On the Road Again!
Trip Start
Jun 21, 2008
1
6
35
Trip End
Sep 03, 2008
Mulegé,
Baja California,
Mexico
Friday, June 27, 2008
A little bit about negotiating the roads in Baja...be careful!! These little strips of bumpy tarmac can be daunting...the main north-south road is no wider than your average driveway and there is no usable shoulder to speak of... and with limited budgets, the Mexican civil engineers have no choice but to follow the contour of the land...bridges are few and far between (they are so special that each one has it's own name), and more commonly you drive through "vados" which range to a shallow dip in the road to literally riding a few hundred feet through a dry riverbed...during rainy periods these would be absolutely flooded. In the dry season, poor signage can mean that you can unexpectedly hit one of these dips at 70mph which can be deadly for occupants and debilitating for machinery.
On the opposite end of the spectrum there are amazing steep grades and sheer cliffs, pretty exciting to ride on the bike, and the views are spectacular, but with the double loaded semi-trucks speeding and cutting corners, I'm concentrated on hugging the right hand line!...those caffeinated (I hope it's just caffeine) gauchos don't stop for anything! Everywhere you go you see crashed cars and roadside memorials....literally thousands of them...sometimes these are the only mortal reminders to an otherwise heavenly view.
Ok, enough about roads...we're averaging about 70 miles an hour and the bike is running great...coming into Ciudad Insurgentes we're now in the agricultural heartland of Baja...for the most part it looks like Oxnard...smells about the same too...lots of fertilizer aroma and fruit stands.
Mission San Ignacio
A short break to fill up our Camelbacks and our next stop is San Ignacio, a real honest-to-goodness desert oasis, complete with palm trees and the whole nine yards! In fact, this is a real town, with a town square, a nice mission, one taxi car, and of course the Baja racer's hangout - Rice and Beans! Malin and I popped in for lunch...I laughed when Malin ordered a cheeseburger in Mexico, but then I though about that Jimmy Buffet song and she was justified. We watched European Cup Spain vs. Russia match on TV while a little Mexican kid had that Guitar Hero video game - kind of like musical karaoke, and he was belting out a pretty good rendition of Ironman and was throwing a little Ozzy Osbourne antics into his performance...I was hoping the little muchacho would take it to the next level and bite off a few pigeon heads, but I guess he reckoned that he had foreign guests in the audience and prudently refrained.Despite the power guitar melodies, Malin's cheeseburger wasn't really agreeing with her so we took that as a sign to high-tail it out of town towards Mulege, a seaside sport-fishing town with a tropical look and feel. The heat was pouring down and we decided to stay at a little posada right on the palm-tree lined river banks - Hotel Cuesta Real...for $48 it had a pool, AC, and a little restaurant...perfect!
That is except for the scorpion I had to kill at about 10pm...Malin had already gone to sleep when I spotted the poisonous offender on the wall...it was easier than I thought to kill it...especially since I armed myself with one of Malin's flip-flops and closed my eyes when I delivered the deft but fatal blow. Just another varmint to add to my list of domestic kills. Of course I didn't tell Malin about my lopsided victory until after we checked out the next morning.
Comments
Nice update!
I was just on the verge of wondering if I should be concerned about you guys, came home, and found your post! Whew! It's the mom in me...
You've spoiled us with your narratives and photos...
Waste Not Want Not
You had a pefectly edible scorpion in your sights and you smooshed it with a flip flop? A little cumin, a pablano chile, and you've got yourself a little tapas before almuerzo.
Eeww!
Johnny is gross... I am glad you didn't eat the scorpion. I have only experienced cockroaches and chickens in my motel rooms in Mexico. A scorpion would REALLY freak me out! I'm glad it didn't end up in your bed. Good job in killin!