"The very air here is miraculous, and outlines of reality change with the moment. The sky sucks up the
land and disgorges it. A dream hangs over the whole region, a brooding kind of hallucination.
Some quality there is in the whole Gulf that trips a trigger of recognition so that in fantastic and exotic
scenery one finds oneself nodding and saying inwardly, 'Yes, I know.' And on the shore the wild doves
mourn in the evening and then there comes a pang, some kind of emotional jar, and a longing. And if
one followed his whispering impulse he would walk away slowly into the thorny brush following the call
of the doves. Trying to remember the Gulf is like trying to re-create a dream. This is by no means a
sentimental thing, it has little to do with beauty or even conscious liking. But the Gulf does draw one,
and we have talked to rich men who own boats, who can go where they will. Regularly they find
themselves sucked into the Gulf. And since we have returned, there is always in the backs of our minds
the positive drive to go back again. If it were lush and rich, one could understand the pull, but it is fierce
and hostile and sullen. The stone mountains pile up to the sky and there is little fresh water. But we know
we must go back if we live, and we don't know why."
---- John Steinbeck, Log from the Sea of Cortez
