02/25 Taxco is my new favorite city. I’ve never seen anything quite like it. 75,000 people live in houses that sit along narrow cobblestone streets that wind up and around the massive hills. After a fairly long walk around I think there’s only one road that’s actually flat. The streets have no sidewalks either so you have to be a little careful but it’s mostly VW Beetle taxis and vans and they’re used to people. I even saw about a dozen gringos walking around. Silver mining is huge around here and every street has merchants selling bracelets, chains, etc. Towering over the other buildings is the Santa Prisca church. It’s not that old (compared to other things I’ve seen) but it was pretty impressive looking.

The ride up here was long and hot. I think it ended up being about 8 miles of steady climbing. There wasn’t a shoulder but traffic wasn’t too bad and you could hear things coming up behind you so I just moved off the road if I knew it was a big truck.

Said goodbye to Marten and Karin this morning. They are heading up toward Mexico City so I probably won’t see then again unless we run into each other in the Yucatan. We ended up chatting for a couple hours last night and they are both great people. Glad I got to meet them.

I’m going to stay here tomorrow night too so I have time to explore the city some more.

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02/24 Back in my tent for the first time in a long time. I missed it. Had it not been for the (Spanish speaking) bicycle tourists I met here at the ruins I’d be in a motel. After a pretty decent climb to the site here at Xochicalo I pulled up the place where you buy tickets and saw 2 fully loaded touring bikes leaning against the wall. Mazatlan was the last time I saw another touring rider so I was kind of excited. I paid the $51 pesos to get in and went to check out the ruins and see if I could find the bike riders.

I spotted them after a couple minutes. They are Marten and Karin from the Netherlands. They are on their way from Alaska to Bolivia. I knew they’d been in Alaska because they have a big old thing of bear spray attached to one of their bikes. They had already gotten an OK to camp up here right next to the museum so I went off to explore the ruins since they’d be here for the night.

What an amazing place. Basically the entire top of the (huge) hill was leveled and a city built on top of it. The area where the ruins are is much larger than I thought it would be. I grabbed some pics and then headed back to the museum.

I didn’t want to impose so I was going to head back downhill to a motel but Marten/Karin were cool with me camping up here too so I stayed. The people that run the site let us pitch our tents in the parking lot on a grassy section so that’s where we are–camped next to some old Mayan ruins.

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02/23 Today was perfect. Great weather, nice roads and beautiful scenery. I’m fighting off a saddle sore so I kept the miles down a little. Lowering the seat back down helped but now I’ll have to watch my knees because they get sore when the seat is too low. It’s not easy.

When I arrived in Cuautla is was about 3pm so I found a motel and took a taxi over to the Walmart. I was hoping they’d have a better selection of cameras. They did but the one I wanted wasn’t there. There was an Office Depot next door but they didn’t have very many cameras. I need a Best Buy but I don’t think there’ll be one until Oaxaca, if there’s even one there.

Across the street there’s a restaurant called California Buffet so I headed over for dinner. For US $10 you get the dinner/salad/dessert buffet and all the beer (Corona) you can handle. What a deal.

I decided to stick to my original plans and skip dropping down to Acapulco. It’s a lot warmer now and once I get past Oaxaca I’ll be in lower elevations anyway.

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When I’m old and grey my mind won’t be as sharp so I put together a page of everyone that made a lasting impression on me so I don’t forget them. The page is here . Not everyone I met is on here but I tried to get the bicycle tourists I ran into more than once and people that stuck out for something they did/said or were doing.

02/21 I couldn’t have asked for a better birthday present… downhill for 35 miles. Still had the killer wind in my face but once I get going there’s no stopping me. OK, food and cold drinks will stop me so I had to make a pit stop for some fresh coconut juice and watermelon (hold the chili). Yum.

It’s hard to believe I’ve spent the last 365 days sitting on a bike seat (OK, technically 3 seats). I don’t really have anything profound to say about it but a few things surprised me. The first thing was the reaction people had to seeing me cruising past them. This was really noticeable in the southeast US and in Mexico. It doesn’t bother me nearly as much these days but getting stared at (intently) used to drive me crazy. This happens a lot in Mexico especially because I’m taking routes through some pretty out of the way places. I doubt too many 6′ 3″ white guys on 150 lbs bicycles ride through.

Having random people come up to you, sometimes when you really want to be left alone, was also tough sometimes. That was hard to get used to since I tend to be fairly solitary to begin with. People did end up being a lot friendlier than I thought they would be. If someone is watching me ride by I almost always wave and about 99% of the time get one back. Honks, waves and whistles are still a daily occurrence. It’s kind of nice.

This shouldn’t have surprised me but I was really shocked by the footprint people have left on the land. 6.8 billion people will do that I guess. You really end up appreciating the few places that aren’t fenced in or paved over.

As I mentioned today was a pretty easy ride. I dropped another 3000 feet so now I’m at 4266 feet. It’s so much warmer. I could get used to this altitude. Being able to sit inside without having to wear a long-sleeve shirt, pants and the thickest socks I own is a treat. Before leaving town this morning I took advantage of a car wash place and had my bike cleaned. What a difference. I can’t even remember the last time I washed it. Looks good now though.

Izucar de Matamoros is my half way point to the next stop: Xochicalo. This city is pretty nice so I might stay here tomorrow as a present to myself. They had a big car show in the central plaza so it might be safer for me to be off the road while all the hung over teenagers drive home tomorrow anyway.

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Weather in Puebla when posted:

Temperature: 14 °C, Humidity: 44%, Wind Speed: 10km/hr, Cloud Cover: n/a