Tuesday, August 7, 2012

Mexico experience and Marfa gliding field

So here we are, 500 miles later in El Paso, Texas. We departed Uvalde as planned this morning and headed west on the US-90. We decided to take the longer route to El Paso to be able to experience vicinity of Mexico without the need of travelling there. Eventually we got closer than we would have expected.

el Zigsteros

The Rio Grande river has a dam which is the border crossing point to Mexico at the same time. We talked to the border protection officers there and indeed they let us walk on the dam and physically cross the Mexican border! So we were in Mexico and made a big U-turn before the Mexican border protection. Amazing experience.

Amistad dam

left US, right Mexico

this buddy doesn't care much about borders

still in US
left leg in USA, right leg in Mexico

Mexico in the background

where is Ziggy now?

he decided to walk back to the US border checkpoint

Another reason for picking this route was the fact that we wanted to check out Marfa airfield - the place where the very first gliding word championships in US were held in 1970. Not much was going on at the airfield but you could see it's all maintained in a very good condition and gliding is still happening there although Marfa is a tiny town (population less than 2000) in the middle of nowhere.

Ziggy loves our rental because it's a Subaru

unfortunately it's Monday

Marfa airfield, weather and Zig

memorial at the airfield

first time we see this sign airport related instead of a highway

Driving so close to the border is very exciting indeed. There are check points on the highway where you have to present your passport and answer some questions every now and then. There are also smooth dirt roads running parallel to the runway and very many border protection vehicles looking for foot prints in the sand.

We finally made it to El Paso, had dinner and are getting ready to sleep to hit the road in the morning again. The destination is not 100% set as yet but we'll be heading north through New Mexico.

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