Cuernavaca to Ottawa, Spring, 2007
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
Left at 9:20 am, only 20 minutes behind schedule and was rewarded by a clear view of our volcano, Popocatepetl, surrounded by a white mist. Reached the south toll gate to Mexico City at 10:10 and noticed that in spite of the Holy Week vacation the city was wrapped in a yellow, orange, brown blanket of smog. The city traffic along the Periférico was quite reasonable, perhaps helped by the "second floor" elevated roads which don't help me directly, but do take traffic off my road. After a brief stop in the northern Satélite suburb, I was off towards Querétero and San Louis Potosí. The police were in evidence all along the federal roads, highway 57 and its city bypasses, a change from the past. While it was only 19°C at 8 am, it soon rose to 25°C and as I headed north slowly increased to 35°C under clear blue sky. Crossed the Tropic of Cancer at 4:30 pm just south of Matehuala, and settled in to the Midway Inn, Las Palmas, at 4:45 pm. This city of 78,000 now has a Wal-Mart, so I will go explore it before having supper at the Inn. Driving alone, I made lots of stops, to stretch and walk around, but I seem to be on schedule.
The last few hours have been spent traveling on the "altiplano", the high flat plain between the two mountain ranges of the Sierra Madre East and the Sierra Madre West, very easy and fast driving, keeping in mind the more present federal police. They even have full-size cardboard mock-ups of the police cars planted at suitable intersections. Quite effective.
The first day covered 660 km in 6 hours and 42 minutes of engine time, averaging 98.5 kph.
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
Left Matehuala at 9:40, after a robust breakfast of OJ, a fruit platter, mainly mango and papaya, bacon and eggs, with ranchero sauce on the side, toast, marmalade and several coffees. After the previous day's 35°C, it was a cool 19°C in the morning. It is at 1,500 meters, about 5,000 feet, but the temperature soon rose to about 25C all along the altiplano. When I reached the Saltillo toll bypass, the road left the altiplano to cross the eastern range. It is quite winding here, so the 140 km/h changed to about 90 and a lot of altitude was lost. By the time I rounded Monterrey, the temperature had soared to 34°C, due to the lower altitude. Those who have ever attended flying school will remember that with each 1,000 feet of altitude you lose 3.5 Fahrenheit degrees of temperature. Finally reached Nuevo Laredo at 3 pm and it took a mere 5 minutes to cancel the temporary car import registration, without even leaving the car, but then it took one hour to cross the bridge (#1) into Laredo.
About 70 km out of Nuevo Laredo, I fired up the navigator and said "home". It showed me the car's position in an empty space, with a nice blue line going out of Laredo, northward. Not too useful. When I finally crossed the international bridge and was running up the street, it finally spoke up and told me to "turn right" onto Matamoros Street in Laredo. It took me up to San Antonio, where I thought I would stay, but when I got to the Inn of my choice, they were full up, so I thought, instead of searching around San Antonio, where I have been many, many times, I would try Austin, where I have never been. However, on the way, it started to get dark and so I stopped in San Marcos to spend the night, a university town.
The tolls in Mexico came to 701 pesos, slightly more than going down, about $74 Cdn, and worth every penny. Gas in Mexico today was 6.85 pesos per liter for regular (87 octane) and 8.42 peso for super (93 octane). At 9.5 peso to the Canadian dollar that comes to 72.1¢ and 88.6¢ respectively. As a government monopoly that price refers to all stations all over Mexico. Gas in Texas started at $2.699 US per US gallon, that comes to 71.06¢ US per liter, which is 81.0¢ Cdn per liter. Good thing I filled up in Mexico. I subsequently saw $2.599, but that is rare.
This internet connection here won't accept my smtp address, so my emails are going via webmail.
Thursday, April 12, 2007
After a bit of shopping in Barton Creek Square, I didn't leave Austin until 11 am. Then, on to Waco, but before I got there, traffic was stopped due to an accident. So I got off and had lunch a little early and a waitress who lives in Waco told me a backroad bypass that left me 10 miles further north, beyond the tie up. Then, I rounded the south-eastern corner of Dallas, listening to various events going on in Plano and Richardson (hang outs from working days), and soon I was winging east on I-30.
Interestingly, all the "rest stops" along the Texas Interstates seem to have free wireless high-speed internet, presumably for the truckers, but very usable by me. It was good and did not block smtp as this hotel connection does. I reached Texarkana on the Texas-Arkansas border at 6:30 pm and decided to call it a day.
The car clocks have me at 1,368 miles from Cuernavaca, with 23 hours of time behind the wheel. That's an average of 59.4 miles/hour. The navigator tells me I have slightly more than that in miles to go and slightly less than that in hours, so we shall see. I am hearing Ottawa weather is not so hot. Also, New York state is somewhat snowy. Hope all that passes by the time I get there.
Friday, April 13, 2007
On this Friday the 13th, I slept in to 8:30 am and was slow getting up. After a leisurely breakfast, and doing a sudoku in the newspaper, I managed to leave Texarkana at 10:45 am, under a cool overcast sky. It was 60°F and the first day of not having an uninterrupted blue sky since Cuernavaca. After commenting on the weather to a chambermaid, she told me it would not rain until tomorrow, however, I was not 15 minutes on my journey, when the rain began, before I had even reached Hope, Arkansas. Soon after Hope, I reached Little Rock and was presented with a change from I-30 to I-40, and so on to Memphis. In Austin, I had done a Mapquest of my trip from Austin to Ottawa and it had given me the routing of Memphis, Nashville, Louisville, Cincinnati, Columbus, Erie, Syracuse, etc., and as Mapquest uses the same maps from NavTeq that my navigator uses, I assumed that would be the chosen route for my navigator.
I was surprised on reaching Memphis, and looking forward to some ribs at Corky's, that it sent me north on I-55 to St. Louis. Well I have been there several times before, so I thought OK. However as I neared St. Louis, it told me to change to I-57 to Chicago. Oh well, I haven't been there for a while, but won't the traffic be bad. I looked forward in the navigator and it had me taking I-70 to Indianapolis and then Columbus, well before I got to Chicago, hence I ended up in a touristy place called Mount Vernon, Illinois. So, I am sure, after Columbus, it will take me to Erie and Syracuse and hence home.
After arrival here, I enquired about the eating possibilities and found there are an endless number of chain restaurants here from the Lone Star Café to Fazouli's and much more. I asked if there were any local places and was steered to the Pasta House. It turns out that it too is a chain, but only a small one in the St. Louis area. Anyway, I was pleased with their house red and a nice spicy salad followed by their seasonal seafood linguini. I wondered if it would be heavy on the linguini and light on the seafood, but I got at least 6 ounces of shrimp and another 6 ounces of white fish with real tasty Kalamata olives (instead of those tasteless California black olives so popular in the US) and capers all in a white wine sauce. Quite good. I ate all the protein and left some of the pasta behind.
I am staying at a Drury Hotel for the first time, and they have some interesting perks: free long distance calls to anywhere in US, Canada or Mexico for 15 minutes only, free softdrinks, 24 hours a day, a happy hour with cocktails that I missed and a hot breakfast in the morning. The free wireless is also unencumbered, so I can reach my smtp server with no problems, and for those so inclined, they are pet friendly and I ran into several dogs on leashes in the corridors.
I mentioned the 60°F start of the day, but the temperature kept going down all day, 50°F in Memphis and 48°F now here. The rain never stopped, complete with lightning and thunder, all day, so either it is a very widespread storm or I was following it east. About 50 miles before Memphis the sky in front got very dark and serious looking, but when I scanned for telltales of possible tornado weather I could find none. I did get some really heavy downpours though that did limit visibility (and driving speed).
I have now covered 1,877 miles total and 30 hours 30 minutes total driving time, bringing the average speed up to 61.5 mph. I did 508 miles today and have about 1,000 miles to go. I will likely be in Ottawa Sunday night.
Saturday, April 14, 2007
Left this morning at 9:30 in overcast and light rain. The breakfast was superb - scrambled eggs just as I like them (soft), sausages, and biscuits, together with orange juice and coffee. I went for seconds. The rain got harder and affected visibility and continued all day. The previous night I saw TV clips of the tornados in Dallas, which I had just driven through a few days ago, so I was pleased my navigator sent me further north sooner, to keep out of the warm tornado belt. It seems, whenever I turn the engine off and then on again, the navigator calculates the best route anew each time. Although it had me going through Indianapolis and Columbus when I looked forward yesterday, today, when I got to the intersection of I-57 and I-70 (or slightly before actually) I noticed that it now had me continuing on I-57 to Chicago and then up to Sarnia etc. I did not want to do that, so I turned onto I-70. The navigator quickly recovered after telling me I was off route, and put me through to Indianapolis and Columbus as I wanted. This means the two choices were very close in its algorithm for fastest route, since if it wasn't it would have told me to take a U-turn and get back on its original route.
So, I happily rounded Indianapolis and then Dayton and then Columbus, and finally Cleveland, finding convenient bypasses in each case. The interstate system is truly fantastic and in each city I have gone through or around they are actively extending it by widening the bypasses, improving the intersections of interstates, some with 4 levels of fly-overs, and you feel how backward we are in Canada. Ottawa has only the Queensway, no bypasses and we channel interprovincial traffic down Rideau street and King Edward - 18 wheelers plodding through downtown Ottawa. Even in Mexico, they are adding a "second story" to some of the main thoroughfares. We clearly need two new bridges over the Ottawa river carrying a ring road around Ottawa/Gatineau, but the environmentalists want more gas wasting buses as they idle on the overpasses waiting for rush hour to start and deadheading the length of the Queensway empty. Roads are bad they say, meanwhile the 18 wheelers are spuming diesel fumes as they slowly lumber through our downtown. (Oops - rant over.)
Anyway, here I am in Macedonia, Ohio, not quite Erie, Pennsylvania, but close. At 5:30 pm between Columbus and Cleveland the rain changed to snow, although the temperature never dropped below 35°F. Tonight it is still snowing and already the car has a healthy layer of snow on it. I hope it does not accumulate too much and that the temperature causes some melting in the morning. We will see. Meanwhile, the shorts and sandals have changed to long pants, snow boots, sweater and down vest.
Gasoline is still available at $2.699 per US gallon here in Ohio. I also lost an hour here, as when I crossed from Illinois to Indiana, I entered the Eastern time zone. Had to change four clocks, the traditional one in the car and on my wrist and the "time zone" setting for the car GPS system and my laptop.
Sunday, April 15, 2007
Started early at 9:15, after a light breakfast. It was 35°F and the car had a good layer of snow on it, but it was easily brushed off as it was very wet. The heavy snowfall of the night had largely melted away and the roads were totally clear and even dry at first. At times in northern Pennsylvania, on the south shore of Lake Erie, the road was clear but the surrounding countryside looked like a winter wonderland. I stopped for a late lunch at the Carousel Mall in Syracuse, New York, and then headed home. Gasoline here in New York is sky high, $2.969 per gallon. Must be all those environmentalists at work.
After all those miles, finally, at Ogdensburg, after a local stop, one of the tires was low according to my tire monitor. After getting it pumped up and going through customs into Canada, I got home before 7 pm.
However, the next morning, the same tire was flat, so I had obviously picked up a nail in Ogdensburg. The tire guys extracted the nail and plugged the tire. Also, not too bad as an "only incident" for an almost 3,000 mile drive.
Today was 518 miles (834 km) after 8:15 hours of driving, while the whole trip came to 2,904 miles, 4,674 km, in 46:15 hours total time with the key on. Not too bad. That comes to an average of 101 km/hr or 62.8 mph. It also comes to 7 hours and 42 minutes average per day over the six days, not too onerous.
I just noticed that I started the trip in Mexico on a day with 35°C temperatures and ended the trip in 35°F. Hopefully it will warm up soon in Ottawa. Gasoline prices here in Ottawa are $1.022 per liter.
April, 2007
