As usual, nothing happens as planned. We stopped after 129 miles at Magdalena as our travel buddy had problems with the turbo charger on his diesel truck. We parked in a PEMEX gas station while his truck went into the local mechanic to be serviced. The PEMEX is fine to stay overnight at but not for days on end due to the truck traffic. By Thursday night the mechanic did not have the parts and our buddy indicated the truck may not be ready until Tuesday. Ash was floating in the air along with the smoke from the burning of the local sugar cane fields -- not good for Bev's allergies.
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| sitting on the PEMEX parking lot with view of old opal mine on the mountain in the distance |
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| entrance to the PEMEX gas station -- it is a new station with nice landscaping |
So Vic and Bev decided to head out alone on Friday morning. The next 2 days driving was stressful due to problems encountered along the way. The first problem occurred just east of Guadalajara when a very sharp and downhill turn of an off-ramp tore our stone guard apart. Our rear view camera was not operating so the problem went unnoticed until we stopped for gas about 10 minutes later.
The next problem occurred on the south end of Aguascalientes with a "check engine" light and greatly reduced power. We pulled off easily and everything seemed fine and off we went. The next time left us climbing the mountains at 5 mph with nowhere no pull off so we had to keep driving until we found a spot wide enough to pull off and shut the engine off for 2 minutes. After this brief wait, we could proceed normally.
Near Zacetecas we chose a road that appeared to be a great short-cut. The road started out just fine but we soon encountered some very rough areas and a construction zone. The workers alerted us to a problem and we found that one of the bikes had partially jumped out of the bike rack on the back of the motorhome and was dragging on the ground. The bike was basically destroyed and we left it at the side of the road. The car did not fare very well and has a few scratches in the front bumper.
Some damage to our car might have been avoided if our rear view camera worked consistently but alas it seems to quit just when it's needed most.
We also found out that the auxiliary braking system for the tow car had malfunctioned and drained the battery -- no problem while traveling but an issue when we need to disconnect the car to back into our campsite.
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| clouds around the mountain as we travel from Saltillo to Monterrey |
We stayed overnight near a small town called Concepcion del Oro at a Pemex station that had a hotel. The hotel allowed as to stay overnight in their locked compound for 100 pesos, for which we were very happy and got a nice quiet sleep.
We finally made it to the border at the Anzalduas bridge west of Reynosa on March 19th at 3:00 pm Sat Mar 19th. We had to stop on the Mexican side to turn in the permit for our car plus our tourist visas. That took about 35 minutes as the was a line of cars doing the same thing.
Then we sat on the American side for 1 1/2 hrs in line. Finally we got to the booth and were sent aside for the motorhome and car to be inspected by 6 men with 2 dogs. The inspection was finished and we were on our way at last by 5:20 pm!
We are now back at the Lemon Tree RV Inn in Mission. We traveled 830 miles from Lo de Marcos, Nayarit to Mission, TX. Since we've been here Vic purchased a diagnostic tool that displayed the failure codes on the engine of the motorhome. Turns out that it is just a clogged air filter so that was ordered online from Walmart. Including shipping, the cost is less than half of the auto parts store! Vic installed the new covers on our motorhome air conditioners, ordered a replacement auxiliary brake system and a new rear view camera with monitor. Ain't eBay great! Now we need to replace the bike.
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| one of the prettiest poinsettias we've seen here at Lemon Tree |
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| This chicken wanders through our campsite each day -- it must belong to one of the properties neighboring Lemon Tree RV Inn |
Our costs CAD to date for our trip from Oct 31st 2015 to Mar 19th 2016 have been:
Gas for motorhome: $1745
Propane (to run refrigerator, stove and furnace) $118
Tolls trip to Lo de Marcos $281
Tolls trip LdM to Mission $271
Tourist cards $124
Camping fees $2170
Total $4709 CAD
I have not included our out-of-country health insurance, Mexican insurance for the motorhome and car, our flight home for 2 weeks at Christmas or our Mexican car permit (I'm waiting to see the credit for the deposit for the car permit to see what it cost us in the end due to the change in the exchange rate over the past 5 months).
