Days 120 And 121: San Cristóbal De Las Casas To Ocosingo

Leaving San Cristóbal de las Casas was hard.  Really hard.  We had made a home at Hostal Akumal.  We had a warm fuzzy dog to greet us every morning and to curl up with as we chatted into the wee hours of the morning with our fellow travelers.  Life was so good that we toyed with the idea of making San Cristóbal our base for the rest of our trip, leaving the bikes there, exploring what we could by day trip or bus, and then head straight to Cancun when it was time for me to fly home.  That plan sounded good over several glasses of wine, but the next morning, we realized we weren't ready to stop cycling... so we did some research on our route to Palenque and made the most of our last day in town.

Hipsters have arrived to San Cristóbal, it seems.

Luckily, this clearly pro-Zapatista bike shop is here to balance the hipster-dom.

The road that connects San Cristóbal de las Casas to Palenque is crowded with colectivo buses, tourist buses, cars, cars, and more cars.  It also has a bit of a reputation for being "unwelcoming" to say the least as this is the heart of the infamous Zapatista movement.  After meeting a pair of travelers from the Netherlands who had just gotten robbed on their night bus from Palenque to San Cristóbal at the hostal, Gonzalo and I had some concerns about cycling this section of road.  After scouring through various blogs of other cyclists, I was even less enthusiastic about the route.  No one raved about the nice views and more than a few complained about the volume of traffic and the ever-present yells of "gringo," kids throwing rocks, and indigenous folks putting ropes across the road to force you to stop so they could peddle their wares.

We were a bit torn since we are now facing some time constraints as we get closer to my September 1 flight back to the U.S. ... do we take the extra time to take an alternate route or just suck it up and take the direct route?  We probably could have cycled the direct route from Palenque to Ocosingo, our first stopping point on the way, in a single day if we had gotten up at the crack o' dawn, but our addiction to Erick's homemade breakfast and desire to hit up our favorite wine bar in San Cristóbal just one last time (18 peso per glass Spanish wine + free tapas?  yes, please!) pushed us towards taking our time over two days and doing the slightly longer, but much more pleasant alternate route via Chanal and Altamirano.

Gonzalo found a new friend on the road and saved him from some uncertain death by moving him into a nice shady spot away from the road.

Third flat tire of the trip... all of which have been Gonzalo's!  Knock on wood, not a single one for me yet!

Pro-Zapatista signage dots the countryside.

Coca-Cola has still managed to stay big here despite the anti-Globalization message of the Zapatistas.

Clouds roll in as we wind our way on small traffic-free country roads through gorgeous green farmland.

The small indigenous communities that dot this route seemed just as curious as us as we were about them.  They weren't warm and inviting, per se, but they never made us feel particularly unwelcome.  We were always treated politely at stores, what little traffic passed us beeped their approval, and kids always smiled when I honked my little dino horn as I passed.

It wasn't until we reached the town of Chanal that we got what would turn out to be a false scare.  Gonzalo had asked a gentleman in town to confirm a road went to Ocosingo because the GPS wasn't clear.  The guy seemed concerned.  Yes that road goes to Ocosingo, but it was in terrible condition.  Then, he checked his watch and said something about it getting late, and with that, wished us luck.  We weren't sure what he meant... was it bad for us to be on the road at this time?  Was his concern really just because of the road condition?  Or were their Zapatista rebels hiding somewhere in wait for us?  Even though all we could see was farmland, we decided that we would set up camp early.

A small respite from the rain allowed us to set up an early camp next to this farm.

We survived the night and morning brought sunny skies again as we continued again on traffic-free roads.

We made a glorious descent into a beautiful canyon at the crack o' morning.

And then, the pavement ended.

Some pretty awesome mud, too.  Apparently, this is what the guy in town was warning us about.  All that worry for nothing.

The construction workers watched with amusement as we dragged our bikes through the mud.

She sure looks good dirty though!

I most definitely tested the clearance on my lil Troll.

After several kilometers of gorgeous dirt road, not-so-gorgeous dirt road, and clay-like mud, we were greeted by a nice construction worker who offered up a hose for us to rinse off our feet.  He told us we were close to the pavement again and that the mud was officially done.  As we got closer to Altamirano, we noticed that people started smiling at us more and one older indigenous gentleman even struck up a conversation with us... a first in these parts.  He asked us all the normal questions, admired our bikes, and then explained that he was looking for his cow.  I'm not sure how often this happens, but his cow likes to escape and wander onto other ranches, where the gentleman has to pay to get his cow back.

We crossed a bridge over this beautiful river with the telltale bluish green awesomeness of the rivers and waterfalls that are famous in Chiapas.

Just a wee breakfast in Altamirano with my dreamy filter... that is, the condensation from having descended officially into the jungle.  Good thing I brought my appetite, I demolished the whooole thing.

Fueled by some of the best huevos rancheros I have had in Mexico (which is saying a lot... that's me de facto breakfast order), we made it to Ocosingo in good time.

A few travel notes for cyclists:

• For the first half of this route, there are only sparsely stocked tiendas along this route offering sometimes only chips and soda.  If you see a place selling fruits and veggies, stop and take advantage of it because there won't be anything else until you reach Chanal.  

• Chanal was just big enough to have better stocked tiendas and even a few comedores, but we didn't feel particularly welcome there.  It is clearly an indigenous town where few tourists come and I got the sense they prefer it that way.  That said, no one was overtly rude to us, but rather they just stared as we rode through.  Beyond the fact that there was no hotel, I would not try to stay in this town either.

• Much nicer was the town of Altamirano, which has a lovely restaurant on the edge of town (it's the first one you see as you cycle in) where all the truckers and construction workers eat.  I even saw there were some rooms for rent there.  The kids and the townspeople all wave with big smiles and say "adios" ... which I thought was weird at first, but I guess it makes sense since we are leaving by the time they yell something. 

• The Hospedaje Esmerelda, recommended by the Lonely Planet, welcomed both us and our bikes with open arms.  At just 200 pesos for a room, we couldn't have asked for a better deal.  They even gave us a bucket of water to wash our bikes as we waited for our room to be prepared.  We have found the younger gentleman to be a wealth of information about the area.