Morelia to Mexico City
The motel we checked into was Shirley Motor Court, known as "Shirley Courts". It was known throughout the city as the place where all the American tourists stayed. They spoke English there, and you could trust the water and milk to be potable.
From the moment we entered Mexico (and really starting in the southwestern US), we were learning bits of Spanish. The first word, of course, was "gracias"; wherever you travel, always learn how to say "thank you" in the local language. We learned words as needed on the trip south. But now we had to learn a very important phrase -- in fact, a survival phrase. The parents had us (all three of us) practice saying "¿Donde Shirley Courts?" If we ever got lost or separated from them, we were to use that phrase, which of course means, "Where Shirley Courts?" Not grammatical, but probably would have been effective. We never had occasion to find out.
