In Caleta San Juanico, a sleepy little bay north of Loreto, lies a shrine. From afar you wouldn’t guess it, in fact, from afar you’d guess there laid a site of vandalism or perhaps a trash heap. But upon closer inspection you can see that this grand tree in the desert is adorned with some beautiful relics of boaters that have passed through over the last 20 or 30 years.

Some people have gone to great lengths and created grand pieces to festoon this tree, to tell the world that they have been there. Unfortunately, others have taken a little less time and proved a lot less creative as they have scrawled their name in magic marker on some article of junk they found in their bilge and laid it at the alter. Others have carved their names large in the sandstone cliffs above that overlook the turquoise water.

The debate arose over the definition of graffiti, especially as we’ve been seeing so many ancient petroglyphs in the area. We get tingles down our spine and imagine spirits hovering around the sacred caves when the graffiti is old and from a bygone culture. We (or at least I) scoff at the crass displays when it is from our peers.
Anyways, that’s my judgmental, grumpy old man’s lecture from the soapbox for the day.

And yes, we did leave something at the shrine: a string of seashells with our names writ small.

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