Master Shake watches over us...

June 21 - Topes & Sandwiches

Topes are awful. Topes are speed bumps that the Mexican authorities have decided need to be on every road large and small. Some are tiny, some are so big that we bottomed out… and we’re driving an SUV. Some are we marked with a sign. A few are even painted. Most are unpainted, unsigned, and they totally sneak up on you. Not fun when you’re doing 75 kph.

This morning we went to the supermercado in San Fernando to get stuff for sandwiches for the road. Whole wheat bread – check. Queso Manchego – check. Lunch meat… uh, well. The only option was ham and it all looked disgusting. My favorite was the nasty looking Jamon de Pavo (Turkey Ham). We decided to forgo the ham and ended up eating Manchego, spicy Chinese mustard (stolen packets from the states), and wheat thins sandwiches. But we were planning on camping tonight, so we thought we’d cook ourselves a nice meal.

In Tampico, Janet was driving and I directed her to a nice toll road to go around the city. A bunch of sketchy little roads, a crapload of wrong turns, and about an hour later, we were finally on the other side of town and headed back down the coast. Most of the time was spent circling the base of a bridge trying to find the one road that actually led up onto the bridge.

We got as far down the coast as Tuxpan and decided we would camp on the beach near Tuxpan tonight. So we went to the largest supermercado ever (think Super Walmart) and got some salmon, green beans, and sprouts for dinner. The deli at this store had about 45 types of ham (all gross lookimg) and 3 types of turkey (also gross), so I’m not too hopeful for our coldcut selection for the rest of this trip. We left the supermercado and headed toward the beach. After driving through a couple of small towns, our road dead-ended into and industrial port. Apparently, that wasn’t the beach. It was almost dark now so we turned around and headed back to Tuxpan to find a hotel. After failing to find the one written up in the Let’s Go guide, we ended up at the only big hotel we could find.

I went to check in and had this exchange:

“Nesecito una habitacion doble para esta noche” (I need a double room for tonight)

“Quieres una habitacion con una cama o dos camas?” (Do you want a room with one or two beds?”

“No me importa, cualquiera es mas barato” (Doesn’t matter, whichever is cheaper)

“Hay una persona o dos personas?” (Are there one or two people?)

“Dos”

“Son un matrimonio?” (Are you a married couple?)

“Si” (I assumed it would be easier to say yes and that it might be cheaper)

So she gave me the room key and it turned out the room has two single beds. Apparently she thought we were a married couple from a 1950s TV show. I don’t think Janet and I are pushing the beds together tonight though.

Our dinner tonight ended up being tuna fish sandwhiches with wheat thins (notice a trend) and yoghurt de manzanas (eaten with a fork, we left the spoons in the car). As I handed Janet her crappy tuna sandwhich, I told her, “Well, at least it’s not the worst sandwich I’ve handed you today.”

Tomorrow we’re headed to Tajín (ruins) and hopefully aren’t driving all day. Maybe tomorrow we’ll start our camping and be able to eat our salmon before it completely stinks up our cooler and all our beers!

Money & Beer

We brought a lot. I hope no banditos are reading this blog. That's over $1300 and around 2000 pesos. And like 20 beers. More than the legal limit to cross into Mexico. We figured if anyone cared to ask, they would win themselves a few free beers.

June 20 - Texas to San Fernando, MX

Editor's note: We won't have internet access daily, but we are going to try to write daily and upload all the posts when we can. So the title of the posts will be the date they were written. Below is the post I wrote last night. -Matt

We’re sitting in a little hotel (~$30 US) in San Fernando, drinking beers and planning where we’re headed tomorrow. But the real story is what we did today. And in a nut shell, we did everything.

We woke up around 7:30 in Odem and hit the road pretty early. The plan was to cross the border fairl early in the morning. After a slight detour in Corpus Christi we drove the 2.5 hours south to Harlingen. On the way I called all my credit cards and banks to tell them I was leaving for the country. Some were easy… but for Capital One I had to spell out the name of every Central American country to the guy answering the phone in Bombay. N as in Nancy, I, C as in Cat, A as in Apple, R as in… it took forever. I also booked me a travel insurance policy since I failed at that task the day before by mentioning I had already left on the trip. And I managed translate the CRV’s title into Spanish.

In Harlingen, Janet dropped me off at the mall to go to the AT&T store so I could try to figure out the most complicated way to not pay too much for a phone this summer. The plan was to get a pay as you go phone, port my number to it, forward the calls to my skype number, and still have voicemail set up should anyone who has my resume get the notion to call me and offer me a job. The AT&T guy said he didn’t think I could port my number to a pay as you go phone but he did mention that I could get one of those phones for cheap from Walmart. The T-Mobile guy said I couldn’t port my number either.

Meanwhile, Janet had driven across the highway to the Pep Boys to get the oil changed, check out a weird noise the car was making (turned out to be nothing) and pick up some last minute car stuff. I walked over there, helped pick out the car stuff, and then we went to lunch at the Wendys. At Wendy’s I talked to AT&T and found out I could port the number to a Go Phone and Janet talked to Sanborn’s Insurance to book a policy to cover the car on our trip into Mexico. Sanborn’s is the leader in this type of insurance but is a real Mom & Pop organization and is run out of a hotel in Brownsville, the border town. Grandma Sanborn runs the phones and scolded Janet several times during the conversation.

Once we got the car back (around 12:45), we headed to Walmart to get me a phone and picked up some water and other supplies (including out third compass… the first leaked and the second lied to us). All that in hand we headed down to Brownsville to Kinkos, to print/make copies of important documents. While we drove, I set up the Go Phone and ported my number (around 2 PM). Kinkos was an absolute shitshow, which if you’ve ever been to Kinkos, you understand. While there Janet also called her credit card companies and filled out the forms for the insurance policy while I repacked the car (in the 95 degree heat) to fit all of our new supplies. All packed up we headed in circles to get to Sanborn’s to pick up the insurance company and drop off some trash. When we left Sanborn’s, we stopped by Bank of America and Chase to get some US cash. On the way I set up the Go Phone to forward my calls to my skype number. We then headed into downtown Brownsville to find the post office to mail off the toll that we missed in Houston yesterday. Meanwhile Janet talked to the American insurance company to set up auto pay. We were finally headed for the border and I was testing the Go Phone by logging into Skype on Janet’s iPhone and having Caroline call my number. Didn’t work. Then I tried calling my skype number directly. Didn’t work. So I called back AT&T to figure out how to set up the voicemail on the Go Phone. Then I set up the voicemail. Then I called AT&T back to take off the call forwarding. Tested it all out and it worked.

Janet drove us to the border. We drove through no problem (5:15 PM, just a little later than the morning crossing we had planned), parked, and Janet got out to get the car permit. She came back two minutes later because we needed to get tourist visas first. Somehow in those two minutes she lost her bank card. Searched the car, no dice. Asked the guy at the desk, no dice. Got our tourist permits from another window. Went and had copies made. Took the copies to the car permit window. Needed to get the tourist visas for longer in order to get the car permit. Went to the tourist visa window to get them extended. Went back and got new copies made. Got the car permit. Put the car permit on and headed out. Stopped to get some Pesos from the ATM. Janet found her bank card in the car. Kinda figured out how to drive on Mexican highways. They’re very different from the States. Got to San Fernando, found a hotel, ate some great tacos, cracked open some beers, and here we sit.

You know you've been in NY too long...

...when you are driving by Houston, TX and think in your head "How-ston" rather than "Hyoo-ston." We're a couple of hours south of Houston (SoHo) in a little hotel in a little town called Odem (population 2499). The drive today was mostly uneventful. There are some big things because everything's bigger in TX. Tomorrow we head over the border, once we get the oil changed and the Mexico insurance in order.

The American leg of the journey

The trip has begun. Yesterday, or maybe three days ago…. Or maybe two weeks ago. I left New York at the beginning of the month and spent the next two weeks in “the two Virginias.” Caroline and I drove down to Maryland and stayed with Laura G. for a night (thanks Laura, and sorry to all my other friends in DC who I didn’t call, I was only there to spend the night). Then we drove on down to Lexington for Caroline’s brother Tommy’s graduation from Washington & Lee. Congrats Tommy et al. And thanks for letting me pretend to be 22 again for a couple of nights. I left Caroline with her family for her drive back to NYC and then set off for beautiful Athens, WV. My sister and brother-in-law (Irene & Gabe) were expecting their first child (and my first niece). After more than a week of baby-proofing the house, hanging pictures, putting together shelves, several trips to Walmart (and K-Mart and Target and Michael’s and Lowes…), a day trip to Blacksburg (go Hokies!) , and more getting stared at by inbred-looking and obese West Virginians, we were a week past the due date with no baby. I had to go pick up Janet from the Charlotte Airport on Monday (the 15th) and so I decided to just leave and get the trip started. I packed up the car and started the 3 hour journey to Charlotte. Halfway to Charlotte, Irene called to say they were inducing labor that night. So I picked up Janet and we headed back 3 hours to Athens. We spent a few surreal hours sitting around waiting for Irene & Gabe to go to the hospital and then we went to bed. At 10:45 the next morning, my mom called and said, “She’s starting to push.” Janet and I hurried got ready, put Pico in the basement, and headed down the mountain to the hospital. Margaret Irene was born at 11:26 with the vital stats of: 7 lb 13 oz, 22 inches, and cutest newborn ever. That afternoon we packed up the car once again and headed down the road to Michael & Rachel’s in SC. We stayed two nights there and bought more stuff at Target & Walmart and repacked the car once again and then headed off yesterday down I-85, I-65, and I-10 to Baton Rouge. Natalie and Steve put us up here and took us out for crawfish and beers and sometime this morning we’re hitting the road again for Texas. If all goes as planned, we’ll be crossing the border into Mexico tomorrow morning. So maybe the roadtrip officially begins then. Either way, there are 2200 new miles on the car since leaving NYC and I’m starting to get really excited to break out my rusty Spanish. Hasta pronto!
-Matt