Two for the road…
The Mad-dog Englishman
In the tradition of the best English travel writers… those not quite innocents abroad who set off for places out of the Empire… I’ve been immensely enjoying Simon Gandolfi’s blog. This is great travel writing:
I have read fearful accounts of foreigners’s encounters with Mexican officialdom. Those officials with whom I have dealt have gone out of their way to be helpful.
So what have I seen now that my eyes are open. A toy castle, 1660. What every kid wants: a ramp leading to a drawbridge. Gate into fierce walls mellowed by age. A square keep with a pepperpot on top. Parapets with canon in every aperture and a second pepper pot on one corner. Perfect size for a TV make-over program. Immagine the dialogue betweent the two presenter/designers!
The central square Plaza de Armas) is good rather than great – cathedral along one side has a good interior lit by chandeliers and is small enough to feel intimate rather than overbearing. There’s a good cloister dwn one side, a plush hotel opposite, a line of cafes across from the cathedral, palm trees round the sides, clump of leaved trees (must check what) in the middle round a bandstand with live music in the evening. I threaded my way thru the market today on my way to somewhere else, crowded and very friendly. Cab driver told me: “In Veracruz you can walk anywhere at half past one in the morning. Mexico City you’d be murdered.”
The city is tidy for a Mexican city. Lots of trees, masses of small shops (how do they make a living?), masses of small restaurants and ice cream parlors and ten-table cafes. Street vendors don’t bug you, are happy to give directions and like to chat.
I read in a guide book that Veracruz has a strong black influence. I haven´t seen a single black person. The standard skin colour is a rich pale golden moca – imagine a good sun tan without the red. And very goodlooking, especially the younger generation. Long trousers on the men is obligatory. Girls show their tummys. Given the heat, this seems an unfair advantage. Though I wouldn’t want to show mine.
OK – I am off to sit in the Plaza de Armas, drink a cold beer, listen to music and watch the folk dance.And I shall probably worry much of the night as to how I will handle the Honda and the traffic…
The author was 73 when he set off in May 2006 for a visit to friends in upstate New York, from which he took on a Honda motorbike for Dallas and other points south, recording the the by-ways, folkways and weirdness of life on the road from Texas to Tierra del Fuego. I’m immensely enjoying the “travels of a fat old toad on a bike – US/Mexican border to Tierra del Fuego” and sincerely hope someone options this, pays Simon an obscenely huge amount of money (though he said there’s no such thing as an “obscene” amount when you’re putting two kids through college) and fosters a few more of these eccentric Englishmen abroad.
Cheers, mate!
Caroline and Bill’s Excellent Adventure (or… The Golf to the Gulf)
Sending back posts to The Lonely Planet Mexico Message Board, “Peche” sent nearly daily updates of the drive from Tweed, Ontario (near the east end of Lake Ontario) to Playa de Carmen, Quintano Roo. Canadian travel reports are fun. It’s a stereotype, but they are generally “homey” people… who focus in on the exotica. And come to think of it, Tennesee and Texas are as exotic as Veracruz and the Yucatan …
Caroline (an asthmatic) and Bill (a smoker, but a highly considerate one) braved snowstorms, bureaucratic mixups and the vaguaries of Mexican road signs on their 3500 mile (5600 Km) retirement odessey.
As I mentioned before, I’d been finding it hard to believe we were on the right road even when I had ample reason to think we were. This day was quite remarkable in this sense, as we repeatedly ended up in the right place, although I couldn’t have told you exactly how we got there. We bypassed Tampico successfully, which we understand is an important step in keeping one’s sanity on this journey.
When you think of a toll bypass, do you imagine a four-lane highway, quite empty, clearly marked, well-manicured? So did we. Well, you ain’t seen the Tampico bypass.
Apparently Veracruz state is the topes (speed bump) capital of Mexico. A lot of the aforementioned bypass turned out to be the secondary roads that go through the small towns, all of which have a dozen or more topes, necessitating slowing to a crawl, repeat … repeat … repeat … crawl up one side of the bump and down the other side … zzzzzz
It was so painful, I wish I could have fallen asleep. I was so glad Bill didn’t. He heroically drove all day, all 12 hours. (Mind you, it’s impossible to pry him out of the driver’s seat. Trust me, I offer all day, but he’s just more comfortable driving.)
We saw some interesting sights and I think the one that sticks most is the guy backing up, right in the flow of traffic. We had seen him barreling backwards up a side road and didn’t think anything of it – he’d changed his mind and wanted to go a different way.
Then Bill saw him in the side mirror, still backing up, on the side of the road. Suddenly, he’s in the rearview mirror, traveling at speed, still backing up! This continued for miles!
Finally, we came to a toll bridge and, thank goodness, by the time we’d paid the toll he had disappeared. We think maybe they said, “It’s our bridge and you’re not going over it backwards.”
Then there was the gas station, where we made a bathroom break (well yeah for me, but Bill smokes even more than I pee). Bill watched a horrendous crash, two pick ups, one suddenly deciding to turn into the gas station and the other one running up his tail.
We were shocked the police arrived so quickly, until we realized they were camped up the road stopping everyone for a drug check. They asked us to open the trunk but lost interest when we then produced a Spanish list of everything in there.
We’ve had a lot of help from Sanborn’s guide, as they give a lot of detail. However we discovered we can’t necessarily rely on it. In one case they said a junction would be found at K50, and it was actually at the end of the road after K1. Naturally, for 49 kilometers we were looking and looking and worrying and worrying. Thus is my lot as navigator. Feel my pain.
The Golf survived, though in a postscript, she tells us, it finally did die — temporarialy — when headed to the WalMart … I wish them the best in their (and the Golf’s) well deserved retirement to the Promised Land.
mexfiles.net 
Appreciation of one’s work by a fellow writer is a delight and can only be bettered by appreciation from a writer of huge cheques. Many thanks and I hope one day to eat camaranes a el diablo in your company above the fish market, simon
PS: I spell badly – nowadays this is called dyslexia. In my school days it was called laziness. In my first writing job (a national Sunday newspaper), the editor called it stupidity, ringed all my mistakes and marked a dispatch as if it were schoolwork: 2/100 spelling.
Everyone in the building laughed
resigned.
Loved your stuff, especially the part about the Sanborn’s Travelog, since I used to write it, many years ago. I’m certain that you had a newer one, since, naturally, I would not have made a 49 kilometer mistake — grin. At least, I hope I didn’t.