Self-contained century!

This afternoon we rolled into Santa Rosalia. It is on the eastern side of the peninsula right on the Sea of Cortez. It is by far our favorite town that we have been in so far on our trip. There seems to be a lot of history and a lot of the buildings are old with some stone streets and a really cool center of town. In addition, it seems very lively and full of life. It has been a welcome respite from multiple days in the desert and almost abondoned pueblitos.

A little interpretation of the bikespeak in the title of this post. Jeff and I are doing our journey self contained; that is, we carry everything that we need for the entire trip, not counting food and water that we are buying as we go along. We have all of our clothes, cookware, tent, sleeping bags, maps, tools, water for the day, and a few days food, everything on our bikes. It makes it more challenging because our bikes weigh much more than normal. The century part of the title describes a bike ride in which 100 miles are covered. It was quite a challenge and took a while, but yesterday we rode 100 miles! It was possible mainly due to the flat terrain and a friendly breeze at our backs, not to mention our incredible endurance, rock hard quads as our weapons, and the elven kings from Lord of the Rings at our sides. It was quite an accomplishment, and it made our ride today very short and easy so that we could enjoy an afternoon by the ocean.

Also yesterday, we ran into our first fellow cyclists! It was these two gnarly ladies from Oregon that met on couchsurfing in order to do the trip. They had some adventures to tell. We met them around lunch time and it just so happened that they still had 4 beers in the packs..just enough for us all to share! They had started at the other end of the peninsula and had taken a mainly dirt road until it met up with the highway 1 that we are taking. Their trip seemed much more haphazard and disorganized than ours (I thought that ours was quite off the cuff!) and it seemed to suit them just fine. It was a pleasure meeting them.

Our last night in Guerrero Negro, we attempted what we called "the black warrior bar crawl" (if you did not read my earlier post, guerrero negro translates to black warrior). We soon learned that it was an ill-fated attempt when nobody in town could name which place was open. Not to be deterred, we gave steady business to the three places that were open: Playeros (beach bums), in which we were served by a man that looked like a Mexican Bob Marley and we played pool as the electricity was flickering on and off, El Delfin (the dolphin), where they serve cold cut up hot dogs and olives in the place of popcorn and peanuts, and La Carreta (the carriage), which had a pole in the middle of a large room that we originally thought was to hold up the ceiling until the 40+ bartender wearing a miniskirt and dangerously low cut shirt told us that she is a dancer and pointed to the pole (we put the rest together). All three bars were nearly empty and the owners and bar staff were anxious to be of service. The spanish practice was great and we made some great memories, making many promises to come back some day (just not on pole-dancing night).

Tomorrow, we hope to head south along the coast to Mulege and maybe past. After that is Loreto and then back towards the west. We have heard from many that Mulege and Loreto are both pretty touristy, so we will see what the next few days hold.

Regarding pictures, it has been a challenge to find a computer at an internet cafe that accepts our memory card and we forgot a cord. Pictures will be posted as soon as we can find a way!

A shout out to all my cycling amigos completing the BRR ride tomorrow. The only thing that I am not jealous about is the weather!