Back From San Diego

Hi all,
We got back from our long trip to San Diego to visit our friends Susan and Bob at Rancho Santa Fe. We wish we could have been there for Christmas but had to get back to install our new toys and get out of the marina (about $30/day).

It is over 950 miles up to the border and then you have to wait in line to cross the border so we wanted to get an early start. The rental car company (Budget)forgot that they had promised to bring the car to the marina at 7:30 and when we called they said that we did not have a car reserved. Fine. They came over about 8:30 and we got out by 9:00 in a standard instead of an automatic, with only a quarter tank of gas. We had great weather most of the trip but there were 7 Army checkpoints that you had to stop at along the way and the first one was about 5 miles outside of La Paz. Usually they just ask where you are going and where you came from. Gringos get off easier than Mexicans but we were searched twice. They were nice but meant business. They are trying to slow down the drugs and weapons dealing from south to north.

The highway is much improved over what you may have heard about years ago. It was mostly well-paved, but very narrow with no shoulders. It would take a Humvee to get back on the road if you got off. If you fell off by accident at speed you would definitely die. It is too narrow for all the semi trucks so they drive down the middle of the road even on the straight sections, and certainly on the curves, of which there are hundreds and hundreds. Every curve (and many straights) have the little memorial markers with plastic flowers and crosses to show where loved ones had died.

And of course there are the hated Topes! Topes (also called Vibradoras) are the ubiquitous Mexican speed bump. Mexican drivers don't pay any attention to stop signs and stop lights nor speed limits, so they put these major speed bumps in the middle of the roads to slow you down. Trucks have to practically stop to get across them and if you don't slow down your car you will have knots on your head from hitting the roof of the car. In small and big towns they will put about 20 smaller ones in a row just to make sure you slow down for the great big one that is at the end. Then on the other side they have more on your side of the street so that people can't just use the other lane to avoid them. There are hundreds of them along the way, many before dangerous curves. If you are lucky they will tell you they are coming with signs. Sometimes they are not marked and you are on a long straight stretch going 60 mph when WHAM - speed bump that you couldn't see. I guess you can tell we did not like them.

The drive does have some beautiful sections, and others that are almost beautiful because they are so stark. The highway crosses the baja peninsula three times on the way up and back which adds major miles to the trip. But you get to see both sides - one the Pacific Ocean and the other the Sea of Cortez. It is mostly cactus, desert and mountains mixed in with long flat sections. We could only go about 30 kph (about 18 mph) on some curvy sections but would fly at 130 kph (78 mph) much of the way. Only saw police a few times and they were parked on the way up, but saw about 3 on the road on the way down. That was the total in 2000 miles of driving! So I did not worry about getting stopped for speeding too much. If you obeyed the speed limit you would be killed by everyone else.

We only almost got killed about 4 times - twice with cars in our lane going fast around blind curves, once with a truck ditto, and once with 6 big cows spread over the road just over a blind rise at night. There were other scary times, but these were the worst. It is kind of interesting driving almost 80 mph on a narrow road with absolutely no room for error. To go slower would have taken to long. Luckily we made it OK.

Our main purpose for the trip was to go pick up and return with new toys for the boat: radar/chartplotter, GPS, wind instrument, plus lots of personal goodies that are hard to find in Mexico. Shipping goods down here is expensive and sometimes stuff just disappears never to be seen again. Or, you have to pay a "mordida", or bribe, to get your goods out of customs or shippers jail. We decided to go ahead and pick it up ourselves just to make sure it got here OK since we ended up spending quite a bit on the trip anyway. But, it was also an Adventure!!

Cindy was very worried about coming back over the border without declaring our stuff. We have a legal Mexican Temporary Import Permit which is supposed to allow you to bring in items to replace the same items on your boat. Most of the toys were to do just that, but the paperwork is incredible and not foolproof so we decided to change it and bring it back without declaring anything at the border. We asked literally dozens of boaters, expatriates here and local Mexicans and everyone had a different opinion, but the general consensus was to do what we did. We do know of at least one couple who got stopped and had to pay mucho dinero to keep their goods and to avoid prison and the forfeiture of their car.

The way it works is you drive up to the border crossing coming back from the states. The US does not stop you so the next thing is the Mexican border. Cindy kept asking me what would we tell them when they stopped us to check us in and we were going to be honest but not volunteer anything. Well, you just drive up to a gate that is unmanned with a sensor for the car. That sets off a random indicator light (red or green). If you get a red, you have to pull over and they question you and may search the car. At that point you would start to get nervous, but we got the green and just drove past the border guards and their pickups waiting to chase you down if you drive off after a red light.

So we made it through with our toys and wine and ramen soup. On the way up and back we stayed overnight in Guerrero Negro on the Pacific coast. It is a typical Mexican town - dusty and poor with bad streets (and topes of course). But the hotel was clean and had an excellent restaurant with some of the best fish either of us have had anywhere in the world.

We made it back safe and sound, without any damage to ourselves or to the car. We ended up not having insurance in the US although we were told you could get it on the way out of Tijuana. We did not see any places so just went on to the US. Luckily no accidentes.

Right now we have extended our stay in La Paz (we love La Paz!) to install the radar adn other goodies in a secure slip since I have to spend a lot of time up both masts to replace the old radar antenna and the wind speed/direction indicator. More to follow.