Extra Pics

Some pics from Chuck's camera.

Ensenada Alcatraz (Playa Algodon)

And these were the pics I took of the arch at Land's End



Los Frailles and the Canadians!

Chuck had stayed at Los Frailles before and was very fond of it so we decided to spend two of my final three nights in Baja there on the beach.  Los Barilles lies just a short drive south along the coast from Sierra la Laguna and just as close to Cabo, which is where I would fly out.  So it was a logical choice as well.  Los Frailles was a very interesting location though.  It sits right next to a federally protected reef and marine area, and there were some signs here that the Mexican government had tried to further develop the beach but nothing had really gotten moving.  Instead, directly on the beach was utilized primarily as a fishing village.

The arroyo just off the beach however was a different story.  Once you cleared the sand apparently we crossed the border into Canada.  The entire arroyo and back up it for probably half a mile was totally subdivided into camping areas for fifth wheels.  There were still probably a dozen or so remaining but apparently we missed the rush and the place had been slam packed filled with probably 50 or more in the recent weeks.  They create there own little community down there and ride out the Canadian winter.  Community with its own sort of laws and policing of their laws.  Apparently they had staked some sort of claim on this area and weren't letting the Mexican government of developers come in at all.  I had mixed opinions about the group, they seemed very elitist and self-righteous for my tastes.  Thy even were going so far as to punch holes in a 50 gallon barrel, burying it in the dry arroyo, and using that to dump their sewage.  All the while just down stream the fisherman and local were gathering well water. 

Well we show up with camp vagabundo and they automatically look down on us.  Then we didn't really see the need to abide by their rules and set up camp in a spot that apparently someone has claimed and didn't want anyone else using (bummer finders keepers), and a couple of biologist just seemed to rock the boat more then the Canadians liked.  It was interesting couple of nights, with the Mexican fishing camp totally segregated as well the whole thing was like some sort of odd microcosm for modern society.  Whatever, at least the "absentee land owners" we were apparently squatting on left some nice landscaping.

I mean really?



I'm mocking some but los Frailles was a fantastic beach. 

Just below the rocks in this picture was a the protected area.  There was an excellent reef and I got in some of the best snorkeling of the trip.  Even saw the endemic Sea of Cortez Angel Fish.  The first time I was in water here there was a massive school of Jacks I swam with for sometime.  Just cruised right with them.  I could dive down and swim right in the center of the school, really cool.  Sitting on the beach we could see humpbacked whales breaching in the sea and sea lions cruise from around the point.  There was a ridiculous drop off near shore so the area was pretty productive with fish life even off the reefs.

After getting my fill of the water, in the late afternoon I started walking up the arroyo looking again for wildlife.  It had been a pretty slow trip for the cold blooded animals, but the good luck from the rock lizards was holding still flowing. 

Leaf Toed Gecko

Geckos are freaking cool!  Of course they climb all over everything, but they don't actually have suction cups on their feet.  Pretty much every species has different toad pad shapes, and these toe pads are filled with tiny tiny super microscopic hairs.  Geckos can stick to everything due to a natural phenomenon called van der Waals interactions. These interactions lightly apply force between two objects, all objects.  So if you have toe pads with billions of tiny spatula shaped hairs producing this subtle attraction, bam sticky stuff!  Biotech guys are actually trying to create gecko tape based off this concept.  I tried to get a decent shot of his toe pads.

I also so the always present side blotched lizard, as well as some zebra tail lizards.  I tried to get a good pic of a zebra tail, but they were giving me the lizard middle finger and waving their black white tail mocking me before running down a hole. Punks.  As I walked back to camp I caught the first and only snake we saw on the whole trip.

Western Patch-Nosed Snake (you can see where it gets it's name)

We weren't the only people that didn't really fit in with the Canadians.  There was also Bernie.  Bernie has been coming to this same spot for over ten years.  He is a German expat living in Canada.  Every year he drives down and sits on this beach just reading and enjoying the sun for about four months.  Then drives back.  I don't know what you have to do to be able to pull this off but I'm willing to sign up.

Action shot of Bernie

We got along with Bernie pretty well since he didn't have a fifth wheel and seemed a bit of an outcast to the Canadians as well.

Late the second morning I was making my way to the water, when  was stopped by the Mexican fisherman.  They had pulled all their boats high up on the beach.  Apparently there was an earthquake in a Japan and a tsunami headed our way, who knew?  This sounds like a photo opp!  So Pacifico and camera in hand I waited for the tsunami...

My first tsunami!

There was about a 10 foot rise in the high water line, pretty exciting.  We had our plan though, if the water started to look iffy we'd jump in the Tacoma and climb straight up the side of the arroyo.  If we could make it to mission Santa Maria de los Angeles the walls of the arroyo would be a walk in the park.

Lots of bird life around the beach and the arroyo.  Including Scott's Orioloes which would manage to avoid my lens the entire trip.

Road runner

Xantus hummingbird (another baja endemic!)

Very cool lil bird.

While walking back from the beach that afternoon I noticed a tail run into the cavity of an old mesquite tree.  Not only a tail, but a BIG tail.  Chuck and I waited patiently to see what would emerge.  It didn't take long for the animal to re-emerge looking to enjoy the afternoon sun.  I was right though it was a big tail, a big spiny tail of a Spiny Tailed Iguana!

There was a brief scrabble, some stealth ninja style sneaking but finally chuck and I managed to get a closer look at this lizard (this isn't even a fully grown adult!)

It had a heck of a bite! I was kinda glad we didn't catch one of the bigger ones!

Even with the odd Canadians I still really enjoyed this beach.  The fish life was fantastic and we were able to find a lot of different species I had never seen before.



This was to be my last night camping in Baja.  I coped by not talking about it and enjoying my Pacifico.  One thing I really enjoyed and will miss was the stars.  Sleeping out on a cot every night I would stir and look up periodically, the stars in Baja are absolutely spectacular, millions of them.  One the most undisturbed skies I have ever seen. 

The next day we drove into Cabo San Lucas, back into the city.  There was probably more money in Cabo then the rest of the peninsula combined.  It was honestly a bit of a culture shock after small towns and stark desert for over two weeks.  There is so much visual stimulus in the larger Mexican towns it definitely takes two drivers to keep us out of trouble.  Cabo appeared to be doing fairly well, not great, with their tourism.  Which was a bit of a surprise considering all the "Are you crazy?" comments I received in the states.  We found a hotel got a shower and shave cleaned up, wandered the strip, ate, drank, then went to bed.  Its hard staying out late when you have been passed out by nine pm until this point.

The next morning I probably did the dumbest thing of the entire trip.

Sorry mom...

So the famous landmark in Cabo is the arch formation at land's end.  I had seen pictures many times and we just drove the entire peninsula so dangit I wanted to see the arches.  However, what I didn't count on was just how busy the Cabo harbor is.  There was a cruise ship anchored ferrying people back and forth, numerous tour boats, fishing boats, jet skis darting all over the place, parisailors, it was a mad house.  Not to mention we were at land's end now; no longer did we have the flat calm Sea of Cortez waters.  These were swells.  Still the morning I flew out I was determined, and Chuck wouldn't let me back out.  So as I paddled out into the busy waters Chuck sat on the beach with his camera making sure he documented whatever boat plowed into me.  It was about a mile and a two mile paddle each way and I hauled.  I was so scared I didn't take my own camera, instead I shoved chucks point and shoot into one of the dry wells.  I made it out fighting the waves pulling me into the rocks, circling tour boats, jumping sea lions, took my picture and hauled back.  Here is land's end from the beach.

Strategic timing and early morning hours were the only way I could get a pic without it filled with boat traffic.  Chuck still has the pic I took when I got out there, I will post it when I get it from him.

Baja was an absolutely epic trip, I have been mildly depressed everyday since.  The pictures I took, no matter how colorful or dramatic, do not give the landscape justice.  Miles and miles of pristine desert and deserted coastline, so eye catching you can hardly believe it's not fake.  This will not be my last trip to Baja.  The natural beauty will be in the back of my mind until I return.





Sierra la Giganta and Sierra la Laguna

We first noticed la Giganta driving south along the coast out of Conception Bay.  The mountain range grew out of the desert and had been running parallel to the sea since the Bay.  We found a road up to Mission San Javier that looked interesting and headed into the mountains. 

The road was better then expected.  The map had it labeled as an improved two track road, but it had been recently paved and was clean and smooth.  We assumed they improved the road for tourism since it wasn't far from Loreto.  However, we saw maybe one car on the roughly three hours we were on this road.  What a shame, because this was an excellent detour with spectacular views.

That picture just does not do it justice, the road hugged the cliffs and mountain sides the whole way.  In places we could see all the way back to the Sea of Cortez.

Arrived at a small shrine just before the mission.  Small, quaint worship building tucked back into the mountains.  Cool place, really nothing else up here.

While we descended down the road back out of the mountains, I opened the map trying to find a place to camp for the night.  This was not as easy as you think.  You try reading maps and books on a twisting mountain road without getting sick!  One location I noticed, and that Chuck had heard good things about, was Agua Verde.

Agua Verde lied on the Sea at the end of a dirt mountain road that crossed la Giganta.  Seemed simple enough.  It was so much better then that though.  This was perhaps one of the more scenic drives I have ever been on.  We exited off of HWY 1, split a couple of peaks, then started the winding road to the coast.  Holy crap there was no room for error.  The dirt road crawled along the sides of the mountains dropping 300ft plus into gorgeous ravines off its edges.  I didn't have a wide enough angle lens to really capture this range.  The whole drive I was just in awe.

I was actually unable to get a good picture of our road (since if I stepped out I'd fall 400 feet) until we were nearly down.  But you get the idea.

After riding along the coast for a few miles, we finally reached the fishing village of Agua Verde.  The town consisted of about six ranch homes and a restaurant that we cautiously avoided.  But we were able to find a spot on the beach to camp.  Everything setup I spent the evening watching sea lions and dolphins play in the small bay and the sun fall behind the mountains behind us.

We were getting close to land's end now so the swells and waves were getting larger, even on the sea side.  The next morning we debated putting the boats in but decided to push on south instead and packed up.  We were spoiled by the glassed over water from the rest of the trip. 

Ran into some local traffic on the road out.

After the white knuckle drive back through Giganta we were again at a decision point. I pulled the books and maps back out.  Again, the only real disappointment we had in this trip so far was the lack of reptilian wildlife we had seen.  Now that the only non-biologist member of our party was no longer in the caravan, we decided to try to chase down some lizards.  I had gotten snubbed with rock lizards earlier in the trip (remember the photo of the green lizard head peaking out between the rocks), but there was an endemic species rock lizard only found in the cape region of the peninsula.  We even were able to come up with a locality that we had a good shot of spotting them.  So we headed back south on HWY 1 toward Sierra la Lagune National Park.

Turning off the pavement at the town of San Antonio (sans Alamo) we dropped down through Sierra la Laguna bound for the arroyo at the the bottom and a place called San Antonio de la Sierra (creative huh?)  We arrived in late afternoon and a prime time to look for wildlife. What a great place we stumbled upon.

The first thing we noticed getting out of the truck was the bird life.  The surrounding area had been very brown and apparently in the middle of a decent drought.  Wait what?  I thought I was in the desert?  Sierra la Laguna was something totally different then the various habitats we had camped in thus far.  The cardon cactus, boojum, and ocotillo have now been replaced with oaks, and cottonwoods.  The birds were apparently congregating in this arroyo that was still relatively green.  I couldn't get any good pics because they stayed in the large canopies of the deciduous trees (including the freaking Scott's Orioles again!), but we added like 12 new species to our trip total in one evening.

Chuck was on bird patrol

I was trying to keep a keen eye out for the San Lucan Rock Lizards.  It didn't take long before I spotted a juvenile on a large boulder.

Now this guy was pretty cool looking, but he wasn't mature and was lacking the striking colors of the adults.  I saw a couple of LARGE adults but they just weren't allowing me anywhere near close enough to get a hand on or get a decent photograph.  I was losing light so I called it a draw and we set up camp in the bottom of the arroyo.

I set up my cot directly under a large cottonwood tree, and watched a ringtail make his way down the arroyo.  Well sometime during the night something started peeping in the tree above me.  It was like a metronome but would change its rhythm every 30 seconds or start accelerating violently.  Sometimes there would be two metronomes competing with each other. 

What the heck is that noise!

Chuck dug out his spot light and we lit up the cottonwood.  After scanning for several minutes we finally found the biological metronome that was keeping us awake, it was an owl about the size of a softball. It was an elf owl!  If it wasn't so freaking cute I probably would have thrown a rock at it to shut it up.  Eventually he stopped establishing his territory and went silent for the night.

The next morning I was out after the lizards hard. I was not satisfied with a naive juvenile.

Success!



So happy, one of the animals I was really hoping to see this trip.  When he finished biting me, I made sure to get plenty of photos.  And holy cow, look at this lizard! (another geek out).

Just wow, what a colorful lil animal.

A successful morning.  We packed up camp and headed out for our final campsite of the trip, los Barriles.

Conception Bay

We met an interesting fellow at the camp in San Ignacio.  Jens Reuter pulled in last night and camped adjacent to us.  Only next to the Tacoma, he parked and unpacked his bicycle.  We had dinner and a couple of beers with Jens.  This man is living the dream.  Jens is from Frankfurt and was sitting in his home in Germany when he decided, "hey! I want to learn Spanish, and I want to see South America."  His solution was a bike ride.... from Anchorage to Argentina!  He quit his job and is devoting a year and a half to his quest.  I was thoroughly impressed (especially after seeing HWY 1).  I would have liked to have visited with Jens more but he was off to see the whales himself the morning we were leaving.  Here's a link to his blog (will have to do some translating) velomerica.de

After a quick shower and a nice morning watching the birds we headed back out towards the Gulf.  The plan was to find a spot on Conception Bay and be a beach bum for a couple days.  Rough life huh.

We did stop in Mulege to look around and pick up some provisions (BIMBO snack cakes, beer, fish tacos, the normal). 

It was sunday and the church was standing room only

It was just a short drive down to Conception Bay from Mulege.  We had done a lot of hard miles the last couple days and it was nice to have a relaxed day (not that I regret it, the roads were fantastic!). 

Conception Bay is a fairly well known spot.  It's a large and narrow bay which keeps it pretty sheltered from heavy swells and bad wind.  The far side across the bay doesn't see that much traffic.  Would be a nice trip to kayak and camp the whole bay.  Next time!

Selected a beach called El Coyote and nestled camp vagabundo back against a cliff and under the shade of a mesquite tree.  We had gotten pretty good at setting up and tearing down camp by this point. We could have tortillas on the stove, Pacifico open, and boats ready to launch in 15 minutes.

The wind was kicking up some waves that first afternoon, so we were content to sit on the beach and enjoy our Pacifico.  As the afternoon waned though, the wind stopped and it glassed out.  We were lucking out with our beach weather.

Not too shabby for sitting under a mesquite tree.

The next morning was still glassed over, and as you can expect I jumped in the yak and headed for the nearest island.

This island was considerably larger then the one at Alcatraz.  I was also noticing some new bird life!  Priority one however was to scale this island peak!  We found a nice beach on the far side of the island, pulled the boats up and hiked up the peak dodging the soaring Frigate Birds along the way.

Ok that's enough landscapes.  I scampered down the peak spotting a few common side blotched lizards on the way.  Back at the kayak, I began to slowly paddle around the island.  I saw something perched along the cliffs and tried to sneak in for a picture.  It took me a while to sneak up and realize what was huddling on the white wash.  Exactly what every secluded warm island needs...Boobies!  The blue footed kind of course.

Boobies are amazing birds!  If you have ever seen any nature documentary with a school of fish swarming out in open ocean with birds tucking their wings back and torpedoing into the water feeding.  More then likely those birds were boobies.  We would watch the birds feed from our beach on Playa Coyote as they hit the water at top speed like a missile.  Very cool, plus they have BLUE FEET!  This species is ubiquitous of Ecuador and the Sea of Cortez is pretty much the furthest north you can regularly see them.

I paddled around to a small rock out cropping and saw Brown Boobies too.  He's cool, but there is just something about blue feet.

I was able to sneak right up on some of the birds on the rocks.

Brown Pelican (starting to come into breeding colors)

These Brandt's Cormorants would almost let me come up and touch them.

Snowy Egret doing his egret thing.

Several cool birds around camp too.

Gila Woodpeckers had been common since Patchen's

 Verdins were bold and made themselves at home in our camp.

 Orioles just never make it easy! (Hooded Oriole)

 Grey Thrashers are an endemic species only found in Baja

 Vermillion Flycatcher

 and the ever circling batman shaped Frigate Birds

On the 8th I went out for one last paddle and we packed up camp.  Michael would be leaving us this morning.  He was headed back north to setup a pit for a motorcycle enduro in the next couple of days.  He was a great resource to have with us.

"Old Man and the Sea"

We reluctantly left Conception Bay and drove into Loreto for lunch.  I really like Loreto.  There were a few more tourists, but that seemed to be the growing trend the further south we went.  The town was just really nice.

 Lame pose!

From this point we literally opened up the map consulted a few books and tried to decide our next step.  We ended up turning the Tacoma towards Sierra la Giganta.  With a name like that, how could it not be spectacular?