Day 1,084
The Butterfly Road
We survived the night, nothing too large took a bite out of us and all the small beasties left us pretty much alone whilst we ate breakfast and packed up. We put our rather dusty and sweat-soaked clothes back on, and hit the dirt. We knew there was a hotel in the small town of Porvenir about 70 miles or so away, and we hoped we might make it. It wasn't to be, because we had a major distraction. Not the condition of the road, though that did make it slow going, nor the heat, even when it hit the mid 40s. No, we had several million travelling companions. Butterflies. Larger and more beautiful than we'd ever seen. They loved me, my colourful top, my orange bags, my sweat soaked everything else. They were pretty keen on Tom too. So despite being completely covered in a thick dust cloud every time a vehicle passed, despite the heat, despite the rough bumpy and sandy road, we rode on enjoying every minute. Finally we called it a day and camped up. A local farmer spotted us checking out what we thought was an abandoned field, and he invited us to pitch our tent in front of his house. Less bugs but a lot of cock-a-doodle-doing!
After a somewhat restless night, whoever said cocks crow to announce dawn never bothered to tell the cocks. All night long they called away. Somewhat bleary-eyed we dressed again in our now stinking and filthy clothes, ate, packed up and hit the dirt. Fewer butterflies today, but just as many dirt cloud spraying vehicles as before, I started to look a streaky orange colour as the red dirt clung to my sweaty face, legs and fingers, basically any bit of flesh on show. Underneath was nearly as bad. Tom matched me, we were like two spray tanned obsessed beauties, without the beauty.
The heat really started to get to us both, during the night it only dropped briefly to mid-20s, in the day it rose steadily to mid-40s. We darted about the road seeking every bit of shade we could find. Though few, we passed a tienda or two, so we could replenish our water supplies. This was really hard work. We reached Porvenir around midday and booked into its only hotel. It was pretty basic, with a decor my dad could have chosen, an aubergine and dark green theme, many years past its sell by date. Still it had a shower and we were in heaven. We washed and washed our bodies but though we felt and smelt better the red dust seemed to ooze from our pores.
My birthday lunch was surreptitiously fed to the local cats, but there was cake and chicken and chips at night, that was hot and tasty. What more could a girl ask for on her birthday?
