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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
As far as hostels go Rick has the premier hostel in the world....In my opinion. We ate dinner last light at Glorias cafe in Erendira, so we didn't get in till around 7:30pm.....which was really 8:30 since we had forgotten the time change on last Saturday.
Even so, Rick came and visited with us and saw that Lulu who was running things for the evening took care of us. Lulu was a delight. She was 20ish,and a local Mexican girl. She was slim and dressed in an uncomplimentary baggy pants and blouse outfit. Still I liked her. She help me get signed on to the wifi. It required selecting 64/128 bit WEP security and getting a 20 character passcode typed correctly. All that was apparently beyond me.
Tam took advantage of the hostel's hot water, then went to bed. I surf the Web a bit. A very slow connection..... That may be my only complaint.
So we awoke to a nice day. Rick had coffee in the percolator. All we had to do was turn it on, and at 8am Ta (a vietnamese gal) came in and fixed us a egg and pancake breakfast....all included with the price of the over night stay.
We took pictures before we left.
Our the hostels sitting room windows.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Outside campfire sit/around BS area
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Rick has added Massage to the accommodation as well as Massage lessons. A nice touch for beat up dualsport riders.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Then there was the bar, Rick has a liquor License...and the game room.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Rick has his hands full running the hostel. Every time I visit there are new projects both completed and underway. Rich here is doing a hands on supervision of that rock wall.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
As we sat and talked on the first night, Rick explained another of his duties. He is home schooling his 16 year old son. He explained, "You can't teach geometry or algebra, if you don't know the subject". He has to learn the stuff before he can teach it. Yep, being a good parent is hell. :)
We left Ricks at about 9:30am. The river going out to Ricks place and Erendira had water in it for the first time that I had ever seen it.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
We had one good day of Baja left so we decided to take the Calentura Trail from San Vincinti to Valle de Trinidad which was a 35 mile dirt road that avoided about 130 miles of pavement to go there the other way. After Trinidad we'd move on to the Laguna Hansen Pine tree area for our last night on the trail.
About 6 miles into the dirt road is a convenience store (Mexican styles).
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
10 or 12 miles into the canyon we began to climb the coastal mountains. the road was in great shape.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
20 miles in we saw a little snaky road that went out of sight to the south. We wondered where that went.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
A couple more miles showed us the road's cut off from our route. That was a 25% grade even though it doesn't look that steep in the picture. Roads that steep are soon washed out horribly in short order if not attended to. This road looked to be in good shape. Someone must be using it frequently.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Finally we could see the Vally de Trinidad in the distance.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
We took a coffee break in Trinidad. Here we asked a cowboy about the small road that went to the south, He said it was a gold mine. Either he didn't understand me or they got a permit....
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Across the street....some kind of religious school, I suppose.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
We moved on toward Laguna Hansen. That required 40 miles of pavement and 20 miles of dirt before we arrive at the beginning of the Pine tree area.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
...a little pineier.....is that a word?
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
That brings us to Ramona's gas stop. Ramona now sells beer and snacks as well as a little bit of hareware, and a few convenience store items.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Ramona on the right is 80 years old. She told me she started selling gas there in 1954. My first visit was in 1964. Her buddy there was 78, making Ramona one of the first cougars. He he. We bought a few beers to get us through the night. They both were very friendly and were happy to pose for their picture.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
I had never seen the road in as poor a condition as it was now. The rains of this spring have taken their toll. Ramona told us that a road grader was due through there soon. Later the guy at the restaurant told us maybe tomorrow.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
These rocks told us that Laguna Hansen would come in to view soon.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Laguna Hansen has been dry for the last ten years or so....not so any more.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
I'd never seen the lake so delightful. There is camping at the lake and solar restrooms, but we choose to move on out of the Park for free camping.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Not far from the park is this Cafe/hotel/lodge.
We stopped for some cokes, and they gave us a traditional bowl of chips and salsa to go with it. We chatted with the 2 old guys who were running the place.
They run semis on this road...
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
We stopped at the lodge
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Listen to the rumble (click the vid)
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
This place and the guys running are always charming.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
They even have wifi when the generator is running.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
The building code is a bit skimpy down there...
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
You can see light through the eves...but it was warm inside. There's no shortage of fire wood, and they were using it.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Various other charming details of the place. I've never been there in the summer when it's hopping but the guys are looking forward to the busy season soon.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
These guys work for their livings up there at 5500 ft. That saddle isn't just for decoration.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
It was early so we hit the trail for another half hour. I missed the old campsite that Lynn and the Socal boys enjoyed through a 2" rain storm. That may have been on purpose as I believe we all got soaked that night.
We found a new place with all the dry fire would that we could want.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Tam surveyed her firepit camp fire.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
I tried to pupu the fire pit....she won. That was our biggest fight. LOL Those bushes behind me were a perfect windbreak.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
I fixed dinner for us...2 packs of Ramen some spaghetti sauce and a can of Vienna Sausage. This is a flash photo...
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
This is what it looked like without the flash. Ha I have to work on a suitable camp light.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
And there was a bunch of this colored rock. I liked this one so well that I brought it home with me.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
In the morning we had a fire to warms us up. It had frosted overnight so the morning fire felt very good.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
There were plenty of bad sections of the 30 mile road out to the pavement. The first 7 miles took us an hour. It got better after that.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
When the holes get to bad, someone does a little road work.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Click the vid
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
We left the pine trees behind. That little bit of Paradise is only about 25 miles long.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
We passed this colorful Century Plant, that was getting ready to bloom, on the way out.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Close to the pavement now...
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Bike shop at 200 meters....I'll have to remember this place
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
Once on the Pavement we stopped at a tire shop to get the tires aired up. We had let them down to 20 lbs and using my air pumps would have taken an hour of steady pumping. While there this couple came along and asked the tire man to ask us if they could get a ride the 20 miles into Tecate where we would cross the border. Of course we obliged. You can't do that in the states with the seatbelt laws.
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| From Baja travel, Mar 2011 |
That's the beauty of Baja....you don't need no stinking seat belts...you camp almost where you want...camp fires are not taboo. It a welcome relief to us older folks that grew up with those same rules. Nope the world is going to hell. LOL
We easily crossed the border, and made a detour to go through Julian to get a piece of their famous apple pie, as it had been at least 20 years since Tam had been there.
Tam and I had had a nice trip. We talked of things that no other living people could relate to. We both checked another item off our bucket lists.
Thanks for listening......
great stuff pete. thanks for sharing the story and pics.
ReplyDeleteglad you and your sister got to reminisce old times and create new memories.