photos off my broken camera

Jeff chilling in his shelter in our campsite on the beach in Tulúm

The site of Playa Esperanza in Tulúm. Awesome vibes.

Gran Cenote entrance 5k outside Tulúm. Cost: 100 pesos

About to get in the water in Gran Cenote. When I jumped in a tiny fish bit my nipple, it felt like a shock and I leaped out of the water so fast and wore a shirt from then on.

another angle of Gran Cenote

Snake Cenote. 500m from Gran Cenote. All of these cenotes were named by the people who explored and discovered them, all English speaking gringos. All of this development has also happened since 1989. So recent.

Jason deciding if he wants to enter snake cenote or just stand there feeding mosquitos.

In Snake Cenote from the top. Must just be a clever name, we didn´t see one snake down there.

The formations were crazy

Those are tree roots growing down to the water making what looked like an altar. Notice a bit of sun light to the right.

More roots. The water was only 20cm deep and smelled of sulfur.

After this we all had broken cameras and hellish circumstances so no photos available.

After our back breaker jungle ride our gear was worked! Almost as dirty as us.

Thick mud on bike, rider, and notice the can of bug spray! Yeeeeah DEET! The boys don´t feel the deet but I would rather die a year early than go it alone against jungle bugs.

We rock a hotel with a small pool. Yea we some ballers! but we turned that place into a gypsy pirate hang out. Our dirty bikes there and all our wet camping stuff on the walls and hanging, not to metion all our laundry, they were cool with it tho.

This bike mechanic knew his stuff. José was his name and he spoke some English while making me SPOKES! My crappy expensive dt swiss wheels have been popping spokes like crazy.

José also fixed Jason´s $200 titanium bottom bracket and installed a Chinese one with no bearings just grease! We wonder how long it will last. Such a funny change, who knows it may last forever, but hopefully craig will bring a new drive train to Guatemala.

Jeff and Jason´s blog

I can't load pics, so check out
the boys blog. It is rad!
www.volksonbikes.blogspot.com

For sure not the best of times, but not the worst either.

In the last week we have seen some amazing sights. We found some caverns with stalagtites and stalagmites, and super clear water. I have some photos but they are hard to load here. The swimmng was great. We pressed on to Cobá where there are ruins, we ran into strage people there. When we rolled into town we found a construction site and made it home. At about 10pm a man came to shut the gate. Tents set up and me in my skivvies we expected him to be none so pleased to see us but he said no problem! and he closed the gate until 7am. Awesome! Then the next day we had a good time at the ruins that were major. Met a mayan man who tried to teach us some mayan, we have since forgot. Then he told me to cut my hair. This is the third time in a week. Here they say the Bible says for only women to have long hair. That is a load of bull-. I asked about jesus but they stick to me cutting my hair. To be honest that guy was totally rude and I had to give him my bit about living with love than living by a book of fiction. I was trying to lay off but dude! Then we swam in two more Cenotes and made way 45 or so k´s to Tulúm. Stayed in a pirate cove we found and got chewed up by bugs.
Heading south we got on a route on gravel or dirt. This trail went thru the jungle south from Tulúm. 45k of bugs bugs bugs! rough road and tours of yuppie idiots in jeeps honking for us to get out of their way. Unbelieveable! what jags! they also didn´t have to pay the park fee! using their motors to destroy habitat! Then we hopped a skiff across the bay to the other part of the park where we think it is 45 more k until a town. WRONG! try 70k of pure jungle and we thought the bugs were bad before. We could sort of outrun the mosquitos which were in swarms by the millions, but the horseflys that bite were fast and aggresive. The road proved too much for my rear wheel and broke more than 5 spokes. yikes! fixing them was not cool with so many bugs. dark fell quickly and the sounds were rediculous! eerie sounds of frogs and stuff I did not know what it was. oh yea did I mention the BUGS!? some the size of staplers! and the road at times under water from the swamp hip deep! that was fun the first twenty times then a challenge. in the morning i had to fix a flat in my tent for doing it outside was just stupid because of the bugs. No romantic glory here defiately type 3 fun. only fun to tell how hellish the experience was. The last 2 or so hours on the trail we 3 were split up and when we met in the town at the end of the jungle we were a surly crew of chaps! swearing like salors and covered in mud, sweat, and blood. Gnarley! we got a hotel for cheap but expensive for mexico and it has a pool, so we are cool for now. I had said this morning that if all the trip was like the las 5 days costantly wet and chewed up that I would be done! Just not fun when you are always getting eaten and wet.
dry and safe, going out to get a beer and drink it in the pool.
hell yea
el pirata
mr

pics take a long time to load

Our camp in Tulúm on the beach it was rad! Jason chillin´
Drunk mayan dude who kept drinkin our beers when we were not looking he was maybe 5 ft tall. He was speaking mayan and freakin because we didn´t understand. Pretty funny.

Diving and dining on the reef

There is a reef that runs from the south of Cancún to Honduras. It is huge! Long at the very least. We have seen it from many different locations. Puerto Morelos was awesome, but we were told that we must purchase a tour for gringos... Obviously you could imagine our response. Good thing we picked up slang and curse words quickly-not to mention our ideas of globalization and capitalism. Further on in Akumal we lived the pirates dream. We snorkeled the evening we got there and noticed many spots where the local sea turtles were laying their eggs. We were prohibited from camping on the beach due to this scenerio, but for some reason it is totally cool to build walkways and walls for adjacent condos. Yay capitalism! Nearing dusk we got fruit from a stand and 19 coconuts from a nearby tree and gourged ourselves on coco. Fat city. We rested on a pedestrian over pass of the highway so we did not get eaten alive by mosquitoes, then found an awesome camp. The next day was almost all snorkeling, we saw eagle rays, coral fish, angel fish of every color, and a few sea turtles. The following day in Tulúm, I speared a fish grilled it and it was wonderful. Just before taking a nap I had a great sample of coco. Life is going pretty well at the moment. We are looking for nearby cenotes (seh no tays) that are under ground fresh water you can swim and dive in before heading to Belize.
be cool
mr

Diving and dining on the reef

We have been doing a lot of snorkeling along the reef from Cancún to Honduras. It is huge! Some parts are pretty sketchy and dangerous. I got raked across one shallow part- it could have been so much worse. I wish I could show pictures of what we saw. So far I have seen so many pretty fish it seems lame to mention, also angel fish, huge eagle rays, and tons of sea turtles that have been laying eggs on the beach. Quite a sight. Barracuda and sharks were on my mind yesterday when I speared my lunch. I had to swim back quite far to the shore and I didn't want to share my catch with a swimming friend that had lots of teeth.

some photos droppin

Thought for sure it was going to break.

Jason trippin that these shadetree mechanics were gonna ruin his internal hub,
"forget it dude I will just figure it out"

Els pirates pensan

Sneaking in to overpriced ruins in Tulúm

Life is gooooooooooood!

Looking for repairs in a small town. This is the bike mechanic.

On the road to Tulúm. Wow look at all the traffic.

Jeff busted something on his bike.

Jason trying out a new hair style

silly one

The croud that night got a little loose. The litre beers are called Caguamas ¨( kawamas)

Tryin to lie up some funny photo scene, Jeff is all about it.

We were able to keep our bikes in a vacant room. Yea that´s right!

Rad Spanish couple we met. These folks know their politics. Good people

oops double

Hostal in Playa. Cheap and kinda a cool traveler spot.

Playa del Carmen beach. Kind of touristy.

Jeff Tryin to get some on Isla mujeres beach.

What? This must have been my luckiest day ever! Starbucks, Chili´s, AND Hooters. and all away from home so i can feel so American! yea USA! Boo actual differences between cultures and places!

Jeff fadin out while waiting for his fish on Isla Mujeres.

First required repairs, I broke a spoke somewhere in the first 50k around Cancún.

This is the back patio of Jeff and Jason´s couch surf connection in Cancún. The dude Rodrigo was amazing helping us out and letting us stay. J&J had been there like a month. They sent boxes from the north to Rodrigo and he kept it until it could be sent back to the states with a friend. Awesome hook up!

Solid Rodrigo!

My first night in a spot along the super expensive hotels. People were weird in this part of town. Money seemed to take away sense of humor from these folks.

Dark skies proved to wear on leisure, as this wash out from Hurricane Alex dumped a few minutes after this photo.

Playa del Carmen

Been riding slowly, but the bugs at night have been horrific. We were cycling at night to get to a place where we could sleep for free, but the bugs were so bad we made camp in 15 seconds. I felt some rain and jumped to put on my rain fly but just then the rain stopped and I got chewed alive! I awoke slowly, sweating profusely, to move a bit down the road. My stomach was wrecked from the water I suppose, so I rocked the grapefruit seed extract and it took a while but feelin great now. We are taking longer than expected but all is well. Playa has lots of gringos but hopefully we can still sneak thru the cracks. We have a hostel tonight, so that means bug free beds and showers! Wow, what luxury. I was able to wash my dreads out and feel like my hair might stay for a while now that I got it clean and clear of salt water. If you come here to playa look out for some old gringo telling you he can get you a deal on hostals. What a jerk, if we did not speak spanish well it would cost 20 percent more. hah!
vivo todovia
sorry about photos I will get on it soon-
just being lazy
mr

Isla Mujeres to Tulum

Isla Mujeres is really small but the snorkeling was amazing. While playing with my new spear that I made, I found myself surrounded by barracuda. There were maybe ten to 15 of them. They were small but I drew my spear and they got closer to me and spread apart. I released the spear softly and swam backwards and they seemed to relax. The fish probably posed no real danger but my heart was racing. At the moment, the island is half filled with mexicans on vacation and americans and brits doing the same. We had a bit of a run in with a jerky who claimed we never paid for our hotel and got into a nice argument with Jeff. Funny stuff. Continuing to stealth camp and just slip through the cracks and drink tap water, rolling pretty cheap. Tommorrow we roll to Tulúm- about 120km. Photos to follow
mr

Wastin away in Cancún

Been living on the super cheap in Cancún. Fresh seafood, fruit, and friendly Mexicans all around. This place is amazing. I expected it to be lame and touristed out but the center is super cheap and people are amazing. Today we are moving to Isla Mujeres to stay at a hook up house on the beach. Maybe we can spearfish with the Hawaiian sling I made and get some of our own ceviché? There may be local regulations of no fishing because of fish protected habitats. I am very relaxed and just focused on learning my surroundings and enjoying life. So many people have approached me and started talking to me about love and connection of us with the earth and all of life. It is like I am wearing a sign. No complaints-all of these people have amazing things to say and super positive energy.
rolling on
mr

oil slicks and clear cuts

Interesting our global problem with contamination and destruction.
Last weekend for the 4th of July, while driving to the coast I couldn't help
but notice all the beautiful old growth forest that had been clear cut.
Think about this when we use paper products.
Along the same lines, the Pilot on my flight into Cancun mentioned to interested passengers that the gulf oil spill was visible from the plane along the Texas shoreline. It was not small! The black swirls ran for what seemed to be forever.
Lets take care of our home folks. I will try my best not to use any plastic bottles
but this is going to be tough as the water here is only drinkable inside bottles or
trucks. I will work on the latter.
peace and love
mr

In Cancun, the humidity is off the charts. When the plane landed it was so humid the air from the vents was a thick white vapor. Sweating profusely I assembled my bike and all is well.
Going to chill out, get an idea of what is here to do, and do it.
So far awesome-
People seem so nice and very curious about why I have so much stuff on my bike.
Pets here are small, beat up and wild, there is bottled water everywhere, and amazing fruit.
get some photos tomorrow
mr

ready to go

The long days upon us but still chilly in the P town. Summer will be here soon. I have a feeling that come Monday I will not be cold in Cancun. I have my things in order and packed. I suppose I will miss some of the delicacies of the Pacific Northwest -espresso, beer, et al. However I can't wait to cycle in the warm air eating street food and spearfishing. As of late I have been my own slave driver making sure all my ducks are in a row and everything is done. Nothing left to do but smile!

Flight 6:15 am on monday July 5th

ooh early, after a party night on the 4th

may be an all nighter.