Before jet travel, driving was the only way to visit Mexico, and motor homes were king

In 1933, Mazatlán saw the daring of the first six American car tourists who braved a dirt road from the Arizona border to a new-found Mexican paradise. Although the original caravan leaving from Los Angeles had more vehicles, only those half-dozen made it all the way south to Mazatlán.

More than a decade later, in 1948, Wally Byam, a future legend in the history of Mazatlan tourism, arrived with a caravan of 15 motor homes. The group, departing from Arizona on their way to Acapulco, made Sinaloan history by spending a few days in Mazatlán first.

In 1933, Mazatlán saw the daring of the first six American car tourists who braved a dirt road from the Arizona border to a new-found Mexican paradise. Although the original caravan leaving from Los Angeles had more vehicles, only those half-dozen made it all the way south to Mazatlán.

More than a decade later, in 1948, Wally Byam, a future legend in the history of Mazatlan tourism, arrived with a caravan of 15 motor homes. The group, departing from Arizona on their way to Acapulco, made Sinaloan history by spending a few days in Mazatlán first.

Every year through the ‘50s and ‘60s Wally led hundreds of motor homes to Mexican beach sites. One trip, in 1955, had 2,000 visitors scattered throughout the city in 520 trailers. At that time the main trailer parks were improvised on Miguel Alemán Avenue, on the beach at Playa Sur, where a neat and tidy neighborhood of homes sits now. This area was filled in by the city in the 1960s in order to build a new port for the cruise ships and other big boats.

Local officials understood that year that something important was beginning and organized a warm, happy and huge ceremony to welcome the American caravan. On January 23, 1955, the party was held in El Lienzo del Charro (The Rodeo Place) in Colonia Juárez as a gesture of friendship to the American visitors. In return, the travelers invited the Mazatlecos to tour the inside of their trailer homes.

Mayor Amado Guzmán and other politicians realized that Mazatlán lacked many facilities to develop tourism and decided to launch an ambitious plan of public works. In 1955, this American caravan had spent $10,000 U.S. every day and obviously that was very good for the local economy.

In the beginning, the caravan season was very short; the trailers only stopped over on their way south. But in the ‘60s they started to stay more than a week. There were not many American tourists in those years and the “snow bird” season was not tumultuous. Jet travel would not begin until the 1960s, so tourists came by railroad, bus, car or motor home. Only a few adventurers challenged the narrow Mexican highways.

Wally Byan returned again in 1958 with a caravan of 195 trailer homes. By this time he was so important that the new mayor, Héctor González Guevara, and the poet and personality of Mazatlán, Carlos McGregor Giacinti, personally assisted the visitors. The city didn’t yet have a specific place for the motor homes, so the caravan parked in the Municipal Stadium. By the next year there would be four small parking lots just for them – the first RV parks. This visit was just four days but the tourists spent $200,000 pesos; the dollar was at $12.50 pesos and this had a tremendous impact on the local economy.

In 1957, another group of snow birds, headed by Wester Gray, came to Mazatlán on its way back to Arizona from México City. That same year, a third group of 150 vehicles arrived, organized by three businessmen from Los Angeles, Jeff Fries, Harold Right and Edward Duvall.

Until the 1980s, these RV caravans got a lot of attention in Mazatlán. Several trailer parks were built in the ‘60s and ‘70s along Avenida Rafael Buelna, at the edge of the Golden Zone. These were an image of vitality and movement, as thousands of these travelers came in the winter and spring.

In the last 10 years, fewer and fewer RVers have made the trek to Mazatlán. Many things have contributed to this change, including rising gas prices. As the city has grown, the land where the trailer parks were has become more and more valuable, in demand for more profitable business, like hotels, condos and shopping malls. And as these parks have disappeared, so have most traces of the first tourist niche to put Mazatlán on the map.

These brave drivers in the ‘50s and ‘60s were the start of tourism in Mazatlán. They were the parents of the baby boomers - the Golden Generation – and they brought Golden Days to the town. Their legacy lives on, though, in the many loyal lovers of Mazatlán created by these travelers, who continue to visit and even create new parks for their vehicles, continuing to explore and enjoy all the city has to offer.

Arturo Santamaria Gomez is a sociology professor at the Universidad Autónoma de Sinaloa (UAS) and a regular columnist for Noroeste every Sunday. He also writes on migration and tourism issues. Contact him at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .