The countdown is on. Three days until I break my ‘Quédate en Casa’ (stay at home) and venture out into the world again. I’m feeling a little conflicted about doing it, but it’s either go stir crazy in the apartment and lose a chunk of $$$ from not using my timeshares, or venture out for a month and practice my social distancing and hand washing!
So I’ll be riding the bus system from Mazatlán to Puerto Vallarta, where I’ll be at my timeshare for a week. Then I’m off on another bus just a bit down the coast to Manzanillo. I’ll be staying a couple of days in a hostel where I booked a private room. Then another bus to Zihuatanejo for a few more days in a private room at a hostel. Next I’ll be at a timeshare room in Acapulco for a week. Then off to Puerto Escondido for a few more days, again in a private room at a hostel. After that, I’m off to Seattle where I swear I’m going to work on getting my house sold! Realistically, I’m expecting to be away from Mazatlán until March or so.
I used Amazon.com.mx to stock up on some KN-95 (they meet Chinese medical specs, not USA) masks which I’ll use on the trip. I’ll admit, they fit better and are much less steamy than my fabric ones.
Other than the exposure on the buses (my biggest concern), I’ll be sticking to my usual travel routine of a lot of walking around very few people. I’ll make sure I eat in open air restaurants, and find a beach chair off, away from the other people.
Speaking of the buses, it appears some of them (all of them?) are doing the health questionnaire like the airlines are. There’s a form online, but it doesn’t work, so I downloaded it as a pdf and just filled in one for each bus I’ll be taking. They want to know where you’ve been in the 14 days prior, and if you’re feeling ill.
Tonight we had a typical summer thunderstorm. Lightning, thunder, and poured down rain. I’m sure the usual streets flooded! And it lasted for a little over an hour! Not too many of these during our summer this year, so it was nice to have one before I leave!
Ok, in parting I’ll give you two of my favorite sources of México news. First is Flipboard. They have a ‘México’ option for a tab, and pull a wide variety of news stories pertaining to México. Next is ‘Mexico News Daily’ (https://mexiconewsdaily.com/). This is the one ‘newspaper’ that I pay to read. The mix of fluff to hard news is about 50/50 – and they don’t shy away from commenting on political items, or hiding the cartel activity.

Wish me luck on a successful exploration of México’s Pacific Coast without any problems!