Jacumba Hot Springs and the Border Patrol

We feel great! Today’s ride was the one we have feared ever since the trip was conceived: climbing the mountains between San Diego and Imperial Valley. It is a beast of a ride, not the length, which is a metric century (60 miles), but in the steady, winding 6-7% grade which goes on for…… about 45 of the 60 miles. At least the anticipated winds from the west were at our backs, and they grew in strength as the day wore on, actually becoming a storm by the end of the day, which caused problems of its own. Brian, our innkeeper in Jacumba, had warned us to expect 100 degree heat and blistering sun as we made the ascent. He could not have been more wrong. We started out with light rain and about 70 degrees, had about 2 hours of sun and cloud in the middle of the day, and finished the last 15 miles in a cloud bank with howling winds and temperatures in the fifties. I felt like I was biking Mount Washington. But the main thing is we made it, and may have put behind us the toughest day of the trip. Time will tell. To view the map of today's ride, go to this link:

http://www.mapmyride.com/route/us/ca/san diego%2c ca/939128595994556446

While climbing at an average speed of 6 miles per hour one has ample time to take in the sights. Today’s sights were dominated by the US Border Patrol. Jacumba is on the border, although there is no crossing. Just miles of fence, stretching to the horizon. White border patrol cards with spotting devices sit on the high ground keeping watch, while an endless stream of border patrol vehicles careen by in both directions. They appear to be scheduled; about every three minutes one would pass us. All white, all with one driver, all going about 70 miles an hour. About every 15 minutes a helicopter would go by, flying the fence line. At one point, I passed Border Patrol local headquarters. There were at least 100 border patrol cars parked in the lot. We also passed by a Border Patrol road block, where armed agents were inspecting cars. They waved us through.
What struck me about this was the amount of men, machinery and time going into the effort to keep folks and drugs out. How, I mused, can our border be like a sieve when there are hundreds of agents combing the hills? Is this effort nationwide? If so, is it sustainable? We will travel close to the Mexican border again in Arizona and our first week in Texas. I cannot imagine that every stretch of fence is as vigorously patrolled as what we saw today. If it is, we are really incompetent.

Now we have just finished soaking in the 100 degree waters of the sulphur spring around which our hotel is built. Jacumba today is a semi ghost town, with over half of the houses in the village abandoned and in decay. As a town, it boomed during Prohibition, when wealthy folks would flock from San Diego to take in the healing waters of the hot sulphur springs. In fact, it was other waters which were brought across the border which they used to cure what ailed them.