12/18 Here’s a short version of what happened over the last 24 hours. Rode 75 miles and made it to La Paz in one piece. Had a brutal headwind all day and some hills but nothing too bad. I was just really glad to be in La Paz. For the next couple hours I rode around the city checking out the huge street market and trying not to get run over. At 6pm, after finding a cheap motel (but not registering for a room yet), I headed over to an internet cafe. That’s when I discovered that the ferry to Mazatlan leaves in 2 hours and not again until Tuesday. There’s a Sunday ferry but I think that’s reserved for cows or hazardous materials or something.

The sun has set by this point, the ferry is 13 miles from the cafe and I’m tired and quite starving by now. I decided that 5 more days in La Paz would be less than ideal so I turned on my front/rear lights and started riding. It was a terrible experience and I thought of turning back many times. Riding at night is bad enough but I was on a rural road with occasional semi’s, cars, no shoulders and zero street lights. I wasn’t even 100% sure where I was going or if that was even the right place to buy a ticket. It was probably a stupid move riding out there but I was careful to move off the road when I needed to. The worst part was how tired I was about half way.

Somehow I made it though. I’d even found the right place to buy tickets. So US $130 later my bike and I were in line to board. Only problem was ticket salesperson thought bicycles were “cargo” and had me in the wrong line. I found this out after standing there for 20 minutes. Now I have 10 minutes to ride another mile to get to the right place before the ferry leaves. Brutal. Complaining wouldn’t help so I jumped back on my bike and raced over to the right place.

Finally I was on board and ready to go. They didn’t even check to see if I had a ticket. In the area where they had me park my bike I was happy to see 3 other touring bikes.

Funny thing is the ferry didn’t end up leaving for another two and a half hours. Not sure what the hold up was but I was kicking myself for riding like a madman fr 3 miles.

The ride across the gulf was 12 hours and it went pretty fast. After eating (cafe on board) my next goal was sleep. I didn’t get a cabin so at 11pm I curled up on 2 seats called it a night. The next morning I grabbed some breakfast and met some of the other touring bicyclists on board. Byron is heading down to Argentina. Chris is another guy that I first met in Alaska (still amazes me that you can run into the same people thousands of miles away like this). There were also a couple from Montreal but I don’t remember their names. They are heading north up the coast.

Once the ferry landed we all packed up and rode into town. Byron and I had a similar plan to hang out here for a couple days and figure out where we’re going next. We gave that even more thought while drinking Coronas down by the beach all afternoon.

Mazatlan is easily my favorite place in Mexico so far. From the bustling city streets filled with vendors to the sidewalks that that are completely different in front of every building it just feels different from the other cities. The town square was amazing as was the huge church next to it. More pics tomorrow. Best part– the motel is US $10.83 a night. It has hot water and a fan so I’m good.

GPX Track

12/14 The highway into Ciudad Constitucion actually opened up into a 4 lane road which was a first since Tijuana. No bike lane or shoulder though. Still a fair amount of traffic. I wonder if it’ll be like this all the way to La Paz? Wouldn’t surprise me since all the tourist towns are closer now (Cabo San Lucas). Ciudad Constitucion is a good sized city with about 40,000 inhabitants. Unlike other towns/cities it doesn’t have a garbage dump or a section of decrepit-looking buildings on the outskirts of it. Found a great Chinese restaurant to have lunch. This time there were lots of pictures so I kind of knew what I’d be getting.

Some idiot in an unmarked white U-haul-like truck thought it would be funny to drive over into my lane and slam on his horn as he approached. I didn’t have a place to bail off the road and he didn’t come over far enough where I thought I’d have to dive into the ditch. Normally something like this would piss me off for the rest of the day but it was hard to stay mad when half the people that passed me waved or gave me the thumbs up.

For the first time someone spotted me as I was leaving my campsite this morning. It was a guy in a truck but he didn’t seem to care. I looked back down the road and I swore I could see the 2 German riders I saw late yesterday. They are heading up north from Argentina but I didn’t catch to where.

As noted on FB I finally broke 10,000 miles on my trip this morning. Oh and what a 10,000 miles it’s been.

GPX Track