Riding with Dinosaurs - Saltillo, Mexico

[andyc740]

Just back from another Mexico bike rally trip, this one to Saltillo. The trip was a nice ride, except for the getting wet part. We spit on rain!! I'm starting the ride report process and hope to have it going up soon.

Dinosaurs does not refer to the people along on the ride, mostly because I'm about the oldest in the group.

 

[andyc740]

Part I - Heading Out

Ride Soundtrack: "When I was a Dinosaur" Trout Fishing in America

Our latest foray into Mexico began at this year’s Motohermandad Rally in Tampico, where we met Javier, a member of the Dinosaurios Motorcycle Club. Javier invited us to their inaugural rally in Saltillo July 23rd through 25th. The timing was good, about two months after the Tampico trip and Lefty’s and my first ride into Mexico included Saltillo, a nice city in the mountains above Monterrey. Though the ride there would probably be warm, temperatures in Saltillo should be comfortable. As usual, I have the pictures posted on Picasa.

I had a hard time sleeping the night before, I’m always wound up about these bike trips, so I was awake at 4:00, up at 5:00 and eating breakfast taquitos at the gas station at 6:30 waiting for Lefty and Rick to show up. We left Corpus at 7:00 Friday morning, then stopped in Falfurrias to add José to the group.

José, otherwise known as Shooter, is a Gypsy who lives near Alice, straight up 281. He and a friend, Buitre, also did the Moto Fronterizo rally in November and he wanted to see more of Mexico. Though he lived in Tiajuana several years, speaks Spanish, and has been across the border more than a few times, he had never been into the interior. Saltillo isn’t very far into the interior, only about 40 miles west of Monterrey, but it’s a good start.

Because of safety concerns, we skipped the shortest route, which is crossing the border at Roma then taking the highway from Ciudad Aleman to Monterrey, instead crossing at our usual crossing point at the Pharr - Rio Bravo International Bridge, then taking the highway from Reynosa to Monterrey, opting for the libre for most of the ride. I’ve heard stories about people getting stopped and robbed on the Miguel Aleman-Monterrey road and didn’t want to take the risk.

Our route was 165 miles from Corpus Christi to the border, and another 210 or so from the border to Saltillo, for a total of 375 miles each way. Major highways in Mexico come in two flavors, libre (free) or cuota (the toll-roads). They parallel each other, the libre being the original highway, the cuota being the new 4-lane divided highway built later. The cuota between Reynosa and Monterrey looks pretty much like I-35 in South Texas, but the tolls come to more than $20 each. I decided to economize a bit and take the libre as far as Cadereyta, the refinery town on the east side of Monterrey, and then pick up the cuota to get around Monterrey.

We had green lights all the way through Pharr from 83 to the bridge, which was pretty nice for a change. The Rio Grande, or Rio Bravo as it’s known in Mexico, was up quite a bit, flooding the fields along the river. We crossed the border without any problems, stopping to get papers for José and his bike and were on our way about 11:00. Leaving Reynosa, we ran into rain at the Aduana checkpoint and broke out the raingear.

The ride to Monterrey was wet off and on. The Reynosa end of the libre was potholed with a 2-mile stretch under construction, but traffic was light and we made it through without incident, stopping for gas at China. Past the construction, the road was in great shape and traffic stayed pretty light.

Monterrey received about 30 inches of rain during the first part of July due to Hurricane Alex and the tropical depression that came through a week later. The Rio Santa Caterina that flows through downtown Monterrey flooded and took out bridges and roads that ran alongside the river, playing havoc with traffic in downtown Monterrey. Andrés, a fellow we met at the Tampico rally who lives in Monterrey, offered to meet us coming into town and escort us across town to Saltillo.

In China, I bought a phone card to call Andrés, but neither of the pay phones at the station were working, so I tried my cell. His mobile number said I had a wrong number and I only got the answering machine at the house, so we pressed on. We skipped lunch due to being behind schedule because of the rain. José complained a bit and I found out that evening that he’s diabetic and needs to eat frequently.

 

[andyc740]

Part II - Cadereyta to Saltillo

We picked up the cuota at Cadereyta, came through the first toll booth and found Andrés waiting for us. He’d been there about half an hour and said traffic was fouled up enough it took him about 2 hours to get there. After a round of abrazos and handshakes, we fell in line behind him and followed along as he roared around Monterrey on the periferica at 80 to 85 mph, his Vulcan 1500 setting the pace. Tolls around Monterrey came to over $20 apiece, but we made it around town quickly then hit the libre to Saltillo. We were looking for a gas station, having come 100 miles from China and José’s VTX 1300 having the most limited range of the group. There’s no gas stations until about 10 miles from Saltillo, where one is located between the two lanes of the divided highway. The pavement was sloped enough, it made filling the bikes at the pump a bit tricky. My odometer read 200 miles from the gas stop just before we entered Mexico.

Monterrey is Mexico’s third-largest city, behind Mexico City and Guadalajara, second-largest in area and is home to a major amount of industry. Population of the metropolitan area is 3.7 million people according to Wikipedia. Elevation is about 1500 ft. From Monterrey, the road climbs through a narrow canyon up to Saltillo, about 5000 ft. elevation. The mountains around Monterrey block much of the Gulf weather from reaching town, so it’s quite a bit cooler and drier than Monterrey. It’s metropolitan population is about 750,000, has quite a bit of industry and is rated as one of the best towns to live in in Mexico. The weekend we were there, it was celebrating it’s 433rd birthday. It’s been around a while.

We had reservations at the City Express located on the periferico near the rally site, found it easily and checked in. We had 4 people, 2 rooms, 2 nights, 700 pesos per room per night, so the math should have been pretty easy, but I was tired and my math skills had checked out quite a while earlier. It looked like a high-stakes craps game with bills piled all over the counter, trying to make change for the other guys, eventually working things out.

The first day out on these bike trips, I always wonder if I changed enough money. By the time we buy gas, food on the way, pay tolls and pay the hotel, pay the rally registration fee, it’s taken a big chunk out of the wallet, then the next day at the event is a lot cheaper and I usually find I have some left over when I get back to the border and change my leftover pesos back into dollars. This trip, I changed $220 dollars at the border and I think I got back $26 from the leftover pesos when we came back.

 

[andyc740]

Part III - Downtown Bike Parade

After checking in, we took about half an hour to get cleaned up, then headed for the rally. Going back down the highway, we heard sirens, then passed the bike parade from the rally, headed for downtown, so we did a U-turn at a light and joined the parade. They had a police escort leading the parade and cross streets were blocked by police at intersections and traffic lights, so we weren’t stopping. People were taking pictures with their cell-phones as we rode past and we were honking and waving.

We wound through the center of town, past the government buildings, then climbed through some older neighborhoods and stopped in front of a church for group photos.

Andrés was taking pictures and Rick was hawking bibles. As usual, we brought several cases of Spanish biker New Testaments with us to give away. Mexicans are happy to receive them, once they find out we’re not asking them to buy them from us. Once in a while, someone turns us down, but not very often.

The Dinosaurios lined up at the top of the stairs for the photos. Javier, the fellow facing our way, is the one who invited us to their rally. It was good to see him again.

The priest came out and splashed Holy Water over the crowd, then we mounted up and headed on our way, leaving some footprints in the fresh cement at the bottom of the steps.

Our route took us into the neighborhoods on the foothills around town, giving us some great views of Saltillo. Dropping back down into town, we rode on to the rally site, a big parking lot at a movie theater that had closed.

 

[andyc740]

Part IV - Checking In at the Rally

Registration cost for the rally had a new wrinkle, one I thought worked pretty well; entrance and a wristband cost P$25, about $2 and entitled you to lunch on Saturday, if you went on the ride. If you wanted the rally T-shirt and pin, that was another P$250, about $20. That made it easy for people to get in if they just wanted to attend the rally, but the total cost was a bit more than usual if you wanted the shirt. Works for me. I got the shirt.

We checked in, parked, then started strolling around the site to see who was there. One of the first things that caught my eye was a shiny chrome Islo. You can see my post on Motohermandad 2010 for more about Islo’s. What’s really cool is that the bikes were built in Saltillo from parts sourced in Italy.

The fellow with the chrome Islo even has a matching helmet. He was with the Aguilas Solitarias (Lonesome Eagles) and one of four brothers at the rally. They told us they were all going bald together and took their hats off to show us. Rick took his off to show them he was a brother, too.

They seemed like a bunch of fun guys. I also ran across a fellow climbing off his BSA. I saw the bike on the ride through town, but didn’t get a chance to get a look at it. His daughter was on a hard-tail chopper sporting what was probably a Honda Rebel 250 engine. He said she was 14 and had been riding for 8 years.

I like the collection of Triumphs parked next to them, but then I’m biased.

This Aprilia scooter was interesting. I hadn’t seen one like it before.

And a shot of our bikes at the rally (from the right #1, 3, 4, and 5. Andrés' Vulcan isn't in the picture).

We wrapped up the afternoon at the rally and went to a restaurant Andrés likes on the main drag through town, Los Cántaros. While we were eating, Lety, a friend of Andrés showed up and had dinner with us. Leaving, I got a shot of the university building across the street. I’m a sucker for ornate architecture. And we headed for the hotel.

 

[andyc740]

Part V - Saturday Morning Bikewash

After breakfast at the hotel, I ventured outside and found Lefty, Rick and José working on cleaning their bikes and decided Rocinante could use a wash, too. I usually clean her up twice a year, whether she needs it or not.

While we were working on that, a family came by on their way out, asked if their boys could sit on the bikes and spent a while talking with us. Mexicans are usually much more open about talking to strangers than most people are in the US.

Andrés worked on washing his bike, too.

Since Saturday mornings are usually slow at rallies, Andrés and Lety suggested going to the Museo del Desierto (Museum of the Desert) instead. Sounded like a good idea to us, so we headed out about 10:00. The museum is located in La Parque Maravillas on the southeast side of town with a great view of the city, though it was a bit hazy for the camera.

 

[andyc740]

Part VI - Museo del Desierto

At the museum, we paid P$25 to park, which I thought was a bit much, but it also gave us admittance to Parque Maravillas. The park looked nice, but we spent our time at the museum. At the museum we got in for half price, P$35, which made me feel better about the parking. Riding a motorcycle, I’m used to getting cut-rate deals on parking.

The museum focuses on the Chihuahuan Desert, Saltillo being on the eastern edge. The museum tour started slow, then we came to a dimly-lit room featuring a bunch of dinosaur skeletons. I had to get creative with flash settings to get any sort of a picture.

And a view of a lab where people were cleaning up fossils.

Couldn’t resist a shot of a couple modern-day dinosaurs.

This one’s name sounds like a piece of computer equipment.

And a big rock covered with petroglyphs. I tried to get one of the museum guides in the picture for scale (that rock is about 5 feet high), but she was camera-shy and hid around the corner. I don’t think I’m that scary a dinosaur.

Then we came to the scariest exhibit of the tour.

This is a replica of a giant bat skeleton, extrapolated from some bones found in a cave in Sinaloa in 1954. According to the sign on the glass, it’s 200 times the size of a typical bat, shown with a human skeleton for comparison. Scientists date the skeleton as 14,000 years old and speculate it lived on fruit. I bet. I sure wouldn’t want to come across that thing on a dark night.

 

[andyc740]

Part VII - Desert Fauna and Flora

The museum also had some displays of desert animals and plants. It included some prairie dogs who appeared to be practicing bodysurfing for an upcoming trip to South Padre Island.

And some tortoises working on their synchronized tortoise formations:

One of the tortoises looked rather shell-shocked. According to a museum guide, it had been crossing a road and was mugged by two snails. When the police showed up to take a statement, the tortoise wasn’t very helpful. The cop asked, “Could you at least give us a description of the muggers?” The stunned tortoise answered, “I don’t know. It all just happened so fast.”

The museum also had some nice cactus gardens. I had no idea there were so many types of cacti. See the picasa album if you like stickery plants.

Two black bears seen on the way out were about as shy as the museum guide.

And a parting shot of Saltillo as we left. (I played with the colors a bit on this one.)

 

[andyc740]

Part VIII - Ride to Jamé

One of the rally events was a scheduled ride to a nearby town for lunch. We formed up a bit after 1:00 and headed out. Lefty and José opted to ride in the bus. Rick, Andrés, Lety and I rode our bikes.

This is a shot taken by a Mexican motorcycle magazine photographer from Mi Moto in Guadalajara. (The rally sponsors gave me permission to use a couple of his pictures.)

And yours’ truly.

Ahead of me, a biker’s armored jacket fell off his bike onto the highway. The lady passenger on the sport bike ahead of me just leaned down and picked it up as they rode past, made it look easy. Another couple on a sport bike had matching helmets and armored jackets and the lady was holding another helmet. When I passed them, I saw the helmet was on their little girl who was sound asleep in her mother’s arms.

We had one lane of the four-lane highway headed out of town reserved for us, with police cars in front and riders blocking off intersections and entrance ramps. We rode 10 or 15 miles at a fairly sedate pace up into the mountains dividing Saltillo and Monterrey, ending up in a small town called Jamé. It’s on my map, but not in the bigger Mexico atlas I have.

Lefty always likes checking out churches. This one had quite a contrast between the exterior and the interior.

I’m more about taking pictures of bikes and people.

Lety and Andrés found a quiet spot.

Seeing the picture reminds me how good the blossoms on the trees smelled. Lunch was some meat, beans and rice and was efficiently served. After eating and loitering, it was time to mount up and head out.

On the four-lane highway on the way home, I took the inside of a corner, crossed over the white shoulder line and ran over some rumble strips on the shoulder. That was a surprise, I couldn’t see them the way they were pressed into the concrete, and traction was even iffier to the outside, with loose gravel on top of the pavement, and scary with a deep gutter beside the road. I backed off the throttle and steered back into the lane.

 

[andyc740]

Part IX- Arteaga

On the way home, we detoured through the town of Arteaga, on the outskirts of Saltillo. We rode down some cobblestoned streets lined with huge trees and people coming out of their houses to see all the bikes going by. Reminded me of one of my persistent bike fantasies of riding as a motorcycle escort in the Tour de France.

We stopped at the city park for a bit. Weather was threatening, but it hadn’t started raining where we were. Andrés found a chair at a fruit vendor’s stall and was swiping ciruelas (a small, cherry-like fruit) whenever the vendor looked away, spitting the pits on the pavement. When he got ready to go, the vendor asked him, “Did you like the ciruelas?” Andrés said, “Yes” and gave him some money to pay for what he’d eaten.

By then, it was almost 5:00. Time to mount up and head back to the rally site.

 

[The Bruce]

Looks like a great visit. Story about the turtles was funny.

 

[andyc740]

Part X - Wrapping up the Rally

Back at the rally, it was mostly a time for wandering around, talking with people, handing out bibles, taking pictures. We were waiting for 7:00 when the Escuadrón Acrobatico del Estado was scheduled to perform (the link is to their inaugural performance in a nearly-empty bullring). I had seen a Mexican police acrobatic team from Mexico City years ago in Honduras and was looking forward to seeing a similar performance, but we were told they pulled out of the program. Oh well, maybe next time.

Rainclouds dropped down the mountain, closer and closer, then receded leaving the rally dry. Downtown did get rain.

I carried those two stupid camp chairs strapped to my bike the whole weekend, then finally unpacked one for an hour or so, when I got too tire to keep standing at the rally. Lefty, José and I wound up sitting at the first-aid tent near the gate, watching people come and go.

Then it was time to head out. We’d lost track of Andrés and Lety, but decided to go downtown and have some cabrito for dinner anyway. Restaurante Principal on the main drag near the center of town was still roasting goat and it was as good as it was three years ago.

 

[andyc740]

Part XI - Saltillo to Monterrey

We started off Sunday morning with a bike blessing for Andrés. I guess we did 8 or 10 during the rally, praying with people, praying for them and their motorcycles, but we hadn’t done one for Andrés. We really should’ve been praying for José.

Then we hit the road about 7:30, after badgering the lady at the breakfast setup who was running late setting up. Once on the road, we headed down through the sweepers to Monterrey, running maybe 70 or so. I’d asked Andrés to throttle back a bit from our pace riding to Saltillo. Lefty, especially, isn’t too comfortable in the mountains and rides his own pace.

Coming through the last set of sweepers, I was following Andrés, with Rick, José behind me, Lefty riding tailgunner. I check my mirrors constantly when riding in a group and one time, when I checked, there was nobody there. Uh oh. I pulled off the highway and waited. Andrés pulled over ahead. No one. A truck honked going by. Another trucker went by, made a tumbling motion with his hands and held up three fingers. Oh no!! I wheeled the bike around on the shoulder and headed back up the highway, not wanting to see what was around the bend. When I came around the corner, the first thing I saw was our three guys standing by the side of the road. WHEW!!! The next thing I saw was José’s bike in the ditch.

José had slowed down waiting on Lefty to catch up, not knowing we just ride on and let him catch up when we get out of the hills, pulled over to the side, got suprised by the rumble strip that had surprised me the day before, and wound up with his bike in the ditch, which was several feet deep. He was scratched up, but mostly OK. His bike looked mostly OK. Andrés went looking for something to straighten out his crash bar, telling us if a cop stopped, to tell him José was pulling off to park to check something, not that he lost it and wound up in the ditch.

We worked on horsing the bike ahead where the ditch was shallower, lifting the front wheel up and pivoting it sideways to the ditch, then pushing it ahead out of the ditch. It was work, but we did it. No cops showed up. Traffic didn’t even slow down.

Then it was a matter of getting the pranged crash bar straightened out on the left side of the bike. José has a prosthetic leg below the knee and uses his heel for shifting both up and down because he doesn’t have any ankle control. The bent crash bars had the floorboard folded up and José couldn’t reach the shifter.

About then Andrés showed up with a pickaxe he had borrowed from a road crew down the highway, and we used it to bend the crash bar back until it was straight enough for José to be able to shift. Then the bike didn’t want to start. That turned out to be the kill switch.

Saturday morning, returning from the museum, Rick dumped his bike on some slick paving tiles on the road just before a speed bump. I awarded him an old pacifier I carried around in my tail trunk for months after finding it in a parking lot. The nipple, as we called it, used to be a tradition in our CMA chapter, always awarded to the person who had most recently dropped their bike. This was our Mexico version. Once we had José’s bike out of the ditch, Rick made sure he passed the nipple on to José.

You’ve got to give the guy points for toughness. He’s on disability after returning from deployment in Iraq with health problems, is diabetic, and spent the whole weekend riding and walking around with us on his prosthetic leg. José, my helmet’s off to you. I did tell him, though, I thought the ride report already was going to be good enough without the added drama.

 

[andyc740]

Part XII - Rio Santa Catarina, Monterrey

I mentioned the flooding earlier in Monterrey after Hurricane Alex and the following tropical depression. Since it was a Sunday morning and traffic was light, we decided to go through downtown Monterrey on the return trip and take the opportunity to see some of the flood damage, also saving us the tolls on the periferico.

The Rio Santa Catarina was mostly a dry riverbed running through downtown Monterrey. Several years ago, Monterrey took the opportunity to develop it into a 15-mile long recreational area featuring soccer fields, a go-kart track, parking lots, giant flea market, etc. I found this picture in an on-line blog, photo credit unknown:

This is what it looks like now:

The route through downtown detoured from one side of the river to the other, depending on which side was the least torn up. Andrés mentioned after the hurricane, he was without water for nine days and without power for two weeks.

Finally on the far side of town (only Mexico City is larger in area), we parted ways with Andrés before getting on the short piece of toll road between Monterrey and Cadereyta, where we would pick up the libre to Reynosa. It was great to have him with us. I always enjoy being able to see places through the eyes of the locals and besides, Andrés and Lety were good company.

 

[andyc740]

Part XIII - Getting wet again

We headed on down the old highway, stopping for lunch and gas in General Bravo.

Coming into Reynosa, we hit an army checkpoint. The young soldiers manning the checkpoint were curious about our bikes (How much does it cost? Which one is the fastest? Mine, of course.) and Lefty gave the soldier searching his bike half a dozen of the New Testaments that we had left. I grinned when I saw the soldier holding them behind his back, hoping no one saw and he wouldn’t get in trouble for taking things from travellers. Just down the road past that, we hit a police checkpoint and they wanted to see ID. They weren’t interested in any bibles.

We had been watching a big raincloud off to our right ahead at the stops, and sure enough, we hit Reynosa the same time it did. When the rain got too heavy to see the potholes on the highway, we pulled under the canopy at a gas station and waited for the rain to slacken a bit.

At the border, the river seemed to be even higher than it was two days before. Sitting in line for customs, another raincloud caught up with us and we were drenched all over again. A brief stop to exchange our leftover pesos and top off our gas tanks and we were back on the road, stopping only to strip out of our rain gear about 20 miles up the highway, then waving goodbye to José as he peeled off at Falfurrias.

All in all, it was another good trip to Mexico. We had a good time, gave away some bibles and came back with some stories to tell. Pretty good exchange rate if you ask me. I’m ready for the next trip.

 

[bato]

Great report! glad Jose was OK i have dropped my bike a couple times when i have stopped on uneven ground I missed Alex by days did my trip to Monterrey late June My daughter was up here and she couldn't go back to Monterrey because the roads were closed for a while. Next time you guys go let me know I want to come

 

[achesley]

Super awesome report and pictures. Thanks for all the work of sharing with us.

 

[andyc740]

Super awesome report and pictures. Thanks for all the work of sharing with us.

You're welcome. My raging insecurities appreciate hearing that.