Crossing Muddy Waters

I woke up first, which is a first - usually, Bob wakes up first, then Cejas, then Bella and Solavina, then me, and then Missy, who waits for me to take a breath before she takes one. I got up at 6:00 and thought it was 8:00, courtesy of the prankster who stayed there before and my own stupidity (check the clocks! check the clocks!) I went back to sleep until the real 8:00 and got up. Bob got up too and made some coffee and then I took the dogs out for their walks, in shifts... Cejas and Missy first and then Bella and Solavina. I can let Missy and Cejas off leash and they will listen and not take off, so we went over the area behind the other building that we had visiting yesterday. Cejas started wandering, and I just followed him, since he was staying in green, grassy fields. We discovered this HUGE field behind some apartments that are just behind the hotel (if you can follow that - think one street behind where you live). Cejas went nuts, running and running and prancing, and chasing little mourning doves... he had a great time! Missy was rolling and rolling in the grass (her favorite pastime) and then we went "home" - back to the room. Then I took Bella & Solavina over and they had a great time too! We went back to the room and then we all go loaded into the car to do our paperwork at the border - take 2. We drove up to Progreso and parked on the US side and walked over to the immigration office. The mean lady with the glasses (is she related to Mike?) wasn't there, but two nice Meximerican guys in the lobby warned us that two jerk immigration officers were in the office and to beware of them and not to give them any money because they would take the money and not do anything... so we go to the office. This is going to be fun. I've had years of practice of dealing with jerks (from being blonde) but I'm not sure that even I can pull it off in Spanish. We show them our FM3s and passports and I ask them, in my bestest Spanish, if they can process (still pulling off my Academy Award winning humble act) and they look at ALL of the pages in both docs for both of us, and then finally the older guys mumbles something in Spanish and the younger guy tells us, in perfect English, that we need to go to Reynosa to get our FM3s processes, since they are new.... so we walk back over the bridge, only to be told that we came back over on the Mexican side and have to cross over on the American side, so all the way back to Mexico, then back over the bridge into the US, where the guard starts questioning us (again) what we were doing in Mexico, and we tell him, getting FM3s stamped, and he asks us why we need FM3s, and we tell him because we are taking our car and staying in Mexico at our condo... and he tells us that usually they only issue FM3s if you are going to work in Mexico. WRONG!!! The main point of an FM3 is that you CANNOT work in Mexico and you have to give them proof of income to show that you can support yourself while you are there. So, it's good to know that our border officials have NO CLUE of the laws for Mexico. You'd think maybe they would have to at least be familiar with them?

We got back to the States and the car and the dogs were fine. So we headed down the road to Reynosa. Lots of flat fields full of nothing. We follow the signs for the bridge to Reynosa, and get on it. Good thing we didn't park and walk over this one - it's about 2 miles long! We got to the Mexican side and parked in the lot for the immigration building. I went in and asked a woman at the counter if she could process the FM3s for us, and she shrugged and said "Claro, si" - of course. Duh. I should know. So, back to the car, move the car to the most shade that there is (which is not much) put up the window shades in the windshield, and go inside. Now, there are two people in front of us at the counter, when there was NO ONE in the place when I went in. They got done pretty quickly and Bob and I went up to the counter. We told the woman we wanted to have our FM3s stamped and our passports, and that we had the car permit, and that we had four dogs with us and needed the pet permits for them. She told us that she could do the FM3s and passports for us, couldn't figure out why the woman who gave us the car permit didn't have us fill out the declaration form (I dunno!), had a supervisor come over to look at the car permit and to make me nervous, who then told us we were ok, and then she finished processing the FM3s and passports for us. She couldn't say my name, so she just kept calling me "Ahn-drays". Whatever. I've been called worse.

After about half an hour, our paperwork was complete and the woman wished us buen viaje. I asked her three times about the dogs and she asked if I had proof of rabies vaccine, and I showed them to her, but she didn't seem too concerned, and didn't take the health certs, so I am assuming (and hoping) that they dogs are legal too. I'll guess we'll find out if we get to a checkpoint and they decide to question/search us.

After clearing all of the paperwork, we decided not to drive back into the US to arouse suspicion so we decided to take Route 2 back to Progreso. So we follow the signs for Route 2 and end up at a dead end in an industrial park (where there is a Maytag factory - Fritz Maytag owns Anchor Brewing where Bob worked) - so back to the guard booth and "Como vamos Ruta Dos?" The nice young man (they are all young here!) gives us directions in Espanol rapida, but I manage to follow along, and we found our way to the 2 and then to the road that leads into Progresso. Went through the border crossing on the US side again, and one of the guys that had been searching the car the day before was at the booth next to us... I tried not to panic and just looked the other way. We got through with being asked the same dumb questions (I'm sure you can all repeat them to yourselves by now: where are you going, how long were you in Mexico, what was the purpose of your visit, how long were you there) and then it was time for lunch.

Bob wanted BBQ because he had seen a bunch of mom n pop bbq joints on the way to Weslaco, in the middle of nowhere... well, Weslaco is too built up to have a bbq joint. So we drove down the main highway, 83, and found a Pennzoil 10 minute oil change and had the oil changed, and I walked around "downtown" while that was being done. Not much to see, but what there was was very charming and quaint. Some really pretty architecture and some quaint little storefrronts. Can't find postage stamps to save my life, so Meighan and Dawne will get their birthday cards whenever... that just means that they can extend the celebration!! :) Stopped at the liquor store and got some more wine (which is responsible for any typos that you might see!) and then back to the hotel and had lunch at the restaurant. The hunting guys were loading up when we went into the restaurant so I wished them bad luck. :)

After lunch, I decided to visit the Estero Llano Grande wildlife refuge, which is about 2 miles form the hotel, on the way to the border. This is supposed to be one of the best birding spots in the world, and there was no way that I could be here with time to spare and not visit it. Most of you probably don't know it, but I am a huge birder, having inherited that interest from my dear sweet Mimi (grandmother). I have birdfeeders out all of the time at home and have a whole list of birds that I have seen in different places. So, I went down to the park while Bob stayed with the dogs and watched the US Open on TV. The park is amazing. So huge and beautiful! There are several little lakes/ponds, and one of them has alligators in it and I saw one of them swimming by, nothing but his eyes popping up above the water. I saw a lot of ducks, mourning doves, and a great blue heron who seemed to be my tour guuide - every time I caught up to him, he flew off and I would follow and it was just the trail that I needed. I saw white herons too, and cormorants, and lots of other birds (I'll send the list later) and I even saw a red and brown turtle but he dove below the algae and plants in the pond before I could get a picture. It was so beautiful and peaceful and serene - and then it was ruined by the sound of gunshots and the smell of gunpowder. The idiot hunters staying at our hotel were out hunting mourning doves - right next to the nature preserve. That takes real cajones, going out to hunt a bird that is dumber than Bella, is about the size of your hand, and then hunting them next to a wildlife reserver to boot. Like fishing in a bucket. There is a whole list of things that I would like to do to these guys - slash their tires; go into their hotel rooms with one of their shotguns and just shove it into their face while they are sleeping and say "WAKE UP!" and scare the bejeebers out of them like they do to those poor innocent little dove... don't get me started. There's at story line for a novel here somewhere - I can't get arrested if I kill them on paper.

After I finished my tour, the nice young (I told you, they're all young here - or is that just me getting old?) ranger helped me post the birds that I had seen that day on their computer, and I got a bird book to use in Akumal (someone stole the first one that I had - pathetic). Then, to a convenience store to get dog food but they didn't have any, so then to the Dollar Store, no dog food, so finally back to the hotel and the dogs each had their very own Whoppper Junior, with nothing on it, for dinner. Bob and I had dinner at the hotel restaurant again, and I had some scraps left from my prime rib that I gave to the dogs. They are all sound asleep now... Bella and Missy on the sofa and Cejas and Solavina on their beds in the bedroom... and it is almost midnight and we have to be up at 5:30 to get out butts in gear, car loaded up and get on the road. We tested the Mexico GPS map tonight and it works!!!! (Thanks, Rod!) And we have detailed directions from Redbeard, including what to eat, where, and the best spots to stop to pee behind a tree (ok not really on that) and we have great directions from Shirley Pogo too... so how hard can it be? Jeesh, my great uncle Roderick drove down to Uxmal and Chichen Itza in 1936 from Pittsburgh, PA to work on excavations and restorations at those sites, and they didn't even have Interstate highways in the states yet then, let alone probably paved roads in Mexico.

I'm hoping Roderick's spirit is hitchhiking with us the rest of the trip.

This might be the last post until we get to Akumal... I'm not sure that the hotels that we are staying in will have internet service, let alone wireless... so if you don't hear from me, we are fine (my mother will send an email to all of you if we aren't ) and we will let you know the rest of the adventure once we get there.

We've crossed the border four times so far... well, they always say, fifth time's a charm!