As with many cities and suburbs in the United States, the population grows over time and the cities and towns expand. Sometimes this causes “growing pains”. In our town, homes have been built along the main street beyond the paved section. It has actually been many years, but this section remains unpaved. When the rains come, this section essentially becomes a river, as there’s a gradual slope leading up into the fields. Here’s a photo of the road to our uncle and aunt’s house last week:
The road to our uncle’s house looks more like a river!
And here it is today:
A week later the road is dried up.
Most of the roads in town are paved, and the local people keep requesting that this section be paved, but so far they are still waiting. Until then, they must live with their seasonal “creek”.
One of the meals Maricela is fond of making is chicken soup. She’s very informal about it, throwing in whatever we have on hand. The basic recipe here is:
1-2 pounds of fresh chicken, which was still walking around the owner’s backyard earlier in the day
Assorted vegetables, picked within the past 24 hours
Salt and spices to taste
Water
Freshly made from fresh ingredients
Even better: serve with tortillas, hand made from dough that was ground this morning.
September 8, 2017 – Some of our friends and family heard about last night’s big earthquake. Fortunately, it was not near us and did not impact us. The earthquake hit in southern Mexico and was felt as far away as Mexico City (650 miles north of the quake’s epicenter). We are another 250 or so miles north of Mexico City, and did not feel anything.
Pray for those who were impacted by the earthquake.
When we decided to move to Mexico, we had to figure out what to do with our dog, Sasha. Our son was willing to take her, but that would be difficult since he’s in an apartment and still has a couple more years of university. We decided taking her with us to Mexico was the best option, feeling that once we were here, she would enjoy the freedom afforded by our new living arrangements – lots of space to run around in and having us around more often. We had never driven with her farther than to the vet or to the nearby hills for a walk, but hey, we said we’re looking for adventure, right?
Sasha relaxing by the kitchen
First, I have to say a big thank you to my brother. Our first stop on the US portion of our trip was at my brother’s house in Southern California, where we visited for a few days. During a conversation about Sasha, he agreed to let her stay with him for the duration of our US travels, about five weeks. We are so grateful for this; it would have been a very different trip if we’d had to bring her with us across the country and back!
Once we returned to Southern California and picked up Sasha for the trip to Mexico, she actually traveled very well in the van. Her crate was on top of other stuff in the van so that she could watch out the window as we drove along. She seemed to really enjoy it. We stopped often to let her out for a break.
It almost seemed like she knew how to behave, too. Several times, people approached the van to wash our windows or sell us some snacks, and Sasha would bark at them. Then one time a police officer motioned us aside to check our papers, and she sat silently. I don’t think the officer even knew she was with us!
Since arriving at our destination, Sasha has adapted quickly. She loves the big yard. She gets more walks than in the past, since we walk most places rather than driving everywhere. She even has a new friend that she doesn’t fight with much – Maricela’s aunt has a dog, and the two of them get along very well.
Sasha loves the shade of this plant
So we’re happy we made the right decision. Sasha is happy to be here with us, we’re happy to have her here, and the process of getting her here was not too difficult!
American credit cards are accepted here in Mexico, but people don’t use credit cards as widely here as in the US. In the US, we used to buy nearly everything with a credit card – groceries, coffee, fast food… Here, cash is the preferred medium of exchange, unless you’re purchasing a large item such as an appliance. Even the gas stations remain cash only, and it can easily be 800 pesos ($50) to fill the van. That being the case, we go through a lot of cash fast, as we’re getting settled in.
Everything I read in advance suggested that the best way to obtain pesos in Mexico is via your regular debit card at an ATM, and that seems to be holding true for us. Some ATMs will dispense up to 7,000 pesos at a time, about $440, and the exchange rate is pretty favorable. Some of the difficulties we’ve run into: – many of the ATMs will dispense a maximum of 4,000 pesos ($250); – one that we used had a surcharge of $6; usually it’s less than $2; – there’s only one ATM in the town, and they don’t stock it with much cash so what happens is: you put your card in, enter your PIN, select the amount you want, listen to the machine count through the bills, and then it tells you it “cannot complete your request”. It doesn’t tell you why it cannot complete it nor how much money is available, so you have to repeat this process, asking for smaller and smaller amounts, until you hit the right number. The next closest ATM is about 7 miles away, and we’ve only gone to it once, but it was not in service at that time. The next one is 15 miles away from us, in the nearest city (population of 100,000), where there are multiple ATMs available from multiple bank brands, so you can be confident about being able to get cash there. The banks are Mexican brands, not names you would know from the US, although Banamex is affiliated with Citibank. Like with many things here, it takes planning ahead and patience.
While there are plenty of unhealthy food options to be sure, one of the things I remember from previous visits to Mexico (and which is still common) is that you can also find healthy and quick options. On many street corners you will find vendors selling cups of freshly cut fruit, served in a to-go cup. Choose from the various combinations of pineapple, mango, watermelon, coconut, cucumbers, and papaya, or specify which fruits you want and they’ll put it together for you. Typically, locals add chili powder and lime to the fruit, but I prefer just the plain fruit.
Freshly cut fruit.
You can easily find healthy meal options, too. Lots of fresh vegetables are used, either as a part of the dish or as a topping, as many items are topped with salsas, onions, cilantro, and/or peppers. Boiled beans, plain corn tortillas, and yogurt are also common. The best part is, many of the foods are grown nearby and sold soon after being harvested.
We crossed the border into Mexico on August 17 and took four days to drive to our final destination. The weather in the northern parts of Mexico was hot. During our first three days of driving the temperatures averaged around 96-97 degrees Fahrenheit with high humidity. However, the clear skies did make for nice landscapes.
We got on Interstate 15 after crossing the border from Arizona, a couple hundred miles inland. The interstate heads southwest, toward the Gulf of California coast, continues near the coast for about 700 miles, then turns inland again. Both the inland areas and the coastal areas were very green, due to the summer rains. On our last day of driving, as we began to head more inland, we climbed in altitude for most of the day. We even drove through pine-forested mountains. As we got to the central part of the country, the temperatures moderated. This region is part of the “altiplano”, or high plains. The high altitude prevents it from being constantly hot throughout the summer.
A rainbow over our backyard.
During our first week here in our town, Zinaparo, the high temperatures were between 78-86 degrees Fahrenheit. We had a thunderstorm one day, threats of rain a couple other days, and some rain one night. The next couple of days there was more frequent rain and temperatures around 70 degrees. So there’s definitely more humidity than what we were used to in the Bay Area of California, but due to the moderate temperatures, it’s barely noticeable. Plus it cools off at night, which provides relief.
Our home in Mexico is an old adobe, roughly 150 years old. The rooms are spread across multiple separate buildings due to additions and modifications over the years.
Main house in the center; kitchen in the building on the left.
The blue and white building has the main bedroom in the rear portion, and a living room area in front. Attached on the left (not visible in the photos because it sits further behind) is another bedroom and living area.
The building with the blue-green stripe and the reddish-brown door is the kitchen, equipped with a stove, refrigerator, seating area and storage space. To the left of the kitchen is an unpainted wooden door that leads to the backyard, which contains a large avocado tree along with lime trees, guava trees, papaya trees, an orange tree, and a storage area / workshop.
Kitchen in the center, main room on the right, standalone bedroom on the left.
Following to the left, the building with the lime green stripe is another bedroom. In the midst of these buildings is a well, covered with a blue-green lid.
Standalone bedroom. The neighbors house is attached on the left side.
The blue-green door on the salmon-colored wall is the main entry door out to the street. When you first walk in through this door, you see a large and inviting patio area with the buildings arranged around it.
Entry door. The main house and other buildings are at my back in this photo. The buildings on the left, right and center are neighbors’ houses. The entry door leads to a passageway that leads to the street.
Finally, there is a bathroom, just to the right of the main house.
The bathroom
There are no interior passageways. In order to go from one room to another, say from one of the bedrooms to the kitchen, you have to go outside across the patio area. I don’t know if this sounds inconvenient at all, but really it works fine. Everything is close together.
There are other more modern houses in town, but when people come to visit us here they feel that it is a peaceful, welcoming and comfortable place, and I would agree with that. We are very comfortable here.
We followed Mexican Interstate 15 all the way south from the Arizona border. Our destination is a small town located about 20 miles off I-15 on a smaller intersecting highway. Generally speaking, the interstate is thoroughly modern and in good condition; however, at the time of our travels, hundreds of miles of it were under construction. In most cases the old road is being torn out and a completely new road being built. Delays were minimized by working on one side of the road at a time and having two-way traffic on the other side. We noticed that the highways are remarkably free of litter.
A rural segment of Interstate 15
Once you leave the interstate, the condition of the local roads is much more variable, but nearly always in fairly poor condition. There are frequent potholes; lanes damaged by heavy truck use; animals (individual and herds), pedestrians, bicyclists and motorcyclists on the side.
A lesser thoroughfare at the intersection with a small town
Then there are the speed bumps – “velocity reducers”, as the signs call them. These are used with great frequency, and actually a pretty good tool for controlling motorists’ speed. For example, when approaching a town, an intersection, a dangerous curve, etc., one or more speed bumps are used to slow traffic for safety purposes. On the other hand, though, they are often poorly marked, e.g., there’s not always a warning sign and, although they were painted when they were installed, that paint has worn off and now the bump blends in with the rest of the road. Also, the speed bumps tend to be very tall, so you really have to slow down – especially when you’re driving a minivan loaded with a lifetime of belongings and with a tow hitch on the back!
At the time of our decision to drive to Mexico, the US State Department had standing warnings advising American citizens to avoid travel to parts of Mexico due to dangerous conditions. In particular, five Mexican states were identified as “Do not Travel” zones, and the level of risk was compared with travel in Syria, which is in the midst of a civil war. Our route was going to take us through three of these states, and our final destination was within one of them.
US State Department advisory map
This was of concern to us of course, and perhaps more-so to our friends and family. But we did not want to let fear stop us from this life-changing trip. We had successfully traveled a number of times before in Mexico, so we felt a certain level of comfort. Not to mention that my wife and I are both fluent in Spanish.
In an effort to heed the safety warnings for driving in Mexico (not counting the advisory to not travel in Mexico!), which advise to only drive during the daytime, we spread our 1,300-mile trip over four days. We headed out around 9 or 10 each morning, and arrived at our next stop around 6 or 7 pm. That gave us enough time for a relaxed schedule, allowing us to get the rest we needed and to not have to rush along the way.
We enjoyed much beautiful scenery along the way
By the time we got settled into our hotel or Airbnb each day, it was early enough that even though it had gotten dark, we didn’t hesitate to walk around in the evening looking for places to eat. In some ways I feel we got lucky, especially when we booked Airbnb’s – since we are not familiar with any of the towns we passed through in Mexico, we had to use our best judgment when selecting places to stay. Ultimately we felt that all of our choices turned out well. We met many great hosts, and we never had any trouble finding good food at nearby restaurants or at local roadside stands.
Dinner at a roadside stand in Topolobampo
For the drive south we had no electronic navigation because we’re on a quirky phone plan and it would have been expensive to use it in Mexico. Instead, we plotted out each day’s drive on GoogleMaps, used our iPads to take screen shots of any important points along the route, and did our best to not get lost. For the most part we followed Mexican Interstate 15 all the way, we just had to make careful notes for how to get off the highway and into each of the towns we stopped at along the way. The interstate passes near some well-known places such as Puerto Vallarta and Mazatlan, but we didn’t stop anywhere that would be recognized as an American tourist destination. We were focused on getting to our final destination as soon as we reasonably could. I acknowledge that “soon” is a relative term, since it took us about six weeks from the time we left California to the time we arrived at our destination in Mexico! Stay with us as we describe life in Mexico.
In 2017 my wife and I elected early retirement from our jobs and went off in pursuit of a whole new adventure. Up until that point we had good, stable lives, with steady jobs, great families, good friends, a nice house. Yet we felt we were missing out on something – we had both worked since our teenage years, without a break (except for some “time off” for Maricela to raise our children). We had taken vacations over the years, but they were always limited to one or two weeks at a time, due to the demands of our jobs. As we looked forward, we could clearly imagine our next 10-15 years: continuing at our steady jobs, along with their long commutes and corresponding stress, and the hope of retirement some time in the future, along with the hope that we would still be healthy enough at that point to enjoy our retirement. That didn’t feel like enough for us, so we decided to take a risk: we sold or gave away most of our belongings, squeezed as much as we could into our newly acquired minivan, and hit the road.
At a campground during the drive across the US. This is before the thunderstorm arrived and forced us into the van!
First we took several weeks to drive from California to Florida to drop our daughter off at university. Having just given up both of our jobs, we economized as much as possible, tent camping where we could, and staying at an AirBnB or hotel when the weather was bad.
As Californians, we are used to highly predictable summer weather: hot and dry, every day. We soon discovered that this is not the case everywhere. We frequently encountered thunderstorms or strong winds, which dampened our camping ideas. But we made the best of it.
After Florida we drove back to California over the next couple of weeks to pick up our dog who we had left behind for this portion of the trip. Following nearly 8,000 miles crisscrossing the US, we drove another 1,300 miles south of the US-Mexico border from the crossing at Nogales, Arizona deep into the central Mexican state of Michoacan. Some people think we’re crazy to go travel so many miles by car, but it’s how we’ve always enjoyed traveling. We get to see more of the countryside, we get to stop and interact with people, and we have the freedom to make stops and detours according to our own schedule, not according to an airline schedule.
In a sense, that is the same reason we left behind our jobs – it’s not that they were bad, but we wanted the freedom to live life on our own terms. Making a long commute five days a week and working long hours puts a lot of constraints on living how we want. Of course it also provides financial resources that aid in living how we want. That is how we came up with the idea of moving to Mexico. We felt that with our small pension and our savings, we would have enough to afford a reasonably comfortable life there, more so than what we expected we could afford living in the US.
I have left out a lot of details here of our first two months of travel. This is because the initial focus of this blog will be on the move to Mexico and the transition to daily life there. Maybe I’ll go back later and write about our travels in the US. Stay tuned!
Originally “Leaving Pleasanton” was going to be the title for this blog. I hesitated with that because our new adventure is not really about leaving anything – our home town of Pleasanton, our jobs, etc. It’s about where we’re headed – we’re headed to an entirely different lifestyle in another country. We’re looking for new experiences and the adventure of doing something completely different.
I’ll try to use descriptive titles for the posts. Browse through them to see if any sound interesting. We’ll be posting more over the coming days and weeks.
Oh, and why did I not go with “Leaving Pleasanton” for the title? It seemed too limiting, as leaving our hometown was just one of our adventures. I looked for an available web address that encompassed our initial adventure yet was broad enough to allow me to write on other topics. Please join us as we share our adventures here.
