Not every day goes according to plan!

When we travel by motorhome, we think it's best to have a plan to arrive at your destination by 2:00pm. That way, there is lots of daylight hours left in case your plan doesn't go according to plan! And if everything does go well, you've got a few afternoon hours to just relax and enjoy yourself.

Well yesterday was one of those days that didn't go according to plan.

The caravan showed up!

We had a nice morning just puttering around. Ruth was going to do some laundry, and we both remember that there had been an old washing machine in the RV Park area, but maybe we were thinking of somewhere else. Anyhow, there is no washing machine here now!

The hotel wanted typical rip off prices to do any laundry, but I don't really blame them. They aren't in the business of doing laundry, so if you want it done, you have to pay.

It's a good thing Igor broke down!

Wow, lots to talk about today! And so, a long blog post with lots of photos. And lots of good news!

The mechanics didn't begin work on Igor until about 10:00am, which was okay with us. We left them to do the installation of the fuel pump and re-install the gas tank, and we decided to do a 10 km (6.2 mile) walk to a nearby lake.

Progress!

Man, we've had a lot of bad luck lately. First my laptop breaks, then my Amazon account gets closed, then Igor breaks down. It helps that we are pretty good at rolling with the punches!

By the same token, we've got a lot of great things on the go as well. Number one is that we're in Mexico!

Stuck on the side of the road...

We headed out from Chris and Juan's at about 9:45am... about 15 minutes later than planned. We always try to have a plan that sees us arriving at our destination by 2:00pm or so. That always gives you lots of daylight hours in case you have problems.

Well.. we had problems.

Time to head further south

Yesterday morning we said goodbye to Bjorn and Freya. Chris and Juan drove them to the bus station in central Monterrey and they took the bus from there to Nuevo Laredo at the border.

They then walked across the border and into Laredo, Texas. They said it was the easiest border crossing ever.

Very frustrating...

First off, let me tell you part two of our laptop story.

Because the card machine wasn't working properly at the store, I had a look at Amazon Mexico and found an identical laptop that suited my purposes, and I ordered it to have it delivered to the hotel campground at our next planned stop in Matehuala.

Bjorn's birthday, laptop shopping, and tour around Santiago

It was fun to be able to help Bjorn celebrate his birthday yesterday!

We all went out in the morning to do some laptop shopping. Here in Mexico, they do a thing similar to Black Friday that starts the weekend before Dia de la Revolucion (Revolution Day), so there are a lot of sales on.

A great day in Mexico

I'm thinking that there will be a few blog posts with that title this winter!

We hung out at the house for the morning, and then early afternoon we set off to the Cola de Caballo waterfalls. But we had a stop to make along the way. 

Reunited with Igor... and into Mexico!

We were up at 6:00am Wednesday morning, and down for our included hotel breakfast at 6:30am. It was actually better than expected, with lots of eggs, cheese, fruits, cereals, and yogurts.

Then we had to figure out how we were getting from the hotel to the border crossing. Uber apparently works in Reynosa, but the system showed that any available drivers were quite far away.

Cancun beach time, and flight to Reynosa

We hung out at Carmen's apartment for the morning, and then took the local bus from there to the hotel zone where she works as a property manager, renting out condos to vacationers.

It cost 12 pesos ($0.80 CAD, $0.58 USD) each for the half hour ride.

Welcome to Mexico!

We were up at silly o'clock (3:00 am!) in order to get ready for our 6:00 am flight to Cancun.

We planned on getting the 3:30 am shuttle from the hotel, and we were down there at 3:20, waiting in the area specified by the front desk. But at 3:30 am, the shuttle hadn't arrived!

Next stop, Cancun!

Writing this Sunday evening from our hotel at Ottawa airport.

The hotel was actually paid for by our house sitting hosts. They had asked if we were willing to stay past our original flight date of November 1st, and we couldn't get a rescheduled flight until November 11th. But their returning flight arrived on the 10th (today).

Dinner party

We've spent much of our last week here in Canada visiting with friends, as it could be a long time before we're back here again. 

We had Bob and Denise here on Monday, but forgot to get a picture!

Settle down...? Why would we want to do that??!

We actually missed it, and Ruth only reminded me the other day that we began our 18th year of alternate lifestyle travel on October 15th. In fact, you can go back and read our very first blog post to see when we set off across Canada with our motorhome Sherman.

We're often asked "when do you plan to settle down", or "what is the end game"?