November 17th, 2006:
Back on the NEW road!!!
Lynne buying fruits from one of the numerous fruit stands on the road
One of the locals said it was flat... Nice view though
It’s Christmas at this end of the world right now... a new highway just for ourselves. In Mazatlan the advice we received from locals about which roads to take everyone was unanimous. Basically, the advice was to avoid la libre and take la cuota. Let me explain, in Mexico there are two sorts of roads: la libre is a road without shoulders to bike on and is very dangerous. Most of the traffic is on this road because it doesn’t cost anything. The 2nd is la cuota: a toll highway with shoulders without any traffic. The road from Mazatlan to Tepic is divided into la libre and la cuota. Some sections are still under construction and will be accessible to the public November 25th... but this doesn’t prevent 2 cyclists from Canada to pass through. For more than 100km we had the rights to a brand new asphalt road to ourselves without any traffic.
The road between Santiago and Las Varas
My jaw dropped when I saw this one
But everything comes to an end... la libre was awaiting us. We were curious to the facts from this web site that this road was named “A suicide for biker”. Finally we understood and hopping into the cab of a 4X4 that brought us to Ruiz, where the road was less dangerous.
Just before sunrise in Mexico
Can you believe it? This was all to ourselves!!!
We can’t really compare Baja to the interior of Mexico, where we would pray to find a tree for shade and now it’s a jungle, vegetation everywhere. What a relief to have the towns close to each other, no more hauling 20L of water and excess food...Yeah!!!
Well good bye for now…we need to get ready to bike to Puerto Vallarta...where we will find our Canadian tourists.
