A Travel Story by Bruce Porter
Another cultural interlude (to balance out the previous shooting session) - Bruce was dragged into the modern art museum in Charlotte, North Carolina.
And not the weather kind.
With our drift south we noticed a lot of motorbikes, all going the same way, So we did the natural thing and followed them.
We ended up at Panama City Beach, Florida, bike week.
http://www.thunderbeachproductions.com/Sun, sea, sand, beer, bikes. music. I keep needing reminding that it is October as I sip a beer in the evening dressed in Tshirt and shorts in about 22C.
Its not as big as Sturgis, where we went in 2007, but bikes are in the 10-20,000 range and the whole town ihas been taken over.
Meaher State Park, by Spanish Fort, Alabama.
Is it a log? No its a 10 foot alligator skulking in the lagoon 200m from our tent. I slept with my feet facing the lagoon.
They call the ... yadda yadda yadda, been there seen that.
I drove my chevy to the levy ..... etc etc etc, actually camped by it.
The man who said he would look at my bike, did, it was one look, followed by "What sort of bike is that ? I thought it would be a Harley, I'm not going to start looking at that."
He then sent us to the Harley dealer, saying they worked on all sorts of bikes. The Harley dealer took one look at the bike and said, "Its a metric, we don't work on metrics".
Now, Jean and I were stood there thinking the same thing, "does electricity work in different units in the US?"
We are back on the road. Final diagnosis was a fault in the electronic dash, so the high beam switch has been taken out of the equation and a hardwire by pass put in.
If this bike gets home, it will be fun getting it through an MOT.
To finish off an expensive day, I had a haircut.We headed out for Texas over swamp and marshes, where they have adapted houses for the tropical storms and hurricanes.
From bleak oil terminals, to verdant (and warm) country side.
You would not see British crops left out in the field so late in the year.
Following our long 300 mile day into Texas, and not stopping in Abbeville which was having its annual party, we did the only sensible thing we could. We ran back to Louisiana, a very short 75 mile, 1 diner, ride to the State Park near Lake Charles. A proper camp site in a swamp
Garden around trailer house in Sabine, Texas
They're not happy with BP here.
As so many T shirts shout out in San Antonio.
And, they are right, its something like 2000 miles across.We have all seen the film, heard the stories , so I wanted to see the real thing.
The Alamo.
This is the only remaining building from the events in 1836 that led to the formation of the Republic of Texas.
I'm not sure which wall it was that Ozzy was arrested for "dis-respecting" this national monument, but he could have used the restrooms round the back.
Big Bend NP
At least we were heading south, even if it was away from the border. Although, while there we camped by the Rio Grande, which is the border.
USA to the right, Mexico to the left.
Back in 2002, the local soft borders were closed, Mexicans still try and cross to sell souvenirs, if caught they risk a large fine.
After all the tales of hassle at the borders, armed patrols on the roads and watching for bandits as we travelled through the USA, it was a very uneventful crossing.
We bimbled up to the border around 8:30, had the sense to stop despite being waved through, park the bikes, walk over to the USA customs and hand in our white visa cards. I can see why so many people fail to as the USA guards are not interested in south bound traffic at all.
Some notes on driving in Mexico.
Petrol :- The oil and petrol business is state owned, there is one brand of fuel, Pemex. The price is the same every where in the country, even on the toll roads. Octane is variable, they all have 87 which the the equivalent of our old 2 star and then there is 91 which is the same as the UK unleaded and sometimes 92 or 93.
Or Mexico D.F (District Federal) as it is known, or just Mexico. It does not seem right following signs for Mexico while in Mexico.
The Mexican motorway service areas are a little different from ours, a line of restaurants appear with ladies waving brightly coloured flags to attract our attention.
We had some nice Chorizo Verde tacos, everything in it was green, including the taco.
Jean does not think I should mention we had green poo the next day.
Garry led us out of the city, dropping south to avoid the ring road and a scenic detour to view the volcanoes, then as he had to go to work he pointed us in the direction we needed to go and with a wave merged with the traffic and faded into the distance.
For the 1st time in two weeks we were on our own again. Our general direction was towards the Yucatan Peninsula.
On the way we had the worlds worst traffic jam, caused by someone selling lottery tickets at a tope, aided by a statue of Jesus.
8 weeks of being dry, and then we finally got tropical weather.
As we entered Chetumal, on the Mexico / Belize border, looking for a Couchsurfer's house, the clouds let rip, big style. Within minutes the roads were flooded and we were ankle deep in water (that is, ankle deep while on the bikes). It went dark, and the rain so "thick" we could hardly see,
We quickly found shelter in a tyre fitting bay.We just pulled in, got off the bikes, smiled at the staff and stood there dripping.
