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.

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.

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.

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.