The many uses of sand, salt, ice ... and beet juice?

Inevitably when we travel south in search of a warmer climate, we can't help but watch the weather back home in Niagara Falls, Canada. Until a short while ago, it has been unseasonably warm there, but today was not the case. One of the newspaper headlines reports ...

Whiteouts are particularly dangerous because of the low visibility. A major highway was closed for a while in Niagara today to clear multiple crashes. I won't comment on some people's driving skills in such wintery conditions. 

So, here's today's temperature in Niagara Falls Canada, in Celsius, which converts to 12ºF. In their current blustery conditions, the wind chill factor will make it seem considerably colder. Perhaps you can now see why we choose to be snowbirds?

"Traffic was reduced to a crawl in Niagara Falls on Friday,
Feb 12, 2016, during gusting wind and heavy snow squalls "

For many years in Canada, sand and salt were used, in conjunction with snow plows, to de-ice the roads and lessen slippery conditions. More recently, Niagara has added the use of beet juice. Yes, for those who don't live in snowy conditions, I said beet juice. Check out this article, that lists four foods that help prevent slippery roads: pickle juice, beet juice, and potato and cheese byproducts. As far as I know, Niagara only uses beet juice. My understanding is one negative is to be effective it has to be sprayed on the road before a snowfall, so that can't always be timed correctly.

So, the point of my story is to see if I can parallel the use of these things in the two locations: Canada and Mexico.

Sand

Yep, we use sand here too, but nature takes care of providing it. The "white stuff" is not snow either, thank goodness.

Salt

For the rim of the margarita glass ... 

... or a shot of tequila.

Ice

Of course, we NEED ice, but I'm sure you guessed that one!

The other four foods

Well, Greg did cook beets last week, but we didn't save the juice. I doubt we'd need it down here though, so we're OK.

Today's weather in Lo de Marcos: High of 78ºF (26ºC), low of 70ºF (21ºC). No chance of slippery road conditions ... unless we indulge too much in the use of salt and ice perhaps ;)