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We have had letters from some readers who are interested in pulling
a trailer down to Central America. This little story may help them. We have
abbreviated it, just recounting the parts that may interest you.

This story was told to me by a man who is now my neighbor and good
friend, Arzinia Richardson, and took place in l994.

Arzinia, his lovely wife and two teen-aged daughters decided to move
from Oregon to Costa Rica. They decided to pull a 4,000 pound trailer with
their "goodies" that they wanted in their new home. They had a Suburban
and a modified trailer. Arzinia is a sort of "Jack-of-all trades" type of fellow.
He is highly educated and has taught his favorite subject--Egyptology.
His wife is a registered nurse. They are not rich, but had saved their dimes
and nickles for this sojourn to paradise. As they had lived and travelled
to many other countries, they could "roll with the punches" with anything
they might encounter on their trip.

Arzinia has a lot of mechanical aptitude, so he modified his Suburban
for the trip. He "beefed up" the car and the trailer to withstand the rugged
trip he knew was ahead of him. Even so, on the segment of his trip from
Oregon to Brownsville his trailer hitch broke, so he repaired it at a welding
shop en route.

Their trip through Mexico was uneventful. He said he felt like an
attraction, however, as the locals were not used to seeing an Afro-American
travelling with such good equipment as they had. At no time did they have
to unload the trailer for inspection. At one point, the inspection problem
was solved by the customs officials in an interesting way. They put a
soldier in the car with them, and they had to take care of feeding and
providing lodging for him until the check point where they left the country.
Customs wanted to be sure that nothing was sold or left behind in their
country. Every border check was trouble-free, and they had only one
mechanical problem that Arzinia was able to take care of himself.

His advice is for you to be sure your trailer hitch is strong and that you
take care in balancing your load so it will trail properly. Also, be sure that
your vehicle has plenty of horsepower. It is best that the vehicle have a
stick shift, and be a four-wheel drive, if possible. You can get by with a
two-wheel drive, but you will have to take it easy.

There is one more important thing to remember. Be sure to have a set
of tools--a ratchet set in both metric and inches, and the usual - hammer,
screw drivers, etc., just like we mention in the first chapter.

One other precaution that Arzinia took, was to equip his car with
"bullet proof tires". I do not think you need to go that far, but be sure you
do have heavy-duty tires. It is best if the tires on your car and trailer are
interchangeable to cover any problem you might have with spares.

Thank you, Arzinia, for being such a good neighbor and for sharing
your experiences with us. We hope you have learned something about
travelling on the Pan-American Highway from these accounts.
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