The Kanetsu seems to function correctly, it's just not well designed. If I press forwards I can feel the heat from the front wires. I've just been wearing the RP2, it's rain layer (which has some fleecy stuff on it), the Aerostich Kanetsu, and a smartwool t-shirt. I could grab another fleece or sweatshirt or something if i really needed it but it's Dachary who's more significantly affected because her stuff fits pretty tightly. I'm voting for a rain slicker over the whole thing and a fleecy layer underneath but we've probably made it out of the worst of it now that we're in Lousiana. We're here till Tuesday so hopefully things will have gotten back to normal temperatures by then.

__________________
-Dachary & Kay
http://www.CorporateRunaways.com

Ive been reading your trip report today and am so envious (even with the challenges) and wish you guys all the luck and a safe trip and yes you took off right when this cold front hit but looks like it will be getting warmer starting tomorrow. I assume you are going west on I-10 on in to and thru Houston and it shows to be in the 70's there tomorrow. Now for the Corporate Runaways thing that sounds great so should you be working (Dachary ?) ha ha But just have fun and enjoy

Steve

__________________
2017 KTM 1290 SD GT, 2019 KTM 300 XC, 2019 KTM 500 EXC, 2019 KTM 350 SXF, 2003 Yamaha TZ 250, 2008 MV Agusta 1000 312R, 2010 KTM RC8

Looks like your going to have a great trip.
And you'll be ready for some fun in the sun!

FYI the bead rider is installed the wrong way on the black bike. The narrow end should face forward. Not sure if it makes any difference on a bench seat like that.

Day 8 got off to another late start, as we had an email from our magazine app developer with a new build that we needed to check out. Took a while to futz around with that, and it was 10:30AM by the time we hit the road. Arrived in Baton Rouge just after noon, where we picked up my new Anakee 2 tires at Hebert Cycles.

The shop offered to mount them for us, but they were going to charge me an hour of shop service to mount them and we didn't feel like spending $88 to do something we could do ourselves. So we threw the tires on the back of the bikes and headed toward our destination - Sea Rim State Park in Texas.



Are we real adventure riders now?

Along the way, we ran into an oil refinery. Literally rode through the middle of it. I've never seen anything like it. It's a massive complex - miles and miles of strange looking towers and industrial things and tons of piping everywhere; crossing the street, running along side the street. It was insane.

Amusingly, we also ran into houses on stilts. It's the first time I've ever seen houses on stilts. It was just like something out of Dr. Seuss - I was waiting for the houses to get up and start walking around. Real life isn't that entertaining, though.

Alas, we were racing the sunset (it still gets dark so early!) and it was dark by the time we arrived. We're literally camping on the beach, though - in the sand and everything.

This was our first time riding in the sand - and Kay dropped his bike. We were trying to park and Kay pulled forward to do a loop in a less-packed dune-y section of the sand, and the bike went over. Dragged his foot back and smashed it under the pannier - between the pannier and the ground. Luckily, Kay has good boots that have malleous protectors so he just got a bit bruised. Alas, this first drop of the trip was in the dark so it was impossible to photo document. I suspect we'll have more, though. (Perhaps even in the morning as we try to get our bikes out of here.)

And, we would be remiss if we didn't include this little gem:


Muggles at Hooters

--------------
Kay:
The oil refinery was… I don't even have words for it. It was so massive. They were literally bringing workers in by the busload. It was something of a turning point for me. It really helped put the cost of using fossil fuels into perspective. All of this… this huge monstrosity of pipes and power and entire shiploads of oil just so that we can buy gas to drive around with one person in an SUV that seats seven…

Wait… there's a sea-bird, squeaking on the beach while I type. My ears are filled with the sound of ocean. I'm about to sleep on the beach for the first time in my life, and some tiny squeaky sea bird is just outside our tent. We've been brought here by these incredible machines, and yet… there are literally miles of oil refinery maybe twenty miles down the road. It's glow lights up the horizon behind us.

I feel incredibly fortunate, and a little bit guilty. I want to do this ride while we still can, before we humans have ****ed up every place out there with our litter and lack of concern, and before we run out of gas. I don't know what comes next, but I feel there's going to be a time where gas is outrageously expensive, and there will be a period of years where there simply won't be an alternative that'll allow us to take a journey like this.

We have to take this chance at adventure while we can.

__________________
-Dachary & Kay
http://www.CorporateRunaways.com

Woke up today to sunrise on the beach. We got to watch the sun come up over the Gulf of Mexico, and it was beautiful. We were camped maybe 100 feet from the water, in what seemed like it would be a glorious, picturesque paradise. Instead, we woke to find a fine spray of sea water all over everything.

The air felt moist, and yet, within minutes there was a film of salty sea spray on both bikes, the panniers, the spare tires, the dry sacks - anything we left outside. By the morning the tent fly was soaked in salt spray, and there was no chance of drying it because salt would continue to spray as we sat around trying to dry it. Somehow the water even seeped up from the sand, through the footprint, the tent floor and our foam sleeping pads to cover the bottom of our sleeping bags in a wet, slurry mess. We're at a loss to explain it.


Our first evening's camp spot



Invisible horizon


Beach Reflections



Boots

Sunrise on the beach was glorious, but not quite glorious enough to make up for sea water over everything. Our original plan had been to camp at Mustang Island State Park tonight, which is another beach, but after last night's sea water fiasco, we decided to source other camping. So today's destination became Lake Corpus Christi State Park, near Corpus Christi, TX.

The mornings riding revealed a wonderful thing. Somehow, overnight, it had become warm! Yesterday, I was still using the electrics on low on the interstate. Today, after riding for an hour to find breakfast, we packed our electrics away in the panniers. And our rain liners. We switched to summer gloves. And Kay even opened the jacket vents, which prompted me to do the same. It was glorious.

On the downside, today also dawned windy, and got more so as the day wore on. We were bent over at an angle until the very end of the day, and there was nothing we could do about it. Today was the first day I experienced the phenomena of leaning left to compensate for the wind while turning right. It really is a mind-**** to be leaning the wrong way while turning.

To negate the winds, we took a mid-afternoon stop at Buc-ee's. We'd been seeing signs for Buc-ee's for what felt like a hundred miles. They promised free jerky samples, beaver nuggets, awesome food and other extraordinary delights. Surprisingly, Buc-ee's delivered.

We were awed by the selection of jerky options. There were nearly a dozen flavors (and of course we bought some). They also had fudge, Dippin' Dots - everything a hungry traveler could want for a long car ride. The bathrooms were extraordinarily lush. In all, it really was a traveler's paradise.

The only downside of Buc-ee's was the dirty looks we kept garnering from conservatively-dressed, middle-aged, cowboy-hat-wearing Texas men. I don't know what they have against motorcyclists dressed in full gear, but Kay and I both got a plethora of dirty looks from these gents. It was quite odd. The greeter asked us if we were sky divers, and later we ran into a guy at a gas station who said we looked like "those guys who fly up in the sky… you know". Apparently they don't see a lot of people in full gear around here.

We ended the day at Lake Corpus Christi State Park. We got into the park just around dusk, and we were racing the sunlight to find a spot and set up camp. First we dodged deer and tried the wooded area. The ground was too lumpy to find a good spot for a tent. Then we tried next to the lake. The lake was too windy, and we didn't want a repeat of last night. Finally, we settled on a spot further from the lake, sheltered from the wind by some trees. It was just right.

Except for the burrs. Apparently here in Texas, they don't have normal burrs like we have up North. Here in Texas, the burrs are painful mother****ing burrs that will CUT YOU if you're not careful. And they stick to everything. (Although our motorcycle gear seems to be somewhat impervious - yay, cordura!) Availed ourselves of the lovely shower facilities, and now we and our underwear are clean. Huzzah!

We're only about 150 miles from the border, but we're thinking that tomorrow we're going to move to a state park closer to the border, and mount my new tires so we've got less to carry. We're also going to examine our luggage and hopefully prune something because Kay's bike is very top heavy - you could probably push it over its kickstand with a couple of fingers. Not exaggerating. You really could. As of now, we're planning to spend the night near the border and get up early in the AM on Friday and cross it. Mexico, here we come!

__________________
-Dachary & Kay
http://www.CorporateRunaways.com

I think the biggest rule of adventuring is that things won't go according to plan. Today was a good example of that. We took showers last night and washed our underwear, which we (being the urban sophisticates that we are) left drying on our bikes along with the towels. We we work up the entire park was in a deep fog and everything was covered with a thick layer of dew.

I (Kay) tried rearranging the tires on my bike because of how ridiculously top-heavy it is with them on it, but that ended up going nowhere.



Top-Heavy Bike

So, we packed up our tent with its wet fly-sheet, our damp towels and underwear, and set off, agreeing to stop at the first interesting place we saw for food, which turned out to be Michael and Mom's. A woman on the phone in there told the person on the other end that she was at "The Restaurant" because it literally was *the* restaurant. This was a one light town. But the food was great. Between us we had excellent home made biscuits, sausage, gravy, and delicious pancakes the size of your head. Neither of us could finish our plates, although we definitely tried.

I'm carrying around far more stickers than we need and the plan has been to drop them off at a post office, but the one we passed this morning we weren't ready for, and the ones we told the GPS to find for us either didn't exist, or had their employees out to lunch (literally).

During this search, we found ourselves on Route 666… incidentally, this plays an important part in the rest of the day.


Route 666

We made our way to some Bentsen-Rio Grande State park, and were thoroughly disheartened when we got there. It was RVs as far as the eye could see. So, with sunset on our heels we turned around to grab food at the nearest place (a Jack-In-the-box… bleh) then came back, only to find out that the entryway beside the endless RVs wasn't actually the entrance to the park even though the GPS said it was right there, and there was a sign for some butterfly place on that road. No. it was the road at that intersection that had the large "Road Closed" signs across it.

Under normal circumstances we'd have turned around and taken one of the nearby dirt roads and found some little hideaway place to stick the tent, but the Border Patrol isn't just vigilant here, they're ****ing omnipresent. Every back road we went down or passed seemed to have a Border Patrol SUV on it, and they're specifically out looking for people being a lot sneakier than we could be with a 3 person tent, so there was no way we'd be able to hideycamp without getting hassled. (Did I mention this park is just a few miles from the border? No wonder border patrol is everywhere.)

The next nearest state park was 50 miles away, and searching for "campground" would have yielded 500 RV parks and probably no tent campgrounds. It was time for an alternate plan.

But, I've left out one important detail. Not long after our failed Post Office hunt Dachary had me pull over to tweak my tires. (On the infamous Route 666, I must point out.) After tweaking I got back on the bike and realized I didn't have my gloves, so I leaned the bike over onto the kickstand only to discover that I'd already lifted the kick stand, and down it went.

"Hmm." I thought. "It's not all the way down since it's leaning on that little hill. I can probably lift it myself without issue." At which point I proceeded to lift with my back, and not with my knees. I got it up, but the right sight of my back paid a pretty hefty price. It hurt a bit initially, but it wasn't too bad, and there wasn't much I could do anyway, so off we rode and I mostly forgot about it until we got to the Jack-In-The-Box. When I got off the bike there I started walking around tilted to the right like I had scoliosis and in a bunch of pain. Apparently the only position that doesn't hurt my back, besides laying down, is hunched over like I'm riding a motorcycle.

And that, plus the Road Closed sign, and the sun that had already set, is how we find ourself in a Quality Inn tonight. Dachary's threatening to stay another day if my back is still hurting but I really want to get out of this city. The room is nice but it's another $50+ a night and McAllen Texas just depresses me. I hate this massive urban sprawl.


Unloading in Style by CorporateRunaways, on Flickr

(Dachary's Note: What Kay doesn't mention is that he's seriously in a lot of pain. Every little thing, from rolling over to sneezing, elicits an "ouch." Short of a miraculous recovery overnight, I don't even see how he'll get out of bed tomorrow - let alone ride. Add to that the stress of our first border crossing, and having a top-heavy bike since we didn't get to mount my new tires tonight - and I'm leaning toward it probably not happening. But we'll see in the AM.)

__________________
-Dachary & Kay
http://www.CorporateRunaways.com

Enjoying this read!
Keep the updates coming!
Send me a sticker and i'll advertise for you guys

Where are you guys now ? Looking forward to your progress reports !

Steve

__________________
2017 KTM 1290 SD GT, 2019 KTM 300 XC, 2019 KTM 500 EXC, 2019 KTM 350 SXF, 2003 Yamaha TZ 250, 2008 MV Agusta 1000 312R, 2010 KTM RC8

I haven't been on a long trip yet although I am hoping to some time in the future. I just wanted to say I'm really enjoying your journal. Have a safe and happy time.

Get some robaxacet patinum. It will help some.
Bill

pannier_fail by CorporateRunaways, on Flickr

The riding was slow up until 2-3PM, when we finally got into Ixmiquilipan. Today's destination was going to be an archaeological site at Tula whose name I keep forgetting. It's supposed to have these large head-totem things that are quite impressive. (Can you tell that Kay researched these spots for us? I have no idea what we're going to see, but there are signs for it!) Unfortunately, because of the slow riding, we didn't get to this site at Tula until 4:56PM. There was still plenty of sunlight, but the place was closing and the guy wouldn't let us in. So we turned around and headed into Tula in search of a hotel.

Unfortunately, we've gotten into really populated areas near Mexico City. It wouldn't have been possible for us to hidey-camp today, so we were stuck in yet another motel. And contrary to what people keep telling us about hotels being cheaper the farther you go, we paid the most we've paid for a hotel yet - $450 MEX, or around $40 US. The parking for our bikes is quite secure - we're inside a courtyard, and they've let us pull the bikes up right into the open-air hall in front of our room - behind a wall and not even visible from the courtyard parking lot.



bikes_in_front_of_room by CorporateRunaways, on Flickr

Unfortunately, at this price, I'm not a fan of this hotel. There may be wi-fi, but the signal is so weak we can't use it. (Plus, it's password-protected and they didn't give us the password.) The room has a slightly run-down quality, the bathroom is tiny (you can't even open the door all the way because it bangs into the counter) and the beds are uncomfortable. Someone was either watching TV quite loudly until around 1:30AM, or carrying on a loud conversation, because it kept waking me up and around 1:30 I decided to give up on sleeping and get up. There's a smell like rotten eggs coming from the bathroom, and every time someone flushes, we hear it in our plumbing. This is the most we've paid for a hotel, and it's the least nice hotel we've stayed at. (It's still not dirty and seems to be more-or-less bug-free, so it could be a lot worse… but for $450 pesos, I've come to expect more.)

We walked down the street to where we'd passed a movie theater with the thought of grabbing a bite to eat and seeing a movie. Kay thinks it would be a novel experience to catch a movie in a foreign country. We were surprised to see that most of the titles were American. The price for general admission was just over $4 US ($49 pesos) and a 3D movie was around $6.50 US ($79 pesos).

Unfortunately, by the time we got around to checking out the movies, we were both getting tired - and were worried about the state of our colons because we'd drunk fountain soda from a nearby Burger King. (Yes, we ate dinner at a Burger King. Because it was late in the day, it was one of the few things still open. The BK menu was almost exclusively in English, and with the exception of the hamburger meat tasting different, it was almost exactly the same as eating BK in the US.) Having drunk the fountain soda, it occurred to us to wonder if the soda machines were hooked up to a local water supply or how they mixed their soda. If it was local water, we wanted to be near the comfort of the toilet in our hotel room just in case it had negative effects. Luckily, so far so good.

We're planning to still see the archaeological site in the morning, but sadly we've got to head into Mexico City after that. We made an unfortunate discovery today - Kay's fork seals seem to be going. The left fork is weeping fork oil, and as much as we'd prefer to avoid driving in Mexico City, we'd rather get it taken care of at a BMW dealer than wait until we get further south and hope the seals don't give way completely. We'll also try to get the oil changed in both bikes there, and pick up a new rear tube for the bikes since we used one of our spares on mine. Hopefully the BMW dealer can get us in and out fairly quickly, but I'm still expecting we'll have to spend at least another night in a hotel either in Mexico City proper, or just outside of the city. I don't think we'll get very far today.

__________________
-Dachary & Kay
http://www.CorporateRunaways.com

(sorry this one is out of order)


We got on the road today at around 10AM. Took time out this morning to do a Pimsleur Spanish before we left, and we hope to do another one tonight. We're putting ourselves on a two-a-day schedule in an effort to become a bit more proficient. We do seem to be doing fine on the extremely rudimentary Spanish we have, though - we've been able to buy things and book hotels and ask for directions. We just can't carry on a conversation.

Riding today out of Ciudad Valles toward Xilitla was much nicer than the riding we've been doing. We were riding along lush roadways with nice plantations and ranches - not the soulless, corporate mega-farms we'd seen closer to the border. You still get a sense that most of the people in this part of Mexico are poor, too, but they seem to have more pride. Things seem better cared-for. Many of the buildings are brightly painted or cleaner than the ones we'd seen in the past couple of days. Everything here seems a bit more human.

Today we saw Las Pozas De James - the place that Edward James had built. It was really surreal (although not in the way people have apparently compared it with surrealist art, which was in many of the descriptions that Kay read for the place.) It was these massive, oddly-shaped stone structures integrated with the jungle. Jungle grew in some of the structures. In other areas, the structures took advantage of the natural landscape, incorporating waterfalls and pools of water.


las_pozas_1 by CorporateRunaways, on Flickr

We bought a map for $25 MEX (a little over $2 US) but it didn't help much - we kept getting lost amidst the criss-crossing staircases and multiple, unclear pathways between parts of the place. It was really interesting and definitely worth exploring, in spite of the fact that many parts of it triggered my fear of heights and I wasn't able to enjoy it as much as I think I would have otherwise.



las_pozas_8 by CorporateRunaways, on Flickr



las_pozas_5 by CorporateRunaways, on Flickr

Las Pozas also highlighted the fact that many of the things we've seen here simply wouldn't be accepted in the United States. At Las Pozas, for example, there are tons of staircases with no railings, high platforms with no rails or protection to prevent people from falling, and even a tricky waterfall crossing on a ledge approximately 18 inches wide, with a pool of water on the right and a sheer fall down a cliff on the left. The fact that Las Pozas can exist in its natural state is a testament to the fact that in Mexico, a lot more things are acceptable. In some ways, this is refreshing from the liability-aware, ever-fearful-of-a-lawsuit United States.

The riding to and from Xilitla was also amazing. We took route 85 south from Ciudad Valles, toward route 120 to Xilitla. It was only 14 kilometers on 120, but it was mountainous, twisty and beautiful. In the end, we went back down 120 to hook up with 85 again, thinking it would be faster to get south toward our next waypoint. Unfortunately, 85 through here also goes through mountains and around these amazing twisties, so we only managed to cover 109 miles in the roughly 4 hours of riding we did today.

Around 5PM, the sun was setting (as it does early in the mountains) and we had no hope of getting to the next town along our map, which was 175 kilometers. We just happened into Chapulhuecan. We knew we had no chance of hidey-camping tonight, because the road was sheer cliff on one side and sheer drop-off on the other. No place to pitch a tent, and not even any side-roads to go down to try to find a place to camp. Luckily, Chapulhuecan had a hotel, and we wisely decided not to try to go any further. Otherwise, we'd probably still be puttering along in the dark.

Today's hotel appears to be a family-run establishment - i.e. it's a very large house that this family has turned into a hotel. There's a common area with a television where they sit and watch the news after dinner, and the wife clearly does most of the running of the place. The rooms have a feminine touch, with cute rugs and curtains that aren't the typical nondescript curtains you find in a large, impersonal hotel.

There was a minor snafu with our booking process - Kay went in to get us a room and apparently at one point, the woman asked "Two hombres? In one bed?" Kay wasn't thinking and said yes, that would be fine - and then realized when he came out that they probably thought we were both guys. He asked me to say hi when we went in, so she'd know I was a woman, so I did one better and unzipped my jacket - I was wearing a girly shirt with a floral print and a feminine cut today.

When I went inside with my stuff and greeted the woman, she smiled warmly, and then asked if we wanted a bigger room. We declined because we already had most of our stuff in the room she'd originally given us. Kay and I think she gave us a bit of a crappy room because she thought we were two guys sharing a bed - we'll be more careful about this perception in the future.

Kay asked about secure parking for the bikes, and they told us to wheel the bikes right up onto the front porch. They were literally in front of the doors to the hotel, under the covered porch/sitting area. We locked the tires between the bikes and locked the bikes together, and anyone who wanted to make off with them would have had a hard time.

After unloading our stuff, we went out in search of food. We've found that in most of these small towns (and even the bigger ones like Ciudad Valles where we stayed last night) restaurants tend to close early. A pizza joint where we ate last night closed at 8PM - unheard of in the U.S. It was after 6PM when we went searching for food, and we walked up and down the town and finally settled on the only place that seemed open - a literal hole in the wall with signs for hamburguesas.

When we walked up, there was a woman and her two daughters sitting around a table that protruded out into the sidewalk. We asked about hamburguesas, and they shot into action - turning on lights and firing up a grill. While we were standing there, we saw a sign for types of hamburguesas and prices on the wall, and saw a sign for a "doble hamburguesa" that was only $3 MEX more than the regular one. We asked to amend our orders to that, not sure what we'd get, and we ended up with these delicious hamburgers with lettuce, onion, cheese, thin-sliced and fried ham (think Canadian Bacon), jalapenos and some sort of mayo. They were DELICIOUS. Two of these beauties for $46 MEX, or just under $4 US. It was a good note to end the night.

Today's lesson: don't think you can get very far in the mountains, because you can't. Geez. 40KPH all day long and that was the right speed, based on the roads and curves. Not much forward motion, but a beautiful day on the bikes.

__________________
-Dachary & Kay
http://www.CorporateRunaways.com

Kay here...
We got out of our room and around the corner to Atlantes de Tula shortly after it opened, which turned out to be perfect because the three shanty towns of vendors along the one kilometer path from the entrance to the actual pyramids were not yet staffed.



atlantes_de_tula_dudes

We learned a few things during this visit:
1) it doesn't matter if it's only 55 deg F out. Don't bring your riding jacket. They may throw in a 1k hike in a rising sun just for the hell of it.
2) My hat was made by idiots. It's waterproof and *freaking hot*. If my head was cold i'd put on a cold weather hat. I plan on taking my leatherman to the lining.
3) Mexicans have an odd way of preserving archeological finds that seems to frequently involve adding concrete.
4) Atlantes de Tula is absolutely not worth the drive. If you're nearby it's not bad. The museum had hardly anything in it and hardly any of that was actually *from* the site.


jacket_pack

We put our headsets back on our helmets when we went to leave, only to have the tab on Dachary's break off on the baseplate. The Sena SMH-10 has a tab at the bottom, and a clip type thing at the top. Put in the tap, pivot, and snap at the top. The tab at the bottom keeps the pins on the headset module against the connection plates on the baseplate. Without the tab there's nothing to keep the connection. We got it kinda-sorta working with duct tape, but by the end of the day that had completely failed and Dachary could only hear me, or talk, if she held it just so, which was, of course, not possible when dealing with the stop-and-go traffic that we encountered on our way to Motohaus BMW in Mexico City. She could only get it to work when she literally held it against her helmet, which she couldn't do when she was using the clutch - an almost constant thing during our 5-hour drive.



taped_sena


Having intended to totally avoid Mexico City, we had no detailed maps of it either in the GPS or on paper. The SmellyBiker GPS maps we're running under didn't have the details. (There may be a more detailed version that has the details, but we didn't have it loaded.) So, we took the only road the map had which took us through the center of Mexico City which, unsurprisingly, took forever. It's like driving through Manhattan during rush hour, only slower.

I'm still pretty impressed with Mexican drivers, although Dachary was a bit unnerved by the cars squeezing into nonexistent lanes. Dachary's thermometer on her dash read 115 F and mine on my handlebars read 35.6 C. Both were probably getting some heat from the engine but you could definitely see heat waves rising above the cars ahead of us and the exhaust fumes from all those stationary cars were pretty intense without any breeze.

But, eventually we made our way, after Dachary nearly wet herself trying to hold all the water from the CamelBak she'd drunk during traffic while we tried to find somewhere with a bathroom. And, of course, there were multiple stops to ask policemen, and pizza delivery men where the address was…

We had kept going without stop for anything but gas and bathroom since we left Tula, and it was a huge relief to finally spot the BMW rondel on the side of the road. We pulled up to the large metal gates at about 4:30pm and thought, "oh shit. They're closed." , but they looked out and saw a couple of BMW bikes pulled up out front and, like magic, the gates parted and we were ushered into the land of Awesome.

"Habla Inglais?"
"Sure"
*Jaws drop*

We were in a bay with probably 30 BMW bikes, ten of which seemed to be black F650GSs like Dachary's and Robert and Eduardo proceeded to absolutely take care of us. They didn't have the fork seals in stock, but they'd get them tomorrow (Wednesday), and while they had a bay full of bikes needing service, they'd still fix my fork seals, and get us out of there at some point mid-day Thursday. Oh, you need a hotel? We'll find you one. How much are you looking to pay? Here, let us take you and all your stuff there. No no, you don't need to take a taxi. Oh, and those headsets you were asking about? Here's a hand-drawn map to the guy downtown who distributes Cardo headsets for Mexico.

Note regarding BMWs: yes, they cost more than some cheaper bikes. And yes, BMW service by an actual BMW service shop is almost always more expensive than you could get by going to a perfectly competent, non-affiliated mechanic. But with BMW rondel comes a level of service that you don't get elsewhere. The guys at Motohaus BMW were more than just willing to take care of us, they were practically compelled to do so. They offered us water while we waited. They looked up hotels for us and drove us to one that some of their regular visitors use when they come. The hand-drawn map to the Cardo dealer was phenomenal, as BMW offers a bike-to-bike communication system but he said "it's expensive" and was willing to recommend this other guy. They're making room for us in their workload and I have no doubt that they wouldn't have hesitated to help us with anything else. (In fact, Robert told us to let him know if there's anything else we need while we're in Mexico City and he'll help us figure it out, etc.) So yes, our bikes weren't dirt cheap (although we both got good deals on buying them used, although Kay's "good deal" is turning out to be less and less good) but what comes along with the BMW brand has value that people often don't consider with the cost.

The Hotel was $400 pesos a night and is totally swank. We're so outclassed by it. Sadly, the neighborhood has very little to offer, but we found a cart with stools and wonderful Hamburgesas with cheese, ham, mayo, and pineapple. We we given a little plate of Piquante (sliced Jalapeno with seeds) to add as we desired. We also ordered a Tortas which came on toasted bread with eggs, tomato, mayo and chorizo. It was also delicious, but we could barely finish one, and got the second to go for later. We got four meals for $130 pesos (about $10 US). We were grinning ear-to-ear the entire meal.

As an aside we have no clue where we are and there's no way we'll be able to find our way back to the Motohaus without a Taxi (not that we could carry all our crap anyway). Also, we're pretty sure that the Cardo seller is too far to walk in this heat without having a clue where we are. We may attempt to walk back to our hotel afterwards, or we may take a taxi. Honestly we're not sure what it'll cost.

Which brings me to the headsets. In the US they're about $300 for a pair, we think, and while we really don't want to spend the money, like Dachary's boots. We consider the headsets a necessity. Being able to talk to each other as we ride radically alters the journey. Without them you're riding in solitude with your thoughts all day, and then comparing notes at the end.

With them, It's saying "Are those cows on that incredibly steep hill above us?! How do they lay down without rolling off?" or "Oh my God. Look to the right!" It's riding in silence for twenty minutes and then saying "I love you" because you're thinking of how grateful you are to be on the road with them. It's saying "I've got to pee….NO. I've got to pee NOW." or "I'm getting hungry, how about we stop at the next place that looks decent?" or "There it is! The thing we've been driving all day trying to find! You just passed it! Turn around!"

I realize that friends and lovers have been doing journeys like this since before Dachary or I were born without headsets, but it doesn't change the fact that having them adds another dimension to the trip. It makes it much more of a shared experience, and while we'd probably continue without them it wouldn't be nearly as enjoyable.


Gear Notes:
* BMW Rallye Pro 2 Jacket held up spectacularly in the heat. Yes, it was hot. Yes I was sweating. I would have been even in a 100% mesh suit. But, I didn't feel like i was going to keel over from heat stroke. Drinking regularly helped.
* Sena SMH-10 is officially getting a "Won't recommend" from us. We love the usability and the sound quality, but we have gone through 3 bases and now broken a main module. For days we've been putting them on and then running though a sound check… Yes i can hear you. No you can't hear me. Pull down on the module because the pins barely line up with their connector plates.
* BMW F650GSs held up great in ****ing hot stop and go traffic for over five hours. Our temperature warnings never came on.

__________________
-Dachary & Kay
http://www.CorporateRunaways.com

Dachary tried it in both positions and reversed worked best for her. But that reminds me. It's started to fall apart at one point and we need to attack it with zip ties to prevent it from unraveling further.

__________________
-Dachary & Kay
http://www.CorporateRunaways.com

I don't want to sidetrack this thread with headset comparisons and discussions, but, as we've mentioned. The Sena SMH-10 has totally failed us, and we've just gone off to purchase a pair of Cardo Scala Rider G4s (at an inflated price here in Mexico City). Fixing the Sena's last failure wasn't a real option, and we can't stand the lack of reliability we've experienced.

We've got the full details on the failures (plural) and our thoughts here in our blog and anyone pondering getting the Sena SMH-10 should definitely read it.

ALSO...

for those wondering where we are we've got a spot tracker and I've added it to our sig block.

Today we've been wandering around Mexico City by foot and Taxi so I haven't had it on, but tomorrow, hopefully...

__________________
-Dachary & Kay
http://www.CorporateRunaways.com