Month: October 2015

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Respite’s End

Even though I’ve put in a lot of hours over the last three days, it has felt a bit like a vacation, what with a nice hotel room and eating most of my meals out. Back to the real world very soon, I’m afraid. *tongue firmly in cheek*

I was surprisingly tired today, considering how great I felt yesterday. At least, I’ve managed to get up without my alarm every day! It was another good breakfast, enchilada casserole with refried beans. I love Mexican ‘breakfast food’! 😀

After work, I went to the Pizza Hut next door for linner. They didn’t have the special we can get in Canada, a personal pan pizza with two toppings and a side salad, so I got the medium pizza, figuring that the leftovers would freeze overnight and could be munched on during my drive tomorrow. I’ve never spent that much at a Pizza Hut in my life, though, $20 with the tip! But, then again, I’ve never had leftovers. I was pleased to realise at the end of my meal that I knew how to say, “I’d like a takeaway box, please” in Spanish. Really, what a difference from last year!

I came back to my room to drop off the leftovers, then set off to find Finitos, a frozen treat place that I suspected sold nieve de garrafa, the frozen treat I loved so much in Maz last winter. I found them and asked in Spanish if I could try the prune flavour (another thing I couldn’t have done last fall!) before buying a medium sized cup of it for $2. I’m sure they would have mixed flavours, but when a gal’s got a craving, you don’t dilute its satisfaction! 🙂 The treat wasn’t nearly as good as what I get in Maz, but it definitely hit the spot. I liked that there were a few whole prunes in it and that I could suck the fruit off the pits. Yum!

I had a walk while eating my Finitos. This part of Nogales feels so much like Mexico and I got a reminder to watch where I step because the sidewalks are so uneven!

When I came in, I did some Google research to find a TelCel store tomorrow before San Carlos. Looks like the one in Hermosillo right on MX-15 and after the BMW dealership is my best bet in terms of not having to make a detour and actually finding the darn thing.

I spent some time on the TelCel site to see if anything has changed since last year and it seems like it’s all the same. I did fine with this part of my Mexican adventure last year and the only thing that’s improved this year is that I have more verb tenses and will be able to assure them that I did this last year and their SIM card will work on my phone. Oh, and I know to send a text message to activate my data service! One thing I will have to remember to do is ask if they can give me a Mazatlán number since I got a lot of complaints about my long distance phone number last year!

I’d be lying if I said I was completely calm about the border crossing tomorrow, but there is nothing like the pit of snakes I had in my stomach last year! It’s more of a ‘this is so thrilling!’ kind of feeling. I’m looking forward to being at my home on Isla and settling into my Mexican life, but I think that I will enjoy the drive down a lot more this year instead of treating it like a grueling marathon.

Twelve hours till I plan to be up, thirteen till the absolute latest I plan to be pulling out of a gas station, and, oh, twenty-one or so at the absolute most before I should be rolling into San Carlos!

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Well Rested in Nogales

The last two days have really helped me to recoup from my brutal dash across the entire length of the US in 3.5 days! I’ve been going to bed early and getting up without an alarm, which is what makes all the difference in how productive my day is going to be.

I still set an alarm though, just in case, and Siri is very reassuring about it:

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This morning’s complimentary breakfast included quesadillas and salsa, which is much more my speed than are pancakes, plus fresh fruit salad. Very yum! I can’t believe the quality of the breakfast we get!

I hadn’t planned to do any other work besides proofing this week, but ended up accepting two of the three requests from other clients.  That’s how things roll when you’re a business owner. Sometimes, the client’s needs precede your own.

Early afternoon, I headed out for linner after getting a recommendation from the front desk to go to El Canton, literally around the corner and in front of the Mexican consulate. It’s a Chinese restaurant that isn’t really showing up in the search results yet (it’s not even showing up on Google Maps or through a Siri search). The clerk said that it’s the most expensive Chinese food in Nogales, but it’d be obvious why when I got there…

I stepped outside and was promptly hit on the head by something that was, thankfully, not a coconut, but… a date! I’ve never seen a date palm before!

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El Canton is a rather swanky looking restaurant, but, thankfully, Americans don’t dress up. Meals were quite expensive, averaging about $14 each. But there was a small buffet for $10, more expensive than the other buffets in the city, but the first bite of my super fresh and delicious food explained why. I had chow mein, three different kinds of broccoli, and several kinds of meats. Everything was tasty and nothing was overly salty or sweet. What a gem, and tucked away out of sight!

BTW, I had a reader comment on how Chinese food and ‘Mexican’ don’t seem to go together, but there are tons of Chinese restaurants in the parts of Mexico I’ve been to, so I think it’s a popular cuisine with Mexicans. In fact, in the Duolingo app I’ve been using, nearly all the food-related exercises are some variation on “I ate Chinese food”!

I then went for a long walk to the border and back. As I mused on Facebook, it’s funny how walking to Mexico the first two times I did it felt so special and now there was nothing to it.

I stopped en route at a Goodwill store that was rather interesting. Everything is thrown onto huge tables, unsorted, and you have to dig through it for treasures, then pay by the pound. I had a bit of a poke around, but didn’t find anything.

There was a McDonald’s at the point of no return, so I paused to get a McFlurry (Oreo, please), and check my emails since I was waiting for something from a client. I had a decent view of Nogales, Sonora, from my seat.

Mexico is behind a fence:

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Coming back home, I saw this billboard advertisement for a casino resort (it says, “Amigos con beneficios”). As they say in Spanish, jajaja! I wonder if this phrase really has the same connotation in Spanish, or if it’s a joke for bi(multi)lingual folks!

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The weather was lovely today, not too hot, and perfect for a walk. I’m glad that I’m finally discovering a little bit of Nogales beyond the frantic pace of Mariposa Road.

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Off Kilter

It’s been a weird day, time-wise.

I’m technically in the Pacific time zone now, but have to work according to an Eastern schedule, so that means I had to be at work for 5:00 a.m, which has thoroughly thrown off my eating schedule.

It was easy to get to bed early last night since I was so exhausted and I was awake around 4:15 without an alarm clock. There was work waiting for me, so I made a coffee and got cracking. By the time 6:00 rolled around and the restaurant opened, I was beyond ready for breakfast!

I took my computer and phone down with me to the restaurant so that I could respond if any work came in. Breakfast was an excellent buffet with lots of options, no excuse to leave hungry. The coffee was good, too. I look forward to seeing what they have tomorrow as they said that the options change daily. Based on today, I know it will be worth waiting to leave on Friday morning to do so on a full belly.

Despite a good breakfast, I was ready for lunch by 10:00! I had a bit of a picnic, but was displeased that the fridge runs super cold and all my food was frozen! Carrots lose their structural integrity when frozen and thawed, so they end up rather chewy!

I clock out at 4PM EST and another colleague stays on till 5PM EST, but I like to keep a weather eye on my emails if the daily article hasn’t been mailed out by 5PM in case something crops up with it. That was the case today, so I sent a quick email about that and then went off to find food.

My choices within walking distance were Pizza Hut, Denny’s, and Mexican fare, not too inspiring. I’d been to Denny’s twice a very long time ago in Savannah and in San Diego and thought the food was crap, so I didn’t go again until a couple of years ago in Red Deer when it wasn’t my decision. The food I had then had nothing in common with the Denny’s I remembered, ie. it was really good. So I decided to take a chance on that today.

I wound up paying $7.25 for my meal with the tip and I would have paid twice that and thought I got a bargain… I could not believe how good the food was, its freshness, or the quality of the ingredients. Yes, at a Denny’s chain diner! Mind blown.

I had their new $6 ‘Baja quesadilla burger’, which is a real beef patty topped with a bit of cheese, pico de gallo, and avocado, then sandwiched in a flour tortilla. It comes with a side of forgettable and over salty Mexican-style corn chips and meh salsa, so ignore that part of the meal. I actually don’t care much for the taste of beef (but I appreciated that I was eating real meat, no fillers), so I added a liberal amount of Cholula sauce to give it the flavour it needed. As for the pico de gallo, this was the real thing, no skimping on the jalapeños. Between that and the Cholula sauce, my eyes were watering, but I wasn’t in major pain, not like I would have been at time last year eating a moderately spicy meal. Plus, there was tons of avocado to soothe my wounded taste buds! Since I didn’t eat the chips, the meal came in at a very reasonable nutritional count (I appreciated that Denny’s has the nutritional info for everything printed right on the menu).

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After linner, I decided to walk down to the Walmart since my phone said it was 2.5KM away, meaning just far enough to get in a leg stretch, but not so far as to feel like a slog. The temperature was cool compared to yesterday, so the walk was very pleasant. They didn’t have any warm weather stuff either, but I poked through the clearance items for treasures and found a top I liked.

Like the server at the Denny’s, the Walmart cashier also only spoke Spanish to me, so I now know I still remember my numbers. 🙂 Nogales is really a good prep stop before entering Mexico!

It was a lot hotter out when I left Walmart and it was uphill most of the way back to the hotel, so I definitely got in some exercise today.

When I arrived back at the hotel, I popped in at the front desk to get my breakfast coupon for tomorrow. The clerk asked me to confirm that the room is okay (YES!).

Now, it’s time for a beer slushy. Dang, that fridge really does run cold!

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Deming, NM, to Nogales, AZ

I had a decent stay in Deming. My hotel room at the Grand Motor Inn was really good and a bargain at $48. It was freshly renovated and the bed was super comfy. I got my best night’s sleep in a long while there. But I did not appreciate that they vacuumed from 8PM until well past when I finally fell asleep past 10PM. It didn’t stop me from going to bed, but it did make it hard to listen to the show I was trying to watch and it felt almost impossible to relax. So points off for that, but after such a good night’s sleep, I can forgive a lot!

The only real restaurant within walking distance was the one attached to the hotel and it was well rated, so I ate there. First time reviews have lead me completely astray. All but one thing in my meal were appallingly abysmal — the watery salad, the super cheap instant potato flakes covered in canned gravy, and the overheated frozen veg. But the steak was absolutely perfect by my standards, a sharp contrast to the rest of the meal. They at least got the important part right! Thanks, Ed and Linda, for commenting so late with restaurant suggestions. 😉 😉 😉

After dinner, I walked to the Walmart just for the leg stretch to see if they had what I wanted clothing-wise. Nope, it was all plus size cold weather gear, not a tee-shirt or a pair of sandals in sight. So that confirmed that I needed to stop in Benson today.

I had thought to do a lazy morning at the hotel, but was ready to go around 7:30. Or, rather, I wanted to hang out with a huge pot of coffee and a book. I didn’t even trust the coffee at the hotel restaurant (even though it smelled good) and didn’t feel like making my own, so I decided to drive to the IHOP down the street because I knew I could get a giant carafe of good coffee for just $2. After sitting for a bit, I decided to try their food for the first time and ordered two pancakes with bacon, which wound up being surprisingly good. Glad to know that a pancake house knows how to make pancakes! 😀

I left Deming just shy of 9:00 and headed for the Walmart in Benson, directly on my way to Nogales. I discovered it on the way to Nogales last year from Tombstone and like it a lot better than the one in Nogales. I got there around 10:30 local time, so 11:30 by my body clock.

Unfortunately, they also didn’t have any warm weather clothes. I guess Walmart stocks its stores the same regardless of the climate. 🙁 I did get one thing on my list, some comfy cheap capris to wear around the house. There were two identical size medium pairs in black, so I snagged both. At $3 a pair, I would have been silly not to! But I struck out on tee-shirts. They had lots of camis and tank tops, though. I also got all the things on my friends’ shopping list.

I then made a stop for lunch before pointing the truck towards Nogales. I like this drive a lot, off the interstate and through some windy and scenic backroads.

My first stop in Nogales was the post office, where there was a package waiting for me. I was amused that my driver’s license signed Rae was not good enough to prove that I’m Rae versus my legal name (it’s been good enough for banks and other post offices), but my business card was satisfactory!

The hotel was just a half mile from the post office and if it hadn’t been so dang HOT, I would have parked there and walked. It would have definitely been easier than driving. Nogales isn’t an easy to city to drive in.

Even though my reservation said check-in was at 3PM and it was only about 1:45PM, there was no problem with letting me have the room right away. I’d booked through Priceline.com and had followed up with a request for a quiet room preferably upstairs because I would have to work. The hotel is undergoing major renovations, so they put me up in a block at the back that is not in service yet, in a HUGE newly renovated room, and told me to make sure I ask if I need anything because they might forget I’m there! 😀 They also put in a proper desk and computer chair for me! Wow, talk about service! I also get a full cooked breakfast every morning, all for just $65 per night including the tax! I figure I can take advantage of breakfast by monitoring emails on my phone as I walk to the restaurant and bring my laptop there to do any assignments that come in.

I just wanted to crash by this point and not have to go out again for a bit, so I went right back to my truck and drove to Mariposa Road to run a few more errands. First stop was Don Smith Insurance, where they still had me on file. I got a liability only policy with legal coverage for $127, roughly the same price as last year in USD. I was in and out in probably two minutes!

Next stop was Safeway, literally next door, to get some lunchy and snacky stuff to make simple meals in my room. I also got a six-pack of Bud Light and have four nights to get through six beers… 🙂 Final stop was Panda Express for dinner.

I’m ready to drop; it’s been such a long weekend! But I’m so pleased I made it here without incident! I start work in 12 hours (5AM), so I’ll be turning in very, very, very soon.

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My Route in Mexico

Reader Kim asked:

So I’m curious why you aren’t traveling through El Paso/Ciudad Juarez to Durango and then west to Mazatlán? There’s a new Durango/Mazatlán highway with the Baluarte Bridge which appears to be an engineering marvel, not to mention very beautiful.

Primarily because I have been strongly discouraged to do so.

While Juarez is safer now than it has been in a very, very long time, the stretch of the highway between the city and the Durango highway is apparently quite desolate and there is still lot a lot of bandito activity. A single woman with out of country plates, even with strong language skills, would be a target. The only people who have suggested that route are men who just don’t approach travel security with the same mindset as a woman. This advice to avoid that route comes from Mexicans I met last winter (when I was thinking of taking this route to go north).

The secondary reason is financial. While this route is shorter, there is more travel in Mexico at their crazy gas prices. Doing the longer route to Nogales actually saves me quite a bit in fuel.

A tertiary reason is that I like the drive down MX 15. The stopover in San Carlos is rather like stepping through the wardrobe into Narnia. Taking this route again will mean basically zero stress to Isla, but still some new adventures. For example, I intend to stop in Santa Ana to get my phone set up, instead of waiting to get to Guaymas!

Thanks for your question, Kim. I’ve been getting it a lot and keep forgetting to post an answer to it!  I had hoped to do the drive to Durango last winter, but ended up canceling. I am planning to do it this winter instead! So I will be doing the scenic part of the drive you mention.