Our Final day in Mexico - April 24

HoseHey and Sweety ready to hit the road

Our final day of travel out of Mexico started off good.  We had successfully hooked up the tow bar to the truck and double checked the tightness of the bolts on the tow bar receiver brackets.  We hit the road shortly before 8 a.m. Per the GPS, we had just over 4 hours of travel to get us to the Nogales-Mariposa border crossing.  Of course, as mentioned before that doesn’t account for the time it takes to stop at any tolls along the way. In total we’d have four more tolls plus one final stop for fuel before we made it to the border.

By noon we were on another new stretch of highway that the GPS didn’t have record of.  That’s not a bad thing, new roads are great especially after what we dealt with the day prior!  The drive itself wasn’t stress free however.  We were nervous about our “fix” of the tow bar brackets and frequently stopped so I could get out and visually assess whether the bolts were staying tight.  Sadly, on more than one stop we needed to pull the tools out and re-tighten.  It was particularly bad after a small detour stretch that took us once again down roads that were more suited for 4x4 vehicles!  

Another interesting part of our travels was learning trucker language.  Being such a big rig, truckers tended to treat us like we were one of them using their lights as a form of language on the road.  Some of the signals we understood such as a flash of the headlights to let a passing vehicle know it was safe to merge into the lane.  That one is often used here in Canada as well.  But there were many other new signals that were extremely helpful such as:

• Use of left hand blinker to advise vehicles behind you that it is safe to pass
• Use of right hand blinker to advise vehicles behind you that there is an obstacle on the right hand side of the road/shoulder (could be a car, person on a motorcycle, person walking, tractor…anything that is a possible hazard)
• Use of hazard lights to advise vehicles behind you that you are slowing down or driving slowly or even that there is a hazard in the road - such as a pothole ahead.  We saw many trucks on the Mexican highways put on their hazards then move from one lane to the other to avoid a major hole in the road.  That was SUPER helpful (once we understood what they were doing). 
• Honking twice to say “thank you” and honking once to say “welcome”
• Tapping brakes or flashing 4 way flashers twice was also a “thank you” from truckers who we’d let pass

Dan used this language for the entire remainder of our drive as a method to communicate with other truckers and even other smaller vehicles who may have been stuck behind, unable to see past us.  We did notice that this kind of trucker language was much more widely used in Mexico.  Definitely not used as frequently in the US.

By 12:30 p.m. we made it to km 255 where we would stop to return our Temporary Import Permit (TIP) for the truck.  When we arrived in Mexico we needed to purchase a TIP.  A TIP is required for areas outside the free or border zone.

Mexico Free Border Zone (link)

Because we were travelling past the free zone we had to have a TIP while we were in Mexico.  Upon leaving you stop at a small building to return the TIP and receive a refund.  The TIP used to be a sticker that was applied to the windshield but recently changed to a paper format only.  They also issued a unique QR code that you can upload to your cell phone and provide if ever asked for it by officials. When we entered Mexico the TIP cost us just over $600 Canadian and once the refund was processed (approx 5 business days later) we received just over $500 back.

It’s important to pay attention so that you don’t drive by this building.  There are a series of red and white radio antenna towers along the highway as you get close.  That’s what we were keeping our eye out for, as well as the kilometre markers on the highway.  The building itself is almost directly across the highway from the building we got our TIP at on the way down (at KM 21).

The small building where you return your TIP.

I borrowed the photo above from the More Golden Years (link) blog. The writer Carol does such a great job documenting the road conditions and key stops along the route from Nogales to Mazatlan and back. If you are ever interested in more details about the road conditions and navigation I’d highly recommend checking out her blog.  She updates the route every year with lots of detail and pictures.  She and her husband have been travelling down to Mazatlan for a number of years each winter.  Click on the blue font link of her blog name above to check it out.

As we arrived at the booth there were about eight cars (no RV’s) in line.  Many were getting agitated and were getting out of their cars walking up to the booth to see what the hold up was.  Of course, it was our first time there so we didn’t know what to expect.  From the way the other people in line were acting it seemed like the wait must have been longer than “normal”.  We figure they might have been short staffed.  After a 30 minute wait in line, another agent appeared and they split the line and things started moving.  Because we were in an RV, we used the centre lane, on the left hand side of the building.  There was no way we were getting around the right hand side of the building as there is a tight turn upon exiting that side.  When it was our turn an agent came out, took photos of our VIN, took our original TIP paperwork and went inside to process the refund to our credit card and returned to give us our receipt.  Then we were on our way for the final leg of our journey to the Nogales-Mariposa truck crossing border.  

Nogales-Mariposa
Mexico-US Border crossing

By 2:00 p.m. we arrived at the border crossing.  Digital signs indicated it was a 38 minute wait.  There was lots to look at to keep occupied while in line with many vendors walking in between the vehicles selling everything you could imagine from food, hats, ice cream and of course many options for those last minute souvenirs.  In the picture above you can see a number of vendor stands on the right hand side.  Remember, click on any picture to make it larger.  

Within about a half an hour we were directed to an RV only lane where we were the only ones in line.  Two US border agents came out to greet us, asking what kinds of food we had in the RV, whether we had any alcohol, drugs, tobacco etc.  They also asked us to open up each of the RV bay doors for a visual inspection.  We were lucky in that when the agent asked us what food we had, we forgot we had some sliced ham in the freezer.  When he came into the RV to look through the fridge and cupboards he found it and confiscated it.  Thankfully, he let us off with a warning, but said that he could have given us a $400 fine.  He also took our fresh eggs, which we did tell him we had.  Although I did some research on what we could bring across, we figured we’d just answer their questions and let them take whatever we couldn’t bring across.  That way, we’d know for any future trips what we could and couldn’t take across.  Here are the food items we learned are not allowed:

• No fresh eggs - hard boiled would be allowed
• No chicken or pork of any kind fresh or frozen.  We had frozen steaks in the freezer and even though they were only in ziploc bags and not marked with the store name/item, we were allowed to keep those.  We also had frozen hamburger in the store packaging, that too was allowed
• No fresh vegetables or fruit - frozen is ok

And although they asked us if we had our “paperwork” for the animals, they didn’t ask to see it.  When the food inspection agent boarded we safely secured the cats in the soft sided dog kennel we brought down with us and we took Heffay outside on his leash.  That worked really well as the last thing we wanted was a cat to escape at the border!  After they visually checked all the bays and took away the foods we couldn’t cross with they had us drive slowly through a large x-ray machine.  Once we exited they waved us on and we were officially in the US.  All done, it was only one hour in total from the time we first got into the lineup until we officially crossed at 3:00 p.m.

Our first stop after crossing was at the nearest tool supply store in Nogales, Arizona where we bought lock tite, larger ratchet wrenches and more washers so that we could better secure the loose bolts on the tow bar brackets.  After an hour or so crawling around on the hot pavement in the store parking lot, we were feeling MUCH better about the secure mounting of the tow bar bracket to the truck and headed back on the highway to our final destination for the night.  By 5:30 p.m. we were stopped at a beautiful rest stop located about halfway between Nogales and Tucson on Interstate 19. 

Canoa Ranch Rest Area, Arizona (link)

Guaymas, MX to Canoa Ranch Rest Area, AZ - April 24

Total miles driven - 282 miles

Total number of tolls - 4 tolls

Total cost of tolls - $785 pesos (approx $51 Cdn)

Total cost of fuel - $22.25 pesos/litre - topped up tank (18 gal/68 L) for $1,500 pesos ($98 Cdn)

Accomodation - $0 

The next morning we would head into Tucson to find an RV dealer where we could buy a new Blue Ox tow bar to replace the bent one.  We’d then continue our journey en route to Las Vegas for a one week stay at the mid way point to home.

Until next time / Hasta la proxima vez!