Dec. 23, 2012
We arrived in Mazatlan, and the Las Jaibas RV park yesterday at 2:3o ish. All is well, weather good, set up a bit yesterday and a bit more today.
I am too tired to do a big blog post just want to let everyone know we actually made it and we are very happy to be here and everyone is happy to see us. Life is good.
Merry Christmas…..I can’t actually believe we are here!
Thursday Dec. 20, 2012
We drove into San Carlos late yesterday morning for a little shopping and a look at the Marina San Carlos and then lunch.
We drove to San Carlos along the ocean route through Miramar which is quiet and scenic.
A first quick stop at Ruth & Rudy’s European Bakery as we entered town for a good loaf of multi grain bread and a couple of blueberry tarts.
As we drove by the Totonaka RV park it was easy to see it is not very full. I stopped at Tony’s vegetable market just past the RV park for a few veggies and fruit and and I was the only customer in it. Unusual
It seems that every year we come here there are less and less people. As we drove into town we also noticed that there are not many gringos around. Very, very quiet.
A quick stop at the Banemex Bank for money but that didn’t work out all that well. They have installed chip verifiers and the cajero automatico did not like mine. A lady next to us said to try Ley’s or the Marina Terra so off to the Marina Terra Lobby where we had no problem getting money. It too verified the chip but liked it just fine.
A walk around the boat docks and lunch at the Marina Yacht Club restaurant. Good Taco salad.
The San Carlos docks.
A very expensive, new sailboat.
After lunch we headed over to the Marina Seca which is the Marina San Carlos’ dry dock across the road where we attempted to have a look at sailboats that are on the hard. The last couple of times we have been here that has not been a problem but this time we couldn’t get in without having a name of an actual boat that we wanted to see. A bust.
We then stopped for fuel and Eric asked the Pemex attendant “ No muchos personas?” and he said “ No money!” He didn’t have much English and Eric not much Spanish but he knew what Eric meant.
A quick stop for me at the Sagittaria which sells a huge amount of glass ware, pottery, clothes etc. etc. A nice store but pricey. I have been buying daughter Erika specific glass ware here every year and this is the only place they sell the ones that I want so I always stop there. Again quiet in the store and no one around. This store is usually very busy but maybe it’s because it’s so close to Christmas. Maybe not.
Today we had a quiet morning and then off to the Wal Mart for few groceries to stock up before we hit the road tomorrow. Since it will be a couple of days before Christmas when we arrive in Mazatlan I wanted to be make sure I had everything I needed and not have to go shopping right when we get there.
That’s our rig in the middle looking up from the hotel.
Playa de Cortez Hotel.
So….on the road tomorrow. Tomorrow night Los Mochis and then Mazatlan and Las Jaibas on Saturday afternoon.
The weather here has cooled right off with clouds and breeze so hopefully Mazatlan will be a tad warmer.
Wednesday Dec. 19, 2012
We left Santa Ana yesterday morning at about 10 to 9 on our way south. A quick goodbye and hug for Edgar and Anna and a promise to see them on our way north in the spring. Edgar asked Eric to make sure and take care of his motorcycle this winter (Big Red) but he also said that he really likes Blue better because she is much prettier. Too bad Edgar’s life was ruined by a motorcycle accident when he was young.
The drive from Santa Ana to Hermisillo was slow due to the fact they are rebuilding the entire south lane so the lanes are really narrow and there are many areas where there are huge drop offs. They are raising the height of the road in many areas and there are many, many new bridges being built.
Road building 101.
All the material you see at the edge of the road is dirt, actually lots of it is really nice topsoil that they should put in the meridian and plant trees in. When you use it for a road bed and then pile gravel on it the whole thing eventually collapses. I guess that is why they are constantly rebuilding and repaving the main highways.
There were constant detours from the south bound lane over to join the north bound lane as we headed south. A very tiring drive for Eric as you must pay very careful attention to the road.
The travel through Hermisillo was a bit better at the north end as they have repaved the area of the road from the first turn left to Guaymas and the area where you join the northbound traffic on the periferico. In years past it was deeply rutted with many, many topes. This year it was smooth and level with only a couple of big topes.
We had been warned about getting in the right lane after the prison so that we could make the left turn to Guaymas at the south end of Hermisillo. It would have made more sense to us if we had know the reason for this information. What actually happens is that you are leaving the main highway and travelling down under a large overpass where you make your left turn to Guaymas. This is the same corner that we turned at before it’s just that it has a huge north, south overpass over it now. It was had to fathom why we had to be in the right lane to turn left until we actually got there. Luckily the traffic through Hermisillo was very light yesterday so there were no issues.
The rest of the drive to the Hotel Playa de Cortez RV park in Guaymas (Miramar) was quiet and uneventful and we were parked and set up by 2:30pm. Okay we did have one little issue. As we came to the turn where we would go to San Carlos or Guyamas Eric continued to San Carlos. I said “ Uh, aren’t we going to Guyamas and Eric looked at me like I was crazy!” He said “ Why would we be going to Guaymas?” Call me crazy but I thought that was where the Playa de Cortez was! Just a slight brain fart on Eric’s part, a quick turn around down the road and back to “Guaymas!” Yikes! One sweet ride.
For those of you who haven’t stayed at this RV park the only confusing thing is making sure that you turn right for Miramar at the bottom of the overpass going into town. There is a sign about a block before the turn saying turn right for Miramar but when you actually get to the turn there is no sign. You could easily miss it if you didn’t know where it is and then you are going downtown which would not be good.
We do love the peace and quiet of this park although we did have a little electronic music playing last night for awhile. Still nothing like the racket at Totonaka.
We will stay here for a couple of days and then head south at the end of the week. The weather is warm although it has clouded over a bit.
We’ll go into San Carlos today and pick up a few things and Eric will browse the sailboats.
Monday Dec. 17, 2012
First things first. I know that my baby sister Joy reads my blog so “Happy 50th Birthday to to you!”
We left Why this morning at about 9:30 am and just before leaving my first order of business was to stow away my beef, salmon and wieners in a cold bag in preparation for the border crossing.
Heading to the border.
We were stopped at the border and the Mexican border guard wanted to see inside my freezer. He would have taken the beef but did not ask about fish. The pork and chicken was okay but was supposed to be in it’s original packaging and he could have taken that. He was nice and said remember for next year. He did not look at our passports or ask for Visa’s.
As we passed through Sonoyta there was a large gathering of police and a greeting committee of some kind. Turns out it was a welcome to Mexico by the municipal police and perhaps someone running for mayor! We were given a brochure in Spanish and a piece of paper that had emergency numbers to call in case we were hassled by police.
Town of Sonoyta.
Policia tourist hand out. I didn’t get a picture of the greeting committee as I thought they were federalies to start with and by then it was too late. They did take pictures of us!
Waiting for the pothole crew leaving Sonoyta.
On to San Emeterio where you are forced to go through. The booth where we turned in our vehicle stickers last year is gone so I assume that they are not doing the vehicle importation documents there anymore. They may still be doing tourist visa’s but that is not clear. There the huge drop off that we had issues going down last year has been fixed. We passed through one of the lanes and again no one asked for any paperwork.
Sonoyta to Caborca. Long lonesome highway.
We stopped at the first Pemex coming into Caborca for our usual lunch stop and fuel. One thing of note is the discrepancy between the fuel pumped and the fuel that our trucks computer said we used. There was a 7 liter discrepancy and it was not in our favor. We had been checking in the US and the amounts were correct. I might mention that we had noted this on quite a few occasions at Pemex’s in Mexico last year. Nothing we can do about it but irritating just the same.
The next police greeting committee was just east of Caborca and they were handing out brochures as well. Luckily we already had one because he ran out just as we got there. A major push to make people want to come to Sonora and feel safe. We also noted new blue signs ever 20kms or so giving an emergency number to call if we were in trouble.
Onward to Pitiquito.
Caborca.
At Pitiquito we drove through the customs (Aduana) lane and not the vehicle importation lane as we had all our paperwork done. There they did not ask for any paperwork of any kind either. So….no one anywhere wanted to see any paperwork of any kind. Now that is all well and good if you have what you need but if you don’t and also don’t know what you need you are going to end up in a big mess! Total confusion.
The road from Caborca to Santa Ana is once again being paved and guess what is paying for that. You guessed it….tolls and boy did the one east of Caborca go up since last fall. We have 3 axles on the rig and 2 on the truck so we pay the same as the semis. Oct 2011- 160 peso’s…Dec. 2012 – 231 peso’s. About a 45% increase. Ah Mexico!
We arrived at Edgar and Anna’s around 2:30 pm and they were very happy to see us. Business is down even worse than last year and every customer counts. I would guess that all this confusion coming through Lukeville is not helping them at all. Many people have chosen to come through Nogales and then you are so close to Santa Ana that you would not stop unless you made a point of it. Edgar did mention that while he was sitting out there waiting for customers he has not seen as many rigs pass by this year as last. So….please make an effort to stop and stay with them if you can as they count on us for their livelihood and they deserve our support. Lovely people.
Eric and Edgar.
Entrance off the front road into the park. Edgar put us in “our usual spot at the back” where we like to park.
One other rig has arrived so it looks like Edgar will have two customers tonight.
Tomorrow on to the Playa de Cortez RV park in Guayamas.
Sunday, Dec. 16, 2012
I arrived back in Yuma on Friday night at 7:30 pm right on time. It was a long day that started in Kelowna with a snowy drive to the airport by brother in law Ian at 6:45 am and an 8:20 flight to Vancouver that turned out to be 45 minutes late. That of course meant I landed in Vancouver when I should be boarding my next flight to LA. The young women who was sitting next to me on the flight to Vancouver turned out to be living in Kelowna but was from Terrace, B.C. our home town and was on her way home for Christmas. She is working at a job doing theraputic horse riding and knows lots of horse people that I know at home. I asked her name Amy P. and it also turned out she had orthodontics done at my office when I was working….small world. When we landed in Vancouver I hustled my butt and back pack from the far end of the airport at domestic arrivals to the absolutely other end of the airport to international departures as fast as I could and actually made the flight to Los Angeles. The flight to LA was good with a movie available in one of those little screens on the back of the seat in front of you. The arrival in the LA airport (which I have never passed through) was very confusing. All terminals (7) are in different buildings so it took some time to figure out what building I should go to and how to get there. I finally made it to Terminal 7 and found a restaurant (Wolfgang Puck) to eat. Good food at a good price. Luckily I had a long layover (3hrs) so no rush.
Saturday back in Yuma was a busy day with laundry, shopping and the most important thing …Mexican insurance. I do our Mexican vehicle insurance on line and had saved our quotes from last years policies so it was not a long drawn out process. Printed what we needed and saved a copy to the computer. Done.
Today we left Yuma just before 11am and hit the road for Why, Arizona and the Hickiwaan, RV park. A nice relaxing drive and we were set up and parked by 3pm.
I nice happy hour in the sun in the peace and quiet. I nice change after the hustle and bustle, planes, trains and automobiles of Yuma.
Tomorrow we will leave for Mexico and Edgar and Anna’s RV park in Santa Ana. We have our tourist visas, Mexican insurance and our import documents so it should be a short day.
We are super dee duper happy to be hitting the road.
