(no subject)

The morning of 23 April 1983 found me saying goodbye to my Orange County friends. With less than $200 at my disposal, I decided to hitch to Mexico. It was a beautiful blue-sky Cailfornia morning. The cars joining Interstate 5 looked as if they had been driven fresh off the assembly line. The houses and commercial buildings all seemed flawless amidst the rolling green hills. More than one flag proudly waved its colourful stars and stripes. Even the people seemed driven to perfection. This was Mission Viejo, a bastion of middle-class affluence fifty miles south of Los Angeles. Standing there thumb out by the freeway entrance, I fitted into the picture about as much as an old battered car or a house with graffiti and flaking paint.

Nevertheless, I didn't have to wait long... An old VW car came down the `off-ramp' and to my amazement it crossed straight over to the `on-ramp.' I shot out my thumb. Seeing an attractive blonde girl behind the wheel, my arm involuntarily dropped through eighty degrees. To my surprise she stopped and, in the sweetest, friendliest voice imaginable, asked where I was going. ...

We dropped down the mountains to the hot, flat expanse of the desert, giving me my first glimpse of what lay ahead.

— Graham Mackintosh, at the beginning of a long journey, as recounted in Into a Desert Place: A 3000-mile Walk Around The Coast of Baja California (917.2204 M158i).