Back to the Pacific Coast

Puerto Escondido... one of the beaches


Linda talking to her Mom on the beach strip in Puerto Escondido

March 16 /06

With the new route plan formulated, we were up before sunrise and had the bikes loaded and ready to go at dawn. We opted to start on the Autopista Cuota (pay highways) to make time. We made good time for the first 100K, then the pay road ended. You can definitely make better time, but the pay roads are expensive. We figured that the charge was about 10 cents per kilometre. There was little traffic on the pay portions. Obviously they are too expensive for the masses.

We made pretty good time on the route to the Pacific coast despite several areas of construction. Once on the coast, the road became more interesting. A nice winding road through the hilly coast line with good pavement, few towns (ie. topes) and little traffic. Normally we would have stopped earlier that we did, but knowing the route and the availability of accommodation, we decided to push on to Puerto Escondido. We covered about 650K. The longest day yet. We rolled into our planned accommodation (Cabinas Edda) at about 5:30 and got two nice cabinas. ($15. each). Having made good time and not to mention that we all had sore butts from the last two long days, we decided to stay and extra night here and catch up on the laundry, internet, phone calls and an oil change for the bikes.

March 17/06

Happy Birthday Leslie. Hope you had a good time and didn’t consume too much of that green beer.

We relaxed today and caught up on the chores. Saturday we are planning to stop just outside Acapulco.

March 18/06

Wow! It was hot day down here. . . especially coming through Acapulco. It seems that everyone here drives their car on Saturdays. It was bumper to bumper traffic most of the way through the city. I stopped as we entered the city to take off my jacket. It was at least bearable in a T-shirt. We only lost our way once and managed to get back on course in relatively short order (sometimes you are lucky).

Once we reached our destination, Pia de la Questa. . . a narrow beach strip about 10K north of Acapulco, we searched out our chosen hotel. We found it right away. Things were falling into place…. until we discovered that it was a long holiday weekend and every place we check was booked up. *%#^@!

Eventually we found a room. The hotel owners knew that it was one of the last ones available and it was reflected in the price. Fortunately there was a nice beach restaurant nearby and we settled in to a good sunset meal.

Meeting other travelers is an enjoyable part of this experience.

March 19/06

We were up before sunrise this morning. Do you think maybe we are getting that “heading for the barn” feeling? Partly, but mostly it is more comfortable to travel during the cooler parts of the day. Also, we trying ride about 400K per day. With an early start we can find a place to stay by 3pm. and relax for a while.