Riding through the jungles of Chiapas and Guatemala

So we have finally began to ride our bicycles non stop through the deep jungles of Chiapas and made our way across the Guatemalan boarder where we currently are.
On our second or third day of non stop bicycle riding from Cometan, Chiapas, we came across a construction site. Now at first I thought it would be just an average construction site, but I was totally wrong. Apparently the river washed out some of the road which meant that there were cars lined up on both sides of the road with no way to pass over. There was a huge tractor scooping up a bunch of dirt and filling in the road. After the tractor smoothed over the road they started to let cars pass. After some cars passed by our whole bicycle gang of 8 bicyclist passed over the road with no problem. After a brief moment of excitement and jumping around we heard crying and people screaming. We all turned around immediatly and saw that the road that just got packed in started to crumble, which made a pick up truck fall in the dirt partially. Everyone evactuated the truck safely before we arrived on the scene. Kipchoge and I and some of the rest of the gang started to run towards the truck. As I arrived to the scene people started yelling at me in Spanish and English saying they wanted to use my light and that they needed a large chain that was in the back of their truck. Without thinking I quickly jumped into the back of the truck which was halfway off the road trying to find a chain. Shortly after throwing everything around in the back of the truck frantickly, I found the chain and then carefully jumped out. They connected the chain to the tractor and the tractor pulled the truck out which turned out to be a happy ending.
So after biking through the dense jungles of Chiapas and camping out in various places everynight, we have finally found ourselves in Guatemala. As soon as we crossed the boarder we realized that Guatemala is a little different compared to Mexico. The roads, the clothing, the food, the langauge, and the money have all changed.
So now we are currently in Coban, Guatemala trying to figure out where our adventure will bring us next.

Oaxaca and San Pedro Cajonos

So we took another bus to the beautiful city of Oaxaca Mexico. We played a really cool show in a small cafe called Cafe Central, the place was packed full of people and it was a pretty cool atmosphere. The show went well, there system only shut down once for a couple of seconds. There werent that many volunteers though, the crew including me pedaled the bikes a lot. And the same volunteers kept coming up for more. There were a lot of girls with high heels pedaling, which seems like it wouldn´t be too fun. Then after the show I danced all night until about 430 am. The next day I Kipchoge, Corey, Laughter, and Dave took a cab up to San Pedro Cajonos for a fiesta. Cara, Matt,Jared, an awesome indeginous guy, and me hitchhiked on the back of a pick up truck to the same fiesta. We arrived to the fiesta and met up with the others. We paid 50 pesos to get inside. The music wasn´t very good at first. It was really really loud and not a lot of people were dancing at first. Then after a couple hours a lot of alchohol for everyone else besides me, it started to get a little fun. I started dancing solo among the large crowd with traditional mexican music. Then Corey tackled Jared and the police with the big guns came after and pretty much kept an eye on us, which wasnt cool. Then we left shortly after that and slept at an awesome community center. They gave us bowls of hot chocolate and bread that night. Then in the morning we woke up to the band of horns, drums, and symbols walking into the community center where we were sleeping. I took a short little video of some of it. It was one of the best wake up calls I ever had in my life. Then I walked around the beautiful town of San Pedro Cajonos. I got invited into a nice little house and met a couple of children and Antonio who spoke english. Then I went back to go find the rest of the crew. We firgured out that there was a huge protest against the price of diesel gas. Which meant that there were no buses are taxis coming in or out of town. So we all split up in pairs of two and hitch hiked. Me and Dave hitch hiked together, before we left the town. this awesome family invited us in for lunch. We taught them a little bit of english while they taught us some Spanish. My Spanish is getting much better. I am more confident to out on my own to get food or just to have small conversations with people. Today we are taking our final bus to San Cristobal, Chiapas. From there we will start to ride non stop to Panama. I am excited and a little nervous for the epic journey ahead. Hopefully I will try to post up some pictures and Videos in the near future.

One more last blog worthy story=
So on the way out of Mexico City we rode our bikes to the bus station. On the bus station the whole gang stopped at this section of stores that were all music stores. There were about 10 different music stores. So we all split up and walked around while Kipchoge and Jared were looking for a new mixer. Dave went into a cafe and brought his back pack with his computer, cell phone, and chargers in there. The guy at the cafe was really nice and kind and knew a little bit of english. Then the crew regrouped and we rode to the bus station. About five minutes after we got to the bus station, Dave remembered he forgot his backpack with all of his valuables in it. He started flipping out and was going to ride his bike back to the cafe which was about a 15 or 20 minute ride. Then we all sugegsted that he should take a taxi. So right when he ran to grab a taxi, the guy from the cafe comes out of no where and starts running towards us covered from head to toe in sweat. It turns out that he ran all the way from the cafe to the bus station on stop with daves bag. Someone ran and got dave to tell him. We all gave him hugs and gave him 20 pesos for doing so. It was unbelievable and very awesome. That shows you how nice people really are, especially in Mexico. Everyone has been so kind and generous to us. I am having an excellent time, and I think it will only get better.

Last Day In Mexico City

So today is my last day in Mexico City. I had a fantastic time and I had some times that I will never forget. Last night me and my new found couch surfing friends all went to a free jazz concert in Coyoacon. It was a really great show. Then on the last three songs the saxophonist daughter came out on stage and sang. It was really great and entertaining. Then after the show we spoke with her for a while and played with some really cool children. They were the children of some local merchants selling jewelery on the street. Then after that we walked to a park and saw this great Mexican guitar player playing a traditional mexican guitar with 7 strings. Then after a few songs he asked if any of us played and everyone pointed to me. So I got next to him and played a beautiful classical guitar while he played his traditional guitar. It was an amazing expeirience. It was great music that I will never forget. I needed that, It made me feel so powerful and creative. I just let everything flow through me and into the guitar. Everyone enjoyed it and there is a video of 2 of the songs. I will post up a link to it after it is posted up online.
So tonight we are going to take a bus to Oaxaca. There will be 10 of us. Enio is a new addition to the pleasant revolution. He has got us a lot of shows and will continue to do so. He is the tour manager I believe. Which is good because we definitly needed a tour manager.
So I have been feeling a little better after I took some anti biotics but I have also been feeling a little weird. Sometimes it feels like the floor is moving when I am standing still, and it kind of feels like everything around me is pulsating sometimes , which is wierd. If it gets worse I will see a real doctor in Oaxaca. I would love to go to a beach in Oaxaca but I don´t think we will. But Kipchoge said we will go to some beachs in Central America. I can´t wait.

My battle with pollution, amibas and loco driving in Mexico City

So it has been an intense week for me so far. We have been working on the bicycle generators because we keep having multiple problems on stage at pretty much every show. But we still manage to have a great time and have really cool shows. I keep meeting a lot of cool people and I am learning more and more about the Mexican culture everyday.
So the other day Dave,Dante and I rode our bicycles to Dantes shop where we worked on the generators. The ride there was nuts. It was really conjested traffic and the pollution was unbelievable. The ride wouldn't of been so bad if there wasn't so much pollution. The pollution is so bad that you can see it everyday. It just lurks over the city and hangs out in the tops of the trees. But I survived.
Anyways I apparently ate some dirty delicous street food which gave me some amibas in my blood stream which made me have bloody poop. It was awful. It was the most blood I ever seen come out of mi ano ever. But I went to a really small medico clinic that was the size of my bedroom. There were about 40 people in line waiting for care. I eventually saw the doctor who didn't speak any english. He prescribed me some antibiotic pills which kills the bacteria. I am taking three different pills all at the same time. I feel a little weird but I hope it helps. He said I can't drink alchohol for two weeks and can't have greasy food, condiments, or street vendor food. Mexico is full of all of those things. It is really hard to eat pretty healthy here because everything is so tempting! But I will get over it.
So we are taking a bus to Oaxaca tomorrow night and will arrive there in the morning. Mexico City has been really great and awesome but I am ready to move on for now. Hopefully I will come back here in the future.

Jesus Ride a Bike bike shop and Coyoacon

So on sunday we rode on the Ciclo Pista Bike trail to the Glorieta Andgel De La Independencia. We were supposed to arrive there around 930 am, we didnt end up getting there until around 12. We were supposed to play for the Mexican Minister of enviromental awareness, or something similar to that. But it didnt work out because of multiple scenerarios within the morning. It was a valuable lesson for the whole crew and we all learned a lot from our mistake. I learned that my critical thinking isnt so critical. I get shocked and scared and nervous and lazy sometimes when an emergency or problematic situation occurs. I usually rely on others to help me out or fix the whole problem for me. I have been doing this my whole life, and this tour is helping me relize this. I am very greatful for these kinds of expeirences and I am learning a lot from each problem that occurs.
Anyways... we ended up playing the show anyways even though were really late. The minister wasnt there but we still had a good crowd with us. The film maker who is making the Ginger Ninjas documentary was there and video taped the show. The show went very well I thought. Dante the engineer was there to guide us a little with the system but I think I did a good job setting it up with little help. My spanish is getting a little better. I am so glad that I am meeting people who speak a little english. My notebook keeps getting filled everyday with more and more spanish phrases and words.
So we stayed at the Jesus ride a bike bike shop in col. Santa Ma. la Ribera Mexico DF for two nights. Pablo is a great bike mechanic who runs the shop. He helped fix matt and daves bike. He also helped me out a little while I fixed Andreas bike. Her bike was in really rough shape. The gears barely shifted, the cables were really worn out, the housing was bad, and her handle bars were really small and uncomfortable. I replaced both shifter cables, the brake cable, cleaned her bearings and repacked her cones, and replaced a her front derailer shifter. I also changed her handle bars to cruiser bars which are very wide and pretty comfy. I plan on coming back here after the trip to visit and help coordinate an earn a bike program possibly.
After we finished all the bicycle repairs we helped clean up the room we stayed in by bagging up some trash and debris that was lying around. Dave and Corey went to meet up with the rest of the band for band practice while Matt stayed at the shop so he could go to Dantes work the next morning to help him work on the generators. Andrea and I rode to Destiny's house in Coyoacon. It took us about an hour and a half to 2 hours. It was around 8 pm and was pretty effing dangerous. More dangerous than Boston rush hour traffic. We met another bicyclist who was going our way so he pointed us out in the correct direction. We finally got to Destiny's house. We were very hungry, thirsty and tired. We walked in the apartment and met about 10 or 12 other travelers. It was a unique expeirence that I enjoyed. Everyone came from another part ofthe world. There were people from Austria, Canada, France, and other parts of Mexico. It was awesome. They just cooked noodles with squash and gave us some beer to go with it. We exchanged stories about our travels and went to bed shortly after. So Now I am in a Internet cafe about a block away from Destiny's wondering what the bands next plans are. We might play a show tonight after a huge critical mass like ride. But it is still undecided. So I was thinking about doing a little shopping. If you would like to send me a postcard with a little story on it give me an email with your address at jshchadwick(at sign)yahoo.com

Cuernavaca and Mexico City!

So on our last day in Guadalajara we took 2 separate buses from Guadalajara to Cuernavaca. All of our bikes wouldn't fit on one bus so we split up into two groups of four. I went with Corey, Dave, and Andrea. It was a 10 hour bus ride from 12 am to 10 am. I slept for the majority of it but I hurt my knee from climbing some hills in Guadalajara so it was kind of uncomfortable. So when we arrived to Cuernavaca, I realized that the whole city was on one big hill. We met Enyo( I dont know how to spell it). He has been setting up the band with all the shows in Mexico. He rode his moped through the city while the 8 of us followed by bicycles up one big 15 hilly city to his house. On the way there up the big hills we saw a bunch of mexican military men with big guns and hummers flagging random cars over. There were also a lot of fruit stands and the usual taco,torta stands. There was barely any pollution in Cuernavaca compared to Guadalajara. There were some times when I had to put my handkerchief of my nose and mouth because the pollution was bad in some parts. Enyo's house was really nice and his mom was really friendly and accommodating. We had beans and eggs made in a pan with handmade tortillas and the best coffee I ever had in my life. It had cinnamon in it and it was definitely local and delicious. Enyo told us that the every tortilla taste unique because some of the natural salt from the makers hands is put into ever tortilla. They were amazing tortillas, they were really soft and warm and semi sweet. It was like paradise staying at his house. His dog Jack was a tough boxer kind of looking dog who was in love with everyone legs or back. And he kept attacking my toes. Then later on that night we rode all the way back down the huge hill we originally came up to a blog past the bus station to a universidad where we played a show. The show was fun and we had a couple of technical problems but everything went well. The crowd was large and really fun and into the whole project. People instantly lined up to pedal the bikes once we started.

I started having stomach cramps and deadly gas. Last night we went back to the house and I let a small but powerful flatulent out which made everyone cover their noses and clear the room. They also decided that I should sleep alone outside in my tent. I enjoyed sleeping by myself outside in the beautiful yard. I was surrounded my beautiful flowers, papayas, huge agova plants and other exotic plants and trees. So I decided I will be vegetarian for a couple of weeks to clean out my system. I enjoy eating vegetarian and vegan dishes anyways since I have a lot of friends who are vegan and vegetarian so hopefully that will make my system nice and cleaned out. I decided that I shouldn't trust the meat from every taco and torta stand I go to. Even though they have basically all been delicious and yummy.

So we had quesadillas with more extravagant coffee and left to go downtown to catch another bus that was only 50 pesos to go to the outskirts of Mexico City. We are currently at Dante the engineers shop. He is working on fixing some of the generators and we are doing some minor work on some of the bikes. The plan is to stay in Mexico City for 2 weeks and play a lot of shows. Tomorrow night we will joining in on the weekly sunday night critical mass ride in Mexico City. There are going to be about 500 to 1000 people, maybe even more. Then after the ride we will play show. I am not sure where we are going after Mexico City, but I do know that I am thinking about living in Guadalajara for about 4 or 6 months after the tour. I have been telling a lot people who live here about the Earn A Bike program, and I have been thinking about helping start a couple of different programs in different locations. I would like to collaborate with recycled bicycle programs such as Bike Not Bombs or Worcester Earn A Bike or other programs closer to Mexico like in Texas or California in the United States. The idea would be to raise money to get a container shipment of donated bicycles that are in fixable condition shipped to Mexico where we would restore, fix and teach people how to fix a bicycle while earning one for themselves for free.

There are more people who ride bicycles and there are way more bicycle advocacy groups then I imagined when I first thought about traveling through Mexico. I have met a lot of great people and keep more and more who are really passionate about bicycles and using a bicycle as their only source of transportation. The culture is really interesting and intriguing and I am curious and would like to know more. That is why I would like to live here for a while so I can help clean this planet up one minute at a time.

Oh yea when we were in Guadalajara we rode our bicycles with the mayor for the opening of the ciclo pista, which is a bike path that is built on the side walk on a lot of main streets.

I am just having a great time and my mind is just filled with marvelous sights and unbelievable stories. I wish I could write down everything but I can't, so maybe the next time I see you we can exchange stories of our lives.

So until next time. Hasta Luego!

Last day in Guadalajara

So today is our last day in Guadalajara, we will be taking a bus to Mexico city tonight around 8 and arrive there in about 9 or 10 hours. We might be spliting up and some of us will be staying at a girl named destinee´s house I found on couchsurfing.com and the rest might stay with the engineer for the band.
Last night we went on a huge bike ride with about a thousand people!!! It was a site I will never forget. It was really organized and fun. I saw about 10 crashes and a couple of break downs. I saw one really bad after effect of a crash of the only bicyclist with a fixed gear. I talked to him earlier in the night because he knew spanish. At first he thought I was disrespecting him because I shouted WOW A Fixed Gear. But then I told him I respected him for riding that because they are so dangerous sometimes. He was going to fast and hit a huge hole and cracked his head open. Kipchoge, Jared, Cara and Dave were riding around with there low glow flourencent green lights on the bottom of their bikes last night, which made it easy for me to spot them in the huge crowd. Kipchoge has been riding around soul cycling. Soul cycling is when you attach a battery to a huge speaker on the back of your bike while playing music on a music player like an IPOD. It was a pretty intense 2 hour ride. The largest and longest ride I have been in and seen since I became a 24 hour non stop hardcore bicyclist. After the ride we arrived at a big statue with all of the riders and started to set up and play a show. I set up all the bicycle generators to the power source. Last night I couldnt get Jared´s bike to work properly, There are a couple of problems we have been running into since the begining but they will out get fixed up once we arrive in Mexico city and meet up with Dante the engineer. He is the one who put the generators together. So hopefully I will learn a lot about the system and get a better understanding of it all.

Yesterday evening another member of our crew showed up at the house we were staying at. Her name is Andrea and is from Mexico. Chava is working on setting up her bike today so it will be ready to go for tomorrow. So now there is a total of 8 crew members. We might get more in the future possibly. We will see what happens.