↵  Return to Boyz Photos Page . . .←  back | next  →

Part 2: A Journey to Mexico: Highways & Arroyos
Episodes 4 and 5

Highways

The roads and road construction in Mexico are quite interesting. Most of Highway 1 was 2 lane as I said. Some of it near towns was 4 lane. It was common to see a sign that stood for "dip". It wasn't really a dip as we know it. That meant the road was going down in to a small stream bed and back out. These streams are normally dry and they were just a few miles apart so building a bridge over every one would be expensive. They did have a bridge over some of the big arroyo's but not all of them. The road just went down in to the arroyo and out again or followed along the bottom parallel with the arroyo if there wasn't a bridge. On occasion, traffic in one direction had a bridge and in the other direction did not. We drove so many miles that we saw a lot of construction. They built the bridges right on site. We make bridge beams in certified plants and truck them to the site. They make the concrete beams right next to the river using river rock and sand. They did large pits that probably fill in during the next rain. Workers swarm over the bridge site like the house builders. While they build the bridge, they just have traffic drive thru the arroyo and back up again. Some of the arroyo's are nearly a mile wide so we had a rough ride.

When they repaved a long section of hiway, they had us drive on the dirt on the side of the road. After work hours, we drive back up on the unpaved rocky hiway. I guess that is how they compact the dirt.

Arroyos

An Arroyo is a river bed. When there isn't any water in it, it is just a big, deep ditch with steep sides. They might be a football field wide or they could be half a mile wide. They are everywhere, starting in the mountains and go to the Sea. The bottom is usually sand and small rocks. They are used for roads, golf courses, gravel pits, etc. When it rains, they become raging rivers draining the mountains and desert. In the tourist areas and heavily populated areas, a bridge spans them. They provide a road up to the big ranches and are the roadways of the ATV's with tourists like me.

I heard a good story about them when they are rivers. Bob was chattin' with a couple of the locals and he asked them how they crossed the big arroyo's that didn't have bridges over them when they were raging rivers. One guy said "we wait for the probe to get here". Bob was wondering what they had that could probe the depth so he asked the guy. The guy said that they waited in line on the road until someone came along that was willing to drive thru the river and see if he could make it across. This dummy was "the probe". If he didn't make it, they waited until the river went down.

When a heavy rain hits, the arroyos fill up and the town of Cabo becomes sort of a lake and big stream. Any highway dividers or retaining walls all have big drain holes in them to let the water pass thru. The marina is at the low point of the city and everything drains down into the marina.