Click on a photo to enlarge it.
On Monday we spent a few hours with Stuart and Sara, going through maps together and giving them lots of tips for
Baja California and updating their Church and Church guide. We also gave them our espresso machine, as they will put
it to good use. We're fans of the instant decaf variety!
Then we drove back along the bumpy road and parked up in town. We knew that Winnie wouldn't be able to get up to Bob
and Suzanne's! We took with us a spatula for Jenny and Cam who don't have one with them and desperately needed one.
We spent an hour saying goodbye to Bob and Suzanne and thanking them for their wonderful hospitality and said we'd be
back next year!
Bob walked with us back to Winnie and we gave him three paperbacks that we'd already read. Then we drove up the
serpentine road and back onto the main road towards Cuidad Valles. About 20 miles west of Valles we pulled onto a
Pemex (petrol) station and parked up for the night.
We thought we would run out of propane overnight and that our fridge would start to defrost, but when we got up,
it was still going! So we drove into Valles and the first thing we did was get more propane. Then we got more
drinking water and drove to a hotel where there was a trailer park.
The receptionist at the hotel was really helpful and we got a map of the town where she marked off all the things
we needed - supermarket, internet, laundry, banks. Then we walked into the town for a couple of hours to get
everything done, and came back for lovely hot showers. Then we walked around the corner with two bags of laundry
which we dropped off and picked up 3 hours later. When we got it back, it smelled very strongly of roses!! Maybe,
the woman at the laundry thought our clothes needed freshening up! Or we did!!
On Wednesday, we downloaded a new update and went back to the internet to add it to our website. On the way back,
Kirsten remembered that she had to make a payment over the internet for our website and ended up having to run back
and forth between the internet and Winnie because she didn't have the right pin numbers. It all took quite a while
and we didn't leave the campground until 3pm.
We drove 53 miles south, through the mountains and passed lots of stalls along the road selling oranges and turned
off to a place called Xilitla (pronounced hillitla) famous for it's gardens. We drove up a very bad dirt track and
got there just after 5pm and parked up for the night at the entrance to the gardens.
On Thursday, we spent a few hours walking around the gardens, designed by James Edward, apparently an illegitimate
grandson of Edward 7th. The gardens can only be described as a "Folly". There are steps and paths leading to various
structures that are both abstract and surrealist - weird and wonderful. The various structures don't appear to have
any practical use whatsoever and they are slap bang in the middle of the jungle!! The photos will give you a far
better idea than words.
After the first 20 minutes of exploring, we realised that we needed a map, because the place was like a maze.
Unfortunately, the map was only useful in showing what there was to see, not how to get there! Great map!! But it
was fun exploring the place, climbing up and down the thousands of steps and finding a waterfall and various bridges.
Xilitla.
At 3pm, we set off heading south again and drove further into the mountains. We were looking for a place to stop and
were hoping to find a Pemex. But there weren't any! By 5-20pm we hadn't found anywhere and it was starting to get
dark. As we passed through a small village, a man at the side of the road waved at a lorry in front of us. Helen
thought he was waving at us and she waved back!
A little farther on, we found an area to pull off the road next to a shrine of some sort. We were just trying to get
Winnie as level as possible, when the man who had just waved at us (or the lorry), pulled up. He told us that we
should not park here for the night, but that we should follow him.
So we did and he took us to a friend of his in Semita Grande, who said we could park up next to his house for the night! We were tired
and hungry after an exhausting 3 hour drive through the mountains, but we were now guests, so we couldn't just say
thank you and disappear into Winnie!
We showed the family inside Winnie and tried to think of something we could give them as a gift. The problem is we
don't have much! Eventually we got out some pens and a pad of paper for the two 7 year old twin boys. We spent about
2 hours chatting to the family, who made us feel very welcome.
On Friday, mom seemed to be stressed out trying to get the twins ready for school. So we said a quick thank you and
said goodbye. We left at 8am and continued the drive along the long mountain road, negotiating all the bends and the
pot holes, and trying not to let all the large lorries and coaches sitting on our back bumper worry us!!
We were also getting a bit concerned that there didn't seem to be any Pemex (petrol) stations on this route!!
Eventually, we managed to find one and stopped there for breakfast. We got to a place called Ixmiquilpan at 1-15 pm.
The family we had stayed with last night thought it was hilarious that we had so many problems trying to pronounce
this name!
It took us a few U turns and a bit of time to find a parking spot, and we only just made it to the monastery before
it shut for 2 hours! We wanted to have a look at the wall murals that dated back to the 1500s but only had 10 minutes!
Afterwards we drove to El Chico National Park via a very confusing traffic system around Pachuca.
When we got there, the trailer park was closed and looked like it had been for a very long time. It was already
getting dark, so we parked nearby. On Saturday, we had the problem of trying to get Winnie back up the dirt track
from the trailer park back up to the road. The road wasn't that steep, but Winnie didn't make it!!!
We have too much weight in Winnie and his engine isn't big enough for the hills when we're up at about 8,000 ft
(2,700 m) altitude! We had to roll back a bit, and then Kirsten had to get out and push!!! Yes, we're being serious!
Otherwise we wouldn't have made it. (Well Kirsten pushing meant 9.5 stones less weight for Winnie! - 60kg) Poor old
Kirsten! She got a mouthful of dust, and as Helen put her full body weight on the accelerator, Kirsten fell forward
and grazed her hands! Then she had to get up like a shot and carry on pushing!
Eventually, Winnie made it to the top - boy, were we relieved. We had visions of being stranded there! We spent most
of the journey along the road through the National Park, discussing how we could reduce some of Winnie's weight, and
maybe moving some of the heavy stuff, forward behind the driver and passenger seats! At least we knew we would have
to drive the same way back, so we didn't miss out on the scenery.
Unfortunately, the narrow and windy road started going downhill to a place called Mineral del Chico, which meant that
Winnie was going to have to get back up! As we came into the town, there were a lot of "Topes" - sleeping policemen,
and then, all of a sudden, the tarmac stopped and was replaced by extremely large cobblestones, that then took a nose
dive down a very steep road into the town.
We stopped on the tarmac and took a very long look at that steep road. We knew that if we went down, we'd never get
back up! It was also part of a one way system, whereby we would have to turn right and then come back up the steep
cobbled road. No way! We couldn't park where we were and we couldn't turn there either because that too was steep and
Winnie would have had to lean severely to one side for a U turn.
Well, it turned out that we could turn right and park up just around the corner and then turn round and come back out
the same way. We'd seen the one way signs but apparently the locals ignored them!! But we were still going to have a
problem getting back around the corner which was steep and extremely bumpy because of the large cobblestones.
After a short walk around the town, we moved some water bottles from the back, to behind the driver and passenger
seats and decided that we'd have to get rid of some of the water, to reduce weight. We set off and Kirsten had to
push again, so that Winnie could make it back up the hill - he was having problems on the tarmac part of the road!!
Helen couldn't stop, otherwise Winnie would have got stuck. So Kirsten ended up having to walk quite a distance in
the heat!! (When Winnie needs to reduce weight, then the heaviest person has to get out and push - well it made
perfect sense to Helen!!)
After all her strenuous activity so far, Kirsten still managed to accompany Helen on a steep, 3 mile walk uphill to
a look out point. We also had a 4 legged guide who abandoned us at the top - we weren't going quick enough for him!
But at least the dog looked healthy!)
When we got back to Winnie, we noticed something leaking out, from somewhere under the drivers seat. It turned out
to be one of the plastic gallon bottles of fresh water. That's one way of getting rid of it! That's something else
for us to sort out. Not really our day today! But we did manage to find a spot at the side of the road to park up for
the night, as there was no way we were going back down to the trailer park for the night!
On Sunday, we were woken up by the police who just wanted to check that we were OK! Very nice! It was also a cloudy
day, so we decided to leave some of the other sights in the area as we were going to come back later, on our way to
the coast. We headed back to Pachuca and after picking up supplies from a supermarket and filling up with petrol, we
drove west to San Juan Teotihuacán to see the pyramids. We found the trailer park which looked closed and was empty. But the
gate wasn't padlocked, so we drove in and parked up.
A couple of hours later, Wolfgang and Ursula from Germany arrived so we weren't alone. We set about trying to dry
out the water from behind the drivers seat, which basically took all evening, because the carpet is so thick.
Meanwhile, Kirsten was trying to help Ursula download her digital photos onto Ursula's laptop. Kirsten tried to
download some software onto Ursula's computer to make things easier for her, but the laptop went on strike.
Then there was panic because we had the horrible feeling that Ursula's computer was "Kaputt" and it was our fault!!
The computer wouldn't do anything! Wouldn't re-boot, and we couldn't get it going again!! Fortunately, Ursula had
the instruction booklet with her - but only in French, Dutch or Spanish!!!
In the end it was just a matter of pressing and holding down the "start" key for 4 seconds and it started again!
Unfortunately, it took a few hours of panic to find out!!! It was also 11pm and there wasn't enough time to do
anything with the photos. The story continues ...
