Friday, December 30, 2011

Still on the scene after 6 hours.....

So now we are all tired, cranky and since the sun went down a few hours ago, cold. The Honda was gone, traveling who knows to where, supposedly to the Honda dealership. We didn't get a receipt for the car, but hey, how could anyone lose a bashed in Honda?

We had everyone help in loading the van with our stuff. The Insurance agent and even both Federalies as well as the new tow truck driver.

The Van was loaded, the dogs were inside, La suegra, bags, boxes, gifts, run over computers and cameras, jackets, dog food, stuff from every nook and cranny of the car that we were able to get to.
We knew that we would be separated from the car for awhile if not forever and we always were told of the horror stories of cars being , violated, vandalized and stuff stolen even when under guard.

We had a few hours to formulate a plan "B", since having a rent a car was out of the question. The insurance would not pay for it and getting a reasonably sized car is not as easy as ringing up the local Hertz agency.
I decided that I would sacrifice myself and head back home to Patzcuaro.

The plan would be to pick up the truck, return to Guadalajara and reload and continue our trip. After all, we walked away from the accident, why would we ruin the plans and besides we had reservations for an beach view home on the warm coast for the holidays.

Friends were also flying down to meet us, spend a week and return home, we would continue to stay and enjoy the warmer locale.

So the plan was to drop of my wife and her mom at a motel, I would then grab a cab to the Bus Terminal and hop the bus to Morelia, there take a cab home, grab a few hours of sleep and return the next morning to continue.
However......

We had to go by the Honda dealer in Guadalajara first. Even thought the car was shuttled there we were the owners and had to let then know all the contact info and figure out the despoliation of the car.

I grabbed a cab to go to the bus station, traffic in GDL on a Friday evening at 7:30 is not the best time to try and get anywhere in a hurry, especially with bumper to bumper traffic. I knew that the buses were frequent to Morelia but the last bus was around 10. I was hoping to catch an earlier one as not to spend all night travelling.

The traffic was not moving for some reason. At this rate I wouldn't get there till 9 or so, miss the last bus to Morelia and get totally screwed up.

Luckily, the cab pulled up to the station at 8:23, I ran to the desk, was able to get one of the last two seats on the 8:30 bus that pulled out exactly at 8:30.

The only delay was me, pulling out all my crap that I had stuffed into my vest. During the exodus of the car accident scene, I grabbed, keys, cell phone, cell phone charger cords, pocket knives, pens, keys to the house,flashlight, the remote gate opener which I would need if I expected to get into our property in the middle of the night, unless I wanted to walk quite a distance from our gate to the house, all of which was stuffed in the multiple pockets of the bulging and heavy vest.

The security guy was getting a little irritated by the amount of stuff I had, but finally hopped on the bus and sat down.

The next 3 hours was the best part of the day, nice comfortable bus, fairly quiet the only annoying thing was the video screen which seemed very bright in an otherwise dark coach, flashing scene to scene.

I probably didn't get more than about an hour's rest, but still happy to be in one piece and breathing, sans neck or bone damage.

The bus pulled in on time, I grabbed the cab and in the back of an speeding careening cab, I knew that my life would come to an end that day in-spite of the earlier accident.

I was having pictures in my mind of the cab in flames as he hit a wet spot on one of the many curves on the highway between Morelia and Patzcuaro. I had survived the day but would be in a twisted mass of a taxi.....

I don't mind driving fast, but going 110 to 120 km an hour in an old cab at 1 AM on crappy highway was not my idea of safe travel.

After a few more minutes we arrived, I was home, in one piece and alive....the world is good.

Our caretaker and his wife came and asked why I was there?

I told him to have the truck ready for a 7 am departure, now I would try and get a few hours sleep......

3 comments:

Calypso said...

OK loving the serialized report - quite the story thus far.

JerryL said...

I can just picture your taxi ride, a couple of times for us, left us with memories ingrained forever, along with longer knuckle from hanging on.

Don Cuevas said...

A classic epic.

Keep it coming.

Saludos,
Don Cuevas