PowerCycle

Took advantage of a beautiful, sunny day and rode in the Via RecreActiva in Guadalajara. Via RecreActiva is a weekly 6 hour event where they clear the cars from certain streets and only pedestrians and bicyclists are allowed on them. About 150,000 people then get to ride along about 15 miles of roadway completely free of cars through the 2nd largest city in Mexico. The whole thing was amazingly well-organized. Cross streets all had either volunteers or police to manage cars wanting to cross the route and every mile or so there were repair stations for people that had flats or other bike issues. It’s a shame more cities don’t promote events like this.

The plan was for me to ride my bike to Guadalajara and meet up with Beata, Diana and Isaac at the place that loans bicycles to people. Unfortunately by the time they got to the bike place there were no more bikes left. We just ended up just walking along the sidewalk checking out all the bikes and people. After a couple miles we made it to a mall at which point Isaac went home and the girls went shopping. I jumped on my bike and rode along with the other cyclists. I ended up riding about 14 miles through the city until hunger set in and it was time to head home.

Little update since its been a few days. Still in school although I changed my classes a little. For the first week I was the only student in both my morning and afternoon classes. Then on week two some more people joined in the class. The new people actually knew a little Spanish so it was kind of awkward for me to have to go through the lessons using my halting, child-like Spanish skills. I switched over to private classes so I can cram more learning time in. Picking up everything has been hard. Learning a new language is 100% all about memorizing things and there’s a lot to remember. My sentences are starting to take shape a little and my vocabulary is a lot better. I doubt I’m going to be able to have constructive 2 way conversations with anyone when I leave but if I can get the basics down I can always practice on the road.

The place I was staying didn’t work out so I moved into a school-owned private apartment. The people there were awesome but the room was too loud and I had to sit outside to get internet access. The new place is a 15 minute walk from school but its 100x quieter and it has wireless.

One of the 2 things I ordered from the States via eBay arrived after just a week. It was a GE 26695 VoIP In-Ear Headset/Earphone & Inline Microphone. Got it for when I’m using Skype. It’s crap. The headphone part is fine but the microphone is terrible. Even with the PC mic volume all the way up recorded sounds are barely audible (Skype’s software even warns about it when making a call). The background hissing is also distracting.

The other thing I ordered, the immersion heater, hasn’t arrived but I saw one in a store and bought it since it was only US $2.65. Some of them don’t have a long life expectancy so I’ll hang on to both if the other one gets here before I leave.

Oh, I tried grasshoppers for the first time yesterday. A friend of mine, Beata ordered something off the menu called Delicious Crepe. Well on the English section of the menu it had the real name of the dish: Grasshopper Crepe. She went ahead and ordered it and we all tried some. The little hoppers had been fried up and seasoned with various things. I had 3 and thought they were pretty good. Will I start riding with my mouth open now? No.

After the grasshopper dinner we took a taxi to Guadalajara and watched Sherlock Holmes (in English–good movie too). I’ve had a cold for the last few days so the 40 F rainy weather was kind of brutal but I had a great time. They had a Dairy Queen at the mall too. First one I’ve seen in Mexico.

The pics below are just random ones from different days last week.

Went over to Los Guachimontones after class and took a tour of the ruins with the Director of Operations for the school, Wouter and 2 other students, Sarah and Steve. The circular stepped pyramids were interesting. The biggest one had a little story behind it. Back in the day when they were building the nearby highway they needed some rocks. Well it just so happens there was a huge pile of rocks sitting right nearby so they started grinding them up to use for the road. Not sure how much time passed but they eventually realized that the rocks they were grinding up were from the pyramids that date back to as early as 300 BC. Oops. Not as bad as when they used to burn mummies for use as firewood but still.

There was a playground there and during some of the games the winners would actually have to honor of being sacrificed. The game was like basketball but they’d used their hips to move the ball (not sure how) and they scored by placing the ball in either corner of the opposing team’s “end zone”.

After the tour we headed over to a great restaurant on a lake an enjoyed some margaritas and dinner. Took a while to get back because rush hour in the 2nd largest city in Mexico is brutal.

Took a stroll around town after class. One of the places I went into was El Refugio. When it was built in 1865 it was one of the largest buildings in the world. Now it’s a cultural center and museum. The museum was free and it was pretty remarkable. The first thing that struck me was just how many items were just sitting on display tables unprotected by glass barriers. Some of the things looked very fragile. It was work from all over Mexico and a lot of it was extremely vibrant and detailed. I would have liked to have taken some pics but they had lots of signs saying no photography.

Finally got around to ordering this gadget from eBay that another touring rider introduced me to. It’s call an immersion heater and all you do with it is plug into the wall, drop it in your water-filled cup and wait for it to boil. It’ll save me a lot of aggravation in the mornings where normally I’d be struggling to find a place to get coffee and some food. Now I can make my own right in the motel room. Should help save some cash too.

Tomorrow I’m taking a trip out of town to a place called Los Guachimontones. It’s a pre-Columbian archaeological site near the town of Teuchitlan. There are some pyramids along with some other building complexes. Should be fun. It’s through the school so I’ll even have a guide.