Busted by the Police (Transitos) BUT, 2 awesome experiences

So we’re tooling down MX15 libre from Patzcurao to Roca Azul on Lake Chapala. As we approach Zacapu, my 2 GPS’s go nuts. The Garmin insists I return back to Tzintzuntzan where Robin had just bought 5 purses for gifts. Google Maps insists that I MUST go to 15D. So GPS was now useless. The road signs didn’t show “15” anywhere…I should have known the next town, Zacapu. I had 2 choices. I took the wrong one and ended up in el centro. A little while into this I hear a burrp from a police siren…a Transito truck pulled up to my side and said “Amigo, you are lost. Where are you trying to go? I told him and he said “follow me”. 10 minutes later and after many tight squeezes we end up at a road and I see the 15 sign. He gets out of the truck and points us the way and wishes up a safe trip. We asked him if we could buy he and his partner lunch and passed him a hundred. He said not necessary but smiled, took it and waved bye.

• As I understand it (Chris correct if not), in the food chain of law enforcement in Mexico, Transitos are at the bottom and not very well liked. They enforce traffic in towns. They are not paid well and often are accused of taking bribes. I can't validate any of this. All I can say is these two gents were awesome to us and didn't expect anything in return. 

Then, as we got off the Jiquilpan bypass we started hearing horns. Then people passing and pointing to the rear. When I could, I pulled over to see what was up. As I did a taxi pulled in front of us holding one of our rear wheel covers! What we gather is that it lost its 2 lug nut/covers and had rolled off a ways back and the taxi (with passenger) stopped and chased it down. THEN, he came after us!  He was so nice and so excited that he had recovered it and caught up with us. He tried to refuse a 100 note but we said he was a working man and that took him from his work. 

For almost the entire last month we have been in the state of Michoacán having a ball. Oh. Wait. That state is on a US and Canadian State Dept no travel warning. We haven’t had a hinky feeling anywhere but I guess we’re glad that we are now in Jalisco State. I feel so much fuzzy.

The trip was stressful. MX 15 is often narrow with no shoulders. Tree limbs whacked the RV many times because I could not get over because of incoming trucks/buses. That's the whine. The police were great to us, the taxi driver went so far beyond and above, we had no damage.

Some pictures...these do not do justice as to how narrow the road was:

This is berry (not Barry, Barry!) country. Driscoll has a huge facility here so now you know where your berries come from when you see them in Food Lion.

Definitely Berry Country

These go on for miles and miles

Ok, this sucked. They are doing a massive repaving effort around the lake on MX 15. Great! Except that they destroy the old road (which wasn't much to begin with) and traffic has to go on this for miles. Thus our stress level.

 An adventure with a great outcome.