Coronado would never appeal to such nomads as ourselves as a place to stay for any length of time—even forgetting the "freight," if we were able to be so happily oblivious to a matter of such moment to us. After a saunter about the grounds, indescribably glorious in the tempered sunlight, and a drive about the village, we were ready for the road again. Like nearly every stranger who comes to San Diego, we were hankering for an excursion into Old Mexico—just to be able to declare we had been there—and the short jaunt to Tia Juana served this very useful purpose. The trip was doubly sensational since Tia Juana had recently been the seat of genuine war, and you could see bullet holes in the wretched little hovels. It was even guarded by a "fort," which chanced to be deserted at the time of our incursion. The village lies only two or three miles across the border-line, beyond which the road was simply execrable. It meandered in an aimless fashion across the wide plain and was deep with dust and full of chuck-holes that wrenched the car unmercifully. And after we arrived we found nothing but a scattered hamlet made up of souvenir stores, saloons, and a few poor little cottages. Evidently the place depends for its existence on the troops of tourists from across the border, and Tia Juana—which, being interpreted, means "Aunt Jane"—welcomes them as cordially as her limited means permit.
While the ladies ransacked the counters of the souvenir store for bargains—principally, no doubt, for the satisfaction of carrying a little "contraband" over the border—we endeavored to interview some of the native loafers on the status of the revolution, but got only a "No sabe" for our pains. A few minutes of Tia Juana will generally satisfy the most ardent tourist and we were not long in turning the "Forty" U. S.-ward. The customs official waved us a nonchalant salute—he did not even give us the courtesy of a cursory glance into the car; evidently he knew that one would find nothing in Tia Juana worth smuggling into the country. We bade farewell to the land of the greaser with a feeling of double satisfaction; we had been in Mexico—quite as far as we cared to go under conditions then existing—and we were glad to get off the abominable road.