San Miguel

Stopped for papusas for breakfast while leaving our hotel. How could we resist, they were already made and ready to go! We had to climb back up the steep descent we dropped down when we came into San Vicente to the higher mountain ridge to continue east. The riding in the morning wasn't bad, at altitude a little cooler and with little uphill. We stopped for more papusas for lunch.  Had a descent from over 600 meters altitude down below 100 m. The valley was very beautiful, however, and filled with bananas, mangos, and a little fruit like an apple but with single large seed, bit pulpier, and crab apple sized. The low altitude was very hot, so we had to soak ourselves multiple times. In one area, several people on the side of the road were trying to sell iguanas - live and hog tied. It is illegal so they hid them when cops went by. We tried again to buy 4 bananas, but were given them instead. The bananas were not typical, being a little starchy.

Just a couple ox pulling a wooden cart stacked super high...

We were supposed to meet a couch surfing host in San Miguel at 8:30. Waited at a tim hortons style place with a huge menu and super busy, but free internet. Their menu included wonderful things like fine cheesecakes, cakes, pies, frappes, coffees, and ice cream. They also had less dessert like options which are not as exciting. We had pizzas and a fantastic oreo frappe. The drink was more expensive than the price of the pizza!
 Did not hear from the host and were unable to access a phone to call, so instead we had to find a hotel.  The hotel we found wanted 15 bucks, we offered him all the american cash we had left, 11 and change. He refused, we tried to leave. He stopped us, asked for thirteen. We tried to leave. He asked us to wait while he called his boss and then accepted. The hotel room had no internet, but was the cleanest room we've had since Mexico - or maybe since the states.