Our Trip to Colima

As we left to go to Colima on Thursday, May 20th, it started out the way it ended...with problems.  We left our house at about 7:30 a.m. with the hopes of being in Colima by around 5:00 or 6:00 p.m.  

Shortly into our trip, while we were still in Puebla, we were pulled over by the police.  This time it was because we only have one license plate in the back.  (All cars in Mexico must have two plates, but Pennsylvania only gives us one.)  We got out of that without anything but a little delay, but that was just the start of what was to come.

Once we reached the toll booth in Mexico City, I realized that we couldn't drive on Thursdays.  Mexico City has a rule, because of pollution, that there are certain days which you can't drive depending on the last number of your license plate.  When we first arrived in Mexico, the day we couldn't drive was Monday, but in December of 2003, our license plate was stolen off of our car, so I had to get a new license plate from the states, which had a new number.  Well, we forgot that since we changed plates, the day that we couldn't drive changed to Thursday, the first day of our trip.  

So we went to the toll booth, and asked them what to do.  They told us that the rule only applied within the city limits, not the state.  So, we decided to go around the city instead of going through it.  Well, the information that we received wasn't exactly accurate.  It was not just the whole city, but the whole state of Mexico!  It wasn't too long before we were pulled over.  Another missionary that was with us, purchased "permission" to drive in the city for about $20.  So we kept going on our trip.  After driving for a while longer, we were pulled over again.  This time, they told us that the "permission" that we purchased was not a valid permission.  So, we had to pay about $200 to get a "police escort" to the state limit so we wouldn't be pulled over again.

By now, we were about four hours behind schedule.  After driving for another four hours, at about 5:30 p.m., all of a sudden, we heard a thud and this weird noise.  We looked out the back window and saw this big piece of the car, about the size of a softball, bouncing in the road.  We pulled over, went back and got it along with a few other pieces.  It was a piece that connected the car's axel to the wheel.  Obviously, the car was not drivable.  We were about 100 km away from Guadalajara out in the middle of nowhere.  The Mexican Pastor that was with us and I hitchhiked to go to the next toll booth which was about 5 km up the road.  They called a tow truck for us, and we went back to wait.  We waited and waited for 4 1/2 hours before the tow truck came.  There were three cars broken down with 1 km that needed to be towed, and there was only one tow truck.  We were the third in line.  It was a long wait, and the kids were excellent!

Finally, the tow truck came, and towed us to the toll booth where we had to get another tow truck to Guadalajara.  At 2:00 a.m., we pulled in to Guadalajara.  Fortunately, the Mexican pastor driving with us grew up in Guadalajara, so we went to his parent's house to spend the night.  Well, at 2:00 a.m. we couldn't just let Caleb cry himself to sleep, so he slept with us.  The only thing was that he didn't sleep.  He was awake the whole night!  Finally, he fell asleep around 8:00 a.m.!

That day, Friday, we got a mechanic to look at our car.  He had some parts rebuilt, but as he started to put it together, realized he was missing another part.  He wasn't able to find the part anywhere!  So, I called a man from my home church who works at a Chevrolet dealership.  He had the part and shipped it Saturday morning by FedEx and told us it would be here on Monday.

So, a pastor from Guadalajara and the mechanic took us to Colima.  We finally got there on Friday at 10:30 p.m.  Since we hadn't eaten dinner yet, I told Susan, "I could skip dinner, and go right to bed!"  Well, they had other plans.  We went to the church where most of the people were waiting for us to eat dinner.  So, we finally got to the house were we were staying at around 12:30 a.m.

Well, we had a profitable time in Colima, and returned to Guadalajara on Sunday night.  Then on Monday, we waited for our car part to arrive.  We called FedEx, and they told us that it would be to the house before 6:00 p.m.  Finally, at about 6:50 p.m., they arrived with the part.  We called the mechanic, and he came over and had it fixed by about 9:30 p.m.  We were planning on returning that night, but decided to wait until Tuesday morning to return.  We made it home without any problems.