Burning Through XV - Completing the Cleanse

Amtrak’s Pacific Surfliner leaves San Diego central heading north at precisely 6:00 am. It’s New Years day and half of the passengers are heading for the Rose Bowl game in Pasadena. We speed along the suburb laden shoreline enroute to LA where I transfer to the train that will deliver me 36 hours later to Seattle. It’s fast, efficient and a great way to see southern California at dawn and on this day to learn the betting odds for Penn State versus USC at the Rose Bowl.

North of Santa Barbara the track hugs the wild California coast through a roadless section featuring a colourful visual palate of the invasive ice plant and range wildlife including coyotes, vultures, and deer. The aqua blue pacific mixed with the autumn colours of the ice plant, puffy white clouds and endless sky makes for a memorable stretch of iron highway. I fall asleep somewhere south of San Francisco to an orange sunset and wake up to a snow storm in northern Oregon.

I am anticipating a warm welcome as the friendliest bus driver on earth delivers us to the Canadian border. The last off the bus I am also the last in line from our bus to be interviewed. All the others get whisked through with ease. When I answer that I went to Mexico for a holiday the customs agent quipped, “going by bus to Mexico doesn’t sound like much of a holiday.” I quickly assess that the true explanation wouldn’t wash - that I went by bus because I needed to stay connected to the earth and move on the ground in order to burn through some emotional baggage; baggage which had been obstacle to getting on with my life and which obstructed truly connecting with my inner authority. Yes, it’s fortunate that I held my tongue.

It is rather upsetting when a customs agent leafs through your diary at 12:30 am after you’ve been on bus, train and bus again for 4 days straight, you smell like an Amtrak toilet and your glasses are broken so everything which is normally double because you have double vision is now triple or quadruple. My mind is moving slow but I realize he suspects me of something when he squirts out my toothpaste, reads my hotel and bus receipts, looks at the pictures on my camera and puts his latex gloved hand into my spare socks. When he asks what my wife thinks of me going to Mexico without her by bus I am speechless, but to myself I recall her laughing when I proposed the trip. By the time I am given the OK to proceed my mouth feels as dry as the Baja in August.

I feel my stomach turn over as we enter Vancouver. It’s not the graded snow piles heaped up against curb side cars that upsets me, it’s something to do with somebody I don’t know assuming I am being dishonest, that’s what really hurts. I’m so pathetically sensitive.

After a cold wait for the sky train then a bus to get to Kits, I am back in my apartment. Unlocking the door I hear Elizabeth from the bedroom say, “You’re home!,” and I feel warm and welcome. Over the next three days my body completes its cleanse with a full compliment of stomach ache, endless hiccups, diarrhea and other discharge. By the end of it I feel lighter.

What started out as a passing thought during lunch with colleagues in November 2008 turned into a transformational journey. You never know where your thoughts will take you unless you follow them.

Burning Through XIV – Passport Scanners and a Lumberjack Breakfast

Ensenada before dawn reveals this country's sleepy nature. My lonely walk to the bus terminal on lamp lit streets contrasts the touristy bustle at mid day, now devoid of diesel drenched streets. To my surprise, the 6:00 am border bus fills. As I settle in my seat the driver inserts the first of several videos chronicling 80’s “new romantic” rock. After 25 minutes of Duran Duran vintage bands pounding out spandex stunners, I consider leaping out into the foggy stretch of cliff side highway. This all helps to consolidate my feeling that I truly am done with Mexico.

An orange sun is just rising over Tijuana as we navigate her highways and overpasses. I sit anticipating the border and how I will respond to questions about why I don’t have a tourist permit. The predictable riffs of Spandau Ballet aren’t enough to distract my anxiety. To my surprise the bus trip ends at the Tijuana airport. My protests about promises of transport to the border are met with a blank stare. The driver, white dress shirt, thin Latino mustache and slicked back mullet points to the taxi station. Fifteen US dollars later and I am at US customs, one among the hundreds of Mexican day pass workers heading to San Diego to scrub floors and trim hedges for the wealthy.

I brace as the serious Customs Officer waves me forward. He glances at me then swipes my passport through his scanner saying, “proceed.” Whoosh, I am in the united States of America. I had been imagining this moment since my first pre dawn steps on the bus station tarmac in Tijuana 10 days earlier. I have been creating anxiety raising scenarios since then about what could happen if I am questioned about having no tourist permit.

I sweep past the x-ray machine out of the customs building. Its so clean I feel like I could eat off the sidewalk butting up against the shinny red trolley cars quietly loading to take sleepy passengers to San Diego. Everything seems to hum with precision. I purchase my ticket from a machine with some US dollars I purchased from a rip off money changer 50 paces the other side of the customs officer.

An hour later and I am in an American Denny’s surrounded by a lot of very big people, stuffing down a lumberjack breakfast – 3 thick pancakes dripping with sugary syrup, gobs of bacon, sausage and a giant orange juice – with pulp. Molly my waitress, with the friendly pride you only experience in these united States barks – “I’m right over here honey if y’all need anything.” America the beautiful.

Burning XIII – Northern Exposure with Toast

With a white Stetson tipped forward on his dark wizened forehead the old Mexican sitting quietly next to me paints a picture of patience. He’s a silent teacher and I can learn a lot about how to wait for a bus. The San Ignacio depot is a dirty affair, a ramshackle store front office tucked into a concrete jumble of shops. The attendant selling tickets for just the one bus uses this opportunity to argue with her mother via cell phone while her husband sets up an evening taco stand. Such is the enterprising life of San Ignacio residents.

We wait. The old man, his beautiful graying hair and perfectly trimmed mustache, nods and chats briefly with passers by as the sun drops out of the sky. Three hours of this small town Mexican bus depot ‘entertainment’ and I’m jittery. The ‘waiting’ lesson only went in skin deep.

Aquila Lines arrives and I’m all set to roll north - a 10 hour trip to Ensenada. But 5 minutes out of town we slow to a stop at the military check point. Passengers are shuffled out of the bus and told to wait as gun totting soldiers sniff the bus and search bags. I tense knowing I don’t have a tourist permit and know if they ask for my passport I could never explain why I don’t have a permit. My bag gets pulled onto a bench and I am called over. A young soldier empties my neatly packed wares onto the dusty road. “Joo ‘ave any draaggs, any gaanns?” He watches my eyes as I answer and walks away satisfied leaving me to pack it away.

The night ride through the desert begins. I pull out my sleeping bag to drift off and am woken only by the stench of the mud flats in Guero Negro. My dreams are broken and scattered but compelling enough to keep me sleeping. So much so I almost sleep through the Ensenada bus station, but wake suddenly and stumble off the bus. I say "Ensenada?" to the driver who is having a smoke with a bus station attendant. He says “Ci Ensenada ci.”

It’s 5 am and I wander the empty streets a little dazed. This tourist town wakes up early and by luck I find a place that serves good coffee, toast and eggs. The sun rises exposing one of Ensanada’s attractions, a massive Mexican flag which flaps in the cool Pacific breeze wafting a wash of shade over the foreshore. Tijuana is only an hour north. I’ll spend the day here and arrange cross border transport for tomorrow. That will get me in San Diego in plenty of time to catch the train to Seattle. Tijuana … the border … my heart races with the thought.

Burning Through XII – Jesus Turns Sand into Water

What a strange scene with the morning sun on my huevos rancheros. Those palm trees across the street don’t jive with where I am – right in the middle of the Baja. I know Jesus turns water into wine, but can He turn sand into water?

San Ignacio is more than a catholic mission I learn, it’s a true oasis. Life giving water bubbles up from deep below the Sierra de la Giganta. It cracks the surface creating a series of lakes in the centre of this wide desert valley. Desert palms rustle in the breeze beneath scorched volcanic hills topped with cactus.

The mission and it’s village are a long walk from Jorge’s Rice and Beans, the travelers hostel where I spend the night and where I inhale my morning eggs. The magnificent church with its blossoming jacaranda and the shaded central square are also an oasis for me, my body absorbing the tranquility. And inside the church, I see that Jesus really suffered. He’s always so brutalized in Mexican effigies. It’s like they need a graphic reminder that it can always get worse.


This is a lazy town. Old men play checkers in the street side pub where I enjoy a frosty Corona; tourists laze about wandering from buses to the church then over to a café; children laugh as they play a ball game in the zocalo (square); a wizened old couple sort dates in the warm sun, vultures cruise overhead and all around the ever-present craw of roosters.

I seek a higher perch, scramble up a scree slope to the top of a ridge overlooking the valley. On top I find a maze of volcanic rock and cactus. I have my moment of Baja bliss. Warm sun on my face, overlooking the oasis below and rusty hills for backdrop. Church bells below carry a sweetness to up to me, lightening my mind and body. A wispy thought tells me to suck in this moment, fill myself up with it. I know that once I leave this perch, I begin my long grind back to my couch in Kitsalino.

I know then that I have had my peak moment. Jesus created a miracle in the desert, turned the unexpected in to 5 minutes of bliss. Every bus terminal debacle, every bad meal, all the twists and turns that have led to this are worth it. I have a profound feeling that my whole life led up to this moment, but then isn’t every moment like that?

Burning Through XI - Wind Blasts me Inland

The news from home is of a white Christmas. Snow piling up, travel thwarted - delays. I wake to a cool north wind blowing from Canada straight down the Sea of Cortez. It blows me right off the veranda where I perched to start my day.

Should I stay or should I go? Waiting for the ferry means 2 days in this town and it’s getting smaller all the time. I assess my options and stay. The next days are filled with many hikes up to the top of the surrounding hills, overlooking the town and the desert, investigating the old smelter where I hear the ghosts of all the Mexicans who died making money for the man in Paris. I wander the streets to visit and revisit familiar shops and restaurants. Time slows down as my movement decreases. 20/20 hind sight says moving on would have a better choice.

My plan was to catch the ferry on the 28th and make a run from Guaymas in Sonora to catch my train in San Diego by the 31st. When I made the plan I didn’t know the north wind would cancel the ferry again.

Being immobile for those days had an ill effect. The luster from when I first arrived wore off. Yet the beauty of Santa Rosalia and it’s people stay with me even now. From this distance I see it was not the place but the sense of familiar and lack of movement that began to crowd in on me.

I knew I had to move. The bus for San Ignacio left at 4:00 pm and I was on it.

It is early evening as I roll into San Ignacio. I hop off the bus and instinctually walk down a side street and fumble with broken Spanish asking around for a hotel. An ex heroin addict visiting his family from L.A. leads me down a dirt track to the highway and points in the direction of a hotel. I wander aimlessly and turn back.

I am famished in the fading light and choose a roadside taco stand for a meal. Three generations serve me as I sit and listen to evening sounds. Cicadas begin their evening cadence as fifth wheel tractor trailers roll by, the Grandmother is crying desperately out back somewhere, and the TV is background noise to all of this. A shiny faced kid with holes in the knees of his jeans serves me coke and offers me a Chick let. It was the worst meal I had in Baja, but perhaps the most memorable.

It’s time to find a bed for the night. A waft of refried beans and diesel follow me as I make my way to a travelers hostel I found out about.

It is a long walk in the dark. Dew and desert palms line the road to the hostel - Rice and Beans. I meet a Canadian couple who have spent the past 15 years of retirement in Baja, traveling back roads with their heavy duty 4X4. I haven’t been at a travelers hostel on this trip. There is a strange but familiar ethic among road people here and lots of English. It is a good place to be for a night. Bob and Ruth tell me the catholic mission here is one of the finest in Mexico. I have part of the day tomorrow to check it out.