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BBQ, Tex-Mex, big steaks, and lots of preparations for our border crossing

After checking into yet another Comfort Suites (the points are racking up!) that could really use some remodeling (what is that vinegar smell in the stair well???), we took advantage of the warm evening here to take a stroll down the Riverwalk. Sunday night and the Riverwalk was teeming with tourists and convention-goers. This is probably the most crowded place we’ve encountered yet, even more so than New Orleans or Key West. We did get to enjoy some outdoor dining at one of the many mediocre seeming touristy restaurants.  (The Mexican food we had was pretty good.)

The next few days were spent running errands. This is our final stop before crossing the border, so there were some last minute things we would just as soon do in the States, such as finishing our taxes, getting the car checked out, going to the bank, laundry, shopping for all of our (Caroline’s) favorite hair products and toiletries, emailing people and updating our website, for starters. We also wanted to do some research on how we go about getting our 6-month visas, registering and bonding our car, getting Mexican auto insurance, figuring out what we’re allowed to bring into the country (i.e. no more than 20 audio CD’s). It’s started to seem like we’ll never cross the border.

We did take a couple of breaks to walk around downtown, go see the Alamo, and went to the movies one night (we saw Sideways, which really brought us back to California – we have been getting nostalgic for the west coast recently). People (i.e. Texans) seem different than in MS, LA, & AL. We were expecting people to continue to be nice, and have that southern hospitality we’d been experiencing. But most of the Texans we’ve met have seemed very unfriendly, and they’re probably the most impatient drivers we’ve come upon in our loop around the country. Okay, we’ve only spent any amount of time in one major city, so there’s a bit of generalizing here, but that goes with pretty much all of our observations across the land.  Drivers across the Southern states have seemed pretty rude overall, with the exception of Florida. In Florida, people don’t seem to be in any kind of a hurry for the most part, and will let you into traffic from parking lots or let you change lanes in front of them without trying to run you down, maybe because of the huge retired population in the areas we visited.

We’re headed to Puerto Vallarta for some much-needed R&R (we realize we’re not getting much sympathy here, but anyone who has done any extensive traveling will know what we mean).  Looks like we’ll be crossing the border this Friday, March 4th, and heading directly for Saltillo, just past Monterrey. We think the best route will be Laredo – Saltillo – Matehuala – San Luis Potosi – Guadalajara – Tepic – Puerto Vallarta - ??? (Once we get to the Pacific coast, we’ll just stay for a while wherever we think seems like a good place to stop).  Internet access may be spotty, so bear with us, but we’ll be updating you as soon as we can!

Figuring out the best route through Mexico