I am here for the 4th year in a row, riding my bicycle each day.
I usually do more posting once I am home but this year I have done a fairly good job of keeping up daily,
The high lights so far have been visiting Dan and his family at Azul Beach resort. That story is in the Saturday ride page. I road down to Puerto Morelos for the first time and that story is in the Sunday ride page. Yet to be writtin is the Patriots first round playoff victory that I watched for the second year at Hooters at their Isla location.
I’m almost at the 1/2 way point. Have ridden 5 days and hope to ride 6 more. Tomorrow is Monday, 1/14. I arrived on Monday 1/7 but too late to ride and it rained Tuesday morning. Monday is always a hard day to ride. Most of the normal groups take the day off. My idea is to show up at the normal “Hotel Road” meeting point in plenty of time as always for the regular leaving, 6:15. My guess is that no one will show. But if someone does, I will probably start off with them, get dropped at some point and return along the 307 route that I rode today instead of reversing and riding the Hotel Road back. If no one shows, I will ride back to Elite Cyclery and follow the road out of their toward Porto Morelos. Instead of following the route we took today, Sunday, I will try riding on the wrong side of the road and pick up a new bike path that has just been in operation the last few months, It is brand new and leads maybe 5K? toward the airport and the end of the Hotel Road. I might ride it back and forth a couple times and then come home.
My plan for later Monday, once recovered, is to take a Colectivo, local “we go when we are full” van, toward Puerto Morelos. One of the hardest parts of that adventure is the Colectivos going to that area only leaves from a parking lot behind the ADO bus station and that station is like 2K in the wrong direction from my airbnb! To make matters worse, I am not really going to Puerto Morelos but instead about 4K beyond that access road to a brewery called Casa Cervecera Pescadores. Internet says they open at 10:30. I have been there before. There is no food. Just a man at a bar making beer in the back room. Hopefully I can write down the name and the man loading the Colectivos will be able to charge me the correct amount. Because I have the iphone google maps, it is easy for me to yell to be let out when we get near the right place. After a few beers, I have the challenge of getting to Porto Morelos for lunch. I have a great place to eat. To get to the actual town, I need to cross the road that the brewery is on and flag down a taxi or Colectivo that will take me back the 4K to the Porto Morelos access road. Running up and down that road is a VERY inexpensive, like 25 cents, bus.
I used to always eat in Puerto Morelos at La Sierna. He often has some almost reasonable beer on draft and a few Greek dishes like Gyro and Taramasalata. But the man last year at Pescadores directed me to the restaurant across the square, Punta Corcho, and I loved it. Another of my favorite locations in town is just a wall next to Dai y Noche Beach club. I have to sit on the ground but I am in the shade and have a wall for a back rest. There is lots of activity as the locals take tourists out on boats from there and getting the boats off the beach and into the surf without scaring the tourists to death is a wonderful reality play.