The morning started of quite leisurely, me sitting outside relaxing and waiting for my friends to wake up. They got up around 8am and came down to start making coffee and breakfast. Lyle prepared a big scrambled egg hash with onions, zucchini, mushrooms, tomatoes and I'm not sure what else. And we added the rest of the mini cheese croissants I brought from Canada as well as fruit. I was just happy with the coffee, this morning it was a nice strong Cuban coffee and I loved it.
We said around and talked and joked some more, then I had to get things together to leave for the hour drive to the airport. Yes this city is that big. I made my way in okay but getting out was another story. Somehow, I missed an exit and had to go up and circle and turn around to get back on the right track. As I was heading deeper into the city it dawned on me that this was not the route that Lyle had shown me and explained about some weird uturns you had to make to get there and instead I was going south, then north to the airport. I was doing well and almost to the cut off when again I missed an exit and had to go 3 kms out of my way to uturn and come back. By the time that I got there, Ismael was walking his way towards the highway to meet me. I pulled to the side and reorganized the dog into the backseat so Ismael could be in the front and off we went.
We instantly started talking, he with his translator app and me butchering Spanish, as of course, I couldn't operate my phone while driving and surely not in this chaos called traffic. We made good time towards the arco Norte around Mexico City but that highway is a nightmare and especially in the Jeep. The potholes, dips, heaves had us bouncing up, down left and right and it was an exhausting stretch, especially when you are also trying to keep it in the lane and not crash into a semi beside you. There is so much truck traffic down here it is unbelievable.
We finally got off the Arco Norte and heading towards Puebla. We stopped in a small town for gas and give the dog a potty break. She was being so good today curled up asleep in the back seat. After we passed thru Puebla we entered into Veracruz and we had to go up and over some mountains. Well speed was dropped from 120 down to 80 as it was all hills and valleys and switchbacks with tunnels thrown in for good measure. The best part about it was the scenery, it was stunning, lush green, trees and fields...breathtaking. Ismael was videoing almost the whole stretch of road as he was amazed.
We finished up in Cordoba tonight and got a couple of rooms at what they call an autohotel (or love hotel) you can rent overnight or by the hour, but the bonus part of it, is that you have a garage that you pull into and it closes and you are tucked away and you and your belongings are safe. We decided to walk up the road to find dinner and give Kahlua a chance to burn off some energy. Well it was a bit longer walk then expected and we were all worn out by the time we got there. We had a couple of burgers and mozza sticks for dinner. It was damn good but I couldn't eat it all. Kahlua was much better behaved tonight then she was yesterday in the restaurant. When we were done, Ismael went in the store to pick up some deodorant and hair gel as opps I guess I forgot to tell him about sizes with carryon bags and they took his away from him. We decided to take a taxi back as we were all tired including Kahlua and it had started to rain a bit.
We got back and he had bought a six pack of beer which we share, while I talked to Dana and he chatted with home. He finally said that he was going to go to bed as He was on his way to the airport at 4am this morning. I have to check distances on the map, but we may stop to see his family along the way tomorrow. Otherwise, we will have one more night and then be in our destination on Tuesday. My journey is almost done, approximately 5000kms and 6 days driving so far. I got this!
1 comment:
Hi Ismael
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