Early in the morning and we are headed to Palenque. This will prove to be a very boring ride. Our excitement will come in the form of the town Francisco Escarega. Every guidebook has warned us of this town and recommends that we get through as quickly as possible.
No words can describe this place. On one end of the spectrum is Chichen Itza and on the other is this place. Being here for 10 minutes erases 1 year of bad deeds. Just driving through and we are cleansed. Sure, the town is basically a big truck stop and that isn’t bad in itself. It’s the ceaseless barrage of street vendors that wears us down. Just to make sure we’ve done our penance, we stop at Hambucase Rey (Burger King) for breakfast. We would have stopped elsewhere, but the onslaught from the street hawkers had the opposite of their intended effect. We pay a guy outside the restaurant to wash our windshields more so he won’t mess with our bikes rather than the cleaning.

In Palenque our base for the next two days will be the Kin Ha motel and we are quite pleased with the accommodations, except for the long walk to the room. They allow us to park our bikes near the desk and our room is on the second floor in the back surrounding a small courtyard. Most of the rooms are single bungalows. Our number 1 criterion at this point is cold air and the room has it to spare.

 
Amazingly, the day slips through our fingers and we don’t go to the ruins or falls, but we do head to town. Mike finds Mexico stickers for my bike. This has been a quest of mine on the 3M Tour. Sure, you can find Barbie stickers everywhere, but “I went to Mexico and all I got was a Barbie sticker” just doesn’t cut it. On the weird side, Palenque is the hippie capital of Mexico. Yes, there are hippies and lots of Che Guevara t-shirts for sale.  The guy dressed in the costume outside of the pharmacy probably gives them acid nightmares. The thought of being dressed in a thick costume with today's heat makes me woozy.


On the way to dinner at the motel, guess whose tire is flat yet again? Oh, c’mon already. Must everyone of my trips be an “adventure” as Don would say. Let someone else have the adventure for a change. After the 3rd plug I think the tire is fixed. Now what about the chain and the engine stumble? Tomorrow we’ll go visit the ruins and I’ll see if I can get the bike serviced.