Toluca Archives - Iron Roamer

It wasn’t where I wanted to be, so I was just killing time in Toluca.

Quinta Del Rey

The Quinta Del Rey hotel itself was nice.

The room was modern and clean and the staff were very friendly. There was secure parking for my motorcycle. And they had a sort of a restaurant. You could get basics and that was it.

The problem is that it was in the middle of no where. Well, that isn’t quite correct. It was next to the airport. But there was nothing around it I could walk to and explore. The road leading into the hotel was a potholed dirt road.

So I ended up riding to places during the day.

One Percent

Yes, it may come to a surprise to you, but I found a Starbucks a few miles from the hotel in a nice “North American” mall.

We talk about the 1% and the growing divide between the rich and poor in Canada and the US. In Mexico it appears to be even more prevalent. In many of the larger cities there are these enclaves of shopping for the more well to do. Surrounding them are the little shops of poor people trying to make a living.

After having my coffee at Starbucks I just sat in the mall and watched people go about their shopping.

The next day I did pretty much the same thing only at a different mall.

La Cantrina

It was Sunday though and that means NFL football. I tried to find a place to watch a game or two. Once “sports bar” was closed Saturday and Sundays!! I did find La Cantrina. When I walked in they had soccer on all the TVs. I asked to watch NFL Football and they were more than happy to oblige.

It was funny communicating with the staff. They decided to use Google translate. Now the program is excellent and sure helps, but it isn’t perfect. We laughed as some of the translations were not understandable. And each time it got it right we broke out in laughter.

After a salad for my daughter

and I think enchiladas, I left for my hotel to watch the rest of the games.

My Location for November 19 and 20, 2016

It wasn’t what I wanted to do, but I had to head inland where I experienced lots of roadblocks and chaos from Acapulco to Toluca. I wanted to stay on the coast for a few more days over the weekend. However, the prices of hotels skyrocketed over the weekend. For example, I was paying $50 CDN for my hotel in Acapulco. Over the weekend the same room cost $300!!! I looked at various places up and down the coast within a days ride and the prices were all over my budget. I then looked inland.

The prices for hotels inland were cheaper for sure. However, a lot were sold out. I wanted some place in a city centre where I could get out and walk around. All the hotels in my price range were sold out. The best I could find were several hotels in the outskirts of Toluca. Tripadvisor rated Quinta del Rey Express as the best of these.

La Quebrada

Before leaving Acapulco on the morning of the 18th for Toluca, I wanted to go to La Quebrada to see where the cliff diver dive from. According to Wikipedia, the La Quebrada Cliff Divers are a group of professional high divers, based in Acapulco, Mexico. They perform daily shows for the public, which involve diving 35 metres (115 ft) from the cliffs of La Quebrada into the sea below. The depth of water in the “Gulch” can vary from 6 to 16 feet depending on the waves, with an average depth of 12 feet. The 1963 Elvis Presley film Fun in Acapulco brought the cliffs to worldwide attention. ABC’s Wide World of Sports popularized La Quebrada during the 1970s as one of the early extreme sports. Professional high divers worldwide regard La Quebrada as one of their favorites.

I remember seeing the cliff divers on TV and wanted to see the spot. Here it is.

Unfortunately, La Quebrada was the opposite direction of where I needed to go to get out of Acapulco to Toluca. Complicating matters was that my GPS couldn’t calculate the route to Toluca! So I had to put in a town on the way.

It took me a hour just to fight my way out of Acapulco.

Acapulco to Toluca

I knew it was going to be a long day but I wasn’t prepared for how long of day it was going to be.

Choas to Me

Some of the cities I went through were chaos ha ha. I am sure it doesn’t seem that way to the locals, but for me it sure did – Car, motorcycles and carts everywhere on narrow cobble stoned streets, dust, non-working lights, cars stopping in a lane, speed bumps, honking of horns AHHHHHHHHHH. And of course I ended up taking a wrong turn just to complicate matters ha ha.

Then there were cities like Taxco that is built on a cliff. The main road through the city consists of a series of cobble stoned switchbacks down the cliff.

I noticed that my clutch cable seemed looser … I need to check that out.

Roadblocks

Then there were the roadblocks.

In 2014, 43 male students from the Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers’ College went missing in Iguala, Guerrero, while traveling in a bus along the road I was riding. They are presumed to have been murdered. There is a lot to this story, but since then, there has been lots of security along the route.

I passed roadblocks set up by the military, federal police, state police, and municipal police. There were even roadblocks set up by men who were not wearing uniforms but carrying automatic guns and asking for money. I didn’t know what to make of it and didn’t stop for them or give money. They did have vehicles and I saw a sign on them that I was trying to make out but couldn’t. There were some sort of initials on them. Perhaps one of my readers will know. They didn’t look too intimidating and in one of these roadblocks the federal police were just down the road and didn’t look too concerned. Perhaps they were a Mexican form of Citizen Patrol ha ha.

In one city I observed young men who would block the road for a while while other young men would collect money from cars. These people just bypassed me.

As I got closer to Toluca it got cooler and cooler.

Quinta del Rey Express

Just outside of Toluca my GPS kicked in and showed me the way to my hotel. Although the way it took me was needlessly through a series of small streets.

It was 6 pm and I was just glad to have reached my hotel after a long day.

When I got there they didn’t have my reservation 🙁 Luckily, the staff was great and they had room.

Killing Time in Toluca