OK, for the record, I started with great safety intentions!!! Cause, when you´re about to cross a border renowned for it´s fierce drug and people smuggling habilities, ponctuated by numerous druglord wars and assassinations (Juares is by all means the murder capital of the world with 1900 executions this year, breaking their own record of 1400 from last year… always great to set better goals!!) you do need a mínimum of precautions…

So here were my rules:

1. Spend as less time at the border crossing of Agua Pietras, renowmed for it´s drug smuggling…

2. Do not, in the 1st 200 kilomters, give a lift to anyone that demand s to come in the Jeep…

3. Follow traffic and drive deffensively…

4. Nerver, ever drive at night, the risks of bandits, donkeys and drunks are way to high…

5. Avoid big cities, and try not to drive in them…

6. Don´t cave into or offer any bribe, to anyone…

7. Stop for no one

So… I came to realise over the years that I have a certain problem with rules and authority, including my own. So I always come with the same mindfram: if you´re gonna break a rule, might as well break them all, as you´re in deep shit anyway from breaking the first one.

So heres what happened!

1. I couldn´t spend no time in Agua Pietras, as i needed to deal with Mexican bureaucracy and get an entry visa, an import permit for the vehicle, and wait in line on Mexican Time. What should have been a 3 minute ordeal soon became a more tan 1 hour task that would´ve put Gandhi to test is pacifism!

2. Now, the lift thing, I left Agua Pietras with no Mexican Money, cause it took me forever to find the road that leeds out of there, and once I was out I didn´t want to go back… it´s a real shithole!! So in the next town, I stopped at the gas station ans asked for a bank… at which the employee proceded to ask his ¨friend¨ the local bootleg cd seller, who´s neck is coverd with tatoos of spiders and marks (which reminded me of marks you make after each killing you did in your life) to show me the way… Offer that I decided was genuine and safe enough, and accepted to take him in my truck, in a town in the middle of nowhere… Nice fella, been clean of drugs for 3 years, and found God…

3. Ok, traffic, either too slow or too fast to follow…and driving deffensively is great in theory… but in a town of 800 000, nearly imposible!! So son decided that offence is the best way to win, and deffence would lead me nowhere. So invented my own style of drivng: Deffenattack!

4. I did drive at night, but only to follow Rafael, a guy a I met 2 hours earlier, who brought me to his house..

5. First city I drove in was more tan 800 000 people, with no urban planning whatsoever!!

6. Ok, not a big one but…In Agua Pietra, the custom lady charged me 1 US dollar for 1 photocopy. She was over 60, old and frail, asked me for the dollar with a huge smile…. And that was in the customs building, next to the sign that said: BRIBE OFFERERS WILL BE PROSECUTED, PLEASE DENOUNCE BRIBES IMMEDIATELY, with a big red phone next to the sign… that sits right in front of the person asking for he mini bribe!!!

7. Stop for no one… how naive of me, between random custom inspections, military check points, toll road blocks and various objects clogging the way, how the hell am I suppose to stop for no one!!!!!

In fairness, I´m a victim here, the rules kinda broke themselves!!

WELCOME TO MEXICO, REMEMBER TO ALWAYS YIELD TO THE GUY CARRYING THE M-16!!!