Mission Accomplished

 We pulled out of the rest area at 6:15am. The air outside was still fresh with coolness of the night. The highway was near empty. But before entering the border we pulled out to a LOVES Truckstop to fill up with Diesel. Fuel is much more expensive in Mexico, well....like in California.

Of course, as this was our first border crossing into Mexico we felt a bit apprehensive about the procedure and also getting into the right lanes. Well, we just followed directional signs and slipped through the truck crossing on the US-side easy peasy. The next thing was the Mexican customs stop. we approached it in a crawl and an officer waved us to a stop. I handed over passports and registration papers for the bus, the car and the trailer. The only he looked at was the bus registration. And he wanted to compare the VIN number with the sticker we have inside the bus, There were no questions about food items or anything else. After he released us we were free in Mexico......except we still needed the FMM, or "tourist card".

The necessary stop at km 21 is very badly marked as such, but we found it. As soon as a line-up of people forms you can spend some considerable time there.

Thanks to our early start there weren't too many people waiting.

And then we were on our way again.

Now a couple of words about the road conditions. The first part right after the passing of US customs facilities was about the worst I ever drove. The pavement was in a state of total destruction. After the km21 I noticed some slight improvement but still worse than the famous I-70 in the US.

Continuing south there were stretches with new pavement which suddenly ended in disaster-like conditions. Calling this federal highway which takes in thousands of millions of pesos in a month the best road in Mexico scares the hell out of me. Cause what state are the lesser roads in?

As we had stopped for lunch at a PEMEX station a whole caravan of Canadian RVers pulled in. As I heard from them they were underway to Porto Vallarta or a little north of there.

We left the area before them but later got into a position right among them on the highway.

Hermosillo, the only bigger city in the area has modern style bypass so we never saw anything of the city.

From Hermosillo it was only a tad more than an hour of driving to San Carlos. We had stayed in continuous  contact with our friends who had been waiting for us in San Carlos. So when we arrived, they were there to welcome us.

After scouting out a site we found a place very close to the beach. But what did I do? I got the motorhome stuck in the sand. Yes I did! Embarrassing and stupid. But with the help of my trailer ramps and some sand mats from a fellow camper we got it out of the sand and back to solid ground.

Phew!!

The place is just steps from the beautiful beach where the waves of the Sea of Cortez holding 26C or about 79.5F are tempting for a swim.

Even though the drive today was only about 500km we were exhausted. It had been too hot most of the day and temps were at 33C (91.4F)

And I think Dixie was suffering the most. Only after hours in the shade of the rig she recovered.

Tomorrow we've got to do some serious grocery shopping.

Mt. Cerro Tetakawi