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 I always look forward to traveling to Guadalajara to be with Alma’s family and mine. The new direct flights between Bakersfield and Guadalajara has been a good thing for everyone in the valley and in Guadalajara. It was a connection that needed to be made for a long time. It brought our people and cultures closer and the trip is only about 3 hours. The cost of airfare is very inexpensive and before you know it, you’re in another country, enjoying the sights and speaking another language.

That other language is not actually a barrier to those that do not speak Spanish since a great majority of people that live there speak English. Those that have traveled south of the border, Tijuana, Mexicali, Ensenada and Rosarito can tell you that their English is better than our Spanish. Vacation locations such as Cancun, The Mayan Peninsula, Puerto Vallarta, Mazatlan, Cabos, Acapulco and other resort towns may be in another country but you won’t have a problem communicating with anyone.

Okay, now back to my last trip to Guadalajara. Since I met Alma, we have traveled to Guadalajara at least a couple times a year to be with family and friends. How did we get around? Well, we actually purchased a Nissan Sentra a while back and drove it down there so we can have something to drive and get around whenever we go there. I know, I know, I had sworn that I would never drive to Guadalajara again but I have sworn that I would not do other things too and I end up doing them. Zoom ahead 25 years from the past of 1982 and I was very surprised that Highway 15 takes us directly to Guadalajara just as Mexicana Airlines also takes you there directly. The bad thing about flying is that you don’t get to see the Mexican countryside and make stops whenever you want.

Well, we didn’t just jump in our car and start driving. Preparation is of the utmost importance. Because of the bad reputation by the news media that Mexico has a lot of crime on the highways and cities, I thought I’d use a lot of caution on this trip. Alma has driven throughout Mexico all her life and she never had a problem with anything or anyone. She explained and I understood that there is crime everywhere. Murder, Robbery, and Carjackings are not restricted. We have that in every city in USA. Just pick up the local newspaper in Bakersfield or any other city. Well, thinking I knew better, I felt I had to prepare for this trip.

Being the type of person that I am, I always want to know where I’m at. I knew my GPS was not going to work in Mexico so I did the next best thing. I went online to Virtual Earth and Google Earth and printed out numerous maps of the Mexican highway we were going to travel and all the towns and villages we were going to drive by or stop while on our trek to Guadalajara. This was just as good as having a GPS system in my car.

After packing our bags for the duration and making sure we had our passports and turned off the iron and fed the fish, we headed south. We knew we were only going to drive in the daytime because night is for sleeping. So I want everyone to understand that whatever I say about Mexico is from my experiences and my opinions. We know that everyone has different opinions and their experiences may be different.

On the first day, we drove to LAX in separate cars to drop one off at the LAX long term parking lot. I was flying back in a few days to LAX and needed a car to drive home to Bakersfield. No, I was not able to get Mexicana plane tickets directly back to Bakersfield. So after parking the Chrysler and repacking the Nissan, we headed east towards, Nogales, Arizona where we spent the night. After breakfast the next morning, we headed south across the border where we entered into Mexico and into the Mexican border city of Nogales, Sonora. We stopped and obtain the required permits for the car which are good for 6 months and exchanged dollars into pesos.

As we headed south, we had a choice of traveling Hwy. 1 which is the old highway which I traveled in 1982 or the new toll Highway 15. We were told that if anything bad happens, it would happen on the old highway since it is a two lane hwy. with one lane each way. Our choice was the toll road, Hwy. 15, which turned out to be a perfectly maintained 4 lane highway. This highway was not crowded like most freeways in the states but it did have an occasional truck and trailer and passenger sedans.

I guess the reason for the great condition of the highway was due to the money paid at the toll stops throughout our trip. I believe there were about 21 or so stops along the route and the tolls ranged from 19 pesos in Magdalena, Sonora to the highest being 160 Pesos in Acaponeta, Nayarit. We figured 10 pesos are worth about $1.00 so throughout our trip south we paid $1330 Pesos in tolls which come to about $133.00 American dollars. So if you consider a trip south via car, consider the toll costs and the gasoline stops.

The second day took us from Nogales, AZ to Culiacan, Sinaloa. Culiacan has a bad reputation for narcotic and drug dealers but so do a lot of cities in USA. It was dark and we were tired and got lucky enough to find a nice hotel in Culiacan (comparable to a 4 star hotel here). After a nice dinner at the hotel restaurant, we crashed till the next morning. We had previously decided that we were not going to rush our trip so we had a nice breakfast, huevos con frijoles, con papitas with freshly cooked tortillas de arina and Mexican fruta which included Mangos, papaya, piña and melon. Tienes hambre verdad?

On the third day, we ended up in Mazatlan, Sinaloa, cruised the tourist areas for a little bit and stopped to have lunch. We knew we wanted to get to Guadalajara sometime this day so after lunch, we headed south through the state of Nayarit and finally arriving into the city limits of Guadalajara at around 6:00 p.m. Mexican time. There was a two hour difference from our Pacific Time here and it was just getting dark. We were glad to finally arrive at Alma’s house in Guadalajara.

Although our trip lasted about 27 hours of driving time (3 days and 2 nights), and cost us $133 dollars in tolls plus the fuel, hotels and meals, it was a good experience and well worth it. The Nissan handled perfectly, the seats were very comfortable, the music on the IPOD was very enjoyable and we traveled at top speeds that varied from 110 to 140 km or more (I’m not admitting to my speeds) but I was going a good clip and my radar detector warned me of any unusual noises. Oh yeah, my GPS maps worked perfectly and I always knew where I was at. The best part of it was that we did not observe any criminal activity anywhere.

Stay tune for part IV