Lechuga
Day 6. We’re spent. The lactic acid has built up in our legs and hasn’t left since day 2. This means that any up, any effort beyond the normal instantly triggers the muscle burning sensation. We’re fatigued.
The morning has started out amazing. We slept in a hotel and were at least able to shower. There was cold and not so cold water but we had a towel and just getting the last few days of grime off of us was well worth the shivers. The added addition of an amazing dinner, served twice (we devoured it and then sheepishly explained we had been riding for 5 days and ordered another serving each), topped with local Mezcal. And the finishing touches of a beautiful sunrise sent us to bed, early, but satiated and ready to finish this thing out.
As we began pedaling, we noticed the smoke. At first, the assumption was that it was trash being burned, but the plumes were rising all over the valley. Nearing one, I braced myself for the stench, but was met with a different smell that I couldn’t quite place until we rode by. The fires were the ovens being warmed to cook the Mezcal. We were leaving the World Capital of Mezcal after all. The smoke blanketed the valley giving an eerie sense to the morning but also made for a beautiful backdrop for the cold that we were met with.
As the day proceeded, we began little ups and downs. Each up was met with groans and tired legs. The undulations brought us in and out of little towns. Sleeping poblados that appeared to be emerging from sleep for the day but also stuck squarely in the past couple hundred years. Women, maybe 4 feet tall, walking the streets carrying masa in a basket on their heads. Men wobbling through the streets carrying produce we assumed they were taking to market to sell. The streets were either cobblestone or hand lain cement. There were cars but we didn’t see any that were moving. It would have been sacrilege for machines to break the tranquility of the dawn.
We are rolling into another small town that is built on a hill. Rolling across a small stream we can see the road pitch upward abruptly. It’s steep. There’s an old man walking up the hill ahead of us carrying a wooden basket, clearly handmade and well used. It’s worn and wears the badges of having been carried daily for years. Out of the basket are poking many vegetables, lettuces, radishes, maybe a carrot or two. I don’t know for sure but it was my guess that he was either headed to market to sell his vegetables or he had just come from the market purchasing the vegetables for the day.
Passing him on the right, we greet him with as jovial as a Hola as we can muster as our legs burn and we push against the weight of our bikes. He greets us back. We push a bit farther up the hill and then it’s just not worth it and I step off my bike. Huffing over the handlebars the old man catches back up and stops. He asks us if we are tired, we reply that yes, yes, we are pretty tired. He stops and looking through his basket asks us if we want some lettuce to refresh ourselves. I can’t say I’ve ever felt that way about lettuce but it could explain some of Plug Alonge Pete’s behaviours. He insists. So I accept the lettuce. He then hands some to Mama Bear and then turns and heads up the hill disappearing as he turns off onto a foot path leaving the road.
I’ll try anything once. I rinse the lettuce and pop some leaves into my mouth. I’m not sure how much it refreshed me, but the taste was amazing and the interaction left me ready to push on.
Ponche
I ride past the store as Mama Bear is yelling at me that it looked like a good tienda to buy our food. I disagree and feel confident that we will find a better store as we get closer to downtown. She’s a bit tiffed but we keep rolling.
As I predicted, after rolling several more blocks we come to the closest thing to a supermarket we would see in a while. The front was open, and produce was spilling from every corner of the door. There were oranges, avacados, lettuces, radishes, and bunches of other stuff that I can’t recall probably because I didn’t know what it was. KB goes to town finding the fresh fruit and veggies she was craving. I walk back into the back and find some junk food and a Coke. Behind all of the produce the proprietors are sitting eating lunch, it is Christmas Day, and it would appear that they are having some family time.
To pay, I approach the table and start chatting with the family. The mom starts to figure out the total using a calculator. The son and grandpa are asking questions. Based on their queries, they don’t see a lot of gringos coming through and buying oranges. They want to know how long we will be in town, where we are headed, what we are doing, how we are getting home. They are very polite but clearly curious. After a pleasant conversation, I pay and we head back out front to repack our bikes and start pedaling again.
In mid repack with stuff somewhat thrown in different directions scratching our heads on how we are going to fit one more avocado into our frame bag without it exploding and covering everything in guacamole, the old man of the house emerges somewhat timidly from the store. He asks if we would like some ponche. I have never heard that Spanish word before, but after looking at the group, I tell him sure, we would love to try some.
He comes back out with a pitcher and several plastic cups. He hands the cups around filled with a hot liquid and what I assume are boiled peaches. He explains that we need to let the water cool and then we can drink the ponche. The water is piping hot and despite his warnings, we all try to take a sip. He goes back inside and we are left with cups of hot peach water that we can’t drink. The cups are put down as we wait for the water to cool. We go about repacking our bikes, finding places for those last avocados and drinking Coke and eating other junk food we had purchased. When the water is at least not boiling, we slowly sip down the juice. It is not sweet, at least by American standards, but has a nice, mellow peachy flavor to it.
We drink as much as we can, but worried about the time and the fact that it is still too hot to really drink, we fish out the pieces of peach and drink as much as we can. I walk back in with the empty cups to thank him for the ponche and to return the vessels. He is clearly proud and happy to have been able to share this drink with us and his smile makes my day. I thank him and wish them the best.
Cerveza
Day 5 starts with a big climb, about 4,000 feet right out of the gate.
We awake early just as the first light is starting to fade into existence on the horizon. Coffee and water are our first priority followed by food and getting all of our shit back on the bike. Determined to start as early as possible to beat the heat, we are packed and moving just as the first rays pop over the river valley making all the green pop. We roll out through a barely moving town. As we cross the bridge over the river, there are fields below us and we can see an old man plowing with a team of oxen and a manual plow. No machines needed here.
This route puts a premium on dirt. We leave the pavement onto a clearly unused road that pitches upward at a grade that is not ridable by me. We find ourselves pushing our bikes right out of the gate. I look back across the valley. The sun is popping and the small town we are leaving is brilliant in the sunrise. As much as we would love to just stay in this almost too hospitable place, we continue upward.
The climb is steep, but doable and we quickly click off the miles of the climb hitting the end where camping is noted on the route map. This is where KB and I had planned to eat lunch and we stop. Everything is sharp. The plants are all pokey and the ground is covered with and made up of rocks that want to tear at your skin. We are happy to have the Z-lite and we find a small chunk of real estate that is kind of in the shade to eat. It’s hot. We are sweaty and dirty and tired and I’m pretty confident that you could tell those things from about 300 yards out.
While we sit in the kind of shade we found, a small truck, the first one we’ve seen all day, comes bouncing down the road. It’s white, two-wheel drive with an extra cab. There are three men in the truck. As they roll up, the truck slows and they offer us some water out the window and ask if we are ok. We indicate we are and that we are good on water. They wave and roll on.
To be honest, I was a little worried about water. We had done a big hot climb sucking on our supply and if my guess was right, we should be mostly coasting into the next town. Our route notes show the town and that there are stores but has a disconcerting note that water may be hard to find. Hmm. Well, I’m committed to making it on what we have.
The avocados and beans on tortillas are amazing. Simple and always satisfying after a hard morning of climbing. We stuff all our junk back onto our bikes and return to spinning the cranks. My guess is accurate and we begin descending. We coast almost all the way into town but as this route goes, it turns on the steepest mother fucking hill I’ve seen or at least I’m sure I’ve seen to go up into the town just to stay on dirt. I look at my watch strapped to my handlebars and can see that if we take the road that is straight, we can circumvent this steep climb and my guess is that we don’t really need to go up and over at the highest point to get through.
After a few blocks off route, we roll up to a store.
There is a fence around the dirt yard and a tree off to the left. There are two men sleeping in the shade of the tree or at least relaxing. I say sleeping as they don’t seem to care at all that we have entered the yard. We stash our bikes up against the tree and head inside.
Upon entering the store, we see a man with a couple of Coronitas on the counter and a lady on the other side with a calculator, pen and a piece of cardboard where she has written a bunch of numbers. They are in the middle of calculating his tab.
In many small towns, the store owners become a type of financial institution. They allow close neighbors to buy on credit keeping a tab of everything purchased and then settling up when they feel it is appropriate. The calculating of tabs is a bit of an art form that is unique to Latin America (or at least as far as I can tell, I’ve only ever been to North and South America so my scope is limited).
This art goes something like this. The lady mentions a few things that the man owes. He nods and she punches them into the calculator and then shows him the total. He nods if he is in agreement and the number is written down. Then she goes to the next things on the list that appears to only exist in her head and his faded memory. He nods, she punches numbers on the calculator, shows him the total and writes it down. Next items, he replies with some questions, there’s some back and forth, but ultimately the items are agreed upon. Calculator, show, write. This process is continued until the tab is calculated, agreed upon and then paid.
In this particular instance, there is very little disagreement and the exchange is pretty pleasant. This is aided by the pauses he keeps throwing into the process by grabbing Coronitas out of the fridge he is standing next to and adding them to the tab. Two of these beers are handed to us as we stand waiting for the dance to terminate so we can pay. We say thanks and drink two beers standing in a Mexican market in the middle of nowhere while two people calculate their tab.
He can see we are about done with our beers and tries to hand us two more. Knowing how these things go, we push back and only accept one for the two of us. We already have two beers we are planning to buy and we both know that if we get too far into this, we won’t be making our mileage for the day. He is happy to hand us one. Several more minutes of the dance is left before they exchange money, add some stuff to the list in her head and we are able to pay. We buy our items and head back out to load them on our bikes.
One of the men under the tree has awoken partially by us leaving the store and partially by being offered another beer by our new friend who seems to be flush with money and wants to get everyone drunk. About this time, a man is walking up the hill in front of the store carrying a large load on his back. Our friend yells at him by name and asks if he wants to stop and have a beer. He stops, says no, pulls the load back up onto his back and continues trudging up the hill.
While we are loading our stuff, the man under the tree becomes quite talkative and our friend from inside returns with more beers. In the process of packing our bikes, I puncture one of the tall cans of Corona I have purchased. Not wanting to let it go to waste, I pop the top and we are committed to this scene at least until this last beer is done. We get to talking to the man under the tree. He lived in Michigan for a few years, has children there now. He pulls out his phone and finds photos for us to see.
Our buddy from inside comes out with more beers for his friends and we chat while we finish up our beer. Phone numbers are exchanged, not sure why, but we shared. Just as we are finishing up our Corona, the generous one pops out from the store once again but now he has Mezcal.
It’s time to go.
We quickly pack everything up thanking them for their hospitality and generosity.
And we start to pedal.
Mezcal
Santa Maria Zoquitlan.
Our route notes show a restaurant in this little town and that is our first objective. We have been moving pretty good all day starting high in the mountains with fog and cold only to end the day low and in the heat. We’ve had plenty of climbing and even more descending. A good hot meal is just about the perfect ticket. We left Kenny and Heather the day prior and don’t expect to see them again, but as we roll up to the house that doubles as the town eatery, their bikes are outside and they are inside eating.
We make our way inside and sit down. There’s lots of questions from both sides, but first we need a beer and some food. This particular spot does not have a menu. We kind of tell them what we would like and what we are willing to eat and they bring us food. Delicious food, perfectly cooked and to our specifications. Oh, and we snag beer out of the Coca Cola cooler sitting by the table.
Mama Bear has become a big fan of Mezcal. We first tried some in Oaxaca when we arrived, and she has been ordering and/or looking for it everywhere since. Naturally, she orders a beer and asks if they have Mezcal, they do and of course, she orders a copita.
The best way that I can describe Mezcal is that it is Mexican moonshine. Everybody makes it, has it or is selling it. Prices range from less than a dollar to $30-40 for a bottle. I’m convinced that the cheap stuff has a high chance of making you go blind, but the good stuff is worth the money. It was not uncommon to be in the middle of nowhere, pass the one house that exists for miles around and see a sign saying they were selling Mezcal, typically for pretty cheap.
The food and drinks are devoured while we exchange our different stories of how we arrived to this town that seems pretty amazing. As we are getting ready to pay, the grandpa and dad walk over to the table and the older gentleman says he would like to gift us another copita of Mezcal. We aren’t about to turn that down and he quickly finds a glass and pours us another shot. We are ecstatic and I can tell he is pretty proud so I ask if he made the Mezcal. Turns out he had and proceeds to give us the family history. His grandpa had started making Mezcal about a hundred years ago in this same spot. They still grow the agaves where he did and use the same method to process and distill the liquor. Soon most of the family is around telling us the story and we are directed to a photo on the wall of said great, great, great grandpa.
Of course, this is the best sales pitch we’ve ever heard and we ask if we can buy some to take with us. This catches him a bit off guard but he quickly says yes and asks how much we would like. A liter seemed appropriate. They hustle back to the back side of the house desperately looking for some sort of container to put this Mezcal in so we can buy it. Having nothing else on hand, they grab an unopened bottle of water. The water is dumped out and the Mezcal is poured in. We pay the man as he is beaming with pride.
The bottle is attached to KB’s downtube and we roll out.
We find a brilliant little campsite at the edge of town down by the river. Once we get our gear sorted, food laid out, coffee ready for the morning and the sun is beginning to set. The bottle of Mezcal comes out. Kenny starts playing the uke and we sit and enjoy the fading light in Santa Maria Zoquitlan.
Asi es la vida en Mexico.
Embrace Chaos. Seek Discomfort.
