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Goin' In
It is Saturday night around midnight. Tonight is my last night in the US for quite a bit. Matt and I head
into Mexico along with some good karma. My brother's girlfriend, Meagan, has already hooked me up with
places to stay with very cool family members and has come through yet again down here in San Diego. Her
family had Matt and I over tonight and it was great. They even called some TV stations and one came and
interviewed me! We also met her brother, Adam and his family, who offered us a place to stay just over the
border into Mexico, north of a town called Rosarito.
Although I have been bad about updating my proposed itinerary, I am taking care of this. I've handed that
job over to Matt so the proposed route will be more realistic and up to date. Good delegating, eh?! Anyway,
we're heading into Baja and will travel down Route
1 to La Paz. There, we will take a ferry to Mazatlan. We are looking to arrive there just before the 25th.
I am planning on doing a bit of translating work for my former employer at a candy manufacturing factory in
Mexico. Hopefully, I can be a part of saving energy for the site and maybe stock up on some milk chocolate.
Once I finish that, we'll continue down the coast.
I was OK with the change to riding Baja since I had no presentations planned until much farther south -
hopefully in San Miguel de Allende and Iztapa Zihuatanejo. San Miguel is into the interior and Zihua, as
they call it, is on the coast, about 120 miles north of Acapulco. I've gotten my pencils for our simplified
campaign and I am still working on a simple pamphlet about littering, forestation, and water.
Honestly, I am a little nervous, but very excited. Having Matt, and now a good safe place to stay our first
night, should make for a great start. Our "fake" wallets and mace are at the ready and our attitude of
"We'll probably not have to use them" is along with us. I've gotten beefier tires and an easier rear
cassette cluster so I actually have granny gears, but none of this will go on until I need them. I feel
pretty good about the condition of my bike and the trailer. My spokes, chain, cabling, and gears have been
all checked out and OK-ed. We've got some fuel and extra food and very colorful reflectors on our bikes.
I also stopped by Rudy Project in San Clemente to pick up some lenses and got a pretty nifty bright yellow
riding jersey to wear too. I got extra lenses and tomorrow I just need to pick up some dish washing gloves
for those rainy days (they're really great you should try it!) and some tubes for my beefier tires. My head
is in this and my body is tip top. I got a little burnt on my upper thighs from kayaking the other day, but
the pain of the burn is gone. My hair is a little too long, but I've decided I want to grow it down to my
butt, which will probably never happen, but I can dream. My teeth have no cavities but I have a huge zit
the size of Everest on my forehead which, if attacked over the next few days, could be used as mace. We
found a great map of Mexico in a burrito restaurant that comes with crayons and a word maze so I can't
imagine we'll get lost. I think that's it.
I'm ready. I think...
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