When we awoke, we found ourselves in Alice, Texas with more bus problems, There was a Lot of speculation as to what the problem seemed to be. Charles and Harold were out working on the bus so I went out and asked them what they thought was wrong. Charles told me the air compressor that creates air pressure for the brakes and some other accessories had broken. He carried a spare in the lower compartment so he and Harold were working on this.

I took my seat on the bus again and began listening to the people try and explain what the problem was to those just waking up. It was really quite funny how one person in the front of the bus would tell the person behind him about the problem and as the story was passed along to the back of the bus, the problem worsened. I couldn't take it any longer so I related to them what Charles had told me so that the stories would come to an end. We then started a conversation about how rumors fly when nobody knows the actual facts of a situation. I started joking about the seriousness of our bus problems and then began making fun of all the speculation that was being made. Someone suggested they could write a book about all our problems thus far. I spoke up and said we could have a whole series of books about this trip. Loretta and I suggested several funny titles for the books. Our first book was to be called "Alice, Texas." I was still hearing comments and speculation from the back of the bus so I decided to enlarge on this. By the time I finished, we had lost the motor and were going to be stranded. Loretta retorted in a gasp of laughter as the plot thickened. I had decided that all we would have left at the end of the trip was the empty shell of the bus. Loretta remembered a hamburger joint in Texas similar to McDonalds called Whataburger. This name soon changed to Whata-Burro which was the place that we were going to have to buy the Burro to pull us back home in the shell of the bus. All of this joking seemed to lighten everyone's spirits and made the time pass quickly.

A few of us found that the truck stop had showers for use by passing truckers so we decided to take advantage of these facilities. This was about 6:00 A.M. and some of the troops weren't out of dreamland yet and missed all the fun. We told them of the showers and not believing us went to check the story out. Soon they returned for their clean clothes and toiletries. We had fun teasing them about this which was OK as we got to know each other a little better and this helped to pass the time.

Charles and Harold finished working on the bus and we were on the road by 9:00 or so. A short time later we rolled into McAllen, Texas, the border town across the Rio Grande from the Mexican city of Reynosa. Once at McAllen, we were to go to the K-Mart parking lot where we met Mary and Judy, who had come up from Galeana, Mexico to meet us. Mary was so glad to see us as we were so late in arriving due to the breakdowns we had experienced. Mary, Charles and Loretta's daughter, along with Judy and others, work as missionaries in Galeana in children's ministry. Mary, Judy and I went into McAllen to exchange the group's money into pesos. We went to a bank who offered a better exchange rate, but they were out of pesos. We then went to another bank where the rate was 165 pesos to the dollar. Mary thought we could have gotten 167 pesos at the other bank, but we decided the 2 pesos difference wasn't too bad.

Back on the road, we crossed the border into Mexico. We paid a toll at the American side of the border to cross the bridge before entering the Mexican checkpoint. Upon entering Mexico, we parked the bus and entered a building to obtain our visas. We were full of anticipation and curiosity as a number of us had never experienced anything like this before. The official on duty told us to take a seat and gave each of us a form to fill out in order to obtain our visa. Then each individual had to approach a desk where the officials processed our visas. They checked our birth certificates and verified the information that was on the form we filled out. After either giving us our visa or stamping passports, we went back to the bus. At the time of our arrival at the checkpoint, officials started looking through our belongings in the cargo bays and had pulled the tarp off the trailer to check our baggage. Out of curiosity, we followed them around and they asked what we were planning to do with the big bags of clothing and shoes that were packed in the trailer. They also questioned the purpose of us taking an old wringer-type washing machine into Mexico. They climbed on top the bus and looked through the items we had in the cargo carrier. Of course they came across the small apartment size clothes dryer along with other items Mary had received as wedding gifts. They didn't like this at all! They soon began questioning us about everything. After conferring with another older man (who looked like a high ranking military official), they advised that we could not cross the border because of the items on the bus. It seems they thought we were going to take the items into Mexico to sell for a profit.

We assured him we were simply on a mission trip to build a church and the items we were taking with us were for the poor people of the region. They still would not let us pass and the older man told all the custom officials to leave us alone and tell us to go back. Charles, nor any of us, knew what to do. We were all pretty confused and very disappointed at this chain of events and, at the same time there was a feeling of fear among the group and also a little anger at the official's decision. Someone suggested that perhaps Charles, as a committee of one, could persuade the officials to let us through by offering them a gift for the favor. Charles returned to the custom office and everyone refused to talk to him. The man in charge told Charles to leave and, furthermore, to get the bus out of the area. Everyone got back on the bus and prepared to leave the area. Judy, who had been following us in her car, decided to go back with us. Merle had a difficult time maneuvering the bus around in the small area where he had parked the bus. And, of course, the trailer on the back was a hindrance so Charles got out and helped guide Merle out of the parking lot.

At the border, before crossing the Rio Grande back into the U.S., we had to stop, one more time, and pay a toll. When we reached the U.S. side, we had to stop at the customs station to be inspected for what we were bringing back from Mexico! Charles explained to them that we had been denied entrance into Mexico. The woman in charge was very understanding of our situation and advised that we should either try crossing at another point or try again later at this same checkpoint. Back at K-Mart in McAllen, we made the decision to continue our trip by trying to cross at another point and, hopefully' we wouldn't have to leave anything behind. As all the items were very badly needed, it would be very disappointing to leave these items behind. We devised a plan to repack the trailer so that all the clothes and other give-away items would be in the bottom of the trailer under duffle bags and suit cases so they wouldn't be quite as obvious. We also moved the washing machine to the front of the trailer hoping that it would not be discovered. In addition to these precautions, we packed the washing machine with ice, pop and other cold or frozen items to disguise the washer as a cooler! I was in charge of repacking the trailer and the others in the group kept busy trying to mix shoes in with the rest of the items on board.

One problem to overcome was our passports. Everyone had given their visas to Loretta so they wouldn't have them when we reapplied for them at the next checkpoint. A problem arose when Charles pointed out that he just had his passport with him and it had been stamped in Reynosa. Everyone else had their birth certificates with them so they wouldn't have to use their passport. Mary solved this problem by tearing the page that was stamped out of the passport book. We could only hope that whoever was in charge would not notice the missing page. It was also noticed that the permission form that Charles obtained for the bus and trailer was stamped on the very bottom. Mary simply cut across the page very carefully. A few persons in the group felt that what we were doing was wrong. I felt that the items were very badly needed and this fact alone warranted the use of slightly underhanded methods to enable us to cross the border. I knew I wouldn't lose any sleep over this and I had done worse things for a much lesser cause. At this point, we prayed to God asking for his guidance in carrying out his will, whatever that would be!

The question is "where to cross next"? Progresso, the name given to a small private bridge, was some 20 minutes to the S. E. of our present location. Mary told us the roads were pretty rough on the Mexico side of the bridge, but the only alternate route to this would be Laredo which was some 2 hours or more away. We decided to try Progresso and when reaching the bridge, we had to pay another toll. At the other side, the office in charge told us we would have to turn right around as he wasn't allowed to process buses at this checkpoint. We finally got turned around and back across the bridge (one more time).

The next closest crossing was Brownsville, Texas/Matamoros, Mexico so what did we have to lose, right? It had gotten quite foggy since we left Progresso and it was also spitting a little rain. Brownsville was about another 20 minutes from Progresso and we reached it in a short time. By the time we pulled into Brownsville it was raining quite steadily. This was certainly to our advantage as we felt that the officials would not want to stand out in the rain to inspect our baggage. We had all agreed that upon inspection of the bus and trailer only three people would be near enough to answer any questions that might arise. We had decided there were simply too many people around the officials at Reynosa making them nervous also suspicious.

Merle, Charles and myself, who had done most of the repacking, went out to answer any questions. The man at the desk where we applied for our visas was very nice and we conversed with him for a time. After receiving the visas, our group stood away from the bus so as not to "spook" the officials. Two men inspected the bus and an older official went around in front of one official and asked us to open almost everything. The other man told us it wasn't necessary and not to bother. We opened all the cargo bays so he could look at everything. He then asked us what we had in the top carrier, to which I replied "baggage." After a short time, he asked us for a payment of "appreciation" for letting us pass. We were positive by this time that he would not let us pass until we filled the empty spot in his wallet. I gave him $10 and Charles gave him another $10. We found the empty spot, but had not quite filled it to his liking. I gave him a five and Charles another five (or ten?). We finally must have found his price as he smiled and walked off. We all got on the bus and prepared to take off before they changed their minds! Before we could get pulled away, the man from the visa desk came running out to the bus and asked us for a Bible. We gladly gave him the only Spanish reading bible we had with us. This made all the trouble we had to go through worthwhile, at least to me anyway. We were finally in Mexico to continue our mission... almost that is. There was still one more possible setback which was the 20 mile checkpoint we had to cross... and pass.

The first man on the bus at this 20 mile checkpoint asked to see our visas and then carried on a conversation with Mary who was able to communicate with him and was acting as our interpreter. We all had become very happy when she told us that he was a Christian. He had also told us to make haste in our mission as he felt the day of the Lord was close at hand. He told us to park over to one side so that they could look over our baggage. They looked under the bus in the cargo areas again and pulled up one corner of the tarp on the trailer. He questioned us as to whether they had looked over our belongings at the border. After a brief inspection we were back on the road to Galeana. We drove to Linares where we spent the night. Mary and Carlos went on home to Galeana.