The river looked calm and blue this morning when my husband and I crossed the border into Nuevo Progreso, Mexico, to get our tourist cards for our upcoming trip to Mexico City.

Tourist cards are required for anyone visiting or doing business in Mexico. If travelers plan to visit Mexico for seven days or less, there is no cost for the tourist card. People spending over seven days in Mexico must pay a $40 fee to obtain a tourist card, which will be valid for 180 days. It is important to ensure you have a valid passport with an expiration date six months before your travels. Please note that these cards are not visas. American citizens do not require a Visa to visit Mexico. Tourist cards can be obtained at the Reynosa airport, where we plan to board our flight with Viva Aerobus, but this is a time when people travel more, so we decided to get ours today and avoid delays at the airport.

When in Nuevo Progreso – or Progreso as it is known in the Valley- in the morning, we have to stop at Rene’s for breakfast. This morning, the choice was “chilaquiles” for me and “machacado con huevo a la Mexicana” for my husband. As always, we were serenaded by a group of young musicians playing the guitar, an accordion, and a “guitarron” (large base guitar.) I’m from Mexico, and I’m in Mexico in wonder at breakfast served with lettuce, tomatoes, limes, and french fries! It’s not a usual breakfast combination for me. Rene’s is known for their complimentary fresh cheese, American cheese, and heavy cream Nachos and a variety of salsas, pickled jalapenos, and pico de gallo. The average cost for a breakfast entree at Rene’s is eight dollars.

Chilaquiles de Pollo con Queso.

We also needed to exchange dollars for pesos. It was a shock to see how much stronger the peso has gotten since our last trip in October 2022. Today’s rate is one dollar, equivalent to $16.84 pesos. In October, the rate was $19.96. This means less shopping for me to stay on budget. I Googled the reasons behind the strengthening, and pictured below is what I found. That is good news for Mexico and Valley businesses. Mexico is also still strong among the top travel destinations in the world.

InterNations, which is one of the largest international communities for people who live and work abroad, recently shared the results of its latest 2023 edition of a survey called Expat Insider. This report is a comprehensive survey of life abroad based on the experiences of over 12,000 expats from 171 countries. According to the survey, Mexico is the best country in the world for expats. Second is Spain, and Panama came in third.

But the most pleasant surprise came when we noticed the space on the busy sidewalks. The news is that all the street vendors who had set up camp on the sidewalks have been moved a few blocks away, where they have their own space together. This is important because it frees a good amount of space for pedestrians. It was getting to be too crowded, hot, and uncomfortable. This morning we felt the breeze and noticed some gift shops can now use part of the sidewalk to showcase their goods. This change happened just two days ago we were told.

Several years ago, there was talk about converting the entire street into a pedestrian shopping center, but city leaders and shop owners could not reach an agreement. It is nice to see that at least this happened, and it was nice.

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