Dirtdiver

Us in the Mexican's truck about to head from Valle T to Tecate.

After the accident at Mike's. Dave was in a lot of pain, but it did not look that bad. Swollen immediately and the swelling got worse. The pain went away, in part, as the nerve was choked for blood.

In Valle T for dinner. Funny enough, the tire repair place in this picture was owned by the guy that gave us a ride to Tecate the next day after the accident. The place that we stopped for dinner was where his wife worked.

Back out on the highway headed for Valle T. Running out of daylight.

After the Lake, after Ojos, and on the goat trail.

My son David.

Some gorgeous country between his place and the Lake.

I wanted to put in some pics of our day one. Looking back, it reminds me how much fun and companionship we have on these trips. We took the Compadre trail and then turned off to go to Laguna Hansen. This guy below has got a nice set up and is looking for tourists. The ranch was built by his Grandpa in the 1920's. He has got a hotel on the right and a cantina on the left.

I have a couple friends that rode to cals today. i wonder if you all met them? They would be on 450-530 type bikes. steve

Thanks Eddie. He is doing incrementally better each day. He is up at school crutching around, and his friends are helping. I went for the first week and just got back yesterday. I left him my auto transmission car and got him a temporary handicapped placard. He is trying to get off of the prescribed drugs and removed the last of the staples today. He is working on range of motion and will be able to drive once he is off of the narcotics. We are trying to get his knee surgery scheduled for his spring break in 10 weeks from now. So, things are coming along. At this point we are hoping/wondering how much function he will get back. The surgeon said a lot of function to come back but not like it was. So, we will see. We still see ourselves as really fortunate compared to the way it could have been. I have been keeping a casual eye out for the two guys that were on the other side of the accident to post over on the ADV site. No luck so far. I have a few words to pass on. haha. steve

Thanks Eddie. We went for the post OP today where the surgeon took out some of the staples. He gave me some instructions on how to remove the rest of the staples which I will do while we are at college. So our first meeting with the Ortho guy on Monday and then driving up to cal poly, assuming the Dr is OK with it. I need to rent that movie where Rodney Dangerfield goes back to college with his son and is snorkeling around the jacuzzi with some Co-eds. Hahaha A couple of the guys I ride with are going to Baja for an overnighter through the mountains and over to Coyote Cals. I'll be with them once we are back to normal-ish routine in my house. I have gotten a huge amount of offers to help. From you guys, my friends and my co-workers. It is really heartwarming. steve

Boy that looks like a great trip. Thanks for putting the RR together Dan!

wow, gorgeous.

You did the best you could with the experience, information, expertise and time provided- seems you made several correct decisions- well done. Help us understand the nature of his injury- was the leg injured by the other's bike, or by his own? What kind of pants was he wearing? Thanks, and I hope he's recovering well.... He had on motocross pants, nice knee guards, and alpine star tech 8 boots. He also had a expensive helmet and one of those jacket style armor for his upper body. He tells me that as he came over that rise and saw the other bike in his lane he tried to dodge to the right. The other guy dodged the same way also since he had a partner next to HIS right. Seeing an imminent collision my son laid his bike down and started to slide towards the other rider. The other rider ran him over and locked up his back brake dragging over my son's legs. We think the locking up the brakes was a good bit of the problem. My son has his calf torn off of the knee, the hamstring torn off of the knee, and the 4 ligaments torn off. His leg was extended 45 degrees to the front. His tibia and the femur were broken. His main artery was crushed and clotted. During the first surgery they sliced the skin in 2 places to relieve the swelling that had choked off blood flow to the lower leg. This is what you see in the picture above I posted. They also harvested a vein from his right leg to replace the artery section of his left leg. At this point my son is home and the cuts made by the surgeon are stapled shut. His leg is in a soft cast. We go back to have the staples removed on Friday and see the surgeon for post OP. He has been moving around and can get himself to the bathroom on his crutches. He has an ortho appt on Monday and we are planning to drive him back to college after the ortho appt. We are not sure if this is realistic but we are planning with optimism. I just took him to get a haircut which tired him out. He is in good spirits - as he generally is. The other two guys were from seattle and dressed in blue jeans with hiking boots. We heard that they had been drinking heavily the night before at Mike's. They both stuck around until the first truck arrived. They felt bad but there was nothing they could do to really help. I hope they at least realize the seriousness of their actions. I am glad I had $400 in cash so that I could negotiate for rides. It would have been another issue if I needed to find a bank along the way. steve

Thanks Dave. Pre arranged air evacuation would be a huge risk mitigator. Imagine a spinal injury where time is everything??

In hind site. - I would have left my bikes at mike's for later pick up. It would have saved me an hour and I think they would have ben safe at Mike's. - I would have kept the ride's I arranged from the various Mexican guys. That worked pretty well and did not cost me much time. - I would have walked across the border like I did. It was hard but as quick as anything else I could think of. - I would have called 911 at the border vs having my wife to pick us up. - I would have gone to a trauma center vs an ER. With internal injuries it is hard to know the extent of the injuries and the right level of response.

I'm confused; didn't the Mexican border guys stop you from "hopping" into the US via pedestrian entrance? So then how did you get through? What do you mean by "...a long, long way with such a load and injury"? More details, if you get a moment, please. Following this thread with great interest (for the same reason as everyone else who has been/will be in Baja)... but, mainly, SO VERY THANKFUL that you were able to get your son back to US medical care, nice work Dad! The border guy, tried to stop us and threatened to arrest me. I pushed by him as he jabbered into his radio. He kept threatening - I just kept going. Another patron got on the other side of my son and helped us move forward. The pedestrian entrance at Tecate looks like it would be close but is about 100-200 yds long by the time you get through the turns and turnstiles. With my son's bad leg, me trying to carry him, him in pain, our 20 pound back packs - it was hard. There was no way for me to shout ahead for help from the US side because there was a one way turnstile at the very end which would keep me from going back. When we got up to the counter I laid my son on the floor and presented our documents. As we were driving north and I was trying to figure out the best course of action I decided to walk across the border because (1) I did not know that my son's leg was time critical. I figured it was broken but an hour here or there would not matter. I was wrong. (2) my wife can't lift the trailer onto the truck and I wanted my bikes on the US side. She could not bring the truck and trailer south. (3) I did not know how long the border wait was and did not know the criteria for the medical line. My son's leg was swollen but did not look that bad. I did not want to get in a 3 hour border wait. (4) I had no idea that the walk to the CBP was so long.

An interesting side note. I was trying to walk my son across the border and having a tough time. The mexican driver had dropped us at the OXXO near the border crossing. I locked the bikes together and supported my son to the pedestrian entrance. He could hop along if I supported his weight. We had our valuables in two big backpacks. The Mexican side border guard tried to stop us and call for an ambulance. He told me if I kept trying to leave the country with an injured person I would be arrested. He wanted to get an ambulance to take my son to a Mexican hospital and then arrange things from there. I was saying to myself, "F - you, we have come 200 miles in 7 hours there is nothing stopping me from getting through that gate!". So we hopped our way to the US which was a long, long way with such a load and injury. ---------- The medical people here at UCSD consistently tell me of trouble in Mexican hospitals. Either infections or bungled procedures or ransom to get your patient released to the US. This may be overblown like a lot of Mexican rumors but that is what they are telling me. They convinced me that I a glad I made a good effort to get back to the US vs trying to get local treatment down there.

Thanks everyone. I am not a big social part of the club but I keep an interest in the Baja section and every once in a while do the desert dash or the mystery ride of Ken's. But believe me when I was running through my options I had some thought of a call of support from SDAR! Head on collisions are always my fear in baja since people are so few and everyone enjoys a fast ride. I know that the first rider is most at risk and I wished I would have taken the lead. Steve

We were getting limited blood flow to his leg but I didn't recognize it. It almost cost him his leg. My wife got us at Tecate border and took us to the chula vista emergency room. We farted around for 2-3 hours while we went through the process. Eventually my wife (who is a nurse practitioner) insisted that she was worried about "compartment syndrome" and asked for the ER doctor. The ER doctor checked a few things and then jumped into fast action mode calling for a ambulance to take my son to the Trauma center at UCSD. My wife has been huge in this ordeal. The surgeon at the trauma center pointed towards the 14 hours (since the accident) and talked about amputation and prosthetics. As it turned out the major artery needed to be cut out and replaced but there was enough tributaries to provide blood flow, saving the leg. They also sliced his leg to allow the swollen tissue to expand and not choke off the blood flow to the lower leg. So, that is where we are at this point. He is headed for surgery #2 later today to see how things are and remove dead tissue. We are hoping that they know what they are doing and that things go well. Believe me, I have found religion in the last two days. haha steve

Thanks guys. The accident happened two miles short of Mike's the other participants stayed with Dave while I went to mike's for some help. The mechanic there, David, had truck. We applied ice and David could take us to Valle Trinidad but not beyond. When we got to town I texted my friend in Murrieta who was willing to come down, but that would take some time. I went to the tire/emchanic shop at the far end of town and got the owner to drive us to Tecate for a fee. Everything moved pretty quickly. What I did not know was that my son's leg injury involved the crushing and clotting of the major artery to his left leg. So, we was getting limited blood flow to%2

Thanks Ken. I think I have got it under control, it did occur to me to ask for help while the situation developed in Baja. As it turned out I pretty quickly arranged for rides back to the border. The whole thing was just awful to see my son in so much pain.

Thanks guys. I have a bad ending to this trip. We camped 10 miles short of Mike's on night one. Things were going great. The next morning my son was in front, went over a rise and had a collision with a guy coming the other way in his lane. They both (my son and the other guy) tried to dodge to my son's side of the road. For some reason the other guy was in a group of two riders leaving Mike's and riding abreast. My son went under the other rider and was ridden over. I have a swell of feelings to the other guy that run the full spectrum. A long story short my son is in ICU back here in SD. He almost lost his leg. I am glad it was not worse and I hope this will not be life changing for my 21 y/o son. We really enjoy our time riding together but this falls into the category of sh*t happens and it fell against us this time. If nothing else please, please take moment to look at your riding style and re-affirm to yourself that remote trails are not a closed course. Steve

I just pored a 10x10 slab of concrete by myself and wife. Cheaper than that and a lot less work. I see that you already bought the pavers but still. My slab was the cost of a weekend of labor and roughly 50-60 bags of cement at $4/bag. Pavers are a lot of work and who cares how it looks under the shed?? Just my .02. DD