People always ask us how the driving is in Mexico. The driving is fine. It’s the roads that will kill you–or at least your vehicle. Lots of pot holes, for sure, but the most damaging obstacle during a Mexican road trip is a thing called a tope: noun, huge concrete speed bump usually unmarked and usually brutally steep.
In order to keep some semblance of wheel alignment and avoid giving ourselves whiplash it’s best to roll gently over each tope (pronounced toe-pay) at about 3.7 mph. Unfortunately, some topes inevitably sneak up on you and we’ve gone flying over more than one.
This is why we were not surprised when the mechanic at Radials Llantas (a tire chain in Mexico) pronounced our tie rods shot when we popped in to get some new BF Goodrich All-Terrain T/A KO tires. While the guy was under there replacing our tie rods we had him look at our shock absorbers too.
Happy to report that all four of our Bilstein shocks are doing just fine–despite the topes!
Here’s more about travel in Mexico
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