Day 11

Today was an interesting day. We have started our journey once again, not quite the way we planned on doing it. Our original plan was to start at Esperanza Texas on the road 192, however, we got stopped by the local Sheriff.  The sheriff informed us that 192 was a very bad road to ride on.  He said that every vehicle he pulled over was either carrying drugs or guns.  The sheriff then asked us to follow him to a safer place to start our bike ride. He escorted us at a pace that was ridiculously fast for the road. Prior to our escort from the sheriff my dad was driving down this road at about 35 mph 

(the speed limit was 50). Scott and I were enjoying the view in to Mexico, since the Mexico/US boarder was about ½ a mile away from the road. We were also watching the farmers prepare this barren land for cotton planting. The Sheriff’s speed however made it impossible to look at the scenery since he was cruising at about 65 mph. He took us a little beyond the junction with 34 and let us unload our bikes. He stayed there and watched us pack up our bikes, making sure we were safe. 

This incident with the Sheriff made my mother really nervous. She kept saying “you better call me when you get in tonight.” So of course before I wrote this entry I called her.

Other interesting things that have happened today would be boarder patrol. Apparently since route 10 is so close to the boarder they have a mandatory inspection stop for east bound traffic. I learned that riding on rumble strips with your bicycle is incredibly hard! Also we were in the break down lane (or shoulder if you prefer) and we had no option but to ride our bikes to the place where bad vehicles go. Since we couldn’t cross the traffic lanes because Trucks were in the middle lane, cars in the left and the right lane (where we had to ride) was reserved for cars they expected where caring drugs, guns, aliens and prisoners. We road up on our bikes near the drug sniffing dogs and a couple of suspicious looking vehicles and were questioned. The great thing about our questioning was the guy asking them sounded Canadian (or northern woods type)! The question were  basic, where are you going, where you coming from, are you a citizen. I think we passed the questioning because the guy said “ok”, he never told us to be “on our way” or “have a nice day”, so we ended up standing around for a second with the other patrol officer looking on before we decided (silently in or heads) that “ok” meant we could leave.

The rest of the day went relatively with out a hitch. We were a little confused coming in to Sierra Blanca because our maps said “Camping: Town Park, Main St., primitive, no water.” We assumed that the Town Park would be on Main St., however when we got to “Main St.” it was a dirt road that looked more like a back alley. So we ended up asking the person that ran the RV park where this magical Town Park was. Well its not on “Main St.” but it is on the main road that goes through the town called N. Archie Ave. We got to the park and checked in with the local Sheriff department to make sure that we could camp here and the lady answer “yup” like it was the most obvious thing in the world to let bikers and hikers just camp in the town park.