Flagstaff, Tucson and Nogales

I know it’s been a very long time since we posted for the last time but we’ve been having way too much fun and haven’t had the time to sit in front of a computer and write stuff, so suck it! Heheheee.

So after having a great time at the Grand Canyon, we finally left and headed towards Flagstaff. I have heard of this city since I was like 10 years old at my mom’s hostel, because many travelers that came to the house were river rafting guides in the Colorado River and went to Chile to work over the summer at the Bio-Bio River there. After some years I got to meet a lot of people from this city. One of them was Brad, who became a very good friend of my parents and came back to visit many times throughout the years. I only met him once or twice, since I was usually gone camping or something when he came to the house, but when my parents heard we were going to be in the area they made me promise I would stop by and pay him a visit.

So when we finally arrive to Flagstaff it was too late so we ended up staying at a local Walmart for the night. At 7k feet elevation it was a pretty cold night for some of my companions, but I actually enjoyed it very much. The next morning we drove around looking for Brad’s address, which my mom gave to me in hope that he would still live there, cause the last time he went to Chile was over 10 years ago! We finally found his house and it really did look very much like the stilt houses you find in the South of Chile, which is a clear indication of the influence that my dear country had on him. It was a beautiful house!!!! Lots of wood and big windows with lots of light!

Brad knew right away who I was once I told him, although he didn’t physically recognize me because the one time I saw him I was like 14. He invited us in and showed us around, while we talked about my parents and Chile in general. Inside, this house was even more amazing! Lots of room and beautiful decorations! What made my heart stop was the fact that he had SO MANY of my father’s paintings on his walls! They were everywhere! He always considered my father a great artist and throughout the years he bought (and was given) many of my father’s paintings. There was even one of me when I was like 13 or 14, sitting at the kitchen table having breakfast, although I didn’t tell him it was me because I didn’t want him to feel bad for having something that he might have considered mine.

                                                Brad and I in front of some of my dad's paintings

He is also pretty much the only one in the area that builds wooden boats for the river. Some of them are replicas of very old boats and have even been put in exhibition at the museums in the Grand Canyon.

That night they were going to celebrate a friend’s birthday at his house, another river guide who was turning 71 years old and he was still running the river. They invited all of us and also to spend the night there. We had a great time and drank more than enough of the local beer, heheee. Great people indeed!

The next morning as we were getting ready to leave, Brad gave me a few pages where he wrote his first encounter with my father. I must have been a small boy back then and I was probably visiting some relative, because I never met him until many years later, but the way Brad wrote about him and my mother (He is a very avid writer!) really made me think of them and remember the good old times. That night I couldn’t help to shed a tear or two as I reread his story. Brad has a special place in my parents heart and now I understand why, He is indeed a great man!

 

From Flagstaff we drove to Tucson where I was supposed to meet up with another old friend of the family, also a river guide, Mike, aka El Maldito! But before leaving Flagstaff, Brad told me he was working and living up in Alaska, and that he has been there for more than 10 years already, so I didn’t get to see my good and very old friend. We met also in Puerto Montt, more than 20 years ago.

Instead of Mike, we met up with Sarah’s father, Charlie. He just happened to be there for work as we passed by, so we stayed that night at a local campground and met with him for breakfast at his hotel. He was very glad to see us as his daughter and son in law just pretty much start their part of the trip with us! We had a great breakfast that he graciously didn’t let anyone else pay for, talked about a lot of shit related to the trip and other stuff, took a few pictures together and said good bye. It was a short although very nice meeting. Charlie has this awesome personality that makes you really like him from the very first time you meet him, and he is a very smart man. I know he would really love to be part of this trip even if it was just for a few weeks and now that his daughter is part of it he is actively stalking our every move on facebook, the satellite tracker we have, and here on the blog, so he probably was the first one to read this post. Hi Charlie!!! Heheheeee.

From Tucson we finally arrived to our last city in the US: Nogales. This town is in both the US and Mexico, and we stayed that night in the US in preparation for our crossing the next morning. We took care of getting insurance for both the Pichula and Cubby, arranged everything that needed to be taken care of and spent our last night in the U.S. at the local Walmart. So many things people had warned us about regarding traveling in Mexico!!! We were all a bit worried about the crossing and about what was going to happen once in Mexico! It’s amazing how uninformed people are in the US (and everywhere I guess)!! We crossed the next morning and all that happened was that we got stopped by and Mexican border officer, I got out of the car, opened Cubby’s door as he saw the stickers on the back of Cubby with all the parks and countries we had visited so far and some of the coolest cities and asked me tons of questions about those, and literally didn’t give a crap about anything else and didn’t even ask me if we had weapons or vegetables or anything else. He was just so excited about our trip and the places we had visited and were still going to visit. That was it. We opened Cubby’s door as he just kind of looked inside from the entrance and closed it right away and officially welcomed us to Mexico and to have a great trip! We crossed into Nogales, the Mexican side now, still a bit nervous and changed some money and found out where we needed to go to get our tourist visas and car papers taken care of, and went on our way. We have been here for almost a month now and have enjoyed every minute of it and can’t believe how stupid we were and people are in general, regarding not having a clue about anything and believing any stupid thing you hear just because everybody things that way, although we must not get ahead of ourselves, because that’s another story. Stay tuned!