A walk down the river

 I walked a total of 11.25 miles yesterday, four miles before school with all the dogs, then another 7.25 (!!!) at the high school, only because one class wanted to walk the track since they had turned in all their assignments.  Six of the 11 students did walk the track and took the time to sit in the grass and socialize.  The other five sat in the shade of the bleachers and busied on their phone.

By the time I got out of school and drove home, virga clouds were forming.  It looked like it was going to rain!

I was determined not to walk so much today, cutting my sunrise walk back down to two miles, and walking another 2.3 miles during my lunch break.  So when Susan asked me if I wanted to walk the river at 4:30pm, I said yes, knowing it would be at a gentle pace.  Minnie stayed home this time.

We started shortly after 4pm to a cloudy sky with a breeze.  It actually felt refreshing, having diffused heat and a cool breeze in the shade.  But we didn't walk a full two miles.

On our way back to our cars, we spotted a lone man in camo attire walking north.  "That's an illegal" said Susan, but I wasn't so sure, as the man didn't seem too concerned about evading us.  Then he yelled "Border Patrol!" to let us know he was a good guy.  My dogs took off running toward him to sniff him out. They didn't bark or get defensive and the man seemed cool with five dogs coming toward him. 

We approached the man, who identified himself as EricT, with his USBP badge attached to his belt.  "I'm dressed like a migrant" Eric explained, mimicking the many migrants now coming across the border and using the river as a guide.  I've never seen a USBP agent dressed as he was, but he was friendly enough.  He told us that since marijuana was legalized in Arizona, the drug trafficking has slowed, but the regular migrant traffic has picked up.

Later that evening I read on a US Border Patrol Tucson Sector page that 124 migrants had turned themselves in to USBP agents in San Miguel, a small town north of Benson along the San Pedro River.  A lot of Mexicans live there and the town has the feel of a Little Mexico.  Spanish is the main language head in town; even the signage is in Spanish. Of the 124 migrants, 105 were unaccompanied children. 

Despite the cool breeze and cloud cover, we never did get any rain.  It was all a tease