We didn't have to have the bikes back til 6pm and I wanted to get more riding in since I was finally feeling comfortable on the bike. We rode north back to Tijuana, dealing with more traffic than we had yet to experience but it wasn't bad at all. I'd much rather be on a moto than in a car. We were following Josh, it was fun ride in a 4 bike group. I think we missed the turn - he was taking us to a 'hiking trail' so we re-grouped at this gas station to make an illegal turn (yes lots of honking at us but hey a perk of the moto) to make our way back around the highway to get to the road we needed to be on.
Another pit stop at the top of the hill where supposedly this trail was suppose to start... haha! But we had a great view. According to Josh's map there was a road that could take us north leading back to the north west corner of the country and where our bike rental place was.... little did we know what we were in for, lol.
But first one last photo shoot on the bike. :-P
As you can see we are now on dirt roads, which I actually preferred because I just stayed in first gear, no clutch work it was FUN! As crazy as the next stretch of road was it was probably the funnest part and I'm VERY glad this was at the end of the trip when I felt good on the bike verses that first day. From the point above the road straight ahead went straight down and straight up... so we turned the corner and there was no straight up but it was mostly straight down. Josh went first, then Juan, I was next feeling good, going slow, riding the clutch. I was about midway through when I saw Josh going back up, Kyle had laid it down at the top and he went back up to help. The way it felt and with the slope it was super heavy and took both of them to tip it back upright. I had to break my camera out. You can barely see the two of them at the top of this hill.
Kyle made it down:
We traveled on, road much like this... when you think of poverty in Tijuana... well this was it. We were in the BOWELS of the city. Unable to take photos while riding, really wish we had a GoPro running for this trek. We passed PIGS and Josh just had to stop. Have you seen the movie deliverance? Well that was running through my head about this point, HA! It was fun riding, but I also did NOT want to stop, get us safely out of here.
There were two guys pulling nails out of pallets and were very nice when Josh asked if he could take a photo. As you could imagine the smell riding next to this.
We continued on as it was really only big enough for one vehicle, we had to pull off a little when an approaching car/truck came by, everyone looking at us like we were crazy. Three fancy bikes (not really fancy but they did look brand new since they were rentals and matching). Josh had a tendency to stop on a hill to re-group which I was not a fan of because I'd end up killing it trying to get going on the incline. I did say my feet could touch... well my tip-toes could touch on flat ground, much harder on a slope.
We started to make our way through a little bit more civilazation... well shanty's side by side. We'd ride by and the children would look at us and run inside... til eventually we made it to the top again and a paved road and road signage, yes! We'd made it out, phew. It was fun. We took the city road down around through a little tunnel but had an amazing ride, riding into an ocean view. Which landed us at the northwest corner of the country where we made one final stop at friendship park. The park that lies right at the wall of Mexico and United States.
Read this, very interesting:
We sad our goodbyes to Juan and returned the bikes :-(
One other place Josh had on his food list and in walkable distance from our hotel, just 1 km, was a place called Tras Horizonte by Kokopelli. He had heard the octopus was good.
We were celebrating a great trip! We all felt stuffed from the food the past few days so we shared a couple things. Didn't get a photo of the octopus taco before we at it.
Back at the hotel and our final rest of the trip. Oh here was the final map of what we rode on Friday (technically day 4 of our trip)
The next morning I woke up and got a workout in, then we had the breakfast buffet before heading out. Josh had parked his car at a friends house that first night, then we learned the hotel had free parking so he went to get the car while Kyle and I attempted the hot tub (turned into cold sauna sit) and left it parked in the hotel parking garage. So we just went down, loaded up and prepared to cross the border.
Weights in kilograms.
In preparation for this trip we had applied to get global entry. Mine processed pretty quickly and I was able to get the access, Kyle's is still processing. So I was able to stay in the car with Josh, we let Kyle hop out and go through the walking border crossing and picked him up on the other side of the border.
Back in the US, we drove to San Diego to do some sight seeing before our plane departure.
We explored North Park. Stopping in at this book store.
Isaac sent us a photo of Thomas at his first basketball game.
I had a hankering for tres leches cake... which was pretty difficult to hunt down. Thankfully there was a grocery store next to this bakery where we scored a decent looking piece, grabbed that and some fruit then drove over to Balboa park for a little snack picnic and walk around.
Made the mistake of looking at our phones to see the moment Alexa Pretti got shot... not fun to be away from your home city and seeing it splashed all over the news!
Josh dropped us off at the airport where we continued to tune into news events, not looking forward to going back to Minneapolis and kinda disappointed at the buzz kill of a great week. But we didn't let it get us down, we morned the events the next few days, I took a few days to let the grief pass through then picked up on the high of the trip and what a wonderful time it was to get away. Also going through it again two months later reminds me how fun it was and reliving the memories. Can't wait to do it again.
#noloentenderias
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