After a lot of buggering around with bikes and what ever we were finally off to Palenque .
We had a great time in San Cristobal , the food was great and the beer even better . There was a lot of tourist and also a lot of ,how would I say hippies I suspose . I would go as far as to say Cristobal was my favourite stop over city wise in Mexico .
Anyway off to Palenque 211kms and we thinking 3hrs (wrong when will we learn) , it took us 7 hrs again over some beauitful mountians an very windie roads , mostly in very good condition with only a few washouts . We had a stop off to visit the Azul Falls , just before the Falls the road was blocked by some rebels (cant remember there name ) but we had to pay them 25peso each to get through .
Next was the kids , as soon as we stopped they came out like bees on honey and all saying the samething
"Mr I watch Moto 10 pesos" , "Mr I watch Moyo 5 pesos" , "Mr I watch Moto 2 pesos" , and so it went on . Anyway this kid about 4ys old was there so "I say 2 pesos you watch my Moto" , he says "si" . Then I made the big mistake I gave him 2 pesos and then he was gone , I yelled out "hey what about my Moto" . With that he just smiled and keep on walking (little bugger).
The falls were ok but not that great, it was hot so with all the gear on and time running out , we were on our way .
We arrived in Paleque found a hotel and had another great meal (Damon loves his food), we all bunked together at a cost of $10 each .
Next day to the long awaited Palenque , I had heard a lot about this site and it proved to mostly up to my expections . The only dissappointment was that it has had alot of it rebuilt (even though they only say 20% )
. We did get sucked in though by a local boy with promises of hidden temples and the like deep in the Jungle . We paid him 200 pesos and we were away ready to see what no man had ever seen before (we were excited and all felt like Indiana Jone's) , but he took us about 50 yards into the bush and showed us a few rocks and that was about that . When he walk away we all just looked at one another a laughed , we had been shit on and from a great height.
We were very lucky that there was a lot of howling monkeys in the trees which gave us much entertainment with all the howling . The whole site is very well done, boarding on beautiful rain forests and well worth the trip .
Back to Cristobal
We were told by a taxi driver to take a different route back (through Villamosa) as it would be 3 hrs quicker (wrong again we must be thick ). It was 395kms and took us about 9 hrs , it rained a lot of the way and at places the road was very slippery , we also had some very high passes to get over with very narrow roads and quite cold at times with heavy cloud cover it made it very hard to see . We wound our way over mountian after mountian after mountian , stunning absolutey stunning , the amazing thing is that you maybe at the top of some mountain in the middle no where and there will be a village this is a very special peice of the world
. I had a near tumble on diesel , it was almost like someone had just tiped a bucket of diesel on the corners . But also it was another one of those great rides scenery wise, road wise and of course the adventure , we never got back into Cristobal until about 8.30pm (and very dark) and more great food a few beers .
Next Guatemala and DISASTER with a BIG D
Photos
1/2 Palenque
3 Azul Falls
4 Outside our Hotel San Cristobal De Las Casas
