Down to the Banana Republic
Down to the tropical sun
Go the expatriated Americans
Hopin’ to find some fun 

Some of them go for the sailing
Brought by the lure of the sea
Tryin’ to find what is ailing
Living in the land of the free

– Jimmy Buffett, “Banana Republics” 

It was 1970 and I was in San Diego, where I still live, on summer break from college when I read an article about a small town deep in the Mexico jungle with the lyrical name of Puerto Vallarta. A paved road had just been built into the town from Tepic, making the drive there a possibility instead of flying or boating in, which was the only access prior to the new road. Having some time to kill and a few dollars to burn, I called my old high school friend, Tom Dawson, who was attending Stanford University, and asked if he wanted to join me on a Mexico road trip. A week later, my non-air-conditioned, beat-up 1966 VW bus, rolling on four bald tires and no jack, was loaded with a case of Dinty Moore beef stew, one loaf of bread, a jar of Jiffy and a couple cases of Oly in the cooler as we crossed the border into Mexico at Nogales. I’m pretty sure we had a map, but maybe not. All we knew was that we were heading south, it was cheap, and we were absolutely invincible. Plus, you never know, there might be some like-minded girls on those warm beaches. That’s about as deep as our 20-year-old minds went in those days. By the time we limped into San Carlos Bay just north of Guaymas, half way to Vallarta, all four tires had blown, the sun was blistering and the beer dwindling. In that short time we had learned what has been proven to be true many times during my travels –  the Mexican people will stop whatever they are doing and help you when you are too stupid to help yourself, expecting nothing in return. 

We pulled onto to the beach at San Carlos via an asphalt runaway leading into the just abandoned movie set for Catch -22, which had recently been released in theaters in the States. A couple of guys that had worked as grunts on the movie set were camped there, enthusiastically  pointing out the exact location that Paula Prentiss had shot her nude scene, as they described what the various bombed out buildings had been used for. When we dove into the translucent, blue Sea of Cortez, it was if we had jumped into someone’s personal aquarium, with vast schools of rainbow-colored tropical fish as thick as outhouse flies.  

A week or so later, after spending several days of camping on the beach in Mazatlan, and one night of getting devoured by blood-sucking no-see-ums on the beach in San Blas where the federales ran us out of town at daybreak after searching every inch of the van, in vain, for marijuana and weapons, we landed on the sleepy, cobble-stoned streets of Puerto Vallarta.  Continued...

The author and editor of The Mexico File, David Simmonds, has a consulting business helping people who would like to explore a move to Mexico. To find out more, go to www.movetomexico.com.