On Our Own And Far Away From It

Day 48-53 – Bahia de los Angeles, Baja California, Mexico to Mazatlan, Sinaloa – 10,586 km

Day 48 to 53 route

It was sweltering under the afternoon sun as he hurried through the sorting and arranging of his gear and clothing. It was packed in duffle bags, backpacks, and stuff sacks that were of various sizes, shapes, colors, and states of disrepair. These – of which there were probably a dozen separate packages – were tied down, piled upon, and hung from every possible location so that his raggedy, yellow Vespa scooter had swelled to maybe three times its original size. He took down one bag and then another, swapped some of the articles in each, then replaced one of the bags, took down two more, and then swapped the contents between the three. He continued this way for maybe 20 minutes, taking down bags, swapping the contents, putting bags back, taking down new ones, putting them back, and then taking old ones and new ones down again, until each of his dozen receptacles had been juggled into and out of the mix with its contents either being partially or entirely replaced.

We watched this frenzy of activity from under the shade of the control booth from which the dockworkers coordinated the loading and unloading of the ferry.

It’s like playing the carnival game where you try to follow the three cups to guess which one the ball is under, I thought to myself but I was too lazily comfortable in the warm afternoon shade to say it out loud to Jess.

Unpacking and repacking, and over again

‘What a circus,’ was the only part of the thought that I managed to say to her sitting just beside me.

She nodded and then we both fell silent again.

         We had arrived at the Pichilingue port near La Paz more than two hours before and now we had another two hours to wait before we could load our bikes onto the ferry for the gulf crossing. There were no berths left for the 17-hour crossing to Mazatlan when we arrived at the ticket office for Baja Ferries, which operates the barges that ferry people and vehicles between the mainland and the peninsula. This was a real gut shot to Jess who had many experiences of being seasick and was counting on having a berth with a bathroom to get through the crossing with some degree of comfort and privacy. There was a crossing scheduled for that same evening to Topolobampo, which is a much shorter 7-hour trip because it crosses due east rather than southeast from La Paz, but we were both reluctant to take this crossing because the ferry would arrive well after dark, whereas that bound for Mazatlan would come in during the daylight of the next morning. The third option was to secure a berth on the next Mazatlan crossing but that would not be for two days and, after brief discussion, we had no desire to sit around in La Paz for that long.

         Jess brooded quietly for a long time, which is her way of coming to grips with a thing that she doesn’t like, while I registered and purchased our fares for the Mazatlan crossing for that afternoon.

‘You’ll take your Dramamine and I’ll be there with you the whole time if you get sick,’ I said after the tickets were bought.

We rode into the port area and passed through customs. The agent was courteous and officious as she checked that we had the Temporary Vehicle Importation Permits, which had at first caused us so much grief back in Tijuana.

         ‘Toque el botón,’ she said when she finished reviewing my documents. ‘Press the button.’

         I pressed it and a green light signaled me to pass ahead. Then, after her documents had been reviewed, it was Jess’s turn to press the button and, when she did, it flashed the word ‘Revisión’ in red.

         ‘You’ve been selected for an inspection,’ I translated to Jess after the customs agent explained the meaning of the signal.

         Still brooding at the imminent seasickness that she would have to contend with during 17 hours in steerage surrounded by several dozen beer-swilling truckers; un-showered backpackers; and pooping, crying babies; Jess slumped at this further indignity before she pulled herself together and smiled at the customs agent while she went about opening her panniers and duffle bag.

         After the inspection, we pulled up to the scale and paid the port fee, which was a flat rate of 72 pesos per vehicle (about USD 6), and then we rode around the dock until we found the Mazatlan-bound ferry. We pulled our bikes past the 18-wheelers and the line of private vehicles and parked beside the control booth. It was hot under the strong afternoon sun, so we stripped off our riding jackets and we slumped down on a bench under the shade.

         ‘He looks like such a ragamuffin,’ Jess said a few minutes after my circus comment as we watched in a sort of daze as the man continued the confusing, almost frantic process of sorting through his luggage.

         ‘Makes me thankful that we only have two panniers and a duffle,’ I said.

         ‘I don’t understand why he does it in such a hurry,’ she said. ‘There’s at least another hour until we can go on the ferry.’

         ‘He’s got a Canadian flag sticker on his windshield,’ I said because I knew this would prick at her.

         ‘I know, he’s probably one of mine,’ she said.

Highway from Bahia de los Angeles

Five days earlier we had left Bahia de los Angeles after our long off road slog to reconnect with Carretera 1 from Puertecitos. We enjoyed warm weather and blue skies as we followed the 1 south across the state boarder and into Baja California Sur at Guerrero Negro. From there we began our fifth crossing of the Baja peninsula but made it only about halfway before we stopped for the night in a large town called El Marasal.

Jess rides the Carretera 1 desert

That evening, after eating tacos at a small, family restaurant, we sought out a laundromat because even our dirty clothes had become un-wearable. We sat on the steps of the lavandería as we waited for our clothes to wash. I wore only a t-shirt and bathing suit because everything else was in the machine. The locals who waited for their own clothes to wash took an interest in us and I conversed intermittently with an old man and his señora and then with a middle-aged man who was first a metal worker and now a glass-maker while he drank beer and smoked cigarettes.

Can this really be a desert?

We reached Santa Rosalia by midmorning the next day and then we stopped in the small town of Mugelé where we ate gorditas, which are like tacos only the meat, vegetables, and salsa are stuffed inside the tortilla as if it were a pita, instead of wrapped or rolled into it as in a taco. That afternoon we rode from Mugelé to Loreto and it was about 130 km of the finest riding and most beautiful scenery we had experienced in the whole Baja California peninsula. The highway meandered through costal mountains that were covered in bushes, shrubs, and cactus so intensely green that I was sure it could not be considered a desert. Then, intermittently the highway emerged from a sharp, high-speed curve and suddenly we were leaning out over a beautiful, turquoise coastline speckled with rocky coves, islets, and a few anchored yachts. It was as if this stretch of highway had been expressly designed for motorcycling, combining the perfect blend of speed, lean, and scenery so that I was completely lost in it. At intervals I would emerge from the trance of hard, smooth riding to realize that I had left Jess far behind.

Jess rides the costal mountains

We spent that night in Loreto, which is a pleasant seaside town that faces out towards the Isla de Carmen a couple dozen kilometers into the Gulf of California. The town has a nice boardwalk that runs along a kilometer or so stretch of the seafront and this made the fine course of several laps for my morning run. We set off midmorning after my run and breakfast and some time spent fiddling with Moxie’s oil level until we were satisfied.

Beautiful coastal mountains and sea views 

From Loreto, the highway continues to weave through the beautiful coastal mountains along the Gulf side of the peninsula, providing us with another 40 km or so of beautiful scenery and exquisite motorcycling. Then Carretera 1 swept us eastward to cross once again to the west side of the peninsula. Only this time the highway stops about two-thirds of the way and we followed it on its southeasterly curve inland through the sister cities of Ciudad Insurgents and Ciudad Constitución. Eventually its course began to take a more easterly bent and we completed another crisscrossing of the peninsula by returning to the Gulf side at La Paz where the peninsula narrows just before bulging again and then sweeps down and around to the Cape.

We covered this stretch quickly and with less excitement than we had that morning because the highway had left the lush, green coastal mountains and became dry, washed out, and generally unremarkable. In the late morning we stopped for fuel and then a snack break under the shade of some trees outside Ciudad Insurgentes and then again for fuel at La Paz. From the principle city of La Paz we continued south on the 1 and then left it to continue south on the 19 when the 1 suddenly swung sharply eastward to follow the Gulf coast down to San José del Cabo. At the end of 80 km we reached Todos Santos, which had caught my interest for being designated a Pueblo Mágico.

The Pueblos Magicos is a moniker granted to certain small and midsize towns across Mexico for their particular beauty and historical significance. In point of fact, during my first motorcycle trip through Mexico I had visited a fair many of the 83 Magical Villages. I had decided that, while I passed through plenty of towns of equal or greater beauty than the Pueblos Mágicos, I was usually not disappointed when I visited one. There are three Pueblos Mágicos on the Baja California peninsula. We had missed Tecate because we crossed at Tijuana and we had enjoyed Loreto where we had spent the previous night, so I was quite sure we would like what we saw when we arrived in Todos Santos just past sunset as the twilight was quickly fading into night.

We stayed the night at a hotel beside a laundramat, which was a convenience that we would have appreciated a couple nights before in El Marasal but was now mostly just a bother because it was noisy and crowded. In the evening we strolled through the town. We stopped for dinner at a taco stand and then bought sweets from a pastry shop but we decided we were generally unimpressed with Todos Santos as we walked back to the hotel.

         In the morning we rode the 80 remaining km of Carretera 19 to Cabo San Lucas at the southernmost tip of the peninsula. I called ahead the evening before to reserve a room in one of the less expensive resorts because the thought of a comfortable bed, strong water pressure, and a full spa treatment as a belated birthday present had been essential to getting Jess through the off road slog several days before. It was good tarmac all the way to Cabo but the ride was not particularly exciting or scenic despite good views of the coastline.

Pool side at the resort

We arrived in Cabo before our room was ready so we fished our swimsuits from our panniers and stripped off our riding clothes to spend the rest of the morning and all through the afternoon relaxing by the pool. In the afternoon when we were checking into our room a group of Canadian bikers of various ages arrived at the resort. They had shipped their bikes from Vancouver to San Diego where they began their ride down the peninsula. Arriving at Cabo was the climax of their trip and you could feel their energy as the dozen sundry motorcycles riding in loose formation pulled into the carport at the entrance of the hotel.

Evening in Cabo San Lucas

‘Look how big the guys with the 1200s are!’ Jess said. ‘Love, you look quite small when you stand beside them.’

As a reply I gave her my ugliest frown and after I had a short chat with a few of the bikers, the concierge completed our check-in and we went up to our room to clean up before dinner. That night we ate fish tacos and then had beers at a restaurant on the sand. Back in the hotel room after a few drinks, we sunk quickly and comfortably to sleep. The next day I went running by the restaurants and shops along the marina and then we went back there for breakfast. After breakfast it was back to the hotel room for the first of Jess’s naps while I went through our photos and worked up a story for the blog. Later she awoke and flipped through the TV channels and then she grew drowsy again and fell asleep for another blissful nap. In the evening we went for dinner along the marina and shared a surf-n-turf special and then indulged in an ice cream at the Häagen-Dazs.

Do you see the smile on Jess's face as she naps?

The next morning we pulled out just ahead of the group of Canadian bikers who were packing up and getting ready to begin their return ride to San Diego.

‘It must be hard to get out the door in the morning with such a large group,’ I said as we zipped on our riding jackets and mounted our bikes.

‘I’m ready to be out of Baja,’ Jess said. ‘There are too many foreigners doing motorcycle trips here. I want to be on our own and far away from it.’

I smiled thinking about what she said as we pulled away and I gave a quick wave to the few Canadians who were standing by their bikes waiting for their compañeros to finish their checkout. She is the same way here as she was in Africa and everywhere else she goes, I thought. She wants to be as far out there as she can and associated with as few other foreigners as possible. It’s her adventure and she’s very picky about who shares it with her. It’s like certain Harley riders you meet who don’t want to share the road with someone riding any other make of motorcycle, I thought. In South Sudan she was the only white face in the town where she lived and I’m sure she secretly took a whole lot of pleasure in knowing it. When I first met her all her friends were Africans and I think it was to her mind that she was making a great exception or maybe finally conceding her illusions to get involved with me. I thought about this for the first ten minutes or so of the two-hour ride north to the Pichilingue port up the coast from La Paz and then I turned my audiobook on and settled into the morning ride.

Moxie and Penelope wait to board the ferry

Eventually the man finished the unpacking and repacking and he settled down in the shade beside his scooter. He introduced himself to us and we discovered that he was German, not Canadian. He had shipped his scooter to Vancouver and from there he went up the coast towards Alaska and then back down through the United States and Baja California to reach 20,000 km later where we were meeting him now. His plan, he explained, was to reach the bottom of South America but he was in no hurry to do it.

         ‘I figure it will take me a year or more,’ he said with much excitement. ‘I make furnitures for yachts so I will stop in Columbia to work if I can. You know, I ride very slow on the Vespa so it will take me a long time. Also, I met the Vespa club in Vancouver and they gave me names and address for the other clubs so I will stop to meet them on the way.’

         ‘See! He’s not one of mine,’ Jess said when the man’s attention was grabbed by several Mexicans and gringos who showed interest in his scooter and its enormous payload.

Jess packs an overnight bag for the Gulf crossing

         It was more than an hour later after all the cars and most of the 18-wheelers had loaded that the dockworkers signaled us that it was our turn to load our motorbikes onto the ferry. We gunned our engines and I lead Jess on her Beamer and the German on his Vespa onto the ferry and then down the center ramp into the very bowels of the ship. After parking our bikes as tightly and securely as the space permitted, we pulled out some clothing, a few toiletries, and other sundries and then headed up to steerage to claim our seats.

         ‘It’s like sitting on a bus,’ she said when we reached our seats several decks up.

         ‘Yeah, but at least these are comfortable, reclining seats,’ I said. ‘And it couldn’t be anywhere near as bad as an overnight bus ride I took to Mombasa.’

         ‘Aren’t the waves going to be rocky?’ she said.

         ‘No, I don’t think they will,’ I said. ‘The Gulf should be calm but take your Dramamine just in case.’

We reclined in our seats for a short time but eventually our ears needed an escape from the volume of the sound that accompanied the movie playing on several large flat screens, so we went outside onto the deck. The sun was close to setting when the ferry finally pulled out from the port and began the slow arc around the nub-like protrusion of land before it could swing south towards Mazatlan across the Gulf. It was warm on the water so that the breeze felt good against the bare skin of our arms but eventually it got cool as twilight came and Jess found herself growing drowsy from the medication. I stayed on deck for a while longer and then I came in and we went to the mess for dinner.

Sunset over the Gulf of California

All through the evening they played loud movies in steerage so that we wore earplugs as we slept or just rested. Late in the evening the ferry began to rock from the larger waves of the open Gulf but it was not enough to upset Jess’s stomach or to overturn our motorbikes, which we had not anchored to the deck. She slept or rested through the night, while my sleep was more intermittent so that for a time around midnight I went on deck and joined several truckers in splaying myself out on the benches until the hard wood became uncomfortable and I could appreciate my recliner in steerage again.

The ferry pulled into the harbor at Mazatlan around 10 in the morning and it was another hour or more before those with vehicles parked on deck one were permitted to descend and disembark. We were filthy from passing the night with the stale sweat of the previous day but our bikes were gassed and loaded and we were well enough rested that we decided to ride out of Mazatlan and push as far inland as we could before the late afternoon. From the harbor we passed through the city and then onto Carretera 40 eastward toward the large colonial city of Durango. Once outside of the city we were quickly ascending into the Sierra Madre Occidental mountain range. Here the highway folded into beautiful switchbacks and hard twisties.

We are on the mainland and alone in our adventure just as Jess wants it, I thought.

I flashed a thumbs up to Jess who rode a few meters behind me and just as I did a group of gringo bikers on two BMWs GS’s, a Kawasaki KLR, and a Suzuki V-Strom whipped past us out of a hard turn.

We’ll be on our own soon enough, Sweetheart, I thought as Jess flashed me with her high beams in an ‘All’s well’ response to my thumbs up.

In The Shade Of The Tall Rocks

Days 45-47 – Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico to Bahia de los Angeles – 9,278 km

‘Bean, I’ve really made a mess of your birthday!’ I said.

         She was sitting on a rock in the small shade made from the taller rocks and the low afternoon sun. She had gone down twice today already – both times in sandy patches – and there was still at least 20 more hard kilometers of rock-strew dirt road before we would reconnect with Carretera 1. The first time she had gone down was about 15 km in from where the tarmac ended at Puertecitos and where we had camped at Gonzaga the night before.

I was riding up ahead and she was riding slowly and carefully behind me until I next glanced in my rearview mirror and saw her pinned under her bike. I pulled off to the side carefully so that we wouldn’t have two downed riders and then I hurried back to where she was. When I got there she had freed herself from under the bike and was walking to meet me.

‘Are you ok?’ I said when I reached her.

‘I think a rock bruised my thigh but it’s ok,’ she said. ‘What about my bike?’

Moxie Thumper was splayed completely on her side and with the weight of the side cases and the top-heavy weight of the large duffle across the seat, we struggled to right her during our first two attempts. As we worked, a rider on a light, unloaded KTM pulled alongside and helped us to get the bike right side up. The rider was gone, blazing down the dirt road, just as soon as we thanked him. Reviewing the bike, I found that one of the brackets on the right pannier was broken and this made the case unsteady on the rack but we didn’t worry about it because we had dealt with this after Jess’s first fall back in Utah at Capital Reef National Park.

         ‘Don’t bother with it now,’ she said a little disheartened from the fall but still mostly in good spirits. ‘I’ll probably just fall and break it again.’

         After that fall she had continued on cautiously for another 8 km or so until she hit another sandy patch that got the better of her and she went down again, this time on the left side. This time there was no rider who magically appeared to help us but we used our legs more than our arms and we got Moxie back on her two wheels and kickstand. This time the left pannier had been damaged. The force of the fall had knocked the internal slider off its track so that the expanded cased hand crushed down to a retracted position. As I opened the case and began to replace the slider onto its track, a four-wheel ATV racer sped by at high speed and kicked up an enormous cloud of dust.

‘The Baja 1000 race begins next week so you might see some of them with their support vehicles practicing the course,’ the English-speaking man who owned the petrol station near Gonzaga had explained earlier that morning. ‘They are tearing up the middle of the road but you should be fine if you stay to the sides.’

I easily popped the slider of the plastic side case back onto its track and, despite the new scratches, the pannier was as good as ever before. But now with this second fall and still some 40 km or more to cover at what was proving a snail’s pace, Jess’s was beginning to look defeated.

‘The next time you see a truck I want to put my bike in the back until we get to the tarmac,’ she said.

I rode her bike out of the sandy patch and up a sandy rise past where I had parked my bike and until where the ground was firmer. There she remounted and we continued to press forward. Both of us were running road tires, which made the many sandy patches extremely difficult so that we were both quite stumped by it. I had several very close calls but managed to keep Penelope upright through each of them and kept both of us from dumping into the sand.

I rode ahead at between 20 and 30 km/h and Jess trudged slowly behind in first gear at about half that speed or less. For her, the slow speed made the distance interminable, while for me it was the short burst of forward progress followed by the waiting for her to catch up and worrying that she not go down again. We had left the coast after the first few kilometers and now we were riding inland through the heat and rocky, sandy wastes of the Parque Natural Del Desierto Central De Baja California.

About 20 km in the road undulated into alternating dips and rises. Now and then a truck or an ATV racer would scream past us and we would shut our helmet visors and hold our breaths until our lungs would burst and the dust began to settle. We took breaks at intervals of 10-15 kilometers and it was at one of these breaks about 40 km in that Jessica sat on the rock in the shade of the tall rocks and the low afternoon sun.

‘Greg, this water is terrible,’ she said. ‘From now on I’m buying bottled water!’

I had been insistent that the least we could do to lessen our carbon footprint on this trip was to avoid buying bottled water. Instead we had brought a SteriPen, which emits UV light from a bulb that is dipped into the water to kill any pathogens. I had used it previously while backpacking and when living in Africa. It works quite well for its intended purpose but it does nothing to improve the taste and we were only now discovering just how horrendously potable drinking water can taste.

‘That’s fine, Bean. We tried but you’re right – this water tastes truly awful,’ I said after reluctantly swigging a dry mouthful.

She was silent for a time and I sat quietly beside her.

‘This is not what I wanted for my birthday,’ she said suddenly.

‘I know, Bean. I really made a mess of it,’ I said.

‘When we get to Cabo I want to stay in a nice place,’ she said defiantly.

‘Sure, Bean,’ I said. ‘We’ll stay in a nice resorty place and we’ll get you a nice massage.’

Since we had sorted our vehicle permit issue three days before in Tijuana, we had traveled south down to Ensenada where we left Carretera 1 and began to traverse the peninsula on the 3. We covered about half of this distance that day and then halted for the night in Valle de la Trinidad where we stayed at a cute little hotel and ate excellent tacos at the neighboring restaurant. In the morning I went running through the dirt roads of the town and then out amongst the lanes along the farms. This began a ritual of morning runs lasting between 30 and 45 minutes that have given me a wonderful way to see a bit of where we are and keep myself in form.

That day we covered the rest of the distance across the peninsula until we reached Carretera 5, which we took it south to San Felipe. San Felipe is a pleasant seaside town that looks all set to host several cruise ships of tourists but is only missing the tourists. Here we sat on a bench on the boardwalk and ate a snack while we talked to a couple who had traveled down two up on a Harley.

From San Felipe we followed the highway south, stopping only for fish tacos at a restaurant beside the highway, shortly before the tarmac ended at Puertecitos. It was late in the afternoon when we stopped for lunch and the owner of the restaurant suggested a nice place for camping at Gonzaga, just a few off tarmac kilometers past Puertecitos. The short stretch of off road was an exhilarating way to end a fine day of riding and our second since resolving the issue with our vehicle permits. At Gonzaga we paid 150 pesos – about USD 15 – for a palapa, which is little more than a hut roof held up by a large central pole. We pulled our bikes under one side of the palapa and pitched our tent opposite them under the roof. It was high tide and the sound of the waves was very soothing and we were the only people to be seen for at least a couple kilometers.

‘Happy birthday eve, Bean,’ I said. ‘I feel very bad that I don’t have a big surprise gift for you but it has been nearly impossible to get away from you long enough to search out something!’

‘It’s fine and this is a wonderful place to spend my birthday eve,’ she said.

That night we walked the couple kilometers inland beside the airstrip to the general store and taco stand beside the dirt road that continued from where the highway had ended. We bought a bottle of red Chilean wine and when that was finished we drank Mexican beers until we were rather well lit. Then we ate tacos to fill our stomachs and drank more beer to wash it down. Jess practiced her Spanish and local men came from the road and stopped for dinner and then went and some stayed a while to watch television in the courtyard. It was a very late eight o’clock when we staggered back along the airstrip a couple kilometers and then another kilometer up the beach to our camp.

‘I’m so cold that I have tunnel vision and I’m not even paying attention for coyotes,’ I said as we walked because we had seen what we thought was a pack of three coyotes earlier on our walk to the general store.

‘Greg, I don’t want to be eaten on my birthday,’ she said.

We fell asleep to the sound of the waves and the breeze against the reed roofs of the palapas. In the morning I laid the solar camp shower in the sun and then I went for a run along the airstrip. When I came back, I hung the solar shower from a nail on the palapa and Jess took the first shower. Although there were no other people to be seen, we were showering in the open so Jess modestly wore her bikini. But I was not so modest and I thoroughly enjoyed the feeling of standing naked under the trickle of water that remained in the shower bag when it was my turn. 

‘I didn’t even condition my hair,’ she said when she realized that she had left me so little of the four liters that had been in the polyurethane bag before her shower.

We scrounged another half liter or so from our water bottles and Jess held the spigot so that we could conserve every last drop as I soaped and mostly rinsed off before the water ran out.

After showering and packing up our bikes, we stopped at the roadside general store to fill our bottles from the tap and then sterilize the water with the UV pen. By then it was around 10 o’clock and we took to the dirt road that our map showed would reach Carretera 1 after about 60 kilometers.

‘Are you sure you want to do the off road?’ I asked before we set off and then again several more times before we were too far in to turn back.

‘We’re not going all the way back to San Felipe and then to Ensenada just to come back down again!’ Jess said.

Then after a pause she said, ‘We’ll see if I’m still saying this a few kilometers in.’

A few kilometers further on after we had drunk the foul tasting water and rested in the shade of the tall rocks and the low afternoon sun, we reached Coco’s Corner. Coco is an old Mexican with no legs and a few words of English mixed into his sentences. He seems to spend most of his time strapped onto an ATV, which he uses to get around. His – Coco’s – Corner is a flat expanse that is like a junkyard of old vehicles and other sundry odds and ends. Here they sell cold beer, sodas, and water to those who pass through and want a rest and cold drink.

‘Ask him how the road is up ahead,’ Jess said as she rested slumped on a plastic chair and drank from a glass Coca Cola bottle.

‘Quedan 20 kilometros but la terrecería no es like antes. It’s más duro,’ Coco said in his mix of Spanish and English. ‘There remains 20 kilometers but it’s not dirt like before. It’s more difficult.’

I began to explain what he said to Jess but she had understood him.

‘Is the road sandy?’ she asked.

‘No, son big piedras and boulders,’ he said. ‘El camino rises y baja por las mountains.’

‘The rocks are better than the sand,’ Jess said.

‘Bastante peligroso, señorita,’ Coco said in a very serious tone. ‘Quite dangerous, young lady.’

After we finished our drinks, I bought two more cold waters to go and we struck back out onto the road. It was as Coco had said. The road was not sandy but it quickly began to rise and dip and wind through the dry desert hill country. Rocks and broken boulders were strewn across the road so that, not only did you have to avoid the loose stuff, but you also had to navigate the biggest and sharpest of those boulders or you might puncture a tire or take a nasty fall. Also, through most of it’s meandering through the hills, the road seemed to cling precariously to the slopes so that missing a turn or going down on the wrong side could mean a steep tumble.

Jess continued to plod along slowly but steadily and without any further mishaps. Seeing fewer sandy patches, I worried less about her safety, except on those particularly precipitous turns where even her good, cautious riding might not be enough. Also, now I worried less about her resilience because she had the experience and success of covering more than 40 km. I knew that if she was going to give up it would have been in the very beginning. Now, despite the treacherous final kilometers, I knew that the road would have to defeat her to stop her because she would keep going so long as the bike and the daylight held out.

We covered the final 20 km more quickly and adeptly than we had the first 20 and at least I was beginning to very much enjoy the experience of riding off tarmac and using my motorcycle for what it was made for. After the mountains, the land flattened and the road straightened and a few kilometers later almost without realizing it we were suddenly off the dirt and back onto the tarmac. At the junction we pulled off where there was a llantera, tire repair shop, and we used the portable electric pump to re-inflate our tires after we had spent the day on low pressure tires for better stability off the tarmac.

Now the off road adventure was over but it was late in the afternoon and the sun was already near setting. With our tires re-inflated for the tarmac and our chains greased to clean off the dust and gravel, we considered our options. The owner of the petrol station in Gonzaga had told us there were few towns and possibly no hotels for a good distance Guerrero Negro and at Coco’s Corner a local traveler had suggested that Bahia de los Angeles was a good place to spend the night back on the gulf side of the peninsula.

We decided to strike out for Bahia and, despite the dust in our eyes and the deep exhaustion in our bones, we hit the highway with speed and purpose. The sun set before we reached the junction where the highway branched towards Bahia. From here it was 66 km of good tarmac as the twilight was overtaken by darkness. When we arrived in Bahia it was the fullness of night but the village streets were quiet and it was a short time before we had traversed the town and settled on an overpriced hotel to spend the night.

‘Happy birthday, Bean,’ I said as we lay in bed collapsed from fatigue.

There was no answer. She was fast asleep.

I Was Fine When The Bombs Were Going Off

Days 42-44 – Los Angeles, California, USA to Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico - 8,586 km

Tijuana street scene

‘No se puede otorgar más de un permiso por persona,’ the customs official explained simply and politely in Spanish. ‘More than one import permit cannot be issued per person.’

         ‘Pero usted sí puede otorgar el otro permiso de vehícuo a ella como lleva una carta de autorización de mi, el propietario titular, y la carta es certificada por notario,’ I replied. ‘But you can issue the other vehicle permit to her as she carries an authorization letter from me, the titular owner, and the letter is certified by a notary.’

         ‘What relationship does she have to you?’ he asked.

‘She is my partner,’ I said.

‘Then if you are married it is fine,’ he said. ‘I will only need to see the marriage certificate.’

‘No, we are not married,’ I said.

‘Oh, then it cannot be done,’ he said. ‘You see you must have a legal relationship to grant authorization of the vehicle for temporary importation purposes.’

‘Perhaps there is some additional fee that we can pay to circumvent this regulation?’ I asked hopefully.

‘No, there is none,’ the customs official replied matter-of-factly.

I stood before his desk a moment longer waiting to see if he might yield to the attempted bribery or to compassion or to the annoyance of my hovering before his desk. He sat there tranquilly and returned my gaze until I realized that we were out of options and we left the small customs office. We sat down on a step outside the office and ate a snack from our tank bags while we discussed our situation and sorted our various papers and photocopies into some kind of order.

‘So you can’t import your bike because it’s registered to my name and we’re not married, and I can’t import more than one bike at a time,’ I said.

‘I understood that,’ Jess said. ‘And without the permit we can go throughout Baja with no problems but we won’t be able to take the ferry to the mainland.’

‘Yeah, or to take it out of the country when we want to cross into Belize,’ I added.

We believed we had thoroughly investigated the possibility of registering the motorcycle in Jess’s name back when we bought it but dismissed the idea because she does not have a residence permit.

‘So we have to get married,’ she said and I tried to decipher if her smile was more from shock or excitement.

Jess and panda at San Diego Zoo

We had crossed the border into Tijuana earlier that morning after staying the previous night at my cousin Jamie’s condo in San Diego. The border crossing was easy and then we had followed the signs that pointed to the customs office where you could obtain a ‘Permiso de Importación Temporal de Vehículo’ or Temporary Vehicle Importation Permit. Here we had swiftly gotten our tourist visas, which, like the vehicle permits, we only need for travel outside of Baja California, but at the customs office we were informed that the vehicle permits were no longer being issued from this location.

‘Sigues las senales hacia el aeropuerto y por allí pregunta por Garita de Otay,’ the customs official said. ‘Follow the signs towards the airport and around there ask for Garita de Otay.’

We followed the signs but the maze of over- and underpasses quickly got the better of me and in the end I paid a taxi to lead us there.

‘Conducza despacio por favor,’ I said to the taxi driver. ‘Drive slowly please.’

Then to Jessica I said, ‘Stay on my six so I don’t lose you in the traffic.’

‘I will,’ she said but after a few turns and stoplights several cars had cut between us. I began slowing so not to lose her but as I slowed several cars cut between the taxi and me. Eventually Jess caught back up and then together we caught up to the taxi and we three stayed in tight formation until he pulled over and pointed me towards a small office at the end of a dusty dirt road beside the Otay border crossing.

‘Aquí está el Banjercito de Otay donde pagas el permiso de vehículo,’ he said. ‘Here is the Banjercito de Otay where you obtain the vehicle permit.’

We pulled up and parked our bikes beside the office.

‘What happened to staying on my six?’ I said to Jess.

She made a sheepish grin and then she said, ‘I took a moment shifting gears out of first and all of a sudden all these cars had jumped in front of me!’

After sorting our gear and withdrawing our documents from inside the panniers we had gone into the Banjercito office, which is the bank of the armed forces, to obtain our vehicle permits. When the official saw that both motorcycles were registered in my name, he directed us to the customs office, which was one office down, to see what might be done.

‘So we have to get married,’ Jess said as the conclusion to our review of the situation.

‘You’re so calm and relaxed in these situations,’ I said. ‘I’m feeling all nervous and anxious and actually quite depressed by this.’

‘You wanted an adventure,’ she said, ‘and anyway we’ll find a way through or around this obstacle. It might just delay us a little.’

After some further discussion we decided to find a hotel in Tijuana and from there to further research our options by internet – in particular to research what documentation would be needed to get married in Baja California.

With our documents back in our side cases, we started off back towards Tijuana center where we had previously seen signs for the hotel district. But our excitement for the day was not over because with one wrong turn we were suddenly stopped in the traffic of cars trying to cross into the United States and there were no exits.

‘Fuck! This is my fault,’ I said over the drumming of our engines as we waited in the traffic. ‘The sign said San Diego but I thought there would be another exit or two towards downtown. I didn’t realize how close we were to the border.’

We inched forward over 20 minutes or so with many of those in cars urging us to split lanes to get to the front of the lines faster. Eventually, I saw a break in the short wall that separated those leaving Mexico from those just entering. I pointed it out to Jessica and she cocked her head quizzically as if to ask, ‘Can we really do that?’ I nodded an affirmative to the question I assumed she was asking and we cut through the space and sped off back into Mexico.

It was another 20 minutes or so into the city center and then a series of aimless turns until we found a very modest hotel with secure parking. After unloading the bikes and confirming the presence of a working Wi-Fi signal, we walked in the direction suggested by the desk clerk and found a small, outdoor taco restaurant.

‘They’re really good,’ Jess said as she shoveled what remained of the second taco into her open mouth. ‘I like that you can put the salsas and everything on yourself.’

‘I can’t tell you how relieved this makes me,’ I said.

‘Why?’ she said.

‘Because this is the cheapest and most common food for the next few months and I was concerned that, if you didn’t like it, it would be all chichi restaurants for us.’

She frowned and said, ‘I’m not that difficult.’

‘You’re the pickiest eater ever,’ I said.

‘I just don’t like when they put sauces on things,’ she said.

‘Uh-huh.’

We spent most of that evening on our respective computers searching the Internet for information about temporary vehicle importation and about getting married in Mexico. We even called several resorts and wedding planners in Cabo San Lucas for information about prices, scheduling, and what documents are needed. We discovered that the only thing we needed that we did not have with us was our birth certificates.

‘My mom thinks she has a certified copy of mine but otherwise she can get one for me tomorrow,’ I said after ending the phone call with my mother.

‘I only have the short form at home so I would need to get the long form,’ Jess explained. ‘Then it needs to be certified by the Ministry and then legalized by the Mexican Embassy in Ottawa.’

She searched and read on further and then added, ‘I could have the long form expedited to my mother and that will cost $75. Then she could overnight it to the broker who will get it certified for $175 in two days and then legalized for $150 in five days and then they overnight it back to my mother and she overnights it to us in Cabo.’

‘That’s going to take at least three weeks if all goes perfectly and then it’s close to $1000 with all the overnight fees and then even the cheapest wedding planner, blood test, and marriage license in Cabo is going to be at least $500,’ I said in complete despair.

We also tried calling the immigration lawyer whom we had spoken to some months earlier about obtaining residency for Jess if we decided to stay in the States after the motorcycle trip. We wanted to know how marrying in Mexico or in San Diego and then leaving the country might prejudice our chances for residency after the trip. We didn’t get through to the lawyer but the online message forums made clear that US Immigration would not let Jess back in on a tourist visa if they discovered that she was my spouse and we would have to file for her residency from abroad.

Then later in the evening I had an idea and I even began examining the vehicle registration document from the DMV.

‘You know, this is printed in two colors and it has no particular stamp or watermark on the paper,’ I said. ‘Could it really be so difficult to scan it, swap out my name for yours, and then print a new copy?’

A discussion with my sister decided that it would be easy enough for her to do in Photoshop if she were provided with a good enough scan.

‘Do they verify the registration of the bike when they issue the permit?’ Jess asked rhetorically because she knew I hadn’t the answer to that.

‘Can they really have access to the DMV database?’ I asked rhetorically in reply and this launched another half-hour of Internet searches and skimming through message board postings.

That night I slept very poorly because the situation was unresolved and we were without a clear, viable way forward. When I woke early in the morning I couldn’t remember why we had been so convinced about the futility of registering the motorcycle in Jessica’s name.

‘The dealership couldn’t do it because I didn’t have proof of address,’ she said when I asked her about it as soon as her eyes opened that morning.

‘Ok, but now you have proof of address from the joint bank account we opened,’ I said, sitting upright with the computer on my lap.

‘Maybe,’ she said. ‘Your mom sent me an SMS this morning asking the same thing.’

‘I’m reading postings about all the Canadian snow birds that come down during the winter and they buy a car in the States because it’s cheaper than bringing one down with them. The snow birds aren’t proper residents any more than you are so how is it different if you use my mother’s place as your address?’

She shrugged and with little more discussion we decided to cross back into San Diego and give it a shot. Our hotel was very close to the border so after a few turns we were back in the stop-and-go traffic of cars trying to enter the United States.

‘Will there be any problem for me crossing back because I don’t have residency or an onward ticket?’ Jess said over the idling of our engines.

We decided that, if they asked, our story was that we were going back to Africa in a few weeks and we had only wanted to get a quick taste of Mexico before ending our motorcycle trip. This time we slowly worked our way between the cars, despite the width that the side cases added to the bikes, and soon we had passed through immigration without any trouble or need for a story.

After crossing the border it was less than 20 minutes and we were at the California DMV office just off the Otay Mesa Freeway. Another 45 minutes and we had completed the transfer of title and Jessica held the new vehicle registration document in her hand.

‘I’m emotionally wrecked from the last two days,’ I admitted when we were back at our bikes outside the DMV with Jess’s new vehicle registration safely filed with her other pertinent documents.

‘Yes, love, you really fell apart for a while there,’ she said.

‘I know I did,’ I said. ‘It’s so shameful! To think that I was the Security Focal Point for like 20 NGOs in South Sudan when they started shelling the town.’

‘I’m sure you were much better then, love,’ she said.

‘I was much better,’ I said. ‘And I was fine when the bombs were going off all around us in Iraq. But the lack of a vehicle permit threatens to end the trip and I totally despaired!’

We had lunch and then we crossed back into Mexico and very quickly found our way to the Banjercito office where they issue the vehicle permits. The official smiled when he recognized us from the day before and within 20 minutes we had paid our temporary deposits and were issued each with a separate vehicle importation permit.

‘Aren’t you relieved you don’t have to marry me, love,’ Jess said when we left the Banjercito office with our permits in hand.

‘Yes, Bean, I dodged a bullet, didn’t I?’ I said.

We stayed that night at the same modest hotel near the border as we had the previous night only this time I felt much more relaxed and I slept very well and soundly. The next morning we packed our bikes with a renewed sense of excitement and we followed the free highway south out of Tijuana and away from the border.

On The Lookout For Bright Eyes

Days 28-41 – Las Vegas, NV, USA to Los Angeles, CA – 8,134 km

‘I’m going bad in my stomach,’ I said. ‘I’m going bad very quickly.’

         ‘It was your idea to come here,’ she said.

         ‘I know but that was before my stomach went bad,’ I said.

         ‘Ok, love, do you want to turn back,’ she said.

         ‘No, I want to keep going,’ I said, ‘but just know that my stomach is going bad and it’s paining me to keep going.’

Jess on The Strip

         We were walking north past Caesar’s Palace on Las Vegas Boulevard. It was a Sunday but that didn’t matter because it was nighttime and The Strip was dressed to the nines and packed with tourists. We had arrived in Vegas that afternoon after departing Mesquite just as quickly as we could be packed up and out of the miserable motel room where we had stayed the night. After about 50 kilometers on the I-15, we branched onto Highway 169 and took it through the Lake Mead National Recreation Area. This was a beautiful desert road that gentle meanders through the hills that surround the country’s largest reservoir. The weather was cool but sunny and there were plenty of motorcycles out, which kept us constantly waving the biker’s salute.

         When we reached Las Vegas, we grabbed a quick view of the casinos along E Flamingo Rd before we reached Silver Sevens Hotel & Casino. We had picked Silver Sevens the night before because it offered a three-star room for less than we were paying for our scumbag motel room in Mesquite and because it was close enough for us to leave the bikes and walk to The Strip at night.

         After checking in, we went down to the casino because we had a few hours before we were scheduled to meet up with Megan and Marshall whom I had met on my first motorcycle trip and who had so generously let us stay in their condo when arrived in Seattle three weeks before. When we were leaving after four wonderful days at their condo, I had called Marshall to thank him and review the checkout procedure.

‘It’s my pleasure. We’re glad you enjoyed it,’ he said. ‘Just water the plant by the window if it needs it. We’ll be in Vegas during the week of the 20^th. Let’s meet up if it fits your itinerary. You can stay with us at our friend Ben’s place when you’re here.’

It turned out that October 20 fit perfectly with our itinerary but we gratefully declined the offer of accommodation because we decided we wanted to ‘do Vegas’ even if that only meant a stroll up and down The Strip.

In the casino, Jess stretched $5 over more than half an hour on the penny slots and I tripled three dollars on quarter video poker only to watch her give it all back trying to fill in straights.

‘The thing of it is I’ve never gained enough comfort at the blackjack table to be able to enjoy the thrill from it,’ I said as we drank a beer and she squandered my video poker winnings. ‘And, besides,’ I went on, ‘I can only enjoy it if I am prepared to lose the money. That way it’s like I’m paying for the entertainment like if it was a movie or the batting cages or something. Right now, the thought of losing a hundred bucks at the tables is that it’s a day or two knocked off the end of our trip.’

‘Yes, love, I’m with you,’ she said without raising her eyes from the screen. ‘Now is it better to hold the pair or go with the four that are all the same suit?’

In the evening we walked up the street to Höfbrauhaus, which Jess had earlier that afternoon decided would be our dinner destination.’

‘Did you see? They’re doing an Oktoberfest with a band. Tell Megan and Marshall we want to go there!’ Jess said through her riding helmet when we pulled alongside at a stoplight.

Dinner with Megan and Marshall was a highlight of the trip for me. There was some catching up and getting to know each other better and plenty of great talk about motorcycle traveling. We also met their friend Ben whom they had gotten to know when they all lived in Thailand.

An evening of Oktoberfest at the Höfbrauhaus

‘Ben will stick around as long as he can,’ Megan explained. ‘He has a date tonight.’

‘A late dinner?’ I asked.

‘Drinks,’ he said, ‘It’s a second date and dinner is to much commitment.’

We ordered German sausage dishes, which were shoveled into our faces almost upon their arrival at the table, and then we talked – mostly with Marshall and Ben – while we poured beer into our overstuffed bellies.

‘I’ve just had to accept that my days of participating in an adult conversation are over for a few years,’ Megan said when she returned to the table after chasing down their daughter Coco at the big fountain.

Jess and a burro

‘It was a really great feeling for me seeing them,’ I said to Jess as we left the Höfbrauhaus after dinner and began walking towards The Strip. ‘I was so impressed and envious of them doing their motorcycle trip together and now I’m where they were and it feels every bit as good as I imagined it would. I’m ready to go south now.’

I said this as we walked shortly before my stomach went bad and then I didn’t say too much more after that except occasionally to make sure that Jess was still aware of the troubles I was having with my stomach.

Jess at Zabriskie Point in Death Valley

The next day Megan, Marshall, Coco, and Ben went rock climbing in Red Rock Canyon and Jess and I crossed Death Valley. There were only a few viewpoints that I was interested to see and no hiking trails that I felt compelled to follow. Maybe it was because I had gotten my fill for a while from the five national parks over three days in Utah or maybe after the evening with Megan and Marshall my thoughts had turned to the Latin America leg of the trip.

If my thoughts had escaped from the present, riding always has a wonderful way of keeping me planted in the moment and traversing Death Valley was no exception. Jess and I moved through the national park at our own paces as we had decided we would do after our blow up in Utah. She first went on ahead when I lingered at Dante’s View then I caught up briefly at Zabriskie Point and finally we reconnected later at Furnace Creek.

Jess rides Highway 190 in Death Valley

Late afternoon was creeping into evening as we stopped along highway 190 near the west entrance to the park to add layers of clothing and shovel down a granola bar and an orange. It was nighttime as we left the park, riding slowly and cautiously and on the lookout for bright eyes that would denote wildlife in the road. We spent that night in Olancha where the 190 meets Highway 395. The next day it was south on the 395 into Los Angeles for 10 days of rest, refit, and, as it happened, dental work, before continuing on south into Mexico.