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Rough ride from Santiago de Mendez to Cuenca
It's light rain again as I head for Cuenca. I had to find the turn off from Route 45 about 35 km from the hotel. I followed google maps which said 130km in 3 hours. It started out good until I came upon a mudslide and the mud was just deep enough to slow me down and I nearly dropped the bike when I let it stall.
It continued to rain, the road went up in elevation and it turned cold and windy. Road construction and gravel kept things slow. Alternating patches of gravel and asphalt seems to be mostly gravel. The water was running hard down the steep slopes. There was plenty of vegetation but it's no match for the force of the runoff. The 3 hour ride took 5+ hours.. It was one of the worst riding conditions I've ever dealt with. Things got better when I got to Gualceo. The rain stopped and I had dry hardtop the remainder of the day.
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