It was decided that the trip back home would quicker than the trip down. Majority rules in these
cases, I'm always for a leisurely trip, the more sightseeing the better. Logan was suffering a minor case of home sickness, and Rick didn't seem to care one way or the other, so it was full speed ahead back to California. The country side of Chihuahua was just as dazzling and beautiful in the AM as it was on the way down in the PM. We were convoying along with Chip Johns crew and when we got to a military check point, we noticed his trailer was listing hard to the left, one of the tires had disappeared. Rachel Larratt's trailer caught up with us as we started on the wheel, so I took pictures as the boys unwrapped steel belt from the axle and changed the tire. These checkpoints are always thought provoking, an 18 year old with a big German sub-machine gun, I guess that's
happening all over the world, always interesting. With our race car, they were rather curious about our fuel cell, and why his stick wouldn't go all the way to the bottom of the tank. After pulling up a brick of foam, they got the idea we weren't hauling any contraband. Besides, they seemed to get a kick out of the Chevelle, with "Malibu" being the secret password.
A couple hours up the road, we were scraping the entry sticker off our windshield and then heading into Cuidad Juarez. This time the stop at customs took only two hours, a minor amount of
paperwork and then an x-ray of the tow car, trailer, and race car. We were given a clean bill of health and crossed into the good old U.S. of A. After a very short discussion as to whether we should go on a shopping spree in El Paso for boots and saddle blankets, we parted ways with Chip and Company. It sounded good to me, but as I said, we were now on a mission to get home ASAP. Being back in Texas, and hungry for something other than Mexican, we had choice of real southwest BBQ or a full selection of junk food palaces, we ate at Wendy's. That was our last stop for almost real food. On one of our gas stops in New Mexico, we came across "The Joyride
Rally", some sort of Richie Rich charity drive from Santa Monica to New Orleans. They were all driving expensive, exotic rides, I got a picture of the Maybach and Bentley, and there was also a red hot Mercedes that tore up the on-ramp. At this particular trading post, among other things, they sold big 'ol fireworks. Personally, I would never touch those nasty things, yea right, but it was kind of fun to be in a super market of them. After that, all I remember is only gas stops, Red Bulls and iced coffees. Twenty four hours after we left Chihuahua, Mexico, we were pulling into Santa Rosa, California.
Next Time: Unfinished Thoughts
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shakedown, and give ourselves a clue what road racing in Mexico is all about. We put a little over a thousand miles on the car in Mexico alone, so that gave us a pretty good idea. We didn't burn up any tires or brakes and we didn't tear up the motor or trans, that's all good. A list of "fixes" was started during the race and continued on the ride home, nothing too extreme, but enough to keep busy for awhile. In fact, a couple of the small ones are already fixed, and that's just a little bit of 
alright! At this point, we have about 90 days till we leave to meet the convoy in Texas to drive to Oaxaca, where the La Carrera Panamericana will start. I'm just about ready to get excited!
