Leaving the USA by Dan (Tuesday, September 16)

On the morning of Tuesday, September 17, we awoke early at our campground in northern San Diego and packed up.  I drove Alison, Sam, and Maeve to the Birch Aquarium in La Jolla (and used the morning to continue my quest to repair electronic devices.)  They reported that their favorite parts were the seahorse exhibit, watching local sharks and rays being fed, creating electricity while teeter-tottering on a see-saw, and talking to the real oceanographers who worked there.

No USA Return

No Return

Then, around 5800 km from Thunder Bay, it was time to head to the US-Mexico San Isidro border crossing!  The first step was to stop just short of the border to buy Mexican auto liability insurance, $80 for 10 days.  Apparently not mandatory, but handy for avoiding jail in case of the unlikely.  Then we drove through a queue called ‘nothing to declare’, received a green light in the random green/red lottery, but were waived over for inspection anyway.  A guy with a big gun was convinced of our harmless intentions in a few minutes, despite the suspicious roof bag, and on we drove…

…immediately into a parking lot to get our tourist cards and auto importation documents.  We needed four tourist cards (at $25 each), since we were planning on travelling past the free zone boundary at Ensenada, and this was no problem.  For the car, we were told (a bit uncertainly) we had to visit the Importacion office at a different border crossing  ‘near the airport’ on the Mexican side.  So we made our way through the totally different traffic culture of Tijuana (in which other drivers get annoyed when you stop at a red light with no cross traffic) to the other border crossing.  Oops, going back into the USA in a few meters… drive backwards for 500 meters against traffic, whew.  A missionary donation collector directed us around the block to the office, which was closed for the Mexican Independence Day holiday!  

So back through the traffic, using GPS to try to figure out how to get back to the previous office inside the San Isidro border control zone. The car choose this moment to overheat for the first time, the wavering temperature needle and malfunctioning front differential adding to the relaxing atmosphere.  I did figure out how to leave my ID with the very friendly soldier and walk back across a pedestrian bridge to the first office, where I was told that we could just visit the Importacion office in La Paz in several days, since of course it’s Independence Day.

La Bufadora

On the toll road to Ensenada, the car cooled down, we visited a very cool ‘blowhole’ called La Bufadora where ocean swells channel through a small hole and shoot water 50 feet in the air, sometimes soaking the (refreshingly almost all Mexican) onlookers.  We camped across the bay from from Ensenada, with the city lights before us.

Camping near Ensanada