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| 4/14/08 After returning from a three-week Mulegé trip in late March, my folks reported the same thing I've been hearing from a lot of people--that Tijuana and the toll road are crawling with military and federal law enforcement. They said everyone they dealt with was unusually polite and efficient and that they felt safer on the Tijuana-Ensenada stretch than they had for several years. They took the photos below on the toll road. Check out the chick in the Paris Hilton shades. Also, it's rumored--although I'm not sure if it's true--that local police are now forbidden from pulling over any U.S.-plated vehicle in Rosarito. It's also rumored that most or all of the Tijuana and Rosarito police forces were removed from duty, investigated, polygraphed, and their weapons ballistics-tested. There are some wild numbers going around--like more than half of the Tijuana police were found to be significantly involved with narco-trafficking. Supposedly those who came up clean are being reinstated. Again, this is nothing but entirely unsubstantiated rumor. At any rate, it does seem that the crime wave of late 2007 has either already ended or is nearing its end. And seemingly, as a bonus, police shakedowns in Tijuana and Rosarito are much less common than they were just a few months ago. Please do keep me posted about your trips. 
 
 On a lighter note, the following picture was taken farther south while they were waiting at a checkpoint. Seems like there's some critical information missing.  Finally, it was an unusually wet winter, and the peninsula is as green as I've ever seen it.  |