Catazaja to Palenque (61 miles)
In my last post, Week 5 on the Road to Patagonia, I explained how I took a reprieve in the lakeside town of Catazajá to get off the road for a few days to hydrate, recharge and come face to face with Mexican Jesus (see previous post for explanation). The quaint town of Catazajá is situated on a quiet peninsula surrounded by Laguna Catazajá, a popular tourist destination for Mexican tourists and a well-known manatee sanctuary. My time there was incredibly relaxing and productive. I wrote, read, did yoga, played guitar and took daily walks down to the pier which overlooked the lake. Each evening I had hoped to catch a glimpse of one or more of the large graceful “sea cows”, but had no luck. Manatees came here to peacefully swim, voraciously graze on grass, aquatic weeds and algae and not be bothered. At this moment I felt as though I had a fair amount in common with these big beautiful water-living creatures.
I pedaled away from Catazaja feeling refreshed and spiritually enlightened thanks to Mexican Jesus staring at me and judging me for the last three days. I didn’t originally plan on visiting Palenque, but it was only about 60 miles out of my way and it is known for beautiful Mayan ruins. In my previous travels I had yet to visit Mayan ruins that didn’t absolutely AMAZE me in their intricacy, beauty and marvel of engineering, so I decided to start peddling in the direction of Palenque. As I cycled out of town (on the only highway NOT barricaded by stones, car tires and broken concrete), I put my headphones in, turned on an audiobook and went into a meditative trance typical of solo long-distance cycling. I was abruptly pulled out of my trance and dedicated peddling by a young driver who passed me while expressively honking his horn, smiling, waving and giving me the thumbs up. He appeared friendly, but I was NOT exactly sure what was happening.
The car slowed down about 50 feet ahead of me and the driver turned on his flashers. It was roughly 9am, my bike was loaded up with all my gear, and of course my guitar strapped awkwardly on my back, swinging from side to side with each peddle stroke. The whole situation startled the shit out of me. I slowed down and pulled up next to the driver’s side window. A young dude with hair as long as mine and driving barefoot introduced himself as Ricardo, “but you can call me Richard”, he said. He had a smile, and I kid you not, that took up ¾ of his face. He was glowing with enthusiasm and positivity. He was pure light.
Ricardo: “You are living my dream! I have always wanted to do what you’re doing. I am a musician, a singer and song writer. I want to explore my country by bicycle and play music along the way, but right now I don’t have the money.
Me: “Are you from Catazaja?”
Ricardo: “Yes, and usually we have tourists who come to see the lagoon and go on manatee tours and eat seafood, but since the pandemic, we haven’t had a tourist season. Usually I play music in local bars and restaurants. It’s how I earn money and I am GOOD at it. But since the pandemic it’s been terrible. I feel like a parrot with broken wings”.
We stood there, he barefoot in his car and me on my bicycle, chatting for nearly 30 minutes. He told me about the style of music he plays and the different musical ensembles he performs with. He told me about the songs he writes and the music he hopes to create in the future. I explained to him the bicycle route I had taken, my challenges crossing the border into Mexico and all of my mishaps along the way including flat tires and heat exhaustion. It was a pleasant and energizing exchange and before we parted we exchanged contact information. He put himself into my phone as “Ricardo from Chiapas” and we agreed to stay in touch. Unfortunately, when I tried to contact him later, the phone number didn’t work. Bummer! He seemed like a cool guy. Perhaps I would have returned to Catazaja one day and played music with him or done some adventure cycling. As I continued onwards toward Palenque, I reflected on how good it felt to have Ricardo’s support and to meet someone who was equally, if not EVEN MORE, excited for my travels than I was.
I encountered a similar situation while visiting a coffee shop in Cancun while shopping around for a bicycle. One of the more comprehensive cycling outlets had a quaint boutique-like coffee shop adjacent to it which was owned by an incredibly friendly young woman named Estefania, who enjoyed sitting and talking with her guests. Tourism was down in Cancun and as a result she had fewer opportunities than usual to meet new people and share travel stories. When I explained to her that I was looking to buy a bicycle and travel around Mexico before heading south into Guatemala, she exploded with excitement.
“How incredible! You are going to get to see so many small villages that people usually don’t get to see. The people, the food, the countryside, it’s all so beautiful! You must visit Chiapas and Oaxaca!”
Estefania and Ricardo were like cheerleaders and fortune tellers restoring hope in my adventure. They both arrived at strategic times when I had been questioning my efforts and life’s choices. If I could have translated their collective enthusiasm it felt like they were telling me, “You have no idea what you’re getting yourself into! You are in for one hell of an adventure! The best is yet to come amigo. Oh, and don’t forget the sunscreen”. And as I write this, 650 miles from where I started, I’ll be damned if they weren’t right!
As I pedaled towards Palenque I received more encouragement and signs of admiration. Horns would honk at me and “thumbs up” emerged from car windows. Truckers in 18 wheelers would express enthusiastic gestures along with flashing their headlights and hazards as they passed me coming in the opposite direction. But the support and encouragement that impacted me most, which I valued above all, was in the faces of cowboys, farmers, mechanics, rancheros and boteros. They would pass me on their horses, tractors or motor bikes, facing me as they traveled in the opposite direction. Sun ravaged faces weathered by hard labor and the turbulence of life: tan, fierce, defiant and as reflective as processed leather. I would receive a solemn inquisitive squint, and with the complete absence of a smile, a stoic nod of approval.
“Ok gringo, It’s 95 degrees out here. I see what you’re up to. Respect!”
Like the howler monkeys and barking street dogs I regularly encountered along the way, these visual and auditory experiences reinvigorated my spirits and re-inflated my travel dreams. So, as I peddled forward, high on life and the excitement of unknown adventures – shortly after meeting Ricardo from Chiapas and with 40 miles left before my final destination – Mexican Jesus showed me that he had a sense of humor. I got a flat tire…and then it began to rain.
In all reality the flat tire shouldn’t have surprised me. My load was still too heavy and all of it was being supported by my back tire. I rapidly changed my inner tube in the rain and attempted to inflate it with my travel-sized hand-pump. I successfully inflated my tire to 45 lbs of pressure before my handpump exploded into multiple pieces, leaving me with a tire that was 30 lbs low on air. For anyone who has ever peddled a bicycle with tires low in air pressure, they know that it is a painfully slow and arduous experience. I continued on in the rain, and it was 20 miles and two hours of peddling, before I found a service station (thank you Mexican Jesus!) where a few energetic and curious gas station attendants helped me inflate my tires and balance my air pressure.
Something that has helped me on more than a handful of occasions is the fact that, in Mexico, nearly all gas stations are full service and open 24 hours a day. They are always equipped with friendly attendants ready and willing to help me fill my bicycle tires with air. Some of the best conversations, best travel advice and most helpful directions came from these service station attendants. I would tip them 20 pesos (US $1) for their generosity and good conversation and they were usually incredibly grateful.
I made it into Palenque and to my campsite near sunset when the rain was steadily pouring. Everything exposed on my bicycle, including my sleeping bag, tent, guitar and extra blanket got soaked. I rolled up looking like a drowned hippy rat and was greeted by the patron of the site, a doe-eyed youngster named Hidalgo.
I inquired about camping fees and Hidalgo smugly offered, “You can set up your tent out here in the yard or, if you’d prefer, I have private rooms with a double bed and hot showers for $13/night.” Hidalgo was friendly and professional, but the smirk on his face said it all. His negotiation skills were ruthless and brilliant. It’s important to note that some campsites I have found, but not all, have overhangs which offer protection from the elements. This particular campsite had no place to set up a tent or hammock that was protected from the pouring rain. Hidalgo, both savior and savvy business man, had himself a deal.
With a weary smile I thought to myself, “SOLD! To the underprepared backpacker in the soggy tank top!”
I checked into my room, took a hot shower and promptly fell asleep for the next 13 hours. When I woke up in the morning the rain was still coming down, but it had lightened up a bit. I biked around in the drizzle looking for bicycle shops or at the very least bicycle mechanics who could help me out. My bike desperately needed a tune-up and I was hoping to purchase a front rack in order to redistribute the weight on my bicycle. No luck. I found very few bike shops in Palenque and the ones I did find did not have the capacity to help me with more than minor repairs and adjustments. All of the mechanics I spoke with appeared to be more versed in motorbikes than bicycles. Palenque was very hilly which made cycling around it challenging. The town’s narrow and busy roads tended to unexpectedly turn from pavement into mud and gravel and then spontaneously turn back into pavement. The roads were generously adorned with potholes which made bike riding more of a gauntlet. Trucks drove dangerously close to me. Taxis honked their horns to show their annoyance and alert me to their presence. Evidently, they were not interested in sharing their potholes with me.
In the afternoon, I explored the famous Mayan ruins of Palenque which were located about 10km (6 miles) from my campsite, making it convenient to bike there. The rain had subsided and was now coming down like a gentle tropical mist, intermittently changing back to a drizzle. A combination of the rainy weather and the looming pandemic resulted in barely any other tourists. This gave me the archeological site nearly all to myself. I leisurely walked around, took photos and, at times, sat to contemplate the mysterious and mind-bending reality of the ancient spectacle that surrounded me.
What I learned:
Palenque, specifically is a mid-sized Mayan settlement, slightly smaller than Chichen Itza and Tikal. It has the typical step pyramids that are common at other ruins and has a variety of other decorative structures with names like Temple of the Cross, Temple of the Sun and Temple of the Foliated Cross. The architecture is graceful and like nearly all of the other Mayan ruins are located deep in the mist-shrouded jungle.
There are 4,400 Mayan archeological sites which exist in Latin America, and most of them are in Mexico. In my previous travels I have visited Chichen Itza in the Yucatan peninsula of Mexico and Tikal in Guatemala. Both were beyond AMAZING! Phenomenal, earth-shattering, sensational! What I think I have always found so mind-blowing and perplexing about Mayan ruins is that the unearthed structures which are observable at these archeological, are just a fraction of what has yet to be excavated. After the decline of the Mayan empire the ruins were overgrown by the jungle. Wild cedar, mahogany and sapodilla trees as well as other botany of the hungry forest swallowed up these ancient civilizations. These Mayan cities – like Palenque, Tikal and Chichen Itza – once covered thousands of acres of land, had hundreds of documented buildings and dominated parts of five countries: El Salvador, Belize, Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico. One could easily spend a whole lifetime exploring all the Mayan ruins in Latin America.
Aside from the ruins, I enjoyed visiting the city of Palenque. It has a population of around 100,000 people and it is apparent that, pre-pandemic, it thrived on local and international tourism. As I pedaled around I passed coffee shops, hotels, restaurants and souvenir boutiques, many of which were temporarily or permanently closed. It was sad to see so many businesses closed down, but I could imagine what it looked like when commerce was booming and it made me smile. I look forward to returning one day. But aside from tourism being down, the good citizens of Palenque were still grooving. Bakeries, butchers, liquor stores and “Cocinas Econonicas” (Translation: economical kitchen), offering a variety of delicious smelling food, were still in full swing. Signs advertising tacos, empanadas, huaraches and tamales offered nourishment and enjoyment to the active and hardworking people here.
Palenque to Villahermosa (97 Miles):
One solid day in Palenque was enough. I woke up early the following day and was eager to get moving on to my next destination, the city of Villahermosa. The rain had stopped and the sun was out. I cycled out of town and towards my next destination. The elevation ranged from sea level to about 60 meters above. The jungle continued on in every direction around me, however the quantity of roadkill seemed to stop. The last 400 miles or so, the highway was continuously covered with snakes, lizards, birds, bats, ant eaters and enough flat iguanas that they began to look like an integral part of the steamy assault. Now, peddling into the state of Tabasco and towards the city of Villahermosa I witnessed no roadside animal carcasses, which made me happy. Cars kill a lot of animals. Bicycles kill very few if any.
The route to Villahermosa was long. I passed multiple road blocks occupied by heavily armed police and military. These had been routine throughout my travels, and had caused me minimal problems. Military roadblocks are stationed frequently throughout Mexico. Law enforcement is usually looking for drugs, firearms and evidence of cartel activity. I was carrying neither drugs nor firearms and the police/military personnel usually found me and my travels interesting. I would be held at these checkpoints only long enough for them to inquire about my adventure and then wish me well. On this particular 97-mile stretch, I encountered 3 check-points, only one of which demanded to see my passport and travel documents, some of which I had misplaced which irritated the officers. I was released with an annoying wave of their hands and I continued on my way.
I passed through more unincorporated towns where I paused, refilled my water and ate more delicious (and spicy!) tamales. In one town I made friends with an older gentleman who appeared to be in his 80s who was selling inexpensive hand-made tamales. He had a bald head and one of the most exquisite and bushy mustaches I have ever seen: a real Mexican Mark Twain. As he served me up a plate of tamales he inquired about how far I had come. When I informed him that I began in Cancun and had covered roughly 550 miles, with an additional 47 to go that day he looked at me expressionless. Unlike many others he did NOT look at me with admiration or encouragement. He stared at me with skepticism and confusion as if to say,
“That’s the stupidest thing I have ever heard. Why the hell would you do that gringo? In this heat?”
As I peddled away he didn’t even wish me a good trip. He gave me a friendly, but condescending smirk and waved me goodbye. Perhaps I should have informed him that I’ve had the protection of Mexican Jesus since Catazaja, but I thought better of it.
I continued on in the hot Yucatan sun with half of my days trip still ahead of me. Somewhere in the middle of the journey, during the extreme heat and sweat and traffic and jungle and intermittent farm land, I all of a sudden heard the unsettling sound of metal clicking – like pocket change in the dryer – as my bicycle began to skid to a complete stop. I lowered my kickstand and there on my back wheel, causing a disruption in my gears and rotation was, not one, but TWO broken spokes. I traveled the rest of the way to Villahermosa in the hot sun, nursing a broken back wheel and imbalanced weight distribution which threatened to give me another popped tire.
I arrived to Villahermosa at sunset. The stark contrast from biking in the Mexican countryside and then having to maneuver the angry and chaotic streets of an urban environment, is always an adjustment. Villahermosa is a big city and…once again… I was hoping to find somewhere to get my bike tuned up and locate a front rack. The word Villahermosa translates to “Beautiful Town” (Villa = town, hermosa = beautiful), however I met a nice French couple in Catazaja who told me that they had just come from there and reported, “Be aware, It’s not very ‘hermosa’”. I found a nice hotel in a seedy area of town for $12/night. The manager was a hospitable young fella named Gabriel who lived on-sight and slept on a blanket, on a concrete floor, in the laundry room. In fact, he wasn’t just the manager. He lived at the hotel 24 hours a day and served as the security guard, concierge, chef, custodian, valet, housekeeping, room service and barista. He did this all with the customer service of a 5-star resort. He and I became instant friends and he upgraded my room to a larger fancier one at no extra charge. Gabriel was incredibly helpful in assisting me in locating bike shops and places to eat around town. Unfortunately, similar to Palenque, none of the shops or bike mechanics had the capacity to help me with what I needed.
The French couple was incorrect about Villahermosa. Sure, it had the chaotic energy and pollution of a large Mexican city, but it also had a series of beautiful rivers, canals, lagoons, parks and animal sanctuaries which existed directly inside the city. I might even refer to it as the Venice of Mexico. The city had equal part serenity of nature and the eyesore and offensive noise of traffic and industry. The truth is, I don’t favor cities, but I always find something to like in even the most offensive of urban environments. What I enjoy, and find beautiful, in even the grimiest of big cities is that, aside from the unpleasantries of crime and pollution, this is someone’s community, someone’s home.
Tucked into every corner of these concrete jungles are local foods and faiths, students and workers, reasons for celebration and interesting people with families and stories. We can visit beautiful countries like Mexico and spend all of our time on the beaches with other tourists, but then we miss out on so much of the essence that makes this country, and others like it, so unique and unforgettable. I am reminded of the time I met a Peruvian girl in a low-budget hostel somewhere else in Mexico and she said, “This place is filling up with locals. I don’t like that.” I replied, “So, you came to Mexico to NOT hang out with Mexicans?” She seemed annoyed at my response. She said nothing and then walked away.
Stay Tuned: In my next post I miss a bus, have an emotional breakdown in public and then rediscover a mountain town and indigenous population I fell in love with on a visit to Mexico nearly 15 years ago.