THE RIDE OUT
I'm finally leaving Mexico City. It's been a good month and I've done just about everything I came to do here. All the restaurants, the museums, all the parks and interesting new places. I've bought all the stuff I don't think I'll be able to get down the road, and I packed up Lechuza.
Riding out of the city is just like riding in- you go uphill. The whole city is in a big bowl, so you get to drive up and out and admire the smog as you go. The smog. I cannot explain to you how bad the smog is. On a blue-sky day, it's a white haze. You're like a fish in water: accustomed to it. You don't realize how bad it is until you get out. When you get out, you realize oxygen has a smell. It's like drinking dirty water for weeks then finally getting a purified glass of it.
I am an animal in Mexican City traffic. I love it. I own the lanes, I weave through aggressively and keep moving even with full panniers. I know how wide I am and I weave through with ease. I'm sure it actually looks quite impressive because it's such a large machine. I've really gotten the hang of it. Unfortunately, the fun ends and I start the climb out of "the bowl."
I'm taking an unusual way out because I wanted to hit a historic landmark. "Paso de Cortéz" is where I'm going, the exact mountain pass the conquistador and his indigenous allies used to march on Tenochtitlan to conquer it in 1521. The 3rd and 2nd highest peaks of Mexico, BOTH volcanoes, flank the pass. The highway up was beautiful. It was a nice 2-lane highway curving through the pine trees high up in the mountains southeast of the city. The air got more fresh. You better bet I noticed.
Once I got to the top there was only a massive pedestal for a monument to the pass. There USED to be a big statue of Hernán Cortéz there, but it was taken down. All that remained was a plaque of the march, there were 3 bullet holes shot into Cortéz and his horse. The locals selling snacks there couldn't tell me when it was taken down, but a young boy that was about 4-5 didn't remember the statue at all. It must've been a while.
I told them we tore down our statue of Christopher Columbus in St. Paul, Minnesota as well. The locals, very native in complexion, seemed happy to hear it.
Upon going around the empty pedestal to the other side of the mountain pass, I found my route to Puebla, the next city on my list. I'm also officially crossing the border out of the State of the City Of Mexico (CDMX) and into the Mexican state of Puebla.
The state of Puebla did not feel it necessary to pave their side of the Paso de Cortéz. It's all sand. I stop a truck and ask if there's pavement and they say no, not until the next town. It's about ~20km of not just dirt, but SAND. A lot of sand.
THAT'S WHEN I FELL
I was heading downhill and I found a nice bowl of soupy sand. I tried to power through it, but sand sucks. It builds up in front of the tire if you're not accelerating so you always have to be using the throttle, otherwise you're effectively 'braking'.
Well, I decided to power through and it got deep. I ended up wavering to one side and it got even deeper. I rode the throttle HARDER and that was the mistake: It pushed me too fast over to the other side, literally crashing at about 15-20 mph. I hit the sand so hard it sent me tumbling, literally feet in the air. My pannier took the entire hit and BROKE OFF. When I finally got my bearings and rolled over to turn off the engine, I found the pannier completely detached beside me. Me trying to throttle through the sand sped me up to ramming speed right into the ground.
It was hot. 12:30PM. I hadn't had lunch. I was crashing from coffee and sweating. I now had the shakes from the crash. There was shade some 15 yards / meters away but the bike was just laying there. I started to take the panniers and bags off to lighten the load to lift it up. At least lift it. No gas was leaking and no damage other than the pannier.
It was then that I saw an oncoming work truck. An old indigenous man and his two grandsons jump out, along with an old grandma and a toddler. I'm very happy to see them. They help me lift the bike and I put it on more solid ground.
I try to put the broken pannier on. If I can't get this thing back on the rack, I'm in trouble. It's the biggest situational bottleneck.
Guess what: as I'm trying to push and force the pannier back onto the rack, I send Lechuza tumbling on IT'S OTHER SIDE. That's right, it fell AGAIN.
After embarrassingly asking the family to help it to it's 2 wheels again, I tried to push on the pannier. It actually got into its brackets. Great work.
I put on all the gear and went to thank each of them with a handshake. Without them knowing, I'd taken a 200-peso bill out of my wallet. I gave the grandfather the ol' bill-slip handshake but it fell to the ground. "It's for you!" I said in Spanish, It was probably enough for all of them to have lunch that day. He smiled and actually looked somewhat embarrassed. He didn't want to take it.
I was also surprised, but I didn't want to push his embarrassment any further. I ended up using that bill at a lunch spot down the road.
JUNK YARD PAY DIRT
On the way into town I find a junkyard flanking the highway. Bingo. I whip a shitty and park right in front of a building that's adjacent to the plot. I can see someone staring at me out of a window and I walk right up to them. I ask who owns the lot with all of the dead cars and they say that they own it. Not one, but 5 boys, all ages 18-25 come out to check out Lechuza and talk to me.
They were happy to speak Spanish with a gringo, they were curious to know where I was from and headed, and where I was that day. After explaining my story, I told them the reason for my visit- license plates. I've collected about 7 from several states across Mexico and I was here for any I could find. Puebla specifically, which I'm sure they had.
Now, I've had some luck with license plates but it's not easy. You find different flavors of junkyard owners when you do searches like these. This goes for everywhere. From me searching throughout Central America, Canada, and even Ireland. Some junkyard owners are suspicious and won't sell them because they're afraid I'll use them for crime. Others want money for them and are a little standoffish because they're trying to work in a negotiation. I try my best to steer the conversation away from it. Junkyard owners are also each their own breed. They're typically hard to understand, even when speaking English (again, Ireland was weird.) If you're looking in urban areas, they're typically in industrial or low-income neighborhoods. You really gotta dig to find these guys and when you're there, you gotta try to work with them. It's all hard-mode.
When the father comes out, he straight-up tells me that he WILL NOT sell me any plates, and I CAN HAVE ANY I WANT.
This is the best flavor of junkyard. The Cookie-Dough of junkyards.
The boys run around, rounding up plates from SEVERAL STATES. I get Puebla and even its neighboring states. I cannot believe how good of a haul it is. I get somewhere around 4-5 plates, even a vintage Puebla plate from the 80s or earlier. Always a good find.
I leave them on good terms, even giving one of them my FB page for 2W1C so they can follow me. It's at that point I turn back to Lechuza and it's covered in dust. The crash made it look pretty rugged. So much for the wash I gave it in CDMX.
Underground Bunk-A-Biker
I find myself meeting up with Raul, a friend of a Bunk-A-Biker. I actually used Bunk-A-Biker to stay at a place in Mexico City when I'd first arrived. After speaking with him and having coffee again later in the month, he gave me a contact in Puebla. Raul was a motorcycle parts supplier here in Puebla and he was going to give me a place to stay. Upon contact, I told him that I had crashed and my pannier was damaged.
He knew exactly where to go. Upon meeting up with him (for the first time I might add), he had already lined up a place for us to go. We went to the place where I would be staying, which was an entire apartment all to myself. I'm writing in it right now in their wifi. I have a shower, bed, everything to myself. If that isn't hospitable enough- after dropping off my things, we drove to the welder.
Raul took the lead and asked how much it would cost to fix the pannier. $300 MXN, or about $15 USD. It'll be ready in an hour. Also, the damaged pannier is the one that carries my spare fuel can. I disconnect it for them and leave it with them. I figure they won't want to solder my pannier so close to an explosive substance.
Raul and I go to a restaurant and talk bikes. He's been to the states quite a bit and is actually a really good hockey player here in Puebla, his home town. He was born just blocks from where we're staying.
He gives me the lowdown on Cinco de Mayo (A Mexican holiday ONLY IN PUEBLA) and we talk about some of the attractions I'm planning on seeing around town.
After eating we head back to the welder. After inspecting the pannier, I see it clearly closes perfectly and it's all sealed up. The brackets line up perfectly and it clasps right back onto Lechuza like it did before the crash. I find myself actually admiring the solder job. Scars from Paso de Cortéz. Exactly 502 years after he marched through, Lechuza and I crashed on the same spot of land. It's one of those many moto-blemishes you never forget on a trip like this. Bikes don't heal, so they can tell a lot of stories.
Then things get heated-- the guy wants 400 pesos for the weld-job now. 100 more than discussed. Raul immediately bites the guy's head off. "300 is fine, we went to you specifically when we could've gone somewhere else. I'm a parts dealer, we could even do business if you like." He pushes back with a segue. Nice.
They even exchange business cards.
I then remember I forgot the gas can, so I run to get it and strap it to the pannier. As I'm doing so, it feels light. I can't believe it. There's less gas in the gas can. I then ask, what's going on, you didn't use any GAS did you?
They said "Well, it was a little fat so we released some air pressure. It was from the heat."
I'm sure gas weighs just as much gas, I think.
Raul goes inside their garage to berate them a little. They mention they already have a gas can so they couldn't have used mine. Well I guess that settles everything then, huh.
Fuck them.
I laughed it off and we leave.
I'm still laughing about it. They wanted to raise the price of the solder job AND they stole my gas? I wonder if it's because I'm a gringo. I'm about 75% sure it is. It's happened before.
WHY AM I NOT PISSED?
I've been doing some reflection here today trying to find out why I didn't get pissed off today. It was, after all, a rough day. I fell hard. I broke my pannier. It was in dirt, something adventure bikes and adventurers should be ready for.
The Critic didn't come up once today.
I'd like to think it's because I recognize how good I am in Mexican City traffic. There's a LOT of people out there that are good at dirtbiking and motorcross. Not very many, I imagine, are able to swiftly and efficiently cut through the living breathing organic creature that is Mexican City traffic. I'm much better at that. Loads better.
Also, it was because I wasn't pissed that I had my eyes open down the road. I wasn't tunnel-vision angered, so I saw the junkyard off of to the side of the road and I got all of those plates FOR FREE. That's something to celebrate in itself.
What's more, because I wasn't pissed, I was able to keep in contact with, and have a good time with Raul who was able to find me a place for the night, and get the bike fixed.
The universe was still trying to throw me a middle finger for not being pissed though: the bastards stole my gas.
In response, I'll flip the universe off and laugh back. I don't believe in that stuff, but it's fun to picture it in my head.
-JT
4/3/2022