Travel Log 15: December 17, 2009 - Dilemma at the Mexican Border

 

 We left Yuma Tuesday morning (December 15) at 7 am. It was 1 degree C as we packed up and hitched up. We travelled to Lukeville through Ajo and Why, AZ. 

 

The crossing at Lukeville/Sonoyta is very quiet and small. The border here has a small immigration office only, and no office to dispense the vehicle permits. So RVers simply drive through the border without stopping and then travel about 17 miles east on Mex 2 to the offices where we can get both our immigration and vehicle permits. We crossed into the U.S. here going north in April 09 on our way home so we are somewhat familiar with it. The immigration office is one fella sitting on a chair with his feet on his desk watching Mexican soap operas.  I'll refer to him as a "fella" because calling him an "official" seems to bestow too much credit! This is where we get our tourist visas and next door at the Banjercito (ban-her-see-toe) is where we pay for the permit which allows us to bring our vehicles into Mexico.

 

The usual process involves a lot of backing-and-forthing between the two. Pay here, go back there get a stamp, come back here get a photocopy, etc. Politeness and patience on our part is the key to success. On our final visit to the immigration fella for our "entry to Mexico" stamp we encountered a small problem. Before he would stamp our passport page with our new entry date, he looked at the previous stamps and wanted to make sure there was a matching entry and exit stamp for each visit. Last year when we exited Mexico, we did not get an exit stamp, but we were sure to have an entry to U.S. stamp. He did not consider the entry to U.S. stamp proof that we had left Mexico. He was very nice and somewhat confused about the whole thing. 

 

Although we maintained a very polite composure during this situation, we both felt the situation was ridiculous based on the fact that, in our experience, it is difficult to get any kind of passport stamp on the Mexican side at all. We make sure to ask each time, and often we have to ask more than once and then someone reluctantly shuffles over and stamps our passports as if we've asked for the moon on a platter! 

 

When we exited Mexico through this crossing last year, we found no one really knew what they were doing, even on the U.S. side. We asked the U.S. official who stamped our passports with entry to the U.S., where we should turn in our tourist visas and he told us we didn't have to turn them in. We knew very well this is not the case, so we walked back across to the Mexican side of the border and there we were told absolutely we need to turn the visas in. In this kafuffle, we did not get our exit stamp on the Mexican side.   

 

Back to our story. Adrian and I both had a brief moment of concern as to whether we would be allowed in to Mexico based on the missing stamp. Actually, Adrian had a moment of concern; I had a moment where I could not breathe! The immigration fella finally decided to fix the problem. He took his mechanical stamp and changed the date and code to match the date of our U.S. entry from the previous year and he stamped each of our passports to "close the loop". Before officially stamping our passports though, he wanted to "practice" stamp to make sure it all looked right. He grabbed the first piece of paper he could find and made several practice stamps. When he turned his practice paper over, it turned out to be one of our crossing documents (fortunately, only an extra copy page). He took the page and said to us "no show anybody this page!" We all three had a good laugh.

 

After all this the next stage is the search -- of which there was none! We passed by the stations where several Mexicans and their cars were being searched. There were suitcases open and strewn about and trunks and doors open. We were very glad that we bypassed this. 

 

As it happens, we crossed to Mexico on exactly the same day as last year - December 15. We continued our travels along Mex 2 to Caborca and then merged onto Mex 15 bound for Hermosillo. 

 

As we passed through Caborca, another interesting situation arose. The traffic was quite slow through a series of traffic lights and on the side of the road sat a police car and a few officials standing around. As we approached, a policeman waved us to pull over. We both braced ourselves a bit for a problem. We have always heard about the police attempting to charge gringos with a bogus traffic infraction and in doing so ask for a "mordida" to make it go away. Direct translation of mordida is "little bite", but it is used commonly to refer to a bribe. The tour books talk about how to deal with this, so we were bracing ourselves for some action. 

 

An official approached Adrian's window and asked if we spoke Spanish. Adrian of course shrugged his shoulders acting suitably dim (the tourist books say this is step one to the mordida dance -- even if you know Spanish, never let on. The hope is the police just get frustrated trying to communicate and let you go). Anyway, next thing this fellow starts talking in moderately good English and hands us a brochure. There is a new campaign to stop the Mordida. We were so pleasantly surprised. He took a quick survey and asked how our experience had been at immigration. We said of course fine (the small problem we had was nothing to do with being harassed). He asked about the road condition so far and how we felt about it. With the brochure he gave us, there was also a single sheet of paper, in Spanish, with phone numbers. He said this sheet is for us to use. If we encounter any kind of corruption, we must call this number to report it and they will "remove the corruption". This paper is what we would show to a policeman if he attempts a mordida. He then wished us "bien viaje", good travels, and off we went.

 

We arrived in Hermosillo at 4:30 to 26 degrees C. A real pleasure after leaving the 1 degree in Yuma! We made excellent travel progress this day. It also helped that we virtually did not stop. I had packed lunch and snack things in the cooler so, other than letting Bailey out for a pee now and then, we just kept trucking.

 

Last year we bypassed Hermosillo (pop. 700,000) in our blinding rush to get to Guaymas for our first night. We didn't think much of what we saw of the outskirts of Hermosillo at that time. The RV park here is literally the only one in Hermosillo at this time and it is only a couple of years old. It is run by a construction company (family) and they use part of their property for business purposes and have made an RV park on the other side. The small office is impressive. Nice stone work and tile inside. The office desk was not wanting for any technology -- nice computer, phone system, fax, etc. 

 

The fellow at the desk was maybe in his early 20's. He worked with his father in the construction business. His English was excellent with hardly a trace of accent. He recommended us to a restaurant in town that night and gave us a map so that we could find Costco the next morning. A part of their business is selling the "fake lawn" which is synthetic. It looks great. They had put a small putting green in the middle of the RV park using this fake lawn, and we later saw one of their installation trucks parked in town.

 

That evening we went for supper to La Casa Grande. There was valet service, but we were unsure what Mexican valet service entailed (wouldn't be surprised if we ended up with the wrong vehicle at the end of the evening!). As we drove around to find a parking spot on the street it was obvious we were in a very swanky neighbourhood.  The houses were incredible. The restaurant was an absolute pleasure. Food was great and the facilities were immaculately clean. We sat on the patio under an almond tree and had a wonderful evening. The wait staff were completely professional and trained. The manager knew English so we asked about the neighbourhood. He told us that this area houses the mayor, governor, lawyers and doctors. The main industry in Hermosillo is mining, followed closely by ranching, farming and seafood distribution.  We also visited briefly with another patron who was a businessman from Toronto, here on mining business. He said he travels here several times a year for a few weeks at a time.

 

The next day we drove around the same area to see if daylight altered the glamour we perceived the night before. It was just as beautiful in the day. In our travels we have noticed often that towns will have a nice street, followed by a derelict street - very inconsistent. Here we drove several blocks afield and found that although one could sense a slight change in class, the same cleanliness and care were evident. We would have been happy to live on any one of these streets. As we made our way to Costco we drove by Sonora University, a huge facility right in the city. The roads were excellent and we got the feeling that one could definitely function here.

 

Shopping at Costco Mexico is very similar to home product-wise. One difference in procedure is there are staff to unpack your buggy onto the conveyor and then repack your buggy after purchase. Nice!

 

After packing a month's worth of beef and chicken into our little freezer (something like a jigsaw puzzle), we headed off for Guaymas. Two hours later we arrived at our (well, my) favourite place Hotel Playa de Cortez. We will stay here for a couple of days before moving on. 

 

Bailey is very happy to be in Mexico. At the RV Resorts in the U.S. dogs must be on a leash constantly and they are not allowed in common areas. When we go to the pool she must be left in the RV and miss out on all the fun. Where we are at this moment there are only two RV's so she has lots of room to roam around. And the beach is never far away. She's once again wearing her silly grin!

 

This seems like a lot of information for just two small days into our travels, but I thought you might enjoy the detail.