<done from mem­ory 8/30/10>

Mex­ico has never seemed like a larger coun­try than when I was dri­ving balls to the wall try­ing to get out of it.

I left Coatza­coal­cos early, and drove most of the day.   I don’t remem­ber much about that day other than bad roads (MX has huge traf­fic bumps — much higher than the US, and on main (non-toll) roads. )  Along the road, I had a decent lunch at a water­front open air restau­rant.  It was very fresh, cute wait­ress, and very over­cast.   Oth­er­wise, there was some rain, and I passed quite a few water­front RV parks (get­ting closer to the US?)

Drove through Tampico, and into a lit­tle sub­urb called Altamira.  I found a hotel on the main drag that offered park­ing (that should sound famil­iar.)  It wasn’t too bad, and I the TV had all the chan­nels, so it seemed appro­pri­ate.    Once I got there, and show­ered, the sun was down.  I walked down to a Taco cart and got a few tacos.  It was pretty nice, and a decent end to MX for me.   In the morn­ing, I got an early start, and watched two high school lovers check into my hotel.