I first crossed paths with John windsurfing Wyoming. He was living in Erie Colorado and working in a junk yard.

We really couldn’t figure him out. He was so full of knowledge about almost everything. We called him “Professor”.  He was taken aback by that nick name and he thought we were making fun of him. But we weren’t, we all really liked and respected him.

As time went on John decided to go traveling and he sold his house and bought a green Dodge van. He loaded that van with everything that he thought he would need and hit the road.

I always admired him for cutting loose like he did.

John remained a vagabond traveler between Hood River and Baja for quite a few years.

Often I would fly into San Jose and Paco would pick me and all my gear up at the airport. I would pitch my camp close to his and we would fish, mountain bike, and windsurf every day.

Paco’s camp was always buzzing with activity. Everyone just liked hanging out there. This often got on his nerves but he was always accommodating until he felt that someone was taking advantage of him and then they were GONE!

I have many stories and fond memories of my adventures with Paco.

This one comes to mind:

One day back in the early 90’s Paco and I were wind surfing off North Beach at Los Barriles out on the Sea of Cortez.

We were sailing faster than the wind and jumping the open water swells that roll out of the north down the Sea Of Cortez

It was delightful to be sharing this experience with Paco one of my favorite sailing partners and friends.

We were probably about a mile off shore and I was thinking to myself that we should probably turn back when all of a sudden we were surrounded by thousands of dolphins.

We slowed our board speed to a slog and stayed in the middle of this massive migrating pod of dolphins as long as we possibly could. We then raced back to land and our camps.

That evening I said to Paco “You know if we told that story to anyone they would think we were exaggerating!”