Palomas, Mexico

Monday we went to Mexico!

From the Pancho Villa State Park it is a quick 3 mile drive south down the highway. Once at the border we parked in the lot and walked into Mexico. All very easy...

Since we had done this before we knew where to go. Well we sort of knew where to go. We knew where the Pink Store was - pretty hard to miss. 

It's PINK!

But we were looking for Dr. Karla - a dentist I had read about on the internet.

hmmmmm

Either this area has grown since we were here last or our memories are a bit off. 

So we headed into the Pink Store to see if we could get some info there. Good news! Dr. Karla's office is in the Pink Stores courtyard.

On we went.

Bad news - no openings for today - not until Wednesday. We didn't really want to stay in this area that long - it would mean paying for 2 more nights at the park. So we carried on.

The border crossing from the USA side.

Derek FINALLY got his boots shined in Mexico - he thinks about doing that each time we cross over - I'm glad it finally happened. 

While that was going on Cassia and I enjoyed our bakery treats.

Two bolillos and 3 pastries for $1.50. They were good but not great so we didn't go back for more even those the price was great!

WoW! George did a great job for $3 - we gave him $5.

Looking south into Palomas - NOT where tourists want to go. Best to stay near the border.

Pancho Villa Commemorative Statue.

George sent us to a dentist that was 'cheap' and 'fast'. Hmmmm that should have been a red flag I guess but 'cheap' works for us. So we headed on down to the dentist to find out it was $25 each for a cleaning. We knew that some of the others were charging $40. Well, we did get our cleanings - cheap and fast - a little to much of both we think now. What would we have gotten for the $40. We'll never know unless we try again next year. We weren't totally thrilled with the cleaning job but they are cleaner - sort of.

After that we headed back to the Pink Store. We had seen a guitar there for Cassia that we wanted to pick up before we left. The Pink Store is a one stop border shop. Every type of Mexican souvenir is here.  I'm so glad that I have probably bought each of the Mexican things at least once - I no longer feel the need to buy anything.

Cassia's new little guitar that she can practice on BEFORE the ukulele.

Since our groceries were pretty scarce back at the trailer (no stores in Columbus) we decided to treat our selves to a meal at the Pink Store. Very good and we were stuffed for $20 including the tip.

And so that was our little trip into Mexico for the year. Certainly much different then planned when we left home back in October. Back then we had big plans of driving to the Yucatan Peninsula! 

Later when Derek returned from his walk with Roofous around the park he mentioned that he had been reading on the bulletin board that the Mayor of Palomas had recently been kidnapped and killed, a man was found with a knife in his chest and thrown in the central square with the word narc on his shirt, and a pit with 20 bodies had been found just outside of Palomas.

hmmmmm - well not much different from most of the other stories we hear about Mexico.

Lots of people warn us about going into Mexico - and of course one has to be careful when they travel - but we have never had a problem in all the years we have travelled close to the border or have crossed over. 

We just wouldn't have gone any further then we did......

Hey - I just found another blogger who stopped in a couple of weeks ago - check out Chappy Trails for some more pics.

Adios!

Teresa

Today's Interesting Link: So - ready for ANOTHER cooking blog.....sorry - I just can't get enough of them! Can you believe I have 321 'likes' on my fb page! This is one of them - the blog Two Peas and Their Pod...

Be a Fan