Lynne and Greg's Excellent Adventure

I don’t have a lot to write about this week. The Rainy Season appears to be over. My ankle seems to be healed up pretty well. I haven’t tried running yet, but that ne a bit more from laziness than anything else. I’ve been out on the bike a bunch, about 2100 kilometers so far. Out to Sayula and a few trips to the south side of the lake and even one around it. (250k).

The only funny story I have been from the bike ride yesterday around the lake. First the clutch cable broke when I was half way to Jocotepec and the bike shop. I thought I was supposed to be able to just kick it up a notch and expect the bike to jump, but I couldn’t make that happen. 30 minutes to go 10k, with all my safety stuff on!  They replaced the cable at the shop in about 15 minutes, for 40 pesos, about $3.50 in our world!

Half way around the lake something stung the side of my neck. I don’t know what it was but, I was doing about 90 kph and after it stung my neck if flew down the back of my shirt and started stinging my back! I pulled over to the side of the road, rather quickly, and tore off my helmet, jacket and t-shirt and tried to scratch the bit spot and swat at the rest of my back with my t-shirt. I never did find the bug. 24 hours later i still have welts on my back. I’m just really glad it hadn’t flown up my pants!

The following is the story a friend forwarded to me about Hell. I LOVE it!

HELL EXPLAINED

The following is an actual question given on a University of Arizona> chemistry mid term, and an actual answer turned in by a student.

The answer by one student was so ‘profound’ that the professor shared it with colleagues, via the Internet, which is, of course, why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well :

Bonus Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?

Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle’s Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant.

One student, however, wrote the following:
First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving, which is unlikely.. I think that we
can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving. As for how many souls are entering Hell, let’s look at the different religions that exist in the world today.

Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can
project that all souls go to Hell. With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase xponentially. Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because
Boyle’s Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added.

This gives two possibilities:
1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.
2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell, then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over.

So which is it?
If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year that, ‘It will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you,’ and take into account the fact that I slept with her last night, then number
two must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and has already frozen over. The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore,
extinct….. ….leaving only Heaven, thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting ‘Oh my  God.’

THIS STUDENT RECEIVED AN A+.

I had decided that I was going to ride back over to Sayula again, but to stay overnight and do a little exploring, as well as pickup something from one of the knife shops. The weather was very overcast when I left a few minutes before 10:00AM, but I went anyway. I’d done the trip last week, but didn’t stop in town.

The lake beds that I drove through last week were half dry again already. It was interesting to be riding along, watching the clouds roll in and then to feel the sudden drop in temperature as the rain was about to start. I was lucky that I seemed to get ahead of it each time that happened!

I packed my iPad into my knapsack along with some walking clothes for when I got here. I didn’t want to be walking around in jeans and boots! I stopped just inside town to check the iPad GPS. I Didn’t know if it would work without being attached to the net. Apparently, it needs to be!

I started to ride off down the main street. I got about 2 blocks in from the highway when the front wheel felt really strange. It was wobbling and felt like it was going to fall off. I wasn’t going fast. I pulled over and got to see my first flat tire.

Good grief! I just barley know where I am, I have no idea where a bike shop is, and, I don’t speak the language. This was going to be fun. The first guy I talked to spoke  enough English to tell me to go back to the highway. I rode really slowly, at about 5 kph. I phoned Lina ( friend and Spanish teacher) thinking that she could translate for me. Her line was busy so, i had to work through the language thing myself. Didn’t want to push the bike, but I was worried about hurting the tire or more so, the wheel. The guy at the gas station told me to take it across the highway, that guy told me to take it a couple of kilometers into town. I was getting worried about damaging the wheel, so I pushed it. I found the place eventually. No one spoke any English, but we got by. 20 minutes and $100. Pesos, (about $9.00 CDN) later, I was on my way again with a new tube installed.

The town is a series of one way streets. I eventually found the hotel that I had reserved the night before. In typical Mexican fashion, there is no sign out front and, it’s about three blocks from where it’s supposed to be.

I found out where the knife stores were and walked the few blocks to check them out. I picked up a cool knife belt and a set of steak knives that I saw a year ago.

The sky’s opened up after I get back to the hotel. We’ll see what tomorrow brings!

Thursday was my first real ‘destination’ ride. I’d been out and about exploring the south side of Lake Chapala and a couple of neighbouring towns, but, it was time to head out on a mission!

Sayula Mexico is the home of Rodrigo Ojeda,  and Jose Ojeda,  among others who, for generations, have hand-made knives of all types. From kitchen knives to pocket knives to sword blades in canes and hidden belt buckle knives and anything else you cold imagine.  I’ve always been fascinated with knives. I’m not sure why. Just a ‘guy’ thing I imagine.  Anyway. Sayula  is only about 100k from here so, I thought it would make for a good bike ride. *Sweet Secrets of Sayula“

I didn’t realize when I went out to see the Volcano a couple of months back, that Sayula was on the way. This was great because, I got to ride on that great highway that cut through a couple of dried lake beds that I driven on before. At the time, I was thinking or riding and imagining what a cool ride this would be.

I took a side trip along the way to the new highway that cuts through the mountain on the north side of Jocotepec. This highway will bypass the town when it’s done, but in the meantime, there’s a pretty nice view of the lake and the town from there.

Looking south-east across the town and Lake Chapala

Looking south across the fields towards Jocotepec with the mountains beyond.

A closer look of the church at the town square.

The highway doesn’t go all the way through yet, so I had to turn back after a few kilometers and drive through the town before heading out on the highway. The road out of Jocotepec, to the north, si also under construction as they widen it a bit. I got caught up in a bit of that construction, but, quickly the highway cut south and through some beautiful; mountain before heading out across what used to be, dried lake beds.

I stopped about 1/2 way along one of the two lakes for these next shots. One forward, one back.

Looking ahead to the west.

It’s rainy season down here and, it HAS BEEN RAINING!  When I drove through here a few months back, there were huge dust bowls on either side of the highway. The wind was whipping up little dust tornadoes along the way. Now, with all this rain, the beds look like lakes, which they are. I think the lake is 6 inches deep at the deepest part!

Huge, 6" deep lake!

I did find the town and it looked beautiful I took longer than I’d expected getting there so, I rode around for 20 minutes and headed back to Ajijic. I had Spanish lessons with Lina that I wanted to get back to.  I’m thinking of heading out over the weekend to visit the knife stores nd check out the town more. I may stay overnight. It would be interesting to see how I could survive in a Spanish-speaking town by myself!

I couldn’t believe how tired I was when I got back here to town though.  All that time and distance,  (250k) with my butt in the saddle sure takes its toll. A bigger bike with less vibration sure will be nice one day!