October 31, 1978
Last night promised to be a good one. There was a beautiful sunset. The whole western sky was lit up in sundry shades of orange. Red sky at night, sailor’s delight. Red sky in the morning, sailors take warning! I took comfort in that aphorism. I crawled into my tent hoping to have a night without incident, especially one where I stayed dry till dawn.
Maybe the orange sky was not red enough, or perhaps the axiom was only true when one sailed the seven seas! It certainly proved to be false in Bolivia, a landlocked country in the middle of South America! A few hours hence, that solacing adage would loose all credibility!
I was awakened at 2:30 AM by my tent canvas snapping in the wind. It was being violently jerked back and forth, up and down, collapsing on me one second, then bellowing around me the next. The weigh of my pack and my body were probably the only causation for it not growing wings and flying away through the darkness. I looked through the tent window and saw that the sky was filled with clouds. Great bolts of lightening were shredding the northern sky. I knew I was going to get it and decided to abandon ship.
I hurriedly repacked my pack, and stuffed my sleeping bag into it’s cover. Lastly, I donned my plastic poncho. As I crawled through the tent door the first drops of rain started to fall. I crammed my gear under the frame of a truck on a flat railcar hoping it would stay dry. Then, I tied Boris and Tasha to the train car where they could huddle between the rails and behind the big iron wheels and, hopefully, stay dry. I went back to get Toughy when the clouds unleashed their full fury. The rain fell by the bushelful, threatening to drown anyone, man or beast, unlucky enough to be out in the falling deluge. I decided that it was every dog for himself, now!
Instead of rescuing the pup, I dove into my tent seeking what little shelter it afforded. I did not like getting soaked to the skin! Outside, Toughy was howling, yiping his complaint, like someone was beating him with a stick. He did not like the rain, either! I thought it was rather funny, but my mirth was quashed a few minutes later when my tent collapsed on top of me. The nylon canvas was heavy with water and it stuck to my wet poncho making escape difficult. To complicate things further, the zipper on the tent flap got stuck. I wiggled my way through the reduced hole and got thoroughly soaked in the extrication. I untied Toughy and sprinted for the train work station where we could get out of the rain. Getting warm and dry was another thing!
By 3:30 the rain had stopped. I went back out and tied Toughy with the other dogs. Then I set up the tent with the hope the rain was over. It was wet inside and out, not a place I wanted to be until it dried out again. I had tried sleeping, sitting with my back against the brick wall, but found that very uncomfortable. I got my sleeping bag from the train flatcar, spread my poncho onto the wooden floor made from railroad ties, and laid my bag on top of it. I took off my boots and gingerly deposited my body onto the hard surface. My clothes were wet, but perhaps I could last the rest of the night.
I could not take much more misery like I had experienced the last few weeks. There had to be an end to it, soon! I prayed and asked God to please hurry and send a train. I had already given up on the one that was to arrive at 10 PM, late yesterday. That hour was long passed and the train did not come as promised.
In the wee hours of the morning, I heard what sounded like a train coming. I passed it off as a truck or tractor. I had heard both of these many times during the nights I had spent in Santa Rosa. Trains, not so much! However, I opened my eyes with budding interest as a bright light began illuminating the trees, the flatcar with all of our stuff on board, and the locomotives sitting on the tracks nearby. The light got brighter and brighter and the roar of the engine sounded louder and louder. Still thinking it was a logging truck, I kept expecting it to downshift as it crossed the railroad tracks. It did not! Suddenly, a whistle blew. It was a train!
“While they are yet speaking, I will answer.” I pulled my boots onto my feet and ran out to watch that beautiful train pull into town. The diesel engine was followed by a long line of flatcars. I knew it would continue on to Puerto Yapacani to unload all that stuff, but seeing a real live train filled me with hope. I knew it would have to return to Santa Rosa, soon!
The train stopped only for a few minutes, perhaps to let passengers detrain. When it was gone, I laid back down on top of my sleeping bag. The heavy downpour and the resulting uncomfortably wet clothes I wore had driven good sleep far from my eyes in the hours before the train arrived. Dosing off and on was the best I had done since the coming torrent had awakened me.
My shirt and jeans were still wet and the wooden floor I lay on was so hard! It was still dark out. I took a chance and stripped down to my briefs and crawled inside my sleeping bag. If I could fall asleep before I got too hot, maybe I could get some coveted deep sleep. I was counting on sheer exhaustion to be my sleeping pill! I shut my ears to the barking of dogs and the crowing of roosters. It worked! I got one good hour of shut-eye before dawn drove the darkness from the station.
At first light, I took a good look around before shedding my cocoon of a sleeping bag. I wanted to make sure there were no prying eyes to watch me in my metamorphosis from near naked to fully clothed! Believing I was alone, I quickly pulled my wet clothes over my lanky frame and stood up to face the day.
My tent was still wet with sitting water inside on the floor. I took it down and drained it as best I could. Then, I hung it out to dry, draping it over our swamp tractor to let it air as best possible. It was maybe a hopeless cause because the sky continued to drizzle on it.
About 9 o’clock in the morning, a second train pulling flatcars rumbled into town. My chances of getting pulled to Santa Cruz were improving. Surely, one of the two trains, upon returning from Puerto Yapacani, would go all the way to the big city!
By early afternoon, the sun was shinning and my tent was dried out all the way. I decided to pitch it inside the train work station. I used nails that I found lying around the train yard for tent stakes. I pounded them into the railroad ties with a makeshift rock hammer just enough to hold everything in place, but loose enough to pull them out should a train engine arrive in the middle of the night. The wooden floor would, again, make for hard sleeping, but it would be dry! I would also have privacy!
By eight o’clock I crawled into my tent. Stars were shinning in the night sky, but there were still lots of clouds up there. I was glad I was not taking a chance on the weather by pitching my tent in the open. I did not want to get soaked to the skin again!
The rumor was, the train would come early in the morning. I believed it would come, but not that it would come early. Just in case I was wrong, I tired the dogs on the flatcar underneath the bed of a truck. If it did come early, I hoped it would whistle and make lots of noise. I did not want to sleep though its arrival and departure and still be there in the morning to find our tractor and all our stuff gone! I knew the hard floor and the big bottle of pop I drank for supper would make it hard for me to sleep soundly. That soda was already looking for a way out!
Writings By Phil 
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