Jim Key in Central America

My Last Day in Mexico

My last day in Mexico didn't rain but I had one hell of a crosswind. More frequent military checkpoints and getting pinched twice by bandito policia in less than two miles. The first cost me a 200 peso bite($20). Up ahead there were two more blocking the road waving me over. I was just cruising looking at my map. We chat for a minute. My line as I hand him a fake drivers licensce was "no compradie". Then the bite. He wants $100 DOLLARS! No way! I had 150 peso in my easily accessible money. The rest well hidden. I told him to go talk to his buddy around the corner. I don't even have $100. Ha he says ATM. I say no ATM. I challenge him over and over to write the ticket but he wouldn't. I point to his radio and say supervisor. He says no. Well I say I have no other money and if he takes it I won't be able to buy gasolina until tomorrow when I can get more money from a bank. He grabbed the 150 pesos and walked off. They cost me $35 in less than two miles. In the scheme of things that's not bad. It just pissed me off.

I made the border at 5:30. The Mexico tollbooth said vehicle deposit cancellation and immigration was over the bridge. He lied I was in the USA. I had to pay the Mexican bridge toll again go back over hunt down someone. I finally found the proper office to cancel my deposit. The tollbooth jerk wouldn't let me through unless I payed one more time. I argued for a minute handing him the receipt he gave me twenty minutes ago. It wasn't worth the argument. I payed another $2.25 toll and crossed into the good ole USA a second time.

From Brownsville I was in San Antonio by noon. Great shop and people. My girl Jeannie's sister happened to be in San Antonio with her boyfriend. I've never met her. They all got together to twist my brain for some fun. I was talking to Steve from the shop about my trip when she walked up and asked if I was Jim? Yes..........? Oh I've been following your trip online. Really? I said how wild is that. there was something familiar about her, like we've met before. Her boyfriend let me off the hook. Listen to her voice...she and Jeannie sound exactly alike. I was abit confused until everything sunk into my road wary head.

Alamo BMW has great personal. I ended up spending three hours there. The only complaint is charging the suggested retail price plus for a tire. Over $200 for one tire and disposal not including labor is crazy. I work at a motorcycle shop. I know how much the cost. BMW of Denver sells the same tire for $135. Suzanne was a sweetheart and knocked the bill down to $191 for the tire. Still nutty but a very cool shop.

I rode into the Texas hill country. At dusk the deer own the road. I saw no less then 30 in a hour. I made it to Jeannie at 6:30 pm the next day. The sun set just after I got over Raton pass. I had all my cold weather gear on but still froze. The last hour lasted a week.

It was a great trip. More rain than I was expecting. It made it difficult to film and had to pass so many amazing scenes I was dying to capture. I still ended up with nearly 19 hours of film. Now the hard part of the trip starts. Opening a two foot high stack of mail getting back into the swing of being home. Not being able to lane split or blowing by cops.

Guatemala Volcanos and The Push Home

After my luxurious hot shower. Luxurious because it was hot. Throwing my laundry in the machine for the first time in over week and a half. Paul and I planned our ride from Guatemala city to Lago de Atitlan. A incredibly beautiful lake dominated by two volcanoes. To get there we first had to get out of Guatemala City. The traffic was almost as crazy as Bangkok's. For over an hour we battled squeezed and cut between cars and black diesel smoke belching trucks and buses. Blipping our horns so the other drivers knew we are squeezing through. It was exhausting. One of those moments I was hating at the same time I was smiling knowing the story of that hour was going to be told and retold forgetting how horrible it really was. Also knowing that I could back up the stories with the video tape from a couple angles.

We finally broke free onto a very twisty fun road to Antigua. A very cool cobblestone village. After a bite to eat on the plaza the road west out of town got progressively more and more scenic as we twisted through the mountains. It just kept getting better and better! The lake surrounded by volcanoes came into view. Wow! Could it get any better? Yes it did. We descended down the mountains to the lake on a incredibly steep twisty narrow road. The ride that day is probably my favorite ride of the trip. Towards the bottom a couple large deep mudslide road damage was being repaired. Dried mud six to eight feet deep formed a wall on one side and broken pavement dropped off into a huge wash gully.

Supermotard Central America

As usual I plan what I think is a possible route with time to "smell the roses" in several areas. I´m into quality of miles, not quantity miles. As usual, I found I was beating myself up trying to complete the conceived route. Bad weather, unexpected groovey places, poor roads, out of the blue sidetrips and traffic always add up to really having to hump to hit everywhere I wanted. In SE Asia the plan was to ride north through Malayasia, Southern Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Northern Thailand. I ended up skipping Laos all together and I've been to northern Thailand to do over a month of deep Cambodia. On the Copper Canyon/Baja ride last February, we skipped some of the northern stuff because we had so much fun in the first weeks. I never felt slighted.

Edge of Insanity, New Year's and Border Crossings

On News Years Eve day I rode south. I was going to cross into Honduras at Copan but it was mid afternoon. Borders are best crossed early morning and being a holiday I decided to continue south and cross at Agua Caliente in the morning. Since Christmas fireworks go off night and day. By 2:30 things where really getting out of hand. Every village and town rockets where flying across the road and explosions as I past. Drunk people were staggering in the road. After for the second time a gun jutted out a window & capped off a clip I decided I better get holed up. Esquipulas was about a half hour ahead. The fireworks were going off everywhere. Barrages of whole bricks of firecrackers would last several minutes. These aren´t the firecrackers we get at home, bigger! As night fell it was the cloesest to how D-day sounded as I care to get.

From inside my room it was deafing, I couldn´t hear the TV at top volume. Then the really big stuff started to go off. It had to be dynomite. BOOM!!!! the whole hotel would shake, stuff fell off a table, a picture fell off the wall. I wanted to go outside to check it out, but with all the gunfire, I thought against it. They don´t seem to know what goes up must come down. It was off the hook! I wasn´t scared, it was just incredible. As nutty as that sounds, when midnight stuck you can only imagine the escalation. Huge explosions rocked the building. I fully expected to to see craters in the streets the next morning. No craters but the firework paper was several inches deep all over. Wow! Happy New Year!

Bivouacked On Top of an Ancient Civilization

I don´t know what it is about jungles, I´m drawn to them, they facinate me. Camping on top of a Mayan ruin is an experience I´ll never forget. Sabine came jogging up the street in San Ignacio about 2:30. Neither one of us really knew how this was going to go, but we both realized at worst it´ll be great.

It´s about a 15 mile ride to the ruins. The jungle canopy closes over the last 7, so it´s like riding through a lush jungle tunnel. I wanted to film the ride out. It can be tricky sometimes messing with the cameras, looking around & paying attention to were I'm going. We going slow, 5-10mph, I noticed the right crash bar camera had collected some leaves & needed to be redirected. I reached down, peeking over my throttle, my eyes darting back & forth from the camera to the trail. I saw the washout at the last second. Not big, but I was going to catch it on the edge.

Getting Even Deeper

I loved Placencia! I intended to stay a day or two but ended up spending three nights. I rode the Hummingbird highway back to Belize city & pick up my gear then rode straight east to San Ignacio right on the Guatemala border. A east ride, belize is such a small country.

I rolled into San Ignacio around 4:00. New towns are always abit confusing , Irode out to where Wendys home is. I wasn't able to find "Bigga" to take me to her home. It was beautiful but to far out from town. I wanted internet & to watch the Christmas festivities. I got a guest house room right by the center of town for $20USD. In no time the big BMW G/S drew Allen & Tony from Arizona over to see who is riding it. Turns out their both riders & produce motorcycle Videos & events. They have done a ton of work for SPEED, TRAVEL & many other channals & networks.

Wendy, Percy & The Howlers

The past two days have been pretty exciting! It's fun meeting people on these rides. I met a women, Pamela, in the Internet shop and got to talking. She and her husband recently pitched it all and moved to a pennisula down in southern Belize. A town called Placencia. It sounded nice and the route to there offered about 80-100 miles of dirt. She gave me her phone number & give her a ring if I make it. I got a late start the 21st.........Wednesday?? It's easy to lose track.

Late start due to rain!!!! At 11:30 I decided to hit the road, hoping it would burn off like it has been. Riding south out of Belize City was confusing. Alot of one way streets always going in the wrong direction. After breaking its grip, it's about about a 40 minute ride to the Manatee road or also called the coastal road. It's a 60-mile dirt ride through wetlands & forest. Since all the rain I was a little apprehensive. I still have the Tourances on and had visions of becoming mired like in Malayasia. The road was muddy but really pretty good traction. Alot of potholes, the edges looked good, but was actully 6-7 inches of muck or sand. The rain would stop until I got the cameras all mounted. I'd have to stop, put them away & remount them at least 3-4 times in the first 30 miles. It was about 1:00 when it finally stayed away. The scenery was amazing!!

Belize Bliss!

Coydog is a nickname I've had for awhile. It's a domestic dog that has mated with a wild coyote or wolf. Wild with a domestic streak. After 11 days of Mexico, Belize feels very domestic. Real Mexico was a struggle. Language struggles, map struggles, internet struggles, to name a few. If you look at those struggles they were all on me. I lost my map, I didn't know their language & internet because I just want to make this ride as interactive as possible. Adventure or global touring is hard. The hard is what makes it great! If it were easy everyone would be doing it. It's funny how the struggles become my favorite stories after the fact.

Belize is very easy or domestic (so far) compared. The coydog comes out of the wild into town. Immigration/ customs took 15-20 minutes. My map is good and there are others to obtain easily. English is the language & internet that works. I'm not at all ranking one over the other, it's just nice to relax & catch up. The wilds make me apprieciate the comforts much more.

Leaving Mexico, Entering Beliz

Hola, It was raining Saturday morning when I left Vera Cruz. I just wanted to get going. I drove out of it in about a hour. If it were not for the huge overloaded trucks & buses, going either 10mph or 90mph it would have been kind of pretty.

Map crappy map made it quite a confusing day. I started out riding the gulf coast to Alvarado & then headed south. I wanted to avoid Villahermosa if possible. It is a capital city which in the past have not been any fun getting through. Things were going fine. The towns on may map were showing up. Signs were indicating all was well. The scenery was getting lush, roads were twisty & the pavement good. South of Acoyacun I decided to stop & get a photo of a flock of Egrits or some kind of white cranes that Ive been seeing along the way. The roads have no shoulder, its about a 8-10 inch drop to get off the pavement. As soon as i stopped the majority of the birds took off. Oh well I took a couple pics & angled to get back on the road. The front tire climbed up no problem, the rear tourance slide to edge not climbing. In used to having TKC´s which would have climbed it no problemo. The bike dipped to the left & I chopped the throttle which pitched the bike right. Over I went! Just a tip over but with all the gear on the bike it would be impossible to pick up. I started to unpack when a pickup came by. He stopped about a 150 yards down the road. He hopped out & walked all the way back & helped me pick up the bike.

Very Gringo in Vera Cruz

Hola!
It is easier to find decent internet in Cambodia than Mexico. I walked & asked directions to this one for 45 mins.The present keyboard Im using is so worn that most of the letters are worn off the keys. Im not one of those who can type without looking at the keys. It took 5 minutes just to get my email to open. My plan was to post nightly if possible. Uploading photos from this computer will take all night. I will do the best I can. I am quite surprised by this.

I am in Vera Cruz tonight. The plan was to leave Tuxpan yesterday but it was pouring. It was supposed to clear last night, so I stayed one more night. I awoke to overcast drizzle this morning. I hit the road anyway & rode the Gulf coast south to Vera Cruz. A short mileage day, but due to construction hold ups & accidents it took all day.