Southern Baja (Stage 7)
The next stretch, along
Baja Concepcion, had about 50 miles of beautiful beaches to choose from to
pitch a tent. This time of the year there was still plenty of room, but come
year’s end it would get to be rather crowded, as “snowbirds” from the north are flocking down, I was told. I ended up
staying at Playa Buenavista for a
couple of days, relaxing and hiking. This was some fancy camping though.
Instead of pitching the tent on the beach, I set it up inside of a hut that was
provided. On the second day, another cyclist, Rin from Japan, stopped in for a
break. He had started out in Anchorage, Alaska and was headed for South
America.
The journey continued on
to Loreto about 60 miles further south, also founded by Jesuit missionaries in
1697. There I met up with Rin again, as it is a small town of about 14,000 and
the tourists seem to congregate all in the same places. We joined forces,
checking out the sights as well as food and drinks. . . .The main attraction is
fishing, but as we only eat fish and the beaches were disappointing after Baja
Concepcion, we pedaled on after one day, 22 miles farther south to Puerto
Escondido. This was one more nice camping treat, as for the first time in Baja
the tent could be pitched on lush green grass. This would be another resting
day, before crossing the Sierra de la
Giganta back over to the Pacific side of the peninsula.
We left at separate times,
figuring we would meet up again somewhere in Ciudad Constitucion 78 miles later. The mountain range is very
close to the coast, so shortly after I left, the road started to climb.
Although the entire peninsula of Baja California is an area with one of the
lowest precipitation rates in the world, it happened to start drizzling during
the climb and pouring after the summit, and it kept raining buckets for the
rest of the day. No complaints though, as this was the first time it rained
since crossing the border into Mexico and my friend Fredy always says, “There is no bad weather, only insufficient
clothing!” As expected, I crossed paths with Rin downtown and decided to
get a room, as it was still pouring and roads started to flood. The rain
continued throughout the night and for most of the next day. Surely I was
rather happy not to be out camping in the elements at this time, even if it meant
to share the room with some cockroaches.
After leaving the city, the first 35 miles were perfectly straight. This reminded me of 1983 when I rode the
motorcycle around Australia and crossed the Nullarbor Plain to Western
Australia, only that desert road is 700 miles of almost straight and the
longest stretch of absolutely straight tarred section is over 90 miles. The
customary Baja sun had returned, pushing away the clouds, and the road was in
smooth, great condition. Santa Rita is where the road has its first bend. There
I found a little place to have some breakfast. It was just an excellent day for
riding, so it ended up being a 100-mile ride, also the longest one on this
adventure. As the sun was going down, I
found my last cactus camping spot for this trip. The next few nights would be
spent in motel beds. . . .
Until next time...
Tony Bike
No comments:
Post a Comment