Moving to Mexico, Day Three and Four

Sunday morning in Wichita and we are getting a very early start again.  Our goal today is to make it down to San Antonio Texas so we can make our final assault across the US/Mexican border.  The weather is very nice as it has cooled off very much from the prior day, however the forecast is for the temperatures to escalate again today.

So we are driving down through Oklahoma and then enter into Texas, the landscape again continues to vary from green farm country to more of a high plains and then to the flat boring plains.

One of the few scenes that changes is the various road side signs, we have seen many and several of them just make you laugh.  Also to keep our minds on the job at hand Matt and I play various traveling games, like counting the number of hawks, eagles, cows, pigs, etc.  You can see we are very very bored.



Since we have entered Texas, one thing we have noticed is the lack of quality rest areas.  We finally find one and it is just packed with large commercial trucks as well as cars and other sorts of transportation, such as a bike rider.  It is around 98 outside and we are all over heating from the temperature.



As we come into Fort Worth, the traffic comes to a halt as they are doing road construction work on a Sunday afternoon.  It seems to take us two hours to get through Fort Worth and we are now behind schedule, but I am sure that we will make it up.

As we drive south from Fort Worth, we are amazed at how different the scenery looks, it is less planned, more run down and not very inviting.

We finally make it into San Antonio around 7p and check into the hotel for the evening.  We take the dogs out for a walk but can not find any type of park to walk them, so we have to stay on city streets as we are on the south side of the city and not in the nice Riverwalk area.

Early Monday morning we pack up hopefully for the last time and head out for Mexico.  We are crossing at the Colombia Bridge border which does not open until 8a.  So we leave San Antonio around 6a so we can get down there when the crossing opens.  As we get down to Encinal Texas you can see the various commercial trucks queuing up for the border crossing and we stop at the last gas station before crossing to fill up with sodas, water and chocolates. 

As we cross the Rio Bravo into Mexico we come to the first stop of the border crossing.  Here we get a red light which means that the Aduana (customs) agents want to inspect our vehicle.  The agent was very professional and asked me a number of questions, which was interesting given his limited English and my limited Spanish, but we finally settle on a duty charge for the goods that I am bringing across.

After I go and pay the duty charge, Matt and I have to leave the pets and get our Tourist visas and I need to get my Importacion Temporal de Vehiculos (vehicle permit).  We complete this process and are told that we can enter Mexico.  Then about 25 miles later we come to a second Aduana inspection site.  I am not sure what the purpose of this one is, but we are given a green light and we vamous rapidly.  At this point, all of our research says that we are clear of the border crossing inspections, however about 10 miles later we come across another road side check point and we get waived over.  At this inspection, the agent starts asking me about our contents, but I explain that I have already paid my duty at the crossing and show him my receipt and all of the formal stamps on it.  He then wants to see the health certificate for the pets and only asks about our smallest dog Snickers.  I am glad that both Hershey and Raider are not barking and making a tense situation any worse.  I continue to explain that everything has been taken care of and he checks our vehicle permit, then all of a sudden gives everything back to me and tells me I can depart, which I do as rapidly as possible.

Now that we are through what should be all of the border inspections and have left Nuevo Laredo behind, we start our drive which will initially take us around Monterrey.

One thing that both Matt and I notice is how nice the Mexican toll roads are.  Although I35 was in good condition until we got to Fort Worth, the Mexican toll roads seem newer and in better condition.

Leaving Monterrey we start heading up some steep mountains that lead to Saltillo.  Based on our notes for the drive, this is the most dangerous part of the drive because of the steep elevation and the number of large commercial trucks that drive this road.  We were also struggling with the elevation as our Ford truck and the trailer were fairly well loaded and we slowly climbed up the hill.





One issue that we discovered on our drive is that even on the Mexican toll ways there are no Rest Stops that you are use to seeing on the US Interstate Highways.  However there are very nice facilities in many of the Pemex gas stations that line the toll ways.  Also one other point you notice is the complete lack of any of the typical US fast food restaurants, it was nice not too see the hundreds of McDonalds, Burger King and Taco Bells.



The directions we were using to get from Laredo to San Miguel used a number of old road side signs which were in the shape of a bull and were advertising Magna Osborne.  Matt and I could never figure out what they were advertising, but later we were told that they were advertisements for a Spanish liqueur that ceased doing business in Mexico, but never had the signs taken down.



As we were heading down to San Luis Potosi we saw an experimental farm on the right side of the toll way.  It looked like an oasis in the desert, but again we never found out what they were specializing in or what types of techniques they were experimenting with.



Once we passed San Luis Potosi we exited the toll ways at San Luis de la Paz and drove to Delores Hidalgo and then turned on to the road leading to San Miguel. 

When we were about five miles from our new home, we encountered a long procession of cars and trucks following a large truck hauling an extremely large load, so large that the vehicles on the other side of the road had to pull over so this truck could pass.  Well as luck would have it, we were inching a long and all of a sudden, we get rear ended by a small car who was rear ended by a truck.  Because everyone was going so slow and our trailer had a moveable rear end, we had not visible damage and were able to Rancho La Luz.

We arrived around 7:30 in the evening and were greeted by our contractor Luis Alba, whose crew is doing a wonderful job out our renovation.  After doing the minimal amount of unpacking Matt and I crash after three and half days of driving.  We covered almost 2500 miles, averaged around 14 mpg and had no vehicle problems until we got to within five miles of home.  Not a bad adventure.