10/5/11 Day 4 San Antonio, TX to San Fernando, Mexcio, 340 miles

Well counting  on Aaron as our alarm clock didn't work so well today. I woke up at 8am and everyone else was still sleeping! Considering that we didn't get the boys settled in their beds until after 11pm and Kris and I didn't turn in until 1am, the extra sleep was certainly needed. We decided to get our Mexican car insurance out of the way before we got to the border so Kris bought it online and we thought we'd print out a copy at the hotel. Turns out the hotel didn't have a printer. Rather than hunt for a printing place in San Antonio (which is huge city by the way, I drove into it last night and it was late and dark and a little bit scary), we'd find one in Brownsville because we'd be going through there anyways before crossing the border. With our bodies up and fed and the car finally loaded we pulled out of the Travelodge at 10am.

whipped cream clouds & greenery!!

Heading into Southern Texas we were amazed at how lush and green everything was! Texas has trees!! We went over many rivers and we couldn't even see water because the trees were so thick. There were also big green fields too, and tons of big white fluffy clouds- they reminded me of whipped cream!

Huge puffy clouds! So pretty!

One thing that has impressed us is that we've seen a lot of police cars... but they weren't pulling people over, they were helping stranded motorists. There would be a car over on the side of the road with a blown out tire or with its hood up and suddenly with lights ablaze, a state police car would swoop in and start lending a hand, or a radio call for a tow truck. We saw this in Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas! We also filled up for the cheapest gas yet, $3.28gal, eat your heart out CA!! :o)
Lunch was sandwiches at the nicest cleanest rest stop I've ever seen, the Kennedy County Rest Stop. The bathrooms were huge and smelled great! There were big murals and tile mosaics, it was just a beautiful place to stop and eat. It was warm but there was a breeze and the boys did laps around the picnic table, "we're doing our exercises Mommy" Jonathan informed me.

Deep in concentration 

One of the fun parts of the car ride was busting out the "I Spy" bottles, thanks so much Heather. The boys were so excited! Jonathan spent a good amount of time turning and tipping the bottles to find the hidden objects. Aaron liked all the colors and enjoyed shaking it to make music. He really wanted the things to come out, and thankfully Heather, your superglue held the lids on tight!

Thanks for visiting Matamos, the great door of Mexico

 Crossing the border was an event in and of itself. There really aren't any directions and most of them are in Spanish. I've been to Mexico before back in high school on a missions trip and it seemed like the crossing was quick and painless (but then again I wasn't the adult in charge of all the paperwork back then). This time it wasn't painful and it didn't take too long... but it was warm and challenging. The immigration people really didn't speak much English. Kris and I each speak some Spanish so between the two of us we were able to decode what they were saying, oh and the forms we had to fill out were in Spanish too, so that was fun! I had most of the paper work already copied and that sped things along. We had our car inspected and it went pretty quick. Kris said that the inspector opened the back door of the suburban and Aaron's potty chair fell out (it was in a white plastic garbage bag) and he caught it. Kris told him (in Spanish) to be careful because that was a toilet. The inspector quickly tossed it back in the car and signed off on our cargo! Kris said we need to rig that toilet to fall out at each customs inspection and it should speed things along!  We did go through one customs stop and the agent had us open the back and he looked in all the doors. His only remark, "Toys, toys, and lots of toys!" Praise the Lord that the border crossing went so smoothly.
Once we were through the border control area, we were really in Mexico. How different! We drove with the windows up and doors locked although it wasn't scary, just busy. Everything is packed in so close together and the driving is very unpredictable. Kris navigated it well and before too long we were out of the city and on the open road. The roads weren't as great as our roads in the states, but they were better than we expected. They are paved but bumpy too, no major potholes though. At one point each side of the road and 1 1/2 lanes and if we came up behind someone and wanted to pass them they'd move over into the 1/2 lane and we could go by (using a good 2 feet of the lane for the oncoming traffic). We came across many loose animals grazing along the highway- horses, chickens, goats, cows, etc. Just standing feet from the shoulder happily munching away on their dinner. Thankfully they stayed there and didn't venture into our space (insert "Why did the chicken cross the road?" joke here).

hotel room beds

boys eating dinner in hotel room

We traveled a couple hours down the eastern Mexican coast to a town called San Fernando. We got into town about 6:30pm and started scouting for a hotel. Kris wanted to find one that looked safe, aka had gate for sure and armed guards were desired but optional. We came upon one promising one (it had a big gate and about 5 armed guards)and Kris got out to ask about costs. Turns out it's not a hotel anymore but an army barrack! So the search continued. We were also looking for a "Cambia" or money changer to turn our dollars into pesos. We asked for directions at a couple of places but had a hard time understanding the people as they talked so fast. We finally found a bank and although it was closed it had a separate ATM area that was open. Pesos in hand we resumed the hotel search and hit the jackpot!! La Quinta had a gated parking lot and looked safe and beautiful. Just as the sun was setting we pulled in and Kris got us a room. The funny part was that we still didn't know the exchange rate for dollars to pesos. He paid 600 pesos for our room and we hoped that was a good deal. At this point it was too dark and too late to do anything else. We moved into our room, which was enormous, with two queen beds, a big closet, bigger bathroom and a shower so big that I could stand in the middle of it with arms outstretched and turn a full circle without touching any of the walls! I put together a quick dinner of sandwiches and fruit and then we let the boys go swimming in the hotel's pool. Oh, during dinner Kris jumped on his computer and found out that 1. the hotel had wifi and 2. the exhange is about 13 pesos to 1 dollar, so we paid about $44 for our hotel room, including taxes! The best deal we got in the US was $60 per night and it was half the size and not nearly as beautiful. I'm hoping to get some pictures of the outside areas in the morning before we leave.

Pool view from our room

We also had a small table outside our room and after putting the boys to bed Kris and I just sat there and enjoyed the peaceful atmosphere. We feel so blessed to be on this adventure. Tomorrow (and I'm learning to say this part loosely) the "plan" is to be up by 6am and on the road by 7am. We're hoping to make it to Poza Rica, which should be about 7 hrs of drive time. Until tomorrow! Good night!