Going The Distance

Day of hell. Worst yet, I think. 45′c, bureaucracy of bike crossing borders, swarms of men trying to “help” for money at the border, 2 tropical rainstorms of biblical proportions (turns out that nothing remains waterproof in those conditions – and the sidecar doesn’t look like a bathtub for nothing…)

Weepy wife at end of day. All just too much. As we get closer to the Equator, the sun sets very quickly, so we’re suddenly plunged into blackness – and left doing the one thing which everyone has advised against: driving in the dark. As we enter Guatemala City, we of course get horribly lost (not that we have an actual destination, but just that we are aiming for a half decent hotel, me having been sodden and seated for most of the day). When we get to a hotel which seems ok, we check in, it’s ripe with faded glamour. Things don’t really work. Promised wifi doesn’t work. Have to move rooms. Don’t have an interviews for Guatemala lined up. It’s late, we’re both broken by fatigue, it all feels insurmountable. What are we doing? Two people, with the help of only my tireless father, on their own trying to make a documentary about love. The biggest subject out there. The fact that everyone has an opinion about it is both a blessing and a curse. We have bitten off so much more than we can chew… how can we dismiss entire countries with only one (if we’re lucky!) interview? Are we really capturing the soul of Guatemala by doing an interview with the local paper and grilling the hotel security guard? The thought of going home overwhelms me. I’m exhausted. I don’t speak Spanish. We still have so far to go – not to mention the interviews we have to arrange. We haven’t even hit rainy season. Please, Mikey, can we go home?

Sorry folks, I will update this. Basically a long day of driving. But I just don’t have time to now. But we did stay in a cool place – an auto-hotel. They have them all over – a room with an ensuite garage! How cool is that? Don’t have to spend 20 minutes unpacking bike – garage door locks!

The name of the place we were heading to, Tehauntepec, caused us to get into a massive fight. Or rather, for me to be a massive bitch to Mike. Leaving Oaxaca, the road to said place is not immediately clear so we had to ask directions 3 or 4 times. Each time, Mike asked about “TehuantepIC”. On the 4th time of asking, I got very quiet, then when we pulled up for petrol 5 minutes later, I told him that I thought he was rubbish at languages because he seemed incapable of remembering pronunciation. And vocab, for that matter. A completely unjustified attack, given that he is the team’s Spanish speaker. An hour passed in silence.

We became friends again when Mike gently extended a hand down to the sidecar, to let me know that he’d forgiven me. What a guy. I have promised not to be mean again, he has promised to try and remember words. Ah, compromise, thy name is marriage.

A day of driving the high, windy roads out of Oaxaca to the south west. It started to feel very tropical – lush green forests, and humidity. To top off the tropical feel, it started to piss with rain. Only the third time we’ve seen rain on the entire trip. Out with the sexy wet weather gear, much to the amusement of a passing truck full of lads who jeered and laughed at the mad sartorial scramble happening at the side of the road as the heavens opened.

No doubt we’ll see more rain during the rainy season in the rainforest.

Yesterday was a long day of driving to get to Oaxaca from Mexico City. When we arrived in the city, it started to rain and I became increasingly venomous towards Mike. Good days and bad days – and invariably we only have each other to take our rage out on. Basically, we take turns. Extended periods of time in the sidecar make me volatile; Mike tends to be pretty distant and snappy in the mornings. Fun fun fun.

Saturday in Oaxaca, we head to the Dona Rosa pottery workshop, south of Oaxaca in a place called San Bartolo Coyotepec. Valente and Rafaela have been married for around 46 years (it took them a while to remember). Valente is the son of the famous Dona Rosa who developed the process for making Oaxacan black pottery, famous around the world. The local clay, used for pottery since pre-Hispanic times, cooks to become a matte grey. What Dona Rosa realised was that if the clay is rubbed with the flat edge of a quartz stone when it has been drying for a fortnight or so, the top layer of clay comes off to reveal a shiny surface. When cooked in the kiln for 8 hours (less than the usual 15-20), it comes out a beautiful and totally unique shiny black. No varnish, no paint needed. The workshop sits behind a large courtyard lined on all four sides with hundreds of items of all styles, shapes and sizes made of this pottery. Some gorgeous stuff. Mr Clear firmly told his wife that the lovely fruitplate she was coveting (for $15!) was definitely not joining Team GTD.

The biggest news of the came from back home: Mike’s elder (only) brother, Phil’s wife Bex gave birth to a baby girl, Eva Louise Clear. The first Clear girl to be born in over 100 years (the last one, Peggy Clear, was born in 1908). Much jubilation and tears from a little, homesick outpost in Oaxaca. Thank God for Skype, at least we could talk to Mike’s parents – the brand new grandparents – and we hope to meet little Eva on Skype in the next couple of days.

That night we stayed in Oaxaca with yet another representative couple of the US ex-pat community – a friend of a friend of a friend (remember our whole connection with this warm and generous community started with a 3 minute conversation outside a bike shop in a cloudy suburb south of Seattle, when the kind Janis offered us a place to stay with her sister, Barb (the wonderful!), in Mazatlan).  So, to Patty and Don. Married for 35 years – and they took off on a BSA motorbike shortly after that marriage, so they were ripe for advice. Originally from Missouri, Patty prepared a mid-Western feast for dinner of pot roast pork, mash, biscuits and gravy. Followed by pumpkin pie. Took a while to get to sleep, we were so full.

We’re back on it! A fabulous day and what a way to end our time in Mexico City.

Sadly, I haven’t got time to write a full update, but here are my bullet points:

- Interview with the Bishop of Mexico City, Excmo. Sr. Dr. Florencio Armando Colin Cruz (the Cardinal is the big man here in Mexico – and a frontrunner for the Big Job recently, apparently, and he has 3 henchmen Auxiliary Bishops, of which Colin Cruz is one) Absolutely sensational interview. I had tears in my eyes at times. We asked him about the Catholic ideal of Love, what makes a great marriage, how the church prepares couples for marriage – and supports them in times of marital problems. He delivered superbly eloquent, articulate and flawless answers. Totally sold (I told him that he should polish his elbows and get in line for the Head Man job) even though I’m not a Catholic. In fact the closest I get is a very lapsed father.

- To Basilica de Santa Maria de Guadelupe. This is a very very important place for Catholics as it is the site of the only Church-recognised apparition of the Virgin Mary in the Americas. I’ll do more homework on this and update this. A woman shuffled past the half mile of crazy vendors of every notion of religious relic (”genuine pieces of the cross”) – and past us – on her knees to get to the church.

- That was in the far north of the City and the next interview was in the far south. And this is the biggest city in the world. Mike and I are down with the Mexican Metro. Looks and smells just like the Parisian one. So do the armpits.

- Interview a luchador. It was one of the things we really wanted to do here in Mexico City and it looked like it wasn’t going to be possible, but at the last minute, he comes good. “Crazy Boy” is his name and we grilled him on his fascinating life of two halves: the fame, adulation and fawning groupies of his masked existence, and the total anonymity and search for real love of his private life.

- To a Mexican housing estate to interview a couple who are celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary this Saturday. Tears all round as they talk about how they’d die without each other – what would be the point in going on? – and how much they love the family they have created. Deeply moving and very wonderful. Again, a strong sense of faith plays an important part in their marriage, and a very strong worth ethic.

- To Reuters to pick up the footage they sent out to newspapers and TV stations nationwide. We get there by Metro and as we surface onto Reforma, the main road through town, we land smack in the middle of a huge demonstration by the electricians of Mexico City. The atmosphere was electric. We were shocked. (Sorry, too good to miss) Hundreds and hundreds of riot police waiting for trouble.

- DATE NIGHT! Somehow in the midst of the busiest day we’ve had in weeks, we manage to get to an Italian restaurant for a little marriage time. We squabbled quite a bit earlier in the day (Mike: “we should’ve taken the Metro” when we’re stuck in thick traffic on the way to the Luchador.  Me: “Should’ve! Should’ve! It’s always bloody “should’ve” with you!” Rational, as ever.)

- The journalist from El Universal, Mexico’s national paper, calls for a phone interview. It’s difficult because it’s our first interview in pure Spanish (though our Spanish is far from pure). So it takes an hour and a half – Mike does the whole thing. At 1am, I lose my cool and start shouting about going to bed. Again, rational.

I think today might just be our lowest day yet. We spent all day chasing potential leads (an author, a wrestler) across the city only to find at the end of the day, they all came to nothing. Add to that the reporter for El Universal failing to turn up for our arranged 6pm interview and you have a day which amounts to nothing at all and two very very low GTDers.

BUT we did have one highlight of the day: we went down to Coyoacan (Frida Kahlo’s birthplace) to meet with the AAA – publicity company for the Lucha Libre Mexican wrestling. We were ushered into the waiting room before our meeting. There were no seats available. The 3 sofas could in total probably seat 10 people. The highlight of the assembled lardies was a pair of men – both large, of slightly different complexions – and their DWARF WRESTLER MINI MEs. To be honest, I don’t know why we’re complaining about today. Any day with a dwarf is a good day.

Well. The day starts with a phonecall saying that Reuters Mexico would like to interview us for Reuters TV. Woo hoo! I rush to don some slap (in vain), and we head out to meet the team of 4. Thus the Evel Knievel suits and the bike are caught driving around Mexico City, taking in the sites, and each of us is interviewed individually (Reuters’ policy, apparently – not for turning, even when the documentary is about couples), all with the Angel Del Independencia in the background.

I talk slowly and inarticulately. Not, I suspect, the surest of first steps on our thousand mile path to world domination. (Having said that though, Mike rocked)

In the evening, our wonderful host Roberto takes us to meet a gay couple he knows. Sadly, they are not delighted by the thought of me scrawling their intimacies up here (they are, however, happy to appear in the documentary, so another excuse to tune in whenever we make the thing). They have been together for 26 years and we had one of our most wonderful interviews so far, in that they were both so good at talking about the situation in Mexico in general, then setting themselves in that context. My ropey Spanish even let me understand about 80% of the interview, and anything I didn’t understand the amazing Roberto happily and flawlessly translated (NB A Puerto Rican with the best bilingual abilities I have ever seen. Normally with kids who grow up bilingual, it’s very difficult to translate because they’ve never been taught, for example, that una pareja = a couple, for example. It’s just a couple. But Roberto is a master. Also an environmental consultant. Have made him promise that when he does a TED talk, he’ll comp me a ticket). Alongside the wonderful interview, they prepared a breath-taking meal of traditional Oaxacan, pre-Spanish delicacies. In the picture, (clockwise from guacamole at the top): guacamole (where would we be without it? Not Mexico, that’s for sure); the coup de grace chapulines which are tiny fried baby grasshoppers. Hundreds of them, like sprinkles you’d put on a cake. But slightly not. You can see all their bits: legs, thorax, head. They are harvested in nets, then dry fried, and the taste is unlikely anything I’ve ever encountered before, kind of salty, kind of bitter, kind of important you don’t think about what you’re eating. The way that you eat them is by taking one of the tostadas (in photo, bottom right), layering it with refried beans (in photo below said grasshoppers). You then add some of the cactus leaves (with tomato and avocado) as pictured bottom left, then sprinkle the chapulines on top liberally. It’s totally delicious. But just don’t dwell on what exactly you’re crunching on.

(PS Shoot me now for being one of those people who takes photographs of the food they eat then posts them. But this particular time, I had a couple of requests to see the grasshoppers. Apologies to the rest of you)

We interview Lyn on love in Paztcuaro’s town square. She never wanted to be a “wife”, saying she wanted a wife of her own, and so resisted Edward’s proposals – which started 3 hours after they met in a bar, and continued at a rate of one a week for 4 years. Finally she acquiesced and married him, and they have been totally happy ever since – expats by nature, they started in Guatemala, moving to Thailand for a few years, then back to Mexico, all over their 16 year relationship.

They had a plate made depicting their story with traditional Mexican skeletons

She said she called her mother after she got married, in Carson City, Nevada with their 10st St Bernard dog as a witness, “Why didn’t you tell me it would be like this? It’s magical!”. She loves being a wife now, and says it’s not 1+1, but being “to the power of two”: anything they believe they can do, they can do. Nothing can stop them. Though Edward is now ill and has to remain on constant oxygen, and is unable to leave the house. It must be incredibly hard on both of them, I say, and she agrees – but demonstrates no less fervour in her deep love for him. In sickness and in health indeed.

We have another massive day’s driving (I think this may be the theme for the next few months, certainly the next few weeks as we try to get to Panama for October 26th, my 30th birthday). We stop briefly in Morelia, another very very beautiful city, then onwards to Mexico City (”DF” as it is called – districto federal”)

First, we get very very lost in a place called Toluca, an hour outside Mexico City. Signs from the Cuota direct us towards Mexico and lead us into the impoverished suburbs of Mexico. Not ideal. Our host, awaiting our arrival, has the good grace not to inform us of his concern over texts we are sending each other. One hour later, and dusk, we find our way back from the backroads onto the Cuota.

Mexico City is MASSIVE. Still the biggest city in the world, we are told. It sprawls. Really. In such a way that even the locals get lost, let alone the Brit idiots without a map (or a GPS. RIP – in Vegas). But what a great city. It’s alive the minute you enter it. All gleaming skyscrapers and monuments. The traffic, as we have been warned, is solid. Apparently the Mexican government lets cars with different number plates in on different days to try and calm it, but it doesn’t seem to be working particularly well. The one bonus is that, as we sit in very sluggish traffic, a taxi driver draws level with us and yells out in Spanish “you’re the couple driving from Alaska to Patagonia! I heard about you on the radio in Guadalajara!”. Fame, how unexpectedly you knock.

We arrive late to our host, a friend-of-a-friend (which has very much been the theme of our time in Mexico. This time, thank you Flo), Roberto, who we go out for dinner with and generally celebrate the joys of this great city.

Another day of driving. The distances just don’t seem to be getting any shorter… This time from Guadalajara along the Cuota (paid highway – always very good quality roads, though expensive) to Patzcuaro, an utterly beautiful city between Guadalajara and Mexico City. We’re staying with friends of Barb’s: Lyn and Edward. Edward, a Vietnam vet, has a lung disorder so is on oxygen and unable to move about much, Lyn is a bubbly and slightly hippy Canadian. They prove wonderful hosts in Patzcuaro: Lyn gives us a detailed tour of the place.

So what’s the story of Guadalajara? We ask. We need to get a couple before we head on, and today is the day to do it. It’s the birthplace of Mariachis (but no joy there, grrr). But the centre of the world of tequila is, as you might imagine, Tequila. And it’s an hour outside Guadalajara. So today’s mission is to find a couple involved in the tequila business. Advance phonecalls yield nothing, so we set off joined by our friends Carlos and his brother Davide, to find a tequila story.

Tequila country is green, with rolling hills (we later learn, an aged volcano valley) lined with cornrows of blue agave plants. I was nervous. Coldcalling for interviews is hard enough, but just turning up on people’s doorsteps – and not speaking the language. Well, it was going to be a toughie. 

The place which we had found online but been unable to contact was called Los Abuelos, with 5 generations of experience behind its name. Surely, with that kind of family credentials, it must have a couple tucked away somewhere? Well, no. Buuuuuut, it did have a totally fabulous owner (divorced) called Guillermo Erickson Sauza (of the famous Sauza tequila family, hence the name) and a rich history of enmity and love conquering all. AND Guillermo speaks perfect English, looks like Paul Newman and gave us a perfectly-gravelly-voiced tour of the place. As it turns out, it’s the only tequila manufacturer who is sticking to the principles of 100 years ago, and the results are hugely palatable – velvety deliciousness a world away from the salt-encrusted Shame Fuel of my student years.

So, for today’s “what we have learnt” (the bifurcated blog of tourist and el amor)- tequila production in a nutshell:
1. The blue agave plant is the one favoured for tequila. It delivers a softer taste so wins out against its 120 cousin agaves (the green agave is used for Mezcal).
2. Once planted, the agave grows 3 new leaves a month. They are usually harvested after about a year.
3. The leaves are cut away from the pineapple-like centre – this is where the good stuff is. Once the leaves are cut off the base, the bases are collected and delivered to the distillery for processing.
4. It goes into the oven. They use steam and cook for 33 hours, caramelizing it and turning it from the white of the outside to the brown of the inside.
5. This is where I’m going to start to get hazy (relevant grey matter weakened by ensuing deluge of the final product). The agave is then shredded in the only electrically operated machine in the entire Los Abuelos distillery. 
6. Oh God, I’ve realised I have nothing like the vocabulary to describe what happens next. But basically, it’s put in a circular well in the ground, where it’s crushed by a revolving millstone, dragged by a horse (though in this case they now use a tractor). Two men push the agave around to ensure that it is fully pulped. This process takes about 7 hours.
7. Water is added to the well, the agave is washed and the wood fibre is removed. This takes about 3 hours, then once its drained, its pumped up into wood vats for fermenting.
8. The brown “mosta” (must) is fermented with yeast (the only additive at any point) for 3 and a half days. It then becomes “mosta muerta” (dead must).
9. It’s then double distilled. As its cooking off the must, the first thing to rise is the alcohol. At its first pass, it’s about 25% alcohol. This is called Ordinario. (It’s like taking the water out and keeping the alcohol, with a filter) They make 10,000L in a day.
10. This clear liquid is then run through the second set of stills (copper pot stills). After this, it’s tequila.
11. It then goes to the tanks (blanco) then to the barrels for the reposado and anejo.

Blanco is the plain and simple tequila. If you’re taste testing tequilas, you always use the blanco because it’s the base stuff. I suspect it’s what has blotted out most of my university career. Reposado (literally “reposed”) goes into barrel and remains there for under a year, normally about 9 months. Anejo (aged) lives in the barrel for over a year, but less than 3 (after that it becomes Extra Anejo).

We head into Los Abuelos’ tasting room, set deep in candlelit caves set into the agave hill. Quite breathtaking. Mike, he of dodgy tum fame, is coersed into tasting with me – and Guillermo who really enjoys what he makes, evidently. The blanco is a good tequila. None of that burning, poisonous sensation of “quick quick, hand me the f”cking lime!” tequilas. It doesn’t need a chaser at all and goes down a treat. The reposado is lovely, more of a kick, but still not a burn. And finally, the anejo, the punchiest of the hattrick, is more in the tequila vibe. But totally palatable at room temperature and without a chaser. Really very good indeed. Perhaps my alcoholic arch-nemesis and I will become more contented bedfellows in future…

Los Abuelos wins 99% of the taste tests it goes into. The way they make the tequila is totally unique, using all the old traditional, laborious methods, and it really pays off.

Los Abuelos is called Fortaleza in the States, and is waiting to make its European debut. But what a tequila! Awesome.