I’ve been climbing along the Mexican border since 1985. In all those years, I’ve seen a lot of scary goings-on, crazy stuff that many people wouldn’t believe, and I started seeing it way back then in the ’80s. I’m sure I was far from the first to notice it, but I can say that it’s been getting worse, not better, as the years have passed.

One of my earliest eye-opening experiences happened in the Pajarito Mountains to the west of Nogales, Arizona. I remember it as if it were yesterday – February 18,1988. As I prepared to sneak into Mexico to climb the range high point, the Border Patrol found me and tried to talk me out of it. They warned me that the area was overrun by “very bad men”. Nowadays, if you try to cross back into the USA at any spot that isn’t a legal border crossing, you could be in serious trouble (even if you’re a US citizen) – I know this because we climbers have had this conversation in recent times with the Border Patrol. So back to 1988.

At first light, I crossed into Mexico in a remote spot, then followed ridges for miles until I reached and climbed Cerro El Ruido. As I was walking back from the summit, minding my own business, I was suddenly confronted by armed men on horseback. I saw them coming, but there was no place to run, no place to hide. They and their dogs were on me in a heartbeat. When I saw the handguns sitting on their hips, I felt sick. Terrible thoughts were running through my mind – there I was, miles illegally into a foreign country – these guys could do whatever they pleased with me and nobody back home would be any the wiser. We talked. It took a bit, but I finally convinced them that I was only a pathetic climber, there on my own, my only goal having been to climb the peak back over my shoulder. I assured the leader that I would never have trespassed had I known that he owned this land. Eventually, after listening to me babble at length, he told me that I was free to go, and should make my way back across the border as quickly as I was able. He told me that the area was overrun by bad men, a constant threat to him, his cattle and his property, and that I had taken a considerable risk in coming there. That’s the only urging I needed – I picked up the pace and made quick time back to the border. I’ve gotta tell you that American soil had never looked so good.

Here’s another one for you. Late May in 2004, I drove from my Tucson home, across the Tohono O’odham Indian Reservation, to an obscure no-name peak only 6 miles from the Mexican border. I mean, this one was way out there at the edge of nothing – no climber had been there before me, and nobody will ever bother to go back, guaranteed. Late May in the desert is hotter than the hinges of hell – the monsoon rains haven’t arrived yet to help cool things off – it’s just plain hot, a hundred-plus every day. So there I was, looking an 800-foot climb in the face, and thinking I needed to dispatch it pretty quickly before the heat got the better of me. Up the slope I went, making good time and enjoying the day, and before long I reached the fairly level summit ridge.

I don’t know if I heard a faint sound, or perhaps caught a glimpse of movement out of the corner of my eye, but all of a sudden I looked up, and straight ahead of me, not 100 feet away, I saw a young Hispanic man. Then another, and another, and one more. They were walking quickly away from me, then running. They had obviously seen me before I had spotted them. Thankfully they were running away from, and not towards, me. I was shocked and surprised to see them, but probably not as surprised as they were to see me. My heart was pounding and I was pretty scared. They headed straight down the steep southwest side of the mountain, and they were moving pretty quickly.

I thought that I might as well reinforce my situation, try to gain the upper hand as it were, so I shouted “Párete, Migra!” after them a few times. I’m sure they heard me but they ran like hell down the steep, loose mountainside. I watched them go, and they were on the desert floor, 800 feet below, in probably 3 minutes or less. It’s a wonder that somebody didn’t fall and break their neck. Then the thought occurred to me “what if there were others nearby, hiding behind rocks or brush?” I looked around, but didn’t see anyone else. I’m sure they thought I had come to arrest them, but I bet they never thought someone would actually climb a mountain at daybreak to catch them! When they reached the desert floor on the south side of the mountain, they kept running. This part of the desert is remarkably flat and featureless, and is aptly named “The Great Plain” on topographic maps. How flat is it, you ask? It is so flat that the elevation only drops 100 feet in those six miles as the land slopes away to Mexico.

Well, Folks, I had wandered right into a really dangerous situation. This was a lookout for drug-runners. They park themselves up on a mountaintop and watch for any law enforcement, which in these parts would be U.S. Customs, the Tohono O’odham police, or the Border Patrol. They keep in touch with their cohorts on the ground who are moving loads of marijuana, cocaine or methamphetamines into the country from Mexico. And they are up on these mountaintops for long periods of time. Those lookouts I had surprised could have been armed, but I think they were so surprised to see me that they decided to just get the heck out of there and not take any chances. Who knows, they may have thought that there were others coming up the slope right behind me. I still wonder today if they remember their surprise visitor, the old Desert Mountaineer.

There was stuff everywhere. Sleeping bags, blankets, water, canned food, propane torches, cigarettes, clothing, backpacks, binoculars, you name it. Maybe others had also camped out in the same spot before them. It would have taken a herculean effort to have lugged all those supplies up there. I figured that those four guys had been so scared that they weren’t coming back. All they left with was the clothes on their backs. If they hustled, they could be back in Old Mexico in 2 hours, easily. So I started rifling through their stuff. I didn’t want to leave anything there that would help them further their plans to get drugs into the US. I took all of the food and hid it in crevices in the rock. I emptied all their water jugs. I took their propane, clothing, binoculars, the biggest backpack, and all their cartons of cigarettes (if that smoker ever did come back, and was expecting to find his smokes, he’d be going through some serious withdrawal). Some of it I hid lower down the east slope where they wouldn’t find it, the rest I carried down to my truck and later disposed of in a dumpster, (except the binoculars, which I kept in my truck to use against other Bad Guys!). Naturally, before I descended I left a cairn and register, because at the end of the day I’m still a peakbagger, no matter what excitement I may run into.

There’s an Arizona mountain range which is full of excitement but is not right by the border. The Growler Mountains approach no closer than 16 miles to Mexico, but those are empty miles. Bad Guys can travel the distance unhindered and arrive at the range in a long day, then vanish. Once they climb up into the spine of the Growlers, they can operate with impunity. Sure, from time to time the Border Patrol will swoop in by helicopter and arrest someone up there (God only knows I’ve reported my share of them), but within a week the void is filled with more scum working for the Mexican drug cartels.  From one end to the other of this 26-mile long range, their lookouts keep watch on the movements of the Border Patrol in the valleys below. Using encrypted 2-way radios, they advise those carrying loads of drugs into the country how to best avoid detection. My friends have had scary run-ins with these guys in the Growlers, so it’s not just me, but there are 2 events that I experienced personally that scared the hell out of me, which I’ll relate to you now.

Back in 2013, I backpacked my way into the northern part of the range around Christmas. The first 4 peaks north of Charlie Bell Pass had been visited by others. They were the first ones I climbed, then camped for the night hard by a footpath I’d found. I arose early the next morning and continued north by headlamp, excited because the next many miles hadn’t been visited by climbers. In fact, the area was so unknown that the folks at the Cabeza Prieta Refuge office in Ajo had asked me to report back to them about Sheep Tank, a feature shown on the topographic maps. None of them had ever seen it, even though it was deep within their territory, and wanted to know what I would find there. By sunrise I had arrived, and discovered a deep pool in the native rock, what we here in Arizona call a tinaja. After a cursory examination, I moved up a nearby slope and dropped my pack so I could climb my first peak of the day.

As I sat on the summit, marveling at the remoteness of the place and its utter silence, I thought I heard a familiar sound – voices! How could that be? By all rights, nobody should be out here but me. As I sat on the summit filling out a register, I scanned the valley below. Yep, there they were, 2 men carrying large box-like loads on their backs. (It turned out that there were actually 4 of them, not just the 2 that I saw). No doubt about it, these guys worked for one of the drug cartels. Where I sat, I was not visible to them. They were moving quickly, much faster than I could travel. One small problem was that they were heading the same direction I was. There were still peaks I needed to climb, and I had invested so much in this trip that I was loathe to quit now. I figured that by the time I got back down to my pack and resumed my journey north, they’d be so far ahead of me that I’d never see them again.

By the time I’d shouldered my pack and continued, they had at least an hour’s head start on me. Great, that should put me in the clear. Away I went, heading down the canyon, It twisted and turned, keeping visibility ahead to a minimum. After a while, it widened and became a wash with a nice sandy bottom. Everything was going well, then in an instant my world got turned on its head.

I had not a care in the world, no expectation of seeing those guys again, so I was walking down the wash and enjoying the day, minding my own business. I was walking along a straight stretch, looking down at my footing, when I heard voices. I looked up and there, standing in the shade of a big mesquite tree not a hundred feet from me, were 4 Hispanic men. They looked young, not above their 30s, and were speaking Spanish. Their loads were on the ground beneath the tree. I had to make a split-second decision, and my life might depend on it. As I think back on this moment, I’m sure they must have seen me walking towards them – after all, I was right out in the open. It seemed to me that I had 2 choices:

1. Keep on walking right up to them and then continue north along the wash past them. What would I do, stop and say hello? Four men with four huge loads of drugs beside them probably wouldn’t be in any mood to chat. What if they were armed? I wasn’t, and besides, four against one seemed like bad odds.

2. Avoid them altogether. I could turn around and go back the way I’d come, and that’s exactly what I did. The moment I saw them, I turned on my heel and walked quickly back south. My heart was pounding, and I was terrified. I didn’t look back, and as I walked away I listened for any sound of pursuit. I heard none. My mind was racing, and after I’d gone a couple of hundred feet, I scrambled up a short embankment and into a thick patch of brush. I tore off my pack and lay down on the ground, hoping that I couldn’t be seen and that no one was following me. I waited several minutes, scared shitless, then slowly sat up. I couldn’t see their tree from my position, but by now I felt that they had decided to leave me alone.

I climbed 2 more mountains in the vicinity, watching like a hawk for any sign of them. Late in the day, I had moved a few miles to the east of where I’d seen the smugglers. I climbed one more peak, then settled down for the night. After dark, I could hear those idiots shouting to each other, at times sounding quite close. It was very unnerving, and I lay awake until late, hoping they wouldn’t stumble upon me. By morning, I felt sure they had moved on and were miles away. I never saw them again, and was happy that this encounter had ended as well as it did. Even today, I think back on it and realize it could have ended so much worse.

Less than a month later, I was back in the Growlers. A friend had told me that he’d discovered a remote peak in the range that had a full thousand feet of prominence, and that I needed to go climb it. Easy for him to say! Of course, once the seed had been planted, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. The reason no climbers had been to Peak 2870 was its location – it was far removed from everything. My big day finally arrived. I drove to the farthest spot that was allowed and camped for the night. In the pre-dawn darkness, I set out by headlamp on an old road. Seven miles later, I left the road and set out cross-country, climbing an intermediate peak en route. Then it was just a matter of following a long ridge southwest, slowly gaining elevation, until, eleven miles from my truck, I approached the summit.

I was excited, as I’d come a long way to reach this one. A boulder marked the obviously-highest point of the gentle summit, and I made a beeline for it. It was ten minutes past ten. But, as I was stepping up to tag it, something froze me in my tracks. Two men, both dressed in camouflage, were sitting near the steep western edge of the summit. They were chatting in Spanish and didn’t see me. However, I knew that it was only a matter of moments before they would. I made a split-second decision, one that I hoped I wouldn’t regret.

I was about 20 feet from the men. Looking right at them, in a clear voice they couldn’t mistake, I started talking to them. Here’s what I said: “Hello Lads, good morning! I’m a climber, out here climbing a few peaks today. Four of my friends are right behind me and will be here in a few minutes. We’re then going to head farther south along the ridge to finish up our day. Good luck!” (This was all said in Spanish). I casually walked over and tagged the summit boulder. You should’ve seen the look on their faces – you’d swear they had just seen a ghost! Even as I was talking to them, one of them slowly reached down into a backpack and pulled out…………. a two-way radio. I was so glad it wasn’t a gun. Even as he began speaking into it, he and his companion dropped off the western edge of the summit and out of sight.

I had no intention of following them to see where they were going, that’s for darn sure! Any plans of leaving a register had long since vanished as well. Turning on my heel, I said goodbye to Peak 2870 and headed quickly downslope to the south. It took me a few minutes to muster up enough courage to look back to see if anyone were following me. Nothing. I kept on going, crossing over Point 2727, then lost hundreds of feet more. Looking back, still nothing. I was starting to calm down. By telling those guys we were going to continue south, I’d hoped they’d clear the route of their people.

So many of our ranges near the border have been overrun by Bad Guys that it’s hard not to feel vulnerable these days. Some of them are armed, with anything from handguns to AK-47s, knives to machetes. The simple fact is that they want my stuff, and will take it if they can. Food, water, boots, clothes, phone – it’s all fair game, and out in those parts it could be a matter of life or death. I always try to give them a wide berth, but can’t always see them before they see me. My friends and I have had many close encounters with these guys. Often they are alone, but the greater danger lies in meeting groups, as you could easily be overpowered.

I’ve been to dozens of their lookout spots high up on mountains, and I always try to destroy their stuff if I can, especially their radio equipment such as batteries, solar panels and the like. It gives a great feeling of satisfaction to throw a solar panel off a cliff as if it were a Frisbee and watch it smash against the rocks below. Even lesser things like blankets, sleeping bags, backpacks and clothing can be disposed of (burning it works well) so that Bad Guys visiting that spot in the future cannot use them as they commit their crimes. It’s a sobering thought that foreign criminals routinely cross into the U.S. and act as if they own the place while they go about breaking the law.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t give a shout out to the US Border Patrol. On many occasions, I have encountered them out in remote desert locations, where they have been nothing but supportive. They have told me that I should never hesitate to call on them if I ever feel threatened by Bad Guys, or if I have a mechanical breakdown. I have returned the favor by always calling in to them any sightings of Bad Guys and their illegal activity.