Living in Low Gears and Low Temps: Day 1 of Cycling Baja California

Good news! After three days on the trail, I can say that I am surviving! Barely. I'll get to it, but to put it one way, there is no bunny slope when it comes to cycling this country. Without further ado, a recap!

Day 1: Tecate to Cañon Manteca

I could tell I was a bit nervous as I tried to maneuver to correct building that housed the immigration office. My wonderful hosts in San Diego, Joe and Taylor, had driven me to the border where I was to set off. After finally going back and forth between immigrations and the bank across from it (where I had to pay for the tourist visa) I finally passed into Mexico. The trip had started and if there was ever a time to turn back, it was now.


I did not start well. Almost immediately after turning onto the first busy street in Tecate, my sandals which I had lashed to one of my bags flew off. I had to double around (safely) and then wait for a break in the cars to grab them and re-lash them to the bike. After a few busy streets, Tecate made sure I knew I was in the mountainous region of Mexico with an enormous street hill where I even saw locals pushing their bikes up. If only I knew of the sign this was for things to come. After navigating through calm streets of the outskirts of Tecate (calm except for a a few barking dogs that chased me down the road), I made a cut onto a dirt road that led to the highway out of town. I tried to stop to drink some water and immediately realized the clear of my shoe was stuck on the clip of the pedal and I had no choice but to fall over on my side. A man on his bike shouted to me "¿Está bien?" to which I replied that I was ok. My first of many good interactions with the Mexican people.

Onto the highway, the steep inclines increased, now partnered with screaming fast cars that left only feet between them and me. The few miles of highway felt like they went on forever, but eventually I turned onto the dirt road that would take me into Cañon Manteca, the gateway to mountains of northern Baja. A few miles down the road I found a bluff where I'm sure campers have settled down before, and I was able to make camp quickly and chowed down on some tortillas and beans with cotija cheese. The view was incredible and as the sun went down the tint of the rocks which received its light changed from white to green, pink, gray and then blue. The only sound during the night was the wind and the occasional call of a few coyotes. It was a tough first day, but I felt invigorated and ready to cycle on.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The One Where I fight a Cactus...

Image
After successive days at the sea-side towns of Camalú, Vicente Guerrero, and San Quentin, I rode back into the mountains with my companion, Andre, for what would be two days of difficult and slow mountain riding. Leaving San Quentin, back roads adjacent to huge farms eventually led to the beach where we rode for several miles over the damp, compact sand alongside the Pacific Ocean. After several miles of easy riding on the beach, we returned to the back country roads and continued to Ejido Nueva Odisea where we stopped at an excellent Cocina Michoacana to grab a meal before sojourning into the looming mountains. I admit that I was not terribly excited to go back to the place where my bicycle would struggle the most to traverse but almost a week in the country had given me the confidence I needed to tackle the challenge. Our goal was to spend two nights camping in the mountains and slowly make our way back to Mexico Highway 1 where we would ride the rest of the 78km to Cataviña by paved...
Read more

Baja or Bust: End of an Era and Why I'm Riding a Bicycle into Mexico

Image
       For those in my inner circle and for many outside of it, y'all may be aware that I have been planning a bicycle trip for nearly two years.  In a flash, two years have passed, and the time to make good on my wild proclamations of Choose Your Own Adventure: The Bicycle Addition, has come at last.  While many of my original plans (more on this in the future) were ultimately amended and compressed, I am pleased to announce that I will be embarking on a 1,700 mile trip through the Baja California, Mexico by bicycle in just a few short weeks.  The trip will begin November 22, last between 30-40 days, and will traverse the length of the Baja Peninsula and the deserts, mountains, and beaches that it comprises.        I've never written a blog before.  Never thought I'd start one.  Don't really care who does or doesn't read this.  I wanted a method of chronicling this trip, from the planning to the execution, and m...
Read more

El Fin

Image
I came out of my rest days in Ciudad Constitución with achy knees and a waning motivation to return to the trail. I admit I was tempted to call it a voyage complete and hop on a bus with my bike and take the easy route to La Paz. While the temptation strongly pulled me in that direction, I dismissed the urge and set out on the bike for the final stretch of the trail. The Baja Divide finishes in La Paz and I wanted the experience of coming out of the wilderness and riding, triumphantly (in my head, at least), into the city. Only in that way would I feel that I had truly accomplished the goals of this trip. And so, packed out with enough food and water for a few days on the trail and with some pain killers to manage the pain in my knees, I rode out of the city. My goal for the first day was to make it past the steaming, burning dump outside the city as quickly as possible, and to put as many miles on the bike as I could on what I expected to be relatively good, flat roads heading east. T...
Read more