Day one in my new apartment here in Zona Centro (downtown) Tijuana, I learned that I was going to need to buy a propane tank for the tankless hot water boiler. I went to the ferreteria (hardware store) around the corner and picked out a shiny new 10 kilo minita (barbecue sized propane tank) for $1500 pesos (about $75 USD at the time). Then I had to figure out how to get it filled up. I’m not kidding, I walked in circles for like 3 hours with that thing over my shoulder. By the time I finally found Baja Gas & Oil, I was drenched in sweat, exhausted and in pain. They filled it up for about $200 pesos or $10 USD and I hailed a DiDi (cheaper, Chinese version of Uber) to scoop me up with the propane tank and carry me home – where I still had to haul it up to the roof and figure out how to install it myself – which isn’t difficult – but proved to be a challenge the first time. (Pro tip: make sure you have a pair of channel-locking pliers to loosen/tighten the regulator from/to the tank valve.)
After about 3 months of daily use, my hot water ran cold In the middle of a shower and I realized it was time to refill the tank – your mileage may vary depending on your usage patterns and if other appliances like a stove consume propane or not. By now, I had learned that once you have a tank, pretty much any gas company will deliver propane directly to you so you don’t need to drag that damn thing around like I did the first time. So I sent Gaspasa a quick text on WhatsApp (it’s the go-to text and voice app in México – everyone, including businesses use it) and within a couple hours a guy showed up to deliver my propane.
I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I imagined that he was going to drag some kind of a portable tank up to the roof to refill my minita. When he arrived, it was clear he was annoyed and losing patience with me because my tank was still on the roof and he was double-parked in the taxi zone. “Oh, I need to bring it down to you to refill?” I asked him in mangled Spanglish. “No,” he said in Spanglish, “bring it down and I’ll swap it out for another one.” That was the moment I realized I wasted $1,500 pesos on a brand new tank that I was just going to trade out for an old, used, beat-up tank I was never going to see again, every 3 months…
After all that, I could’ve bought a used one at the tianguis (market) also called sobreruedas (literal translation is “over wheels,” meaning flea market) for about $200 pesos. Expensive lesson, learned. Also, do yourself a favor and text the day before you need gas delivered and request a delivery window, or you could end up waiting all day for same-day service. And don’t forget to carry efectivo (cash) — usually around $200 pesos (plus a tip of $20-$40 pesos) on hand — when you swap tanks.
Alternatively, some small tiendas (stores) and abarrotes (neighborhood grocery stores, bodegas or convenience stores) have tanks you can exchange if you live within walking distance. Less convenient, slightly more expensive (+/- $50 pesos,) but faster if you don’t want to wait around for delivery. In Tijuana there are at least a half-a-dozen gas companies that will deliver propane directly to you. Some of the major ones are:
Baja gas and oil
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