today was a really long day. the short summary is that i woke up eaarly, drove a lot, and am now in a nice hotel in los mochis, sinaloa, mexico. also, none of the horror stories everybody talks about have come true:
1)RUMOR — i’ll have trouble with customs because of the hiding spots & timelapse camera. ACTUALLY — customs took 1 minute, they checked almost nothing
2)RUMOR — you have to bribe the cops at checkpoint charlie…with money or blenders. ACTUALLY — checkpoint charlie wasn’t even there.
3)RUMOR — all cops want bribes. ACTUALLY — i had to stop at ~5 checkpoints…they all waved me through without any issues.
4)RUMOR — cops pull over american cars. ACTUALLY — i ended up following a police car for a while (which was going above the speed limit), and even sped by one (i figured speeding was better than driving in the dark…see note 6)
5)RUMOR — libre roads are dangerous (as opposed to toll roads). ACTUALLY — i took one, just to see what it was like…ended up being a pain, i got lost, it took forever…but no serious issues at all (i followed the cop car, above, for about half of the time on this road).
6)RUMOR — never, never drive at night. ACTUALLY — because of my delay with the libre road, i ended up driving for ~1 hr at night. it was fine.
of course this was just one day…so tomorrow might be different.

the longer story is below:

TUCSON….a one horse town
so today i woke up at 4am, was on the road at 4:30, and started heading east to tucson. after about 30min, i realized that i probably missed tucson, so i started heading back. turns out, my hotel was in tucson (i assumed it was a tiny little suburb of tucson). anyway, i don’t want to badmouth tucson.

NOGALES (mile 146,565, 7am)
so, i finally got to the border at 7am. nogales is a pretty barren little town…although i think it might still have more stuff to do than tucson. it’s only purpose (on the us side) seems to provide gas, mcdonalds and other necessities for travelers. i started driving to the border, saw a sign that said ‘last u-turn in usa’, freaked out, and turned around.
reinvigorated after a conversation with some women who had just returned from mexico, i got back in the sentra, made sure all the panels were covered up, and drove in. narcotic dogs were barking in the distance…and my heart was racing. well, they checked my car for 1 minute (i opened the trunk, and showed the spare tire under the passenger seat)…and i was through. they didn’t even look at my passport or license.
once in mexican nogales, the contrast is very apparent. for some reason, everything just seems a little browner: the sidewalks, the street, the billboards/posters, the sky…and yes, the people too.

CHECKPOINT CHARLIE (mile 146,577 – )
21km into mexico, there was another station, where you buy the traveler & car permits (total price ~$40 US). no lines, and the whole thing was done in 15 minutes. I put the sticker on the car and drove south. about an hour later i realized they never stamped my passport…oh well.

DETOUR #1: San Carlos (mile 146,832, 1pm)
San Carlos is a tiny beach town off of route 15. the scenery is amazing and the water is really refreshing…especially on a hot day without AC. There are some really nice beach houses….but unfortunately, there are a ton of condos too (mostly for sale), so it ends up seeming like a bit of an american timeshare community (most tourists and many signs are in english). Nonetheless, it’s an incredible location…and was surprisingly empty for a hot saturday (most beaches had only 1 or 2 families).

DETOUR #2: Navojoa (mile 146,960, 4pm)
Since everything was going so well, and i was sick of paying $5 tolls every 50 miles, i decided to take the libre road. turns out the libre road just makes a massive detour around the toll booth…so instead of paying $5 to the government,you use up $5 in gas. halfway through i ended up on a dirt road with peasant shacks and a dirt soccer field — it’s such a different lifestyle than what i saw in san carlos or anything else from the toll road. I figured i had made a wrong turn (the signs are quite bad…or missing), turned back…and some how managed to get on the right road. it was ashame i was so worried about cops, hijackers and the impending night to appreciate the countryside. The road was small & bumpy, with farms & the random donkey on either side — it felt like driving through the midwest. Except for one thing. The houses along the road were one room shacks. Some built from adobe, some from wood, they all reminded me of the old indian houses i saw in utah. it’s pretty crazy how there can be such a dichotomy of wealth…and how it can be so easy to miss it (you can’t see it from the toll road….and even on the libre road, i was so preoccupied with friends’ warnings, it took me a while to realize my surroundings). Anyway, i finally ended up back on the toll road, paid some more tolls, went through some more checkpoints….and arrived in los mochis.

OTHER
here are some more observations from the trip:
-mile 146,671…literally a 3 mile backup of trucks waiting to get through a checkpoint. i can’t help but think it’s inefficient…especially after my experiences with the inspection stations (nobody even noticed the camera!)
-mile 146,742….hermosillo is the first major town you pass through. so far it’s the nicest town i’ve seen in mexico (san carlos had nice scenery….but it was one road….not much of a town).
-mile 146,860….end of usa hassle free zone. i’m not sure what that means, but apparently route 15 is ‘hassle free’ up until that point.
-mile 146,945….stack of pigs (see pic).
-it’s weird to see people walking/biking alongside the road…in the desert climate…when there might be 10 miles between towns.
-food is crazy cheap.

well, that’s it for now…hopefully tomorrow i’ll get to start experiencing the country (rather than just driving through it).