19 Feb 2025 3 min read blog

1/6/25-Monday-Day 31 “La Gran Reserva”

We’re on the road again early this morning and we initially backtrack a bit to Parras for supplies. First a Soriana to stock up on groceries and then a trip down some narrow side streets to fill our water cans. We wait in a Pemex parking lot while Josh and Darci look for water on the other side of town and Heather spots what she thinks to be a tortilleria. After realizing that it is in fact a restaurant and not a tortilleria she still manages to convince the nice lady to sell her a stack of 20 fresh warm tortillas for $40 pesos (about $2 USD) before we head out of town.

You never know what the selection of food will be like at the stores down here so we were quite excited to find Ranch Style Beans on the shelves!

Our drive today is relatively short though much of it is spent dodging massive potholes along with random topes in the residential and industrial areas we go through. After about 125km on pavement we turn off onto a dirt road and pull over to let some air out of the tires for the last 15km or so of our drive. The drive was beautiful. We saw several cowboys on their horses and were quickly reminded once again of how different life is here in Mexico. It makes us both smile. We also see an abundant amount of agaves in all stages of life. Heather was pretty excited seeing them, especially when they’re at the stage of looking like a giant asparagus. As we make our way through a couple of towns on our way to camp we receive plenty of intrigued stares accompanied by smiles and waves from the locals. We’ve come to recognize this as a good sign and it sets much of the group at ease to feel welcomed.

The Agave sprout these massive stalks in their last year of life, growing up to 1 foot each day

There are multiple campsites along the dirt road and after deliberating over a couple of options we settle into a spot big enough for all three of our rigs. We are once again in higher elevation at 8,000’ and find ourselves quickly breaking out our winter gear. We managed to finish dinner and clean up before the evening sun faded behind the mountain but still found ourselves inside rather early. We are both looking forward to a quiet night in this peaceful forest.