20th - 22nd April 2011- Campeche - Nautico Club - (£17.50 per night)
After Cancun, we drove 3 hours to a place called Valladolid, an inland town, famous for its sausage! We stayed in a place that had its own ceynote, a cave with a natural swimming pool with a ole for light in the roof. It was eerie in there with bats but so cool and the water clear and cold. Later we went into the town to sample the sausage, spicy and thin, enjoyed it.
The next day we drove to Merida and then South towards Campeche. About halfway in between the 2 cities we heard a massive bang, our two back tyres on the passenger rear had exploded and were in tatters. Interesting, we only had one spare! Also our levelling jacks had stopped working and we had no other jacks. Luckily not too long after a Canadian RV passed us and stopped. Bear in mind, this is only the 2nd RV we have seen on the road in Mexico. He promised to stop at the nearest place and send help. This was on a very busy road, but only 2 lanes, no hard shoulder and the trucks were flying past us…we had no cones and had to tie a “flag” to the stepladders in the end to stop the cars and trucks hitting us. It was so hot on that road I was getting redder and redder and Adele’s flip flops were melting, oh and they hadn’t long burnt the bracked on the side so we were black from the ash. About 45 minutes later a man came with cones, a jack and tools but still took him about 3 hours to get the tyres off and the only spare on. We then went to his garage. He did not have another tyre of the right size so he fitted a slightly smaller one with our good spare. So we hit the road again but by this time it was getting dark, There was funny noise coming from the tyres so eventually we decided to stop at a little restaurant. Our spare tyre was just about to burst, it had no tread on at all, gosh if that blew again in the dark…we were I the middle of nowhere and we would have had to leave the RV. Anyway luckily the man had a tyre “garage” thing next to it. He had old tyres and tools for getting rims off etc. He let us stay there and the next morning rang the police who rode around the local area looking for tyres for us. (All this by the way, no one spoke English but we managed). They found one tyre so we limped into Campeche, driving 15 miles an hour and then found a Continental dealer who had the right tyre in stock. We have realised that we play Good Cop Bad Cop very well and reduced the price of the new tyres by 600 pesos each (£30). Me amiga (that’s Adele) wants check precio) and then he caves. We have now replaced all the tyres on the RV since we bought it and now have 2 spares, not taking any chances.
We are now in a very upmarket resort with the wealthy Mexican’s, enjoying Semana Santa, overlooking the Mexican Gulf by the infinity pool. All is good again and the levelling jacks are working again and new tyres for our journey to Pelanque.
Happy Easter everyone!
After Cancun, we drove 3 hours to a place called Valladolid, an inland town, famous for its sausage! We stayed in a place that had its own ceynote, a cave with a natural swimming pool with a ole for light in the roof. It was eerie in there with bats but so cool and the water clear and cold. Later we went into the town to sample the sausage, spicy and thin, enjoyed it.
The next day we drove to Merida and then South towards Campeche. About halfway in between the 2 cities we heard a massive bang, our two back tyres on the passenger rear had exploded and were in tatters. Interesting, we only had one spare! Also our levelling jacks had stopped working and we had no other jacks. Luckily not too long after a Canadian RV passed us and stopped. Bear in mind, this is only the 2nd RV we have seen on the road in Mexico. He promised to stop at the nearest place and send help. This was on a very busy road, but only 2 lanes, no hard shoulder and the trucks were flying past us…we had no cones and had to tie a “flag” to the stepladders in the end to stop the cars and trucks hitting us. It was so hot on that road I was getting redder and redder and Adele’s flip flops were melting, oh and they hadn’t long burnt the bracked on the side so we were black from the ash. About 45 minutes later a man came with cones, a jack and tools but still took him about 3 hours to get the tyres off and the only spare on. We then went to his garage. He did not have another tyre of the right size so he fitted a slightly smaller one with our good spare. So we hit the road again but by this time it was getting dark, There was funny noise coming from the tyres so eventually we decided to stop at a little restaurant. Our spare tyre was just about to burst, it had no tread on at all, gosh if that blew again in the dark…we were I the middle of nowhere and we would have had to leave the RV. Anyway luckily the man had a tyre “garage” thing next to it. He had old tyres and tools for getting rims off etc. He let us stay there and the next morning rang the police who rode around the local area looking for tyres for us. (All this by the way, no one spoke English but we managed). They found one tyre so we limped into Campeche, driving 15 miles an hour and then found a Continental dealer who had the right tyre in stock. We have realised that we play Good Cop Bad Cop very well and reduced the price of the new tyres by 600 pesos each (£30). Me amiga (that’s Adele) wants check precio) and then he caves. We have now replaced all the tyres on the RV since we bought it and now have 2 spares, not taking any chances.
We are now in a very upmarket resort with the wealthy Mexican’s, enjoying Semana Santa, overlooking the Mexican Gulf by the infinity pool. All is good again and the levelling jacks are working again and new tyres for our journey to Pelanque.
Happy Easter everyone!
