Adios, Mexico

I don't enjoy long driving days, but sometimes it makes sense. In this situation, none of the attractions we wanted to see along the way were open, and so we enjoyed one last day at the Las Palmas Midway Inn in Matehuala. Hard to believe we were there for 10 nights!

We hit the road at just after 7:00am. First thing we did was to fill up with some very cheap fuel.

The things that went wrong...

Eight motorhomes and 14 people touring Mexico together for four months and doing 7,000 kms (4,500 miles) worth of sometimes rough Mexican roads.

What could go wrong?

Well, as we explained to the group at the beginning of the trip, a lot can go wrong. It's not a matter of if there will be a problem... only when.

Highlights of a fantastic four months touring Mexico... part 2

Okay... if you missed part 1, you really want to go back and check that out first.

https://www.travelwithkevinandruth.com/2020/03/highlights-of-fantastic-four-months.html

Many people think of Mexico as "beaches". But there is so much more to Mexico, and we think the vast majority of the good stuff is actually in the interior.

Highlights of a fantastic four months touring Mexico... part 1

Not much going on here at the Las Palmas Hotel and RV Park where we have been holed up for the past week. No point in just writing about the same things day after day, so I thought we might review what has been a fantastic four months touring Mexico.

We crossed into Mexico at Presidio, Texas and into the state of Chihuahua.

We don't seem to have any problem keeping busy

Yesterday, I cleaned Sherman's awning. It was way overdue... probably because it's a pain in the butt to clean! When I worked at the RV dealership parts department back ten years or so ago, they had a thick liquid product that you spray on both sides of the awning, roll it up, leave it for a few hours, and then rinse it off.

But of course I don't have any of that... so I used Spray 9 and a scrub broom!

Margaritas by the pool

Well, we continue to wait things out at the Las Palmas Midway Inn here in Matehuala, San Luis Potosi, Mexico.

Yesterday, I got up on Sherman's roof and gave it a bath. Some regular readers will remember when I re-coated the roof back in September 2015. Considering that was almost five years ago, it was a good thing to do and it has held up well.

Nothing better than fresh air

We are of the opinion that the best place to be right now is outside and away from people who are not part of our group. Some readers even think that we shouldn't be associating with members of our group... but we think there is no logic there. Our group have been together every day for the last four months. If one of us were sick, we would all be sick.

So we stay outside, or inside the motorhome with all the windows open.

Will we stay, or will we go...?

Well, another day another decision.

As I said before, we are playing this thing one day at a time. Many of you have your own opinions of what we should or shouldn't be doing and one of the problems with putting our life out there the way we do is that people want to make their opinion known if they think they know what we should be doing. And while we appreciate the concern, Ruth said it best...

One day at a time

Nice to have some down time here in Matehuala. The rest of the group are keeping busy puttering around their rigs, getting some laundry done, and generally relaxing.

We walked with Bob and Denise over to the Walmart. Bob was looking for some oil do do an oil change on his rig, but we thought that the Autozone would have a better selection so we left Ruth and Denise in the Walmart and the two of us walked another km down the road to the Autozone.

Change of plans

Woke up yesterday morning at the run down El Banito Restaurant Balneario RV Park just south of Ciudad Valles. We wanted to visit some waterfalls in the area, but didn't want to base ourselves out of that particular RV park. I didn't even take any photos there!

Anyhow, online I found what looked like a decent parking area at the Micos waterfalls and I had read that they have a swimming area as well. And it was hot... calling for a high of 33C (91F). Nice to be somewhere to cool off in the water.

The odd surrealist sculpture garden of Edward James

We have known about this place for quite a long time and have never made the effort to visit. It's one of the reasons we came to this area besides the fact that we simply had never been here before and there is a lot of other stuff to see as well.

It was only a 25 km (15 mile) drive from where we had stayed Wednesday night at Club Palma Solas. So we headed out at 9:00am to try and beat any buses to the parking lot I had read about.

The most beautiful drive in Mexico?

Monday night we had been parked overnight at the Pemex gas station just south of the town of Jacala. When we got up Tuesday morning, several of us went for a walk in the countryside before heading out.

Even with a 10:00am start to the driving day, we should still arrive at our destination of Matlapa by 2:00pm.

And then there were five...

We started off this trip with 8 rigs. We had high hopes of finishing the trip with 8 rigs but then this Coronavirus (now apparently being called Covid-19?!) thing happened and people's plans change.

Larry and Martha decided their best option was to be back in the United States and they set off a week ago. Then a couple of days ago, Sue and Roy decided their best option was to be anywhere but the Unites States and they chose Valle de Juarez, Mexico (we were there at Christmas)... and Garth decided he didn't want to be in the Unites States either so he was going to visit his sister in Puerto Vallarta, but would go with Sue and Roy along the way.

Busy day with hot springs, caves, and waterfalls!

The tour buses began arriving at 7:00am. This is a popular spot, and especially so on holidays and long weekends. And they kept coming, all day long.

First thing we did was that I drove Sue and Roy's van down to the lower parking area before it got too busy down there. Roy would have had a tough time doing the climb up to the parking area where the rest of us are, and their vehicle can fit into a normal parking spot.

Yet another adventure for the group!

First off, let me address the craziness going on in the world. We do not talk about politics, our health, or the news unless it affects our travels. So far, what is happening in the world has not affected our travels. In fact, if it weren't for the internet we wouldn't even know about it.

And so that's all I have to say about it for now. If that changes, I will be the first to let you know! But for now, it is business as usual here at Travel with Kevin and Ruth.

Back to our regularly scheduled programming...

One of the prettiest campsites in Mexico

We were happy at the place we had stayed Wednesday night, and would have been prepared to stay another night. But Ruth and I had found a better spot just a couple of kms down the road. The sign at the entrance had said it was a community campground and it was 50 pesos per person to camp overnight. But there was nobody around and the gate was wide open. We had paid 200 pesos per rig where we were, so not only was the place down the road better... it was also cheaper.

We set off at 9:00am for what would be a very short driving day!

Yet another beautiful campsite in the mountains

We left the little ejido village of Tuliman right at 9:00am. Our host Josue insisted on leading us out of the area and up to the main road. Really nice people.

We were headed up to Mineral del Chico National Park.

An adventurous hike with waterfalls!

We hired Josue to take us for a hike into the canyon. He brought along Carlos, one of the local boys to bring up the rear so nobody got left behind.

Ten of us set off at 9:00am. We first went to the ridge of the canyon, and then walked the road down to the park entrance.

This is why we come to Mexico

9:30am start for the group yesterday after a great week in the Cholula/Puebla city area. But, it's time to get back into the countryside.

As I mentioned yesterday, the next couple of weeks are going to be interesting. Not many RV'ers to Mexico visit the region through which we are headed. As such, there aren't many official RV camping areas and we kind of have to wing it.

Not every day you see something like this. Especially here in Mexico!

Sundays are a great day to explore downtown Puebla... there is so much going on!

So yesterday morning at 10:30am, we ordered some Uber taxis and took the group downtown to central Puebla.

Bike ride in Puebla, and new dinette cushions for Sherman

(I posted February's expenses last night... you can read about it here... February Expenses.)

Eight of us set off at 9:00am yesterday for a bike ride into Puebla.

Puebla is a modern city of about 3 million people. It is located at an elevation of 7,000'. It's also one of the cleanest cities in Mexico... very little graffiti, and lots of green space. We purposely didn't go into the historical area itself since we are taking the group in there today. Plus, the "cyclopista" doesn't go into the central area.

February Expenses

Not a bad month, pretty much exactly as expected at $1,900 CAD ($1,415 USD).

We started the month in Cuernavaca and drove all the way to Ocozocoautla and back to Oaxaca so we actually did a fair bit of driving in February. So of course gasoline took up a fair chunk of our February expenses!

Steak for dinner!

It just occurred to me that I never published out February expense report... and I don't have time to do it now. We are headed out to do some cycling around Puebla this morning and we are leaving in 40 minutes... so this will be a quick post.

I'll get to the expenses later today.

We had to go to plan B

We had a van coming to pick us up at 9:00am to take us on a planned hike in the national park located between the two volcanoes.

The town of Cholula where the campground is located is at 7,000' altitude. The park where we were going is around 12,000' altitude, so it's a bit of climb by vehicle just to get to the trails.

This town doesn't get many tourists!

Great day for a hike.

But, it was a great day for other things as well because some of the group chose to go bike riding, and some took the Cholula trolley tour.

We set off with Bob and Denise at around 9:30am.

A great first day in Cholula

We really like this area. There is so much to see and do, and the weather is absolutely perfect in our opinion.

First thing we did was to walk the 2.5 kms or so to the Great Pyramid of Cholula. This is the largest pyramid in the world, built over a period of more than 1,000 years between 300 BC to 900 AD. When the Spanish came, they built a church on top of it, and they may not have even known it was a pyramid.

Mexico RV Caravan Travel Day - Oaxaca to Cholula

Long driving day yesterday as we made our way from Oaxaca city to the Puebla suburb of Cholula.

It's a distance of 369 kms (229 miles), and we had thought about taking the free road and breaking it into a two day drive, but due to a variety of reasons we chose to take the toll road and do it all in one shot.

Market day in Tlacalula

The Tlacalula market just east of Oaxaca city is a huge Sunday market that has been operating since before the Spanish arrived. Many of the indigenous people from the surrounding hills come here on Sundays to sell their goods and socialize.

A group of us hopped on the local bus at 9:00am to do the drive out to the town of Tlacalula.

Alebrijes and Cactus... more touring around Oaxaca City

Yesterday was another great day out touring for the group. We once again booked a van for the excursion and driver Omar showed up right on time for our 9:00am departure.

We headed directly to the alebrijes studio of Jacobo y María Ángeles located south of the city of Oaxaca in the town of San Martín Tilcajete.