house in a nearby town, saw the sculptor's alabaster mine, and went to his house where Hans asked to include him in a project of local artisans that he's working on. The sculptor was a really nice grandfatherly type -- well dressed, and showed us many of his current and past projects. Now, I'm back at the hostel, planning where to ride south, on the next phase of my trip.

Day 17: Today Hans and I returned to climb the via ferrata again. This time, we rented special pulleys to descend via the 3 Tyroleans (aka zip-lines) off the mountain. After we reached the top again, we started the first Tyrolean, which ranks among the scariest things I've ever done in the outdoors! Primarily because it was just the two of us up there, with the cable in front of us that we'd seen on the first ascent, and no one there with experience on these things to confirm we'd be okay (although Hans had talked to a guy at the climbing store who told us "no problema"). I'm glad I talked him into going first! Click here for a video of him just after he stepped into the void.

When it was my turn and I stepped off the platform and the pulley started buzzing, louder and louder on the steel cable, going faster and faster over literally HUNDREDS of feet of air (probably 500 feet if I were to estimate), I thought my heart would pound out of my chest. I didn't quite make it to the other platform, and had to hand over hand the last 30 feet or so.

Then we found out that we hadn't quite brought enough rope for the rappels to the 2nd platform. We BARELY made it, using our extra webbing, slings, a pack, and very nearly our shoelaces.

On the 3rd Tyrolean I went first, and as I approached the ending platform, I thought to myself "okay, I should start to slow down about now... Ummm, any time now!!" But the cable was just a bit too taught and I crashed into the platform, fortunately okay. With Hans it was the same story -- I don't know how the commercial trips do this one!

We reached the bottom of the mountain right at sunset with a nearly full moon in the sky. What a fun day!

Day 16: I was able to descend Matacanes today! Bright blue sky and a couple puffy white clouds. I was on the bike riding from the hostel at 4:20 am today to meet Chuy’s group at the Cola de Caballo at 5am. His two guides, Edgar and Miguel, had 6 clients to lead down. We had a great time. I go so often with experienced people, and occasionally newbies to the sport but who do have some training, that it’s really interesting for me to see a group of people with no skills in a moderately difficult canyon. I think the folks today were exhausted by the end.

I suggested to Hans that we repeat the via ferrata, and he has another canyon in mind. At this rate I’ll never actually head south! At least the hostel is $12 per night.

I am getting a little concerned about my goal. I am truly having a lot of fun here in Monterrey, but Bing maps is telling me it's around 1500 miles to Guatemala. I need to get on the road soon if I even have a hope of getting this accomplished...

Day 15: Two weeks on the road now. It was a really productive day for me. I went to the climbing store and got the special Vertigo carabiner for my harness. It's a one handed autolocker, and I'll use it for my safety tether.

Then I went over to the muffler shop and they took the muffler off the bike and welded it very well. The muffler has two mounts, and unknown to me, the 2nd mount was completely ripped off! They welded that back on, along with the first mount that was tearing a hole in the exhaust. I’m soo happy that is fixed – they did a great job, and afterward we pressure washed the bike. Total cost was 100 pesos. I was so relieved (the first shop I went to told me it couldn't be done because the metal is too thin), and plus when they first gave me the quote it was for only one mount, not two, and with pressure washing the bike, I gave the guy 200 pesos total (which is still only $16).

After that, I found my way to Walmart and got a replacement duffle bag (for the one that fell off my bike and was stolen in the 5 minutes it took me to get back to where it happened), so I can carry my stuff to the canyon tomorrow morning. I'll be descending Matacanes, the most beautiful known canyon in all of North America.

I've noticed that things are pretty expensive here. Everything in Walmart was about 50% more than in the US, especially electronics. Maybe the import fees?

Oh, also I heard back from my aunt today, and she’d be happy to see me, so I'll swing by Mexico City on my way south.

I need to meet the group for the canyon at 5 am, so I’ll leave here at around 4 am. Time to go to bed!

Day 14: Hans and I descended Reflexiones today, which was dry but quite pretty. We had tremendous wind blowing up the canyon as we descended the rappels.

I went back to the Culinary School for dinner. It wasn't quite as impressive as the first time, but was still a nice meal of stew, pasta, and fresh papaya juice.