Tequisquiapan

Leaving our site we snuck past the green elephant and pulled up to the pumps at the attached Pemex to fuel both motorhome and jeep then hooked up, a procedure that seemed to fascinate the attendant. We were on the highway at 10:25, heading north to avoid the city traffic.

We were a little taken aback by the sign at the Pemex station. We didn't realise that the Aztecs had Pemex stations in the year 880!

Less than 15 Km north of the Trailer Park there is a new toll bypass, mandatory for heavy trucks enroute to Mexico City. Since Queretaro was 15 kilometres south of us anyway it seemed logical. We remembered the trip through town some years ago, and judging by the increase in traffic, it was a decision well made. Although the on-ramps and exits are still being worked on it was a relaxing and easy drive.

Approaching Del Rio, our turnoff point, we pulled over for a navigation discussion, and continued on down the freeway for a few more kilometers to the Tequis exit. (I won't say who was right and who was wrong because this is being written on her birthday.)

Following the instructions in Church and Church we made it through town and about 10 kilometers further on came upon the sign for the balneario.

This waterpark has lots of space for camping and is a very popular summer vacation spot for Mexican families, though there was only one tent there when we arrived. They began packing up mid afternoon to return to Mexico City, about three hours away by car.

Once parked and leveled and the power hooked up we had a quick bite of lunch and set off in the jeep to explore the town. We were looking for centro and hoping a few shops would be open even though it was Sunday. This is a well known Fire Opal centre and Gillian was hoping. . . after all, tomorrow would be her birthday! On the way in we spotted these wonderful drawings on the overhead.

The entrance to the main part of town looked promising but we couldn't find centro! At least the shops. Lots of houses and a few bars. One-way streets kept taking us out of town!

After two such attempts we gave up and headed for the Sunday Market which we had noticed on the main road into Tequisquiapan.

We even found a place to park right by a gap in the fence for easy access to the market. The market is obviously very new. Clean, modern, stalls which lock up at night. Wonderful basketwork, for which the area is well known besides Fire Opals.

We wandered the stalls and had a good look around but avoided temptation and made no purchases, though some items were very beautiful and the workmanship excellent, transporting them home would have been difficult. The opals would have been harder to resist. In any case, we returned to the RV Park pesos intact. Staying another day was tempting.

We had parked right in front of the speakers which had been playing loud Mexican music since our arrival, though thankfully not Rap! We returned to find all quiet and peaceful. In fact the place looked like a cemetery with concrete blocks which marked each space (and contained the electrical outlets) like rows of headstones. In the photo you can just make out the motorhome at the far end of the field. Even the jeep was lonely, parked outside of the locked campground for the night.

6:PM to the minute the power to the coach dropped off as the incoming voltage reached the high cut off point, probably when they switched pool pumps off. Meanwhile batteries were fully charged so we weren't concerned.

Later at TV News time we'll put the inverter on. 5 O'clock CHEK news from home at 7 O'clock will be the norm now until mid March! From here on we will be making good use of the digital recorder on our Shaw Direct Satellite receiver to make up for the 2 hour time difference.

Power was on and off through the evening but the inverter got us through until bed time which wasn't late as we planned for a fairly long run to Cholula next day.