The Trip Home

Before I begin this story, we are going to have another game. Look at the picture below and venture a guess as to what Nolan and Josh are doing.



Okay, so here is the story. I am still relating the events of last Saturday. After descending from the waterfall and leaving the park, Nolan got a call from the office. While Al and I waited for him, we began to discuss how we were going to get back to my apartment. It was beginning to get dark, and we were on a mountain side in the middle of the country, about 45 minutes from town. We decided we could probably catch a cab back to the main road and then try to take the same bus that we used to get out to the falls earlier that day. While Nolan and I threw food at a bunch of ducks, Al went into the hotel to see if someone could call a cab for us. I don't know who brought up the idea first, but when Al returned, Nolan and I were considering trying to hitch a ride back to town with someone who might be leaving the mountain. Al informed us that a worker at the hotel had volunteered to call a cab for us, but he was going to charge us 12 pesos. That's a little more that a dollar, and I decided it just wasn't worth it. We all looked at each other, and unanimously voted to hitch-hike our way back to Monterrey.

I know what some of you are thinking - that I must be completely insane. I mean, we are talking about hitch-hiking...in Mexico. I assure you that it was safer than 95% of places in the U.S. Anyway, as we started walking down the mountain I wasn't so sure that anyone would pick us up. The first couple of cars that passed us waved and a few people laughed, but no one even slowed down. Next, we saw a couple of pickup trucks passing by, and tried to flag them down, but to no avail. I remember saying, "It would be perfect if we could ride in the back of a pickup truck." Less than one minute later, two pickups came down the mountain, and the first stopped ahead of us and the passenger motioned for us to hop in the back. We quickly jumped in and were on our way. Descending the mountain was a blast. The wind felt awesome, and the thrill of hitchhiking home was a perfect compliment to the other events of the day. As we neared the main road, the driver rolled down his window and asked me where we wanted to go. I began to tell him in Spanish, and he quickly asked me (in English) if I spoke English. It turns out that our drivers were from the U.S. and they spoke better English than Spanish. They were also going back to Monterrey, and he told us to just tap on the back window when we wanted to get out.

We spent the next half hour relaxing in the back of the pickup, laughing about how fun and crazy our day had been, and trying to figure out where we were going to eat. Bungee jumping and losing your underwear to a waterfall can really make a person hungry! Anyway, when we got back to town, the truck (which was traveling with another truck behind us) dropped us off at Wal-Mart, which was perfect because I needed to go to Sam's. We thanked the guys and gave them a little gas money, and then did some shopping. After taking a cab back to my apartment, we had an excellent dinner at Paco's Tacos, and then watch videos and looked at pictures from our adventures.

As crazy as last Saturday was, it was only the opening act for Sunday. I will tell you about that in my next post.