| | |  Vallarta Living 
Simply Puerto Vallarta - On The Road
 Laura Gelezunas - VideoDivaProductions.com
December 10, 2010
| | In this edition of Simply Puerto Vallarta, Laura talks with Canadian RVers who cross two international borders to get to their winter home in Mexico. (Video Diva Productions) | |
They can't wait to get on the road again, especially those driving motor homes to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.
"We stick to the highways and with our rigs we have to," says Richard Chenier from Quebec, "And we just roll along." His wife Mado Babin says she enjoys the road because they travel with good friends, take their time and she sites having a good driver as part of the experience.
Almost everyone in an RV park just outside of downtown Puerto Vallarta is from Canada so they cross two international borders. Richard says it's pretty standard entering the United States from Canada and usually takes a very short time.
There are 42 places where you can cross the almost 2000 mile border between the US and Mexico. This year travelers were thinking ahead because of all the media hype. "Of course we heard on the news everything about it, just like everybody else, it was a concern to us but we decided to contact friends that we would meet at the border and cross as a big group," says Richard, "We thought it would be safer that way and we decided that we were going to come down anyway."
"We spent about a week in Pharr, Texas close to the border," says Richard, "We formed a line and we crossed the border. There was ten of us, and actually that was the smoothest border crossing ever. I have been down here five years in a row, and it was my easiest, I guess they were waiting for us, but there was nothing wrong, usually there are a lot of check points, and stuff like that from either the police or military, but we just had one spot where they checked us."
"I've been coming down here for 12 years and we've never had an incident on the highway," says Dirk Miller of Kentucky, "And crossing the border there was no difficulties and this year was just as easy as any other year and the only thing I noticed this year, closer to the border, within a 100 miles, was a lot of Federales, but that's just different this year, I noticed there was less military in the interior of Mexico this year, too, but everything else was the same."
According to these experts, driving through Mexico is a breeze and the locals are very friendly.
"It's great as far as I'm concerned," says Richard, The roads are 80 percent A1, and last year we had an experience, if you break down on the toll highways, they have what they call the Green Angels, and geez they are right there and they take you anywhere you have to get fixed, and it's usually at ridiculously low prices, too, it's really great."
"I've had breakdowns with my coach in Mexico and all the Mexican people would come out to help me with whatever it was," says Dirk, "Whether it was a fire or a blown tire, or had any kind of a problem, they would practically come out in great numbers to help us."
"I was near Patzcuaro and I made a wrong turn one time with my motor home and my car got hung up on a curb," says Dirk, "And about 12 guys came out of this village and lifted my car up on to the curb for me so I could get it unhitched so I could get it around the corner. And then I didn't know where the auto pista (highway) was and so I asked a fella to show me the autopista and all of a sudden he showed up on a bicycle with his daughter on the cross bar and he peddled up over hills for about three kilometers to show me where the autopista was and I was kinda going slowly behind him and he kept waving for me to hurry up because he wanted to go faster, but that was a good experience and it was most helpful. We gave him some candy and some money and everybody was happy."
These RV snowbirds say they would not miss a season in Puerto Vallarta and hope others do not curtail their plans for a winter in paradise.
Simply Puerto Vallarta is a multi-media promotion campaign that highlights the richness and diversity of Mexico's premier coastal tourist town. Unlike traditional PR efforts, the video series was designed to put the media message back into the hands of those it most affects - area residents.
Click HERE for more Simply Puerto Vallarta videos. |
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