WHAT IS COURAGE?

As I stood out in the barren desert the other day, listening to nothing but the wind whipping about my ears, I looked around and tried to imagine what it would have been like to come upon this vast expanse of flat valley, over a hundred and fifty years ago, after traversing the mountains in the distance... on horseback, with only the food and water I could carry with me.

It struck me how brave people were back then. What absolute raw courage - guts - it took to up and leave civilization and set out for, literally, parts unknown.

At this point, let me just say that I have had a few people tell me I am courageous for taking this trip on my own and perhaps, in light of todays feeble civilization of people who would rather watch someone else have an adventure than get up of the couch and have one of their own, it could be considered courageous for a single woman of my age to set out on a trip such as this alone, but I hardly think it is. And I don't feel one bit courageous, in fact I feel like the biggest cowardly traveler on the face of the earth sometimes. I am always afraid of losing my wallet, of someone stealing my purse or pickpocketing it, of being late for my plane, of having security pull me over and go through every scrap of content in my bag and refuse half of it and it takes so long I will miss my plane, of there not being enough room on the plane for my carry-on so it will get checked and then lost, that I will get lost once I am off the plane...stuff like that.

But to come across those rugged mountains, after who knows how long an arduous a trek up to then, and see nothing but dry, rugged, scrubby, cacti filled desert stretch out miles and miles before you, vanishing into the heat of a hazy horizon... I can't imagine, but to me - that is real courage. At least this valley has a river so that had to be encouraging - they weren't going to die of thirst, which I am sure happened all too often. But how many dry valleys did they traverse before they got to this one? And how did they sleep out in the open at night, what with the creepy crawly things that live out here - snakes, scorpions, HUGE spiders, lizards. Not to mention the bigger creatures, if there were any.

And the mountains themselves - well, as the famous line says - "There's gold in them thar hills" or there was. Eventually, the mines of Yuma County produced a total of about 771,000 ounces of gold through 1959. But before that, there were prospectors who came on horseback and searched for gold, ledge by ledge, stream by stream. And had considerable success.

There's several stories of lost or buried treasure in these parts:

- The massacre of the ferrymen at Yuma Crossing left the fortunes of the ferrymen buried somewhere near the ferry. It is reported to be in several caches and amount to $50,000 in silver and between $20,000-$30,000 in gold.

-A rotting wagon with 15 sacks of rich gold ore was found by James Hurley. He took samples to have assayed, but when returning for the rest, he could never find the wagon again.

-A rich gold placer was found by a prospector in the desert south of Topock, who gave some of the nuggets to a railroad conductor. The man returned later with his son to assist in working the mine. Both were found dead south of Topock, killed by Indians, but the Lost Placer was never found.

-Somewhere in the Tank Mountains, north of Yuma, is said to be Camel's Tank, a tank of natural water that had gold nuggets laying around the tank. It was found by John Gordon and Juan Perea, who took a load from the site, but could never relocate the tank again.

-A rich ledge of gold is said to be located in the Little Horn Mountains. Poncho (a Tonto Apache) gave a large sample to Jose Alvarado in appreciation for Jose taking care of his son during an illness. Jose died before ever visiting the ledge. (There's several stories like this one, where the person died before they could go back).

-A streambed of gold nuggets, found by a Mexican girl and Papago Indian boy enroute to Gila City, is said to be located near Tule Tank in the Cabeza Prieta Mountains.

-A "sizable fortune" is said to be cached near the Rancho de los Yumas by William B. Rood. A can with $1,000 was found, but much more is expected to have been buried.

The rest of the state has even more stories and you can read about them here.

I'd love to get out in those hills and turn a few rocks over and see if I could find any gold. As a teen I read several books about prospecting in days gone by and of lost treasure that remains to be found in places just like this. It really caught the spark of my imagination and I loved the idea of setting out to find some of it. Being here has rekindled that spark.

AMAZING AFTERNOON!

NOTE: Be SURE to click on the photos to get the large version and see the fabulous detail, especially of the mountain I tried so hard to get close to.

I decided to rent a car this afternoon and go exploring. Enterprise Car Rental was supposed to pick me up at 1:00 but kept me waiting until 1:45 so I had them throw in a free GPS (which ended up not helping me one bit). I also got a double upgrade on the car, not sure why, and ended up with a Nissan Cube - a car I consistently deride for being drop dead ugly when I see one on my commute. But, hey; if I am inside it then I don't have to look at it.

I set off to get as close as I can to a set of mountain peaks I had noticed the other day when I was in the taxi on the way to Los Algodones. I commented on them to the driver but she didn't seem to know what they were, by the lack of any reply. So strange.

I didn't have a map but I'd checked online before I left and found a road, Ogilby, that looked like it might go out that way. It seemed there was a wide expanse of desert between me and the peaks, but I was up for it. I just hoped the car was.

I got onto the #8 Hwy headed west. On the way I passed a small church on a very squared-off, man-made hill and made a note to check that out when I came back; something about it struck me as very odd.

I no sooner got off of the highway and onto Ogilby Road than I saw a big white sign posted at the side of the road.

It was a long, flat, blacktop road stretching out ahead of me as far as I could see, it looked like a normal county road, and so I couldn't understand why I would need a permit. There was another two similair signs on either side of the road at dirt entrances to what looked like a two rut track across the desert sands, one going east and the other west. So to me, it looked like you couldn't go in any direction but back without a permit. Fabulous. I turned around and got back on the highway going east. As I did, I saw a mountain that I had seen from the plane flying in that had intrigued me. From the air it looked like there were giant steps carved out of the middle and I had wondered if it was natural or man made. It almost had the look of the start of an Mayan pyramid. Now I could see that it was definitely man made and was either from and old mine or graded to remove gravel or some such rock.

I got off at an exit marked 'Felicity' which is where the church on the hill was. I crossed over the highway on an overpass and onto the small road that ran beside the highway, passed a CHP's (California Highway Patrol) building - I was in California since passing over the river- and turned into a drive with the following sign:

Odd claim.

I parked in the wide gravel lot, where there was only one other car, and looked around. Behind me, just beyond the parking lot, there were a set of stairs that wound their way up to nowhere. They were metal and pretty rusty looking.

There were two buildings at the front of the property, one a mirror image of the other. As I walked in front of them I saw a creepy sundial to my left and, between the two buildings down a path that separated them was a small pyramid. The place seemed totally deserted and it was giving me the creeps big time. Something about this place was seriously not okay.

Each of the two buildings had signs painted on the stucco fronts; one Museum and the other Post Office. Both had their main doors, which faced the pathway between them, wide open. I stepped inside the one marked Post Office.

Five feet inside the door, there was a small glass counter with some souvenirs for sale inside as well as a few guide books to the place. There was one of the guide books laying on top of the counter along with a steno pad with three names written down and a number beside each one. Not phone numbers, just a single number per name: 9, 12, 60. Behind the glass counter was another small counter with a cash register on it and then a huge empty room behind that full of empty metal shelves. I picked up the guide book and flipped through it, trying to figure out what this whole place was.

Instead of trying to explain it, you can read about it here. Turns out the stairs are part of the Eiffel Tower. Not sure how they landed here.

I lay the book back down and stepped outside into the blazing heat and walked over into the other building marked Museum. There was one small table with some framed certificates of some sort on it - one from the military. To the left was a small TV and a couple of folding chairs. To the right was a few more empty shelves and a poster on the wall that said something about an 'Invisible Dragon' - which there had been a book about in the glass case in the other building.

I walked out of there and over to the pyramid. Behind it was the rows of pink granite triangular walls with the important history of the world written on it and beyond that, the church on the hill.

Feeling completely creeped out, I got the heck out of there without ever seeing another single soul.

I drove east, back towards Yuma and then got off the highway on the north side and, for a couple of hours, tried to find a road that would take me to the rugged mountains that intrigued me so. But I was stymied at every turn. I thought I might finally have it when the road turned to sandy gravel, but there was a sign indicating that I was about to enter a land fill site so, reluctantly giving up, I turned back and headed to Yuma.

On my travels down many back roads, I came across a field of palm trees, all planted in neat rows. It looked so odd. As I got closer for a better look, there were a lot of rather nice vehicles parked among them and at first I thought it might be a camp site but it became clear that wasn't it. There were several lift-type vehicles that were fully extended into the tops of the trees. Maybe a coconut farm? A little farther on I came to another much bigger field of palm trees and then saw a rough sign indicating that there were dates for sale! Mystery solved!! They were all date palms. Although, the first set I came across, the ones with the lifts, were much taller trees, so maybe that one was a coconut farm.

I drove back into Yuma, rather disappointed that I never got close enough to those mountains to take a good picture. The sun is so bright here that most of my photos are washed out and ones of something far on the horizon, like the mountains or some sand dunes I tried to photograph, don't show the horizon detail at all. It's like there's nothing there.

I was wondering what I would do for the rest of the afternoon when I spied a Visitors Center so I pulled in and asked them about getting closer to the mountains. At first she wasn't sure what mountains and then I described them. "Ohhh, you must mean Picacho." and went on to tell me how to get there. At first I was totally confused but it started to come clear to me that what she was describing was exactly where I had gone and then turned back because I thought it was the entrance to the land fill. "Oh, no no," she said, "the land fill is farther down the road but if you stay on that road it will take you over the canal and then it's 18 miles to Picacho over a pretty rough dirt road."

I also told her about the road with the sign and how I had turned back because I didn't have a permit. She said I could definitely have continued on that road, the signs were for the land on either side. One needed a permit to off-road there. Sheesh. That is NOT how it appeared.

I decided to go back to the land fill road and try again. I wouldn't make it the whole 18 miles to Picacho, but maybe close enough to get a decent photo of it.

The road ended up not being too rough, but there were a lot of large sharp rocks on it and so I had to drive slow and dodge them so as not to blow out a tire. I eventually got close enough that there was nothing much between me and the mountain, and to get a decent photo. As I stepped out of the car to take the picture, a commercial jet flew overhead and as it disappeared, I realized that there was now no noise. Not a single human sound. The only thing I could hear was the wind whipping around my head. I stood there, transfixed, looking around me at the expanse of dry, rough, desert that ended at the foot of some amazing mountains, mesmerized by the sound of only the wind. I took my photos and then stood there some more, listening to the wind.

FINALLY, A Pic of the GORGEOUS Mountain.

I did not want to leave. I don't think I have experienced anything quite like it. I literally had to force myself back into the car. I also didn't want to turn it around and go back. There was something that kept drawing me just a few more yards down the road. But eventually, I turned the car around and drove back to my hotel.

I also saw one lizard and two road runners in my travels.

As I took the pics of the cactus tree, I looked down and saw...

...THIS!! With only flip flops on my feet, I was sincerely hoping they weren't Desert Tarantula homes

I'd love to go back with a motorhome one day and plant myself at the foot of those mountains for a few days where the only sounds I hear are the ones nature and I make.

SHOPPING!

I was very happy to see that my face did not swell up through the night like it had for the previous two nights. I had ice packs on it all day yesterday and managed to bring it down by more than half. To see it still that way this morning was a relief.

I felt good enough today to make the walk down to the Yuma Palms Mall, an open air Mall - because this is where the weather is always nice! There were a couple of things I needed to get; one being a lock for my MacBook Pro - I don't want to cart it with me everywhere I go but leaving it in various hotel rooms for 5 weeks is just asking for it to be taken. I went straight to the Best Buy but they didn't open until 10 and it was only 9:30, so I wandered into Ross and found myself a lovely little plain black dress and a fabulous bathing suit - two items I really needed (the black dress I had originally packed to take no longer fits me, as I discovered when I had the bright idea to try everything on two days before I left because I have gained some weight working on Mr. Young. And my 2 swim suits are at least 8 years old). The swim suit is really good quality (Maxine of Hollywood, regular price $80) all the shades of the Caribbean water and a very flattering cut. Only thirty-five dollars lighter, I walked away pretty happy.

Best Buy was open now so I asked about the lock and they were all out. The sales guy said he could sell me one of the store's used ones and I walked away from there with a perfectly good lock for under $20. Bargain! (The tricky part is finding something to tie it to that can't just be lifted up to release it - like a table leg - or just carried out with it. I finally hooked the cable onto a wall lamp).

Then I headed over to Target for a few little necessities and a box of Crest White Strips, the professional strength ones, for my bottom teeth. My top teeth will be lovely and white in a few days; "toilet white", as the dentist put it, and so I need the bottom ones to match. I asked him to bleach them but he said there wasn't time before I left, he needed it all for the crowns. So hopefully the strips work. I have never used them as I find them to be very expensive. But I didn't mind spending the money today as, even buying the most expensive version, they are cheaper than the whitening process at the dentist office.

I relaxed by the pool for a while. I wasn't there ten minutes when the same group from yesterday showed up - three couples, one set being grandparents, and 7 kids under the age of 8. Rowdy bunch. But today instead of leaving, I sat it out and after a few hours they were gone and the pool was all mine, along with another woman my age. We struck up a conversation - she had a lovely Scottish accent - and now I am back in my room waiting for the hotel complimentary Happy Hour to start. I have met some interesting people at the one or two I have gone to so far. There are a lot of military guys here as there's a base about 35 miles away and this place is where they put the ones up that are from out of town and not staying on the base. Pretty nice hotel for that - that's US tax dollars at work!

The tan is coming along quite well.

I so could get used to living in this climate. I love the desert air!!

THE BEST DENTIST IN TOWN

I woke up before the alarm. I slept pretty good considering the bed was super firm; not my favourite. Even thought the room was recently redone, the bed seems cheap and the pillows too. I am really glad I am moving to a new hotel today. The plan is to check out at 7:30, cab it to the airport at 7:45 and then have the Best Western shuttle pick me up and take me over to the hotel, I will leave my suitcase with them as it will be too early to check in, and then get another cab to the border. Sounds simple enough.

As soon as I am dressed, I pack everything that I have used back into the suitcase, which is much easier to do now that I have expanded the lid with a special zipper. If I had done it at home, it would have been too deep to pass the regulation size and I hadn't wanted to risk having to check it. The evening before I was departing I had gotten very frustrated with myself for always having to pack a bag, no matter the size, until there wasn't a square centimeter of available space. I had stuff in my large purse that should have been in the suitcase (and it was making my purse too bulky and very heavy) but there just wasn't a hairs breadth of room. So I hauled the suitcase up onto the bed and, after I had promised myself I wasn't opening it again no matter what after a huge struggle earlier to get it closed, I zipped it open and quite rashly removed eight articles of clothing. Now that I am repacking it at the hotel, I look at the few items of clothing I have and think I may regret that move. It's really not much stuff for 5 weeks.

I take a last look around and then step outside into the amazing warmth and the orange-pink glow of a desert sunrise. The air is heavy with the scent I can't describe but love - I've only ever smelled it in a desert or tropical climate - part earthy, part plant, sort of a heavy smell. I can't describe it.

I check out with the receptionist and she tells me that the girl from yesterday has ordered me a cab for 7:45 as I had requested. I head over to their breakfast buffet but don't see much I fancy except for a small danish. I have that and a cup of tea as I get on the computer and write down the directions to the new dentist that he sent to me. I am still not that nervous about going and it's so odd. I should be half way to freaking out by now and I'm not even close. Just ever so slightly anxious about what awaits.

I pack up my computer just as I see a taxi pull up to the main entrance - and then keep going on through. I look over at the receptionist and she looks back at me, surprised. "He just pulled right on through, didn't even pause." she says. I go outside and look, and he's nowhere to be seen. We both can't fathom it. "Maybe because I wasn't standing at the curb, waiting?" I say. "No, no. They always stop and come in." A housekeeper standing around nearby asks what company it was. "Yuma Cabs, #33." she answers. "Well, I really need to get going. Can you please call me another one?" I ask. She gets right on the phone and orders one from a different cab company. Then she calls the first one and complains about the guy not stopping. She saw the cab car number and lets them know. She hangs up and says, "They didn't seem to care, 'oh okay then' and that was it." She asks me if I will be taking a cab much while in town, and I explain that I will be cabbing it to Los Algodones for the next few days. She says she has a friend who drives a cab, the one she just called for me, and she says 'wait one second' and calls her back. She tells the friend that I will be needing a cab all week and would she be interested in taking me. She asks what her rate is and then says and then turns to me; "my friend will drive you to Los Algodones for the week and she says it's usually $20 but she will do it for $14 for you." I am thrilled and say I'd love that. She tells the friend and then I thank her profusely when she hangs up. She writes her friends cell number on the cab company's card and hands it to me. I tuck it into my wallet. After about two minutes, a cab shows up but I can see that it's the same one that drove through a few minutes ago, #33. I walk out to tell him that it's too late, we've called another cab company and he tells me that he went around the back to my room. Oh well then, that's different - so I ask the receptionist to cancel the other cab and get in this one.

He drops me at the airport and I wait on the curb for the shuttle I ordered for 8:05. And wait. And wait. And wait - for twenty minutes past 8:05 as my anxiety mounts. I had asked for a shuttle last night when I called the hotel after booking the room online. He told me to call in the morning just before I needed it and I had called when I checked out. He assured me it would be there at 8:05. I am getting more frustrated by the second. I finally walk to a pay phone just down a few feet and insert my only two US quarters and dial. Nothing. So I hang up and pull down the coin release lever. Nothing. I hang up the handset again, several times. Nothing. Now I am really frustrated. I don't want to have to use my cell phone as it's just so expensive from here so I walk inside the airport to see if I can use a phone but there's no one about. I walk back outside and dig around in my purse for my phone and make the call. The same fellow I spoke to earlier tells me that he had a hard time finding a driver and he just left and should be here in about 3 minutes. I tell him that I tried to order the shuttle last night and was told to just call this morning when I needed it so that would lead one to assume there would be a driver standing by. He was all apologetic, apparently the clerk from yesterday had not left a note about it as he should have. I tell him I am on a time line here and needed it to be on time. He apologizes again, and I have no choice but to wait. The shuttle finally shows up 5 minutes later.

When I get to the hotel, I leave my bag with the front desk, call the cell number on the card and tell the woman that I just got her number from her friend at Howard Johnsons and ask her to come and get me. After hanging up I ask the hotel clerk if I can use the internet. She points to a couch and tells me to go ahead. I whip out my laptop and, once she gives me the password, send and email off to the dentist to tell him I am just waiting for a cab and, depending how long it takes me to get over the border, I will be there as close to 9:30 as I can.

The cab shows up and I climb in, grateful to finally be on my way to the border. It's about a 10 minute drive and on the way I chat with the woman about Yuma, how beautiful it is, the weather there, and she is curious about Vancouver. At one point she tells me we have just crossed into California. I can't figure out how. On the map I have been looking at, California is no where near the border between Arizona and Los Algodones. I need to check the map again.

We pull up to the border near a large parking lot. It's for all the people who drive here and then cross over into the small town. I pay her, tell her I will call when I am done, and then walk over to the sidewalk that I can see other people heading to from the parking lot.

Border Ahead; Sidewalk for foot traffic.

There doesn't seem to be a line up of any sort, but the sidewalk snakes around a building so it must be on the other side, I figure. There are three elderly women in front of me so I follow them. At one point they ask if I want to pass and I say no, I am following them as I have never been here before. We keep walking until, suddenly, we are on a street. I am confused. "Scuse me," I say to one of the ladies, "Is there no border guard to speak to?" She laughs, "No. Just going back the other way." I can hardly believe it; they just let you walk into Mexico, without any formalities? Okay then. As soon as we cross the road and head down a busy sidewalk, street hawkers call out to us to try to get us into the huge pharmacy right there. The ladies walk by without acknowledging them so I do the same. "Oh I see, all dental patients, eh?" says the handsome young Mexican man as we pass on by. "Listen to me," the woman says, "If you feel like buying anything, look at the price and offer half." "OK, thank you." I answer, "Well, I need to figure out where I am going." I say as I start to dig around in my purse for my notebook. "Good luck." she says, and doesn't break stride as she walks off with her two friends.

I find the dentist office without much effort, winding my way through dozens of street vendors crammed along the edge of every sidewalk. I think this place would be fun to explore if I had the time to do it. But I don't so I hustle along, scanning the myriad dentist signs on roofs, doors and walls, looking for The Smile Shoppe.

I find the office easily, thanks to Dr. Arce's excellent directions. Of all the one's I have passed, and that has to be at least 30, this is the most professional one I've seen.

I walk in and am greeted by a very handsome man sitting at the desk. Turns out, he's Dr. Roberto Arce. After filling out a form while listening to the TV show Friends playing on the small TV inset into a wall, he welcomes me into the back and into a dentist chair. He then takes 15 minutes or so checking my teeth, my bite, and my profile with my jaws clamped shut. When he's done he leans back against the wall and pulls down his blue paper mask. He asks when I lost the teeth that are missing and I tell him I can only remember when I had two out; one when I was 16 and the other 25 years ago. I remember that one because Ashleigh was two and quite ill - hadn't kept a thing down in three days, not even water and as soon as I got back from the dentist, mouth packed with gauze, we took her to the hospital because her pallor and listlessness had grown worse in the few hours I was gone and I was shocked. She was admitted for three days and put on an IV and I sat with her the whole three days - 8 months pregnant, sore mouth and all. Why I have no memory of the other three, you'd think I would - dental visits being such a traumatic experience for me, I have no idea. But then, maybe that's why - I've just blocked them.

Anyhow, he starts to explain what has happened to my bite due to the missing teeth, and it's a lot. Most of it I knew as I've been feeling the effects of it for years. He is very thorough in his explanation of what is wrong and what he wants to do to fix it. He says I need all crowns. The teeth have worn down because they have shifted and are hitting the teeth above and below in all of the wrong places. The way they were made to fit together no longer is happening. The damage is extensive and he says that he wants to replace all of my upper teeth with crowns and bridge the two gaps. I had read that many dentists in this town will try to get you to let them do root canals on all of the teeth they want to crown, as it's a great money maker for them but it's often not necessary. I wait for him to tell me that I need root canals, but he never does. In fact, everything I had listed that I wanted done in order of priority, he now lists to me and in the same order. He says that he wants to do only the top jaw today as my available time is limited and it will take a big favour from his lab, which is run by a friend, to get all of the crowns made by Wednesday. He knows I have a flight out that day, but not until 5, and says we will start early Wednesday morning and I will be done by 1:00. He explains the three kinds of crowns he uses. One is metal and porcelain, one is just porcelain, and another I didn't really grasp what it was but he said, although it was the most expensive option, he didn't recommend it. He recommended, and I wanted, the porcelain. He then sits down to assess the cost of what I need and I sit there and pray it's not more than I have budgeted.

I had $6000 for this, but now that I have to spend $600 on a hotel instead of $280 at the B&B, and thus have to cab it each day as well, I have shaved $500 off of that amount and it worries me because I really felt I needed $6,000. After a few moments he shows me, on the chart I filled out, the teeth that need crowns, the ones that will be part of the bridge, and the total cost. It works out to $300 per tooth and $900 each bridge, which comprise 3 teeth each, the one missing and the one on each side, so basically 16 teeth at $300 a tooth. Including Xrays ($20!!!) and the temporary I will need until the crowns are made, the total is $5,740. That puts me over my budget. I ask him if he would give me a 5% discount for paying in cash instead of a credit card and he readily agrees and that brings the entire bill down to $5,400. I am thrilled. Just thrilled. From the get go I had planned on saving $5,000 to have this done and then the number $6,000 kept coming up in my head. I couldn't shake that number so I took it as from God and saved $6,000. And now the entire bill for this including the extra I will pay for hotel and cabs will be almost exactly $6,000. I am in awe of how God is taking care of me through this whole thing. First having TLC screw up so badly that, despite my total frustration and anxiety over that, worked it out so I get the dentist my friend was so happy with; and now showing me clearly why I had $6,000 stuck in my head.

I agree to the fee and the process begins. He takes some Xrays, and then freezes my entire upper jaw. Six hours and three rounds of novocaine later, I have pegs for teeth. I will skip the gory details, and there really aren't many. The worst part for me was when they took several impressions. I have an easily triggered gag reflex and when I bit down and the excess hit the back of my throat, ACK! And that happened three times. He was extremely gentle; told me to raise my right hand if I felt any sensitivity and when I did, immediately put more freezing in. My back was giving me a LOT of trouble in the chair so he had his assistant bring me a pillow for it, and let me get up a couple of times to stretch it out. All in all, it was about as good an experience as one can have in the dentists chair, I would think. Certainly the best I have had by far.

I am fitted with a temporary which looks like the teeth part of an upper denture plate, they are polished a bit (they're still pretty rough feeling) and I am done. I then get to pick out the color the crowns will be. He shows me the color he likes because he thinks it is the most natural but I can clearly see the yellow tinge to it and I don't like it. I tell him I work with actors who all have beautiful white teeth and I want the same. He asks me what I do for a living and I tell him, the short version. Earlier, while he had his hands in my mouth, I had started laughing because I could hear Phoebe singing one of her awful songs from the TV playing in the reception area and he had asked me if I liked the show and I nodded yes. Now I tell him I have worked with Matthew Perry and he is surprised. He then says I will leave on Wednesday with the smile of a movie star and hands me a little bar with four much whiter teeth on it, arranged in a row from really white to slightly less white. He explains that there are many shades of white; white walls (and points to his which are definitely on the cream side of white), white shirt, white toilet. I pull the whitest tooth out of the four, "that is white toilet" he says and I laugh. I hold that one and the one next to it up to my own mouth. I like the whitest one. I expect he is going to try to insist I go less white but he says he wants me to be happy and I can have whatever I want. I am very happy. He then asks if I want solid white or a little translucent on the bottom edge, a more natural look. Translucent, definitely. That makes him happy.

He tells me to come back on Wednesday at 8:30 and gives me a painkiller to dissolve under my tongue right there, and then 8 more to take home with me. He says that my purse was very heavy (it has my laptop in it) and because I had taken two Xanax earlier and am still feeling quite unsteady on my legs, he sends his assistant to walk me to the border with strict instructions, in Spanish as she speaks very little English, to carry my purse. I pay him the full fee, which lightens my money belt considerably, and we set off. When we get to the border there is a long line of people waiting to cross. The sidewalk has a canvas cover so that one is in the shade, which is nice. The assistant leaves me there and I spend the next 5 minutes saying no to all the vendors hawking cheap jewelry to their captive audience.

All of a sudden, someone takes my arm and I looked around, startled. It is the assistant, she has come back, and she holds out a note to me. It is from the doctor and says that I've just had extensive dental work done and due to my condition can not stand in the sun so would they kindly let me ahead of the line. She then keeps the note, holding it out for anyone who needs to to see, grabs my hand and pulls me forward in the line past all of the other people. They look a bit startled but then one look at me and they all step aside. I guess I must look awful because not one person complains, they just let us by. She never needs the note. When we get to a turnstile, as far as she can go, she hands me the note and indicates that I should use it to get in front of the dozen or so people ahead of me. I thank her in Spanish, she smiles at my effort, and leaves.

I can't get up the nerve to ask people ahead of me to let me barge through. Two women come through the turnstile behind me, who I had just passed with the help of the assistant, and ask if I am okay. I say I had just had a lot of dental work done. They look very concerned and say I looked pale and like I might pass out. I do feel very shaky. I am leaning against a wall to help out with that. They tell me I should go to the front of the line but I just can't do it so I wait and the two of them keep an anxious eye on me. I get through the customs in about 5 minutes and without any problem at all and as I walk down the long walk between some buildings, suddenly another woman appears from behind me. She asks if I am okay. I say I had just had a lot of work done. She asks me if I am driving myself and I tell her I need a cab and does she know where a pay phone is. She pulls out her cell phone and I give her the card from earlier and she dials it in and hands the phone to me. The cab driver is on another run and can't be there for 20 minutes so I say that's fine. I hand the phone back to the woman and thank her and ask if I could give her some money for the call but she waves that off as nonsense and then tells me I should wait right where I was for the 20 minutes as there is no shade out by the road. So as I wait, two fellows come out of the customs office without their wives, who are being held up because they bought stuff. I chat with them a bit and turns out they are both from B.C. - one Vancouver and the other one of the Gulf Islands (can't remember which one, I was drugged at the time but it began with 'S'). I ask if they are down for dental work but turns out they both have a home here that they winter in. Nice, but I think if I were going to do that I'd choose Palm Springs. Although, to be fair, I haven't seen much of Yuma yet.

I wait another 15 minutes or so once I get out to the sidewalk, feeling very faint, and finally she arrives. When I get to my hotel, the clerk calls someone to help me with my small bag so I really must be looking rather ill. When we get to my room, it overlooks the pool from the second floor, and inside it's lovely. For only $10 a night more than the Howard Johnson, this is a HUGE step up. I am under strict instructions to rest so, after a few minutes on the computer, I resist the urge to try out the pool and lie down on the luxury pillow top bed with high thread count sheets (certainly not what the Howard Johnson had) and probably the softest, fluffiest pillow I have ever laid my head on, and fall promptly to sleep. It's 6:30. At some point I wake in pain, take a pill, and drop back off.

I wake up again to use the lav, and see that it's after 11:00. Wow. I really must have needed that sleep.

I am back off to bed. The mouth is sore, my gums are purple/blue from the bruising I guess, and a few teeth feel sensitive. But when I smile, which I can't do very well as my top lip looks vaguely like Angelina Jolie's and not in a good way, for the first time I can recall I have straight front teeth and no gaps on each side. They aren't the best looking teeth at the moment, but they will be by Wednesday afternoon!

6:00 to YUMA

It was such an early start this morning, I didn't bother going to bed last night. My dear friend, Fran, was picking me up at 2:30 AM to drive me to the airport. We got there in good time as we tried a way I hadn't ever gone before but someone at work had suggested. Basically we took the exact same route I take to work, turned right instead of left on Marine Way and drove all the way to Arthur Lange Bridge. I think we made it in well under an hour - helped by the fact that there's no traffic at that time of night.

We hung out for a bit at the airport Starbucks and soon it was time for me to head through security. I went to the one I am used to going through, International, just to find that I was at the wrong one - there's a totally different area for those traveling from Canada to the States. I haven't ever flown from Canada to the States before...I always go from just over the border in either Bellingham or down in Seattle. I cleared without any issues. I did set off the metal detector and I wasn't wearing any metal but for two rings and I have been through with those before and didn't set anything off. She waved the wand over me and my lower legs set the wand off. Huh? She patted my legs down but there was nothing there but me. I said that it must be my magnetic personality but she didn't bat an eye at the joke. Humourless lot, those guys are. I took a look back as my carry on was going through the Xray and could clearly see all of my vitamins laid out in a layer between my clothing. I didn't use the pill caddies after all as they just took up far too much space. I put each serving (serving? I can't think of the word) into tiny zip lock bags and then put the whole lot into one huge one.

I had a moment there where I thought the woman was going to pull me over for drug dealing but, after pointing at the screen and consulting with a colleague, and a look back at me, they clearly saw my need for vitamins and other assorted drugs and let me leave unmolested, as it were.

My first flight left on time and all was good. I sat at the window beside a lovely young woman who was flying to Hawaii for the first time since she was a small girl, and her husband's very first trip there. I felt badly that they couldn't sit together but he had an isle seat and I really didn't want to give up my window seat. I have found that I get bumped a lot by the attendants going by with their cart when I sit in the aisle, which I used to do all of the time so I could stretch out my bad knee. It keeps me from sleeping and I ended up sleeping most of the way.

When I got off in the San Francisco airport, I asked at the desk where my next flight was boarding. The lady told me and then asked if I wanted to take an earlier flight. I said I would. I had been worried about only having an hour between flights at LAX so this would give me more time. She said that the flight I was booked on was way overbooked so it would help them out. She said it cost $50 to bump to an earlier flight and then looked at me expectantly. I wasn't about to pay that so I said it was okay, I'd take my scheduled flight. She then said that, as it was helping them out, she would waive it. I then told her how it was helping me and she looked at me, surprised. "Why did you have to take three flights to get to Yuma?" I told her that my flight to LAX from Vancouver had been canceled. "Oh well, then you get the earlier flight for no charge anyway." She handed me a new boarding pass and then indicated that I should walk back down the ramp I had just come up and get back on the same plane. So I ended up sitting exactly two rows back from the seat I had just vacated. As there's no food served on any of the flights I was taking, it would give me some time to get lunch in LAX.

A Nice Lunch at Wolfgang Puck's

A Best Buy VENDING MACHINE!

When I went to board the third plane, we actually had to walk across the tarmac like in the olden days or like you do if you are in a tiny Caribbean nation.

I actually took this picture after we landed in Yuma

The plane was small inside and I felt like I had traveled back in time.

It was ancient; an EMB 120 Brasilia (that's for you, Kim). Sitting in my seat I looked out of the window and the wing and engine put me in mind of the plane Carole Lombard perished in when it slammed into a Nevada mountain.

And when the entire capsule shuddered and the engines screamed as the pilot pushed his foot to the floor (or whatever it is they do) in what was starting to feel like a feeble attempt to gain enough speed to get us airborne, I felt sure I was about to follow Ms Lombard's fate. You know the sound seaplanes make over Coal Harbour (for all of my local readers)? Well it sounded just like that only about 1,000 times louder. I felt the vibrations of the strain on the plane down to the very marrow of my bones. After that experience, the much dreaded dentist drill tomorrow will seem, at least I hope, like a whisper and a tickle.

I ended up sleeping, as I had for the first two flights, for most of the way. I woke with a start when we experienced a bit of turbulence and looked down to see the land divided by a river; all dry scrub and desert on one side, and fertile farm fields on the other. The incongruous juxtaposition of the two was vivid.

There was also a cool mountain or big hill that was very rugged except for a portion right in the center that looked like it had giant stairs carved into it. I marvelled at it, so much so I forgot to take a photo, and wondered if the stairs were man made or natural.

After a rather bumpy descent and somewhat rough landing, we were safe on the ground once again, only now in the glorious blazing sunshine of the Arizona desert.

I hopped in a cab for the short ride to the Howard Johnson Inn I was booked into and thought to ask the driver how far it is from the Inn to the border at Los Algodones. She told me it is about 15 miles. I asked how much a cab would cost to there and was startled when she said $30. "Each way?" I gasped. "Yes." Ouch. She said there were places closer to the border and so when I checked in I told the receptionist that I would only be staying one night and explained why. As I walked to my room I found the place to be somewhat shabby but when I got inside, was pleasantly surprised to see it had been recently refurbished. A quick look around, however, turned up some rather shoddy housekeeping. The tub looks like it needs a good Vimming, and the taps are crusted with old soap and stains that would be rather easy to remove with some elbow grease and more Vim. I am happy to be staying just the one night.

I found a similar deal to the one I have here at the Best Western Yuma Mall Inn Suites. The place looks lovely in the photos and the pool area looks great. And their pool is heated; I found out shortly after I arrived that the one here isn't. And it is too cold to use. Anyway I am booked into that place for the rest of my stay and, they have free shuttle from the airport so I am taking a cab back to the airport tomorrow morning and then calling the shuttle instead of the, what would have been, expensive cab ride out to the BW Inn.

Back in the Land of PALM TREES!!!

Poolside With My Plane-Ride-Swollen Feet

Dinner at Applebee's, Just Across the Road