Bit by a dog, and then knock, knock, knock... it's the police.

The mechanic shop didn't open until 9:00am, but when I walked over there to talk to them he said his mechanic wouldn't be in for another hour and a half or so.

So we walked up to the big Monday market to have some breakfast and pick up a few things.

The Monday market in Coscomatepec is amazing. It's one of the few markets left where the locals and indigenous population still trade goods as well as money. And they have a lot of local traditional food.

Coscomatepec.

Once again, loads of cheap fruits and vegetables everywhere.

The tool guy.

Peppers!

We had read about the tradional tamales that they do in this area, so we found a stand selling them. 

Wrapped in banana leaves, they don't look very apetizing!

But they tasted yummy!

Only 7 pesos ($0.56 CAD, $0.41 USD) each.

Now there's a feast!

She cooked us up a couple of memelas, and picadas and corn enchiladas. Delicious!

Corn enchiladas.

So, breakfast in total cost 27 pesos ($2.15 CAD, $1.60 USD) each.

When we returned to Igor, I walked back down to the mechanic but after I explained the problem, he sent me to another shop five minutes down the road. I walked down there, but they were too busy, and he suggested another place. 

At the last place, they had about 6 or 7 young guys all working on vehicles. But the guy I spoke to said to bring Igor over and he would get to it. It turns out he got started right away. We were only there about an hour when he declared everything was ready. I don't even know exactly what he did to fix the problem, but I helped him bleed the one brake line and everything seems fine.

Total cost 200 pesos ($16 CAD, $11.60 USD).

On the road through Huatusco.

We were planning on stopping in Huatusco and having a wander around, but couldn't find suitable parking. We eventually gave up and carried on towards Xalapa.

We stopped at one overnight possibility and I walked into the property. It was really nice, with a couple of cabins for rent, but it was actually closed. There were six dogs that approached me, and the two smallest ones were not very friendly! A woman caretaker came out, but by this time, one of the little ankle biters had actually bit me! And I had to kick the other one away. He tore a little rip into my jeans and left two little marks but it didn't seem to break the skin. 

Then, some kind of a bug bit me. I didn't even see what it was, but it left an itchy welt on my forearm. Turns out it was all for nothing because the lady said she couldn't get hold of her boss, and apologized that she couldn't let us stay. Probably for the best!

It was still another hour drive or so to Xalapa, and we were trying to make it to a resort type place south of the city when I noticed that Igor was acting up. The brakes were fine... this time it was reminiscent of when we had the problem with his fuel pump a year and a half ago. At the time, they couldn't find a replacement assembly, and they had "rebuilt" this one. It sure did seem like similar symptoms. We've got some hills to climb, and that's when we seem to lose power. The power returns after you stop and let things cool down for a half an hour, but it quickly loses steam again after a few minutes.

So, we managed to get pulled over at the entrance to a gravel access road that leads to some sugar cane and coffee plantations. We figured we'd be fine there for the night, so we got settled and would worry about Igor's problem this morning.

Some local dogs came by for some scraps.

The road was actually fairly quiet after it got dark. We had just gone to bed around 10:45pm when we heard a vehicle pull in. I had a peak outside, but couldn't see anything because there were floodlights shining right at Igor. There was a knock, knock, knock on Igor's hood. I was already up and throwing some clothes on, and sure enough, it was the police.

I opened the door and spoke to them for a couple of minutes. They were just checking on us, and said we would be fine to spend the night there.

We are about 2.5 kms (a mile) from the nearest town, so we're going to walk into town and see what we can find for a mechanic. We might (or might not!) be able to limp him up the hill into town, but we also might have to call for a tow truck. We'll see!

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