In the summer of 1991, I stripped the waterproof tape from the plastic tubes of codeine pills and water purification tablets and threw them away, figuring they were long over the hill. That was about the time of Howard Cohl's eclipse expedition. Howard is a scientist at the Sacramento Peak Solar Observatory. When Howard's account appeared in the Sunspotter, Sacramento Peak's very own monthly publication, I was pricked by an old sorrow and vicariously shared the adventure. Now, as Abe has returned from Nayarit with further plans to hang out in Guatemala, I am prompted to record and save these dreams come true.
Howard's story reflects a normal tourist trip on a tight time schedule. Abe's journey was less restricted, but he regretfully observed that time must be considered somewhere along the line.
On Friday July 5, Howard Cohl, Naomi Cohl, John Gizis, and Jimmy Irwin left Sunspot, New Mexico in search of a roughly circular shadow traversing the globe in hopes that they might be able to sit underneath it for five minutes or so. To intersect the path of the shadow, this small band of adventurers entered a land of extreme poverty and richness, of arid desert and lush rain forest. The nation is inhabited by people of good nature and spirit who do their country honor but are skeptically distrusting and of a money lusting nature. In a land to the north there sat a personage at his desk, smirking and thinking, “They will never survive the Death Caravan.”
But survive we did, surmounting all the warnings, rumors, and pitfalls that stabbed at us before and during the trip. We had heard all sorts of rumors concerning Mexico. I think that I can remember them:
1. You won't even be able to get into Mexico, they only allow people who have reservations.
2. Even if they let you in, there is no lodging. All of Mexico is booked.
3. If you do find lodging in the interior, you'll never find rooms on the coast. This is the peak of Mexico's tourist season and the coast that lies within totality has been booked for three years.
4. You will become deathly sick if you eat the food.
5. Don't drink the water.
6. At all costs, don't eat vegetables that might have been washed in the water.
7. There is no unleaded gas. Your catalytic converter and entire engine will be shot to hell. That doesn't matter, though, because you will never return.
8. Do NOT drive at night.
9. Banditos are everywhere. They usually kill their victims to avoid being reported.
10. You will never be seen again. Your only remains will be your car and clothing, driven (worn) by a fat Mexican sheriff.
11. The weather will be cloudy. Ha! After all the torture, you will not see the eclipse.
After hearing all of this, it is no mystery why only four of the original 15 people actually went to the eclipse. But we few had faith in common sense, confidence in the advice of more reliable sources, and went anyway.
When we left El Paso, approaching the Juárez border post, we were nonetheless a bit apprehensive. We filled the tank and a gas can, loaned by Bill Hull, with the last, safe, unleaded gas. The U.S. to Mexico side was a breeze. We drove right through the gate without trouble (Rumor #1 dispelled). We pulled to the side to complete the Mexican version of our papers. Inside a dirty building, staring and resentful eyes completed our papers and issued tourist cards.
Then we drove into Juárez, which we all agreed was a town best savored from inside the locked doors of my Montero. We did stop to exchange our dollars for pesos. While waiting in the car for the others to finish, I found myself in the way of a car wishing to exit the parking lot. I drove to the next side street. That must have frightened the other three members of the Death Caravan when they came out of the Casa de Cambio (money exchange place) to find me gone. A poor decrepit soul, to whom I had donated 5000 pesos, directed them to the waiting Montero down the street.
From a car window, it seemed that Juárez was the kind of town that one didn't want to visit for any length of time without an armed guard. We promptly left to travel a toll road towards Chihuahua. Fifty miles along this highway, we encountered a border checkpoint. I showed my tourist card and we all said, “Mazatlán!” The checkpoint guard let us through, and our first encounter with the non-English experience was successful. The country south of Juárez is mostly deserted. The landscape is similar to New Mexico; a long desert basin with mountains decorating the horizon, occasionally approaching or receding.
The tolls varied from one dollar to almost 10. But we agreed that the shape of the road was fair to excellent, and paying a large toll wasn't so bad when the highway was well kept. Around 3:00 p.m., we approached Chihuahua and decided not to stay. The city we saw from the highway seemed impoverished and dirty. It definitely had more charm than Juárez, but that wasn't saying much. We continued on towards a town called Parral in the foothills of the Sierra Madre. We arrived at 6:00 p.m. and decided to look for a motel recommended by Raul Flores. We had little difficulty finding it, and the price was reasonable at $5 per person. Oh yes, there was vacancy (rumor #2 dispelled).
We rested in our hotel room for a while. We all noticed that we stuck out like a sore thumb. It was embarrassing to walk down the street and have five or six people stare at you blatantly. Actually, the phenomenon of people just hanging out was observed all over Mexico. It seems that this is a fairly common pastime among the inhabitants. Hanging out occurs on street corners, in front of super markets, restaurants, cafes, and occasionally they hang out in the middle of nowhere, like on the side of a highway or in a field. They mostly stand, sometimes they sit. They appear to be intent on their surroundings while being completely disinterested at the same time. But when we walk by, a new interest sparks into their lives as if aliens had landed in their hometown. We took a deep breath and threw ourselves onto the street to find dinner.
At all the restaurants we visited (except Mazatlán), Spanish-English dictionaries were of little use. Menu items were mysteries that had to be solved through experimentation. Even Jimmy reluctantly tried his hand at this game. We ended up having lamb that evening. I didn't expect to find lamb in Mexico. I expected to find fajitas, tostadas, tacos, burritos, and enchiladas; foods that I had become accustomed to at home. Sure enough, these people do eat chicken, lamb, hamburgers, and normal food. We even found white bread and Coca-Cola.
Aside from a small, upset stomach on my part, none of us acquired Montezuma's revenge. All in all, we completely enjoyed the Mexican cuisine (rumor #4 down the drain). We ate vegetables such as lettuce, salsa, and tomatoes at different times during the trip. We are okay to this day. Rumor #6 is dispelled but be careful anyway. Even though we didn't get sick, that is not to say that you will never be. Certainly, the rumors concerning vegetables must have some merit but they are not a law and exceptions exist.
We slept peacefully that evening and were up bright and early for our voyage to Durango. The trip to Durango was uneventful except that we almost ran out of gas. We promptly emptied Bill Hull's can into the Montero's tank and made it to Durango to fill up with magna sin (unleaded gas). Although we never went without unleaded during the entire trip, sometimes the gas stations that have magna sin are few and far between (rumor #7). It was good that we had the gas can to help us make it to Durango. I wouldn't speculate on what might have happened were we to run out of gas in the Mexican desert. I think, although we wanted adventure, that is an experience left untried.
Durango is a fairly large, charming city. Although the people hanging out still stared at us, the stare no longer was as though we were invading their privacy. It had become more like an interesting diversion from their daily routine.
We succeeded in finding a nice motel. It had its own parking lot, which was guarded at night, for only 15 dollars a night. Dinner was a success, and John and Jimmy slept peacefully. Unfortunately, Naomi and I didn't. We had bedbugs and resorted to sleeping fully clothed. This was the only problem with lodging that I remember during the entire trip.
The next day we headed over the Devil's Backbone to Mazatlán. Traveling the twists and turns over cliffs through the Sierra Madre is an experience that everyone should savor. The vistas from these treacherous cliffs are spectacular, phenomenal, and ... obscured. The entire Devils Backbone was in the clouds. The only view was 20 to 30 feet in any direction. Occasionally, a slight break in the clouds reminded the driver that a constant view would be an unwelcome distraction from the road.
In a matter of hours, the climate changed from a mountain desert to spectacular, lush, tropical rain forest. The road, coming down from the mountains into the coastal area, is green and wet as it fords rivers. This last part of the road from Durango to Mazatlán was proof to us that Mexico isn't all a barren wasteland. It contains a jewel that the country should be proud of — and we hadn't really begun to see it!
As we approached highway 15, a band of men with rifles occupied the left side of the road and took our breath away. We passed on without delay and knew that we were veterans of the country. Never again during the trip did we see supposed banditos nor did they hint at bothering us (rumor #9).
We drove along the coast down highway 15 toward the town of Mazatlán, occasionally flirting with the Pacific Ocean. John had never seen the Pacific and Jimmy had not seen a body of water larger than Lake Michigan. Both Naomi and I had been to the ocean in California, but we were all awed by the giant expanse of water in front of us.
There was an obvious change in the habitat of the Mexican people. A new pride could be sensed in their dwellings and surroundings. The people who live in this region are happy to be here and certainly proud of their land. The city of Mazatlán welcomes tourists with open arms, and tourism is obviously the main industry. We looked in our AAA handbook, found a hotel that looked reasonable, and headed towards it on a road not 50 foot from the ocean.
We found our hotel and booked a room from July 8, our day of arrival, until the morning of the eclipse, July 11 (#3 debunked). The next three days was the vacation of our vacation. We relaxed on the beach, ate good food, and savored Mexican beverages. Even the crushed ice, presumably purified, in our piña coladas was okay. Jimmy went para-sailing. We swam and watched beautiful sunsets. We dodged vendors selling blankets, towels, hammocks, food, ice cream, jewelry, woven bracelets, and hats. We haggled a bit over blankets, towels, hammocks, food, ice cream, jewelry, woven bracelets, and hats. All in all, it was lots of fun.
On the morning of the eclipse, we packed up our stuff and drove down to a beach just south of Tuxpan called Playa Los Corchos. We arrived at the beach 20 minutes before the partial eclipse began. We had been a little worried because, in the morning, it had been pretty cloudy. But we knew that the weather could change drastically from place to place along the coast. As a matter of fact, I found out later that Mazatlán had been mostly under cloud cover.
At Playa Los Corchos, the sky was blue with scattered cirrus clouds. The cirrus was not near the sun, and we anticipated awesome eclipse observing conditions. As the partial began, our expectations grew, and you could hear scattered cheers like, “It's begun!” Sure enough, we could see a barely noticeable circular dent in the disk of the sun through our exposed, 35mm, black-and-white film. The sight of the sun being eaten away became more and more ominous as the eclipse progressed. As it grew in percentage of the total solar disk area, it was bizarre that there was no noticeable difference in the appearance of the sky and surrounding landscape. Approaching 90%, it was obvious that it had actually gotten darker outside. From that point on, the eclipse took on a whole new meaning from anything that I'd ever read about it. The darkening was slow but steady, and birds flew around in seeming confusion. As the eclipse approached 99%, you could actually tell that the noon sun itself was darker. At a glance, the sun was almost watchable.
Totality began like a bomb exploding inside our heads. The beach was filled with cheers and screams. Shortly the cheers halted and an eerie silence pervaded the atmosphere. The beach, shrouded in darkness, awed its inhabitants. Small children played in the water as if nothing could disturb them, not even an eclipse. The rest of us stared in awe at the zenith. The sound of camera shutters could be heard all over the beach, and we were no exception. Once the initial shock had receded, the four of us lay down on the beach to enjoy the last three minutes of totality. The moon began to creep away from the sun with almost no warning, and we caught the diamond-ring effect as the sun burst into view. It soon seemed that nothing had happened.
A deep breath and a sigh and we had completed our main task (so much for rumor #11).
We lingered another two hours at the beach. Jimmy and I swam while three- to six-foot waves bashed down on us. After an authentic Mexican lunch, we departed for Puerto Vallarta and a rendezvous with the McGraws. Moving down the coast, it was evident that the change between Durango to Mazatlán would be paralleled by the one between Mazatlán to Puerto Vallarta.
The green of the coast had become GREEN. We crossed over the tropic of Cancer into a land of fairy tales and dreams. The trees were neither evergreen nor softwood. They were similar to the kind of plants you see growing at the Keil's house. Only they were as tall as trees. Huge, waving leaves draped over the road, causing scenic paths to become tunnels of stalk, leaf, stem, and trunk.
Puerto Vallarta was nothing special, except for imposing multimillion-dollar hotels. There must have been Americans in this place as we passed a McDonald's, Denny's, and a Seven - Eleven (7 - 7 in Mexico). We reached the hotel where the McGraws were staying to find that they weren't. They had canceled. We went out into the town at night to find a hotel. At night? No problem, rumor #8 bites the dust. We found a nice hotel in the middle of old Puerto Vallarta for about five dollars per person. We ate in a quaint restaurant and went to sleep knowing that we were safe.
We spent the next three days hurling ourselves toward Sunspot at breakneck speed, arriving Sunday evening at 6:00 p.m. You might have heard us tearing slowly through the residential area of Sunspot with the horn blaring. You might have heard us pause for 30 seconds or so in front of Steve Keil's house, laughing loudly and blasting the horn, “We survived the Death Caravan!” (rumor #10)
And we will never forget it.
A special thanks to everyone who sent the rumors our way.