Hi Ho!

Just a word of caution. Today has been used up trying to get our FM-3s right. And we have made little or no progress.

As we crossed the border at KM 21, we stopped at Immigration and showed our FM-3s. Jeff's expired on 10-27-2011. Janie's is still currient and will expire in a couple of days. When we showed these to the guys at Immigration at KM 21 they said, "no problemo". Just go to Guaymas and renew. "No Problemo".

So we went to Immigration in Guaymas this morning. They said "Si! we have a problemo." Jeff has to pay a $100 usd fine because he let the FM-3 expire while he was outside of Mexico, and he did not get his passport stamped by the guys at Immigration at the border. So if any of you are crossing with an expired FM-3 be firm and make the Immigration guys stamp your passport at the border.

Also we have to do a complete renewal. Pretty much the whole deal we did to get the FM-3 original. All the paperwork has to be in Spanish. Jeff needs to write a letter in Spanish explaining why he let the FM-3 expire, and why he did not get his passport stamped at the border. And we need to get a copy of our bank statement translated into Spanish. There is a whole new crew at the the IMN office. Last year they filled out the paperwork at the counter for us. This year they only will process what we bring in. The first guy we dealt with at the counter this year spoke no English. The guy who seemed to be in charge spoke some, but not perfect English. And the level of assistance was very low. He directed us to a website:www.imn.gob.mx The website is only in Spanish.

Sigh.....