May 22nd to 30th, 2004

May 22nd to 27th, 2004

I shall resume our time in paradise in a few words because paradise is not a complicated place. First word: ahhhhh… I sigh with content. Take a load off… The water is perfect and we realize it every day at least twice. We drink beer, hang, swing the hammock, and let the tension in our muscles turn into tranquil flab. We are joined in heaven by Johanne’s friends from Quebec, Simon and Isa. In their company we spend a couple days sitting and enjoying the conversational possibilities. Our last day some school kids steal my glasses off a table while we swim and we spend a panicky half our tracking them down. We catch up with them in the neighboring town of Mazunte where they visit the sea turtle museum and my 20/20 vision is restored.


May 27th, 2004

We climb some hills away from the coast to Potchutla. There are many beautiful birds: tiny green hummers and bright black and yellow squawkers. The mountains between us and Oaxaca tower in the distance. I hope our legs are ready. The rest of the day goes fine, we do climb a lot, but the terrain is somewhat equilibrated. We have changed worlds in the space of a few hours. We stop for a drink from our water bottles and are stared at in silence by a bunch of kids for a good long five minutes. Behind us lies the dry coast as we ride up through green hills that are exploding with life. Everywhere I look there’s an interesting tree or plant that I’ve never seen before. Colourfull birds abound, there are strange and beautiful squawks and whistles. A butterfly flutters down the road with us. We pass several towns of various sizes; I’m intrigued upon seeing people living in this wonderful place and can’t wait to visit a village in more depth. We camp across the road from some beehives, close to the asphalt but hidden by the considerable foliage. Before bed we have the opportunity to hike down a steep hill and bathe in a cool mountain stream.

May 28th, 2004
The morning of imaginary descents

This morning we grind. Up and up and up into the mountains. All descents that happen this morning are in our wildest dreams. We cruise at the phenomenal speed of 4 km/h past little villages who sell honey. We soon realize that it has a marvelously rich taste, totally different from pure Canadian honey, it is a mixture of flavors. We enjoy it in our frequent water and nut breaks that we take to break the work. A teenager bikes with us up a long stretch on a bmx. We are later joined by his brother who keeps the pace on foot, not a problem as he pushes that wheelbarrow. Hugo and Leonardo are on their way to tend the bees. We stop at the hives and Johanne takes a picture. Hugo warns us to back off as a bunch of bees swarm out of a nearby hive. We step back onto the road and Johanne gets stung. Then many bees begin to buzz around her and she goes running off down the road screaming. Hugo takes my bike and I take Jo’s and we head to join her, funnily enough the bees don’t bother us at all. She is shaken and scared and has killed quite a few bees, we say goodbye to the beekeepers and resume the grind. Our riding is much affected by the addition of a large amount of vertical movement to our regular horizontal ride. We make our excruciating way up to a restaurant and stop for lunch. It’s noon and we’ve done a grand total of 13kms. We climb and in the afternoon we notice that the vegetation has changed from rich jungle to pine forest. It has begun to rain every day and we hereby have the pleasure of cooling off somewhat. The temperature at this altitude is chilly already though. We make a short slick descent into the town of Soledad, the curves are sharp and we have to be careful on the wet pavement. A short while later we enjoy a longer more luxurious descent into Jalatengo. On our way through the tiny village we see a group of community persons collaborating on the construction of a school. Around the corner we stop in front of a wide green valley with a creek running through it for a drink. A man who could best be described as “the village idiot” approaches us. He definitely has special needs and droolingly asks us for soft drinks with much insistence. As we prepare to move on he asks us for a little ride on our motorbikes. We move on up the valley with our drooling friend in hot pursuit. Our camp is a near the road amongst some pines. Across thee street we head after dinner to bath ourselves once again in cool mountain waters.

We prepare for a day of vertical movement with a hearty breakfast of quesadillas, mango, and nuts. I must once again mention the upward movement just because it astonishes us so. Every time we turn around to see the road, way off below us, we are astounded at how high up we have come in the last 20 minutes alone. The amount we’ve done in the last two days is beyond the scope of my imagination. There are clouds far off below us. In short we are high up. Bad luck attacks in the afternoon. Johanne’s cassette has been making unruly noises for some days now and it bites the dust approaching the last 10kms of ascent we would have to do for some days. She can pedal all she wants but won’t go anywhere. We need to get this exercise bicycle to a mechanic as soon as possible. The next truck stops for my thumb and agrees to take us to Miahuatlan about 60kms away. The magical mountain landscape rolls past our eyes through the truck window. Both of us want to cry for missing this long long long descent. We walk our bikes around Miahuatlan looking for a hotel room and find one that is quite luxurious and cheaper than our greasy sex motel in Puerto Escondido.

May 30th, 2004

An early awakening is called for as we want to visit a mechanic without having to pay for another night in the hotel. We have breakfast in a tiny restaurant where the tables are too small for me to get my knees under when I sit. We see a woman kneading an enormous lump of corn dough and spend a few minutes talking to her and watching as she presses tortillas that are about ten inches across. We find a mechanic but the joke is that Johanne’s bike has mysteriously started working again. He begins to inspect her cassette and it is immediately evident to her experienced eye that he doesn’t know what he’s doing. He does however have a very cute little baby girl who uses tools like most kids use building blocks. We decide to see how far we can get with this funny finicky cassette (Oaxaca? Argentina?) and make like Jack. We hit the road with heavy hearts to have not biked all the way through the lovely mountains. We are riding through a plane with mountains on all sides following a relative constant descent between farmer’s fields and past the occasional village. The sky is marvelous with displays of cloud and light that really kick ass. In the late afternoon we see some people working a field away from the road and ask permission to camp. It’s all good and we set up for the night.