On the Road Again

(continued from "Fuel up, we've got a road trip!" )

As we approached the Mexico boarder in the cool early morning air, the 2 cars containing all 13 members of our family, eased through the passage and quickly navigated the tiny streets to the by-pass around Juarez. The sun started to rise in the sky and the clean roads stretched out in front of us. Things were off to a fabulous start!

The media, over the last few years, has portrayed Mexico and specifically Juarez and Chihuahua city as the biggest nightmare on the planet. The horrific stories of abduction and tourist fatalities are enough to scare anyone into bombing the country let alone ever traveling there.  But what we found, was a pleasant country that is easily navigated if you are smart about it and plan to travel safely; do not travel at night and stay on the toll roads. Juarez  (which we drove directly through on the way back) has been depicted as a gang war that carries on all day and all night, an impassable place where they are stacking bodies on one side of the road and cars on the other, but what it really is, is a lot of people, a lot of Americans even, working. Ya, just people working. People walking around buying tacos from stands and chatting with each other. We didn't hear even one machine gun spray fire! Now that doesn't mean I think you should don your hot pink mini skirt and walk the streets at night, but the idea we have and fear we provoke in each other seems a little bit out of wack.

Our spirits lifted as we drove and we found ourselves relaxing ever so slightly. We pulled in to the immigration stop, which we found empty, no lines and no waiting! Thrilled we filled out our papers and the kids had a chance to run around. We registered our cars and felt like the smartest travelers ever. And then...trouble. Turns out there is an issue with people taking American cars to Mexico and selling them, so the person the car is registered to needs to be with the car. No problem since we were driving my mother-in-law's car and she was with us, she even had a certified letter from her husband (who would be flying to meet us after he completed his work that week). What we did not anticipate was that the 2nd car in our group, which had been selected due to it's 'blending in' ability, was also registered to my mother-in-law, Jane. She can't drive 2 cars into Mexico. So the Mexican officers insisted we show a birth certificate for my husband, Jesse, or his brother, Chris, to prove they were related to Jane. Now I don't know about you, but we don't travel with anything but our passports so this was a definite issue. After some time begging, they agreed to a faxed copy. Yay! Only now we had to contact someone back at home and get them into Chris' house to find his birth certifcate and fax it to...where? The office didn't have a fax!

2 hours later, some lovely trash art made by our boys, a bloody toe from a rusty bolt and one faxed birth certificate later, we managed to get approval. Don't ask where we finally found a fax, that is a blog of its own.

Back on the road, way behind schedule. We found ourselves a decent way into Chihuahua state, the next step in survival traveling. We stopped at clean, safe rest stops along the way and found ourselves more and more surprised by how clean and how safe it was...despite our preconceived notions. Chihuahua city was a surprise too; clean and lovely, no piles of bodies or gun fire anywhere. The only bummer was a speeding ticket and sleazy pay-the-cop-and-go experience. On the up side we got to see a side of my sister-in-law we've never seen, she wouldn't put up with harassment and bartered with the cop, she was a total badass.

We stayed the 1st night in a charming little hotel in Jimenez, south of Chihuahua city. It was 6pm and there were still plenty of hours of sunlight, but with the unknown looming ahead, and pale shaken voices of fear ringing out about driving in Zacatecas at night, we decided it best to give everyone some rest. As we settled ourselves, stretched our legs and enjoyed a glass of wine... out of cut plastic water bottles, the hotel quickly filled up. We came to find out that everyone gets off the road at dusk and there were no hotels, no towns, no gas for hours down the road. It was a smart decision to stop when we did and we patted ourselves on the back for it. Other Mexican travelers stopped to chat with us and kindly welcomed us to their country. The wine eased our stress and smiles returned to our faces. Tomorrow we would brave Zacatecas, but for now, we would enjoy the warm air and the sound of our children laughing.

*As a side note, when you forget wine glasses or are caught on the road in Mexico without them. A quick fix is to take an empty water bottle, cut it in half (or with a large bottle, cut about 4 inches up from the base) using your wine key's knife. If you do not have a knife on your wine key, you obviously have the wrong wine key and need to buy one from Vivác Winery. The possibility of cutting your lip on these glasses is a distinct possibility, but hey you have wine so no complaining.

(to be continued...)

-Cheers from the Vivác Winery Family!
ww.vivacwinery.com