First, yesterday was a long 350+ mile, average 45 mph, drive across countless "topes" "vibradores" "reductors", which are a variety of speed bumps, humps, rumble strips above and beyond potholes and rough roads to reduce speed through towns. It ended with spending the night at a PEMEX gas station along with a couple of trucks with mattresses headed to Guatemala, cars in tow going to Guatemala, and what appeared to be over 50 semi-trucks, including the one that parked right next to us and ran his generator all night. Ugh!!! So far we've yet to have a decent night of camping.
Today started off OK, as we headed to Tapachula, Chiapas Mexico. We drove through some interesting farm land. From sugar cane fields, to pineapple fields, to mango orchards, followed by fields of windmills. The crossing through the gap in the Sierra Madre de Chiapas causes a lot of wind, and in Ventosa there is a huge windmill power grid, with countless windmills going. Apparently this gap is the most consistently windy place in all of North America. The mountains on the left (as we headed south) were scenic, as were all the rivers and streams that were flowing to the Pacific since we crossed the Continental Divide. The road was overall much better than yesterday, so Roger could actually enjoy the drive.
Now for the bad. Norm (the idiot, and I'm being nice) decided that we need to get propane. He needed it, we didn't. Anyway because he insisted that we top off on propane, we made two stops for "gas", the name for propane. This wasn't too bad, except he then decided to take us through downtown Tapachula. Sondra barely made the turn at one intersection and we had to wait on a Colectivo (multi-person taxi) to move before Roger could even attempt the turn. Then after that, Norm decided to go down a street that had an ambulance parked on the street. Sondra just squeezed by. We couldn't get by. I went inside the medical building to see if I could find somebody to move the ambulance. The lady on duty had the keys, but didn't know how to drive. I told her to come outside and see the problem. (Picture traffic backing up behind Roger with lots of honking horns, hand gestures and men yelling.) The lady was nice enough to give me the keys, so I could move the ambulance. Well I got into the ambulance and couldn't get it started, because it was out of gas! By now both Roger and I are extremely stressed out. I got out of the ambulance, gave the keys back to the lady and then proceed to yell at the men who were yelling at me to move our RV. (Norm is nowhere in sight during all of this.) Roger finally decided to see if he could squeeze by. I stayed outside and helped him by yelling inch guidance to him. He did a heroic job finally getting past the ambulance, but ended up bending the generator exhaust pipe. Argh!
Norm had already told us that we were spending the night at Walmart. So when we finally got there after a couple of other tight turns through the city, we parked. Once parked, Roger noticed that we were leaking some sort of fluid underneath. It wasn't radiator or antifreeze fluid, which was good but it appears that we have a leak in the air conditioning oil and freon mixture. Argh! since we had the a/c worked on before we left. Hopefully we can get it fixed tomorrow. Norm is going to have his belts replaced, because he is having auxiliary brake problems. He knows a place that should be able to fix both our problems.
So we went to Walmart to do some shopping for stuff. It was interesting to see the differences between the US stores and the one in Mexico. Walmart is an anchor store for the local mall, and this is a very common practice. We got our stuff back to the RV and I decided to return the shopping cart and do some asking about where to see the Spurs game, while Roger figured out what was going on the ground with the ac. While scouting, the rains came. Unfortunately, we had left the windows open in the RV. When I got back I spent over a half an hour wiping things dry and figuring out what to do with the wet stuff. Live and learn. Anyway I found out where the Pub City was for the game. However when Roger got back from Auto Zone, we talked and for Father's Day we decided to check into the nearby Holiday Inn Express to watch the Spurs game, since it looked like it was going to rain all night and our RV doesn't have windows that are easily adjustable for rain. In fact it was raining and blowing so hard, we were getting water inside from the refrigerator exhaust vent. Our room was $69 for the night with free wifi. Roger was looking forward to watching the game, only to find out that the cable TV in the hotel didn't have the game on. Argh! needless to say, today went from good to bad. The night brought a victory to the San Antonio Spurs, so Roger was happy despite having to use game tracker on line, since the wifi speed couldn't handle streaming the game.
I feel like a pirate with all the arghs, but I'm trying to contain my frustration and it has definitely been one of those days, where mutiny is just around the corner.
Tomorrow promises to be challenging, with hopefully things getting fixed right so we can continue heading to Guatemala.
Today started off OK, as we headed to Tapachula, Chiapas Mexico. We drove through some interesting farm land. From sugar cane fields, to pineapple fields, to mango orchards, followed by fields of windmills. The crossing through the gap in the Sierra Madre de Chiapas causes a lot of wind, and in Ventosa there is a huge windmill power grid, with countless windmills going. Apparently this gap is the most consistently windy place in all of North America. The mountains on the left (as we headed south) were scenic, as were all the rivers and streams that were flowing to the Pacific since we crossed the Continental Divide. The road was overall much better than yesterday, so Roger could actually enjoy the drive.
Now for the bad. Norm (the idiot, and I'm being nice) decided that we need to get propane. He needed it, we didn't. Anyway because he insisted that we top off on propane, we made two stops for "gas", the name for propane. This wasn't too bad, except he then decided to take us through downtown Tapachula. Sondra barely made the turn at one intersection and we had to wait on a Colectivo (multi-person taxi) to move before Roger could even attempt the turn. Then after that, Norm decided to go down a street that had an ambulance parked on the street. Sondra just squeezed by. We couldn't get by. I went inside the medical building to see if I could find somebody to move the ambulance. The lady on duty had the keys, but didn't know how to drive. I told her to come outside and see the problem. (Picture traffic backing up behind Roger with lots of honking horns, hand gestures and men yelling.) The lady was nice enough to give me the keys, so I could move the ambulance. Well I got into the ambulance and couldn't get it started, because it was out of gas! By now both Roger and I are extremely stressed out. I got out of the ambulance, gave the keys back to the lady and then proceed to yell at the men who were yelling at me to move our RV. (Norm is nowhere in sight during all of this.) Roger finally decided to see if he could squeeze by. I stayed outside and helped him by yelling inch guidance to him. He did a heroic job finally getting past the ambulance, but ended up bending the generator exhaust pipe. Argh!
Norm had already told us that we were spending the night at Walmart. So when we finally got there after a couple of other tight turns through the city, we parked. Once parked, Roger noticed that we were leaking some sort of fluid underneath. It wasn't radiator or antifreeze fluid, which was good but it appears that we have a leak in the air conditioning oil and freon mixture. Argh! since we had the a/c worked on before we left. Hopefully we can get it fixed tomorrow. Norm is going to have his belts replaced, because he is having auxiliary brake problems. He knows a place that should be able to fix both our problems.
So we went to Walmart to do some shopping for stuff. It was interesting to see the differences between the US stores and the one in Mexico. Walmart is an anchor store for the local mall, and this is a very common practice. We got our stuff back to the RV and I decided to return the shopping cart and do some asking about where to see the Spurs game, while Roger figured out what was going on the ground with the ac. While scouting, the rains came. Unfortunately, we had left the windows open in the RV. When I got back I spent over a half an hour wiping things dry and figuring out what to do with the wet stuff. Live and learn. Anyway I found out where the Pub City was for the game. However when Roger got back from Auto Zone, we talked and for Father's Day we decided to check into the nearby Holiday Inn Express to watch the Spurs game, since it looked like it was going to rain all night and our RV doesn't have windows that are easily adjustable for rain. In fact it was raining and blowing so hard, we were getting water inside from the refrigerator exhaust vent. Our room was $69 for the night with free wifi. Roger was looking forward to watching the game, only to find out that the cable TV in the hotel didn't have the game on. Argh! needless to say, today went from good to bad. The night brought a victory to the San Antonio Spurs, so Roger was happy despite having to use game tracker on line, since the wifi speed couldn't handle streaming the game.
I feel like a pirate with all the arghs, but I'm trying to contain my frustration and it has definitely been one of those days, where mutiny is just around the corner.
Tomorrow promises to be challenging, with hopefully things getting fixed right so we can continue heading to Guatemala.
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