A Morning Bike Ride in Sayulita and more...

A friend told us that it was unkind to have posted a copy of the PV weather forecast on out last blog. I promised not to do that again. Suffice to say that another week passed and still no snow.

We have been busy as usual. Getting lots of exercise. This week we enjoyed 4 good bike (pedal type) rides, several hours of paddling but very little surfing, since the ocean has been quite calm this week.  We put on quite a few miles, walking up, down and around town. We met and socialized with some very nice visitors. Also, I found time to build a paddle board cart.. more about that later.

 We started the week with trip to Vallarta to bicycle to the old town beach area. As I mentioned before many Mexican cities close off some of the major streets on Sunday mornings to allow for bicycle and pedestrian use. We parked the car near the beginning of the route and rode about 5 K to the town centre. Most of the route was on the closed roadway but the last K or so was on a bike path marked on a widened sidewalk and then along the malecón. 

 Here area couple of photos of the malecón in Puerto Vallarta. 

It is not always this tranquil,  generally a pretty happenin' place

It was an easy fun ride. It is nice to see all the families and groups out riding... balloons tied to their bikes, all having a good time. There are not many safe places to ride bicycles in Mexican cities.   We stopped at a cafe on the malecón for a bite to eat before returning to the car.  We had checked several online pages and a recent pamphlet to find out what duration the road was closed to traffic.  We had read that it was closed to traffic until 1pm. However, when we arrived at the location where we had exited the main roadway onto the bike path, vehicular traffic was once again flowing. Que sorpresa!  Actually, not a surprise really. We rarely trust any of the information pamphlets.  We made our way back to the car by riding on the service road and sometimes on the sidewalk. Most of the business and non tourist related stores are closed on Sunday, so the traffic was light. We picked up a few supplies on the way back to Sayulita... including material for the cart.

Most paddle board are a bit heavy to carry for more than 100 metres. The one I have is not one of the heaviest boards but it does not have a handle, so it is clumsy to carry.  We are located only a couple of blocks from the beach but sometimes I arrange to meet someone at a more distant location.  I had been looking at a variety of carts online, mostly for carrying kayaks.  I don't have any sophisticated tools here, but a have a few basic ones. I needed to find a simple design that used readily available materials and one that I could build with the available tools.  PVC piping is easily available in town. The hardest parts to find were the wheels and an axle.  A friend with a bike shop had one used wheel and tire that I thought I could make work. He lent it to me and I headed out on a hardware store (ferretería) shopping trip to try to find a matching wheel or something similar. No luck in Sayulita but at the second shop in Bucerias, they had an exact match. I won't go into anymore boring detail.  Here is a photo of the prototype.  I have plans for a few modifications but it works just fine the way it is. It took me about 2 hours to make and about $45. in parts. Mostly on wheels, axles, nuts, spacers and washers)

As I mentioned, Linda and I did few bicycle rides. One of them I videoed from a handle bar cam. It is an early morning ride in and around the streets and nearby jungle dirt roads. The video is on YouTube.com  Here is the link to the video if you are interested.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAXMsDVK-M0    It is 40 minutes long and not terribly exciting but it gives you and idea of the town and area.

These are a couple of shots from downtown Sayulita. 

This one is taken from ablock off the beach looking inland to the central plaza.

This is of a Sunday morning sale of local handcrafts in the central plaza.

This little gal recently delivered 13 pups. She is quite a sweetheart! 

Many of the dogs in town are pit bull. All that we have encountered have been very friendly.

The weekends in Sayulita are generally quite busy. This afternoon we spent an hour on the beach listing to music on our ipod.  As we were getting ready to walk home, this group arrived to entertain the sun worshipper.  Here is a short clip.

That's all for this update... We are going to San Pancho this evening to meet a friend for dinner. Time to get ready.