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I said I'd get this up here, and some of you are being pushy. ;) So here's Friday and Saturday, the trip down...although as I type this my mind is on something else, and I'm tired. So forgive me for rambling
We left Friday night the 10th around 8:30. The drive down was fairly uneventful. I think we arrived at Eagle Pass around 4 AM, I'm not sure I was sleeping until someone woke me at 5 when the truck stop restaurant opened to serve us breakfast. For those of you who don't know there's a baptist missionary family that moved to the town where we stay while we are down there. They had arranged to meet us at the border to renew their visas at the same time. So they joined our caravan.
We made it through the border fairly quickly, and our stop at the frontera to register the vehicles was fairly easy as well. In order to save himself the paperwork, an attendant allowed us to fill out the permits for the vehicles as normal, and the visas just had each of the driver's information on it, and the number of persons riding in each vehicle. This instead of having each of the 32 people in our caravan come in and fill out the paperwork. So we filled out our paperwork and went on our way. About 20 minutes down the road, the missionaries' vehicle threw a tread. Luckily, the lord was on our side, and the steel belts held, no air was lost, and they were able to pull off the side of the road and change the tire without major incident. We drove for another couple of hours, then we had lunch on the side of the road near Monclova. Then it was back on the road.
I stopped at Cuatro Cienegas with one of the vans to check out the site. For those who haven't heard about my trips before, this is a place where natural springs of brackish water bubble up into several hundred pools in the area. Several of the pools have been marked as protected sites and are now off limits to swiming to avoid contaminating the waters where a small, indigenous fish dwells cut off from the rest of the world by a desert and mountains on all sides. One such pool is easily accessible off of the highway to San Pedro. It's called the Poza Azul, or "Blue Pool" named for the deep hue the minerals in the crystal clear water give to the pond which is about 15 feet at it's deepest. It's a wonder to behold. I don't have the words to describe it, I'll have pictures to share later, hopefully.
We arrived in San Pedro around 5:30, shortly after the rest of the caravan due to a problem with the trailer that delayed them. We had just enough time to finish unloading the trailer when Elaina, the owner of our hotel, had finished cooking us dinner. I love this woman's hospitality. We only pay her for the hotel rooms, but she sees it as her mission to make sure we are in good care. I've taken to calling her "mom" while I'm down there. She's always bringing more food to us and telling us to have more. I ate my dinner out in her courtyard, her green thumb is truly amazing. The courtyard has several papaya trees, a lot of leafy vegetation, and three gorgeous vines that climb up the two stroy ediface that is the bulding with the rooms for rent. This time of year they are in bloom with these wonderfully aromatic flowers. (I hoped to grab some pictures to post, from some friends, hopefully I'll have them soon.) The rest of the evening consisted of hold a quick meeting setting the expectations for the next few days of those who had not been on the trip before, and greeting the preachers and families from the area whom we see every year, and have become close friends. It's always great to catch up with friends you haven't seen in a year.