The Legend of The Three Virgins - "The Volcano"

I love to rummage around in my bookcases. Seems like I always find an old friend tucked away.

Here's a particular favorite that I found inside the cover of one of Gardner's Baja books. This old chum was created by a good Baja fellow named..Geary. (Perhaps some of you have heard his weather reports on radio as Club Burro.) Finding this manuscript conjured up some great old memories, so I settled down with a cold one and read it again.

Ahh..Geary, thank God for Baja, eh?

I'd like to share this account with you...and with Geary's okay, some photos to go along with his account of this famous happening.



We begin.


The Legend of Las Tres Virgenes "The Volcano" as told to Geary by Alfonso Lopez.

"Alfonso Lopez owns a small ranch near Mulege, Baja Sur, Mexico. I suspect Alfonso is perhaps fifty. His weathered face hides behind big bushy eyebrows, several day's growth of a salt & pepper beard, and an untrimmed drooping moustache. He has a twinkle in his eye and a big smile that would rise like a Baja moon behind that huge moustache. His handshakes would usually turn into bearhugs that left no doubt he was glad to see you.

I first met Alfonso in Bertha's beach cantina on a summer evening in 1995.



He walked in, wearing faded jeans, a plaid cowboy shirt, and silver-tipped, broken-down cowboy boots. He removed his sweat-stained straw hat, with the traditional boa string around it that dangles down in back and placed it on the table in front of him. He looked over and saw me.."Que pasa, amigo!", he beamed. "Hola", I returned, testing my limited Spanish skills. Picking up his hat, he came over to my table. "My name is Alfonso.", he said in English, offering a calloused hand. We shook and ordered the first of many cervazas we drank that night.

Over the years Alfonzo and I have consumed many of those cervezas, and have become great friends. He grew up in this area, and, with very little encouragement, will entertain those present with stories and legends about Baja. Especially when someone else is buying.

When Alfonso finished the story that is about to unfold, I asked him if the story he had told me was actually true. His bushy eyebrows raised in mock indignation as he slowly leaned back in his chair, "Mi amigo," he said admonishing me with grandiouse sweep of his hand..and then paused, a smile breaking out through his moustache, and then chuckling.."Por que no?, he said with a twinkle in his eye, "Por que no?"


...and so it goes like this:




"The Legend of Las Tres Virgens"

The story begins a very long time ago before Baja was Baja. Baja means 'lower' and the people who lived there did not know that it was an upper or lower anything. It was just the desert..and that is what the people called it...The Desert. This was not a sand desert, but a desert lush with many cactus, and a vast variety of plants and grasses that the cattle and goats could eat.

Living in the desert was not an easy life. It was cold during the night and the days were scorching hot. Perhaps for this reason there were not a lot of people living there. Manuel and Maria were among the few people who choose to live on the desert. They had been married only a short time and lived in a small house made of adobe. It had only three rooms. A living room with a fireplace and two small bedrooms. One for Manuel and Maria and the other for Maria's brother, Paul. Paul was older than Maria and he should have had his own family by now, but Paul had problems.



Paul's biggest problem was...he was lazy. He was too lazy to even get a wife, because if he found a wife, he would have to build a house for them to live in, and then work to support them. Work was not something that Paul was fond of. In fact, he would go to great lengths to avoid work. He did not even like to think about working. Whenever he thought about work, he would have to take a long siesta..until the thoughts went away. Sometimes..in fact most of the time...this would take all day.



Manuel was'nt exactly sure when Paul came to live with them. He just stayed after dinner one night and sort of claimed the extra bedroom. This did not matter to Manuel, he liked Paul. Paul would keep him company when he and Muchcaca, the family burro, went to the desert in the mornings to herd the cattle and goats.





This was not really work, as they spent most of thier time sitting in shade of a Palo Verde tree, smoking peyote. The peyote grew wild in the desert and was easy to find. Paul and Manuel liked to smoke peyote. They would sit and smoke until the sun was high in the sky, and then return to the rancho for lunch and a siesta. Maria would have a huge meal ready for them, as they would always return with huge appetites. The men always said the hard work and the hot sun gave them the appetites, but Maria knew better.

One day after returning to the ranch, Manuel walked up behind Maria, who was making tortillas in the outdoor kitchen. "Maria, my little cactus flower," he said, as he put his arms around her. "You are starting to look a little chubby. Are you going to bless us with a little nino?"

"Si, Manuel," Maria chuckled, looking over her shoulder into Manuel's dilated eyes. "Hopefully a little boy to grow up big and strong to help you with all the hard work on the ranch."
"Ah, si...the hard work!", a big grin came upon Manuel's face, "Bueno! A son. It will be good to have a son to help with the work."

Maria tossed another tortilla on the grill, looked over her shoulder again and said, "By the way, my hard-working husband, as you know the well is drying up. If you don't dig it a little deeper soon, we will be out of water."

"Ah si, the well.. Paul and I were just talking about that this morning. We have decided to start manana."

Maria turned around just in time to see Paul slipping around the corner. "Burro crap!", she said. "You are getting as lazy as Paul. You have been saying manana for weeks. We need the water now. You and Paul must dig the well deeper."

The following morning Paul had mysteriously disappeared when Manuel, shovel in hand, went to work on the well. This was a two-person job, and he needed Paul. He finally found him sitting behind the house, chair tipped back against the adobe wall, snoring peacefully. After much cajoling, prodding, and finally hollow threats, Paul reluctantly followed Manuel to the circle of rocks that Manuel had mortared together to form the top of the well. He lowered a ladder into the hole and climbed down. Paul lowered the bucket on a rope, then Manuel filled the bucket with dirt and rock, and Paul would haul the bucket and dump it.



When Manuel first started on the project, he thought it might take a few hours, perhaps even an entire day. It ended up however, taking several weeks, and when Manuel did hit water, it came in a flood. Bursting through the bottom of the hole, then filling the well, and floating Manuel over the top of the rock circle and dumping him onto the ground in front of Paul. Paul watched as Manuel jumped around yelling. Only when Manuel hollered, "The damn water is scalding HOT!" did Paul realize Manuel was jumping with pain, not joy.

The ranch now had water. It bubbled and gurgled and steam rose from the top of the stone well next to Maria's kitchen. Manuel and Paul made several open clay pipes that took the hot water several meters away to an area where Maria could put it into large clay pots to cool for drinking.

It was quite a novelty having hot water without heating it on the stove. It also heated the stones surrounding the well. In the evenings, Manuel and Paul would sit around the well for warmth and drink tequilla. The tequilla was made by Paul. He and Manuel had made a still a short distance from the house and Paul finally found something he could do well..that did not require working. Paul did not consider making the tequilla any form of work. He would cut the aguave in the morning, and Muchcaca, the family burro, would haul it back to the ranch each day.




Several months later, as Manuel and Paul were leaving to herd the cattle and goats, Maria said, "I think today will be the day your son will be born." "Cool!" Manuel said, as he, Paul and Muchcaca headed out into the desert. When they returned later that morning, Maria was not at the kitchen with thier lunch. A neighbor lady came out of the house and said, "Manuel, Maria has a big surprise for you." "Yeh cool, my son has been born," Manuel said in his best macho voice, 'but where is our lunch? We're starved."

"Perhaps you should come in the house." the neighbor lady said, "Maria has a big, BIG surprise." Manuel stopped by the kitchen, picked up a cold tortilla, and walked into the house.

There was Maria in their bed with three small bundles laying beside her. "Girls, Manuel! Three beautiful baby girls." She pulled back a corner of the blankets so Manuel could see. Manuel looked down at the three bundles. Indeed there were three baby girls. Manuel had seen many babies in his life, but never had he seen a beautiful baby before. They were usually red, ugly, and had squinty eyes. HIS babies, his girls..were beautiful! Jet black hair, big brown eyes, and it looked like they were smiling.




He was astonished that he and Maria could have produced such beautiful children. They took his breath away. His chest filled with pride as he looked down at his tiny beauties. He must have been staring at them for a long time, because when he looked up, everyone was staring at HIM. He cleared his throat "Harummph", he grunted and turned around so no one could see the tears forming in his eyes. "I suppose the name, Juan, is out of the question now. For the time being we will call them las tres virgenes. Now, how about some lunch? Paul and I have had a hard day in the desert."

As he stomped out of the small casa in his best macho swagger, he thought, "These are very special girls. They will grow up to be very beautiful senoritas. Far too good for any of the local boys. I certainly don't want them to have husbands like Paul, ugh. My tres virgenes will marry princes, perhaps kings. I will be famous, as the father who produced the most beautiful senoritas in all the desert."

That evening, all the neighbors came to see la tres virgenes. Some came from as far away as Mulege. They all brought gifts. There were baby clothes, blankets, and beautiful combs for their hair. Some brought plants, including a Brero Palm, and an olive tree, which Manuel planted near the house and watered with the water from the well.

The next morning on the way out to the desert, Manuel thought, "I have much to do before these girls grow up. No one would want the daughter of a simple rancher. I must become prosperous." Manual wasn't quite sure how to become prosperous, but he knew how to look prosperous. The following morning he and Paul left Muchcaca at the ranch, and headed off to the nearest town, Mulege. That evening as Maria sat nursing the babies, she heard an awful noise coming from the desert. Rattle, rattle, bang, bang. Now she could see a cloud of dust moving along the desert in the direction of the house.



Soon the noise and the dust arrived at the ranch. The noise stopped, the dust cleared, and there was Paul and Manuel getting out of some kind of contraption with wheels. "Our Lady of Guadalupe save us!" Maria cried, "What in the world is that?" Manuel dusted himself off, slapped his hand down on the rusting yellow hood, rattling the fender..and proudly said, "It's called a Chevy Vega." "What's it for?" Maria gasped. "Well," Manuel said, "for one thing, it's faster than Muchcaca, and it can carry more..and anyway all the prosperous ranchers have them."

"Prosperous ranchers?" Maria cried "Manuel, we are not prosperous." "True, my little cactus flower" Manuel beamed, "but we will be. I don't know how, but we WILL become prosperous." Tears gathered in her eyes as Maria gathered the three small bundles close to her chest. "My small children, " she whimpered, "your papa has smoked too much peyote. He is loco. Mucho loco. He brings home a rattling Vega and he thinks we will be rich ranchers."

Several days later, Maria looked out past the new Brero Palm, and saw Manuel and Paul pushing that rattling Vega toward the house. "Que pasa?" Maria shouted. "Don't know," Manuel said, "it just stopped running. Paul thinks it needs fuel. In Mulege they call it gas. It's very expensive and we don't have any, but Paul thinks he can make some."

Sure enough, several weeks later, Paul had made some fuel by distilling the dung that Muchcaca left on the ground. He and Manuel called it Burro Power, or BP for short, and they traveled all over the desert looking very prosperous in the rattling Vega. They weren't sure where they were going, but they were sure making good time, and Muchcaca provided the free fuel.



While the boys were out running around the desert all day, Maria made baskets. When she was a small girl, her mother taught her how to make baskets out of the local reeds that grew near the stream where she lived. There was no stream where she lived now, and she had taken to stripping the palm leaves from the Brero Palm to make baskets. It was almost as good as the reeds she had used as a child. One day, when the boys came home, she had made them each a hat from the palm leaves. Manuel and Paul loved their new hats. Their old ones only had a bill on the front and these provided more shade.

On one of their many excursions into Mulege in the rattling Vega, they were sitting in the El Candil. Sam, one of the customers, asked Manuel what kind of hat he was wearing.



Manuel had never thought to give it a name, and said, "I just call it a Brero hat." Yally, another customer, said, "Well, that is some Brero you have there." Another customer further down the bar asked, "What did he call that hat? I'd like to buy one of those." Sam looked up from his beer and said, 'I think he called it a sombrero." Well..the name stuck and Manual found himself in business making somebreros. Actually Maria made the hats, than Manuel and Paul packed them up in the back seat of the rattling Vega and sold them in Mulege.



Soon business was booming and Paul and Manuel had to cut the top off the back of the rattling Vega, then add a big box to carry the sombreros to town. Maria, who had never been to town, told Manuel that she wanted to see Mulege, but would not ride in the sombrero box (the passenger seat was of course, Paul's). Manuel and Paul decided to fix up the rattling Vega so Maria and the children would be more comfortable during the ride to Mulege. They found some tin, and it on the outside and top. Then they put a bid and chairs inside and added a door. When they finished, they drove it up to the front of the house to show Maria. "Maria", Manuel beamed, "Check it out!" Maria stood at the door looking at the strange box on the back of the rattling Vega. "Manuel, you are loco. What in the world is that?" "Well, my little cactus flower, " Manuel said, "you are always calling this a rattling Vega, so I have decided to call it by those initials. I call it an RV.

The girls were now three years old. They would play under the Brero Palm while Paul would load the sombreros and some tequila in the RV, under the shade of the olive tree. Paul was now selling his tequila, which he named Cuervo, after the crow that sat in the olive tree and constantly harrassed him.

Manuel and Maria were finally becoming prosperous. Sombrero sales were booming and Paul's Cuervo was making a big hit in the bars in Mulege.










They had heard rumors that a road was finally going to go all the way across the desert. It was supposed to go right past their ranch. Manuel suggested to Maria that when that happened, they might start a restaurant. "What would we name it?" Maria asked. Manuel thought a minute and said, "How about the Past US Restaurant?" So it was agreed, and on the day the road opened, so did the Past Us Restaurant. Maria cooked the traditional desert meals of burritos, tacos, and beans..until one day while she was cooking tortillas on the grill next to the well ---one fell in the hot water. It took Maria a few minutes to find something to take the soggy tortilla out of the hot water. Using a strainer she dipped it out and laid it on the table. Manuel came by just then, saw the soggy tortilla, and, using a knife cut it into strips, ate it. "Hey, that's great!", he told Maria. "Add it to the menu." Maria tried a strip and said "That IS good! Perhaps add a little grated cheese on top. It could be a winner. What shall we call it, Manuel?" Manuel scratched his head. "Well, you invented it, let's name it after the restaurant..and call it Past Us." "Naw", Maria said, "it sounds funny. Let's call it Past-ah."



Not long after that, Paul was coming back from Mulege; he pulled into the yard and the brakes on the RV failed..and he came crashing into the olive tree. Several of the olives fell into the large pot that Maria was using to cook the Past-ah. She noticed a sheen of oil on the water, but took little notice of it at the time. Later when she took the pasta out of the pot, she noticed it did not clump together. "Perhaps it is the olives," she thought, and with the next batch she smashed a couple of olives and tossed them into the pot. It worked again..no clumping. "Girls!", she hollered, "I have a chore for you. I want you to take the pits out of some of those olives and smash them for me." The girls, now being into their teens, were happy to do something. Anything. Their father, although now prosperous, would never let them off the ranch. He kept waiting for the princes to come, which they never did..and his beautiful daughters became waitresses in the Past Us Restaurant. Several 'young stallions' (as the girls called them) would come around but Manuel always ran them off.

Paul took over the pitting and smashing of the olives. Several years later, he planted an entire orchard of olive trees..and started the Las Tres Virgenes Olive Company. One day, after too much smoke and tequila, he left the olives in the crusher twice as long as normal..and to his surprise, it improved the oil. He named the improved oil - Extra Virgin Olive Oil.


As the years passed, and the girls got older, Manuel and Paul's businesses became more and more successful. The girls however, remained at the restaurant and everyone referred to them as 'Las Tres Virgenes.' The girls were starting to get a little broad in the beam, but Manuel was sure the princes or kings would surely show up some day, for now they were on a busy highway, called Mex. 1.

Paul was spending more and more time away from the ranch with his different businesses. Paul's RV Sales, Ltd in Mulege was doing great with eight employees. He hired a manager to run the lot, so he could spend more time at his tequila company. He had improved the brew, got rid of the worms, and he now called it 'Cuervo Gold'. His other distillery was still making the methane to run the ranch vehicles. He had even started selling some to his neighbors. Paul still did not consider what he did as work. He was now successful, and people never refered to him as lazy anymore. They would just say "Paul is just a kick-back sort of guy."

Ah..but Manuel. As the years passed, he became more and more depressed. He was finally prosperous, but even with all his money, the princes never came to his door. He had rejected all the girl's suitors, and to the best of his knowledge they were still virgins.

Maria had now retired, and the girls were running the restaurant. They were delightful ladies, but now, in their forties, they were all rather plump. He loved them dearly, but in his heart he knew that no prince wanted a fat, forty-year-old virgin.





Paul wasn't around much anymore, so Manuel and Muchcaca (Manuel named all his burros Muchacha) would daily wander out past Paul's methane plant into the desert. He would eventually find himself sitting under the old Palo Verde tree. He and Muchacha would get stoned. Muchacha would chew, and Manuel would smoke..and Muchacha would listen patiently as Manuel talked about the good old days, when he and Paul watched the cattle and goats.

One afternoon, thoroughly stoned, he and Muchcaca came riding past the methane plant. Manuel had rolled a big doobie, gave half to Muchacha and had smoked the other.



When he finished it, he absentmindedly flipped the roach in the direction of the methane plant, ironically hitting a No Smoking sign. The roach bounced off the sign and fell into a small ditch that had methane at the bottom. They both stared in horror as a small blue flame raced down the ditch towards the huge holding tanks. The tanks erupted in a tremendous explosion.

!!KA-BOOOOOM!!

The ground shook, and then a low rumble seemed to come from the bowels of the earth. Manuel and Muchcaca, who had been knocked to the ground by the explosion, watched with stoned fascination as the familiar old stone well started shooting lava out of the top.

That was the last thing Manual and Muchcaca ever saw....








Soon the restaurant and everything within miles around was covered with ash. The spot where the old well stood was now under several thousand feet of building mountain. When the eruption finally stopped, and the sky cleared...


.

....the mountain had formed three separate peaks.

Paul had just returned from England where he had been attending a board meeting of his new company. He had been quite fond of the name of his Baja company, Burro Power or BP, but it was not quite British enough for his stockholders. They had voted to keep the initials, but now call it British Petroleum.

He now stood several miles away on Mex. 1..looking at the new mountain. This was the place where it had all began for him. He thought, "If my good friend, Manuel, had not been so obsessed with being prosperous..and with all the things he thought it would bring..well...perhaps there is a message in there somewhere."

Paul now looked down, studying the pattern of his snake skin boots. And as he brushed the dust off his hat, he remembered the times when the girls would follow him out to the olive orchard. They would tug on his shirt and look up at him with sparkling eyes. "Will we really be princesses, Uncle Paul?"
"Of course you will, darlin's" he would always say. "Promise us?" they would beg. "Ok. I promise. Now run along." And the girls would squeal with delight, and run off through he olive trees giggling and laughing.

Paul finally looked up, and slowly turned to the people who were standing near him and said. "If no one objects, I would like to call this new mountain 'Las Tres Virgenes' " The people silently nodded in agreement...and so it came to be.



and the legend lives today.

THE END


[Edited on 8-25-2009 by Pompano]

Roger, Roger, Roger .......

Like an old friend of mine from north near Canada ways always says,
" Never let the truth get in the way of a good story."

[Edited on 8-25-2009 by Diver]

Pompano, Thanks for the story and the pictures.

Gee wiz Roger... I'm speechless!

Quality story-telling, Roger, bravo!
So very nice to have you posting again, amigo.

nena

Well, I guess that clears up that mystery

"And now we know the rest of th story!"

I'm overwhelmed!
Half by the story,
and half that David K is speechless!

Great story and pics!

Pompano you better keep posting this thoughtful stuff! You always kindle good vibes with your good knowledge and effort. You dear sir precisely emulate the "Baja Spirit".

You keep the BajaNomad spirit alive and well.

Mil gracias Roger.

Please come be our guests when you pass through Newport.

There has to be

My only question is were did you get all of those historical pictures to go with the story?

Awesome Story dude! thanks for sharing that, I really enjoyed it.