Around the world on a GS850G for a cause

[four_shot]

Stay safe and have fun!

[shirazdrum]

Aug 14th. How not to travel in Mexico!

Today Mr. Murphy had another plan for us as everything that could go wrong, went wrong! We didn’t head out of San Luis Potosi until around 3 pm as the electric car apparently didn’t get fully charged as one of the circuit breakers had switched off at some point during the night so the car had to charge more during the day to make the trip to Mexico City. As we were caravanning out of the city, the support van made a left turn into an alley and indicated for the electric car and our motorcycle to do a U-turn. As I followed the electric car, I didn’t realize that there was a Federal Police sitting behind me at the stoplight. He turned on his lights and started to scream in the bullhorn in Spanish to pull me over (like I knew what the hell he was saying) and promptly started reading me the riot act! Thankfully Cynthia’s fast-talking in Spanish got me off with just an evil eye and stern warning to “Respect the signs!”

Afternoon rains came again without fail, and somehow when we stopped to put on rain gear and switch helmets so that I could wear Cynthia’s full-face helmet, we didn’t see whether or not the van and electric car passed us. We stayed by the roadside waiting a good 30 minutes and then decided to go on. By then it was dark. No sooner were we back on the road than we encountered another toll station. This is where things got interesting. When we crossed into México, I didn’t bother to bring any cash with me, and all I had was about a $100. I figured I would get money out of ATM in México but the past few days were so hectic that I completely forgot to do so. The toll was 5 dollars but all I had was $1.50 in cold hard cash. Cynthia begged for the guy to let us go through and promised we would wait by the road for the electric car and the van to come through so that they could pay for the rest of our toll. We pulled off by the roadside to wait as huge trucks careened on by. After another 30 minutes or so it was apparent that either the rest of the caravan had already gone on through or they were broken down somewhere behind us.

It was pitch black, cold, raining in sheets, and we were still about 100 miles from Mexico City. I wasn’t relishing driving aimlessly in the dark not knowing where we were going. My plan was to find the closest hotel and stop for the night, but first we had to pay the toll if we wanted to move another inch as they were watching us like hawks. We started digging in every pocket and every box to scrape up just enough change in US pennies, nickels and dimes to pay the rest of the toll but we were still short a full dollar. I have a lucky silver dollar that I’ve had for 17 years which I take with me everywhere. With much regret, I handed it to Cynthia to pay up the man as that was our only salvation. Cynthia paid the toll and we continued on our way. As we were running out of fuel, we stopped at the next gas station to find team hanging out there! Apparently, the electric car had run out of charge again and so for the next 4-6 hours we sat around in the gas station while the car charged up. Thankfully they had a deli counter where they made delicious Tortas (Mexican sandwich) to order. After a full belly and a beer or two at the station, Cynthia surprised me by procuring my lucky silver dollar. Somehow she managed to get us through without giving up my silver dollar after all. That was enough to put a smile on my face for the rest of the night.

At 3 a.m. the car was charged enough to continue so we packed up once more to enter the biggest city in the Americas in a torrential rain and pitch black skies. You can see the lights of México City from miles away and the traffic starts long before reaching the city itself. Struggling to stay awake, we rode into the city at 5 a.m. as the local food vendors were preparing breakfast on the roadside. The rain stopped, the sun started to come out and we were safe at last.

[shirazdrum]

Is anyone even reading these posts? I haven’t seen a comment in over 3 months except from Jared. Believe it or not, there’s a lot of work that goes in the writing, editing and posting these blogs and quite frankly, if there is no audience for it, I have no reason to walk around every town in south America to find internet café to post these stories. If there are few of you lurkers around, come out for air once in a while. It encourages me to keep this thing going.

Chris

[tkent02]

Keep it going, Chris, there are a lot of us following your travels.

[DanTheMan]

Sorry Chris, I've been lurking too. I've been enjoying the travel as well. I know people have been lurking and reading mine as well.

[trumpetguy]

Lots of us are reading and following your adventure for a cause! Please keep posting updates.

[Bill Alexander]

Is anyone even reading these posts? I haven’t seen a comment in over 3 months except from Jared. Believe it or not, there’s a lot of work that goes in the writing, editing and posting these blogs and quite frankly, if there is no audience for it, I have no reason to walk around every town in south America to find internet café to post these stories. If there are few of you lurkers around, come out for air once in a while. It encourages me to keep this thing going.

Chris

Hi Chris,
Don't be discouraged about no comments, most of us just don't have anything we feel is worthy to contribute when compared with the adventures you are relaying.

All the way down here, at the bottom of the Pacific, I am keeping an eye out for your posts. You are doing something amazing mate. I take my hat off to you. If NZ is on your itinerary count on a bed in Auckland for as long as you need it.

[azr]

Is anyone even reading these posts? I haven’t seen a comment in over 3 months except from Jared. Believe it or not, there’s a lot of work that goes in the writing, editing and posting these blogs and quite frankly, if there is no audience for it, I have no reason to walk around every town in south America to find internet café to post these stories. If there are few of you lurkers around, come out for air once in a while. It encourages me to keep this thing going.

Chris

Keep posting Chris, you're living the dream. Ridin' everyday and for a cause such as yours. Must give you some real energy some days, and other days shear exhaustion. Safe ridin' my friend.

[Colin Green]

Don't you dare stop posting For many of us your posts are as near as we will get to living the dream that you are. I for one really appreciate your efforts and wish I could be riding with you.

It's difficult to post much other than... 'You bugger, I am so jealous I wish I was there'. Please keep going with your posts, they bring much pleasure.

[Skateguy50]

You only got 8000 views, no one is reading them

I would say though the blog style posts are great reads and very informative but also a bit much to post after. Like no one wants to say something after all that, so a quick more relaxed post after the blog ones would probably get the readers here to say more.

You know like a short post after the big one saying, "wow that took a while to write, hope you like it" would be much easier to comment on.

Anyways, keep on riding, been trying to catch you back on the phone I am notorious for not having mine one me. First call I was still on the road coming from moosehead and think I was biking with the kids in the woods the other one.

[toejams1]

Please keep posting. I rarely comment, but I read everyone of your posts with great interest. I also love the photography.

[four_shot]

Hey! I've been reading your posts too! i even went as far as to read up at the RGE blog to see what youve been up to. You need to relay your thoughts on the Police escort stunt you pulled at one of your border crossings. I read about it @ RGE and actually laughed so loud it woke Deedee!

[Gsxke]

Please keep posting. I rarely comment, but I read everyone of your posts with great interest. I also love the photography.

Same here

[shirazdrum]

Thank you guys for the comments! I never knew there were so many of you.  I won’t stop. It’s the bad internet connection that kills me here. I had to resize and even manipulate the quality of the pictures to upload them to the server because it would take so long that the server would time out. I have written down pretty much everything and they are somewhat ready to post but the server is holding me back.
To make things more complicated, the Montana Internet Corporation (my sponsored web host decided to take down the website without warning. After a long chat with them, they are telling me that my website is messing up their servers (complete bull****) and that’s the reason they did that. I’m moving the site to another server (much more faster and reliable) in a day or two but In case they take it down again, I’ll cross post the images to the flicker account so they still show up here.

A quick update here:

We are stuck in Cartagena Colombia as the bike was missing somewhere on the pacific ocean for two weeks. I just received the bike and doing some maintenance to it (changing tires, signal switch, fixing electrical shorts and a million blown up lights…)
We’ll be on the road in a day or two again heading for Bogota. The delay was actually good for us to visit the poor neighborhoods and distribute food. Pictures and videos are coming very soon. Hang in there.
Thanks for following this journey again, it’s nice to see the people back home reading these posts.

[almarconi]

I'm confused, the last time you checked in you where just entering Mexico City, how did you get to Colombia!