No Visible Means of Support
We were once expecting a load from Mexico, 500 kilos, and that load of cellophane-wrapped bales took up so much room in our white, stretch panel van that we ended up with 3 of the 20 lb. bales up front in the passenger side covered with a few jackets and towels. You could smell the van 50 feet away, even with the windows all closed tightly we discovered, when we got it to Phoenix later and parked on the street, awaiting a friend to arrive. That’s sometimes the game and you have to run with it, like it or not. The paranoia, the stress, the adrenaline rush…..
Anyway......we had used a remote airstrip in Northern Arizona that was outside of a small town. The 10 mile dirt road that went past the airport and on to other private ranches and cabins further out was unpredictable when it came to traffic. Some days only 5 vehicles might pass that way; other days only 2 early in the morning; and on vacation weekends that dusty passage could see 20 campers or hunters going past at odd times.
We rented a 2 ton flatbed truck from U-Haul and drove it 200 miles to the remote airstrip area. One of my guys camped in it overnight since we were expecting the load at 8 am precisely. The airstrip was 20 feet above the grade of the road that passed by and ran lengthwise to the strip. One road section immediately next to the flat mesa that held the airstrip ran through a dry riverbed gully about 40 feet lower than the strip area. This was the “pinch point” that we would use, a section where the dirt road was narrow enough and surrounded by such thick vegetation that there was no way to drive around a stopped vehicle. We had the big truck parked in the middle of the road pretending that it was broken down. This would make any vehicles coming from either direction stop well out of sight from the airstrip above in the gully section of the road that we had chosen for this strategic move. My friend stood next to the truck, ready, just in case any vehicles came along the road so he could quickly lie under the truck and play the role. He had disconnected a wire to the starter so that it truly couldn't move.
Good thing he did so and that we had pushed our plan to the “Mission Impossible” level. Two rancher pickup trucks drove up at 10 minutes to 8am and were effectively blocked. One rancher got extra-helpful and climbed into our flatbed to "help" start it. It turned over and over with no start, just the solenoid trying its best. While this drama was playing out below us, the Sinaloan Air Force Cessna did an immediate landing without even making a quick fly-by as a safety check (for rocks or animals on the runway or to check for LEO or other bogies in the immediate airstrip area) and began kicking out 20 pound, cellophane-wrapped bales of primo mountain-grown Mexican sinsemilla.
Our panel van was at the loading end so they just taxied up nearby and began the unloading process. The pilot and his helper finished in what seemed like a mere 3 minutes, gunned their motor, and blew off the runway and back to Old Mexico. Their job was finished far before our two guys could load the panel van so there was this big pile of bales lying on the open runway. Good thing we blocked the road because it was very obvious what the airplane noise was connected to. If someone had driven by the upper part of the road that had the short connector driveway leading to the airstrip it would have been a mess. It was pre-cell phone days back then in 1982 but many ranchers had CBs (Citizen Band radios) and a few even had wireless FM radios to connect to their ranch's telephone land line.
Hard to imagine how the Sinaloan Air Force could be on time coming from 500+ miles away in a twin-engine Cessna 414, but they were within 3 minutes of the exact hour. They would have most likely crossed the US-Mexico border flying 200 feet above the ground, balls-to-the-wall. No GPS back then and these guys had never even visited our strip. In a meeting in Guadalajara a month before we showed them the airstrip location on a detailed aviation map of the area, the most accurate tool for pilots back then. It surprised all of us because we had nightmares about “What if they don’t show up on time”? Would we sit there for hours and just react when we heard a plane coming in? What if we wait a whole day and it’s a no-show?
Our boys finally got all the bales into the van and drove down into the gully and stopped when they came to the "broken down" flatbed truck. This signaled Jon to quickly re-attach the starter cable and ask the rancher to give it another try. It started immediately, of course, and Jon moved the flatbed toward the nearest wide space in the road where the ranchers had room to drive past. The two ranch trucks also passed our Sinsemilla van, waved thanks, and disappeared. The van moved on down the road, taking a back dirt track to the main paved highway that connected to the Interstate and on down to Phoenix and the Valley of The Sun. The rest is history: that fine herb made its way to its final destination in New York City and Brooklyn without a glitch, thanks to our cross-country driving team that specialized in moves like that. The Brooklyn Rastas and a Soho Chinese fellow sold it all in record time.
Before we even landed back in Phoenix a few days later, they were ready for more.
Ah yes, Capitalism.
