Abusing the bear

Yea, so I beat around osita a bit this week. We had a nice ride to Mitla, where we camped in a nice old lady's yard then checked out the ruins in the morning. Osita didn't come in, but I got to explore the ruins alone as I was the first one there. I realized however, that osita had a little crack in the frame of the xtracyle. So, she had some emergency surgery, a quick weld and we were on our way, up a highway still under construction to the Hierve el Agua, some pretty cool petrified waterfalls that result from the flow of some mineral springs out of the side of the mountain there. Probably the coolest campsite I've stayed at in Mexico, with maybe one exception. Anyway, for the return trip, we decided to take the old road. This turned out to be about a 1000 meter climb up over the mountain from where we were (already pretty high), taking us to 2700 meters or so. It was a very steep, windy, dirt road with lots of rocks and very little shade. I think it was the most challenging climb of the trip due to the incline and sliperryness. I think the climb was mostly self-abuse. However, the downhill part was where the bike abuse came in. We dropped back down to around 1700m in less than an hour. That was the bumpyest, sketchyest, rawest, most dangerous and exciting downhill yet. The thrill had a price though, my front rack broke again (What is up with aluminum racks?). I did the ziptight/ductape thang, but may need to have a new one fabricated back here in Oaxaca.