Travel with Kevin and Ruth: First day adventures

Tuesday, November 11, 2025

First day adventures

I figured we might get on the road around 10:00am, but that turned out to be too ambitious. It was just after 12 noon by the time we got going! A very late start for us.

We weren't going that far... only 153 kms (95 miles), but it's a three hour drive!

We stopped for gas in our nearby town of El Arco, but their payment system was down and it was cash only. Fortunately, Igor still had 1/3 of a tank so lots to get us to the next station. Filled up at 23.99 pesos ($1.83 CAD) per liter. That's about $4.95 USD per gallon.

And Igor's tank holds a lot of gallons. The bill was 2,240 pesos ($170 CAD, $122 USD).

Scenery along the way.

Corn.

More scenery.

Not much traffic , but a lot of topes (speed bumps). It was slow going.

I had read about a campground called La Burbuja. That's the Spanish word for "bubble", but we're not quite sure where the name comes from. Also, I had read that there is a steep and narrow track leading up to the campground...

Igor had no problem crawling up the hill.

Almost there.

We had stopped for gas, and stopped for a late lunch along the way. We arrived at 4:25pm. Definitely a late arrival for us!

This campground is mostly used by rock climbers. There are a couple of small bedrooms and cabins for rent. With a well equipped shared kitchen facility, and clean bathrooms and showers. The reviews said that Raul and his family are great hosts.

But there was nobody around. I had a look around and a friendly cat greeted me. I found a water tap so we could fill our tank before getting parked up, and while we were doing that a truck drove up.

It was the owner Raul, with his mother and two young daughters. They explained that they live a km away and had seen us drive by. The property is usually very quiet during the week, but busier on weekends with use by the rock climbers. Very friendly and welcoming. The price for camping is 200 pesos ($15.30 CAD, $10.90 USD) per night. We'll stay two nights for sure, and possibly more.

So we got ourselves set up. Then, I wanted to get our gasoline furnace working because we are at 8,300' (2,530 meters) altitude and it's going to be chilly at night.

The digital thermostat for the furnace now has an app so that you can control it from your phone using Bluetooth. So before I could start it up, I had to update the software. Part of the process says you have to disconnect the power to the thermostat, so I pulled the fuse. When I put the fuse back, the display on the thermostat wouldn't come back on.

Very frustrating. It's definitely getting power. It's like something electronic in the thermostat went funny. So I'm going to have to contact the company and see if I'm doing something wrong, or if they need to send me a new thermostat.

In the meantime, there is no way to turn the furnace on. Fortunately we have access to an electrical outlet while we're here so we put our small electric heater to use last night. But not sure what we're going to do when we get to the National Park. We'll figure it out!