DRIVING THE HIGHWAY OF DEATH

Or the Devils Highway, thats its other name.  Whatever you call it, driving highway 101 through the northern state of Tamaulipas was absolutely bone-chilling.

To start off, nothing happened to us, nor did we see anything.  We are safe and sound and doing just fine in sunny San Antonio, Texas.

We haven't written a lot about the drug wars in Mexico (and in Central America), but its presence is felt all the time.  We are always asked if such and such location was okay or told not to go to a certain place or avoid this highway or this part of a city or town.  A lot of the last places we have visited lately we've been told that they are surprised to see us because not many tourists are coming through anymore.  We are always asked if we are afraid and the answer is always a very strong no. We ask the locals advice all the time and they have never steered us wrong.  We know that we are more likely to be struck by lightening then to ever come across some cartel activity but just the same, this last section of Mexico is a little bit different.

Going back through Mexico meant that we had a choice to make - where to cross the border.  We read up on each area, and it soon became apparent that it really didn't matter where we crossed.  If we ran into something it was just going to be a case of wrong place, wrong time.  When we received the thirty day pass, it made the decision for us.  We would have to take the shortest, quickest route north.  With a top speed of 55 mph, we couldn't be choosey about where to cross.  We would have to head up through the gulf of Mexico into an area that has a lot of cartel activity.

We don't know how much everyone out there knows about whats happening in Mexico but its pretty horrendous and very sad and not well reported.  We don't claim to understand what is happening here or how it affects peoples day to day lives.  We won't write about the cartels verses the cartels, the government, the corruption, the violence etc.  We have never seen nor been affected by any of it.  All we know is that we drove through a part of the country that was unrecognizable to us.

Normally we wouldn't even include this next bit of information in the blog but to give a sense of whats going on in the area we will.  When we entered the state of Veracruz, from what we had read, nothing much was going on.  The day we drove into the city of Veracruz, we learned that thirty-five bodies had been dumped in the popular tourist area of Boca del Rio.  The day we were checking out the city ten more bodies were found. From the time we left until now, over forty more bodies have been found in Veracruz.  This obviously didn't affect us personally but it did start to play with our heads a bit as we were about to enter a state that has a far graver reputation.

The state of Tamaulipas (located south of Texas) is a no-go state.  There are bus hijackings, kidnappings, shoot-outs, extreme brutality and earlier this year they found a number of mass graves, all along this highway.  The cartels rule here.  We entered the state in the southern city of Tampico and ended up staying for three days trying to muster up enough nerve to get ourselves on the highway and make the more than five hundred kilometer run for Texas.  This would be the longest drive we have ever done in one day on the trip.  We collected as much information from the locals as we could and were greeted with looks that told us we had no business being there.  We were told that there would be military convoys that would bring us from point to point until we arrived at the border.  We were given phone numbers to call to set this up.  We were told by others to have 500 to 1000 pesos on us just in case we were to enter a cartel checkpoint and also to never try and outrun them.  We were also told that it would be okay, that the military had it under control.

So we left early in the morning, not sure was going to happen.  It felt like we had just watched ten horror movies and were about to enter a haunted house.  We got to the highway and there were no convoys, so we carried on thinking that we would run into them later.  Now anyone that has driven on Mexicos roads knows how busy they are.  Semis, trucks, cars, bikes, animals, vendors selling stuff on the side of the road - people everywhere, you are never alone.  THIS ROAD WAS EMPTY.  There were semis and the odd car or truck and that was it.  No vendors at all, closed gas stations, abandoned buildings, closed businesses.  We passed through little villages and didn't see a soul, just laundry flapping in the wind.  We didn't even see any dogs. It was eerie.

The other thing we didn't see was the military.  We have driven Mexico from one side to the other and the one thing that is guaranteed on the roads is them.  We thought that for sure the highway would be full of these guys but we only saw them once.  About 150km from the border there was a large check point that everyone was pulled over and searched.  We asked if the road was safe ahead and he pointed to himself and said, "Si".

We had one stop for fuel and one stop to stretch our legs and after seven hours of driving we reached the border town of Matamoros.  No military check entering the city and very little traffic.  Maybe it was just us and our frame of mind but the city felt creepy - too quiet.  It took us no time to find the border and after about twenty minutes (it only took that long because the border officials kept taking pictures of the truck) we were free to cross the bridge and enter the United States.

So nothing happened, this is a long post with a lot of lead up to nothing.  We knew that the chance of anything happening to two tourists, with no involvement in any illegal activity, was very low.  People drive on these roads everyday without problem.  But for the first time ever, we do have to say we were glad to be out of Mexico or more specifically out of Tamaulipas.  We adore Mexico.  It has been a home for us for close to six months.  We love the people, the food, the culture - we could go on and on.  The one thing we know with complete certainty is that we'll be back.