After Parque Mirador it was off to Tlaquepaque, which is sort of a suburb of Guad. It's raison d'etre today is centered on it's creative talents and has converted many old 19 century country homes into stylish restos and galleries.

When Alberto and I got "home" from Tlaquepaque, Alberto shared his photo album with me. Alberto "works" as a member of Team Honda where he races Honda CBR 600's on paved race tracks at the NATIONAL level where he ranks in the top half. He tells me they reach speeds of over 200 kph on the track. He also competes in the race circuit in Europe....WOW. (Alberto, send me a link for your web site so I can post it.)

The next day, Monday the 5th, I just vegged out, and in the evening we all, (Alberto, when he wasn't checking the world race results on the internet, Yolanda, his mom, and Yolanda, his sister) sat back and chatted.

The next morning I reluctantly said goodby to this beautiful family, but not before a photo session in front of their house.

Then it was off NE to the AMAZING village of Guanajauto (pop 73,000 , elev 6,500 ft.) , where I arrived yesterday in the afternoon. This place is truly special and beautiful and have never quite seen anything like it before...Thanks for the recommendation Yolanda (Alberto's sister). I will describe Guanajauto in the next entry after I've had more of chance to explore.

I digress to what the weather has been like since I left Montreal 37 days ago. It was coolish untill North Carolina, where it became hot (30's) with an hour of rain in the late pm, usually after I got off the bike for the day, but not without the occasional downpour in the mid afternoon.

Contrary to what I thought, MOST of Mexico is made up of the Sierra Madre mountain chain that runs down from Texas to Guatemala, and the weather - temperature - varies directly with the altitude (10 - 60 minutes of rain after dark).

When you are near the coast - LOW altitudes - it's hot and dessert like - upper 30's to mid 40's - and once you leave the coast and head 50 - 100 kms inland you begin to climb, and the temperature drops to the mid 20's to the low 30's.

Now more on the roads...

Once you reach the Seirra Madres the roads also become very narrow and VERY windy with steep hills and many switchbacks with drop offs of 1,000's of feet. Here the heavy semis CRAWL up the winding steep hills resulting in an accumulation of much traffic behind them, and then go barreling down the other side. Everyone passes when they can - double lines mean NOTHING - not even the ubiquitous "Curva Pelligroso" (Dangerous curve) signs make a difference. When you reach any sharp curve, the guardrail, if there was one, is usually totally mangled. This up and down repeats itself at least a few times every kilometer. When you reach the rare straightaway it becomes a REAL game of "chicken"....ALL traffic in both directions pull out to pass (remember these are 2 lane roads). Fortunately with the power my bike has I can usually pick off 3 or 4 trucks before being forced back in by either on coming passers or a Curva Peligrossa...and this goes on all day. Ocaisonally though it's interupted by some plateaus with the gently rolling hills of the agricultural regions.

All drivers in Mexico have one driving trait that takes a while to get used too, and that's how they use their direction signals...the right one is normal, but the left has 2 uses....it can either mean he is turning left, OR it means he is NOT turning left but it's OK for YOU to pass. So when you see a left flasher, you must first check if there are any turnoffs. If there is none, you know you can pass. If this happens on a curve where people pass all the time, you just take your chances. All in all, it's quite exciting.