February 12, 2014

by Cathy Liu in Tapachula, Mexico

We entered Mexico through Nogales on January 9th and exited at the boarder of Ciudad Hidalgo on February 9th. Mexico is a beautiful country with various climates and terrains. We drove through desserts, beach towns, plaines, and mountains. Our path started in a desert climate where temperature dropped below freezing at night, as we traveled southeast, we stopped by Hermosillo, Guaymas, the beautiful beach town Mazatlan in the green state of Sinaloa, small village Jala, the second largest city full of tasty foods Guadalajara, cultured San Luis Potosi, capital Mexico City, mole producing Oaxaca, and border city Tapachula. Altogether, we drove roughly 1900 miles in Mexico, stopped a fortnight unexpectedly due to car and health problems, had one teammate reunited with us, and one teammate decided to return home.

Taco seems to the consistent food throughout the country. Also, we have not visited any restaurant or food stand that didn’t serve corn products. Grilled meat on some sort of corn wrap is most popular form of street food, taco, tostada, quesadilla, huarache, burrito, gordita, flaunt, and many more that I forgot the names of are all meat served on top or wrapped in some dough made with corn flour and then served with some kind of salsa. Up north, tacos are often made with hearty chunks of meat and selections of vegetables and salsas are served on the side, which is noticeable different from tacos in central/south region where meat is marinated longer for flavors to soaked in and vegetables come on top of the taco.

People in the service industry have been very friendly and helpful. When our ambulance couldn’t fit in a hotel’s garage, recommendations for bigger garages else where were always given. Unfortunately, we were unable to find coin-operated laundry machines on the road, so I washed all the clothes by hand.

Everyone had good times in Mexico, we have gone through one country, there are still 12 more countries to go.