Heading to final destination

30748 km, Merida (Yucatan)

From Oaxaca i am starting again solo. Bine again is taking a bus to the coast. There are again a lot of mountains on the way to the Pacific. On the second day, i climb 1.900 meters by bike and spend the night in a small town high up in the mountains. I get a very simple and cheap room, but the view over the mountains is really great. Sunset and -rise is awesome!

On the way down to the Pacific Coast i still have to climb 900 meters, but i am descending more than 3.300 meters. Not a bad deal! The landscape changes from pinetree-forest to tropical vegetation, until it turns into dry and brown surrounding just before the coast. After 110 km i arrive in Puerto Angel, and i am with Bine again.


As Puerto Angel is not that nice, we move to the next place east, just 5 kilometers away. Zipolite. And 2 days later a few kms more east to Mazunte. Both villages are very nices places for us to relax, have good food and have nice and cool beers just in front the powerful open Pacific Ocean. Great!

As my younger brother is marrying Bine and me have to agree on a definite plan for our journey. After long discussions we find a solution. As Bine wanted to end the journey also a few weeks ago, we agree on going both home to the wedding - meaing the journey is over. Mostly for financial reasons we choose Cancun on the Yucatan Peninsula as our final destination. And because this is too far for us to get there alone on our bicycles, we agreed on taking a bus from Pochutla to Palenque, with a short stopover in the famous city of San Cristobal de la Casas. Within one hour we booked the flight and the busride via internet. It's decided. Let's go home.

We arrived at 6 o clock in the morning in San Cristobal, and had a short visit of the historic district. It would have been much more impressive for me, when i would have cycled to this place. Therefore it is just a "nice" town where we had breakfast before the bus to Palenque leaves.

Just before we got ón the bus wé met - what a surprise - Mark, with whom we cycled a couple of months through the US and Mexico. He is also going to Palenque by bus. Within the next two days we had a lot to tell what happened the last couple of weeks, till we split in Valle de Bravo. We also visit together the impressive and very nice ruins of Palenque! And we also met a nice cycling couple from the Netherlands. Also from Alaska on their way south. But those two are not ending their trip soon. They want to go on at least to Bolivia.


On the next Bine and me sit on our bikes quite early. We now start the last leg of our big trip. The last 1.000 kilometers to Cancun. We for the second time have to say goodbye to Mark, and off we are.

The big issue for the last leg for sure is handling the heat. We are now in flatlands on about sea level. Therefore we sit on our bikes at 7 o clock and try to cover as much as kilometers as possible until lunch. Then we either have a long stop until it cools down, or we have a "final sprint" to our destination. Unfortunately the landscape is worse than i thought. The vegetation is completely dry and brown. Just sometimes a little bit of green. Heat. Long strechtes of just cycling on a straight road heading north. Boring. What a pity! But at least we make some nice 120 Kilometers day, which means we are good fulfilling our time schedule. This is motivating.

The Yucatan Peninsula is different to "central" Mexico we experienced during the last 2 months. It is very "US-americanized", similar to the Baja California. Just bigger towns. Normally quite "modern" and ugly. And also the prices are much higher than we had before. Champoton at the Golf of Mexico is ugly. Campeche very clean, sterile, expensive. The malecon modern and along a 4-lane road. Compared to all those nice towns in Mexico we had been before it is quite depressing for me.

Merida is a big city, but despite the many western tourists also not very interesting. Nevertheless a place for us to recover and relax. And the place from which we want to visit the rosa flamingos in Celestun by tomorrow...