THE ROAD TO EL DORADO (RANCH)
From Stephenville, Texas to Baja California, Mexico
March 7, - March 30, 2000 AD
By Luther Butler. © Luther Butler
His E-mail
His Home Page
His Books
Dodge Minivan 1994 Modified for a wheelchair ramp.
- Passengers:
- Luther Butler...........Backseat Passenger (Husband)
- Jo Butler.................Passenger in a wheelchair (Wife)
- Luke Butler.............Driver (Son)
- Sunshine................Luke's white cat
In the late 1980's my wife came home very excited. "A salesman from American Pen just gave Luke and I a lot located on the Sea of Cortez."
"Where’s that?" I mumbled skeptically.
"Baja California."
"Baja California. Mexico?" I asked.
"Mexico," she assured me.
"How did you get so fortunate?" I asked.
I was still not convinced. "Sounds like a swamp in Florida."
"No, this is a desert that fronts the Sea of Cortez."
"How much?" I asked.
"Nothing. We just have to pay a forty dollar a year maintenance fee."
"Oughtn’t to break us. What proof did they give you?"
"Here's the deed and pictures of our lot," she said.
I looked at the pictures. In one a bright blue sea lapped gently at the sandy beach while palm trees swayed gracefully in the background. "No bathing beauties?" I asked.
"No," my wife said again, "but look at these beautiful flower."
"Nice, anything else?" I was dreaming of doing some surf fishing like I did on the Texas coast.
"There's mountains," she bragged.
"Mountains by the sea?"
Again she handed me some pictures. Black ominous mountains rose in the background. "There aren't many trees," I commented.
"Two out of three's not bad."
I put the deed and the pictures in our bank box and turned my thoughts to other things. Occasionally over the years I dreamed about the lots in Mexico and stashed a little sum of money away for a trip. We faithfully paid our forty dollars each year.
On March 7, 2000, the long awaited day arrived. We were off to El Dorado! I was somewhat apprehensive, the weather station reported snow in Tucson, and there was no way around. Luke said, "I've taken off, and we're going, besides, Tucson is north of San Felipe where our lot is."
"Only a little over a hundred miles north," I reminded him. With these words I went in the house for my leather jacket. The temperature was in the low seventies.
"Do you think we can make El Paso by night?" Jo asked. Luke assured her we could.
After several dry years, West Texas dirt coated our windshield as we drove Interstate 20 with a strong north wind trying to blow us off the road. When we pulled off for gas at Monohans, a dark cloud swept westward across the horizon. Muddy streaks ran down our windshield. Since I had the leather jacket, I was forced to pump the gas while standing in a wind that like to tore me from the windswept earth.
Wet and chilled to the bones, I asked the lady who took my money, "You had much rain?"
"First in almost six months," she told me. "This will make some ranchers and cotton farmers very happy."
"Pay me, and I'll come back with some more."
"You do that," she said while she took the money for the two dollar a gallon gas.
Luke drove into blackness full of wind driven pelting rain. I reminded them about the snow in Tucson. By then the rain was letting up. We drove through El Paso toward Las Cruces under a star-studded sky. My argument next morning to go west to Columbus, New Mexico and then north to Deming fell on deaf ears.
When we reached the Kranberry Inn in Lordsburgh, I said, "While you two eat, think I'll take a walk and meet you back on the highway." Since I got a blood clot in my leg on our trip three years ago, the doctor had advised me to walk some when we went on another one.
Since the blazing afternoon sun was directly west, there could be no way I could get lost in a fairly small New Mexico town. After an hour of walking I realized the highway wasn't where it was supposed to be. Walking a little faster in the opposite direction our car was at a filling station across the street from the restaurant.
"We were about to leave without you," Jo said.
"The travelers check are in my name," I assured her.
We drove across the twisting desert road into Tucson where there was no visible snow even on the soaring peak of Mt. Lemon.
"It either melted fast, or those people back east who run the Weather Channel, don't know what they are talking about," I said.
We drove on west toward Yuma where we were to turn south into Mexico and El Dorado where a sixteen hundred-dollar lot by the Sea of Cortez awaited us!
Driving westward into the sun, that made my eyes see dim enough to make it unsafe for me to drive, we drove through giant forests of Saguaro cactus. "You pronounce it Saurao," Jo told me for the at least a hundred times since we had married in the late fifties.
"Well, since I spent almost two years growing up here, I should know more about how to pronounce saguaro than you do. Besides, there are three of us and a cat in this car, and why does it make a damn if I pronounce it with a g are a w sound?"
Luke petted Sunshine who was curled on the dashboard before he spoke. "Mother, the two of us know the correct pronunciation so why don't you leave Dad alone?" This was the first time he had taken up for me in his forty years. Not to let me gloat, he admonished me, "But dad, if you want the Mexicans to understand you, you will have speak more clearly." I was still sulking when we pulled into Yuma when gray shades of night were drawing across that lonely beautiful land so full of mysterious stories of Indians, cowboys, miners and prospectors with soldiers in both blue and gray thrown in over the years.
Next morning's bright sun found us driving south on Highway 95 toward the Gila River and the Mexican border. In terraced fields acres of irrigated winter vegetables waited to be shipped north where snow still covered the ground. Before crossing into the border town of Algodones, Luke and I talked to the border guard on the United States side. "Sir, I have a thousand dollars in travelers checks. I was advised to change it into U.S. currency before we headed toward San Felipe. The money was secure in a brown locked briefcase.
"Open it up and show me," he ordered sharply
While he counted it, I asked another question. "Should we tape our hubcaps so we'll know if someone puts drug in them?"
"We understand ‘cause it does happen. On the other hand, if you come back with packets secured in your gas tank, we'll investigate you thoroughly. Now, go back to the bank and let them advise you what to do about the currency."
First we went to an insurance agent where a very attractive lady who was proficient in Spanish and English, told me three months of liability insurance cost eighty dollars. Full coverage was over four hundred dollars.
"My U.S. insurance won't cover me?" She assured me the instance I crossed the Border my insurance coverage ended. Gambling on a vehicle costing over thirty thousand because of modifications, I took a chance by not buying anymore than the minimum.
At the bank an attractive young lady who was bilingual again waited us on. It ceases to amaze me that people without too much formal education are able to speak in two languages so fluently while a person like myself with three degrees struggles with a minimum vocabulary in a second language. Necessity must be the mother of learning for those who grow up along the Border.
"Should I cash all my travelers checks into Mexican currency," I asked.
"Why?" she asked.
"I was advised to."
"By whom?"
"By advisers over the Internet."
"They love U.S. dollars," she said with a smile. "Let's cash two hundred dollars and put it into U.S. cash."
"They'll take it?"
"With open arms," she assured me.
After putting the money and travelers checks into my briefcase, Luke and I walked out the door.
"Dad, why do you carry your money in a briefcase?"
"Once in Juarez a pickpocket took my wallet from an inside coat pocket."
"They can take your briefcase."
"At least I'll know about it."
"Everyone who was in the bank knows about your money," Luke told me. "I'm younger and stronger. Let me carry it." I kept a wary eye on all that would pay for a long journey into a part of the world that was entirely new to me.
Before leaving Algodones, Luke was told to follow Highway 95 to San Juan, turn right, and take the road to Highway 5 to San Felipe. "Señor, it would have been better if you had gone to Mexicali before turning south."
"It's shorter this way," he said after he tried to buy a highway map without success.
Again we drove through immaculate fields of vegetables broken by green patches of irrigated wheat. On the south side of the Border there were changes. We had gone back into the Thirties and Forties in rural United States. Instead of modern tractors and farming equipment, these operators drove John Deeres, International Harvesters, and Cases pulling equipment used by our farmers at least thirty years ago.
The age of the equipment didn't bother me. What did bother me was that there was a strong smell of insecticides and other farm chemicals on the morning air. Unregulated, I knew the Mexican farmers were being careless with potentially harmful chemical tools they needed badly.
The highway changed into a narrow two lane paved strip of asphalt without shoulders on the road. One false move and Luke would drop into a rut that could cause the van to turn over. The road was not the only change. Houses were small constructions surrounded by rusting farming equipment and worn-out cars and trucks. To compensate for the ugliness of the houses and yards were beautiful palm trees and blooming tropical flowers.
Our paved highway turned into a road full of Mexican potholes that jarred our lowered minivan. Luke had packed the suitcases and ice chest very carefully. After we jarred over a mile of road, all our belongings were jumbled in heaps of disorganized messes.
Luke insisted on not stopping for directions. "They can't understand my Spanish," he complained.
"I know we've traveled more than ten miles." Our conversation grew heated when suddenly Federales with M16s and machine guns brought us to an abrupt stop. A youth of not more than sixteen swung his rifle carelessly by the shoulder strap. I ducked expecting the weapon to fire accidentally at any moment. We learned later that these overgrown teenagers were patrolling the highways at the insistence of the United States to keep guns and drugs from being transported from Mexico into the United States and from the United States into our neighbor to our south.
"You have any drugs?" the modern John Wayne asked.
Luke played the part of a very ignorant person. "No," he said as though he was searching for the Mexican word.
"Open your glove compartment," the neatly uniformed soldier ordered curtly. Glancing, he asked, "Tourist?"
Luke assured him we were, and then got up the nerve to ask directions. "No trouble," our soldier turned tourist guide said helpfully. He pointed to a stopped vehicle the soldiers were searching. "Turn around and follow him back five miles."
We drove into fogging dust that turned our windshield to mud again. A mile up the road, our guide was hauled out of his cab by a burly policeman who was not as kind as the soldiers had been. We were on our own again. We soon learned that it is not best to trust the directions of the natives. One thing, they are speaking in a foreign language. Number two is they have to translate kilometers into miles. Thirdly, we found that some of the natives seem to enjoy giving false information to tourista from Norte America!
At the first small grocery store we stopped at for directions, I found groceries are incidental to large supplies of whiskey, beer, and native wines. Another thing, refrigeration in rural areas is non-existent. They did have glassed containers to keep flies from buzzing the meat.
After futilely trying to make a teenage female clerk to understand me, I got out our American Heritage Larousse Spanish Dictionary which is bilingual. Carefully I wrote, "Autopista San Felipe." To me autopista sounded like a vulgar human elimination act. The young clerk beamed while she drew a small map showing that we should go up the road to San Luis where we would cross the Rio Grande before finding the road to El Dorado!
It was not long before we found the road she recommended was built for vehicles much higher off the road than ours was. A young man showed us how to get on the right road. This was my second trip to interior Mexico, the other to Monterrey, but this confirmed my belief that Mexicans are the most lovable, courtesy people on the face of this planet. Gracias to all of you except to one bank clerk.
With relief we crossed the Rio Grande at a shallow ford and soon found our way to the wonderful asphalt highway that runs between Mexicali and San Felipe. It isn't a four lane modern Interstate, but to us it was like the gold street of Heaven! We later found that the powers behind El Dorado Ranch were responsible for this modern miracle that winds between some very high volcanic peaks and a very dry desert. Gracias again and again!
Before we leave Rio Colorado, do not be fooled by stories that U.S. farmers have stopped water from flowing down the Colorado into the Sea of Cortez. A very good flow of water was flowing in March, which is before much snow has melted in the Colorado Rockies. We are sure all of the river's water is not going into the Sultan Sea of California.
Miles of flat land looking like an ancient salt flat followed us on the left while on the right tall mysterious volcanoes reared majestically into a sky unmarred by telephone wires, electric wires, or for that matter, any impediments of modern man. Civilization consisted of a black ribbon of asphalt highway winding snake like through desert shrubs reaching to the bare black lava. In some prehistoric time, Baja must have been awesome with pointed peaks shooting fire and brimstone into a smoky sky.
"Kind of reminds me of Johnny Cash's song, ‘A Rim of Fire’," I said.
"You mean the Hemorrhoid Song," Luke laughed like he used to when he was a small boy.
When it seemed we would never reach civilization, Luke pulled over to the side of the road and he and Sunshine got out for a walk. I followed. Like an explorer from the Star Ship, I walked toward the black mountains. A trail led through clumps of desert plants where the only signs of life were coyote tracks and the slithering trails of lizards and snakes. The only noise was the whistling north wind that made a coat feel good while my legs browned from a blazing sun.
Sunshine, cat like, crouched low to prevent herself from being too conspicuous. Her white eyes surrounded by white fur, darted back and forth. Far from cover, she remained motionless until Luke picked her up. We had been told coyotes liked cats - almost like strawberries on a bowl of ice cream.
After we got back into the car, Luke and I argued if the peaks were ancient volcanoes or atolls built by ancient sea life like the Guadeloupe Mountains in Texas. After studying Baja on the Internet, I knew the mountains were either volcanoes or uprising caused by the fault line buckling and splitting. Whatever the method the Creator used millions of years ago to create this wonderful world, I like the proverbial bear wanted to see what was over the mountains. The path to the other side came at Crucero La Trinidad where Highway 3 to Ensenada came into our road. Since I had only been able to rent a condo at San Felipe for a week, we didn't expect to go anywhere but home.
There was no time for further speculation. Again a barricade of Federales closed traffic for inspection. These young soldiers had a truck with a machine gun mounted ready to give pursuit. The uniformed young men, unlike the first, carried their weapons at port ready for any unseen opposition. Each man in the living barricade had a bunker built of rocks to fall behind in case of gunfire. More to the point, one soldier sat holding a rope that when pulled would make a line of nasty spikes to spring up and puncture tires.
Stopping, Luke was asked the same questions: Where are you from? Where are you going? What are you going to do when you get there? Do you have any guns or drugs? Open your glove compartment. This time the young soldier did a very un-soldierly like thing, he reached through the window and petted the white cat resting on the dashboard before he said, "Drive on." Looking back at the stark barracks these young men lived in, I breathed a sigh of relief.
Soon on our left the magnificently blue Sea of Cortez arose like a desert mirage. In my years, I have seen the Atlantic from the shores of Rhode Island to the flat Gulf of Mexico from the Texas Coast, I have seen the Pacific from the cliff below Los Angeles to San Diego, but never have I seen anything as beautiful as the Sea of Cortez and the volcanic peaks of Baja!
A billboard, the only one we had seen in Mexico appeared, EL DORADO RANCH. We were in the middle of a desert without any signs of electricity, telephones, water, and any other of the signs of civilization, but we had found El Dorado. It was getting dark; we still had five miles to drive to San Felipe and our condo I had already paid a week's rent. We had no time to look at our find.
After we passed the arches of San Felipe, we found our condo nestled in among similar places. I had made sure our place was wheelchair accessible. After parking, I went through a courtyard protected by a sliding gate and using the key Jorge sent me, I was in a three room apartment with a large window looking over the Cortez Sea and beautiful lights of the fishing village of San Felipe. Instead of being on the water, we were on a cliff three blocks from the beach. I then remembered Jorge had told me it was a short walk to where there was a place to fish. He forgot to tell me that since much of the beach is private property, it is fenced.
The Sea of Cortez is a brilliant blue-green. Seven hundred and fifty miles long, ninety-five miles wide, it is thought to follow a fault line caused by the separation of Baja from the mainland. The Sea has advanced north three hundred miles, but don't get worried, several million years have passed. If the fault line extends northward, California is not likely to fall into the Pacific Ocean in our lifetime. Islands dot the placid waters. A few miles from San Felipe, the island is a submerged volcanic mountain with only its peak showing.
Owners of fishing boats will take fishermen out for eighty to a hundred dollars a day. A three-hour fishing trip is only thirty dollars. Every morning an enterprising fisherman rang our doorbell offering to take us out for a price. Not only did he want to take us fishing, but also he helped himself to anything he could find to eat - and take home to his starving children. He especially wanted a can of our precious Spam. Jo refused to let him have it. About the Spam, whenever we go on a trip I put in an electric grill. Jo puts in two cans of Spam that we always bring home.
Luke and I tried fishing the surf without any luck. I patiently stuck with wetting a line, but he searched for sea life that washes in with the tide. Sand dollars wash in by the hundreds along with some very colorful shells with their inhabitants still alive. We found very little debris in the Sea of Cortez, but we found very few fish close to shore, or for that matter, farther out. For thirty dollars, Luke caught a croaker. The friendly owner of the fishing boat gave him two other filleted fish.
Since it was Spring Break and the running of the Bahia 210, I was only able to get reservations for one week. We arrived on Thursday, Friday morning the condominium next to us started filling up with a fraternity from the University of Idaho. The new arrivals started arriving in rented cars from San Diego. The first carload arrived right after sunrise; the last ones arrived at four o'clock the next morning without keys and no idea where the first arrivals were partying in San Felipe. Our doorbell rang with each new arrival. Luke opened some doors, but as talented as he is at picking locks, he couldn't open all of them without a key.
Like many young college men trying to impress each other, their language was loud and vulgar. The first night, they spoke obscenities in English. After a night or two on the town, they spoke the same words in, would you believe it? Spanish. In spite of two years of high school Spanish and growing up among Spanish speaking people, these frat brothers learned enough in one night to fill their rooms with some very attractive young women. Word like punta, Federales, and the Mexican word for jail filled the very early morning air! These children far away from home were delightful neighbors whom Jo wanted to use soap on their mouths - especially at four AM!
The town of San Felipe curves around a horseshoe bend in the Sea of Cortez. On the north side an ancient volcano rises dark and majestic in the morning sunlight. Under its sheltering shadow, high on a hill, sits the shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, but the steps up to it were more than my legs could take. Rising under the shrine is a lighthouse gleaming white in the day, and at night its turning lights brings boats safely home. The city fronts on the sparkling waters, and San Felipe is a city with myriad businesses waiting to serve tourists and citizens of the city.
Various motels, trailer parks, condos, and some very elegant hotels line the waterfront; the most expensive of which is Misones. The newly constructed rock enclosed dock for shrimp and fishing boats to the south is a welcomed addition. Not only do the commercial vessels come into unload their catch, but pleasure boats rest in this safe harbor. Fishermen sit on the huge rocks and cast out into both the calm waters of the harbor, but into the more turbulent waters of the open sea. Luke and I found the rocks hard to cast over because our lines kept snagging on the rocks. There were a few fish around for occasionally a lucky fisherman brought in pan fish. Most of the fish caught were snagged on artificial lures.
I soon lost my interest in fishing when a small boy on a bicycle came to teach me Spanish. We found out each other’s name. He was in the second grade. He again tried to teach me his language, and I sought to teach him mine. One word I recognized was stupido. Before his parents came to get him, I said, "Yo amor tu." When his face lit up, I savied he understood me.
The children of Mexico are special. Brown skins with bright eyes, they probably trust gringos too much. On one of my walks on the streets of San Felipe, a little boy grabbed my hand. Before long there were at least six children walking in a line beside me. It was only when a father gave me a cross look that we broke our line. May the loveable children of Mexico never learn to fear Norte Americans! In San Felipe there are a group of people called, Amigos, who take up money to send Mexican children to special schools of higher learning. I met the gringo lady who is president of the local group.
That afternoon I waded into the surf to fish. The water was a little cool, but since my clothes were wet, I put my shoes, wallet and shirt on the beach and went swimming. The tide was out. On the Sea of Cortez the tide goes out a long way, sometimes almost a mile, and then when it comes in, it comes in very rapidly. Looking around from my swim I saw a young Mexican man carrying my possessions. Knowing I would be in a bad situation without my wallet, I began to plead with him to leave my possessions alone. He dropped my things and rejoined his wife and children. Reaching the beach, it dawned on me that he was not stealing my things, but he was carrying them to higher ground. After I collected everything, I went to apologize. No sooner than I said, "Gracias, señor," than he let me know he spoke perfect English.
A graduate of the University of Mexico, he had a degree in architecture. The only thing, he wanted to return to San Felipe. Since there was not enough work for him to do in the field he had studied for, he was selling insurance. The two of us visited for at least an hour before he gathered his family and went home. Before he left, I thanked him again for saving my possessions. My mistrust of a Mexican was embarrassing, but how does one tell a person that prejudices are so hard to overcome?
Puertecitos is about forty miles south from San Felipe. Since we had heard about some interesting things about this town, including a very cheap piece of property for sale, we loaded up and went. This was our second day on the Sea of Cortez. Luke didn’t seem anxious to find his lot at Dorado. Perhaps after he saw the desert it was located in, he realized it might not be such a big deal.
Forty miles didn’t seem like a long trip – perhaps an hour if we drove real slow, less than an hour if we hurried. It wasn’t long before we discovered that no one travels forty miles along the Sea of Cortez unless they have a vehicle with a very high wheelbase – and a vehicle they don’t care to tear apart when they hit potholes. When IMS in Farmington, New Mexico made our vehicle, they dropped the floor so Jo could easily get her wheelchair into it. The van took the road very well until we crossed the Arroyo Hutamote, then conditions deteriorated. Even though the van bottom consists of a sheet of very strong metal, we were sliding over pavement that threatened to tear the bottom out. Now I knew why a very desirable piece of property listed on the Internet was so cheap. We couldn’t get there!
After we turned around, we found a dirt road leading to the beach. Before long we entered a gated community. In Mexico, gates into property are ropes strung across the road. A Mexican lowers the gate after he decides you are safe to let in. Along the beach was a row of brick houses that in the States would be priced in the $90, 000 range. Farther down the beach, the building looked like a giant had crushed them.
Luke and I went beach combing. Farther out past the breakers a row of large fishing boats roamed with fishing nets out. Just before the low water tide line, a long gill fishing net was strung out along the beach. When the tide came in a boat would pull the trapped eels in for sale at the local markets. After hiking a mile, sand dollars started flowing up with the gentle tide. These dollars were twice the size of those we found on the Texas coast. It only took a few minutes to gather a bucket full. After my gathering, I saw a large shell shaped like a Spanish helmet. Looking in it, there was something guarding a bunch of eggs. Without anymore investigation of what I’d found I walked toward a family sitting on the sand. The man was a gringo from Los Angles who was spending a week away from his fireman job.
After he told me he had spent summers and holidays when he was growing up in this family owned home, Luke came from his walk down the beach. He sat and played with the large shell, and opening it, he said, "Dad, there is an octopus in here. She’s guarding her eggs." Turning to the fireman, he asked, "What happened to all those houses at the south end?"
The fireman answered, "A hurricane got them. The owners are still trying to settle with their insurance company."
When we got back to the van, a family from Colorado was setting up camp. It took me a little while to find out he was a geologist from Colorado School of Mines. He told me he had discovered this beach while sailing down the Sea of Cortez. Noticing a row of locked bathrooms I asked how a person got to use one of them. "Pay twelve dollars like I did."
Without going to the expensive facilities, I started getting two fishing poles ready. Luke went to turn the octopus lose before I could cut her up for bait. Before I could fish, three teenage Mexican youths drove up in a battered pickup. "Señor," the oldest one said, "you must pay twelve dollars to fish here."
I argued. "Isn’t this a public beach?"
"No, señor, my father owns much land around here. You are on his property."
"We are only going to be here a couple of hours."
"You leave before sundown, the cost is only six dollars." After I paid him, he gave me a key to one of the dirtiest bathrooms on earth.
The two of us fished. Luke and I caught stingrays or skates. I caught a large eel and after deciding it wasn’t electric, I took it off and cut it up for bait. My large salt-water reel and pole was in a holder. The smaller rod and reel I held firmly in my hand. With the sun dropping toward the western mountains, the tide started rushing in. A fish struck my staked-out line. Turning to throw the held rod and reel on sand I turned back to find my other rod disappearing in the rushing tide. The water was a little cool for swimming, I am seventy-years-old, and I wasn’t dressed for swimming. At the last minute I dove into the waves and caught my pole. A large fish broke from the hook, but wet and a little cold, my fishing equipment was safe.
With darkness coming we said goodbye to a beautiful beach and headed for San Felipe. In the middle of the desert we came to a Mexican restaurant that was a little more primitive than some I’ve eaten at in the States. The food was being prepared assembly line style in view of the customers. Two or three small children played on the floor. A white pup with black spots entered, and like a vacuum began to hog all the meat that the cooks had dropped. No one from the sanitation department rushed in and – the food was delicious. More important, Montezuma’s revenge didn’t strike.
The next morning, before we at last headed for El Dorado, Luke took the van to have a low tire fixed. Having nothing to do, I went for a hike across the desert. The deep sand road wound through desert plants toward the black, volcanic mountains. Nothing moved against the azure blue sky except one lonely black crow. When it lit on a desert willow, I went to investigate. The mutilated carcass and intestines of a freshly butchered cow blocked my path. Around the animal all kinds of garbage stretched across the land. I was in San Felipe’s garbage dump. This was the way the town and cities of Baja disposed of their waste. No burning, no burial, the garbage deteriorates under a cloudless sky.
Reaching the tree where the crow was perched, a second bird joined the other one. Perhaps they were tending a nest, but March seemed a little early. Unlike the tidy crows found in the United States, these two had feathers out of place which gave them a frumpy look. How could being a little over a hundred miles from the United States make seedy characters out of very neat birds? Something made them let their feathers down, could it have been the national drink, Tecate beer?
When Luke got back from town, we drove north toward Jo and Luke’s $1,600 lot on the Sea of Cortez. Turning west toward the mountains we soon found houses and trailers in among creosote brush and thorny cacti. There was no sign of modern conveniences. We drove until the road ended and went back to a community center where a half dozen senior citizens lounged reading books, drinking soft drinks, and a few, playing pool. After engaging in a friendly conversation, I found all these people were retired people from the West Coast States and inward to the Rocky Mountains. One couple told me the winters were better than Montana’s.
It took Luke and I only a few minutes to find out these settlers in this desert had solar panels on their houses. Propane fueled generators supplemented their need for electricity. They had built cement cisterns and above ground tanks to hold water trucked in from San Felipe. Their skins brown from an ever-present sun, these people had found a lifestyle they enjoyed in one of the driest deserts on earth. Far from home, they found a land almost free of man made pollution. I agreed that it was worth it to breathe without sinus drainage blocking my airways.
Before we went to headquarters by the beach we looked at a house built of bales of hay. With a good coat of stucco and a paint job, the dwelling looked very livable. "It takes very little air conditioning or heating," the owner told us.
A salesman told us he would lend us a compass, give us the longitude and latitude and if we wanted to walk over ten miles, we could look at our lot.
"Can we build on it?" Luke asked.
The salesman explained, "El Dorado Ranch is a leased part of the Ejido Plan Nacional Agraio that the Mexican government created to resettle homeless people from Mexico City. The homeless people took one look at their vast 200,000 acres of desert, built themselves some shacks that are adequate for the warm desert, and leased the rest to American Pen which in turn gave promotional lots to its retailers. Whether or not the company intended to cheat, the lots it gave are in a section the Mexican government reserved for a wildlife refuge."
Luke asked, "Then can I camp on it?"
"For a price you can camp in the camping area. Would you be interested in upgrading your lot and buying in closer to the Sea? El Dorado Enterprises out of Colorado Springs bought out American Pen."
After he heard the price, Luke refused. I spoke up, "Look, I’ve been paying $40 a year for a number of years."
"Oh yes," the salesman said, "the association uses membership fees to pay rent to the owners."
"Don’t we get anything for our money?" I asked.
The salesman signed a membership card and said, "Make yourself at home. You can use the beach, clubhouse, tennis courts and such. By the way, Pat Butler, the owner, will be here tomorrow. Come by and meet him."
Again I held a fishing pole in my hand while Luke beach combed at least a mile into the Sea of Cortez at low tide. Still it wasn’t mañana, and except for the stingrays, the fish didn’t bite. At least it didn’t cost us anything to fish.
The El Dorado restaurant and bar was worth at least one year’s membership fee. The section we enjoyed most had no roof. Partially heated by butane burners, while we ate we watched stars shining like they used to in the Southwestern United States until our air got so polluted. With a Mexican band playing while more active senior citizens kicked up their heels on the dance floor, it was all worth while. Twice we ate in the restaurant, and the quail at about seven dollars was delicious. The company was even better. With several hundred people in a foreign land, we were like a big family seeking news from home.
Mr. Montoya from Santa Fe stands out clearly in my mind. Born in Albuquerque, New Mexico, he and I attended Albuquerque High, me in 1945, he in 1960. Neither of us graduated. I dropped out after flunking my afternoon classes because of a job; he was expelled for being different. His mother put him in a Catholic high school from which he graduated and then graduated from the University of New Mexico with a degree in architecture. After staying out three semesters, I graduated from Durango High, Colorado and went on to earn three degrees. Mr. Montoya and I spent over an hour remembering the times spent in ethnic gang fights. Our parting words were, "It was a wonder we lived."
The owner of our condo, Jorge, and his wife arrived from Glendale, California on our third day. Except for a Spanish accent, he and his wife were of fairer complexion than Anglos. Exiles from Castro’s Cuba, they traveled Europe until they started managing their property in Mexico. Why they didn’t stay in Mexico, I will never know.
There are three main ethnic groups in Mexico. Six per cent are the white Spaniards whom many descended from the Normandy group that produced conquers like William the Conqueror and much of the royalty of the European kingdoms. Also in the white group are descendents of the French who twice ruled Mexico. The first time to rule was after Napoleon conquered Spain, and the second time was after heirs of Napoleon took Mexico over while the United States fought its bitter Civil War. A number of Norte Americans from the United States have moved to Mexico, gatherings of them can be found in retirement colonies. Some are snowbirds who leave at the first signs of spring.
The second and largest ethnic group are the descendents of Spaniards who married Indians before women from Europe came to Mexico. This Mestizo group, Amerindian-Spanish, makes up sixty percent of the population. Brown of skin, proud natives of Mexico, the Mastezoes have fought constantly to free Mexico from foreign rule. Good workers, industrious in their own way, they are the shopkeepers, schoolteachers, government workers, farmers, and general laborers of Mexico. Free and independent, they work well when they are left to do things in their own way.
The third and the most independent group are the Indians. The Amerindians make up thirty per cent of the population. Free of foreign blood, they seek to live their own lives. Many of this group still live in isolation on land they inherited from their ancestors. Too many of these simple people have lost their small farms to big landowners. Unable to adapt, they have been crowded into big cities where many of them are forced to live at a poverty level little better than the homeless people in the United States.
Before we left San Felipe, Luke and I hiked toward the volcanic mountains. I had heard tales of pools of water in these arid mountains where big horn sheep, coyotes, and other wild animals drank life-giving water. Stopping at a house to ask permission, we met a lady from California. Her U.S. husband worked nearby. When her son who was in the eighth grade came out, we asked him to go with us.
Bilingual, citizen of the United States and Mexico, a football player, hopefully his is the type of person who will help unite our country with its southern neighbor.
Filled with the mystery of setting off into the unknown, we followed a graveled wash toward our destination. Desert shrubs and large cacti of all species surrounded us with a thorny forest that one would not want to walk through in the dark. Along the way we found abandoned shelters that had once been places of human habitation. The desert preserves well so it was hard to tell how long ago these ruins had been built. One place still had the remnants of a garden. In all this serenity there was no quietness. The noise made by vehicles making trial runs for the Baja 210 was deafening!
Although we saw no animals except one jackrabbit, there were numerous tracks. A few horse tracks occurred along with coyote tracks, but there were numerous tracks somewhat like goats, but there were no signs of these animals. When we reached civilization we were told there are many mountain sheep in the area.
Once in awhile we could see the mountain pass that was our destination. Unfortunately we had started out too late. The sun was starting to go down behind the ancient volcanic peak. Afraid of being caught by approaching darkness which comes abruptly and by 6:00 P.M. in this area so close to where Rocky Mountain Standard time changes into Pacific Time. Without giving it any thought about finding our way back to the friendly house where the Van was parked, we had to follow our tracks to civilization.
Telephone service in Mexico is carried on through microwave stations located on high mountains. This means of communication is very adequate for businesses and government use, but it is very inadequate for private use. Numerous public pay phones are located all over Baja, but getting another party on this service is almost impossible. We found that these pay phones were one-armed robbers that very seldom paid off. The best thing to do to make a call is to find a public company and pay them to make the connection for you, or where they have them, pay to use the internet. In our three weeks in Baja we never stayed in a facility that had phones in the room.
Not only is telephone service almost non-existent for the general public, there are very few national or international newspapers. The natives subscribe to newspapers that are worse in reporting news than the local paper in my hometown. Most motels have television in the rooms, but these stations get no more than two stations in English with Spanish in subtitles. We never found a television station that broadcast anything but reruns of United States films and a few national TV shows. One native told me that the citizens of Baja have very little communications with the outside world.
Gasoline can be bought at government franchised Pemex stations. There is no competition. There is no use looking for a Texico or an Exxon. Pemex gasoline is the only brand sold in Mexico, so use it or walk. The government sets the price, and when we were there, Mexico gasoline was higher than United States prices. There are different grades of fuel so you can choose the one that works the best in your vehicle. The nice thing is full service that includes windshield washes. In spite of everything else, watch how much gasoline is put into your tank and keep a running account of how much the total should be. Since you have to convert gallons to liters and dollars to pesos, some operators will cheat you. Before you drive into the station, figure how much fuel your tank usually takes, do a little arithmetic so you know how much you should pay, and then refuse to pay if the price is not right.
Restrooms in most service stations were very modern and cleaner than in the States. A few places charged a small fee for usage and toilet paper. In San Felipe everything was very modern, but on the Pacific side in the mountains two toilet facilities consisted of a very rough piece of plywood set across a concrete opening.
Every morning I took a walk along the beautiful beach that closer to town was open to the public. Walking down streets leading to the beach, large mother dogs with teats red and raw from suckling ran out to bark. None of them offered to attack nor were they friendly enough to pet. Occasionally a male dog made his appearance, but never were there any pups following the mother dogs. I shall long remember the large teated dogs of Mexico – and wonder what happened to the pups.
Before our van pulled out of San Felipe, I must tell about one of the nicest ladies I ever met. Gloria and her sister cleaned and changed the linen not only in the complex we stayed in, but also in several complexes close by. Gloria was the mother of a first grade boy who was a perfect loveable boy. Not only did Gloria clean our condo, she did all the grocery shopping and laundry for us. She knew where the bargains were, and she made sure we didn’t pay more than we should. Her and Jo became close friends, and I will ever be grateful for the kindness she showed not only Jo, but toward Luke and I. Jo finagled a jar of the best wine and several pounds of shrimp Luke and I intended to use for bait. Jo immediately boiled the purchase. Since I am the only one who will eat this delicacy, I got a large jar and pickled shrimp in wine. This delicious food lasted me a week until Jo and Luke made me throw it out by using some very strong language!
The morning came when the sounds of racing cars drove us out of San Felipe. Since so many people came in for the Baja 210 race, our reservations were up. On Thursday morning, Luke and I packed the van, Jorge and his wife and Gloria came to tell us goodbye. While Jo and Luke took care of last minute things, I took one last sad walk through the loose sand of San Felipe. The bright sunlight sparkled on the water, a gentle breeze blew, and I said a sad farewell to the friendly fishing village by the Sea of Cortez.
The noise of big racing motors was deafening. The natives gripe about the noise, but they do nothing about it. Big automobile and parts companies from all over the world pour millions into San Felipe to let them test their new products. The desert is perfect for these trial runs that bring much publicity. Some of the supporting rigs that accompanied each racer represented a large amount of money.
We had planned to stay a week and go home. Luke and Jo asked if I would like to go to the Pacific side of Baja and drive to the end. With Sunshine on the dash, we went through the arches of San Felipe for the last time and set out on a new adventure. Like an early Spanish discoverer we began a new journey. This time I would see what was on the other side of the mysterious black volcano mountains.
The highway cut through El Dorado. All three of us were sad that our lots had turned into mirages far from the beautiful Sea of Cortez. "Want to stop by the office again? Perhaps we can get a late breakfast at the restaurant," I said hoping to ease Luke’s pain. He declined the offer.
Before we got to the turnoff where Highway 3 intersected our Highway 5, we had to go through the soldiers’ inspection again. This army camp had buildings. Also they had vehicles with mounted machine guns. The soldiers were so busy searching a busload of spring breakers that they only gave a passing glance. "May I take your picture?" Jo asked.
The young soldier grinned with appreciation. It must be a very lonely life for these older teenagers to be stuck so far from civilization. On the other hand, we had paid good money to come to this land of sea and sky. Without Jo, Luke and I would have camped gladly.
If you make this trip and you have to stop at the military checks, remember these soldiers are where they are at the request of the United States Government for your protection. Do not take the seriousness of these young men’s job lightly. The week we made our trip, drug warlords brutally killed the mayor of Tijuana by shattering his car with a rain of bullets. Transporters of illegal drugs can become very violent when they are stopped. Be cautious about making sudden moves while you are under inspection. Most of them know only a few words of English so make your answers short and to the point. Also, if you sit in the back seat protected from view by tinted glass, keep your hands in view. And, until the inspection if over, help keep the fright out of your thoughts by saying a little prayer. Above all, don’t take this as an opportunity to be smart. Say as little as possible, use your best manners, and in all cases when weapons cover you, get through the inspection as quickly as possible.
Ahead of where we turned to the left on Highway 3, there is a place named Chinero. Around 1860 AD a group of Chinese had sailed up the Sea of Cortez to San Felipe. Not having vehicles to reach jobs in California, they decided to walk. In this desert, all but a few of them perished. Chinero was named to commemorate where most of them died.
The highway winding through the rugged mountains to Ensenada is a two lane paved road. It was adequate, but our van jumped and shook in places where the highway was filled with potholes. I understand it is never wise to believe that a road is good until you travel it. Sudden rain can cause floods of water to wash the paving away. During the time we were in Baja, we saw no rain – nor except for potholes, very little sign of any moisture. Steep, rocky mountains covered with cacti describes most of the route to the Pacific.
Since it was almost lunchtime, Luke and I thought we would buy take- out food at the large restaurant at the junction to Crucero de Trinidad. Surrounded by white concrete like fence at least three feet thick, we walked into a courtyard. The only thing open was the toilet facilities that were guarded by a man collecting thirty-five cents in U.S. money. He gave us a piece of toilet paper and some soap to wash our hands.
Along the way there were interesting things that had we had the time, we could have spent at least a week sightseeing. At Valle de Trinidad there is a clinic and school ran by the Seventh Day Adventist out of California. Heroes de la Independencia was one of the other villages we would have liked to visit. The only place we stopped was at a small restaurant to get a hot feast of meat wrapped in a large tortilla. A Mexican young lady acted as cashier, cook, and bottle washer, but I never ate a better meal in Mexico.
The scenery changed greatly by the time we reached Ojos Negros. We were in a valley cutting through some very high mountains that towered over 10,000 feet into the blue cloudless sky. Cattle grazed along a stream. Early crops were up good. On the gentle foothills of the towering mountains, farmers had disked the ground and planted wheat and other small grains as far as their tractor could safely go.
There are a number of gold and silver mines north of Highway 3. I was told that among pine trees there is the largest working gold mine in the world. It would take a vehicle higher off the road than ours to reach it. As far as pine trees, we never went above an elevation high enough to produce anything but the spreading pinyons with edible nuts still intact.
Early darkness of the early evening hour of between five and six p.m. was closing in by the time we finished our journey of 120 miles. Ensenada is a large city with a very good harbor. Manufactures in San Diego moved to this Mexican City when the California city’s workers went union about twenty or more years ago. This metropolis with mountains to the east and the Pacific to the west, is a sprawling giant.
Luke soon found the shabby little motel where we had reservations. Since the door was too narrow for a wheelchair, we started looking for another place to stay. The next place we stopped at had been freshly painted and paint fumes choked like a chemical factory. We drove southward toward Maneadero. Luke stopped to ask directions. None of the places where we stopped suited us. The doors in some were too narrow for a wheelchair. Some of the buildings had steps a wheelchair couldn’t navigate.
In pitch black of night, Luke turned westward toward a bay. After driving along water, we approached lights. Baja Country Club loomed out of the darkness. A magnificent white building with over a thousand rooms and condos shone out of surrounding palms and tropical plants. Both of us hurried into a magnificent lobby. I knew this was going to cost us at least one of our hundred dollar traveler’s checks. After some broken Spanish and English, we were charged the huge sum of thirty-five dollars!
On the Sea of Cortez, the March weather had turned to spring with temperatures reaching eighty by noon. On the Pacific side, the temperature was a cool forty-eighty without any heat in the large mansion. By this time a clerk who could speak English had appeared. After we told him we were cold, he gave us a small electric heater.
He explained, "March is our off season. Most of the year we are concerned with keeping cool instead of hot. This place is cooled by a chilled water system. It is too expensive to try and switch to heat."
Luke who has been in heating and cooling for a number of years thought about the situation while we rolled Jo and our luggage inside over sidewalks luxuriantly cutting through the dense tropical plants. Taking only a few minutes to plug in the heater and make Jo comfortable, the two of us went searching for food. We passed banquet halls capable of seating several hundred in luxurious surroundings. We found a bar and restaurant where one man was cook, bar keeper, and dish washer. In a short time we had a very good take out plate for each of us.
Very chilly, after eating I turned the shower on hot and warmed up. The small electric heater took the edge off the cold beautiful room that was bigger than three of our bedrooms at home. We went to sleep in luxury. After Jo turned off the one available television station, a sizzling noise awoke us. The cord to the electric heater burnt in two pieces.
Early morning sunshine shone on a world of blue sky, bright flowers, and the waves of the Pacific. Luke was far down the beach looking for seashells while I dragged out the electric grill and set it up on the patio. When the frying of eggs and bacon was at its best, an employee dressed in black and white walked by. You can’t hide sizzling food, so with a smile, I said, "Buenos diaz." He smiled and walked on by.
After Luke spent an hour showing the manager how to use hot water heaters to heat rooms, we left this tropical cool paradise and were on our way to La Bufadora! This tourist attraction is at the top of a very steep climb up a mountainside. Taking advantage of the natural attraction, vendors have set up their wares in permanent stalls. Some of the articles offered for sale were spectacular.
Since the view of the famous blowhole is not wheelchair accessible, Jo sat in the van at a spot perched dangerously close to a cliff where the ocean beat against rocks thousands of feet below. I thought about her fear of heights, but she seemed content to take pictures of the large Mexican sea gulls that flew around dropping their calling cards. Sunshine came off the dashboard for a quick look at this strange world. One swoop of a dozen or two sea gulls and she was ready to find a hole. The white deaf cat doesn’t like or trust gulls.
Luke and I climbed steps to where we could see the famous La Bufadora. The name sent thrills up my spine! LaBufadora is a cave that extends back into the cliff. The tide rushes into the vacancy of the hole and compresses air in the cave. When the tide recedes, LaBufadora spews a column of frothy water hundreds of feet into the air. This blowhole is supposed to be the world’s largest. The best way to see it is like some children were doing. They leaned as far as they could out over the guardrail, then when LaBufadora shot its wad of water, the children were thoroughly drenched! Never mind, the wetting brought more thirty-five cents to use the bathrooms to change into dry clothing. The Mexicans at LaBufadora are enterprising, but they do hand out toilet paper and soap.
When we left the blowhole, we stopped for a takeout meal of lobster. This delicacy was fit to die for as we made our way southward up, down, and around some very steep mountains. The reason natives tell why the one main highway of Baja follows up the steep mountains instead of following the more level sea coast of the Sea of Cortez is that the Spanish priest, who first traveled this rugged land, preferred the cool mountain breezes over the hot muggy air off the inland sea.
The route up the coastline on the Pacific side would have been blocked in places by steep mountains meeting the bays that cut into the interior. On the Sea of Cortez side, a route could have been more easily constructed along the beautiful inland waterway. If this route had been used, there would have always been the necessity for routes to the villages along the western seacoast. Highway One that ties the southern tip of Baja to the state of California was not paved until the 1970’s. Before that time only adventurers using rugged four-wheel-drive vehicles, airplanes, or ships could make this trip we were making in a van totally unsuitable for dirt roads. Even with the paved highway, most of the side roads to various ranches, coastal bays, and small villages are still rough and almost impassable.
The farming we had seen so far was mostly feed for livestock. Once in awhile a field of long edible cacti appeared on shelves in the mountains. The closer we got to San Quintin the large valley opened up into a flat desert. Enterprising farmers from both England and the United States have tried to capitalize on the aquifers and pump irrigation water out of the underground lakes. A group of Englishmen who came here in the late 1800’s starved out. Their remains lay buried south of San Quintin. This group did some amazing things like drive pilings into the bay so they could build a highway to where ships could dock and carry their produce to far away markets. All that remains of this forgotten highway are the pilings in the bay.
More recently, large agricultural complexes from California have supervised native landowners on how to use large pumps to bring gushing irrigation water onto the arid land. Now from December to April, miles of vegetables grow to feed people in the frozen north. More permanent, fine groves of olive trees and vineyards stretch along the highway.
This tremendous farming operation is bringing wealth to the landowners. Thousands of Indians are transported to the area each year, and for three dollars a day, they do the hand labor that is back breaking. Because sanitary toilets are not provided for the workers, their fecal material has occasionally contaminated the vegetables and caused outbreaks of food poisoning in places as far away as Michigan where school children were fed delicious strawberries grown in these winter gardens.
Besides the contaminated food that very rarely causes problems, another bad problem is occurring. As giant streams of water are pumped out of the aquifer, salt water seeps in from the bays and causes the fresh water to become so brackish that drinking water from wells is made unusable. The big commercial growers plan to stay in one place no longer than twenty years and then move on southward. Perhaps drifting desert sand will reclaim this productive farmland.
San Quintin has a tourist bureau. Luke and I wanted to do some night fishing so we asked for the name of a place near the water. The manager spoke perfect English and was very courteous. He gave us the names of two fishing camps located about eight miles west of the pavement. The dirt road he told us to take was straight out of hell. Irrigation water had run out of the field and stood in large puddles. What should have taken twenty minutes in the light of evening turned into over an hour in pitch dark. While I am at it I have to tell about the Mexican fences. Most are one wire strung very loosely. I think the wire is meant to be a marker instead of a means of turning animals.
Finally we arrived at Old Mill. Strung out along a small cliff, the rooms were adequate and fairly cheap. The owner and operator is a Mexican who speaks perfect English he learned as a boy when he helped his father run the motel. He and his wife have a well-stocked restaurant and bar, but since we had a good supply of food in the ice chest, I hooked up the grill and cooked outside.
Luke and I climbed down a trail to the beach and started fishing in a bay that was calm and free of obstructions. From darkness covering the water we could hear thousands of animals or birds calling to each other. Since we weren’t catching anything and the March air was a little cool we went to bed. Turning on the TV we hoped to watch the one station in English with Spanish subtitles. Suddenly the noise of the generator stopped and everything went black. Rural electricity has not arrived in Baja.
The next morning I walked along the shore and fished while Luke looked for shells. We soon found out where Canadian geese winter. The bay was alive with them. Fish jumped among the birds, but they were farther out than we could cast. About a mile from the motel we found the pilings left from when a bridge stretched across the shallow bay. It must have taken a great deal of work to put the wooden poles in for we could hardly see the other shore. When we got back to the motel, Sunshine was having one big catfight that Luke promptly stopped. If Luke ever gets married and has children and takes care of them as good as he does his cat, he is going to be one good father!
Taking a very cold shower and dressing we loaded Jo up and were on our way. Both Jo and Luke wanted to spend the night at Guerrero Negro then get up early and go to Scammon’s Lagoon and watch the gray whales give birth. When we got ready to leave, the owner came and visited with us. When he heard we had come in by the north road, he told us to take the south one instead. This time we drove on a smooth thoroughfare that hardly shook the van at all. If we had had time we would have gone back and told our first guide what we thought of him.
After we left the farming country we were once more in desert mountains covered with large Cardon cacti that are much bigger than Saguaro cacti of Arizona. The rocky mountainsides had so many interesting plants that we had to stop a time or two and look at them up close.
Perhaps this is a good time to tell you about the Baja Highway Route 1. Most of the pavement was in place. Water from the highway caused a long green stretch of plants growing along both shoulders of the road. Baja cattle find this good grazing, but occasionally a truck or car collides with one to the animals with disaster to both animal and machine. Since the animals graze at night, if drivers must drive by light from headlights, they should do this very carefully. Preferably all traveling should be done in the daytime.
Large trucks constantly use this road. Some haul cargoes of livestock. We saw cattle along with some burros and one load of swine. NAFTA has greatly increased the freighting business with merchandise being hauled both ways. Truckers have been caught with drugs mixed in with their goods.
Like in the States there are various road signs warning drivers of dangerous curves, dips, dips that may contain water, steep grades, and school zones are some of the most common. The one sign Luke learned to stop for was, "TOPEZ" which warns of speed bumps in the highway. Taller than our road clearance, the van slid over each aggravation at most cities and towns on the Peninsula. We noticed that there was a muffler shop located after each of these bumps. One thing the bumps do is slow down incoming traffic.
Attesting to the number of accidents along Baja roads is that little memorials are built for each occurrence of a death. Luke irreverently called these, "Dog houses." I’m thankful that one didn’t have to be built for one of us.
Among all the beautiful mountains and old volcanoes between San Quentin and Guerrero Negro, there is one that really stood out. A cone shaped peak, the sides are covered with rocks about the size of cannonballs. Perfectly round, these rocks are almost identical in size and shape. I wondered if these rocks were shot out of a volcano mouth in some distant past. The Creator must have been in a playful mood the day He created this particular creation.
On the north side of Guerrero, we found one of the government owned Pinta motels to stay in overnight. Luxurious, spacious, the rooms tastefully open on a square plaza filled with a garden of tropical plants. The price of a room was about seventy dollars which is a little high for Baja, but that night, the price was worth it for a cold night wind was blowing and there was heat! One of the courteous employees helped us carry our belongings into the beautiful tastefully decorated rooms with walls at least three feet thick.
The restaurant food was delicious. Only one incident happened that caused us concern. When we locked the door we didn’t know an outside window hidden by the heavy drapes was open. Sunshine found it, and was gone when we got back from eating. While Luke started looking I went out the large window. The white cat is totally deaf like many albinos. There was no use calling. In no time I found her by where we parked the van. Carrying her back to the room, I reentered through the open window. I had stepped in mud and left a large track on the sill. Wiping the excess mud away, I wondered if I should tell the manager about the mess. There was no need for by morning the mud had dried the same color as the paint on the windowsill.
The next morning Luke had to redo the ramp so Jo could get in the van and go watch the gray whales birthing in Laguna Ojo de Liebre or Scammon’s Lagoon. The ramp on the handicapped van is the only thing that has given us any problems, and without Luke we would probably be in Mexico for without it there is no way to get Jo and her wheelchair in. While the repairing was being done, I explored. A family was camped under a quilt thrown over a limb that gave me ideas for our next trip. The hard part is going to convince Jo especially after all the things we heard about the dangers of camping in unprotected places with bandits robbing.
We had been traveling in Baja Norte until we crossed the line before coming into Guerrero Negro. When we pulled on the highway, we were in Baja Sur. Again the soldiers stopped us and had us open our glove compartment. "Do you have any citrus fruit," they asked Luke. I had forgotten we had oranges and lemons in the icebox, but we weren’t asked to open it.
We also had limes, but I saw no reason to volunteer information. Jo and Luke didn’t like the sweetening the Mexican manufacturers used in their Diet Pepsis so they added fresh limejuice to every bottle they opened.
When they asked for visa’s I thought our time in Mexico was up. All they did was have Luke bring all three of our driver’s licenses to a building and give us a temporary visa good for more time than we would spend in Mexico. "Go to a bank tomorrow and pay fifteen dollars apiece," a soldier told us. "You could pay today, but all the banks are closed on Sunday."
A soldier wearing a rubber suit and a mask motioned us to drive forward. After telling us to roll up the windows he sprayed the underside of the van with a mild insecticide that made my eyes and skin burn. We who have been hurt with this material have that reaction. Some have reactions so bad that they pass out.
With a sigh of relief we were on our way to see the whales give birth! In order to get to the birthing grounds or more accurately, birthing water, we had to drive through the biggest salt works in the world. Giant earth moving equipment is used to make giant lagoons to trap the ocean water. Then giant earthworks are made to keep the water in until it evaporates and leaves giant layers of pure salt. Loaded into giant machines that process the salt, it is loaded onto ships and sent all over the world.
The Mexican government (51%) and Japan’s Mitsubishi Corporation (49%) own the salt works. The company operating under the initials ESSA exports seven million tons of salt a year from it's 40-year-old Guerrero Negro facility. Environmentalists are concerned that the salt concentrations and the chemicals used will drive the whales away from their winter birthing and breeding grounds. Probably of more concern is that the salt mining will kill the sardines and other food supplies the whales depend on while they rest on their journey back to their summer homes in the Arctic. Since the salt gathering provides jobs for a large number of people and brings in good money for the government, I hope something can be worked out.
After traveling through private property we were off to find a place to see the whales give birth. Jo and Luke took out their binoculars and were soon oohing and awing over the whales they could see out in the bay. Most people get on sight seeing boats and pay money to observe the birthing process. Jo wouldn’t get on a boat, and I didn’t argue ‘cause watching from shore was much cheaper.
"That mother is leaping for joy while she gives birth," Jo shouted.
"From what you told me about hatching Luke who didn’t weigh quiet eight pounds, I’ll bet that mother having a whale is leaping from pain."
"You look," she said handing me the binoculars.
"I wouldn’t deprive you of the pleasure," I said.
She answered, "I can see them with my naked eyes."
Since my eyes were burned in an insecticide accident, I could see the water and the observation boat but no whales leaping or anything else. The binoculars didn’t help so I cut open a clam and wet a hook. I’m still not convinced they saw anything, but we stayed all morning looking at something.
Again the fish weren’t biting so I was relieved when we decided to continue our journey. It is well we loaded and started to continue on our way. There were no waves, but suddenly the tide started coming in. Before Luke could start the motor, we were sitting in two feet of salt water with more coming every second. I waded out through water knee-deep. It took a quarter of mile of wading to get to a rise so Luke could stop and let me sit in my backseat.
The reason the bay has the lagoon named, Scammon’s Lagoon, is that Scammon was a whaler in the 1870’s and 80’s who with other whalers almost killed all the gray whales. The large mammals are very attracted to humans and boats. This attachment made them easy targets to the hunters who harpooned them unmercifully. Finally getting enough of their killers, the whales started attacking the boats. The saddest part of this story is that the whalers caught the baby whales and towed them behind their boats. When mothers came, they killed the large animals.
At last after getting through the salt works we were once again on our way south to the bottom of Baja. The land was flat farmland when we stopped at a filling station for fuel. Luckily for us, the van got very good mileage. The tank holds twenty gallons, and we only had to fill it nine or ten times to make a three thousand-mile journey. The filling station man told Luke the highway would go through flat land the rest of our trip.
We soon found out we had heard another Mexican lie for we traveled up and down one of the steepest roads I’ve ever seen, and I was raised near Durango, Colorado. The only thing different was that occasionally we would come into a streambed that had an oasis with a beautiful pool of water surrounded by date palms.
Eighty-five miles south of Guerrero Negro the desert was interrupted by a stream of blue water. Turning to the west, we were in the midst of a tropical paradise. Giant date palms surrounded a large lake. Following the road we were soon in San Ignacio the home of San Ignacio de Loyola the church founded by Jesuit Father Francisco Maria Piccolo in 1716 to minister to Indians who lived in this area. The Mexican Jesuit Juan Bautista Luyando, who devoted much of his life to the mission and its people, began the present church building in 1778. He and following priests constructed the building out of four feet wide volcanic blocks cut from the volcanoes known as Las Tres Vigenes. The building’s interior consists of a great altar of carved wood and gold finish, seven oil paintings, and a statue of San Ignacio de Loyola.
Luke and I reverently entered the magnificent but humble building with floors made of slate. We were given permission to take pictures, and then I walked the Stations of the Cross. Centuries melted, and I stood in the presence of the Almighty God who built this wonderful world of Baja!
Coming out of the building and down the steps, I walked across the plaza used for the recreation of the village. This was a Sunday afternoon, and old men of the village sat on benches. Their eyes followed me as I walked across the ancient center of San Ignacio. I wondered about these descendents of Indians and Spaniards. Did they resent an Anglo from the north disturbing the rest of this village? An ancient people in an ancient place ruled over by an ancient religion, were they worse off because of their Catholic heritage instead of my more recent Protestant faith? I once thought they would have been, but on this day, I wasn’t sure but what their faith was every bit as valid as mine.
On that day I saluted the old men of San Ignacio. What had their lives been like? Could I with all my learning have helped these people live better? Perhaps, I thought, this was the way God wanted them to live and care for this beautiful place.
Sobered by the Sunday evening spent in the old church, we drove on toward Santa Rosalia and a new adventure. It was turning dark when we came down the long mountain road that turned and circled the Sea of Cortez. After many torturous miles we were onwn the sea south of San Felipe. In the darkness we must find a place to stay where we could get Jo and her wheelchair into a room. Driving on through the old copper mining town we pulled into a walled motel proclaimed to be El Morro which is an appropriate name for a building perched on a cliff overlooking the sea and the lights of the city curving along the coastline. The palm trees and well cared for flowerbeds made me want to spend a day or two here.
Walking under a protecting porch that stretched around the courtyard, I was troubled to find a step going into the rooms. Walking into the office, a tall noble gentleman of some sixty or more years greeted in English. We visited a moment. He was Mexican with a French mother. His dignity proclaimed him to be from a good lineage.
He assured me he would take travelers check, but he would not take a credit card. This disappointed me since we were down to our last three hundred dollars.
We walked under the protecting overhang to a room. I noticed that the inside walls were of rough lava rock that was very attractive. The back sliding door led out to a rustic walled courtyard covered with large vegas through which the stars sparkled in an unpolluted sky. Water lapped at the foot of the cliff on which the building stood. The large bathroom had a walk-in shower that I could roll Jo and her wheelchair into. It was perfect. If only we could maneuver the step.
Jo didn’t think she cared to try the step. We wandered through narrow streets that curved among wooden houses built in a French style. All the other hotels and motels were unsuitable for a wheelchair. We tried to purchase a door to use as a ramp from a local manufacturer. "The doors are hollow, señor. They are not strong enough to hold a wheelchair," he explained in Spanish.
The next town was down the coast, and we weren’t sure we would be any better off so Luke and I decided we would detach the ramp and use it to get onto the porch. When Jo rolled onto the pavement we found we could lift her and the wheelchair up the step. At almost midnight, we were finally settled for the night. Luke pulled out one of the many drawers in the place so Sunshine could have a place to sleep, and we were settled. "Two drawers won’t open," Luke complained.
"A little rundown," I said. "This place is beautiful, but it must be over a hundred years old."
Early next morning I was out exploring. Besides the coconut palms there were other trees I had never seen before. Some of them were giants with blossoms like orchids. Behind us was a giant courtyard that overlooked the bay with the town nestled around it in a horseshoe pattern. Since we had planned to stay here two nights and regroup I wanted to do some fishing. If there was any fish bait around, I thought I could cast over the cliff and do some good. A path ran below us, and if all else failed perhaps I could fish from there. There was no apparent trail, and walking is not always easy for me.
Luke took my bank Pulse card and tried to draw money from my account. There were two banks in town so while we waited, Luke looked for a part that would rise the springs on the van so the bottom wouldn’t drag. In this part of Mexico, one doesn’t go to a parts house, one goes to the junkyard which has always been Luke’s favorite thing to do. Without any fish bait, I read up on the history of Santa Rosalia.
During the United States Civil War, France had thought it safe to again take over Mexico. The French Foreign Legion had kept the law over the rebellious country. Somehow after the Macmillan rule France bought rights to a vast copper area west of this modern city that was then only a very small fishing village. After the French government promised to build a French village with a large church, the Mexicans deeded over a large tract of land for the French to take out copper ore. Besides the other things mentioned, France built a large smelter that has been rusting away since the mine closed in the 1950’s. On the town square stands a large locomotive engine used to pull the ore to the processing plant.
Besides all the nice physical things the French did for the Mexicans, they hired a great number of them to run the copper industry. The workers loaded the smelted ore on large ships that took it all over the world. During World War I and II, large quantities of the raw product went overseas. When the French pulled out after they said there was no more ore, they left the mining equipment intact. Since then, the people who were said to have been abused by the French have made a living by fishing, off tourist, and from mining other ores.
When Luke came back from the junkyard we went to town to obtain some more money. In our time in Mexico, this is the only time we were treated rudely. My credit card had worked perfectly at every other place in Mexico. In Santa Rosalia, nada! The bank official tried the Pulse card with the same results. Not only would the teller not help me, his assistant escorted me out very firmly. We went across the street to another bank where they would give us no assistance at all even after I tried to get them to speak to my bank in the phone. Going back to the motel and finally getting a call through, my bank told me there was plenty of money in the account, but they couldn’t help me.
Did you ever fight city hall? Try doing it in a language you can only say words like, "Pardone, señor" "Gracias," and a few other phrases. We had enough money to catch a ferry to the mainland and get home. We had to wait two more days for the ferry. There was no fish bait. We fretted. Jo made a delicious salad while I cooked on the grill. Since there was only a small wall between the next courtyard and us, we visited with two young men and their secretary from Pennsylvania. Since they are in the landscaping business that doesn’t exist in the winter, they travel and take it off their income tax. It seems they run a very good business cleaning up toxic dumps.
While the three young people drank Mexican Tecate beer like Kool Aid, we had a very pleasant time until I opened my pickled shrimp. To me it smelled good, but it broke up the party. After some bitter words, Luke threw my favorite food over the cliff. When I remember to buy some shrimp, I’m going to sneak some of Jo’s wine and pickle me some more. I dare anyone to try and dump it!
After traveling with only two pairs of socks, we went shopping for more. For some reason I couldn’t get the extra pair to dry. The only bad thing about shopping was that Jo couldn’t get into any of the stores because of steps. None of the small shops were WalMarts. The clothing stores had ordinary clothing that was much like what we can buy in the States. Most of the people wear blue jeans except they wear dress clothes if their jobs require it. The only socks I could find were white ones that I have had a hatred for since my Navy days. One place had blue and gold socks, but they were long ones for football (soccer) players. I now wear white socks. Jo tried to find some wash clothes and had to settle for ones used to wash babies. Life is different South of the Border. We never did find any fish bait in this mining town.
Jo wanted to stretch out on her bed, and Luke wanted to go to junkyards so I went for a hike. To get to the water, I had to walk south, go down a sandy hill and then walk across gravel to the beach. After resting awhile, the motel and its air conditioning looked good. On the way back I found the motel had a large enclosed area in which they kept birds. Some of the winged creatures were tropical birds, but some of them were cardinals and doves.
The next morning we decided instead of spending another night to catch the ferry, we would take the two hundred dollars it would cost to ride the ferry and backtrack to San Diego. Luke agreed he had seen more of Mexico than he had ever hoped to see so we reluctantly headed back to San Quentin. We were packed and ready to go by eight o’clock. Sunshine was missing! We searched. Workers thought they had seen the cat get into another car. Luke got all the license numbers at the office. The owner gave us permission to search vacant rooms. The staff helped us look. After two hours Luke was ready to start chasing departed cars. One last time he went back into the room and found his cat had gone into a stuck drawer from the back. Fishing her out, we headed north. On the way out we found that the motel was only twenty years old. A poor grade of mortar had caused it to age faster.
The last words we heard was one of the cleaning ladies telling another that these North American are nice, but they are loco. I won’t try to write her exact words in Spanish!
The return trip to San Quintin was as interesting as the one going down. We stopped in some mountain villages that seemed to be inhabited by Indians. One store had cacti post for sale. The natives take the ocotillo cacti and make a living fence from the fence post that grow. It was in this part of Baja that the toilet facilities were worse than in rural United States in the 30’s. At almost dark three rough looking men were standing in the middle of the highway holding a gas can. Although we seldom pass up a chance to help others, we were too afraid of this situation to stop.
The time we wasted in looking for Sunshine caused us to be way after dark in reaching San Quentin. Again we couldn’t find a place to stay that Jo and her wheelchair could get into. Learning from a service station attendant that there was a La Pinta south of town, we went looking. The building’s outside was fabulous. Another good feature was that the beach was at the rear. A long ramp went into the building. We thought we had it made until finding that the ramp ended at a long flight of stairs. The clerks told Luke to go to a nearby fishing camp that was built at ground level.
Anxiously we drove through the dark without knowing what to expect. The van jolted and shook over the dirt roads until we came to Cielto Lindo, PRETTY SKY. There is always something eerie about coming into a strange place in the dark. The only lights visible were from the bar and restaurant where the Mexican manager spoke English. For twenty dollars a night we could have a room that was wheelchair accessible. "The only thing," he told us, "the generator is broken so there is no electricity in the rooms. There are candles," he added.
Thankful to have found a place to stay, we sat down to a feast of cracked crabs. Using tongs and cracking tools, we washed our hands in large bowls with slices of lemons floating on the clear water. A young Mexican male stood close by to bring us drinks and anything else we wanted. While we ate and listened to Mexican music coming from a music box soft conversation and laughter came from the bar. While waiting for the other two to eat, I went outside and got into a conversation about fishing with a tall, handsome Mexican and a short elderly gringo.
"Where can I find bait," I asked the two.
Making a gesture with a long knife, the Mexican pretened to cut off a body part before he said, "Get up early before the clam hunters come and you can find them on the beach. Cut them open, they’re the best bait you’ll find. If that doesn’t work, come back in around eight. We sell bait here."
Going to the room we could tell by candlelight that we were in an attractive, well-kept place. Only one thing was wrong, we couldn’t get the wheelchair into the bathroom. Since we could make other arrangement, it didn’t matter a great deal until it came to shower time. The electricity thing gave me no problem, not having any heat did. The fact there was heavy cover on the bed made me forget the cold.
When the sky started turning pink, I was out on the beach looking for clams. The beach was a block or two from the room. Flat, hard packed sand, the tide was a good hundred yards from the sand dunes. Inspite of the number of sea shells, there were no clams. A mile down the beach I met a retired Air Force man who was also beach combing. We talked awhile. For years he had been with the CIA, and he was still afraid to tell me much about what he had done. Judging from the fact I am seventy and he was in both Korea and Vietnam, he was about the same age as me. At least twenty years out of the service, he was still afraid to talk about what he had done during the forgotten wars. "You might be CIA," were his parting words. Those dudes put the fear of God in us grunts, and dudes isn’t the word I want to use here.
Going back to the resturant, a young Mexican lady had set up a Mexican food place outside for the breakfast trade. I leaned my fishing pole against a pole and enjoyed one delicious meal. After getting my fill, I took Jo hot coffee and hot food. Luke was out fixing the generator which was a rebuilt one from the States. There were no directions on how to hook it up. After fooling around for awhile by taking a hot shower, I remembered my fishing rod. This was one that cost at least eighty dollars from WalMart. In the States it would have probably been stolen. Althought there were twenty or thirty people eating breakfast, my pole was where I had left it. The crowd at Cielto Lindo was like that, friendly and trustworthy.
After Luke got the generator going we decided to stay a few days and enjoy the hospitality. The lady who ran the establishment told us to put everything on our tab and when we left we could pay with a personal check. The Cielto Lindo crowds are special people. Made up of retired military people, Mexicans, and vacationers, the US lady who owns the place, her daughter, and her husband are some very fine people. The husband was a helicopter instructor at Fort Wolters near Mineral Wells during the Viet Nam conflict. People who are not citizens by birth of Mexico cannot hold deeds to land along Mexico’s beaches. Since the daughter was born in Mexico, the deed was in her name.
The owner had found this jewel by looking in the want ads in the Wallstreet Journal. Consisting of several hundred acres, she not only had the restaurant, bar, motel, and cabanas, but a whole string of other enterprises including fishing boats for customers who wanted to go deep sea fishing for several days.
Buying some sardines for bait, Luke and I went surf fishing. The tide went so far out so rapidly that it was hard to keep our lines in the water. We looked for shells, hiked, and visited with people on the beach. The water was too cold for me to do anything but wade to cast my bait. For a person like myself who has chest and eye problems, the beach was wonderful. Dry with enough salt water to keep my eyes moist, the air was unpolluted. I could breathe and see!
Cielto Lindo is located on a point reaching out into the bay. Since fishing boats come into unload about four-mile from the camp, the Mexican government has a military camp to check incoming boats for smuggled drugs and guns. The young soldiers come to the bar and restaurant in their off hours. One seemed very attached to the young lady who ran the outside grill. One day at noon he came in full uniform carrying a long rattlesnake. From its mutilated head, he had used his boot to stomp its head. He gave the snake with rattles attached to the young lady who screamed and went elsewhere.
Cielto Lindo has a typical Mexican barnyard attached to the grounds. A burro was in a small enclosure. A goat on a tether kept the grounds attractive. Peacocks parade around showing off their brilliant feathers. Right in the middle of gathered owners and customers, a pot bellied pig wanders around nipping on the flowers and shrubbery. I traded Luke for it, but since the pig couldn’t drive, I had to leave it.
Besides the present wonderful owners, the camp has had its share of celebrities. John Wayne and his crew used it for a base. Numerous famous writers, musicians, and other celebrities have used the fresh air, salt air, and the comraide of this magnificent place that has tall mountains around it. The only regretful thing about the facilities, the water is brackish and unfit for drinking. It is fine for cooking and washing, but the owners provide bottled waters for the guests. Jo took her showers in a special facility provided for guests who pay a fee to camp out. Admist green grass, salt cedars, and flowers that were starting to bloom, we lived like pampered ricos.
One of the guests was Dan Anderson, Ph.D., who taught marine biology at a California university. While we were there, he spent a day and night on his way to survey the fish in the Sea of Cortez. Mexico and the United States are both monitoring for toxins that might be disturbing the ecology in both the Pacific and the Sea of Cortez. The three of us listened to Dan’s stories until way in the night.
Greg Niemann author of Baja Fever, Mountain Air Books, Crescenta, California was another local celebrity who visited. Niemann’s from California goes away back into the history of Baja. His grandfather worked on a scheme to make the peninsula a part of the United States after he engineered the English colony that failed. The author reminds the reader that before 1970, Baja could only be reached by ship, airplane, or rugged all terrain vehicles. Travelers brave enough to brave the wilds either had to camp out, or visit small fishing towns like San Felipe and Quintin for food and shelter. Even though this land between a sea and an ocean is still primitive, it ain’t nothing like it was before there was a paved road going to the tip. I know with Mexico’s need to bring tourist dollars in, I hate to see the wild, beautiful Baja turned into a tourist trap.
At last our four wonderful days at Cielto Lindo were over. For room, meals, fishing bait, laundry, and one hell of a good time, Jo made out a check for less than two hundred dollars. Luke carried out two large buckets of the most beautiful shells I have ever seen, Jo put cuttings from some exotic plants in her unmentionables, and with a lot of memories, we headed for San Diego and home. The only thing we didn’t take with us were fish, but maybe mañana! I hope there is a next time.
On the way to the States, I stopped in a bank and cashed my last one hundred-dollar traveler's check. The lady at the bank gave me the money in pesos. The Mexicans are very reluctant to part with U.S. money.
The drive from Ensenada is something to die for, and one car full of people in a convertible did. Also, on that beautiful drive, one magnificent bull was left mutilated by the side of the fourlane divided highway running along a high cliff overlooking the ocean. Surfers were pitting their skills against the rough waves. Expensive condos line the beach along this highway. We stopped at a very plush restaurant for hamburgers for Jo and I. Luke ate another dish. We had eaten in Mexican places under all kinds of unsanitary conditions, and except for me, who drank the native water, we had no real dysentery problems. Those two hamburgers from one of Mexico’s finest like to have put an end to Jo and I! One of the food handlers probably forgot to wash his or her hands after going to the bathroom.
About dark we stopped at Tijuana for Luke to buy gifts for three children who are very dear to him. I looked around, but somehow I was going to shop across from Columbus, New Mexico at La Paloma. The quality of the merchandise and the prices are better than any other Mexican market I’ve ever visited. Back tracking, the markets at San Felipe and El Bufadora were the only two on Baja that were worth a flip for buying souvenirs. The other shops we visited were small. They sold only the basic clothing and food. Most of the stores had no refrigeration to keep any quantity of frozen goods. Now, if we had wanted to bring home Tecate in cans and bottles we could have made some beer drinkers very happy.
The Tijuana market is very well policed. The milling crowds of people were very well behaved while we were there. In fact the only one I saw get in trouble was I. After a short journey among the shops, I came back and talked to Jo through her side window. A burly armed policeman hurried over and asked her if I was bothering her. After some hesitation, she told him I was her husband. If she had been mad at me, she could have had me incarcerated in a Mexican jail for a long time! The drive from the market to the Border is one long mile of street vendors trying to sell merchandise to a long line of customers in slow moving cars. In fact the sellers finally made us roll our windows up and turn on the air conditioner. Going through customs took long enough for a drug dog to sniff our van thoroughly.
After a very difficult time finding a motel that wasn’t full in San Diego, Luke and Jo spent the day at the zoo. Sunshine and I spent the day together in the parking lot until I found a very wonderful art exhibit.
Here I’m going to get on a soapbox. We came across the Border with close to forty dollars - if I could have exchanged it for U.S. greenbacks. Luke and I tried at least three banks. All three times we got sent to another bank. What I’m trying to say is if Mexico treats U.S. citizens with couresty, we are going to have to do the same. Any business in Mexico we did business with had a means of accepting either U.S. money or Mexican money. Why can’t our businesses do the same for Mexican visitors? Another thing, why try to keep Mexicans out of the United States? If the system worked it would be helpful to protect our workers, but it ain’t working. Another thing, our citizens must never shoot at Mexicans coming into the U.S. unless we want Mexicans to start shooting our citizens when they go to Mexico.
We stopped twice on our way home. The only car trouble happened on the highway through Tucson. A pebble from a passing car flew up and made a slight crack at the bottom of the windshield. Before we had gone far, the crack was galloping. Luke tried to buy a glass cutter with which to cut a hole in the windshield and let the pressure out of the sealed windshield. Spending over an hour at shops there didn’t seem to be a cutter in Arizona.
Jo and I wanted to spend a night at a mountain retreat we had visited before in Portal, Arizona. Looking for something to eat, I opened the icebox that I had taken care of since our trip began. Luke got very ill from what he said was mold spores. This led to some cross words about me neglecting my duties. Way after dark we finally reached our sleeping place at Portal. Luke was barely navigating. The next morning, I bought a bottle of bleach and washed the icebox thoroughly. Between the odors from the Clorox and the bees that swarmed the jelly, I wasn’t in very good shape for our trip into the mountains and to Columbus. I was well enough to bring a can of Spam in and help Jo make sandwiches. This left us one unopened can!
Lazing along the straight highway that goes from Portal to Columbus, I ate Spam sandwiches all by myself. By the middle of the afternoon we were eating in the Pink Casa in La Paloma. All three of us bought gifts from a very large and reasonably priced selection of merchandise.
Again we went through customs at the Border. Again a guard let a drug dog sniff our car thoroughly. After Luke rolled the window down so the other guard could question us, we were about to be on our way again without incident. The guard dog took one last sniff. Sunshine hung on by one hind paw and took a vicious swipe at the dog’s nose. After some encouraging words from the dog handler, the situation was under control.
With two or three hours of sunlight left, we made it past El Paso for our last night on the road of a trip we didn’t want to end.
A hard, driving rain followed us into Monahanas. I wanted to stop and collect money for bringing it again, but we had plenty of gas, and we wanted to get home before too late. We drove through and after rainstorms most of the day. There were no real violent storms, but water was running pretty strong along the road. After we passed Eastland we could see two weird, scary clouds to the east. All three of us knew someone ahead was getting some violent weather. Jo played with the radio dial trying to pick up a weather report. HillBilly and Country music filled the van. Before we turned south off I 20, a car with Weather Watchers signs went speeding around us.
We hadn’t been in the house but a few minutes when a neighbor called and told Jo to turn on the TV. Our suspicions of being close to a tornado were confirmed. Fort Worth was filling the atmosphere with all kinds of debris. We were thankful to be home with one can of unopened Spam after a long and exciting journey into an unknown world. More than anything, we were thankful we weren’t in Fort Worth!
To Read Novels by Luther Butler click
http://novelsbybutler.homestead.com/files/BUTLERSNOVELS/novels_by_butler.htm