An Interesting Drive?

living.boondockingmexico@yahoo.com

We are on our way to San Antonio and have stopped in Laredo, Tx for the night at the famous Casa Blanca State Park.  We have a great site next to the water.  However, it stinks, literally.   When I was a fisherman, we would catch fish and then take them home to clean them or take them to the cleaning station to do the job.  

To start things off, we arrived to our designated site to find three vehicles and a picnic table full of food and drink and a smoking hot fire in the pit.   As I pulled in front of the site a guy was coming back from the washroom and I asked him if it was his site.  He kind of shrugged his shoulders and said he would be right back as he headed for the water where his friends were fishing.  I told him to check his sticker on the windshield of the truck.  Long story short, they had to move out and fast.   They had day passes only and just plunked down on the site.    No apologies, nothing.   They packed up and moved out.   

Now we're settled in and we keep smelling fish.  We walk down to the water and there are latex gloves strewn all over and dozens of fish heads and intestines.   Kids are swimming just feet away in the stench and it surely couldn't be very healthy.   The park itself is nice and we have a wifi signal although they say you can only get it from the entrance office.   

Still a good place to spend the night and we are settled in and watching the Oscars and having a glass of wine. 

We took the toll highway up from Laredo and it is excellent.  We decided this last year that the toll highways present a sense of false security.  Both the libre and autopista receive the same level of security and the libre is much more scenic with places to stop along the way to eat and use facilities or do some shopping.  The condition of the libre from Monterrey to Laredo is top notch.   Very good asphalt and much better in my opinion than the toll highway.   So we save over 850 pesos round trip.

That said, we stopped in Sabinas Hidalgo for some LP gas and a couple of breakfast tacos.  We got back on the road and we way an armored patrol from the federales.  As we approached they pulled us over.   I didn't think anything of it, an ordinary stop for a check.   The officer walked up to the window and said good morning and the asked if we had jumper cables.   

They had been chasing someone when the bad guys threw a spiked something or other to blow their tires.   As they swerved something broke and the engine died.   The lighting eventually ate up the battery and they needed a jump.  We offered to help them.  They connected the cables and as we were waiting here comes the military and two state patrols and more federales to the rescue.  Apparently the problem had happened just before we were stopped.  All guns drawn, we got their vehicle started and they were very thankful.   Funny part is, as cars slowed down and passed by, they looked at us like we were criminals and were being arrested.   :)   We had an uneventful trip other than that and the bridge wait on a Sunday was only 20 minutes.