What a beautiful spot, a beautiful home, great weather. Its great to be here. The sea has been fabulous, we have had lots of flat water so have been able to do lots of kayaking. The water is so clear on flat days that we can see a multitude of tropical fish right under our boat.
Mike Kate and the grandkids Lindsay (4) and Tristan (2) were here from the 5th to the 15th. We all had a great time, playing, walking the beach, swimming in the little pool; Lindsay is now swimming all on her own! She likes to dive under for things and to sink down to the bottom and sit on your feet! Tristan had a good time in the water too. The two of them get along so well, they played and played all day. They found lots of cool things on the beach including a whole dried trigger fish! That was the best find, but it has to stay here. We visited the neighbors animals with the children and fed them treats. The dogs were more than happy to gobble up their treats and to play ball with the kids but Trish and Trev’s cats scampered away when the kids arrived, only two of the four came out for camerone! And Smokey, well forget him! He didn't show his face!
Mike and Kate did some kayaking and snorkeling while here and they took the kayaks out one day to where the batrays were jumping. They saw literally hundreds of batrays swimming under their boats and watched them leaping out of the water at a very close distance. They were able to get some great pictures. This leaping thing is a very strange thing the batrays do. It sometimes looks like a chorus line with many of them leaping up together and landing with a big slap on the water. This goes on at times day after day and all through the night. When the water is really flat they make a very loud slap, almost like a gun shot! These are not small creatures – their wingspan is between 3 and 4 feet on average so a fairly awesome sight to see at close range.
I started a Spanish class on the 12th for three hours a day with about 6 hours of homework every night. There were a total of 8 in the class and it was only for 8 days, one can do anything for a short period of time right? I learned a great deal, Paulina was a wonderful teacher. There was an exam at the end and I passed. This means I can go on to the second level and spend another 8 days working 10 hours a day/or I fall asleep on Spanish. Not this trip - maybe next year, that was an exhausting 8 days but I think well worth it!
Our neighbors (and friends) Jim and MaryAnne lent us their quad and Lorne and I drove the 6 miles into town. Way cool. I think Lorne is sold on getting one. I had to travel daily with Trevor to town on his quad to attend Spanish lessons; quite a different driver than Lorne! Each day he went a little faster, very fun. Perhaps once Lorne gets more used to it he will find the gas pedal…. Ha.
We have had some great visits with the neighbors here. Some very interesting and lovely people; we feel completely at home in this little neighborhood.
Our friends Ellen and Chris own Casa Metta and they have been so very kind to welcome our use of it even though they will not be here till March 5. I wish we could stay till they get here but we do need to start heading north. Ellen told us that they had a caretaker here who was in the casita (small house) and we could have the big house. Well we did have a bit of a surprise when we arrived here, as the kitchen in the casita had been ripped out and a new one, which was to have been put in months ago, was yet to be completed, or to even have had any workers for quite some time! So that puts Dirk the caretaker in the house with us. Well he sleeps in the casita; and understandably has to cook in the house. Good thing he is such an easy going nice guy.
Tomorrow, Friday, we head to Los Barriles to stay at an RV park in town for a few days then will head north looking for good kayaking. We plan to be home the second or third week of March.
Being without a computer is such a drag I tell you. I only hope we can get things off the hard drive from the fried one.
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Friday, February 9, 2007
Aaaaarrrrggggg
Our laptop has crashed!! Life without a computer is something else - total isolation - totally not connected - I can't remember not having a computer..... We are using a neighbour's old old old laptop and have to go to their house to do it, so its a bit of an interruption in their day; consequently I will not likely be responding much to email or be able to post to my blog frequently. Will, as ever, do my best as I do hate not being connected.
Life at the Casa is well - shorts and ts, bathing suits in the pool, leisurely paddles in the kayak, looking at the multitude of tropical fish in the beautiful crystal clear turquoise water, Its almost as good as snorkeling without getting cold. The water here is a bit on the chilly side when snorkeling even with a wet suit. There are light breezes to slightly cool us so its never too hot. Two delightful grandchildren to play with, a little pool, excellent food and drink, wonderful neighbors with dogs and cats for the kids to visit, what can I say - besides life is good? - fabulous, grand, wonderful? It think its about as good as it gets without a working computer.
We did manage to take the beach road (about 6 km of a one lane packed sand road with a few pullouts) to town and then back on Mex. 1 to Los Cabos to pick up the children. We only met two trucks and had to pull way over, they were very considerate. We almost got stuck in the sand and Lorne drove right over a glass beer bottle and then over a very large boulder. It is a very narrow one lane road with occasional spots called "the slides" by the locals where the road slips away down to the beach. However, the drops are small, only about 20 feet as opposed to I dunno a km? definately to a certain death on the upper road.
We ended up being a bit late to get the kids, it took longer than anticipated and we still had to stop at Costco before getting them and rushing back home before dark. I tell you we took the shortest time ever in Costco (20 minutes) and spent the most money ($500) in order to have enough supplies for 10 days while the kids were here. So yes, we are eating (and drinking) well.
Word from the neighbors is that they are doing actual road work on the upper road with machines. So, perhaps it will be drivable for us to get out of here.
Life at the Casa is well - shorts and ts, bathing suits in the pool, leisurely paddles in the kayak, looking at the multitude of tropical fish in the beautiful crystal clear turquoise water, Its almost as good as snorkeling without getting cold. The water here is a bit on the chilly side when snorkeling even with a wet suit. There are light breezes to slightly cool us so its never too hot. Two delightful grandchildren to play with, a little pool, excellent food and drink, wonderful neighbors with dogs and cats for the kids to visit, what can I say - besides life is good? - fabulous, grand, wonderful? It think its about as good as it gets without a working computer.
We did manage to take the beach road (about 6 km of a one lane packed sand road with a few pullouts) to town and then back on Mex. 1 to Los Cabos to pick up the children. We only met two trucks and had to pull way over, they were very considerate. We almost got stuck in the sand and Lorne drove right over a glass beer bottle and then over a very large boulder. It is a very narrow one lane road with occasional spots called "the slides" by the locals where the road slips away down to the beach. However, the drops are small, only about 20 feet as opposed to I dunno a km? definately to a certain death on the upper road.
We ended up being a bit late to get the kids, it took longer than anticipated and we still had to stop at Costco before getting them and rushing back home before dark. I tell you we took the shortest time ever in Costco (20 minutes) and spent the most money ($500) in order to have enough supplies for 10 days while the kids were here. So yes, we are eating (and drinking) well.
Word from the neighbors is that they are doing actual road work on the upper road with machines. So, perhaps it will be drivable for us to get out of here.
Sunday, February 4, 2007
South to Casa Metta, our Home for a Month
After Saturday night in La Paz we headed to Tecolote, the beach just south of La Paz, rather than drive on a Sunday on Baja, generally not a good idea. We have been told there tends to be copious drinking and driving on Sundays, so a good day to just hole up. Tecolote is a beautiful white sand beach with lots of shells – I know, I think there is something about women and shells – we just have to collect em. As much as I kept reminding myself I already have many containers of shells at home, as much as I walked along doing my best to hold my head up and look into the distance, I kept finding myself finding more treasures along our walks. Even trying to make a deal with myself: nothing in my hands or pockets till on the way back, no matter how pretty…. To no avail; before I knew it I had my hands and pockets full. Of course Lorne will not carry any of my treasures for me; in fact he tries to get me to carry great huge rocks, insisting they are absolutely beautiful and must be carted back, by me. I think he is having me on.
After completely filling the motor home with bags of good things to eat and drink from Soriannos, and CCC, our favourite supermarkets on the Baja, we headed south for the final few hours drive to Los Barriles and our home at Casa Metta for the next month. The road was twisty and narrow – so what else is new you ask? Well we were able to look down on small interesting pueblos and more lush vegetation, palm trees, bougainvilleas if glorious flower; there is definitely water in this area.
Los Barriles was a welcome sight and we could see some of the remains of the damage deal from Hurricane John. The roads through the two arroyos were quite damaged and have not been repaired yet, although there is work on them and there is an alternative road beside the one being repaired.
There are two choices of roads to get out to where we are staying – the paved road through mountain passes that eventually gets to El Cardonel and has a cut off road through the arroyo to Rancho Pescadero where we are located, or the sand Beach Road. We were advised to take the paved mountain road. Oh my goodness….. what a scarey trip!! It’s only about 11 km or so north from Los Barriles on this road – however – it has suffered horrendous damage from the hurricane. Coming this way was a bad decision.
Our first clue should have been when the road crew, who were busy sweeping the road with their new brooms and wearing their brand new safety vests (very unusual to have safety vests on the Baja) looked quite stunned as we drove by. Not a single smile, not a single wave, nada. You have to realize that in Baja, whenever we pass a Mexican they smile and wave; men, women, children – really – everyone does it, and we find that we are cheerfully waving back to complete strangers whenever we pass anyone. As you drive through the little pueblos you are greeted with big smiles and waves from everyone on the street, the truck drivers driving by or passing smile and wave (I wish they would keep both hands on the wheel and their eyes on the road) all the road crews stop working and smile and wave. Even those guys on the telephone poles smiled and waved! BUT – not these guys on this road.
Our next clue – not one single person passed us, nor did we meet anyone on this highway (thank goodness as we were hugging the left side of the road and this is not Britain). Back to this mountain road… I wish I could post pictures – I was trying to distract myself from completely losing it by taking pictures - there were about five places where the road was narrowed to one lane. Why? because the other lane was gone – truly gone – as in down the mountain gone. There was one spot, the very last gruesome piece where it truly looked to me that there was nothing underneath the pavement we were about to go over. The road was so undermined…. I was trying my best to be calm and keep breathing as I demanded that Lorne move over more from my edge – he kept telling me that he couldn’t as there was nothing on his side either ….. now what does that tell you?? I think we are very lucky to be alive.
We successfully made our turnoff (obviously) to cross through the arroyo to Rancho Pescadero (the name of our small community of 8 houses along the beach) however, as we drove on this narrow sandy road throught the arroyo we met two large trucks, one of them the water truck and we knew that at this time of day they could only be heading back to Los Barriles - so they drive that road…. Regularly we find out. And they live. At least so far. HOWEVER – that does not mean that we will drive it. Ever. Again. At least not this trip south…. and certainly not with me in the motor home. What remains to be seen is how on earth we are going to get out of here. I think a helicopter would be good.
At last Casa Metta! Ah what a wonderful sight, we can just relax and enjoy for many days to come. The grandchildren arrive on the 5th (and their parents) for 10 days. That will be fun. We have a little pool (actually a large hot tub) so the kids should have fun with that. Of course there is the ocean at our doorstep as well and low and behold a good effect of Hurricane John is that the beach has returned to sand – the last two years the beach was deep in round boulders, very slippery when getting in and out of the water. Sand is much better.
After completely filling the motor home with bags of good things to eat and drink from Soriannos, and CCC, our favourite supermarkets on the Baja, we headed south for the final few hours drive to Los Barriles and our home at Casa Metta for the next month. The road was twisty and narrow – so what else is new you ask? Well we were able to look down on small interesting pueblos and more lush vegetation, palm trees, bougainvilleas if glorious flower; there is definitely water in this area.
Los Barriles was a welcome sight and we could see some of the remains of the damage deal from Hurricane John. The roads through the two arroyos were quite damaged and have not been repaired yet, although there is work on them and there is an alternative road beside the one being repaired.
There are two choices of roads to get out to where we are staying – the paved road through mountain passes that eventually gets to El Cardonel and has a cut off road through the arroyo to Rancho Pescadero where we are located, or the sand Beach Road. We were advised to take the paved mountain road. Oh my goodness….. what a scarey trip!! It’s only about 11 km or so north from Los Barriles on this road – however – it has suffered horrendous damage from the hurricane. Coming this way was a bad decision.
Our first clue should have been when the road crew, who were busy sweeping the road with their new brooms and wearing their brand new safety vests (very unusual to have safety vests on the Baja) looked quite stunned as we drove by. Not a single smile, not a single wave, nada. You have to realize that in Baja, whenever we pass a Mexican they smile and wave; men, women, children – really – everyone does it, and we find that we are cheerfully waving back to complete strangers whenever we pass anyone. As you drive through the little pueblos you are greeted with big smiles and waves from everyone on the street, the truck drivers driving by or passing smile and wave (I wish they would keep both hands on the wheel and their eyes on the road) all the road crews stop working and smile and wave. Even those guys on the telephone poles smiled and waved! BUT – not these guys on this road.
Our next clue – not one single person passed us, nor did we meet anyone on this highway (thank goodness as we were hugging the left side of the road and this is not Britain). Back to this mountain road… I wish I could post pictures – I was trying to distract myself from completely losing it by taking pictures - there were about five places where the road was narrowed to one lane. Why? because the other lane was gone – truly gone – as in down the mountain gone. There was one spot, the very last gruesome piece where it truly looked to me that there was nothing underneath the pavement we were about to go over. The road was so undermined…. I was trying my best to be calm and keep breathing as I demanded that Lorne move over more from my edge – he kept telling me that he couldn’t as there was nothing on his side either ….. now what does that tell you?? I think we are very lucky to be alive.
We successfully made our turnoff (obviously) to cross through the arroyo to Rancho Pescadero (the name of our small community of 8 houses along the beach) however, as we drove on this narrow sandy road throught the arroyo we met two large trucks, one of them the water truck and we knew that at this time of day they could only be heading back to Los Barriles - so they drive that road…. Regularly we find out. And they live. At least so far. HOWEVER – that does not mean that we will drive it. Ever. Again. At least not this trip south…. and certainly not with me in the motor home. What remains to be seen is how on earth we are going to get out of here. I think a helicopter would be good.
At last Casa Metta! Ah what a wonderful sight, we can just relax and enjoy for many days to come. The grandchildren arrive on the 5th (and their parents) for 10 days. That will be fun. We have a little pool (actually a large hot tub) so the kids should have fun with that. Of course there is the ocean at our doorstep as well and low and behold a good effect of Hurricane John is that the beach has returned to sand – the last two years the beach was deep in round boulders, very slippery when getting in and out of the water. Sand is much better.
Thursday, February 1, 2007
The Big Sting
Friday January 27
Friday morning was beautiful at Santispac! Totally flat sea and no wind. I had a lovely paddle while Lorne got things ready to go. Unfortunately we are feeling compelled to moved along. We met some a delightful couple on the beach - Sandra and Richard Law and their cat Whisky from Osoyoos BC. Lovely people, hope we run into them again.
Didn’t travel far before a big wasp flew in my window, landing on my chair! I successfully dispatched him with our trusty electronic swatter and settled back to writing again when bang bang, I received two sharp stings on my inner thigh! Ouch! I applied sting stop right away and then applied this fabulous German ointment we got in Mexico last year. It went from a large and very sore red welt to two little red dots in short order, and stopped hurting entirely! Quite amazing. I kept applying this ointment the first day and a few times the second. It seemed to be gone so stopped and now (Sunday) it is a large puffy red welt again and hurts. Dang! I’m just so darn delicate.
So, my activity while driving on Friday was to build screens for our windows in the front. Kept me busy for quite some time. Duck tape is amazing stuff. Lorne tells me all kinds of things are made out of duck tape, including ball caps. He wants to make a bet with me about this… somehow I think this is just another of his factoids and I will lose, so I’m not taking him on.
We stopped in Loreto to meet a fellow GMCer that Lorne met on the internet, he and his wife have a house just south of Loreto, next to Loreto Bay developments (this is Butterfield’s project, a man from Victoria). We spent the night just south of Loreto at Porto Escondido at what looked to be a nice RV spot but turned out to be not so great. Driving out of Porto Escondido (its only a few miles off Mex. 1 and on a paved road) we drove over what looked like a tarantula – so of course we stopped, backed up and sure enough it was! It was the biggest dang spider I ever saw! Yuk. It just sat there! So I took some pictures of it – from the safety of the motor home of course. If we ever get to a place with any internet speed and we can upload pictures, I will add them.
Next day we came south to La Paz and stayed at Aquamarina RV Park in town. This is a lovely park on the beach where we have stayed the other times we have been in La Paz. It is operated by a very interesting elderly couple – Richard and May Lou, and is right on the water. They used to have a dock and a very large ship until various hurricanes wrecked them. There is a boat launch tho. Mary Lou grows orchids and their park is filled with beautiful flowering trees as well as palms. Hurricane John this past year did further damage to their trees and they lost half their orchid house. They are such interesting people, we would love to stay and learn more about them. They used to take people touring on their ship, including many oceanographers and biologists on their various ventures.
From La Paz it is just a short drive to Los Barriles and our beautiful Casa on the beach. Casa Metta is owned by our dear friend Ellen and her husband Chris whom we have yet to meet. It is a beautiful home and we are so fortunate to have use of it for the next month.
Friday morning was beautiful at Santispac! Totally flat sea and no wind. I had a lovely paddle while Lorne got things ready to go. Unfortunately we are feeling compelled to moved along. We met some a delightful couple on the beach - Sandra and Richard Law and their cat Whisky from Osoyoos BC. Lovely people, hope we run into them again.
Didn’t travel far before a big wasp flew in my window, landing on my chair! I successfully dispatched him with our trusty electronic swatter and settled back to writing again when bang bang, I received two sharp stings on my inner thigh! Ouch! I applied sting stop right away and then applied this fabulous German ointment we got in Mexico last year. It went from a large and very sore red welt to two little red dots in short order, and stopped hurting entirely! Quite amazing. I kept applying this ointment the first day and a few times the second. It seemed to be gone so stopped and now (Sunday) it is a large puffy red welt again and hurts. Dang! I’m just so darn delicate.
So, my activity while driving on Friday was to build screens for our windows in the front. Kept me busy for quite some time. Duck tape is amazing stuff. Lorne tells me all kinds of things are made out of duck tape, including ball caps. He wants to make a bet with me about this… somehow I think this is just another of his factoids and I will lose, so I’m not taking him on.
We stopped in Loreto to meet a fellow GMCer that Lorne met on the internet, he and his wife have a house just south of Loreto, next to Loreto Bay developments (this is Butterfield’s project, a man from Victoria). We spent the night just south of Loreto at Porto Escondido at what looked to be a nice RV spot but turned out to be not so great. Driving out of Porto Escondido (its only a few miles off Mex. 1 and on a paved road) we drove over what looked like a tarantula – so of course we stopped, backed up and sure enough it was! It was the biggest dang spider I ever saw! Yuk. It just sat there! So I took some pictures of it – from the safety of the motor home of course. If we ever get to a place with any internet speed and we can upload pictures, I will add them.
Next day we came south to La Paz and stayed at Aquamarina RV Park in town. This is a lovely park on the beach where we have stayed the other times we have been in La Paz. It is operated by a very interesting elderly couple – Richard and May Lou, and is right on the water. They used to have a dock and a very large ship until various hurricanes wrecked them. There is a boat launch tho. Mary Lou grows orchids and their park is filled with beautiful flowering trees as well as palms. Hurricane John this past year did further damage to their trees and they lost half their orchid house. They are such interesting people, we would love to stay and learn more about them. They used to take people touring on their ship, including many oceanographers and biologists on their various ventures.
From La Paz it is just a short drive to Los Barriles and our beautiful Casa on the beach. Casa Metta is owned by our dear friend Ellen and her husband Chris whom we have yet to meet. It is a beautiful home and we are so fortunate to have use of it for the next month.
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
In The Water At Last - at Santispac
Here it is, the launch of our Maiden Paddle!! Well, after trying for an hour our connection is just not fast enough to let me post pictures ... not even one! I will see what we can do to speed it up later.
(written Friday January 26, 2007)
Ahh, kayaking – I think we have found a wonderful sport! I’m a born-again-kayaker! We were a bit discouraged when we first arrived as Santispac had a very brisk offshore wind. The next day was better and we enjoyed a short few hours on the water, however it was quite windy returning to shore, requiring a bit of muscle to paddle in. It felt a bit choppy too, on this our maiden paddle. My little mystic is wonderful; it is quite narrow and has a small cockpit but sits very comfortably for me. It does feel pretty tippy but I think I will get used to it quite quickly. I didn’t have any trouble keeping up to Lorne, in fact it was the reverse!, especially when I was using his much bigger paddle! Ha ha! I do like to zip along! Lorne is happy with his kayak but I would not be surprised if we buy another one for him fairly soon. Not sure yet what one it would be, have to do some more research.
Thursday was beautiful! We paddled for the whole morning and paddled over to another little gringo village on the beach just south of Santispac (complete with tennis court). (Posada Concepcion or Bahia Tordillo) This whole area has a lot of hot seeps and this village has made several attractive stone surrounds to make pools so you can sit in them. There is a large one right in the center of the village and several small ones along the shore. Santispac has its own little muddy hot spring that doesn’t look that appealing to me but our neighbors enjoyed it when the tide was high.
There was just a light off shore breeze which of course picks up as the morning wears on, so the trip home took a little more effort than going out. I went out for a late afternoon paddle too, the water was like glass and so crystal clear you could see down into that enchanting world of fish and sea creatures. These beaches are shallow for quite a ways out so much sea life was visible.
No cell service here or internet unless you carry your own satellite. Already being 800 lbs overweight that’s one essential item we do not carry! Sometimes there is someone who has an open WiFi we can hook into but this year, with all the changes on the beach, there was no one. However, Lorne found one over in the little village we had visited by kayak, and with his handy dandy new USB WiFi adaptor we were able to pirate into Jim’s satellite service if we walked way down to the end of beach where we had a clear site line over to the village. If we had brought a headset the signal was strong enough to use Skype. Thank you Jim whoever you are!
There have been many changes on this beach this year. For years gringos have enjoyed the freedom to build little beach front grass houses and last year there were many lining the shore, including some not so little, very elaborate two story ones complete with air conditioning. These houses were framed with wood and the walls were made of a grass or palm matting. They had to pay the Ejido a nominal fee, something like $10 per day for the pleasure. This year they were given notice they had to remove their houses and move off the beach as of the end of January. There were many sad people who were busy packing up their belongings and tearing down their houses to rebuild them at other beaches near by. Rays restaurant, also a palapa style building – sand floor, grass mat walls and palm palapa roof was burnt to the ground, rumour has it the Ejido offered to let him stay if he paid. He refused to pay and it is suspected that they played a hand in this fire while Ray was away on the mainland over Christmas. But, who knows, there are many stories in Baja and many mysteries yet unsolved.
There are three permanent houses built way down at the end of the beach. These are quite beautiful stone and adobe houses with elaborate stone walls around them. Apparently they were offered to buy the approximately ½ acre their houses are on for $120 thousand. This, in our opinion, is a reasonable price as these beautiful homes are worth at least ½ million or more. One family agreed to this and the other still has not! They are trying to sell the house at the moment. Interested? You might get a real deal! It will be interesting to see what happens to this beach in the future. There is much speculation as to what the Ejido have planned for it.
(written Friday January 26, 2007)
Ahh, kayaking – I think we have found a wonderful sport! I’m a born-again-kayaker! We were a bit discouraged when we first arrived as Santispac had a very brisk offshore wind. The next day was better and we enjoyed a short few hours on the water, however it was quite windy returning to shore, requiring a bit of muscle to paddle in. It felt a bit choppy too, on this our maiden paddle. My little mystic is wonderful; it is quite narrow and has a small cockpit but sits very comfortably for me. It does feel pretty tippy but I think I will get used to it quite quickly. I didn’t have any trouble keeping up to Lorne, in fact it was the reverse!, especially when I was using his much bigger paddle! Ha ha! I do like to zip along! Lorne is happy with his kayak but I would not be surprised if we buy another one for him fairly soon. Not sure yet what one it would be, have to do some more research.
Thursday was beautiful! We paddled for the whole morning and paddled over to another little gringo village on the beach just south of Santispac (complete with tennis court). (Posada Concepcion or Bahia Tordillo) This whole area has a lot of hot seeps and this village has made several attractive stone surrounds to make pools so you can sit in them. There is a large one right in the center of the village and several small ones along the shore. Santispac has its own little muddy hot spring that doesn’t look that appealing to me but our neighbors enjoyed it when the tide was high.
There was just a light off shore breeze which of course picks up as the morning wears on, so the trip home took a little more effort than going out. I went out for a late afternoon paddle too, the water was like glass and so crystal clear you could see down into that enchanting world of fish and sea creatures. These beaches are shallow for quite a ways out so much sea life was visible.
No cell service here or internet unless you carry your own satellite. Already being 800 lbs overweight that’s one essential item we do not carry! Sometimes there is someone who has an open WiFi we can hook into but this year, with all the changes on the beach, there was no one. However, Lorne found one over in the little village we had visited by kayak, and with his handy dandy new USB WiFi adaptor we were able to pirate into Jim’s satellite service if we walked way down to the end of beach where we had a clear site line over to the village. If we had brought a headset the signal was strong enough to use Skype. Thank you Jim whoever you are!
There have been many changes on this beach this year. For years gringos have enjoyed the freedom to build little beach front grass houses and last year there were many lining the shore, including some not so little, very elaborate two story ones complete with air conditioning. These houses were framed with wood and the walls were made of a grass or palm matting. They had to pay the Ejido a nominal fee, something like $10 per day for the pleasure. This year they were given notice they had to remove their houses and move off the beach as of the end of January. There were many sad people who were busy packing up their belongings and tearing down their houses to rebuild them at other beaches near by. Rays restaurant, also a palapa style building – sand floor, grass mat walls and palm palapa roof was burnt to the ground, rumour has it the Ejido offered to let him stay if he paid. He refused to pay and it is suspected that they played a hand in this fire while Ray was away on the mainland over Christmas. But, who knows, there are many stories in Baja and many mysteries yet unsolved.
There are three permanent houses built way down at the end of the beach. These are quite beautiful stone and adobe houses with elaborate stone walls around them. Apparently they were offered to buy the approximately ½ acre their houses are on for $120 thousand. This, in our opinion, is a reasonable price as these beautiful homes are worth at least ½ million or more. One family agreed to this and the other still has not! They are trying to sell the house at the moment. Interested? You might get a real deal! It will be interesting to see what happens to this beach in the future. There is much speculation as to what the Ejido have planned for it.
Monday, January 22, 2007
More Pics.
Oh yes, I remember this road! Overlooking Bahia de Los Angeles, yes it is beautiful. Cactus forest, mostly datillilo and cardon.
Hopefully some warmth . . .
Here are some of the camerone at the Black Market in Ensenada. There were several booths with piles of various sizes.
See the snow we left behind? This is our RV site outside Mercy Hospital in Roseburg southern Oregon. Notice my Mystic (kayak) on the roof, Lorne's is on the other side.
I tried to post some pictures to the blog yesterday but no luck, as the connection was so slow. Better tonight, although it does take some time.
Well, so much for Bahia de Los Angeles. Nothing but wind, and very cold. Not as windy as it could be but too much for us to make our maiden kayak voyage. The problem was the wind was mostly blowing off shore and during the course of the day it just gets stronger, not less. If I have to struggle with wind I really would prefer to fight going out rather than struggle coming back in. And since we have only paddled in a pool…..
So we are on our way to Guerro Negro where they will take away all our fruits and vegetables at the agricultural inspection station north of town. We can buy new ones in town. We will stay the night and tomorrow make our way to San Lucas Cove and our next chance to get in the water. Hopefully we will see our old friend John there.
They have made some real headway on running the telephone wires up Baja; they are now almost at the turn off for Bahia de Los Angeles, or at least the poles are, and the wires are on their way. We passed a work crew of about 10 guys, two to each pole, one to climb up and the other to help sort out the wires and ropes the other guy was carrying up. No cherry pickers for these guys; and no harnesses or spurs either. They had to shinny up the pole using a heavy rope fashioned into a double loop. I was truly too stunned to take a picture! More than a bit scary – our friend Lois would have been impressed – she could have shown them a thing or two I am sure.
A great deal of the coastal agave is in bloom along this route. The desert changes frequently; from Bahia de Los Angeles it was predominately boojum, then for quite awhile it was elephant trees together with yucca, along with the boojum; then it turned to predominately datilillo (tree yucca). This is a most useful tree – according to the Baja California Plant Field Guide: A tea from the flower buds is used to treat diabetes and rheumatism. The buds can be eaten like bananas. The flowers are cooked and ground for candy, the rootstock is used for soap and softening cowhides. The fibers are used to make sandals. The stalk is shredded for mattress material. The trunk is often used by ranchers as a living fence around a home garden or corral. Much of the barbed wire fences along here use the datillo, apparently you can just cut off a piece of it dig it in like a post, and it will usually reroot itself. The black ripened fruits were harvested and eaten by the natives after boiling or roasting.
Lorne’s cold is still hanging on. Now it is in his larynx and he sounds very croaky. He is eating Baja honey.
I tried posting a number of pictures last time but our internet speed was so slow it just didn’t work, hopefully we have a faster link tonight. It varies, I forgot about that…
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