Living Without Borders

2 ways out of Texas, pt 3.

February 18th, 2007

Billie from Billieblog, helpfully points out that it is important to check the website for traffic reports at both border crossings, either at Laredo or at the Columbia crossing. You can do so here, at the CBP.gov border wait times web-site and then decide which crossing seems best.

The reason the friend with whom I was driving and I were talking about writing a series of blog-posts about the drive is that we noticed we had quite a bit of confusion finding our way back south. Following signs for Monterrey is easy enough, but after that is where we ran into some, well, confusion, if not actual trouble.

From Monterrey you want to follow signs leading you to Saltillo on highway 57, but from there, nothing indicates the direction points further south like San Luis Potosi or Querétaro, much less Mexico City herself. The road you want to follow is 57D to Matehuala, and though I could be wrong, that is the only sign we saw indicating a city south between Saltillo and San Luis Potosi.

Also we had some confusion about whether we were ever actually on the Cuota highway. Generally the Cuota highways are better and faster than the Libre highways, but even if we were on the Libre road, it was fast and offered spectacular scenery and a near perfect surface the whole way. We saved a little on tolls though in general we do reccomend the Cuota roads.

The Secretary of Communications and Transport offers a reasonably good route planning section of their website that might give you some tips for these or other destinations. You’ll need a reasonably good handle on the Spanish language and certainly, better than average knowledge of what cities are in what states.The best thing about the website is that they give you an itemized account of mileage, travel time and tolls. The map they will generate for your trip leaves a lot to the imagination and is not particularly easy to navigate, but it can give you a general idea of the trip. That map, in combination with the perfectly good Guia Roji maps available everywhere along Mexico highways should be enough to get you where you’re going. The strangely outdated logo of Guia Roji appears here, but notice that the blindfolded traveller seems to be trusting the Guia Roji completely and voluntarily. I’d suggest that without a blindfold, and the Guia Roji in the vicinity of your front seat, you should do just fine.

Entry Filed under: Travel, Living in Mexico, San Miguel de Allende, Other Blogs We Like, Getting Around, Querétaro, Retiring in Mexico