Mexico

[Lopo]

I've been reading through some posts trying to catch up after a long hot summer vegging out in Florida. After I cut my travels short last spring, my first trip in my motorhome, I went straight to a doctor and told her to please test my blood to look for a reason for me to be exhausted way out of proportion to just getting old, and she found that I was hypothyroid. So now I'm pumped with some thyroid and ready to try again, but Im in a quandary. My DH, who some of you might remember has been in a wheelchair for over 50 years (but it doesn't stop him from being up to about anything) is at our house in Mexico, in Yucatan, and I stubbornly refuse to just take a flight from Miami to just hang around the house all winter. I fixed up "Dorothy" and I want to drive her down there so I can make trips to the Caribbean coast, Belize, and lots of places we never go to because he saw it all years ago.
BUT - I'm a bit nervous about driving alone. The first day will be getting across and through the border area, and parks are scarce for that night, but there is one small one 5 hours from the border, a long day. If anyone is dying to see mainland Mexico and wants to caravan with me, that would be perfect, but unlikely, I know. My friends who might ride with me are mostly caring for a sick or elderly someone, my kids would love to go, but are in that busy "40's" time of life. I guess I just want to hear what some of you think, but after reading about the nerve so many of you have to drive through Houston, you'll probably give me a hard time about being scared of a silly drug cartel!

[Bethers]

I don't know when you plan to go, or where you plan to cross, but we have a member and her husband on their way south now who go to MX every year for the winter. They are already in AZ ... don't know what their plans are for crossing - you might want to pm her. Carol, name here is: asirimarco She just posted from Sedona, AZ in general talk.

[Lopo]

Thanks, Beth, but she's surely going to cross in Arizona rather than Texas, probably bound for the Pacific Coast. But I'll check with her. I even considered skipping the Yucatan and forgetting I have a husband, and just spending a few weeks traveling down that coast myself, but I think this isn't the year for it.

[monik7]

I don't know. This just sounds really scary to me. It's a lot different from going to Baja. Maybe I just don't know enough about your planned route, but it seems a lot of the problems Mexico is having are in the border areas of Texas and along the central and eastern parts of the country. I'm just worried about an American woman traveling in those areas. I'd even worry if you were caravaning through there. Sorry, maybe I'm off base but I'd feel awful if something bad happened and I hadn't said something. So if I'm wrong, please forgive me.
Sandi

[Lopo]

Sandi, you're not out of line at all! That's the kind of feedback I'm interested in. Nothing scares my husband (except the thought of a nursing home) so I think maybe he thinks I'm just a big baby for being iffy about this trip, and there are Mexico RV and travel forums that show lots of people driving down there now, and feeling safer than a couple of years ago. But it's a 4-day trip "hauling ass" in a car and no way I want to do that in my motorhome. I would want to stop for a day or two, like along the Costa Esmeralda, along the Gulf of Mexico (sort of a Canadian snowbird - RV area with lots of parks).
If I would stick to the big ol' toll roads, it would be safer, I think, but I am like a person with one foot on the gas and one foot on the brake over this. I'm about to decide to just head west to spend some time with my daughter and grandson in San Diego and see some more of the Southwest. Husband, what husband?

[monik7]

How about going to Baja from San Diego? Beth could probably give you some ideas on routes and good places to visit.
Sandi

[Lopo]

I"m seriously considering that! I've already got the Church's Baja Camping book, and there aren't many road choices in Baja, but I will check with Beth for recommendations on campgrounds, etc. Right now I've just signed up for the gtg in Silver Springs State Park which happens to be just 150 miles from me, and some good outdoor girl time is just what I need to clear my head on this "what to do," I think.

[Bethers]

I wouldn't have trouble going to mainland MX anymore than I do Baja ... especially after getting away from the border. There are border towns I wouldn't even consider crossing in. Then again, I wouldn't want to be on the US side of those towns either, same as lots of areas of all our big cities.

The Church's have a book on the mainland and another on just Baja. Good books.

I don't stay in many rv parks - mainly the boondock locations on the water with a park thrown in now and then just to get water for my tank and dump, etc.

[Lopo]

Thanks, Beth. I have the Church's mainland book, and plenty of other resources, and am familiar with most of the road, although they make changes frequently. Since I'm coming from Florida, I usually cross at Brownsville/ Matamoros but that is a huge no-no now, the worst area. Mexicomike.com suggests McAllen/Reynosa, the next one over (he lives in McAllen) and straight south the first day, 5 hours away, is a 5 space park run by missionaries. I wouldn't dare boondock in this area.
If I go further west to Eagle Pass, that would work but there's a town you can't avoid where the Mexico RV people says the cops stop every RV that comes through with some fake charge and a ticket (which requires going to their station to pay). Where we live is the safest area of Mexico, but there's 1500 miles between the border and there, and the border area is the worst. I will probably pass through with not one problem. Thinking about it ahead of time is the worst, maybe.

[Bethers]

If you contact Carol, she will know the truth about the police in the area doing as you say, most likely. They travel all those areas - sometimes coming in or leaving from TX, others from AZ.

[Lopo]

I just PM'd her. I was looking at her marvelous photos on their blog just last night, not realizing she was one of us!