In order to get to Belize with all of our stuff, and in order to save time once we got here, we decided the best way to get to Belize was to drive through Mexico. Time and money were the two major factors that influenced us to drive rather than putting our vehicle, full of everything we needed in order to live and work, on a ship and flying ourselves down. Plane tickets were too expensive and more importantly, we did not want our truck to sit on the seas and in the Port of Belize for the first couple of weeks we were here. So we made up our minds and here is how it went…The drive to the border was pretty nuts. It ended up taking us forever to get from Orange Beach, AL, where we were visiting family, to Corpus Christi, TX, where we stayed our last night in the States. An 18wheeler hauling some sort of gas flipped and caught on fire. It put us back about 2 1/2 hrs, resulting in a late start at the US/Mexico border on Tuesday morning. We had been working with a broker to get all the proper documentation for exporting the truck. We got to their office in Brownsville, TX and got everything worked out fairly quickly, considering the language barrier. We pulled up to the border around 11ish. There were six lanes of cars waiting to go through. The first five had gone when the customs agent came by and said they would resume after lunch. An hour and half later we started moving. The border was really no problem, just a series of checkpoints for checking passports and paperwork, and for fumigating the truck. Because we were just driving through and had “trans-migrante” status, we crossed the border at Los Indios. We had been told by many to cross the border, get insurance for the truck, then get as far south as quickly as possible, because the border towns are where a large portion of the violence occurs. So this was our plan. However, this is not how it ended up working out. We popped out in the middle of nowhere; just a dirt road that split in three directions. We chose a toll road that we hoped would take us somewhere we could buy insurance and get a move on. We wound up in a little no-name border town, like something you would see in the movies, with one little dusty road passing through the center, barely wide enough for both vehicles and people wondering about. Not a soul spoke English (surprise, surprise). After several failed attempts of asking for “seguro”, we moved on, heading toward Matamoros, a much more prominent crossing.
We pulled into the city, found the road we needed and turned south, hoping we would just come across a place to purchase car insurance. Then all of a sudden, there were no signs, nothing. Just crazy intersections. We were lost again and had only been in the country a matter of hours. This was just the first time that we though, “what have we gotten ourselves into? We are in way over our heads!” Here we were, two gringos and our dog, packed in a truck with everything we needed to live for a year, dead lost in a large border town with the sun on its way down. We backtracked to a spot that was more developed and asked two women (with a couple of Spanish words and lots of sign language) how to get to the road that took us out of town. They ended up just leading us there. A blessing. They took us back to the intersection where we had lost our bearings, and from there wound us through several small neighborhoods, until we dead-ended into the HWY. We never would have found it without them. From there we got back on our way, were feeling pretty good, and were making progress and then right outside of town we were pulled over by two federales (Highway Patrol). Justin had just barely exceeded the 50 KPH speed limit, but mostly I’m sure that we just stuck out. Two officers approached and one asked for our driver’s license and pretty soon after just let us go on our way. They seemed like honest policia so for the rest of the trip felt OK when we would pass them. Once again, we got back on the road and were feeling pretty good for a few more miles until we come to a military checkpoint. It was expected. They set up about 20 miles outside of most of the crossings. They checked our paperwork, and to our surprise told us that we were missing something. It turns out we had not gotten our passports stamped at the crossing. How does that even happen? We felt like we had jumped through all of the hoops at the border. They turned us around. Back 40 Kilometers to Matamoros at dusk. No bueno. We had seen a nice hotel on our way out, so we pulled over there and settled in for the night. We ate dinner at the little restaurant next door, or at least tried, but lack of sleep and a small load of stress made it hard to get anything down.
We were up early the next morning, quickly making our way to the customs office at the Matamoros crossing. After a couple of hours we were able to get what we needed and get back on our way. The maps showed HWY 180, the road we were following almost the entire way, as a decent road, so we were aiming for Tuxpan, a town a little farther south than. It was a great drive. On either side of the road were stretches of farmland as far as the eye could see. It started out as flat, dry farmland, truly great expanse and eventually turned into hilly, desert terrain.
As we approached Tampico, the first major city on this stretch, we consulted the maps on how to skirt it. We had been advised to avoid cities if possible in order to dodge any corrupt local cops. We seemed to have bypassed pretty much the entire city, at rush hour too, and had all but crossed it off the list when all of a sudden, out of the bustling rush hour traffic comes a less-than-impressive police car blaring it’s siren. They pulled up next to us and hand-motioned for us to pull over. As far as we could tell they were saying something about the North Carolina license plates and before we knew it they caught sight of Caden packed in the backseat and immediately started saying “Un perro” this, “Un perro” that while imitating the motion of stamping papers with their hands. I swear, it was just like the movies. Two sleazy local cops, spouting angry Spanish, asking us for $800 US or jail. Back and forth, back and forth, Justin kept telling them “No habla espaniol, no comprende.” They told him to get back in the car and follow them. They turned back toward the city. A scare tactic, to be sure. They pulled over a mile down the road, asked Justin to follow them to the back of the truck and asked again (on paper so we could read it) $800 US or “courto”. In so many Spanish words they were telling us that for $800 US we could continue down the road to Veracruz or go to court. Justin came back to the truck and we revealed one of our stashes of cash. There was $200 dollars and we didn’t want to show them that we had any more. One of the officers came over to see what was talking so long. We got the impression that they were trying to hurry everything along, since they were no doubt breaking the law, there in plain sight, along the side of the busy highway. Justin showed them $200 US and pulled out his empty pockets to ensure them it was all we had. They kept at it until, finally one of them literally snatched the money from Justin’s hand and went back to the car. The other persisted a few more minutes before reluctantly joining his partner and leading us back out of town. They literally escorted us out of town and then waved goodbye. Not cool, but it could have been worse.From there to Tuxpan was a relatively short distance. It wasn’t supposed to take long but that stretch was just a series of small towns that all had "sleeping police" or deadly speed bumps. With our heavy load we had to all but stop to get over them. They started just outside of each town and go all the way through to the other side. It took forever! We endured hours and hours of accelerating and decelerating. At one point, road signs ended again and we were in the middle of yet another little village. We were navigating these tiny dirt roads that I’m surprised we could even drive down. Not a highway in sight. We asked a woman how to get to Tuxpan. She had never heard of Tuxpan. Somehow I managed to ask something she understood and she gave us this arm motion. We followed it. Slowly winding through this little village, we popped out on the highway. Crazy. Seriously, crazy. By this time we were pretty much driving through the mountains, on a windy, two-lane road, the rest of the drive was the same. Speed bumps galore. We ended up having to drive for a little over an hour into the night, even though by driving at night we were breaking the #1 rule for driving through Mexico. We carefully navigated the narrow, unlined roads spattered with unmarked, teeth-shattering speed bumps, loose livestock, and wondering civilians.
We pulled into Tuxpan and grabbed the first hotel we saw. For the second night in a row it was Best Western. We never would have guessed that we would keep staying at Best Westerns while driving through Mexico, but they were lifesavers for us. Again, we played a game of charades at the front desk. The only room they had left was the penthouse. It was expensive, but we just couldn’t bring ourselves to get back in the truck after a 13-hour day. We took it and it was fabulous. Turned out to be a really cool town right on the river. Our penthouse was the entire top floor with two huge rooms, an incredible spacious deck overlooking the river, and a nice bathroom with running water. Even Caden was allowed to come up. The first night in Matamoros, she had to sleep in the truck.
After such a rough start, the next two days ended up being great. We still went through checkpoints, endless tollbooths, and were very conscious of our surroundings but overall everyone we encountered was friendly and we managed to stay out of situations that made us feel unsafe. We experienced crazy roads, beautiful scenery, and some neat little towns. The Sierra Madre Oriental started creeping in on the west and the Gulf of Mexico on the east. We drove from Tuxpan to Villahermosa, coming into the city with an enormous rainstorm. Perhaps a blessing because there were no cops in sight! We tried to go to bed early, as the last days’ drive was, by mileage, the longest, with only a few small towns between. We needed to reach the Belize border by 4, because it was Friday, and if we had any difficulties and we couldn’t get through, we would be spending the weekend in the Yucatan. Not an option. We got up at 4:30am, made coffee and hit the road. A surprising number of people were out and about. A few miles outside of town, we came to a dead stop. People were turning their cars off, getting out, and walking around. We sat for about 30-45 minutes in the dark. It was another flipped 18wheeler. It was officially the third one we’d seen since we left Alabama a few days earlier. As the sun was coming up, we were moving again, and the road was a well-paved toll road. And it stayed that way. Over rolling hills and incredible landscape, it was smooth sailing. We hit the border at 1:45pm. We couldn’t believe it. The leg we had dreaded the most turned out to be the easiest. We called the broker, met a guy on the border, got our bond money back and crossed into Belize. Customs was not too much of a hassle. We had to explain that we were on holiday visiting friends in Rancho Dolores and that we definitely, absolutely, positively were not planning to sell the truck that we were essentially importing into Belize.
Caden barely got her papers taken care of (with the help of a small “administrative gratuity”), our passports were stamped, duty was paid on the contents of the truck, and we were able to obtain a temporary vehicle permit. It seemed like a pretty successful border crossing, especially because we were able to delay paying duty on the truck. We felt overjoyed to be through Mexico and in a new place full of friendly, English-speaking people. We had about an hour-and-half drive to get from the border at Corozal to our tiny, remote village of Ranch Dolores. We thought that we were home free but were quickly reminded that we were still at the mercy of the laws of Belize when we attempted to pass through a police checkpoint about 30 minutes form the farm. It is a permanent checkpoint and we were aware that is was there but had never passed through it coming from the north. At the border we had declined to get local car insurance because we had obtained insurance for the truck, with really great coverage, from an international provider that also provides us our health insurance. Well, without local insurance apparently they can impound your vehicle and slap you with a fine. So after driving from Charlotte, NC to Orange Beach, Alabama to Corpus Christi, Texas, through Mexico and an hour into Belize we had to bribe the officer ($150 BZ) within 20 miles of our final destination. As ready as we were to be done driving and at the farm, we weren’t too upset with getting out of that one. We pulled onto the farm just as the sun was setting. We were home. And it felt great.Though the first two days were nearly too much for our nerves to handle, we are glad we did it! Everyone we met, with the exception of the two local police and one tollbooth attendant, were extremely friendly and helpful. It was a fun way to start our adventure in Belize. Taking all our energy to plan the drive, we had no time to create expectations for this new life, making every moment here like a little more exciting.