Thursday, February 27, 2014

Ride Day 170 La Paz to Mazatlan

I spent the night in La Paz at a nice bed and breakfast called Posada Colibri near the Gaviota hotel. It was a nice quiet comfortable B&B but I am not used to spending so much for one night. I did and I enjoyed my stay.

The next morning after a big breakfast from the B&B and some pleasant conversation with other guests I headed to the bus station. I caught a bus to the ferry 18 kilometers outside of town. There was some time to kill and I wanted to spend it on the beach near the ferry terminal. I ended up hanging out in a bar restaurant with another biker I met that was from Ohio called Dean. We chatted about our rides for a couple hours. He is riding down to Brasil for the world cup soccer matches.

We ate lunch and went over to buy our tickets. It took forever waiting around to buy the tickets and get on the ferry. Bikes are the last to load so we stood out in the hot sun while they took more than an hour later than the scheduled departure time. But all was well. We met another rider from Mexico getting on the same ferry. We enjoyed talking about our routes and such.

The ferry once underway was not too bad. Some cheap Mexican food was included for dinner and breakfast but that is what I have been eating everyday since I arrived in Mexico. We watched a few macho movies on tv with all the truck drivers and boat workers. They seemed to like the hardcore violence and stuff. I finally went out and got my sleeping pad and slept on the deck for the night. In the morning after coffee and breakfast I stood and watched whales, dolphins, sailfish, other unknown fish and all the birds from the rail of the ferry. We arrived in Mazatlan a little later than the schedule but all was well.

We rode into town and checked into a hostel. I had planned to jump right on a bus but tht proved more difficult than I had imagined. So I will spend a night or two here and buy tickets etc then leave under more controlled conditions. I am kind of used to planning on the fly but sometimes a bit of planning is ok. the hostel is full of nice people from around the world and is clean and comfortable. Mardi Gras is going on now here so it might be loud later tonight, we shall see. more later