Driving In Mexico

I am home from Mexico now and really missing it! There are always surprises and learning experiences on every trip I take and this one was no different. Foreign countries have so much to offer and there is never a dull moment. This was as true in Moscow as it was in Puerto Vallarta, although I think the later is a much more relaxing vacation in spite of some of the stress we went through there.

I would no sooner drive in Moscow than I would in Mexico City. Way too crazy. I thought driving in Puerto Vallarta and Guadalajara and the towns in between would be more manageable. For the most part that was the case, but it was still quite stressful and I am fairly certain I would never rent a car in Mexico again.

I drove from Puerto Vallarta to Guadalajara, which took about 6 hours. It was interesting to me (in the way that watching a train wreck might be interesting) that the Mexican drivers don’t give a rat’s ass about the rules of the road. Double yellow line? Doesn’t that mean cross at any time into oncoming traffic whether or not you can see around the next bend in the road? Of course that is what it means down there. You may remember our experience last year in the collectivo (small bus) driving through the mountains… Caroline and I were sure we were going to die. The driver was pretty sure that if he crossed himself continually and kissed the crucifix hanging from his rearview mirror every 15 minutes he would probably be spared the gruesome death of a head-on collision with a mac truck. Fortunately we didn’t die.

I guess I wasn’t really thinking about that in terms of driving ourselves around this year. Unfortunately I am not so faithful nor am I quite dexterous enough to do all that praying, crossing, while driving and paying attention to possible head-on-coming traffic. Luckily we made it through to tell the tale. There were some moments when I was really worried, but truthfully they were mostly when my friend Cory was driving. I just have to be honest in my experience men drive like they are on a racetrack. It is a competition with everyone on the road. Only in this competition we had everything to lose. Imagine driving behind a giant 16 wheeler loaded down with rebar. There was a gang of vehicles behind us. At one point there was one car between us and the truck and a car from behind us tried to pass and couldn’t make it, sneaking in just behind the truck. Cory was cursing the entire time. First he was cursing about the guy trying to pass, “you are such a fucking idiot, you are going to get yourself killed…” etc. The next thing out of his mouth was, “Jesus, you dumb ass! You could have made it just then. Go, go, go.” Eventually we were behind the truck and Cory made his move. But not until after he was about to go and I had to yell, “No, don’t do it! Please, no!” I think Cory was annoyed. But I didn’t really care. Shortly after that he made his move. I squeezed my eyes closed and said a prayer. When in Mexico do as the Mexicans, right? Well, more or less.
We lived. Thank GOD!!

And that is only a small part of the learning regarding driving in Mexico….

When Caroline and I picked up the car at USave Car Rental, we were quite concerned about how jacked up the outside of car looked. It was keyed, scratched, dented, and dinged all the way around the outside. I took a bunch of photos on my cell phone. The man renting us the car lifted the felt covering the spare, showing us the spare and tools. That was meant to “prove” we had “seen” it. Have you ever even looked at the spare when renting a car in the United States?
Another interesting thing was that we were told there wasn’t an automatic economy car available for us. They agreed to give us an upgrade. Once we were ready to go, we were told that they would call us to exchange the car for an economy in a couple of days. In no uncertain terms, Caroline said, “Absolutely not. We will not be available for any exchange as we will be out of the area.”

Returning the car a week later was less than a smooth transition. The clerk was a different guy than the one who had rented it to us. He went out to look at the car. He walked all the way around it and checked every dent. Then he opened the trunk and looked at the spare. For some reason Ken said, “He is going to tell us there is a hole in the spare.” I wasn’t really paying attention, so I wasn’t understanding why he was saying that.
When the man returned, he called me to the counter and asked me how the trip went. I stated it was great, and that there no problems at all. A big smile on my face. We did have an excellent time and we thankfully had no issues with the car at all. He said, “Well there seems to be a problem with the spare tire.” We went out and looked at it and sure enough there was a giant split in the tire. The tire had obviously been in the wheel well for ages. It was dusty, red paint rubbed on it from the car, and it was obviously the spare and not a tire we had ruined and replaced with the spare.
He said he would speak to his supervisor. His argument was that it was obviously us because I had signed a paper stating that I had looked at the spare before I took off with the car. I explained that they had basically not even shown us the spare, lifting the felt and dropping it down again before we could really even look at it.
Furthermore, we would have called if something had happened to us. And furthermore, how could they have rented us a car with a screwed up spare?! We were livid. I was determined not to pay for it. It was really the principal of it all.
They did not care one bit. It was a busted tire and someone was going to have to pay for it one way or another. I honestly think he knew we didn’t do it but someone was going to have to pay for it. His manager felt the same way. She was really bitchy. She wouldn’t give us a copy of the contract. Eventually she gave me a photocopy of the original and gave me the yellow copy I had been carrying around. Interestingly the two looked very different, the original having check marks regarding what I was agreeing to having seen, whereas the yellow copy didn’t have those marks.

In any case, after at least 20 minutes of arguing with them the manager handed me the credit card receipt I had signed a week earlier at the airport, with a total that was 800 pesos more than what I had agreed to originally. I realized it was useless to try to continue arguing in my broken Spanish mixed with angry English. We left with a promised to refute the charges. I recently received my American Express bill. There were at least 800 more pesos added to the receipt she originally gave me. I will be refuting it as well as writing a nasty letter to National Car Rental who runs USave Car Rental.

The good lesson from this whole experience is pretty much: “Don’t bother renting a car in Mexico.” You might as well just take the bus. Buses in Mexico are reliable, cheap, and you can actually relax and read a book on the way to your destination. Sounds good to me.