Okay. It’s time to spill the beans. We sold our house in La Bufadora.
If you’ve followed our adventures over the last few years, you know that we searched for it, squatted in it until we were able to buy it, spent three years fixing it up, almost sold it once after 9-11, but changed our minds. It was our dream house on the edge of the sea. So what happened?
Well, life changes. We all know that, and
ours did. Our workload shifted and expanded and Terry and I found ourselves
working as travel journalists. I write. He takes the pictures. For new
stories, we travel. No brainer. Our trips to La Bufadora became fewer and
fewer as we started venturing further a field. By the time Memorial Day
weekend rolled around, we hadn’t been there in three months, and the trend
wasn’t about to change anytime soon. Plus, we’d started fantasizing about
hitting the road with our dogs. That meant we needed an RV. We nixed the
motor home idea. We didn’t want to tow anything and we wanted wheels—4x4
wheels to be exact. A camper on a truck seemed to be ideal. We figured
we’d keep the house though, for family and friends to use.
Terry started checking around. Pretty soon he had his heart set on a Dodge Ram 2500 four-wheel drive truck with a Cummins diesel engine. He wanted an automatic with a long bed. We went online and sent away for information on campers. One manufacturer struck a chord with us right away. Lance Campers. They’re called the SUVs of RVs, and they are because they can go places 99% of RVs can’t—like off-roading to the out of the way spots at the end of those dirt roads that Terry and I love to explore. They’re tough and rugged. Perfecto.
So
we started looking and realized in about five minutes that we would be
up to our eyeballs in payments if we bought new … which we wanted to do.
Our thinking caps went back on our heads. The date was May 3rd and we were
down in Baja for a book event. Terry struck up a conversation with Dick,
another author’s husband. When he began talking about our dream of the
truck and camper, Dick started cracking up. “I have your truck,” he said.
He did, down to the last detail. It was a 2002 with less than 700 miles
on it. He wasn’t using it, wanted to find it a new home, and was willing
to sell it to us for payments. But where would the money come from?
A few days later—at a business meeting at the Buena Vista Beach Resort—we found out that the marketing director of Lance Campers has been going to the hotel in Baja Sur almost as long as my family has. “Call him,” my friend Axel said. “He’ll give you a deal for sure.”
“Maybe we should sell the La Buf house,”
I mentioned to Terry on the way home. “Wonder what we could get for it?”
The next day we did some research, designed an ad and emailed Victor Leon,
manager of Rancho La Bufadora. It was May 16th. Two days later Victor called
me. 
“A
guy came by here yesterday looking for a house to buy,” he said. “My aunt
had just called me and told me you might be selling your house. So I passed
that information onto the guy and sent him over to peek in the windows.
He seemed very interested. Here’s his number. Why don’t you give him a
call?”
Twenty-two days after that we had the cashier’s check in hand. The next day Dick arrived from Oregon with our new Dodge pickup. The week after that we had the camper. We paid cash for everything and even had money left over. It happened so quickly and so effortlessly, it had to be meant to be. We kept looking at each other as the weeks rolled by and the pieces fit together. We’d just shake our heads and say, “How is that for synchronicity?” We even found a teenage girl who desperately needed a reliable car and sold her Terry’s old Explorer—for cheap. “Gotta keep the good karma rolling,” Terry said.
We hit the road in mid-July and were only
home three days out of the next three and half weeks. We visited the oldest
bar in Nevada, in Genoa. 
We
marveled at the lack of people and traffic. We camped near Lake Tahoe and
swam in the lake. Another day, we hiked to a deserted lake and dove in
just a storm hit. Thunder rolled all around us and we made a beeline back
to car—drenched and laughing in the warm deluge. We hiked again—up a river
to a waterfall and picnicked below it—after dunking in the freezing water.
Afterward we went to a Kenny Chesney concert under the stars at Harrah’s.
Parked
under a stand of redwoods one evening, at a campground in Big Sur where
we were the only non-tent campers, sipping wine while cooking a pork roast
on the barbecue as the last rays of sunlight filtered down through the
trees, we knew we’d made the right decision. We were rested and renewed.
After we got home, we cleaned, shopped, did laundry, packed up again and
headed an hour and a half south to La Salina for the Corona Open. We camped
on the beach with our toes in the sand, visited old (and recent) friends,
made new ones. We danced with Mexicans who only came up to Terry’s shoulder. 
We
spent hours walking along the shoreline, watching Gonzo and Cassie chase
birds and tennis balls. We made bonfires every night and enjoyed the lack
of leash and campfire laws.
I’ve never had a minute of seller’s remorse.
We know we can always go back to La Buf in our camper. Right now we’re
planning the next adventure—all the way down Baja with our dogs—this October
and November. Stay tuned. We’ll be in touch from the road!
© Ann Hazard, 2003. No part of this
article may be reprinted without permission. Article printed in The
Coast News, September 11, 2003.