Dear Sir,

After seven wonderful months in Ajijic and other Mexican cities, we had to start back to the States on July 31.

We left Ajijic and were in Tonala by 6:15 a.m.  – it was still dark. We wanted to be able to cross the border by nightfall. As we were heading toward the toll road in Tonala, we were stopped by flashing lights from a truck. It was dark and we could not see the writing on the truck but two men with masks on their faces approached our car. They appeared to be policemen. They asked my husband to get out of the vehicle and spread eagled him over the car and searched him. They did not ask either of us for ID. They took his wallet, removed the cash and after counting it many times, one of the men put some money in my husband’s pocket. Meanwhile I was in the car with the other person who was doing the same with my money.

When we were finally let go and my husband returned to the driver’s seat, the truck sped off. We both looked in our wallets and all our 500 peso notes were gone and all of my US dollars were gone. We felt lucky to not be hurt, but it was a horrible way to end a wonderful stay in a wonderful place.

It was obvious that we were not just on a sightseeing tour as it was early and our car was loaded including a roof top carrier. And we had Texas plates on our car. We hope this doesn’t happen to anyone else and that is why we are alerting people.

Rene and Don Poe