We made it!

(This is a catch up post, so if you missed this morning's, you might want to go back and read it first.)

Slept fine at the water park on Sunday night. Monday morning, we headed out early. Pretty much woke up and hit the road. Didn't even make a hot drink. The goal was to find some internet and then relax for an hour or so and have breakfast then.

Quite a lot of traffic heading south through Tequisquiapan and San Juan Del Rio. In fact, the entire drive on Monday was pretty hectic and with a lot of bad road surfaces, including on the cuotas (toll roads)!

Of course it was morning rush hour when we got to San Juan del Rio. But Ruth spotted a Home Depot beside a McDonald's and a shopping mall and we figured that one of them must have an unsecured internet signal. So I managed to get into the proper lane just in time to get into the Home Depot parking lot.

Parking lots at these types of chain stores (Home Depot, Walmart, etc) are typically a lot more cramped in Mexico compared to the U.S. or Canada. But we found ourselves a spot. Just had to make sure we made an effort to get out before the stores themselves started to get busy!

Sure enough, we got online. But it was through a TelMex connection that gave you a 2 hour free trial. Thanks TelMex!

Then, further south on the MEX55 towards Atlacomulco and more of a maze of roads and congestion. Really, not a fun area to drive through. And, it cost us a total of 193 pesos ($15.83) in toll fees because we figured the free roads would be even worse. Who knows. I will say, that I don't recommend the section of roads between San Juan del Rio and Toluca. You'll spend most of the drive watching out for topes (speed bumps), potholes, and other drivers! That's why we don't have any pictures of that stretch. It's better with two sets of eyes.

Scenery along the way.

But when we made it to the outskirts of Toluca, we were pretty familiar with the roads. We've either driven with the motorhome, driven with the little blue car, or taken the bus on most of the roads in this area. We took the free road towards Valle de Bravo, and arrived at Embarcadero Chago in a bit of a rain shower at 1:30pm.

Our friend Chago was gone for the day, but one of his employees suggested a spot for us. We waited through the afternoon to see if he would come back in time, but eventually we moved and if he wants Sherman somewhere different for the six weeks we're gone, then we'll move again before we leave here on Thursday.

Our temporary spot.

(This morning, Chago suggested that he was going to move that old trailer and put us in there. Nice...we're happy with that!)

You might notice we have a new friend in the above pic. That friendly local pup took a liking to us right away. Haven't found anybody here yet who knows his name, but we'll keep asking.

The view from our lawn chairs.

Another great Valle de Bravo sunset last night.

In the meantime, we are happy to be finished with our 4,200 km (2,600 mile) driving marathon. Oh...we spent $900 CAD ($700 USD) in fuel to get down here. Not bad, since I had planned on $1,000 CAD. We used 282 gallons of fuel, so Sherman averaged out to 9.22 mpg. Considering the amount of slow mountain driving we did at times, we're pretty happy with that. Good job Sherman!