Close Shave, a very close shave. As mentioned we were heading south from San Diego to Tijuana, Mexico for a day trip. Motoring along with the flow of the traffic (fast) in a far left lane of 8 on a highway which was very busy, we spotted a sign proclaiming 'last car park before the border' and here is the rub, our hire agreement strictly prevents taking the vehicle out of the good old US of A!!! This produces a series of mad and highly dangerous lane changes from Avan which culminates in us just squeezing into the car park, but we can assure Avis that going into Mexico would have been the safer option.

Once parked we walked to the border and had a relatively simple entry into Mexico. Once over the border we were immediately besieged by taxi drivers wanting to take us into Tijuana, but from Heathers prior study we knew that down town was at max a couple of K and would be quicker (and cheaper) to walk given the traffic congestion at the border. One also sees more walking and we were immediately rewarded with the colour, smells and atmosphere of Mexico.

Crossing a bridge we came across a very small boy (about 5) busking with a little plastic ukulele. He was singing his heart out, bashing the strings, with tears tumbling down his face. We do not usually succumb to begging of any kind but this little guy needed a morale boost, and at least he was doing something to earn his alms. We ruffled around but could only come up with a dime in change, so flicked it into his hat. The response was immediate, he stopped playing, singing and crying, gave us a half grateful glance and took off. I guess he was told not to come home empty handed and he wasn't.

We elected to ignore advice and headed away from downtown and its tourist traps and headed into the burbs. The culture was way beyond anything we had previously experienced, poor like Asia but still western. As Aussie's we were as curious to the Mexicans as they were to us. One shop keeper got quite animated and kept repeating in poor English "go on say it", eventually we asked what? It transpired he wanted us to say "G'Day Mate" which we were happy to oblige.
We had the video camera working overtime recording the experience and at one time I saw in the view finder this large guy run out of a shop towards us with a meat cleaver. Now we knew why it was not safe to wander on our own!! We must have had looks of abject terror but a another Mexican with a smattering of English explained he was a butcher and just wanted to be in our movie.
We rounded off the experience by watching about 20 Mexicans climb out of a small car, bought ourselves the obligatory 'worm in a tequila bottle' and headed back to the border.
Customs took longer this time because the guy in front of us was caught with a large quantity of prescription drugs, but no prescription. The guards escorted him away promising him an extended holiday.

Returning to the car we were pissed to find someone had run a coin (or similar) down the side. We rang Avis but it must be a frequent thing to deal with as they did not seem to concerned.

Back to San Diego then to Phoenix.