Mexico 2012 RV Trip - Day 91 - March 26, 2012 Puerto Penasco - Scottsdale, Arizona

Last night the wind blew and blew – so hard that I thought we would end up in Kansas! We didn’t, but the RV rocked and the windows  had a fine film of dust covering them!

We had planned to dump our holding tanks, but the water outlet at dump station didn’t work so we had to wait.  We finally got on the road about 8am this morning heading for the border. We stopped at the PEMEX and used the last of our pesos for gas. That made it official, we had to go home.

Halfway through the trip Tobey began telling folks that we were on the “all you can see of Mexico in 90 days trip.” Yesterday he said he was cheated because even though we are on Day 91, the first four days were in the US getting to our border crossing in Texas. I think he is laying the groundwork for the next trip.

One of the disadvantages of staying at Puerto Penasco before crossing the border back to the US is that you must first drive north to Sonoyta, then drive south 26km to the Mexican immigration station to return your visa and vehicle paperwork. The drive wasn’t bad, but it took us 3-1/2 hours to clear immigration – all because of our “beloved” scooter!

We have never checked the VIN numbers on our vehicles against the titles. When we registered the scooter in Colorado, they made a typo error in the original paperwork, so they don’t match. The Mexicans wanted us to take the scooter back to Colorado, have the mistake corrected, then return to the border WITH the scooter, and present the correct paperwork. The Mexican government is adamant against you taking a vehicle to Mexico and selling it, so they want to verify that what you take into the country is what you take home with you. Finally, after several phone calls and talking to different people, they wrote up an “exception” to allow us to take the scooter home and give us our $400 deposit back.

Back to Sonoyta, we needed to fill the RV so we stopped at the first PEMEX station and they told us they took credit cards. Well, they do, IF their machine was working. We ended up paying in cash because their machine declined THREE of our credit cards. Geez. Phone calls to the credit card companies let us know that they never sent the charges through! By now it it 2pm, and we are both starving, so we needed to stop for lunch. We missed all of the taco stands and finally spotted a Subway. Not exactly our first choice for our last meal in Mexico, but stomachs prevailed, so we stopped.

On to the US customs and immigration stop at Lukeville, Arizona. We arrived and handed the border agent our passports and LONG itemized list of everything we purchased in Mexico. He glanced at it, said he didn’t see any illegal aliens listed, so we were free to go! No vehicle inspection, no food inspection, just “welcome home.”
In Arizona we passed through Organ Pipe National Monument and headed north on AZ Hwy 85. It was strange to go through Ajo, Arizona and not have to stop for topes! North of Ajo, we entered the Barry M. Goldwater Air Force Base area and watched as some planes were doing practice bombing runs in the desert. It was cool to see the rockets launch and then the smoke/dust rise when they hit the ground! A little further down the road we watched as soldiers were parachuting out of a plane.

We drove …. miles today and arrived back in Scottsdale about 5:30 pm. Our moms and our dog, Penny, met us at the park. It was a great trip, but it is good to be back among our family. Tomorrow we will try to summarize details and get a final wrap up.