Chronicles of a Motorcycle Gypsy: South of the Border

By Tiffani Burkett

Losing her job was an opportunity, not a tragedy.

Fresh off of a nine month journey, camping off her 2015 Yamaha FZ-07 sport bike through 49 US states and 3 provinces of Canada, Tiffani Burkett wasn’t ready to return to a nine-to-five. She had picked up a freelance gig as a motorcycle journalist, she had met someone, and she still had a little bit of her dwindling life savings left in the bank.

Naturally, the only logical course of action was to to set her sights toward the next set of landlocked states in North America: Mexico

Despite growing up in Los Angeles, she had never been south of the border, didn't speak any Spanish (except for the swear words she learned in high school), and even without the recent political unrest, it seemed that everyone had plenty of stories to tell about cartels and crime and violence.

But if fear was enough to stop her from living out her dreams, she wouldn't be a motorcyclist in the first place. Whether it's dealing with broken down equipment in the wild west city of Durango, a passport debacle in Costa Rica, or a last minute flight to help a friend race the North West 200 in Ireland, people are far better than the media implies, and what she finds is a wonderful journey through new cultures, new environments, and new found strength in both herself and her growing relationship with her travel partner.

Chronicles of a Motorcycle Gypsy: South of the Border is the second book in a series of memoirs. Originally published as a Travelogue in Motorcyclist Magazine as Girl Meets World, this full length memoir has been rewritten from the ground up to include the untold stories and the details that were a little too racy for the blog. It also includes a full pack list and bike builds for the aspiring ADV rider, and lots of pictures for every chapter!

If you loved Ewan McGregor and Charlie Boorman's Long Way Round and Ted Simon's Jupiter's Travels, you'll love Chronicles of a Motorcycle Gypsy!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tiffani Burkett
• Release date: Nov 12, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463435724

Tiffani Burkett

Tiffani grew up in Los Angeles, CA with a story in her head, a comic book in her hands, and eventually, a motorcycle under her feet. But after a long career in software development, she went off on a road trip spanning 2 years, exploring the US, Latin America, and Southeast Asia with nothing but a motorcycle, a tent, and a lot of hope.Over that trip, she discovered a love and talent for writing, and she's now a published Journalist in Motorcyclist Magazine, the world's oldest running motorcycle publication. When she's not behind the keyboard, she’s a licensed motorcycle road racer and scuba diver, a motivational speaker, an artist, and a seasoned adventurer.

Book preview

Chronicles of a Motorcycle Gypsy

South of the Border

By: Tiffani Burkett

Map by One Stop Map (Onestopmap.com)

Copyright © 2019 by Tiffani Burkett

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof

may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever

without the express written permission of the publisher

except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

First Printing, 2019

ISBN: 978-0-578-57810-1

I have tried to recreate events, locales and conversations from my memories of them. In order to maintain their anonymity in some instances I have changed the names of individuals and places, I may have changed some identifying characteristics and details such as physical properties, occupations and places of residence.

*

Book Design and Cover by Tiffani Burkett

Photographs by Tiffani Burkett and David Hollywood Hayward

Acknowledgements

First and foremost, I may have never written this story if not for the encouragement of all of my friends and family. Special thanks to Ari Henning and Marc Cook from Motorcyclist Magazine, who gave me a chance to share my stories with the world.

I’d also like to thank my mother, Karen Burkett, for supporting and loving me through all of my ridiculous whims and decisions. I wouldn’t be half the person I am without her.

I’ll forever be greatful for all of the people who gave me a safe place to stay and a warm meal throughout my journey, friends new, old, and somewhere in between.

And last, but certainly not least, I want to thank David Hayward for saying Yes instead of No, and staying by my side through all of my toughest moments, both throughout the journey and after it was done. I couldn’t imagine having shared this  journey with anyone else.

Chapter 1

Do you speak any Spanish? Hollywood asked me, his eyes fixated on the flames of the campfire. We were camping in a cold, wet patch of woods on a December night in Oklahoma, marking the 49th state on my tour of the US. Since I had lost my job and started this trip nine months ago, I had ridden some 38,000 miles, over 49 states and 3 provinces of Canada. Having joined me three months into the journey, Hollywood wasn’t too far behind.

I learned a little bit in high school: puta, cabron, pinche, pandejo. All the useful words.  I laughed, maybe slightly seriously.

Right. We turned around to warm our backsides, shifting our view to the surrounding wilderness.

This was supposed to be the end of the trip. The day we both went back to our respective home states and tried to reintegrate into society. Hollywood would go home to Denver, I would go home to Los Angeles. We would get nine-to-fives and start paying bills again. Fall into a routine. It would be as though none of it ever happened, save the mileage on my FZ-07’s odometer and the marks on my heart.

Maybe those marks had gotten too deep. I had learned so much about living off a motorcycle these last nine months that it finally seemed easy and natural. I no longer shook with fear as I zipped up my tent, alone with no defenses. I no longer experienced fits of anxiety every time I struggled to find somewhere to sleep at night. Dirt roads still made me feel like a three-legged, newborn deer wearing roller blades, but that’s at least one more leg than I had when I started. In all my struggles and my triumphs, I would be returning home a different person than I was when I left.

Not that either of us had a home to go back to. I had gotten rid of my apartment in Redondo Beach to go on this trip, and Hollywood had been just a few notches above homeless when he joined me. Still, getting reestablished would be a minor trial compared to the scope of what we had just accomplished. I had friends, I had family, and I still had plenty of savings left.

…I still had plenty of savings left.

Do you wanna go to Mexico?

Yep.

And the snowball continued rolling out of control.

***

Mexico? Aren’t you worried about the cartel?

Check out this story- they just found two decapitated tourists in Cancun. Are you sure about this?

Do you know how much they hate Americans now that we elected Trump? You’d have to be crazy to go down there in this political climate!

We started preparing as soon as we got back. I traded out my winter-focused riding gear for something more suited for warm weather, picking textiles with big vents instead of down liners. We tossed out a handful of our most useless gadgets, like my fishing pole and my action camera that I never had the time or electricity to charge, to make room for water purification tablets, some antibiotics, and mosquito nets. I’m sure there should have been more additions, but I didn’t know enough about riding through an undeveloped nation to know what those additions should be.

We didn’t bother to bring a dedicated GPS at all this time. My last one had barely lasted three months of the first trip, and when it did work, all it did was lead me astray. My sense of direction is tested enough just finding the bathroom in a restaurant. Couple that with the unwanted attention from having expensive toys in plain view, and it all sounded like a headache I didn’t need. I’m sure my phone would be more than adequate.

Now that I had more time to prepare for traveling with another person, I also added an extra sleeping bag to combat Hollywood’s blanket hogging ways. Otherwise, our pack list remained largely the same. I knew the second I got rid of something would be the second I suddenly needed it, and I wasn’t about to give fate that kind of power over me.

The last order of business was to go over our bikes, figuring we wanted to be as fresh and ready as possible before parts for a large modern motorcycle became hard to come by. We stopped by Motorcyclist Magazine headquarters in Orange County, greeting all of the friends who I hadn’t seen in so many months. Will, the mechanic and all-around shop guy, gave my bike a once over, swapping out spark plugs, chain, sprockets, and fluids, then he replaced the digital dash that had started cracking after my crash in Canada (My FZ now has zero miles on the odometer!), and mounted a new set of rubber. We did a quick photo shoot with Julia, the woman who had been editing my articles up until now, and I promised to continue to write for the magazine whenever I could find WiFi.

As luck would have it, within two days of getting brand new tires on both of our bikes, we somehow managed to pick up a couple of nails. My meaty, dual sport Shinko 705s took a plug without much fuss, but the sport touring Bridgestones on Hollywood’s FZ1 were proving a bit more challenging. When his rear tire still didn’t hold air after the first plug attempt, he grabbed a screw, twisted it into the hole, and called it good.

Probably fine.

Hopefully.

Le sigh. 

February 12th was our day of departure, delayed a day thanks to my usual scramble to make sure I wasn’t forgetting anything.

Leaving this time around felt distinctly different from the first time. It was a strange combination of calm and anxiety. I had become fairly confident in my ability to cope with challenges, improvise, and adapt to the good and awful experiences of the road. Yet, despite having grown up in the culturally diverse mecca that was Los Angeles, just a couple hundred miles from the border, I had never even ventured to Tijuana, and I had zero concept of what to actually expect once we crossed that imaginary line.

The unknowns of Latin America far outweighed the possible unknowns of the US, and I had heard more than enough fear mongering and stern warnings to be at least a little scared. Though I was more worried about the quality of the roads and the amount of dirt I would have to ride than the danger of the cartels.

But this time, I wasn’t alone. I didn’t just have someone to rely on, but I had someone who relied on me. And while I might not always be as kind as I should be when taking care of myself, I always had the drive to keep another person safe. I wouldn’t take risks that would compromise his safety. And he… maybe wouldn’t take risks that would compromise mine?

That part was debatable.

But it still helped me keep the notion that things will always work out in the back of my mind. Whether I was in the back roads of Mississippi, the thick of the Canadian wilderness, or in a jungle somewhere south of the border, between both of our skillsets and life experiences, I knew we would always find a way to manage. We had to. And we usually did.

We spent our last night in the USA at a backyard bonfire with a fellow Ninja 250 racer named Mike, situated at his home in southern San Diego. My local Chuckwalla Valley Motorcycle Association (CVMA) racing family came by to see me off and have a few laughs, and we all blissfully ignored the possibility of never seeing each other again.

Stacy, another friend who we had met corner working at Laguna Seca the year prior, drove her van down from Lancaster with a dual sport bike in tow. I introduced her to these people who were all so important to me.

But there was a reason she hauled down her bike, and there was a reason that we were spending the night in Mike’s guest room, beyond the good vibes and well wishes (and the whole having nowhere else to go thing). This time, I was going to start off the trip with escorts.

Mike had been to Mexico quite a few times for surf trips, skateboarding, moto-adventuring, and otherwise, and he was more than happy to offer us a tour and a send-off. Stacy, on the other hand, was just one of those people who was always down to get out and do things. No excuses. No I’d love to, but… Just enthusiasm and excitement. If I had met her before I had run into Hollywood, we’d probably be doing this whole thing together.

Getting to start off our trip with a guided tour and this much backup was almost so confidence inspiring that it felt a little bit like cheating.

We woke up early to an overcast sky, and made our last minute preparations. Stacy and I ran over to a nearby Staples to get some Mexican Insurance papers printed, while Hollywood and Mike gave the bikes and luggage one last once over. Feeling marginally confident that we had prepared everything we could possibly think to prepare, all four of us threw our legs over a bike and we were on our way.

We had an eclectic set of motorcycles fitting of the circus that is club racers. I was, naturally, still riding my 2015 Yamaha FZ-07, a nimble little naked sport bike that was still trying its darnedest to be an adventure bike. Hollywood mounted his black and yellow 2003 Yamaha FZ1, a 140 horsepower sport bike which gave no illusion that it was any sort of adventure bike (despite all of the adventuring he forced it to do). Mike grabbed hold of a café racer styled Triumph Bonneville, with clip-ons angled in a way that would make the Harley racers of the ‘30s proud. And Stacy revved up the only bike in the lot that actually made sense for the task at hand, with her plated dual sport Kawasaki KLX250.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a Tiff adventure if we didn’t get rained on, and within the first fifteen miles of twisty mountain roads, we were at the side of the highway as my travel companions scrambled for their rain gear. You know you have bad luck when even the southernest of southern California suddenly has inclement weather. It’s a good thing I still have a questionable affinity for fighting with nature.

The rain didn’t last too long, as we rolled at a modest pace through hills speckled with unusually green sagebrush. The desert had really come alive this year, and I was convinced that this uncommon beauty was some sort of good omen. In a jiffy, we landed at the dusty Mexican border outside the small city of Tecate.

The border guards never even spoke to us. We were waved through without showing passports or IDs or anything at all. The only obstacles to our crossing were the rows of topes that covered the road. Topes are the Mexican style of speed bumps. They’re made up of large yellow orbs implanted into the ground in tight formation. They’re probably no big deal to a car, but at about four inches high, spaced an inch apart, they felt like trying to navigate a boulder field on my bike. For a country with so many motorcycles, that design could have only been justified out of pure spite.

But it was a minor inconvenience. We parked on the other side of the border station, shared some dramatic high fives, then Hollywood and I returned to the outpost to do our paperwork.

The Baja, as it were, was designated as a Free Zone for tourists, so Visas and Vehicle Import Permits weren’t required for entry. The idea here was that it would make it that much easier for anyone who just wanted to splurge on Mexico’s wine country or party it up in Cabo. The length of the US/Mexican border and parts of Sonora are also Free Zones for the same reason, but the rest of the country is not. We were going to be seeing a lot more than just the Baja and the border towns, however, so we couldn’t go on without our legalities in order.

There weren’t any lines at the border that day, but we had to jump around back and forth to different offices, filling out forms, getting stamps on our passports, and running to small local shops to get photo copies of those same forms. I guess they don’t provide copy machines in Mexican border offices. It took about an hour and a half for everything to be processed, each of us dropping $25 on a visa, $59 on a vehicle permit, a $300 deposit on the older 2003 FZ1, and a $400 deposit on my newer 2015 FZ-07.

The deposits served as a promise that we wouldn’t sell our bikes in their country (paid in cash, as paying with a card would have put us at the mercy of the ever-changing exchange rate). They clearly were not aware of how long and deep my love affair with the FZ was.

All that said and done, we now had six months to see as much of Mexico as we could. I’d be shocked if it took us more than one or two to get down to Guatemala or Belize, but you never know what kind of setbacks you’ll encounter in a place like this. Either way I was stoked. Onward into the great unknown!

The closest I’ll ever be to having all my ducks in a row. (San Diego, California, USA)

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With paperwork secured, doubts squashed, and anxiety very lightly suppressed, we were finally on our way. (San Diego, California, USA)

Storm the gates! Oh wait, they’re just going to let us in? Alright then. (Tecate, Mexico)

Chapter 2

In that first foray into Tecate, it only took about three blocks before it became immediately obvious that we were no longer in California. Drivers had a palpable lack of care and order, paying little attention to road signs or stop lights. The buildings were run down and ill-assembled, some foregoing paint, others foregoing floors. Stray dogs were speckled generously around the streets, wandering like listless vagrants from one mound of trash to the next. It all had an aura about it that felt completely different from even the most rural, podunk backwoods of the US. I hadn’t expected the variance to be quite that sudden and extreme.

Our band of bikers made quick work of the place, opening up into the countryside as we cruised down Highway 3. This year had been unusually rainy (which my bad luck with weather can attest to), turning the valleys and hills shades of green that were reminiscent of my favorite fantasy story books. Flowers speckled the road in miniature bursts of color, while a sign that read Bienvenidos Ruta del Vino arched overhead, welcoming us to the wine route of Guadalupe de Valle. At this time of year, it was every bit as breathtaking as the rich and colorful wine countries of California.

Mike led the way, signaling to pull off onto a dirt road that brought us to the base of a vineyard. Encuentro Guadalupe, a winery built on a mountainside, was a surprisingly modern and sophisticated building, especially compared to what I had just seen. The rectangular rooms were suspended over the cliff and the walls were crafted out of tinted glass, giving guests an uninhibited view of the valley below. We took some Ferris Bueller-esque pictures in the art gallery, then toasted glasses of sangria on the balcony to a most perfect backdrop.

Who knew being homeless on a motorcycle in Mexico was going to be the classiest I’ve ever been in my life?

Mike took the lead again as we went on to the next destination, and I fell back to ride sweep. A few miles down the road, he signaled once again to pull off onto a dirt trail, this one bumping and dipping its way to a small courtyard with a hotel. We opted to spend our first night in Mexico levels of luxury, renting a small two bedroom house. The rooms were modest, but it had the perfect deck for long conversations that trailed off into the night. My favorite thing. I’d travel way fancier if I had more people to split the bill with all the time!

Our bikes skated nimbly around the unmaintained roads after we dropped off our gear, making the seemingly endless circuit of dirt slightly more palatable. I had to accept that pavement wasn’t really a thing down here if you ventured off the main path. I hadn’t ridden much dirt since the last time I face planted in some sand back in Cape Cod, maybe four months ago, and I was low on practice and low on confidence. Every time Mike signaled to turn off, I had a minor clench moment, not wanting to embarrass myself in front of my friends. It was one thing to embarrass myself in front of Hollywood- he was used to me being a klutz- but Mike and Stacy… well, actually, I guess everyone was used to me being a klutz. I don’t know why I was self-conscious at all.

There wasn’t much to fret about though. While the roads weren’t smooth, they were all well-trodden and hard-packed. It wasn’t any worse than, say, traversing the warped asphalt and curb jumping required to get around downtown New Orleans.

Well, until the turn off for the pizza place where the whole road was uphill on uneven cobblestones. My suspension jostled and bucked and whined more than I do (don’t confirm that with Hollywood), as I climbed the hill to Ochento’s Pizza, doing my best to keep a loose hold on the bars and let the front wheel and physics work themselves out. I narrowly missed a set of pedestrians who seemed far too comfortable with being in my out of control flight path, then heaved a sigh of relief as I came to a stop, still alive, in the parking lot.

Fortunately, as we dismounted and pulled off our helmets, Mike informed me with a carefree smile that there was a much easier road that we’d be taking home. He just wanted us to experience the cobblestones first.

This fucking guy.

I’m starting to think Mike and Hollywood might be the same person.

Now, I understand that to people who don’t believe in magic and unicorns, pineapple on pizza is a hot debate. But in Mexico, Hawaiian (or hawaiana, in spanish) pizza is not only a wonderfully delicious staple, but this one had notes of cinnamon and sugar. I had never experienced this before, and now I didn’t ever want to experience pizza without it again. I understand this in no way counts as Mexican food, but my inner fat kid isn’t here to argue semantics. She’s here to be dazzled. And this pizza was sparkling like stripper glitter.

By the time we were done, the sun had set, and I was already breaking my very first rule for Latin America: No riding at night. Stacy strapped all of our leftover pizza to the back of her bike, figuring we could distract any banditos we might encounter with delicious carbs, then we puttered back to our house in the weeds under an intimidating darkness. The potholes were easy enough to spot, the stray dogs a little less so, but all in all, it was an uneventful ride back. We spent that first night relaxing on the deck, talking about life in the comfortable temperatures of a spring night in the desert. It was a night that I never wanted to end.

I wish these kind of mini caravans were a more normal occurrence. When I had first started this whole trip, I set out by myself partially because I enjoy solitude, and largely because I couldn’t find anyone else willing to commit to such an undertaking. But travelling alone with nothing but the passing conversation of strangers to fulfil my social needs for months on end, I had experienced a loneliness that I never expected in my long life of introversion. I ordinarily had no problem with being alone, and most of the time, I quite preferred that, but the level of isolation you start to feel after so long without a real, honest, deep connection with another person is surprisingly harrowing. Which is probably why I had so much patience for Hollywood to get his act together and come with me all those months ago. And why I felt so happy and fulfilled now.

Despite all of the added challenges that come with travelling with a companion- the mood swings, the compromising, the increased cost, or wrestling with differences of opinions, expectations, skill levels, coping abilities, and so many other little nuances- these moments when you can relate to someone beyond constant introductions and goodbyes is what made it worthwhile. It was an intense need for companionship that I didn’t know I had until I had completely deprived myself of those real connections for so long.

Perhaps the secret to a happy sustained travel life isn’t budgeting money, being safe and careful, or making big sacrifices, so much as it’s just having loved ones to share it with. I felt so lucky that I had found that. It was a shame that tomorrow, Mike and Stacy would be heading home.

A little bit of sophistication, and a little bit of punk rock. (Guadalupe de Valle, Baja California)

Our first night in Mexico was quite a bit more classy than I was used to even back when I was still living by the beach! (Guadalupe de Valle, Baja California)

Dirt roads don’t seem so bad anymore once you’ve climbed a road of cobblestone… (Guadalupe de Valle, Baja California)

Piña y jamón is amazing on pizza no matter what country you’re in! (Ochento’s Pizza, Baja California)

Chapter 3

We started our first morning waking up in Mexico with an authentic Mexican breakfast in the hotel restaurant. I had no idea what the Spanish term was for sunny-side-up, so I settled for whatever the default style of eggs was going to be in the huevos ranchero (which conveniently is, in fact, sunny-side-up). My plate came out with two eggs slathered in salsa, a pool of beans, a pile of Spanish rice, and a round container of harina (flour) tortillas. My impression of the food remained positive, but I was already struggling with the fact that they didn’t offer water as an option to wash it all down with.

I didn’t know firsthand what happened when you drank the tap water down here, but I had heard enough to not want to find out. Some places had bottled water available, but it seemed that coca cola was the more common drink option. Otherwise it was all coffee or beer, none of which I liked. I was more of a milk and water kind of person. I guess I’d just be dry-swallowing spicy tacos for a while.

Once we were all recharged and ready to go, the four of us got on our bikes to head to another winery. Vena Cava was built using overturned boats, topping walls built from wine bottles, cut and cemented together like round bricks. We splurged on a $10 wine tasting tour, trying a variety of wines. Mike turned to our young sommelier after savoring a sip of something sweet.

How do you say ‘fucking smooth’ in Spanish? He asked. The class and sophistication of your average motorcycle racer never disappoints.

Ah, pinche suave. Our server held back a laugh.

Pinche suave! We toasted our glasses, feeling as on top of the world as we could possibly be.

As we all headed out for our last destination as a merry little band of riders, we found a speckle of rain had turned