Puerto Penasco, Mexico

[Orpheus]

I just got back from taking a little Spring Break trip with my girlfriend to Puerto Penasco, Mexico. We loaded up the GZ with a tent, sleeping bag, filled the saddlebags and each of us had a small backpack. From Tempe, AZ to Puerto Penasco was around a 6 hour ride, since we had to stop around every 45 minutes to stretch. The ride is a little boring once you get into Mexico, but the US side is pretty nice; you go through Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, and between quite a few mountain passes. When we went down, quite a few of the roadside flowers were blooming, and the temperatures were around 80-85 during the day (lows of around 45 at night).

As we took off, we ran into a lot of traffic on I-10 out of Phoenix, but it lightened up after about an hour, and we were cruising along (at over 80mph!) for the remainder of the I-10 leg of the trip (around 5-10 minutes). I couldn't believe that we were able to cruise under those circumstances at that kind of speed, but somehow we did. My bike is a completely standard US version, and I had just tuned it up, but I really didn't believe that a little 250 could reach those kinds of speeds with two riders and gear. Since we were on the freeway, there was a bit of a tail wind, but no downhill grade or anything. One factor that probably affected the performance of the bike was that I didn't shift to each higher gear until I had absolutely redlined the previous gear; I don't remember exactly what speeds I shifted each gear at, but I know that I can hit around 55mph before I have to shift into 5th. After this experience, I thought that my speedometer might be off, so once we got back home I had my girlfriend follow me in the car and we confirmed that my speedometer is accurate.

Getting off of I-10, we took US85 South for the remainder of the trip (which turns into route 8 in Mexico). This took us through a number of small towns and through the AZ countryside. Traffic was relatively light for the week of ASU's Spring Break, and we only occasionally saw other traffic going in our direction. It's a nice little ride through AZ; there are small towns about every 45 minutes, which makes it perfect for stopping the bike to get up and stretch in every town. We didn't get a chance to stop at Organ Pipe National Monument (since we got a late start on the way down and were rushing to make it back in time for me to get to work on the way back), but I think that might be a day trip for another time.

Once into Mexico, we passed a little border town and were off into the Mexican countryside. Nothing really to report here; it's pretty much just desolate desert. The signs change from MPH to KPH, but that's about the only thing worth mentioning. I thought drivers were bad in Phoenix, but they are HORRIBLE in Mexico. I typically do the posted speed limit, at least within 3-5mph; drivers in Phoenix usually do 10-15 over the speed limit and in Mexico they must be going 20-25 over. I was really paranoid about getting pulled over in another country, so I tried to stay as close to the speed limits as I could and I got passed like I was standing still (by cars with Mexican plates as well as US ones).

After about an hour to an hour and a half, we reached the town of Puerto Penasco. Although much of the town is run-down and not really nice, it gets much better as you get closer to the beach. This town is "Mexico for Gringos" so it's fairly well-kept along the coast. When we pulled into town, we didn't know anything about the area, so we had to search around forever for anything we needed. We ended up finding a nice little beach campground for $5/night and had a little campfire and a couple of beers and called it a night. When we woke up the next morning, we stowed our camp gear at the security guard station and went into town. The "Old Town" area is pretty cool, with shops lining one side of the street and bars/restaurants lining the other (along the coast). Downstairs from the restaurants, there is a little farmer's market area where you can buy fresh seafood and such (it's set up like a little two-story strip mall). Anyways, that's pretty much what we did every day while we were there; camp out on the beach at night and cruise into town during the day. Most of the roads that aren't main thoroughfares are dirt, and you have to be really careful about crazy college kids flying past you in trucks and ATV's, but I didn't really have any problems as long as I kept an eye on my mirrors and stayed to one side of the road whenever someone was coming past me.

Overall, it was an excellent experience and I'm looking forward to going back some time this fall.

Here's a couple of pictures: