Military Checkpoint How-To

After our first uncomfortable incident at a Military Checkpoint we tried a slightly different approach this time. We pretended that we knew NO Spanish. We were pulled out of the line for further inspection and directed to a parking area. It took them a good twenty minutes to get to us while a young soldier with a Very Big Gun watched us from behind his sandbags. I suspect this was to get us nervous if we were hiding anything. Norma had to pee but I told her to hold it because if she headed into the back I was sure it would attract their attention and not in a good way!

Soon two young soldiers walked up to my window and before they could say anything I stated, "No hablo Espanol". He said, "No Spanish?" and I said, "No, sorry". He motioned for me to get out of the cab and he pointed to the Honda and said something. I made an opening motion with the key and he nodded. I opened all the doors and the trunk. The two of them spent a good deal of time checking the trunk. As one was checking out the contents of a cooler the other looked at me, tapped the Honda and said, "Expensive". I think he was referring to the whole motorhome and Honda combination so I said, "No, they are very old". He nodded, temporarily satisfied that we were not rich Gringos.

One of them then walked over to the side door of the motorhome and I did the opening motion again to which he said, "Si". He went in and spent a couple of minutes in the bedroom where I could not see what he was looking into and on his way out he looked around the kitchen a bit. He got out, said something to his partner who nodded, turned to me and said, "OK, thanks" and motioned for us to leave. We exchanged smiles and "thank you's" and waves to the guy with the Very Big Gun behind the sandbags and we were on our way. This was a much better resolution than last time and will be our new model for all future Military Checkpoints. The only thing we did not do was to display a Canadian and Mexican Flag. That probably would have made it even smoother.

Mexican Truck Drivers

As we were heading from San Luis Potosi to Zacatecas we found ourselves in a construction zone with the speed reduced from 80 Kph down to 40. In Mexico NOBODY does the recommended speed so traffic was moving nicely along at 60 or 70 with some hotheads passing at 100 or so. As we rounded a long, blind corner I glanced in my side mirror to see that I was being passed by a semi with two trailers! As his cab pulled even with my drivers door, a car came round the bend heading towards us only a few hundred feet away. I immediately took my foot off the gas as the oncoming car started frantically flashing his headlights. By now the truck had pulled ahead a bit so I was about half way back of his front trailer as he started turning back into my lane! There was no real shoulder but there was a piece of dirt and rock maybe five feet wide beside the pavement with a six or eight inch drop off onto it. My other alternative would have been to get sideswiped by the truck and pushed into the ditch so I dropped my right wheels into the dirt and remembered enough from my BC Tel Defensive Driving Course to not hit the brakes but to just "ride it out". The car dolly axle has only about three inches clearance so it started dragging on the lip of the pavement, keeping the right dolly wheel off the ground as the Honda bounced along behind it. The side of the trailer was just about touching the drivers side mirror at this point. I do not know how he missed the dolly, which is about eight inches wider than the motorhome.

I eventually managed to find a place to get back onto the highway and carry on and I have no idea what happened to the oncoming car. The truck was long gone, not slowing down at all. When I could pull over to inspect everything I found no damage aside from a little more paint scraped off the dolly which is an easy repair. Just another exciting day on the Mexico highway System!

San Luis Potosi

We headed out from San Meguel de Allende at about ten this morning, heading North with the ultimate goal of Zacatecas. The road was a little narrow for most of the way and did not lend itself to fast driving. At about three we arrived in the State Capital of San Luis Potosi, with it's close to one million people. It is one of the old Colonial silver mining centers but has now joined the ranks of the many industrial cities of Mexico.

We found a Woolworths store in a mall with a Soriana Grocery store where we thought it would be safe to park for the night. There was a young security guard patrolling the parking lot so we asked him if it would be OK to park and were told "No problema", but just for the one night. Reading about the city in the Lonely Planet Guide, we found that it has a very interesting Historic Centro and several Plazas. We quickly changed and found our security guard again whom we tipped $20 Pesos ($1.90) to watch the motorhome while we cabbed it downtown for dinner. The cab ride was $50 Pesos each way and made me happy I had not attempted it in the car. There are dozens of unmarked, intersecting streets with traffic moving as it only does in Mexico; fast with no regard to rules, lanes or lights. Like all other Mexican cities we have visited there is never any available curb parking downtown. Mexicans are all expert parallel parkers. They can get right up to the curb in a space only a few inches longer than their car!

San Luis Potosi prides itself in having the most pedestrian only streets in all of Mexico so when we were dropped off at the Plaza de Armas there was no traffic, only dozens of happy Mexicans strolling with their families. It was too early to eat so we scouted out the restaurants and found one in a converted mansion that we decided to come back to later. Norma had been trying to get a haircut for several days and I needed one for longer than that. As we were wandering the streets we came across a Beauty Shop. It is usually impossible to just walk in and get service without an appointment but this time we lucked out. They were able to cut both our heads right away for the princely sum of $80 Pesos ($7.75) for both. We tipped the young woman well and gave her one of our small Canadian Flag pins which she was thrilled with.


We found our restaurant and picked a table beside patio doors opening onto the Plaza. As we were eating an older gentleman named Salvador sat down across from us and spoke to us in excellent English. He was born and raised in San Luis Potosi, got his Mechanical Engineering Degree and then got a job with a large firm in Lansing, Michigan where he worked for 37 years until he got "downsized" with a package and moved back to his old home town in Mexico where he now amuses himself by playing saxophone in a small band. He was soon joined by two old friends from his youth, both named Juan, for ice cream and coffee. That is them in the photo. Salvador has the white beard. He reminded us very much of our old friend and colleague, Jim Fulton with his sparkling eyes.

We then took another cab ride back to the motorhome, fired up the generator to make coffee and settled down for the night. The stores closed at ten and by eleven we had the parking lot to ourselves. In San Luis Potosi, Mexico, Life Is Good!

Leaving San Miguel

We said our goodbye's and left San Miguel de Allende. We really enjoyed our American neighbours, Bob and Mary. They are full time RVers who have a motorhome based out of the USA and another motorhome in Europe. Their time is split with Winters in the USA and Mexico and the Summers in Europe. We had fun watching the American Primaries with them. They are Hillary supporters and we are Obama backers (not that we have a vote). Aside from that we found that we think quite a bit alike on most issues! Nice change to meet progressive Americans and it just proves that there are some out there!

With all the side trips we had been in San Miguel three weeks. When we returned from our trip to Veracruz, we found that the wind had blown our StarChoice dish over and broken it! We are now dependent on finding a place to park beside another Canadian with StarChoice. I have a sort of plan to repair the broken dish with a wedge of 2 X 4, a lag bolt and a lot of glue. It should work in theory but the angle of the arm has to be just perfect in order to have the reflection from the dish hit the right spot.

Anyway, so long San Miguel and now to begin the slow trip North. Next stop Zacatecas!

Final Veracruz Photos

More downtown scenes. The final shot is of our hotel. Our room was on the top left and three of the balconies were ours - two on the side and one on the front. Not bad for $55 a night.

More Veracruz

Some downtown sights. The Church, the Lighthouse, an old mansion and an ancient artifact. There is so much to see here you just get overwhelmed...

Veracruz

The first photo is the old fort that was built to protect the harbor from the many invaders. The second is a remaining part of the wall that used to surround the city. The third is a local furniture manufacturer. What beautiful work! The fourth is a shot of one of the many jeeps full of machine gun toting soldiers patrolling the streets. Exactly what they were protecting us from is unclear...

All Roads Lead To.......

In Europe they say, "All roads lead to Rome", but in Mexico they all lead to Mexico City. We left Veracruz this morning around ten and decided to take the better (Toll) road back which headed in the direction of Mexico City. All the roads in this part of Mexico lead like spokes on a wheel to Mexico City! We intended to turn North before getting too close to the smog and traffic of the Capital and to then join up with one of the many roads leading in the direction of San Miguel de Allende. It turned out to be a lot harder than it looked on the map. The road we chose looked pretty good on the map but it turned out to be poorly marked, rough, busy, narrow and full of impatient bus drivers who like to blast their horn and pass you on the shoulder if you are not driving to their liking. After several wrong turns and having to ask directions from the Federalies We succeeded in joining up with Mexico 57 headed North. The sun started going down soon after we got headed in the right direction so we stopped in one of the small towns along the way and found a really clean, quiet room with a very good WIFI connection for $300 Pesos a night. Tomorrow will be a straight shot to San Miguel and back to our poor, abandoned motorhome.

I was really glad we decided to leave it behind for this part of the trip. There were two mountain ranges to pass over with really steep grades in both directions. I am sure I would have burned out the brakes on the way to Veracruz and the long, steep climb today would probably have burned up more than the full cost of all the hotels in gas alone. For once I made the right decision!

The ¨Rolex¨Watch

As we were having a drink at a open air restaurant in the square last night, a salesman walked by selling watches. I brushed him off in my usual way with a ¨No gratias¨ but he kept returning. I then noticed that one of the items he was selling was a shiny new Rolex watch! He obviously had no idea of the value of this item because all he was asking for it was $500 Pesos ($45 USA)! I wondered how much I could talk him down so I offered $300 which he immediately turned down. I was not going to come up any higher so I said ¨No Thanks¨ at which point his English improved and he told me it was his only sale of the night and he had to buy food for his family and agreed to my price.

Well, I could hardly contain myself as I handed over the $300 Pesos ($25 USA) for a brand new Rolex watch! I checked the setting and put my proud new possession on my wrist. It states, ¨Don´t mess with me, I got me a Rolex!¨

This morning we awoke and Norma asked me the time. I looked at my Rolex and announced, ¨6:30¨. She told me it had to be later than that as the sun was up so I double checked the time on my old watch and indeed it was actually 8:15.

This whole thing just goes to prove that no matter the quality of an item you buy, sometimes you just get a lemon! I am sure I will be unable to find the salesman this morning before we leave so I think maybe the watch will become a Christmas present for my son who also appreciates the value of high end items like a ¨Rolex¨ watch.

¨Lechero¨

The "Grand Café de la Parroquia" is the most famous coffeehouse in Veracruz and is only a couple of blocks from our hotel. Its signature drink is the "lechero". You order the drink which is brought to your table as two fingers of expresso in a heavy glass. You then start loudly clanking on the side of your glass with a spoon, drawing the attention of a roving waiter carrying a kettle of steamed milk. He then ceremoniously pours your glass full of the milk by holding the pitcher three or four feet above your glass and letting it fly in a thin stream. The restaurant is full of the joyful clanking of glass and the laughing of happy customers. The entertainment alone is well worth the $20 Peso ($2 USA) cost of the drink.