11/15/13 Cassandra Roy

Welcome Back!
Cassandra Roy

“When one door closes, another one opens”

 Today was the last day of our backcountry portion in Baja California. We awoke from Catavina; having slept under a starry night sky surrounded by group members in a Mexican desert. Five a.m. came and our group of 14 loaded into the vans and headed to Ensenada. Hours later we arrived, and the town was packed full (The Baja 1000 race was this weekend as well). No sooner were we out of the van than did our group take off to shop for the 2 hours of time allotted. You might be thinking that 2 hours is more than enough time to go shopping, but it was not even close; so many shops, so much to see, and so much to buy. It seems as if two hours was over in a snap of my fingers.

 But what seemed to come even faster was Francisco’s departure. Francisco, or Tati as Jeff likes to call him, was a friend, a guide, and an overall wisdom giver. The two weeks spent with him at Casa Azul was truly an eye opening experience and myself, as well as the rest of ECOEE, cannot thank him enough for everything he did. Sadly all good things must come to an end and Francisco left our group in Ensenada. 

 Back on the road we went all 13 of us to head back to San Diego. With a few wrong turns, the help of a man on a bike, getting the vans split up, and going through border control; we arrived back at San Diego State University within 10 minutes of each other and back into Jim’s graces.

“Do not be mediocre, be exemplary”