Mexican Adventure

MEXIKAN ADVENTURE

A string of shining steel ties together Nogales, Arizona, and Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico, rendering less formidable the 1068 miles that separate Arizona's border and the second largest city in Mexico and through terminals there brings closer to us the large cities of the interior of the Mexican Republic. This string of shining steel has been for over two decades the main artery of trade and transportation that has given impetus to the industrial and agricultural expansion in our neighboring states of the West Coast of Mexico, and whose operations have brought prosperity to these states and to Southern Arizona.This string of shining steel, to use its full name, is the Ferrocarril Sud-Pacífico de México-the Southern Pacific of Mexico Railroad Company-a subsidiary of our own Southern Pacific. Historians have extolled the contribution of our S. P. and the Santa Fe in the building and development of the frontier West that was once Arizona. The S. P. of Mexico has done even more for the territory it serves because its services have not been supplemented by fine highways that have been developed in our state since statehood. Highway transportation along the West Coast of Mexico at this late day is still insecure, although road building programs are being extensively carried out. It has been only in recent years that air transportation has developed sufficiently on the West Coast to contribute appreciably to the transportational needs of travelers and industry. Railroad and shipping have carried and are carrying the main load.

Today at this minute hundreds of carloads of tomatoes and other vegetables are rolling from packing houses in Sonora and Sinaloa for American markets over the S. P. de Mexico. More carloads are at the same time rolling southward along the same line carrying tools, machinery and farm equipment and other supplies from U. S. factories to the Mexican market. Two nations and two peoples enjoy better living through the endeavors of this historic railroad.

other vegetables are rolling from packing houses in Sonora and Sinaloa for American markets over the S. P. de Mexico. More carloads are at the same time rolling southward along the same line carrying tools, machinery and farm equipment and other supplies from U. S. factories to the Mexican market. Two nations and two peoples enjoy better living through the endeavors of this historic railroad.

It has withstood floods and revolutions, hell and high water, and is miraculously doing business in the same old place-between Nogales and Guadalajara.

The trip is a Mexican adventure. The rail fan finds rail-roading with a Mexican flavor a little bit different than rail-roading elsewhere.

It is not the kind of trip you want to take if you demand your trains on time, but if you are patient and will just sit back and enjoy the scenery and the surroundings you will have a fine time. The fare plus Pullman berth lower from Nogales, Sonora, to Guadalajara, one way, is less than $30, (226.15 pesos at 8.63 pesos to $ to be exact) with Pullman meals and good ones, too, between 50 cents and $1.00. Not an expensive adventure to say the least!

You see the kaliedoscope of country that is the West Coast, desert, jungles, plains, mountains and the sea. You see big towns and little towns, and always there is the excitement in the stations when the trains come and go. because nowhere else on earth could the arrival of a train mean so much as it does in these Mexican stations. Four great Mexican statesSonora, Sinaloa, Nayarit and Jalisco-unroll like a magic carpet by your window, and not a mile of what passes before you is not interesting. Not stream-lined luxury, but exciting.