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| Port Isabel, TX |
Because yeah, its Thanksgiving! Despite not getting any pumpkin pie, turkey, mashed potatoes, avoiding the cranberry stuff, and a healthy dose of modern family, its always a great day. Have no idea what happened in the football games today. Basketball now too? Oh well. I had 8 street tacos for dinner. Wait for it… up the street. Then got a tecate on the way back. Tried to get four but she didn’t have enough change to give me the balance on a ten dollar bill. So I gave her the single I had and just took one. Why didn’t I just buy more beer? Good question.
My day on the road was a bit more eventful than usual. First border crossing and all. God it went great! I’d made it the 40 minutes back down from South Padre to the crossing, after topping off the gas, caffeine, and nicotine, before 8. It was dark when I woke up and the sun was just coming up as I started the day. Got to the border and the first guard shack. They were jovial while they asked for three dollars. Rode across the bridge to the next point where I drove through the scanner and it beeped at me. Crap, but I drove up to the inspection lane and the guy just sat there so I just kind of slowly rolled on by. I don’t think he said anything but I had ear plugs in under my helmet and didn’t look back. We just kind of looked at each other. It was really weird.
Then it started to go south. I mean I’m supposed to go south so I just kind of followed my nose and thought I was going the right way. I’d just cruised through the border with the little film canister in the secret pocket, its early, I got a full tank of gas, I’m finally in a foreign land again, and hey… its thanksgiving! So I cruised for a while. Matamoros is not exactly small. Pulled out my gps’s and I needed to turn around. No big deal. But I had to do that like three more times until I was finally on the way out of town on the right road. And even then I had to check again. Welcome away from America. It probably took or cost me more than hour but I didn’t feel bad about it because I set it up so id have a short run to Tampico. Id still get in there some time in the middle afternoon and relax. You’ll notice im not writing this from Tampico.
So I drive about 75k and get to the ‘Aduanas’ station. Customs. Cool. No big deal. I was just here in March and also entering by vehicle so this was kind of expected. What I didn’t expect was that I needed to have a sticker on my windscreen. Id read or heard something to that effect before but didn’t have to do it earlier in the year so… whatever. no big deal. BUT. But, you can only get the sticker at the ‘Frontera’/Border. Yeahp. That’s what I had to do. Rael was great when I got back down there btw and was sheepish when explaining what I had to do. So I drive all the way back up, all the way through Matamoros, and get to the border. It wasn’t exactly obvious where I had to go to get around to the aduanas ao im kind of riding around when this nice looking guard was walking to her truck. Long story short is she takes me through a checkpoint, through the middle, and over to the right building.
So I go in. there is no one behind any of the windows but there are two people at the information desk. But they don’t speak English. At the US border! With incoming english speakers looking to get answers. Quizzical. My spanish got me to the right window but he was to be right back. He got to the window and I had to explain what I was doing. Isn’t this all he does? Anyway, he fills out my form. Very slowly. Its in Spanish but it would have taken me a small fraction. Now I am definitely starting to have to think tranquilo thoughts. He gets done and I have to go across the lobby to another window. I guess I have my visa but now I have to pay. So I go pay. For the visa, for the sticker AND a $300- US deposit. Jeez. And its only good for 30 days so when I come back through I have to do it again. She needs copies of my title, registration, license, passport, and visa. Fifty cents each at another window. Then back to her. Meanwhile she had to take my visa back over to the other guy and use some white out. Yeah they still use a lot of whiteout in MX. She gives it back to me so I can make a copy. Then I go back to her, give her my credit card. Chaching. $350 en todo. Then back to the original window. He does something to my passport and checks my stuff then finally I can go. Oh yeah, somewhere in there I had to wait for another guy so I could go out to my bike and he could check my title against the VIN. So then, its finally time to leave and there is a big orange cone in the middle of the apparent exit lane from this separate little parking lot for the declarations building I’ve been in. So, I salida through the entrada and turn to go back through the checkpoint where the guy and I had the weirdness. They were about to get on me for going the wrong way but I think they could see in my eyes that id had about enough. So after a light scolding they said “ok” and kind of waved me on. Fuck what a pain in the ass. But its still early and its thanksgiving. I’d hate to see what that would have taken on a normal business day, in the middle of the day. Cant even imagine how people do it.
So this time I’m not going to get lost because hey, I already did this once this morning. As I’m coming out of the border area and into Matamoros I immediately realize why I went the wrong way. The way you are supposed to go is closed for construction. So I snake around and get on the highway a block later. I’m on the right road. Awesome. I can be back down to Rael at Aduanas in a hurry and still make Tampico for apertivos y cervezas. Not to be.
It seems there is a jaunt you’re not supposed to miss as you’re leaving town on the right road. So one of the times I stop to check my GPS(I definitely need to figure out how to get my iphone to stay up on display like a real GPS cuz this bites ass) my bike won’t start. It acted kind of funny the last couple times I started it but I thought it was just because I had the fan running for stop and go traffic, the headlight on for safety, and the phone plugged in for charging. Huh. Let it sit for a few with everything unplugged and let it cool off. Still wouldn’t. Not even like the solenoid is engaging the starter gear. Really dead and staying dead. Fuck. I’m parked at an OXXO(7-11 ish) on a busy intersection and my bike is dead. With all my shit on it. And that’s a lot of shit.
A guy from the shop next door came over to see if he could help(then he bummed a smoke) as I took off my riding jacket and gloves and helmet and earplugs. Laid all that crap down and cracked my bashguard toolbox open. Then had to open and partially empty the right pannier to get at my socket set. Took the seat off and the left body part so I could get at the battery. Couldn’t remove the battery holder as it’s a #3 phillips and was crusted solid. I only have a #1 and #2 phillips head and I couldn’t get it without ruining the head of the screwbolt. So I improvised and got the cover off the top of the holder without removing the battery. BTW- I love my bike. The engineers made this thing so it could last in the field and god its awesome in that regard.
My battery is the stock unit. Its not a sealed battery. It has 6 cells. Totally old school. With little rubber caps on top of each cell. I pulled the first cap and looked in. No water! Like none. At all. Hell, there’s your problem. At least it made the diagnostics easy. Now I had to figure out a way to get water in there while its still in my bike with wiring and fuses and frame in the way. And fill six ¼’ holes without getting it everywhere.
I had a bottle of Dasani. Not exactly distilled and ok for the battery. But I figure I need a new Yuasa sealed gel cell anyway so I never have to worry about this again and I’m ok with using it. Now how the hell to get it in there? After asking in the OXXO and looking and asking around(I would have settled for squirt gun), I ended up taking a plastic coke bottle that was in the gutter and rinsing it out with my good water and poking a small hole in one of the bumps on the bottom with my leatherman. Then I filled it up with just a couple ounces with my finger over the hole. I was going to try and dribble it in to each cell. It kind of worked I guess but not really. So I took my smallest allen wrench, held it to my finger and my finger over the hole and the wrench down in the cell and got it to fill mostly efficiently if not slow. Cool. 5 more to go.
At some point a guy stops because he’s riding a Kawi Ninja. I say hey. He says hey. Turns out he lives in Brownsville and his English is better than my Spanish and he offers to jump me. My battery. My moto battery.
I get the battery cells done and the caps back on and the holder/cover back in place and re attach the ground and… presto! Fired up like a champ. I thought the first dude from next door was going to cry. He didn’t think I could be Mexican enough I suppose. Then he bummed another smoke while I shut it down and packed up my tools and yard sale and got ready to FINally get headed south on the right road with the right shit. I have to admit I was pretty proud of myself. Don’t know why I was embarrassed really. It seems so commonplace to have a broken down vehicle down here its just not common for the dude under the hood to be a gringo.
So anyways… I pushed hard the rest of the day trying to still make Tampico but couldn’t do it. I was very tempted to break my rule of no riding at night outside the states on the very first night! Ended up getting a really nice room from a really nice family in the middle of nowhere. Paid too much though. Equivalent of $23.
Eight street tacos and two tecates later I am going to bed. No turkey and not a chance of finding a shot of Kentucky straight bourbon whiskey(wild turkey) to say I celebrated the day properly. Oh well. I’m tired. Good day.
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