Alzar School News

After a last night in Mexico in the small town of Sabinas, we crossed the border at Piedras Negras/Eagle’s Pass easily and concluded our three-week expedition in Mexico. It was a little sad to cross the Rio Grande and know that we would not be seeing Mexico for at least a year.

We drove up the US side of the border to the town of Del Rio, then began heading north. Southwestern Texas seemed as remote (if not more so) than most of Mexico, and Kristin came very close to running out of gas as there was one stretch where we did not see a gas station for 117 miles. We met up with I-10 at Ft. Stockton, and stayed the night at an Econolodge for $70. We lamented the fact that hotels only cost us about $20 a night during our stay in Mexico.

The next morning, we needed to complete our drive to El Paso to pick up Dr. Chewning’s truck and the trailer. We loaded up the bikes, only to discover that Kristin’s bike would not start. We tried and tried until we wore the battery down. We tried for a while to jump the bike off the battery of the hotel clerk’s Suburban, but realized that while we wasted time trying to get the bike started, one of us could be 1/3 of the way to El Paso. Ultimately, we decided that Kristin would stay with her bike in Ft. Stockton while I went for the truck. This worked out smoothly, as we needed to pass through the town on our way to San Antonio anyway.

We felt very fortunate that the one day that we really had problems getting the bike started was the one day it really didn’t matter. I think we could’ve fiddled with the bike for a while and gotten it to go, but western I-10 did not seem like a stretch Kristin would truly regret not getting to ride.

Once we had the bikes loaded into the trailer, we set off to complete their voyage to North Carolina. Riding in the comfort of the truck seemed easy after all the hours of intense focus on the motorcycles. You didn’t need your right hand on the throttle constantly. You could adjust your sitting position without affecting the balance of the vehicle. THERE WAS MUSIC! AND BOOKS ON TAPE!

This was an incredible trip, made possible by Dr. Chewning, Rob Gould, Motodiscovery, the Boise High Key Club, and other sponsors. We have definitely fallen in love with Mexico, and look forward enthusiastically to the day that we will take students there to share its wonders.

Having finished up in Jalcomulco, we headed to Xalapa for a day to check out the nearest big city to our future basecamp. Xalapa turned out to be a confusing city to navigate, with lots of one-way streets, five-way stops, and steep hills. But, we found a hotel within walking distance of the reputable Museo de Antropologia, and went to check out the museum. It specialized in the history of the state of Veracruz during pre-Colombian times, and was well-organized. Probably the coolest items in the collection were the “Colossal Heads,” which were enormous sculptures of, you guessed it, heads.

It was also promising to find Wal-Mart, Home Depot, Officemax, Costco, Sam’s Club, etc in Xalapa. While we prefer NOT to shop at these stores and instead strive to support smaller local businesses, they can be helpful in a pinch. We also found and enjoyed a movie theater… one of our favorite pasttimes while traveling.

Trying to leave Xalapa, we ran into our first hiccup with the bikes. Kristin’s bike is notoriously cold-blooded, and doesn’t like to start up immediately in the mornings. As we worked to get it started, we wore down the battery. So, we tried to jump it using my bike, but its battery wasn´t strong enough to jump it. It took some frantic, sloppy Spanish to find someone to let us use their car to jump the bike… several people told me they “couldn’t” do it because of the computers in their cars. But, the bike fired right up once we had the jump.

After we left Xalapa, we started heading north. We made a stop to investigate “El Tajin,” an archealogical site filled with ruins of the vanished Totonac civilization. This site is famous for having the most ball courts… in this civilization, apparently winners of the ball game were ritualistically beheaded to appease rain gods. Yikes! Anyway, it was a very interesting site, well-maintained and very photogenic. We are interested to read more about the history of the Totonac.

After Tajin, we drove to Tantoyuca, getting even further than we had planned. Today, we hit the road relatively early (to be honest, our hotel last night was pretty cruddy) and made it all the way to Matehuala. Today was probably our longest day in terms of mileage, with something over 300. However, we got off the road relatively early, since we are now cruising on the cuotas (toll roads).

Back to the States all too soon…

Today we hit up the Upper and Lower Rio Actopan, about an hour from our base here in Jalcomulco. Better luck today… no broken paddles! We were also really lucky because Jim Coffey, of Esprit Rafting on the Ottawa River, lent us two boats, so we saved a little cash.

Because of the rain two days ago, the river was slightly higher than normal, and because we had read that in the first 2 km after the standard put-in there are bridges that are difficult to portage at high water, we entered the river slightly downstream. That meant we had to skip the 4 meter waterfall/dam that most people run.

But, the run was really fun. Super continuous Class II and III, with good scenery. There were a couple of fun play spots, but mostly the run was filled with cool boogey water. We did run into a lot of trees in the river, apparently from the storm the other night. Our choffer said it was due to the wind they call “El Norte.” We only had to portage once, though, and we think the run would be cleaner normally. We now our students would love the stretch.

Super tired… more later..