The Lonely Planet Cycling Guide mentions a road leaving Vinales that it strongly recommends not taking unless you like riding in mud, crossing streams and navigating confusing unsigned tracks. It sounds like my kind of ride and so I seek it out.

I love travelling on dirt roads.

Peace...

...and quiet.

Excellent views towards the coast.

It is true that my feet get muddy and I have to ford streams but it is a blissful late afternoon ride, that deposits me back on pavement far, far too soon.

When I finally do get my hands on a map I find that, while there are indeed a few tracks wandering off the main thoroughfares, few of them link up. However, I nonetheless manage to spy out a route that might work – the only issue being a river around the halfway mark that is going to need crossing somehow. I am discussing these route options with an ex-pat American who is overall quite doubtful about my plan but gives me what turns out to be a lucky camping tip; down the highway towards the Belize Zoo are a couple of bar/restaurants that he feels sure will let me camp out the back.

The first of these establishments, which I approach at dusk, gives me a rapid brush off but the second, run by a Hungarian whose overarching philosophy is stated as ‘anyone can do whatever they want here’, is much more welcoming. So, after my tent is set up at the back of the Hungarian’s house, I find myself downing a couple of beers at the bar with an eclectic Caribbean crowd during an extended happy hour chatting to an US archeology PhD student doing some research at a local site. One of the men, clearly a regular, gets up to leave as the happy hour finally draws to a close and the girl I am talking to suggests that I ask him for advice about the roads.

After I explain my potential route to the man, he abandons his plans to leave the bar and spends the next hour making phone calls, trying to track down someone on the farm that the road passes through who can help me negotiate the problematic river crossing. After failing to get a definitive answer, Bruce gives me directions to his house and tells me to drop by in the morning, any time after 6AM, to follow up on the matter.

So the next day, I arrive at Bruce’s house at about 6.30 and, after he has fried me some eggs and made the coffee, the phone rings and the manager of Big Falls farm is on the line promising that someone will be waiting for me at the river to ferry me to the other side. You’ve got to love a small country!

Escaping the highway is not so easy in Belize. Most roads that aren't the three main highways of Belize are private roads. This one runs through a cattle ranch called Big Falls. A chance encounter in a bar gave me the contact I needed to negoitate the river at the end of the road and the right name to drop to the people who accousted me en route to tell me that I was on private land.

Three men are waiting at the river with a canoe help me to negotiate the crossing.

Once across the river, I am faced with having to navigate a confusing tangle of tracks aided only by a few place names: Rancho Dolares, Hill Bank, Indian Church, Lamanai. I am not helped by the fact that mostly I don’t actually know what any of these names is referring to – a village, a farm, a reserve, an archeological site… I have no idea.

The people I make enquiries to are clearly dismayed by the urge to travel. “That’s not in this area!,” they exclaim, while making vague serpentine gestures with their hands to describe the way. One woman tells me that I can’t go to Hillbank because it is a long way and there is nothing there but wild pigs but a group of old men sitting under a shady tree at an intersection tell me that Hillbank is a ‘big tourist place’ where, obviously, as an apparent gringa, I will be welcomed. However, neither of these snippets of information contains very much truth.

Hillbank, it transpires, is a privately owned, protected wildness area that borders the Rio Azul area in Guatemala – it is, in fact, where I would have ended up if I had managed to cross the border at Tres Banderas. Three rangers are hanging out at their post at the barrier which controls access to the area and they ask me if I am expected. I want to give them the right answer so I hedge a little.

“Should I be?”

“Well, yes…”

After I admit that I am not expected, the guy who appears to be in charge radios to some higher authority and then opens the gate. Once I am inside he is much more friendly: he sends me to the water tank to replenish my drinking water, gives me a handful of tiny yellow mangos and then invites me onto the verandah to rest a while. When he see me get out some fairly meagre rations from my food pannier he asks me if I would like to try some of the ranger’s lunch-time fare of chicken, beans and rice.

Three park rangers control access to Hillbank, a protected wilderness area that borders the Rio Azul protected area in Guatemala. I am close to Tres Banderas.

They introduce me to one of three endangered yellow-headed parrots rescued from poachers and now undergoing rehabilitation so that it can return to the wild.

And feed me a fine lunch of rice, beans and chicken.

Eventually, well-fed and rested, I set off again across the savannah, a hot sandy place under the mid-afternoon sun, and struggle towards Hillbank, still unsure exactly what I am going to find there but hoping that it will prove to be a place where I can camp and possibly eat.

Riding on the through the savannah - a hot and sandy business.

I have left the savannah behind me and have re-entered the jungle when I see a couple walking towards me dressed in khaki jungle gear, rubber boots and sensible hats. I guess they think I look kind of strange, too, on my bike. I stop and we exchange particulars – they are ornithologists stationed at Hillbank conducting a comparative study on different swallow species. The objects of their current interest are mangrove swallows.

I ask them if I can camp at Hillbank and they look unsure.

“Well, you can ask.”

They don’t sound very convinced.

I ride off and it is not long before I arrive at a clearing dotted with wooden buildings overlooking a lagoon and, after some dicey negotiation, receive rather grudging permission to stay a night.

Nat and Katy, the ornithologists, return from their walk and, with greater enthusiasm than the management evinced, invite me to the mess hall for an illicit dinner and, more excitingly, to accompany them the next day on their rounds of the swallow’s nests.

The lagoon at Hillbank... with the nesting boxes.

Nat and Katy checking out their babies.

Six day old mangrove swallow chicks.

The chicks are exhaustively measured...

...and even have their nails painted.

Then we stake out the box, having wired it to trap papa swallow...

...a wily bird...

...who nonetheless eventually falls victim to Nat and Katy's evil designs and has his blood taken...

...and vital statistics recorded.

A dragonfly freshly emerged from its shell - still damp and wrinkled, drying in the sun..

It is late in the season and so most of the birds have already flown the nest and the days work is over quite quickly. In the afternoon, after Nat has managed to secure me another night’s camping at Hillbank, we go for a walk which ends in a refreshing snorkelling adventure in a small mangrove lined stream.

Afternoon sees the three of us relaxing on the verandah... (Photo: Nat)

...before a walk which culminates in a swim in a crystal clear mangrove lined creek.

Cool water is heaven.

The next morning, early, before I completely wear out my dubious welcome with the authorities at Hillbank, I set off again.

Packed up and ready to leave at dawn.

Deep black water.

One of my reluctant hosts at Hillbank has drawn me a very detailed and beautiful map to speed me on my way to the border that sadly proves, at the very first intersection, to be utterly useless. I pass through Mennonite communities and ask for directions where I can always receiving elaborate instructions with a myriad of very specific references to local landmarks, accompanied by a fluid wave of a hand that indicates any number of potential twists and turns. All in all, it combines to form a overwhelming fog of hazy information and a number of times I have to resort to my compass to make a reasonably informed decision about the way.

Nat and Katy have informed me that I need $37.50 Belizian dollars to leave the country and this leaves me with exactly $2 Belizian dollars at my disposal unless I happen to find an ATM before I reach the border – which is pretty unlikely – so, with my almost empty food pannier, it’s looking like a hungry day. Things look even bleaker when I discover that I can’t cross the border at the customs post at Blue Creek and not only have I ridden 15 kilometres out of my way but I have to ride an extra sixty kilometres through Orange Walk and up to Santa Elena.

However, I am saved from starvation by a lovely girl called Ingrid in San Felipe. I have been told she sells tamales and when this turns out to be misinformation I clearly look very crestfallen. She tells me to wait, runs to the kitchen, and then returns asking if I would like fried chicken and beans.

I can’t refuse this offer even though it’s probably going to break my budget and leave me in trouble at the border.

She invites me into her house and sits me at the kitchen table where she serves me a generous helping of chicken and frijoles accompanied by a stack of tortillas and a big glass of watermelon juice. After I have polished off the first helping she refills the bowl with beans and then, when I have finished them, she opens a packet of sweet biscuits – an item she surely keeps for special occasions – and gives me a pile.

We chat about our lives as she continues with her domestic tasks, cutting vegetables at a bench with her 8 month old baby daughter scooting around her feet on a walker with wheels. Eventually I get up to leave, asking how much for the meal, but she waves any suggestion of payment aside dismissively and insists that I must come back to visit again the next time I pass through Belize.

Unless I come across an ATM, I have two Belizian dollars to see me to the border so abundant mangoes by the side of the road are very welcome.

The Belizians are not much into signage, it seems. This is one of about four road signs I saw passing through the country. I particularly like its sense of perspective.

I quiz the guy about the border crossing to Mexico and he assures me it is not far but it is the hottest part of the day and I am still worn out from yesterday’s ride so I am happy when the young man points to some hammocks hanging in a thatched shelter. I find myself snoozing the rest of the afternoon away swinging gently in the breeze.

As the afternoon passes, the camp gradually fills up with people. Another man comes over to talk to me and takes me to the kitchen where the camp cook rustles up some re-fried beans and toasted tortillas for me. The first guy I spoke to comes back and shows me a cabin where I can stay the night before I return to the hammock with Como Agua por Chocolate, the novel I am attempting to read in Spanish, and my Spanish dictionary. My attention is constantly distracted from the book by a group of Ocellated Turkeys going about their elaborate courtship rituals.

Eventually the dinner bell rings and I return to the kitchen structure to eat with the workmen.

Later, back in the hammock shelter, the men question me at length about my life and I, in turn, question them about crossing the border into Mexico. They all agree that the border is close and that there is no problem with crossing it. There is, however, no immigration post but no-one seems to think that this small detail is problematic.

Rio Azul work camp.

I get a cabin to myself at the Rio Azul work camp.

A pair of Ocellated Turkeys. The male is involved in a riveting and, clearly, quite exhausting courtship dance. He keeps at it for hours and then collapses on the ground all tuckered out. The female seems largely uninterested.

In the morning I set off, with the intention of crossing the border back into Mexico. I am heading north towards Cancun on the Yucatan Peninsula where I hope to find a way to hop across to Cuba and this foray into Guatemala has been largely motivated by the need to get a little more visa time in Mexico in order to organise the logistics of the Cuba trip.

On the road towards the border, I pass the Rio Azul archeological site and stop to explore. A group of three Mexican archeologists are currently on site and many of the workmen at the camp are engaged in various tasks to do with the restoration and preservation of the structures, presumably under the direction of these archeologists.

Nobody is around, however, and I wander about the overgrown ruins alone. On top of one of the larger structures, a rickety wooden lookout has been constructed and I climb to the top to view the jungle canopy from above. Circling the structures, I notice each one has an opening, carved through the stones, straight to the centre of it and I hope that it is possible to enter but I am thwarted in each case by a firmly locked steel door.

Overgrown ruins at the Rio Azul archeological site. Rio Azul is a working site with real live archeologists doing their thing.

A raided tomb - grave robbers cut their way into the depths of these structures back in the 70s and looted the contents of the tombs at Rio Azul. Most of the artefacts, recognisable by a unique glyph associated with the Rio Azul site, are now in private collections in the States. When I told one of the archeologists that I would like to see inside she informed me that a hazardous fungus infests the tombs and they have now been sealed.

A lookout built on the top of one of the structures provides a rare opportunity to see the jungle canopy from above.

On the way back to my bike, I spy a walking trail which lures me into the jungle for a diverting hour or two.

Spectacular trees...

Coati or Pizote - this little critter is surprisingly aggressive. He catches sight of me and comes scampering down the tree towards me quite threateningly. I backed off.

Finally back on the bike, I head towards the border. I really don’t know what I was expecting of a border crossing without an immigration post but things start to get a little weird.

First, I met the young Wildlife and Forestry guy from the work camp jogging along the road towards me. He stops and tells me that I am close to the border now and jogs away.

Then, the road ends.

Two other guys from the camp appear out of the brush pushing a four wheeler out of a ditch. I look at them a little confused but they gesture into the thicket and tell me that if I follow the path I will come to the road in Mexico soon. They assure me that everything is OK, the way is clear and I can go on. They check my bike over and ask me if I have enough water. Um, yes. I push my bike into the jungle.

I follow the winding footpath through the forest and the warnings of the people in El Remate suddenly come back to me. They told me I was heading in to the Zona Roja – the Red Zone – where drug traffickers and people smugglers do their business across the Guatemalan/Mexican border. I keep pushing the bike along the path while pondering on whether the guys from the camp had come this way specially to check if the way was clear for the crazy gringa on her bike, or, alternatively, if perhaps they themselves are the drug traffickers and people smugglers. They would be pretty well set up for it but they all seemed like nice guys to me.

Intricate plots for a complicated thriller set in the jungle suggest themselves to me. All the elements are here: an exotic location; a host of intriguing characters – the foreign archeologists, the gang of rough and ready workers, with their prison style tattoos, the handsome young Wildlife and Forestry worker, with his girl trouble, the cook and her assistant, rich foreign collectors, without many scruples; pickup trucks arriving in the early hours of the morning, full of mysterious boxes; there is a shady back story, with tomb robbers; sealed up pyramids with a deadly fungus growing inside; wild animals in the forest; a whole range of illicit activities – drug trafficking, people smuggling, wildlife poaching – to add unexpected twists and turns to a labyrinthine plot line. It is bound to be a best seller and if I can tie it all in with the Mayan 2012 end of the world prophecy then Dan Brown will be eating his heart out and I will be laughing all the way to the bank!

At the end of the road in Guatemala a discrete, but clearly well-used, foot path winds through the jungle towards Mexico.

Just after passing a small clearing on the path where people could potentially gather, while still under cover, I stumble, blinking, out of the jungle into a bizarre space. A bare strip twenty metres wide stretches away in both directions, adorned at regular intervals by white painted obelisks. On closer inspection, each obelisk, it turns out, is graced by four plaques, stating Guatemala and Mexico on opposing sides, while the other two sides are bisected by that imaginary line that makes nations.

I spend a considerable amount of time here, unable to drag myself away from this weird spectacle that makes so little sense to me. The idea of nations, a relatively recent historical phenomena, has never seemed particularly real to me and I am astonished by the way this abstract concept has been physically carved into the landscape.

I emerge from virgin jungle into this weird space.

Just so as you are in no doubt as to where you are...

...everything is clearly....

...delineated and labelled...

...at one hundred metre intervals. Absurd!

Eventually, however, after locating the road on the Mexican side of the line by dint of wandering up and down for a while, I am about to set off into Mexico when it occurs to me that, really, getting my passport back in order if I go through with this is probably going to be quite a bureaucratic nightmare. What on earth, I am going to actually tell the Mexican immigration people when I rock up to their office for my entry stamp? And what about the next time I want to enter Guatemala? How will I explain the fact I don’t have an exit stamp? Suddenly, it doesn’t look like such a good idea and it amazes me that it ever did.

So I retrace my footsteps and head back into Guatemala.

When I get back to the road I study my map. The guys at the camp had told me that there were two options for crossing the border and this one had the benefit of being the closest one. The other one is at a place called Tres Banderas, the point where the Mexico, Guatemala and Belize all converge, and the road is clearly marked on the map traversing the border. There is no immigration post there either apparently, but, perhaps, I think, if there is a continuous road, at least, I will have a more convincing story to tell the authorities.

I decide to go to investigate.

I find the junction and set off on a narrow track following a sign which informs me that it is 11 kilometres to Tres Banderas. The road doesn’t appear to get any traffic at all and it gradually gets more and more overgrown but I persevere. Sticks and vines constantly find ways to wrap themselves around the spokes of my wheels and my chain drive and eventually since I am having to stop to remove them every few metres, I get off the bike and push.

Suddenly, some way ahead of me I see a brown shape moving on the road. I stop and grope for my binoculars. A puma! The animal is walking down the track towards me, casually doing puma things, oblivious to my presence. It stops and I lose sight of it for a second as it rolls in the grass and then gets up and continues on its way, pausing again to rub its face on a vine hanging over the road.

The animal moves with a steady feline grace. It seems that the beast is just going to keep on walking down the track until it runs straight into me and I am quite tempted to allow this to happen but at about 80 metres caution prevails and I decide to let it know that I am here.

I wave my arms in the air and say, “Hi, Puma!”

The animal stops immediately and regards me very intently for almost a minute before turning – slowly, disdainfully – and walking, at exactly the same pace as previously, back the way it came before disappearing into the jungle to one side of the track. I wait a little while before continuing on my way past the place it vanished. The forest is so dense that I can barely see 10 metres into it.

It is not long before I come to a point where the track, regardless of the information provided by my map, is suddenly swallowed up by the jungle and there is nothing left for me to do but attempt to get back to Rio Azul before dark.

Puma! I am a bit over-excited (the puma is only about 80 metres away and walking straight towards me) and the light isn't great so, sadly, the quality of this image doesn't do the animal justice. In fact, the photo is barely intelligible and I shouldn't post it but I just can't help myself!.

The men at the camp are astonished to see me. “Couldn’t you find the road?” they enquire. I explain that, really, an illegal border crossing isn’t very convenient for me and they consider this unexpected fact. My only option now is to head due south to where I can cross the border legally into Belize and then north from there towards Mexico – a venture which requires tackling another 100 kilometres or so of muddy jungle road to the border town of Melchor and then traversing Belize to get more or less back to the point where I am now, only about 50 kilometres to the east and legal.

I almost ran straight over this little fellow and after photographing him where he was on the road I heard a rare vehicle approaching so I moved him out of harm's way.

Groups of butterflies in tasteful colour combinations sit on the road.

The mud situation is beginning to get tiresome; after a good start, the track degenerates and I have another difficult messy day ahead of me.

The gateway to the jungle... unfortunately, I am leaving it behind... About fifty metres past this symbolic gateway there is a real barrier manned by military personnel. They were truly astonished to see me appear out of the wilderness on my bike.

A sorry sight on re-entering the lands where humans hold sway.

Muddy, muddy, muddy. The road is negotiable but not at all relaxing.

So the day passes, negotiating patches of mud and fending off clouds of mosquitoes while toucans flap from tree to tree overhead, turkeys, guans and carassows stalk across the track and monkeys chatter and rant above me, clearly indignant at my presence. My fondness for spider monkeys becomes somewhat tempered by their propensity to hurl missiles out of the canopy at unwanted passersby.

The spider monkeys are less impressed by my presence than I am by theirs. They shriek abuse at me while shaking their fists and hurling missiles from above.

Not all the wildlife is so confrontational. A frog sits calmly in a log.

Antonio has given me what seemed like clear instructions on the route but they appear hazier in the forest than they did at his table. I am counting off turns to the left but I am unsure exactly what counts as turn as opposed to an unremarkable path. Additionally the road splits and branches around boggy sections and then reunites on the other side of the obstacle but sometimes the diversion wanders from the main stream for long enough for me to start wondering if I am heading into uncharted jungle.

Getting lost out here would be problematic and I’m not sure if any of the people who know of my plans are sufficiently invested in my welfare to ever know if I make it to the other side or not. I’m sure news will filter through eventually but I’m not certain how fast. However, I have enough water for two days and enough food for four and I imagine that even if I can’t find my way to Dos Lagunas, my first pit-stop, then I should still be able to find my way back to Uaxactun.

However, a sign duly appears – it says Dos Lagunas and has a neatly hand carved wooden arrow painted yellow hanging below pointing to the left. I am torn, though. I thought there was one more left hand turn to pass but this sign is so authoritative.  Leaves cover the track and the trees lean in overhead. Antonio told me not to take the second path because although it does go to Dos Lagunas the road is steep and round about… but why would anyone place such a beautiful sign directing people the wrong way.

Who knows? Another one of life’s unanswerable questions.

It's a beautiful sign. It's a shame that it points the wrong way.

So, obediently, foolishly, I follow the sign and the track gets steeper and steeper and, as it gets more and more overgrown, darker and darker. Moments of doubt assail me and I contemplate again what might happen if I get hopelessly lost alone in the jungle, anxiously calculating available food and water and days needed to retrace my footsteps but ultimately I am reassured by the fact that it is hard to get hopelessly lost if you are following paths or roads. You might not be able to get to where you want to go but usually it is possible to return to where you came from.

The jungle teems with boundless life, much of it in the form of biting insects. The environment is not so much hostile as magnificently indifferent to human needs. As I struggle to haul myself, my bike and my belongings along the punishing track I feel that I am indeed alone in the wilderness. There is nowhere to stop and rest, the only place where it is possible to sit is in the middle of the road itself, where it is not a foot deep in mud and to stop is to be besieged by insects. Mosquitoes whine all around me, ants swarming over the ground sting and bite.

The canopy closes overhead; there is no vista, no way to see the lie of the land or the scope of the forest, but just when it starts to feel relentless another sign comes into view and I go on. The track begins to descend again and eventually I arrive at Dos Lagunas as the shadows lengthen and sun finally loses its sting.

I was beginning to seriously consider retracing my footsteps to the last junction when I came upon this second clue indicating the potential proximity of Dos Lagunas.

Finally, I arrive. This is one of the two lagoons referred to in the name Dos Lagunas. Those inviting waters, home to lurking crocodiles, are sadly out of bounds.

Verdant green waters...

...with cute baby crocs lurking...

...and toucans above in the trees. (This is a Keen-billed Toucan.)

Dos Lagunas is one of the work camps where I hope to find some form of hospitality. I sit by the lagoon until a couple of workers appear. They are somewhat surprised to see me but welcoming enough. I cook my dinner over their kitchen fire and then collapse in my tent and sleep.

I like an unpaved entry into a country.

I can appreciate the quiet countryside and admire the rainy season cloud formations.

However, the only thing my enquiries reveal is that Guatemalans, even more than Mexicans, are appalled by the idea that I would consider riding on a unpaved road and regale me with the various real and imagined dangers and difficulties that I might encounter if I were to dare to do so.

I ride out of La Cruces with no useful information, feeling more than a little chagrined. I am momentarily cheered by the sight of a group of monkeys in the trees by the side of the road. They are not howler monkeys this time; these ones have grave wise faces and their grey torsos and bellies that unaccountably remind me of the portly old Eastern European men who sit sunning themselves outside the surf life-savers club at Bronte Beach in Sydney. They chatter animatedly amongst themselves but they are not as belligerently vocal as the howler monkeys.

A sudden rain shower finds me sheltering under an open tin roofed structure close to a rubbish dump with this long suffering mother dog and her three voracious puppies.

A colourful cemetry also attracts my attention.

A little further down the highway I catch sight of a delivery truck pulling up in front of a small shop. I often question the people who drive the delivery trucks of products such as Pepsi and Bimbo breads about potential routes since, as these products are available even in the smallest of villages, I imagine that the guys who drive these truck must know all of the roads to them. Two men get out of the truck and I approach them hopefully with my map. They respond with the exactly same set of doubts that I have already heard too many times today and it is not until I give way to verbal tantrum of surprising fluency, since it was entirely in Spanish, on the evils of cycling on a highways that, amused and astonished, they give me the information that I need.

A few kilometres down the road a turn to the left takes me off the pavement and onto a nicely surfaced gravel road through farm land and patches of jungle, dotted with small villages and the aggressive drivers and lewd comments shouted from passing cars on the highway gradually fade from my mind.

At the first group of houses on the road I stop to check that I am on the right track. The women I make my inquires to are aghast.

“But it’s a long way!”

“You can’t do it on that bike!”

“The road is too rough!”

“It is pure mountains!”

It is becoming a familiar refrain and I find it slightly wearying. I point out, a little tersely, that I didn’t ask if it were easy to get to Rosa Azul on this road, only if it were possible. The women fall silent and then nod assent. Yes, it is possible. I go on.

It is true that the gradients are severe and the road in poor condition but neither of these issues deters me. However, the single line marked on my map does nothing to shed light on the confusing range of options presented by the tracks which branch out before me. Luckily this area is slightly more populated than the mountains near Senguio and I manage to find people to confirm my path but every last one of them voices their grave doubts as to my ability to negotiate the road.

Another washout in the middle of a steep climb - this one requires me to unload my bike and carry it and my bags around the obstruction.

The going is slow and, after a precipitous descent leading into the tiny settlement of San Javier at dusk, I find a place to pitch my tent in a lugubrious dark damp pine forest. I am not sure whether or not I am influenced by the doubts of the people I have passed during the day but I am beginning to feel it is possible I will never arrive at Angangueo. However, the next morning, after a brief climb, I pass through a gate and soon find myself back on pavement.

Following the road...

...back to pavement.

After some momentary confusion about which way I should turn onto the paved road I set off and not far down the highway, hopeful signs appear. It seems that I may be within reach of my objective after all.

Hopeful...

...signs.

I survey the terrain from the road, reminded again of the relentlessly hilly nature of Mexico. I have been traversing mountains now without a break for the last four months but, mountains notwithstanding, within a few cruisy kilometres a sign appears indicating I have arrived at the Chincua Butterfly Sanctuary.

More mountainous terrain.

A kind of pointless map at the entrance to the sanctuary, indicating nothing in particular.

At the entrance of the sanctuary two women and a child are lying sound asleep in doorway of a small structure. One woman leaps up when I bid her good morning and promises to look after my bike while I walk into the sanctuary. After a relaxed two kilometre stroll, I come to a cluster of restaurants and stalls selling a variety of butterfly themed trash surrounded by listless groups of people waiting for a customer. I go to the rickety wooden ticket booth and a man ducks inside through an opening created by a loose board. He take my 30 pesos entry fee and then asks if I want a guide. When I decline he voices his concerns that I will get lost. I counter by saying that what I need is information, not a guide.

“It’s very complicated,” he says, sighing heavily.

I suggest he could draw me a map and after a moments hesitation he sketches a Y on the back cover of the visitors book and then crosses out the the right-hand branch. It doesn’t appear that complicated.

A cluster of restaurants...

... and some rather tired horses mark the entrance to the sanctuary.

I run the gauntlet of guides and people touting horses and set off on a track through the forest. Evidence of butterflies litters the ground and soon I am walking amongst flittering golden wings.

Dead butterflies on the ground.

The track narrows, leading through increasing dense forest and I pass a few people returning along it. After half an hour, I come across two men sitting on the path. A rope strung between the trees bars further progress and as I gaze down the slope into the trees I am rendered speechless – the branches of the trees are festooned with millions and millions of butterflies.

Wow!...

... there are millions and millions of butterflies here.

I edge my way as close as the rope barrier allows and lie down of a bed of pine needles gazing up at the trees. Dense bunches of butterflies hang motionless amongst a shifting cloud of more active ones. Mating butterflies plummet to the ground spinning crazily like stricken aeroplanes. As the sun starts to warm the clusters, whole branch loads of butterflies suddenly spill forth and take to the sky, before settling on any surface that exposes them to the sun.

Mating butterflies fall to the ground.

Whle others settle on any available surface...

...soaking up the sun.

I lie on the forest floor for some time, alone apart from the two lackadaisical butterfly minders, until my solitude is disturbed by the arrival of a group and their Canadian guide. I rouse myself a little but can’t drag myself away from this spectacle. Eventually I strike up a conversation with some members of the group and the guide tells me that tomorrow they will be going to another sanctuary, about 50 kilometres away, near Zitacuaro. where there are many more butterflies. I immediately press him for more information and directions  – I am determined not to miss it.

A butterfly tag - the blue tags are placed on butterflies from Arizona.

It suddenly occurs to me that it could be my birthday today but I am not entirely certain of either the day or the date.

Another day in ranch country - gentle terrain...

... and a perfect road.

I set off and the road continues to unwind through rolling hills until it deposits me in Dolores Hidalgo, a pretty colonial town that was apparently the birthplace of the Mexican War of Independence. It seems a chilled out place now, though.

A man strumming his guitar in the main plaza of Dolores Hidalgo.

A guy surveying the scene from his delivery bike.

Tiled doorways - ceramics are Hidalgo's main industry.

After relaxing in the plaza for a while, I head out the other side of town onto another gravel track leading towards San Miguel de Allende. After a reasonably challenging start, involving a gnarly river ford, deep sand and some vicious corrugations, the road wanders serenely through more sunny rolling hills dotted with ranchitos.

A little bit of single track as an alternative to a horribly corrugated and sandy road on the other side of the field.

These tiny settlements, often consisting of only a few buildings, nonetheless seem to receive regular deliveries of all the usual suspects – Coca Cola, Pepsi, and, of course, beer. The road I am riding on dead ends suddenly in one of these ranchitos and a man getting out of a Corona truck is perplexed by my appearance. He asks me where I am going and I explain that I am heading to San Miguel de Allende.

“Why don’t you take the highway?,” he exclaims, sounding positively aggrieved.

I suggest that highway traffic poses a greater risks to a cyclist than cattle but he continues to gaze at me disapprovingly and repeats his question. I smile and shrug and eventually he points me back to a track on to the other side of a small lake.

Nowhere is spared: the Pepsi truck is as big as the shop it is stocking.

After a happy afternoon navigating the tangled network of tracks running through the fields, guided largely by instinct and good luck, I arrive at a larger road clearly signposted to San Miguel and from there it’s an easy downhill run into the UNESCO listed town otherwise known as Gringolandia.

Mmmmm... really? I wasn't convinced by this sign.

When I get into town my first stop is a internet cafe which reveals that today is indeed my birthday.

In the morning, the first thing I am confronted with is a flat tyre but as soon as it is sorted I am on my way. Some enquires quickly reveal that it is, indeed, possible to head in the direction of San Felipe on the road I am following. According to the somewhat confusing logic of the Mexican road system the bitumen soon peters out and I ride for a a few kilometres on bumpy potholed gravel before the road suddenly transforms again into what appears to be a brand new highway clearly signposted San Felipe. This expanse of smooth tarmac is obstructed, however, by a mounds of earth piled up at either end of an overpass crossing nothing in particular. Ignoring this half hearted barrier, I ride over the bridge to find myself back on a nondescript paved road.

The uncertain state of the roads in Mexico.

All in all, it is a little perplexing but my hope is that this road is the one that is marked on my out-of-date map and, if so, I will be able to turn off it in around forty kilometres onto a dirt road that should take me all the way, first to Dolores Hidalgo, and then to San Miguel de Allende, my intended break point on route to the Monarch butterfly sanctuaries in Michoacan.

When I stop to restock my food pannier, I consult with the man in the shop about my proposed route. He is somewhat disapproving of my plan to ride on dirt roads, warning me specifically of the dangers of cows and cowboys amongst other, more amorphous, threats, but once he realises that I am committed to the idea he confirms that it is feasible and gives me the unexpected news that there are a number of archeological sites in the area that I will pass through. Fortified by this apparently reliable information, I hit the road again where my happiness is soon augmented by a quick snack of roadside gorditas.

One benefit to riding more trafficked roads is an abundance of excellent roadside snacks. Gorditas cooking on a wood-fired hotplate.

Before long I turn off the paved road and make my way to El Cubo, the first village, where I ask a women standing in her driveway for directions to the archeological sites. She immediately calls her son and her brother, instructs them to get on their bikes and show me the way, and we are soon riding across open fields towards the rocky hills bordering the valley.

A canyon leading up into the hills.

The two boys lead me to the entrance to a canyon where there is a small cave, the walls of which are covered with inscrutable marks.

One of several caves in the area which contain ancient rock carvings.

Inscrutable marks.

More carvings.

I really wish I knew what it all meant.

After I release my two slightly reluctant guides from their duties, I sit and eat lunch, looking out over the valley.

My guides - these two boys dropped whatever it was they were doing to accompany me to the cave which I wouldn't have had a hope of finding without them.

The valley stretching out into the distance - this sure beats the highway.

The road winds its way through rolling ranch country dotted with small settlements and for the most part I ride with only horses and cows for company but enough people make an appearance for me to clarify the occasional uncertain junction.

Lovely dirt road...

...leading into a sunny afternoon...

...on my bike.

Towards evening I meet an exuberant family group walking along the road. They question me at length about my journey and invite me to stay with them for the night. I am momentarily tempted but in the end because I am keen to cover some miles I rather ungraciously refuse in favour of another hour of riding before bedding down in a field for the night.

Antonia, with her daughter and son.

The cathedral in Durango. Durango is the biggest town we have passed through in Mexico and has some fine examples of colonial architecture.

As we got off to a late start we are slightly pressed for time becasue Miguelito is being met by his wife for a lift back to Durango but the riding is pretty easy as we pass through mostly flat agricultural land.

A flock of yellow-headed blackbirds rises in waves, moving across the field where they are feeding.

We stop for a moment for a quick lunch by an impressive water fall and then continue.

There is a quite a lot of water moving through here.

Finally we reach a town, intriguingly called Nombre de Dios (Name of God), where Miguelito’s wife and two grown-up children are waiting for us with a generous pile of tuna sandwiches and soft drinks.

The church towers in Nombre de Dios.

By the time we say goodbye to Miguelito and his family the sun is nearing the horizon and as the next part of our route is on a busy highway our priority is to find a place to camp so we can get off the road before dark. We ride until we find a gate we can open on a track leading to a half-constructed building in a field with enough trees to hide us from the view of passing traffic.

The next morning we have to cover thirty-five kilometres on the paved highway to the bustling town of Vincent Guerrero where we stock up on food for the next section of the trip.

Serious tortilla machinery at the tortilleria in Vincent Guerrero.

We leave town on a highway still under construction – the cars are restricted to a dusty gravel track running parallel to the unfinished road while we coast along using the smooth flawless concrete surface as a bicycle lane.

An almost finished highway becomes our private cycle lane. As you can see, a few car drivers tried the same trick but the occasional deep trench across the incomplete road was enough to deter most of them. (Photo: Jeff Volk.)

Before long we find ourselves back on gravel, riding in glorious afternoon light.

Colours glowing in the afternoon light.

Jeff crossing the fields.

A gentle sunset sky.

We camp in a dry wash in a field before setting off again in the morning.

Cass setting off in the morning light.

Jeff riding the fields.

Our first stop is a small undistinguished village with a single shop. As we exit the settlement we are astonished to see a huge brand new structure which, on closer investigation, turns out to be a rodeo arena. It seems that we are still in cowboy country, although the boys have turned out to be fair weather cowboys and the hats now spend more time strapped to the back of their bikes than on their heads.

A brand-new rodeo arena in an otherwise undistinguished and impoverished village.

Our next surprise is a section of cobbled road leading through fields dotted with what appear to be Joshua trees.

A couple of kilometres of cobble stone road in the middle of the fields.

However, soon enough the road surface changes again and we ride through the plains and low rocky hills on roads that are pretty close to perfection.

A sunny afternoon spent riding ...

... in gorgeous landscape.

A colourful patchwork of fields in the valley below.

The evening brings us to another village with a slightly post-apocolyptic air. We make our way through it and camp a few kilometres away beside the road.

Zacatecas is one of the poorest states in Mexico - a condition evident in the general ambiance of the villages.

The morning brings another desolate village and more great riding.

We attract quite a bit of attention on the streets of this village.

The villagers try to dissuade us from our chosen route, saying the road is terrible, but rocks and river crossings are nothing new to the dirtbag gang.

Cass and Jeff cruising, seemingly effortlessly, up the hill.

I am amused to unexpectedly find myself in Nueva Australia – I ponder the possibilities: did some homesick antipodean migrant settle here and christen the place, which now seems all but abandoned?

A reluctant Australian posing in front of the Nueva Australia sign.

We emerge from the fields into El Meguay, a village that clearly has a history. The main plaza faces an impressive cathedral with a lovely tiled dome.

The cathedral in El Meguay.

As we ride out of El Meguay, with the sun low in the sky, Jason discovers that he has a flat tyre. Since he also started the day mending a puncture he is not overly pleased and the sun is setting by the time we are on the road again to cover the last fifteen kilometres to Zacatecas.

On Sunday morning we set off with about twenty-five Cocono riders on a on a day ride on local jeep track. Jorge Luis lends me a bike with suspension forks for the expedition and I am keen to try it out as my rigid forks make for a pretty bouncy ride on rough roads: a fact I am painfully aware of after the last seven months riding. It transpires that I am the only woman present in the group.

A short break in which at least half a dozen punctures are mended. Thorny vegetation is tough on tyres.

Jason, Jeff and I enjoying the sunshine - the temperature range here in the mountains is considerable - during the day it is warm but the nights are still very chilly.

We stop for a meal on the way back into town where we are treated to lunch by one of the riders; Mexican hospitality is such that, somewhat embarrassingly, our meals often end up getting paid for when we are in company.

Back at Jose Ramon’s family compound in the afternoon we attend to various maintenance tasks before being whisked off by Jorge Luis for a tour of the town and dinner.

Jeff and Jason are DIY guys; much of their camping and biking gear is hand-made. Jeff is constantly on the lookout for a sewing machine and Jose Ramon's wife provides one for him here. Jason is repairing his back-pack and Jeff is working on ongoing series of frame-bag projects.

The Cocono’s have brainstormed a route for us towards Zactecas on dirt roads and Jose Ramon offers to guide us and act as a support vehicle for the first section of the trip, carrying all our baggage for us in his 4WD.

So, on Monday morning, we set off early unburdened by our panniers and hit the dirt after a short breakfast stop at OXXO. OXXO is a ‘modern’ US style grocery chain that sells ordinary products at twice the price of local aborrotes. Despite this OXXO seems to exert an unhealthy fascination on otherwise enlightened Mexicans and constitutes one of my least favourite shopping experiences. Again, Jose Ramon refuses to let us pay for our own breakfast goodies.

Jose Ramon with the "support vehicle" outside OXXO. Note the practically luggage free bikes.

The road, scenery and weather are all perfect and riding an unburdened bike is an unaccustomed luxury so the morning passes delightfully.

Glorious dirt road through the mountains.

We return to the highway after twenty-five kilometres of superb riding, where we reload the bikes and say our goodbyes to Jose Ramon.

Looking back the way we came.

Reloading the bikes.

After a short section riding on pavement, we turn off the highway again and take a road that leads through a series of Mennonite communities, one of Mexico’s more surprising and bizarre phenomenon. The Mennonites, invited to Mexico by President Alvaro Obregon in 1922 on the condition they provided the northern states with cheese, live in closed communities and are not even actually Mexican citizens: they don’t hold Mexican passports, are exempt from military service, speak Low German as their mother-tongue, attend their own schools and are governed by their own laws.

Their conservative but distinctive dress and life-style make the Mennonites striking figures in the Mexican landscape. We ride along with the repeated image of a woman standing, either raking a spotless farmyard or doing laundry by hand, in a flowing floral dress and a straw bonnet with long sashes appearing before us. The men, dressed in cotton overalls and cowboy hats drive into the townships in their pick-up trucks but the women have little contact with the outside world. When we ride into a Mennonite farmyard to ask for directions, driven as much by curiosity as our need for information, the woman stand silent and abashed, unable to speak Spanish, until a man comes to ask us what we want.

A Mexican village scene - a drunk and couple of Americanised kids in animated conversation with Cass and Jason - ...

... in contrast to the austere neat and eerily absent Mennonite communities with their retiring inhabitants.

The afternoon’s riding doesn’t live up to the expectations raised by the perfect morning, intriguing though the Mennonite communities are. We get lost while zig-zagging inefficiently over flat, sandy, corrugated roads and when we reach the highway again, at dusk, we discover that we have ridden over fifty kilometres but only made about twenty-five kilometres forward progress towards Canatlan where our Santiago friends have rung ahead to alert the biking community of our impending arrival. Clearly we will not arrive in Canatlan tonight and our disposition is not improved by the bleak camping prospects offered on either side of the busy highway. We duck behind a mound of earth that shields us from the view of passing traffic and set up our tents in a blighted dying orchard.

Ghetto camp by the highway in a dead orchard.

Breakfast - corn tortillas toasted over the fire. Grey clouds and a persistent wind bode ill for the day.

Dawn is grey and bleak and by the time we reach Canatlan it is raining heavily. We ring Genaro, our contact, and he gives us directions to his business, a parts shop for motor-vehicles. Genaro is the president of the local mountain club and he enthusiastically shows us photos and videos of local cycling events as we pass the wet afternoon sitting in a store-room across the road from his shop chatting to a variety of people who come to marvel at us and question us, in detail, about our various journeys.

The dirtbag gang with Genaro outside his parts shop.

Genaro absolutely outdoes himself in the hospitality stakes: he not only treats us to a fine seafood lunch but insists on putting us up in a hotel for the night, despite our vigorous protests. In the evening, after taking us to the town plaza where we are plied with free tamales and champurrado* in celebration of some national holiday, Jenaro rides us to the hotel in rain and presents us with a jar of preserved peaches and a bottle of tequilla to get us through the stormy night.

Jeff and Jason leaving the hotel.

In the morning it is still raining but, by way of comfort, we have an invitation to breakfast on gorditas* at Gordiatas Plaza, an establishment run by three sisters and their mother. One of the sisters, who came to talk to us yesterday, is a sadly rare example of the female Mexican cyclist. Unfortunately, she has had a recent accident and so is currently off the road.

After an extended, free, all-we-can-eat gordita session, as the rain eases, we decide it is time to head off to cover the 70 odd kilometres to Durango where yet more members of Mexico’s cycling community are awaiting our arrival.

Treated to breakfast at Gorditas Plaza.

Gorditas - one of my favourite Mexican culinary delights.

Three sisters help out their mother at the gordita shop - second from the right is the cyclist.

We pass by Genaro’s shop again where we spent some time trying to organise ourselves sufficiently to leave. Cass and a persuasive street vendor selling cowboy hats almost convince me to join the crowd and buy one but I feel a little overburdened by my belongings as it is. Jason whiles away a few moments strumming on his mini-guitar as we wait for three local riders who have decided to escort us some distance out of town.

The hat man - I should have bought a hat from this guy.

Jason whiles away a few moments before we leave playing a tune on his mini bike-tour-sized guitar.

We finally get underway and ride on the highway through the afternoon, cursing the traffic, the roadworks and the wind, before arriving at Durango just as the sun is setting. In Durango, our first stop is at Pancho’s bike workshop where we lose no time in making some minor repairs to bikes and bike gear. Pancho then bustles us into his truck, two comfortably in the cabin and two less comfortably in the rather chilly tray, and whisks us off to a bike meeting at a hamburger restaurant to which he has strategically invited a couple of local couch-surfers who he hopes will put us up, without, it seems, informing them of his intentions. However, we clearly pass muster because Frida and Jorge Luis only hesitate a second or two before extending a warm invitation to four dirty, hungry, dirtbag cyclists to stay with them in their central city apartment. When we finish our hamburgers and margaritas, sleep is foremost on everybody’s minds.

Meeting Frida and Jorge Luis.

Yoda, the other inhabitant of Frida and Jorge Luis' apartment.

We manage to get lifts back into the centre of Durango and find our way to the apartment. Once we manage to squeeze our bikes into the extremely limited space available in the entrance we all fall into various more or less makeshift beds – four people is a lot to accommodate at a moment’s notice.

I spend the next two days doing as little as I can and enjoying Frida’s company. It is the first opportunity I have had to spend time with another female in quite a while. The boys are rather more active and manage, among other things, to get themselves interviewed about the trip by a local television sports show presenter.

The boys get famous.

* Tamales are filled corn dough parcels steamed in corn husks; champurrado is a delicious Mexican hot chocolate drink; gorditas are small corn tortillas stuffed with tasty fillings such as roasted green chillies, beans, cactus, etc.