We found the bridge easily this time and headed south along the Gulf. It's a familiar road to us now, not great but there is some interesting scenery including Mexico's only nuclear power plant on a beautiful bay.

I've had the city of Gutierrez Zamora marked on my map for years as the location of a vanilla factory that has a good reputation. This time we stopped as we needed money anyway. As we were unhooking the jeep alongside the highway, some friends from the Yucatan Stan and Carol drove up. It's pretty mind boggling that you can run into friends in a little known city in the middle of Mexico's Gulf Coast...and just alongside the road to boot. They were stopping to walk their dog on their drive to their house south of Akumal.

I got some great vanilla and we continued on to a resort area on the Gulf called the Emerald Coast. We stayed at a different spot this time, Posada del Zorro, and really liked it. This area is quite beautiful, the beaches are nice, the Gulf is warm and there are a slew of RV parks within a 10 mile stretch. I took the picture from our door step, we were right on this pool which is one of 2.

We had stopped early for us but then we had been up since 5am! We went out to dinner and were asleep by 8pm and didn't get up until 8am the next day, we slept 12 hours!

Now we had to hurry to get to Akumal and then get up to Cancun to pick up Country on the 19th. We drove all day, spent the night at the WalMart in Villahermosa and drove all day again until 9pm when we arrived in Chetumal and pulled into the RV park there Yax Ha. We've stayed there before, it's beautiful, it's expensive but it is close to our friend Kathe's land and easier to get to in the dark. She says it has been sold and they now have wireless throughout, nice. I got online and sent her email and we called and left her a message that we were in town. We didn't have much time but we wanted to see her and give her a hug, this is the first time we've had a chance to do that since her partner Colleen died. She and a friend, Sam, came by in the morning and we talked a bit and then we had to head out. I took this pick of her and Sam in her ATV, it was raining and there is no top so the passenger has to hold the umbrella! Pretty cute.

Five hours later, on the 18th of December, we pulled into Akumal. Whew!

We did the zigging and zagging because I wanted to go through Tuxpan and meet up with a poster and his wife from a forum I'm on. Even online some people just come across as really interesting and people that you want to meet, Ed and Fran were two like that. We've been through and around Tuxpan before but this time I was determined to stop there and get a chance to meet them.

Tuxpan is a difficult city to negotiate even in a car. It is at the mouth of a large river as it flows into the Gulf of Mexico. There is only one bridge over the river and it takes off from the center of town. We'd gotten stuck there once years ago and had to have the police lead us to the bridge. This time we pulled into a Pemex on the outskirts of town. We needed someplace to spend the night and we needed someplace to park the rig so we could go into town, find an internet cafe and let them know we were in town. I did my blah blah blah in spanish with a couple of the pump jockeys and they said we could park in a dirt strip between the station and a soccer field for a couple of hours. We went to town, got in touch and arranged to meet for breakfast the next morning.

When we got back, there was an 18 wheeler blocking our exit from the dirt strip. It was a pretty good spot anyway so I went over to talk to a new shift at the gas station about spending the night. Lots of blah blah between me and various different people ending with a woman (!) coming over who seemed to be in charge and who said we could spend the night. Since the driver of the big rig was either gone or asleep, I thought that was a good solution and we went to bed.

At bloody 5am the original pump jockey from the day before came to work and started banging on the door of the rig. At first, I tried to ignore her and not answer but she wouldn't go away. I talked to her through the door and she said we were only supposed to stay for a few hours, she would lose her job, we had to leave immediately. I told her I wasn't going anywhere at 5am and I shut the window. At 6am she started banging again on the door. I told her that I had talked to the manager the night before after she left and that we did in fact have permission to spend the night. I don't think she believed me but eventually she went away again.

Mimi and I have stayed at a lot of Pemex in Mexico, we've stayed at toll booths and at restaurants and we've never had this kind of hassle. I am not a happy person when I get woken up in single digits, this pissed me off and I couldn't go back to sleep. So, we were up at 6:30 and we weren't meeting Ed and Fran until 10am. I went outside and had another round of talks with a couple of the pump jockeys and the guard. The guard was really difficult for me to understand, I mean I could only get one word out of every sentence. Finally another guy came over and he told me that the guard was from the country (in english, a bumpkin or a hick) and that no one could understand him. I felt better about that but we still had to make sure the rig would be ok there while we were off at breakfast. Finally, everyone except the original woman agreed that we were all good and about then Ed and Fran arrived.

We had a great time with them, they took us downtown and bought us breakfast and showed us around. I really enjoyed talking with them and it reinforced my belief that with enough time you really can tell a lot about people from virtual conversations online.

When we got back, the 18 wheeler was gone and we hooked up to leave. My original gas jockey girl then had the friggin gall to come over and ask me for money for spending the night. In my best colloquial spanish I told her I wasn't paying to be woken up at 5am. (you can insert a few swear words in there too) With that we quickly left and hoped she wasn't the niece of the police chief.

So, when people ask how it is to boondock in Pemex gas stations in Mexico I can no longer say we've never had a problem. It wasn't a big problem unless you are as grumpy as I am at dawn.

We slept well, there was traffic but it didn't bother us. We left before 10am - early for us - and drove a rather back and forth route to get to Tuxpan. It involved going south a ways and then across on a yellow road and then back north until we could get the road east to the coast. The road was 2 lane and narrow and there was a lot of traffic. We had to drive through Huejutla including making a 90° turn at this busy intersection - we had to turn in front of that red truck. This was another of those times that Mimi wished she hadn't agreed to some shortcut I saw on the map!

This was the street we turned onto! Once we got out of the city center we stopped for gas (OK OK and for a cigarette too).

I'm amazed sometimes at how low tech and labor intensive many things are in Mexico. There was a guy at the gas station washing a huge bus with a bucket and a cup to throw the water with.

He would throw a cup of water on the bus and then wipe that little spot and then rinse it by throwing a cup from another bucket then he would start over on a new spot. Leapin' Lizards! That is a lot of work for a clean bus. He didn't seem to be in a hurry though and I think that is the saving grace in how things are done here. It's hot and the work is hard but by moving slowly and steadily it all gets done. There is no one yelling for you to hurry and if, at the end of the day, you can feed your family then it works pretty well.

I also shot this pic out the windshield of a woman walking home with a 5 gal bucket on her head. I'd guess the bucket either had water or masa in it, it was not empty or light. She has a piece of material wound into a ring under it to cushion her head.

All over Mexico and Central America women carry heavy and unwieldy stuff on their heads. Amazing big, lopsided looking loads sometimes. When I was a kid, in an attempt to civilize me, my mother sent me off to some kind of charm school where one of the things they made us do was walk around with a dictionary on our heads to improve our posture. That is hard! Even at 11 or 12 I found it hard and I've seen girls that small with huge loads walking on uneven paths through the mountains. I love Mexico and I love traveling here but I am grateful that I was not born a women in these cultures.

Las Pozas! Just incredible! I've loved the story of Edward James since I first heard about him. Talking to the guys from Xilitla that work there, they have lots of stories from their fathers who worked for him. He apparently had quite a dirt phobia, washing his hands constantly, washing his money, throwing away clothes after he wore them. He also was very giving, many of the kids in the area went to school because of him and he contributed a lot to various local improvements. He would draw his ideas on paper and the workers would figure out a way to build molds and make it out of concrete.

We only had an hour but we walked in and around the outer walls to see the ponds and waterfalls. There are flying buttresses that don't look like they are holding much, niches with concrete flowers, stairs to infinity, cliffs covered with ferns and orchids...

Going the other direction, the path is lined with stone snakes and a moon gate. Towers that look like egyptian lotus and are filled with orchids.

Large hands tucked next to a wall.

We were just enthralled and we are determined to return for more than one day so we can camp there and inhale the whole place day and night.

But, it was dusk and we had to leave. We got turned around and headed back down the mountain to highway 85. We stopped in the town of Matalpa which has a wide parking area along the road just past the small centro. We parked and I went across the street to talk to the neighbors who had a small store selling shoes in the front of their house. They were very welcoming, told me it was safe and that the land next to us was federal grazing land.

It was good to be out of the mountains and on level ground again. Mimi did an outstanding job (as usual) of getting us in and out of Xilitla - which hangs on the edge of a canyon - and down from the mountain in the gloom.

Matalpa has a couple block long lively center with lots of small places to eat. We walked along and spotted a storefront taco place with the meat cooking 'al pastor' in front, my favorite. Marinated meat is layered with pineapple on a spike that rotates in front of a gas grill, it is sliced off thinly as needed so you always get the crisp part that was closest to the fire. It was delicious and I ate 2 orders, 8 small tacos.

Back to the rig to read, a very quiet night.

This morning we dropped from 7700' to 4000' in 25 slow, sinuous miles. The road was in good shape (Hwy 70) but narrow, 2 lane and no shoulder. At 4000' we were in a green, level valley and we pulled over at a wide spot and had cereal. From there we dropped another 700' to Rio Verde, a pretty little city. It was finally warmer now, there was less cactus and more flowers blooming. Soon we were driving through mile after mile of orange orchards. Put away the hand lotion and the chapstick, the humidity was higher too!

The Huasteca Potosina is famous for a lot of eco-adventure type activities like river rafting, rock climbing, mountain biking. I wished I were younger or in better shape when I saw the flyer about rappelling down a waterfall! It wasn't a niagra but a veil of water that fell a long ways and the pictures showed the rappellers inside the spray. How cool! There is a lot to do and see for the more sedentary as well, lots of birds, beautiful rivers and waterfalls everywhere, hot springs and huge pools or sink holes with dive shops alongside.

We arrived at Bañito Balneario around 6pm. We were the only ones there and we picked a spot that was sort of level. We had heard that the restaurant was good so we went down and had a great dinner. Really tender arrachera and good drinks, the famous french fries seemed kind of greasy to me but the excellent steak made up for them.

The next morning I took a pic of 2 of the 3 pools here, they are all fed by natural springs and the water is constantly flowing through them. It was cool and humid and we didn't feel like swimming. I think that one of the pools is fed by hot springs but I don't think it was really hot, no steam. There was a huge flock of some kind of Amazon parrot in the trees, we lost a lot of time looking at them and trying to identify them.

We got on the road for Las Pozas and the nearby mountain town of Xilitla around noon. We had no idea how the road would be but in our usual intrepid fashion we just went. The road got a lot narrower after the turnoff to Xilitla from highway 85, and it began to climb. We had been very close to sea level but went up to around 1600'. It was misty in places and the jungle flowed over the road with flowering trees filled with orchids and bromeliads.

We passed the turnoff to Las Pozas to go on and see Xilitla. Well, after crossing a long bridge we climbed into the town and quickly realized we'd be lucky to get the rig turned around. We pulled over in front of a paint store which was also the entrance to another road, we were blocking a lot there. We got the jeep unhooked and Mimi was able to turn Tortuga around after some guys helpfully moved a couple of trucks.

Back down we went and turned up the road to Las Pozas. We only got a couple blocks before the road got so bad and so narrow that we backed up to another wide spot and got as far off the road as possible. I went up in the jeep and quickly realized that the road was a spring buster, it was more like driving up a creek bed, single track with huge rocks and holes just as big.

I went on up though and was blown away but what I could see from the jeep. I talked to some of the guys working there and they showed me where we could park free. There was one small converted bus from Quebec already there but we would have fit. I went back and talked to Mimi. She was afraid our 5 yo leaf springs would not like it and I thought that it would be possible but not really worth it for only one night. We knew we had to keep going to get to Cancun in time to pick our friend Country up on the 19th.

So, I went and talked to the people in the nearest house about us staying where we were for the night. Oh no! there is an animal truck due any minute and you are blocking the chute. We went back down to the road to talk to a mechanic that had a little room next to his house, he wasn't home. Across the street at a cement place, nope, our trucks stay here at night. OK, back up the road to find the animal truck with huge pig inside had managed to slide past Tortuga and get to the chute. They were nice and said if we pulled up a few feet we could leave the rig there for an hour or two so we could go up and tour Las Pozas.

Since we go to the Yucatan every year and there are only so many ways to get there, it can get boring if you follow the same route. I try every year to get us to something we haven't seen yet, down some road we haven't traveled. It's not hard as there are still so many places I want to go in Mexico and so many things I want to stop and see. This year we came down the long way through the state of Chihuahua which is like driving across Texas. In Zacatecas we were about half way down the length of Mexico, oddly we were also about level with the tip of the Yucatan although by road we are only a third of the way there. Here's a map of Mexico that is zoomable.

One area I've long wanted to visit is called the Huasteca. It's a long strip of tropical rainforest that runs from the east side of the Sierra Madre Oriental to the Gulf of Mexico. I've read that it is the farthest north rain forest on the continent, no doubt. It runs through 3 states and there are some differences between them. This trip we decided to go to the Huasteca Potosina and check out Las Posas, the fantasy built by Edward James.

To get there from Zacatecas we took a good road to San Luis Potosi and spent an hour getting around that huge city. It was getting dark and we spent the night at a Pemex gas station at the first small town after clearing the city. It was the eve of the Day of the Virgin of Guadalupe, the Mother of Mexico and the most revered saint in the country. There were lots of rockets going off but we slept easily, unlike one of our dogs. Hombre is Mexican, he grew up with lots of cohetes (rockets) going off frequently but suddenly, after one more summer in the relatively quiet US, he is now scared of them. He cowered and shivered and acted like a gringo dog. His sister Chica, she who is terrified of 18 wheelers, slept like nothing was going on. I'm hoping Hombre will get over his new fear and get used to them again. If he doesn't, life is going to be rough on him for half the year.

Zacatecas was beautiful. We took a tour on a double decker bus without a top, we sat up top and listened to the guide in spanish. We were the only people on the bus. The sun was shining and while it was cold it was so clear and crisp we didn't mind. Unfortunately, I forgot to bring the camera! So, no pictures.

We went to a museum in an old Franciscan monastery, it contained the collections of a famous painter from the area. He had one of the largest mask collections in the world, really incredible. The building was also wonderful to wander around in, the gardens the stonework...dream material.

Around sunset we went up to a hill overlooking the city and had drinks and appetizers with a Canadian couple we met. It had rained and there was a double rainbow over the city. Magical.

Sorry about not taking notes while we were there, I know there was a lot I thought I would write about but alas, CRS intervenes and I've lost it.

Hello from beautiful Zacatecas. I'm using a hotel computer so don't have any pictures to upload but wanted to check in and say that we are fine and enjoying our trip. We've driven around this colonial city many times but never stopped. This time we are spending the weekend being tourists and enjoying the sights. This was one of the first cities established by the spanish as it is the location of the most prolific silver mine of that era. Lots of beautiful old ornate buildings and mansions, incredible museums and churches. The city is built in a narrow valley with cobbled alleys and streets going up and down the hills. It's at 8000' elevation so it is chilly and difficult to walk up the hills. We're taking taxis and not worrying about it. More later.

We pulled into Zacatecas around 5pm. We found the deluxe hotel and spa that also has RV hookups in the parking lot, Hacienda del Bosque, pretty easily and got settled.

We stayed an extra day in Deming to get everything done. When I got up in the morning it was 38* INSIDE the rig and 18* outside. Definitely time to get going. We got to the border at Palomas around 10:45am, it took 45 minutes for the paperwork and we now have the new 10 year permit for Tortuga. I doubt it will save us much time in the future as we will still have to get a permit for the Jeep every year as well as our tourist cards. Still, it's a nice improvement.

Our first gas stop the price was 6.64 pesos per liter which comes to $2.31 a gallon. We were still in the border area where gas is a little cheaper so there won't be any big gas savings this year. The next gas stop we were outside the border area and got the standard price of 6.74 a liter, $2.35 a gallon.

We drove 10.5 hours (340 miles) across Mexico's version of west Texas. Long, boring, endlessly similar vistas. We had decided to try out an RV park in the state capitol of Chihuahua called Del Fresno. We found it behind a Pemex gas station and it was surprisingly large with big sites and full hookups available. It was late and we didn't need the hookups but it was a good, safe and quiet place to sleep. There must have been 50 sites there but we were the only RV. We got up at 9am to 38* and grey skies.

Drove all day again through the same grey skies and boring scenery. We pulled over at a toll booth rest area just past Lerdo around 7:30pm. We stayed up late reading some of our stash of english books, at this rate we will have read them all before we get to Akumal.

We woke up at 9am to cold, grey and rain... went back to sleep and slept until 11am. Oh well, no one cares if we get up late. Our only real deadline now is to pick up our friend Country at the Cancun airport on Dec 19th. We started out on a free road that was not very good plus there was a lot of fog so we didn't make much time. Eventually we got on a better road and the fog cleared.

Everything is done and we are heading south tomorrow. We will probably stay tomorrow near Chihuahua but won't set the internet dish up for a few days. So, no posts until we get somewhere we can put the dish up.

Do any of you watch Hero's? I'm so hooked on that show. Tonight was the last show until late in January which is why we didn't leave today. It answered some questions but started some more. I loved the previous theme "Save the cheerleader, Save the world" What a great line. They saved Clair but a cheerleader died so they didn't really save the cheerleader. In fact, it looks to me like they have not been able to change the future at all. You can bet I'll be somewhere with the sat tv set up on Jan 22nd.

Buenas noches amigos, will post when I can.

We made it out of Santa Rosa and down to Albuquerque tonight. We have shopping to do and a list of places we need to go, we stopped at CostCo on the way and now we are parked at WalMart for the night. Tomorrow, WalMart for groceries, Trader Joe's, Sear's and maybe Camping World as our catalytic heater isn't working right. Then we are off to Deming to wait for the mail, deposit some checks, pay the property taxes, switch the phone to the NoAmerica plan and finally, cross the border.

It's not much warmer here in Alb, in the 20's. I'm not whining, just saying that it is bloody cold and I am not amused. I don't have the clothes for this weather. I have maybe 3 pairs of sweat pants, a sweatshirt jacket, a rain jacket and 1 wool sweater. Luckily I found a pair of gloves in the raincoat pocket and Mimi had 2 knit caps so I got one of them. Thank god for Uggs! Without them, and with cold feet, I would not have made it. I know I could buy more cold weather clothes but that's not the point folks, I don't want cold weather clothes I just want to get out of the cold weather.