Southwestern Sunburns and Aloe barbadensis Miller

Although I grew up on the east coast of the U.S.A., I remember being sunburned, a lot. Mostly I just remember the pain, and the peeling skin later. It happened so often, I don’t remember the specific occasions that led to burns. Sometimes it’s a beach, of course, exposing skin that didn’t usually get exposed, or being outside playing or working for whole days in the sun.

I can remember a few specific times, like when my mother covered us in Vaseline, the original petroleum jelly, which looks like snot from a bad cold, or even vomit, but smelled vaguely of motor oil. It was in preparation for a trip to Ocean City beach, a three-hour drive from Baltimore City. When I asked her about that years later, she said she knew that covering a bad burn with Vaseline was good, so it must be good at preventing burns too. It wasn’t. Bodybuilders, particularly the ones at “Muscle Beach” in California, slathered it on to increase the burn, i.e., to get a deeper tan. It helps a lot if you already have a base tan, but now we know that it also increases your risk of skin cancer.

So, of course, I got sunburned playing in the ocean, and walking around or napping on a sandy towel, wearing nothing but swimming trunks. The pain was horrible on the long drive home. My mother prepared a solution of vinegar and baking soda to cover my burns for me. It was freezing cold! But the relief was brief. I could keep reapplying the solution, but eventually, I had other things to do, including trying to sleep at night. Later on, I did find out about Solorcaine lotion. That stuff really worked. It would relieve the pain almost immediately upon applying it. It was good for the itching too. I always had a plastic bottle of that stuff with me wherever I lived. It was a permanent staple of my medicine cabinet. I found it handy living in New Mexico.

One time, I had used up every last drop of that magic lotion and went out to buy some more. I looked in grocery stores, supermarkets, and drugstores. There was not a connected worldwide web of information available then, so I asked a druggist about it. He said it was taken off the market. In fact, before it was removed, the druggists had to hide it behind the counter, and only sell one bottle, tube, or can of spray at a time to a customer. In fact, while it was still on the shelves, it was frequently stolen, at quite a loss for small stores. I asked him, “Why?” I still ask why about a lot of things; I have never stopped asking why.

So, he told me. It turns out, and it was no secret, that cocaine was the active ingredient. People would distill or chemically separate the cocaine from the lotion, and it was very profitable, not to mention illegal. Cocaine had already disappeared from Coca-Cola, and then the war on drugs took out my magic sunburn lotion. At the time, I couldn’t find anything else as effective.

Years ago, in the 1980s, on a trip through Mexico with my first wife, we spent time at a beach west of Hermosillo, in Bahía Kino (Kino Bay) on the Gulf of California. It was far south of the U.S. border, and a very long drive from New Mexico. We drove from Albuquerque down to I-10, and then to Tucson, Arizona, entering Mexico through Nogales. There’s really not much to see in the large expanses of desert, as the towns are few and far between. We spent a little time in Hermasillo. We would also visit Guaymas, a town full of colorful fishing boats, especially shrimper boats. The seafood there was incredible – fresh and flavorful beyond any supermarket offerings. On another trip, we had visited Ensenada in Baja California, a short drive south of Tijuana. It’s a beautiful place. But beaches on that whole stretch of coastline were all rocks. We were able to pitch our tent for free, but it hadn’t been fun on the rocks.

This time we wanted a sandy beach. In summer, there are few tourists in Bahía Kino besides the locals, a fact not lost on the entrepreneurs trying to sell us ironwood carvings and other knickknacks. They were very persistent. On our first day out, very early in the morning, after a brief swim, we decided, spontaneously, to walk along the beach that stretched out south along the bay. I think it was my idea. We walked a long time, too long, in retrospect. It was a cool, pleasant morning, and we enjoyed the walk. The end of the beach still looked a long way off, and the day was now becoming very hot.

Considering that, we decided to turn back. I also discovered I was getting sunburned on my feet. I had applied lotion to my body, but walking in the surf had cleaned it off. There were three problems: we hadn’t brought any clothes with us. I didn’t even have flip-flops or sandals on. I had no hat or sunglasses, so the sun continued to burn my arms, legs, and back, and my feet were already very hot. The sand on the beach was now too hot for me to walk on, so the bottoms of my feet weren’t feeling good either. There was no nearby road, no taxis, and no phone to use. There was no way back except to walk.

Usually, when sunburn attacks my pale skin after I’ve been in the sun too long, I go in, put clothes on, and stay out of the sun. We had miles to go. The beach is eight miles long. I didn’t know how far we’d gone, but it sure looked like a long walk back. The hotel near the beach looked very tiny. I spent a lot of the walk cooling my feet in the surf, but it was already far too late. Sunburns typically don’t show that intensely on me until some time after I quit the sun. The tops of my feet turned the color of lobsters before long.

When we made it back, we went immediately to the hotel, cleaned up, dressed, and went looking for a drugstore. I had taken some aspirin, but I needed help badly. The aisles were full of unfamiliar potions and lotions, so I asked the druggist what he had. First, he wanted to know why. I explained that my feet were very badly burned, so bad I was having trouble walking. I told him I could show him, but I had socks and shoes on, and they were painful to put on or take off, so he told me not to bother. He reached under the counter and pulled out a bottle of – would you believe it? – Solorcaine, with the information printed in Spanish. Glorious, wonderful Solorcaine. It was still legal in Mexico, but, from the way it was hidden, also subject to theft for cocaine extraction. I was so relieved. I thanked him profusely.

After that, we stayed off the beach, unless I kept my shoes on. I applied the lotion often, so we were able to continue our trip, and I could do my share of the driving. To this day, the tops of my feet turn bright red in a hot shower. I developed a mole on the top of one foot.

Eventually, my bottle of Mexican-bottled Solorcaine ran out. It’s hard to avoid the sun in New Mexico. There are few clouds and little moisture in the air most of the year. Albuquerque is a mile above sea level. That mile translates into about 20-25% more burning UV radiation, with little atmospheric shielding. I couldn’t wear long pants or shirt sleeves all summer. I had work to do outside, and I liked to walk, or hike in the mountains that are two miles high (50% more UV radiation). So, sure enough, I would get sunburned sometimes, even just walking around the large flea market on the State Fair property in town. I was always forgetting to wear a hat.

I found a solution, and it had always been so simple – aloe vera. Its botanical name is Aloe barbadensis Miller. It is sold as a thick gel combined with lanolin, and used in other cosmetics. However, all that is needed is the plant itself. All I have to do is break off a small piece and apply the viscous liquid. It dries quickly, forming a thin skin over the burned area, so it is also good for cuts and scrapes. My burned skin never peels after applying aloe copiously several times a day after sun exposure. I have two plants that thrive indoors near a window. I wear hats and sunglasses now and apply sunscreen lotion before hikes and motorcycle rides. I rarely need the aloe vera, but it’s a comfort to apply if I even think I’ve gotten too much sun.