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Published: January 6th 2006
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Set alarm for 7:30 - still raining, Shannon and I woof down some free hotel coffee in room and jump in the shuttle to take us to the LAX Hertz Rental Car place.
We pile into our new minivan wheels - complete with mp3 player, 8 seats and good boot space, tinted windows yea baby. The side door even opens automatically - NZ$1905 split between the four of us served us well.
Remember - tight right, loose left. When at red light, you can still turn right if the coast is clear. There are no roundabouts - instead there are people waiting at 4 stop signs. The first person to the stop sign has right of way. The motorways are so big and huge the 65mph speed limits aren’t really enforced apparently. People cruise along at 85mph (130km/h) and cops don’t really bat an eye, they are probably going the same speed. We probably won’t be testing it however unless everyone is going that speed.
We had breakfast at the hotel - Amanda had great fun in asking for her eggs to be “Sunny Side Up”, I think she had seen it in a movie and wanted to
do it ever since.
We pile into Minivan and cruise down to San Diego and arrive at Sunita’s friend Ashley’s house, who also had her friend Liz staying over. Apparently the weather is normally so good down there that she said “if its not 85 and sunny people stay inside”.
The motorways are simply huge over here - apparently there is enough miles of road in the state of california to circle the globe 3 times.
We decided crossing the border and going to Mexico for dinner might be fun so we cruised down as far as we could, crossed the border by foot and jumped in a cab. I have heard this wasn’t going to be the “real mexico” as it was still quite touristy up near the states, but I definitely noticed the difference. For a start, everything was in Spanish. Everyone looked Hispanic, and the taxi driver could not really speak English. Luckily Ashley had been to Mexico many times and knew the tricks of the trade to get by.
The customs to get into Mexico involved walking through a rickety old rotating gate. Coming back into the states required a passport and
putting our wallets etc through a x-ray machine.
Apparently if I had lost my passport while over there I would have had to be deported back to NZ at my expense - phew.
I don’t think laws are enforced nearly as much over there - for a start, all 6 of us piled into a standard taxi, 5 in the back, 1 in front - sitting on top of each other somewhat. We noticed that the speedometer read a consistent 0, and also had no headlights - well none that we could see on the road anyway.
Mexicans have an uncanny knack of darting across the motorway in front of speeding vehicles whilst being dressed in black.
We ended up going to Rosarito which was about 30 minutes from the border, apparently less touristy and less scungy than Tijuana where most Americans go. We ended up eating at a mexi place where I learnt that Tortilla is indeed pronounced Torteya. All prices in the place where given in both Peso and American dollars, which was around 11 Peso to 1 American dollar. If no American dollar version was given, you just move the decimal place over one and
they will accept it.
The shops were rather intriguing, one we went into was absolutely packed full of lollies/meat/cheese etc. We then made it to a bar that looks as though it would go off in the summer - with wet t-shirt competitions and beer skulling contests I’m sure. I photographed the bar which had g-strings and other bikini bottoms hanging from the ceiling. Apparently during parties girls get up onto the platform, swing around a pole and chuck their underwear into the crowd. These were mementos.
We were told by Ashley (Sunita’s friend) that a common trick barmen do over there is come up behind you, blow their whistle really loud, put their hands over your eyes and pull your head back and pour tequila in your mouth. Once it’s in there they shake your head around or something, and then get you to pay for the shot afterwards. Needless to say, I had my eyes keenly scanning behind me every now and then, and listening out for anything that resembled a whistle.
And yes, the clubs down there really do play Salsa/Marenge music as standard - no need to go the extra mile to find
Mexican Band
Serenading people in a restaurant. a salsa club, its everywhere. Cool.
Went down to the beach, then caught another (slightly less scary this time) taxi ride back to the border and back home. We smelt something really bad at one stage - something I hadn't actually smelt before.
I wondered someone had too much Mexican salsa chilli, but found out that the smell was a run over skunk which is apparently fairly common thing to happen.
If you ever get sprayed by a skunk - immerse yourself in Tomato juice and lock yourself in a room for 2 weeks. Get people to poke you food under the door with tongs.
All up, very glad I made it down to Mexico - great fun, it also brings the trip up to 4 states and 2 countries - yay.
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Julia
non-member comment
Wow!
Hello! Mexico sounds AWESOME! How's Amanda doing? Hope she's made a full recovery from her sickness in Hawaii. Keep the blogs coming - they're great!