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By Terry Sayther

Sat, Oct 16, 04

     Terry and Deb once again discovered the joys of early morning, taking to thecobbled streets of Teotihuacan to see the sights. They hired a guide (the place is enormous) who turned out to be a politically savvy Nauhuatl Indian who gave good information about the ruins accompanied by commentary about the spiritual side of life. What a place…climbing the Temple of the Sun (five levels and A LOT of steps) gave a magnificent view. Going down was much easier.

      Early afternoon found us once again on the road circumnavigating Mexico City. Even 45 kilometers from the city limits at non-peak hours we were in constant stop and go traffic. Inconceivable, really. We finally did get out of town and on our way eastward again. Just past Puebla we saw an old bus hit the corner of a little car as it pulled out to pass, punting the car instantly off the road and putting the bus in a smoky four wheel drift sideways directly in front of us. SOMEHOW, the driver kept the bus off the guardrail and regained control. We had been in the process of passing him at 90+mph and were lucky on several counts.
Coming down off the central plateau through the incredible cliffs and vistas of Veracruz, Beavis had to change carb jets a couple of times to compensate for the air density change. He also had to pound the exhaust system back in pace (after it was finally scraped off by a Killer Tope). Late in the day Beavis and Butthead were having so much fun driving on the curvy mountain roads that they started zooming off ahead of us, waiting for us to catch up, and zooming off again. At about midnight, and we hadn't seen them since about 4pm. We had to assume they were still zooming somewhere, perhaps a little lost but having an adventure all on their own. We speculated that perhaps they would stay closer to the mother ship henceforth, or not….
Minatitlan was our final resting point for the day, and we got to mingle with a local fiesta of dancers and musicians. Debbie got her first lesson in playing the lower jawbone of a horse. I think she has great potential! (And I hope so, for that horse made some wonderful sounds.)

Sun, Oct 17, 04

      Our morning drive via autopista took us past Villahermosa and almost to our goal, Palenque. These toll-road autopistas are great highways that are usually expensive enough to keep the truck traffic elsewhere. Thus, they have become the preferred routes for getting somewhere in a hurry. The scenery does indeed fly by when you can spend hour after hour at 90-100mph, even while towing a trailer. We later found out that Beavis and Butthead were covering this section at 115-120, trying to catch us. At each toll booth they found out how far ahead we were and they were making good progress until they ran out of gas! That car has a 35 gallon fuel cell, but no gauge! Too bad.

We arrived at the fantastic archeological site of Palenque in the early afternoon to find Beavis and Butthead waiting for us with beers in their hands. A joyous reunion! They said that they were not worried, but they seemed definitely tense and were very happy to see us. WE were a little worried, even if they were not.
While we were checking into our hotel, Mario Domenzain and his family arrived for another joyous reunion. Mario (my co-piloto for the 2004 race) brought his wife Renata and his three kids, Miguel, Regina, and Geronimo to accompany us for the Carrera. Mario also brought his race mechanic, Chucho. So, we were quite the family! We all spent the afternoon hiking the ruins and swimming in the pool.

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