When we retreated to San Cristobal de las Casas from Mision Surf we had a lot of work to do. We had some stuff to do on our visas for Ecuador and we were trying to ship the van from Mexico to Ecuador as well.
As far as the visas went, it was a matter of ordering some official copies of documents and getting fingerprinted for FBI and Washington State criminal checks. Our visa company in Cuenca, Gringo Visas, found a place to get fingerprinted which was a nice walk across San Cristobal. Along the way we had to print some forms and print the blanks for the fingerprint forms which are on thicker paper.
The printing was interesting as we needed to buy the required heavier weight paper from one shop whose printer wasn't working and then have them printed at another shop whose printer was working. Once we had everything printed out we headed to the Immigration Office and explained what we needed. They told us that they didn't fingerprint people for their Ecuadorian visas, so we asked to borrow the ink pad to do our own fingerprints. They seemed to find it entertaining as they watched us and when we were done our hands looked like oompa loompas from the ink, but we were printed. We took all of the forms and DHL'd them to the US and thought that was the hard part finished. Man, were we wrong.
We had been recommended an agent in Vera Cruz to ship our van and contacted him immediately. He said he was working on it and then we never heard back from him. After a week we contacted other freight forwarders and even attempted going around them to arrange our own shipping to no avail. Finally, Jackie, our sister-in-law, recommended a woman in Cuenca who helped people ship their belongings to Ecuador, so we contacted Vicki.
She got on it and soon found that, although Ecuador was open for international travel, shipping and importing vehicles to Ecuador was not. Even the Ecuadorian owners of the largest supermarket chain couldn't get their three cars imported. With that revelation everything changed.
We had always planned on selling the van once we were done with the trip, but the trip was not finished yet. We still want to drive to the end of the Pan-american Highway, but realized that with Covid our drive is likely on hold for a long while. We got a quote from Vicki on shipping the contents of the van and posted our home and travel partner, Vincenzo, for sale on the Pan-American Travelers page on Facebook. The next day it was sold! We actually could have sold it three times in that day as it turns out. The buyer agreed to pick it up in Texas which fit our plan perfectly.
Vicki, the shipping lady, said Houston was our best bet to ship our belongings from so we headed from San Cristobal on a Sunday afternoon at about 2 PM and drove north. The first night, with few options, we stayed at a hotel in a town that was like a huge truck stop. The spotless room cost about $18 a night and the only "win" we could find was a bottle of Boone's Peach wine that was 4% alcohol so no chance of a good buzz.
In the morning we were out early and headed for a town that was on the Gulf of Mexico where we hoped to stay by the beach. When we got there the beaches were still closed so we drove another 3 hours to Ciudad Victoria and found a nice hotel with a restaurant for dinner and breakfast. The drive was about 12 hours so we were whooped.
The next morning we were in no hurry since the Matamoros/Brownsville border was only a bit over 3 hours away. We had some confusion on the Mexican side finding the building where we sign out of Mexico and cancel our temporary import permit for the van which allows us to get our $400 deposit back since we were told to look for a building with red and green painted line and there were five of them. After a sad attempt by a female Mexican cop to extort $45 for taking a wrong turn (even though there was no signage) we were able to find the right place and get formally signed out and headed to Brownsville.
The line was crazy long as the rain began. The Brownsville crossing had only two lanes going through and one was for rapid pass holders which we were not. Two hours later we were welcomed back to the US and headed up to Corpus Christi.
When we got there we were hungry and went to the Executive Surf Club for dinner and beer. There was nobody wearing masks in the place! No servers or patrons and there was even a bridal shower going on. We didn't linger after dinner and headed to the hotel instead.
The next morning we headed to Houston but stopped for breakfast in Victoria Texas where at least the servers and a few patrons were wearing masks. Once in Houston we had to buy storage bins and some other stuff and found a park with a tree to work under and emptied the van out. Every item that went into each bin had to be itemized and each bin labeled. How long could it take? Well, we ran out of bins after 5 1/2 hours and headed to the hotel for the night for delivery pizza and beer we bought on the way.
In the morning I bought additional bins and somewhere along the line we elected to stay another night to attempt a recovery. We finished our packing and drove to the warehouse to deliver our stuff to the shippers. We ended up with 2 pallets of stuff - 27 items. It was like a huge weight lifted off of us and the van as we drove away from the warehouse. An early dinner at a wine bar was called for so we cleaned up and went out. It was nice to see that the wine bar/restaurant was practicing social distancing with limited tables well spaced, everyone wearing masks, and on-line menu only. Dinner was great with maybe the best brussell sprouts we were ever served.
The next morning we were off to San Antonio for - among other things - a PCR Covid Test, which looked easy on the internet but proved to be anything but. The first place sent us to the CVS who informed us that they only tested residents and had us call a hotline number that always hung up on us at the point where we said we wanted to schedule a test. We were disappointed, but decided that we would have to wait until we landed and get tested and quarantine in a hotel room in Quito for 14 days before being allowed to continue to Cuenca. We posted as much on Facebook and the community rose to the challenge.
I woke early to see an email from Jackie that her friend in San Antonio had found some pop up testing locations for that day - Saturday. We chose the one with the longest hours in Adkins Texas and got there at 7:45. They began at 8 and at 10:45 we were driving away. That left 4 days before our flight so we had hope that our results would arrive in time.
Off we went to Austin where our new tabs for the van were mailed and where we could finish a little shopping for stuff. The tabs made it, but the mailman didn't deliver them for whatever reason and we couldn't wait for a re-delivery on Monday as we were due in the Dallas area, so we contacted the buyer who was able to get replacements in Washington easily.
In the Dallas area we finalized our luggage and donated clothes and food, delivered our beloved van and hit the sack for a 2:15 AM rising to get to the airport at 3 for a 7 AM flight. Of course the United counter didn't open until 5:30, but check in was easy and we were off to Houston where we hoped the test results would be available. They were not as we boarded the Houston to Quito flight at 10 AM and still not when we landed in Quito at 3PM.
After hope we were back to accepting that we would spend 14 days in a hotel room in Quito. They took our temperatures and tested our pulse ox and asked if we had test results. We explained that we were tested, but had no results yet so they took us to an area to be tested, where 15 minutes later we were proven negative for Covid and asked where we wanted to quarantine! We said at home in Cuenca and they stamped our stuff and sent us on our way.
If you read the last post then you are up to date. Peace and love peeps and more soon....
