On the Road to Alamos

Last night we changed Dennis's tire with a spare knobby from the truck. He reluctantly agreed we might be right about the knobby. I probably offended Dennis the first day by trying to tell him those were not going to work very well. With some people its kind of like kids, when you start to criticize some ones bike setup and you are off on the wrong foot.

It's probably time to meet some of the guilty ones on this trip, starting with the two Canucks.

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This is Rob and Dan. Rob is a millwright for the GM plant in Ontario, Dan is an investment banker from Ontario. Every Canadian rider I have had the pleasure to ride with is just plain fast. I don't know if that's just by chance, but these guys didn't ruin my batting average. They were blisteringly fast. In fact they were so good that Justin didn't have a problem renting them his old KLR's for the trip. I don't know if I am up to wielding one of those big bikes through those roads at the speeds we were traveling.

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This is Mark my roomie, it was like going on vacation with Wilford Brimely. He is a former Marine and Viet Nam veteran. Having gone, served and sacrificed like he did, makes him a hero in my book.

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If that wasn't enough he was a damn good rider too. Full of opinions and good wit made him a necessary part of the team. Riding with strangers, sometimes a little awkward, that's the reason I like to take these tours. Meeting great people I wouldn't meet by myself.

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We started the morning with a good meal. I left early to try to get some shots of the team from a few miles down the road, towards El Fuerte.

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A 30 mile pavement ride and stopped for gas and to fix our first flat for the day.

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Bret showed us how to change a tire and do it in style.

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Dennis found a new friend again, 29 years happily married he says.

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We gathered every one up in town then headed off to Alamos. We made an early morning stop along the road to get rid of our morning coffee and take a few pictures.

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At the Pemex station I accidentally put regular gas in my bike. It was pinging badly. It was making a nasty sound when I remembered it has an alternate ignition mapping for low octane fuel, I had put a switch on it for quick access and it worked.

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The switch didn't work as well as advertised, but it did help. It's supposed to drop the required octane from 94 to 85. I noticed some difference but not a lot.

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I rode along with Bret and David for a while. The roads were alternating hard pack with lots of dust and occasional sand. We stopped in a small village to regroup.

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David and Bret always had bubble gum and stickers to give out to the kids.

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This character showed up.

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We think there is some resemblance to Danny, Nicks friend and a cop from California.

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More dust then it was my turn to wait at an intersection. We rode on what Justin called the buddy system, each person waited for the one behind them.

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The day was still young. I took this leg at a fast pace.

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Bret told me over dinner that evening, you could replace the cactus with the trees in Africa, "Its just like a lot of the Dakar route." He was American Dakar Team member Larry Rosesler's wrench in 03 I believe. He said its no picnic.

We did the route in about 3 hours.

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Speaking of the GPS, I purchased the Bici maps of Mexico for the GPS and they were wonderful. I was surprised how most of the remote roads or sometimes goat trails were included. Over all the Bici collection was a huge success. Well worth the 39 bucks for this region. I also bought the Baja portion too.

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The bike is doing awesome, I had time to look it over when waiting for the rider behind me. The rear tire was looking pretty tired and with the pinging problem, I was forced to take it easy on the throttle today.

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On the last one intersection I waited with Ron from Houston, we rode together for a while. Ron's a metallurgist and works for an oil company.

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As we approached Alamos, we stopped at an outlook for a break and a bite to eat.

There is a neat overlook that serves these coconut treats

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Hot sauce on top, it was pretty disgusting sounding, but was good.

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Of course, our ambassador Dennis met a nice family out for the day. We asked mom if she had ever ridden on a motorcycle, she jumped at the chance.

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We put our best rider, Dave, up to the task. Her daughter and mother were waiting, I asked her mom if she wanted to ride and got this enthusiastic nod, yes. She was using a cane and when it came her turn the cane was tossed on the ground and we lifted her onto the bike, she was grinning ear to ear.

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4 generations of this family. Nice people.

We headed off for our rented Hacienda near the downtown area.

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Doing some maintenance on the bikes.

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This place slept 10 people for the night.

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We found one of the many restaurants for dinner and walked around afterwards.

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There was a large festival in Alamos that night, we ran into Maria and her daughter again.

We went back to the hacienda and retired for the next day. Chinipas awaits us.

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