Day 41

I left Mexico City Saturday after finally getting the package. I felt it was time to go as things were beginning to get a bit repetive. Saturday night I drove to Vera Cruz, a big city on the Gulf of Mexico. As I got in late in a driving rain storm, and my attempts to contact friends in Mexico City via cell phone failed, I wasn´t in particilarly good mood to enjoy the city. My shoot from the hip impression of Very Cruz is that it reminded me quite a bit of another oil town: Houston, where the people that live there if they have the money aspire to drive SUVs and enjoy their air conditioning. Similarly to Acapolco the rich history of this city as the link between Mexico and Spain is largely lost due to the climate and development.

I left Vera Cruz Sunday for Xalapa, inland of Vera Cruz at an elevation of about 4500 feet. Xalapa is the capitol of the state of Vera Cruz and has a more moderate climate and is the hub of Mexican adventure and eco tourism. After a day resting and running errands, on Tuesday I drove to the town of Perote and climbed a small mountain (4250 meters). Here are some pictures:


A beatiful flowering Bouganville plant in front on my room. For some reason there are no tourists in the town. The last two nights there have been three people staying in a hostel with over 50 beds. I like the privacy, but I miss the company of other people.


A picture from the roof of the hostel south into the valley under Xalapa. This morning a big storm blew into Vera Cruz, so it rained and was cool in Xalapa. It felt like home and I loved it, though it seems like everyone else in the city was cold and hated the weather. Because of the quantity of water blown in off the Gulf of Mexico and the huge changes of elevation, everything in the world grows in the State of Vera Cruz somewhere. In the lowlands of Vera Cruz where it is hot and tropical they grow suger cane. Near Xalapa at 5000 ft elevation it rains and is misty (sort of how I image Ireland) and there are many dairy farms. At higher elevations near Perote where I climbed a mountain, it is more arid and you see pine forests like eastern washington and oregon. There is a little bit of logging and the soil is sandy and farmers grow potatoes and onions.

I drove the motorbike to Perote and tried to drive as high as I could up a dirt road to the top of the mountain. Somewhere above 10,000 elevation my carbaretor failed me and my bike stopped running. I pushed the bike to the side of the road and chained it to a tree. Only after chaining it to a tree did I notice the grave marker withing 5´ of my bike. Weird. I have a picture of this and will upload it later. Later when I am walking down the mountain I see a family driving to the top in a VW bug. The VW bug did make it past where my motorbike stalled out (they have a better carb, or know how to rejet the engine maybe)... but the guy driving the car did make one consession to altitude. He made his whole family get out and walk behind the car, including a grandmotherly type with a cane.


On top of the mountain. Looking to the east we see rolling rain clouds and mist. Looking to the west we see desert. The demarkation between wet and dry is very stark. Cool!


Even though the mountain is in an ecological reserve that didn´t stop the local phone utility from covering the mountaintop with cell phone, TV, and satalite relay equipment. This installation has been here beaming radio signals to 5 Mexican states for 35 years.


We climb these stairs, kindly provided by the phone utility to get to the top of the mountain. If you can´t tell from the picture, it is steep.


Here is a man pouring some fresh concrete. The folks at the utility were really cool to let me run around their worksite snapping pictures.


Here is a picture of Alberto, an engineer at the top of the world. Alberto is an electrical engineer who works on site at the top of the mountain, one week off and one one week on maintaining the cell phone and satalite equipment. I told him he should move the US and become a fireman, I think they get more off time.