Pacific coast Birthday – Day 80 (7413 miles)

I can’t remember if I have said that in order to find places to camp in Mexico we are mainly using 2 sources, a book called Mexican Camping and the I-Overlander website.  The book is a self published labour of love by an American couple who have been travelling in an RV for years, they have also published books on campsites in other parts of North America and Europe.  Although it is now pretty old (last published 2009) it has been an invaluable starting point in finding nice out of the way places and gives great directions (helps reduce the navigation related domestics a little).  I-Overlander often gives more up to date reports from travellers and these 2 tools work really well.  The pic above is where we spent a few days either side of my birthday, it was wonderful and we would never have found it without these info sources.

It is a little resort of holiday apartments and camping pitches in a village called Celestina Gasca, simple, quiet and as you can see not exactly crowded at this time of year!

Ceviche Birthday dinner, very nice.

Loving the lizards.

The owner Noe was and even though we have now moved on, continues to be a huge help with customs questions we have had from the company who will arrange our shipping from Vera Cruz to Cartegena.  They were telling us we had to get temporary importation documentation for all the contents of the van before they would be able to ship it for us but they could not confirm whether we had to get this from the border crossing we had entered Mexico through or at one of the many customs offices around the country.  We mentioned this to Noe and he offered to take us to the customs office in Mazatlan the closest sea port to check out the documents we have against what the shipper says we need.  As Noe is a native Spanish speaker it really helped us understand what we were told.  We were told there really should not be a problem we have a full list of what will be shipped, non of which is illegal or not for our use.  However, we were also told that Vera Cruz may do things slightly differently so we really should ask them direct!  Again Noe came to our rescue and called them for us.  We are now pretty confident that we won’t be leaving behind all our camping stuff or having to pay duty on it in Colombia.

Dealing with different countries Customs procedures always reminds me of dealing with the HMRC at home they have a way of telling you stuff that should be the correct process whilst not accepting any liability if you follow that process and someone else in their organisation wants it done slightly differently!

We were invited to Noe and Estella’s daughter’s 3rd Birthday party and enjoyed cake and a traditional Piñata.   Noelia is such a sweet girl and chats away in Spanish and English.  We had a lovely time with them all.

 

Fab sunsets every night.

We dragged ourselves away from the beach to do a bit of sightseeing in a pretty little town called Cosala.  Treated ourselves to lunch out and managed to order and get what we expected, the Spanish is improving slowly!

Not a great photo but an interesting concept.  A mobile  phone aerial disguised as a metal tree.  Much less unsightly than the usual design!

Bye for nowxxx