The plan was simple; we would drive down the I-5 from Vancouver and spend a day in San Diego before we crossed the border. My husband Jan and I stayed several days in Chula Vista south of San Diego before we ever worked up our nerve to venture into Mexico.

I had found a coupon in our BCAA camping book for a lovely RV park situated on the ocean, with one day free if we arrived on a Wednesday. We could not believe our luck, it was so luxurious. We had full hook-ups, hot showers, a Laundromat and best of all, a hot tub! We spent the first day running around getting Mexican insurance for our little van. That taken care of, we went searching for aluminium folding chairs. California does not stock ANY folding chairs in what they call their winter season and we came home empty-handed.

As we were soaking in the hot tub that evening we made the decision to stay an extra day. After all, we would only be paying for one night at the RV Park, as the first night was free.

The following day we shopped until we were exhausted. We filled the van with all the food we were sure we would never find in Mexico. We bought snorkels and fins and finally some chairs at Wal-Mart. (I made a vow to always buy chairs in the summer in Canada and stash them away for our winter trips.) That evening we had another soothing soak in the hot tub. "Where you folks going?" our neighbours asked. They recoiled in shock when we told them we were heading for Baja in the morning. They had heard VERY BAD things about Mexico and they would NEVER go there.

Neither of us slept much that night, we were nervous about the next day. In the morning we stopped near the border, changed our money to pesos, bought some bottled water and headed for Mexico. Crossing the border wasn’t bad, they did a quick search of the van and we were on our way. I had a book called The Magnificent Peninsula by Jack Williams with me. It gave us detailed instructions on how to drive through Tijuana and get onto the Coastal Highway. It went like a breeze; we sailed along the freeway enjoying the scenery, the blue Pacific shimmering and the warm sun high in the sky. This was easy.

Then we came to the tollbooth; what did they want? Pesos? How much? We handed over a fistful and they carefully extracted what they needed. We had no idea what they were saying. The road signs were all in Spanish; I had translations for some of them but not all of them. Jan began to worry about salida. "Look it up, everyone’s turning off there." I couldn’t find it in any of my books. We slowed down; people were honking at us, passing us on the left and right of the van. "What do I do?" Jan said. "Just keep driving, I’ll find something!" It was not in any of my books, we just finally figured out it must mean exit.

Our first job was to get our papers stamped in Ensenada. The instructions in the book looked simple, just turn off the freeway to town, stamp the papers and be on our way. We took the wrong turn and ended up on a rutted back road that went nowhere.

"Should I go north or south, west or east?" Jan said.

"I don’t know," I answered, "I can’t see any mountains."

"What have mountains got to do with it Joan?"

"I always go by Grouse Mountain in North Vancouver," I replied.

"Well, Grouse Mountain isn’t visible in Baja, is that the only way you can tell?"

"Yes!" (The following year he installed a compass on the dash.)

I quit talking to him. He could find Ensenada on his own. He looked at the map, figured it out and drove straight to the Immigration Office where total confusion reigned. After one hot, frustrating hour the officials came out, slapped a sticker on the Van and we were on our way.

Our friends had suggested we stop for the night at The Old Mill. The guidebook told me where to turn off to find it. The only problem was that each town we came to wasn’t named. How would we find a turnoff if we couldn’t even find the town it was near? We were hot, frustrated and we needed gas.

We pulled into a Pemex station and everyone started honking at us. Now what? We were facing the wrong way. Apparently it is really important to all face the same direction. We had practiced saying magna sin all the way down. That’s lead free. Jan got out and watched them pump the gas all the while hanging onto his wallet; he’d heard so many stories. He was beginning to get the hang of the money – we just weren’t used to people begging at the gas pumps or trying to sell us Chiclets or parakeets.

We drove several more hours and were delighted to see a sign for the Old Mill. This looked easy. All we had to do was drive toward the ocean on this old dirt road. We drove and drove, no more signs, what if we were wrong, where would we stay, it was getting late? A bend in the road and there it was.

We pulled in beside several other RVs They were all going to the restaurant for dinner and drinks, would we care to join them? We declined. We opened a can of beef stew, buttered some sourdough bread and watched the sunset together. We started laughing; we’d made it through our first day in Mexico and we’d been through so many emotions – mainly fear – fear of bandits, fear of murder, fear of the water and mostly fear of fear.

We needn’t have worried; Mexico was waiting for us with open arms.