Christmas was spent as usual, here in Poway with our family. The day after, however, we were ready to head down to Baja for a week. We'd gotten some bad news on Christmas Eve. The house Pandro was remodeling burned down, taking his tools up along with it. He had to cancel out, so he could have fun doing such things as haggling with his insurance company. Fortunately, the owners didn't have any of their belongings in the house and no one was injured. Our friend Louis and his girlfriend Annie were planning to ride down with Pandro. Ed and I decided to let them ride in our extended cabs, so at least they'd get to go.
We were off at around 9:00 AM and cruised across the border with no problema, no morbida, and no ado. At a little after 1:00 PM, we were in San Felipe running the standard drill of ice-up at the icehouse, food-up at the Horse Market, Tequila-up at Licores Calafia, beer-up at the Sub-Agencia, and filler-up with gas at the Pemex station. From there, it was off to the south, past the airport, through the baggie orchard, and on to Puertecitos. The Puertecitos road was as it was the last time we'd gone south: in pretty good shape, all-in-all. The washouts and damage caused by the October storms had been repaired. The nasty part of the road south of the Campo Christina curve was still not repaired, but it was graded relatively well. We breezed through Puertecitos and climbed the hill at the beginning of the Gonzaga road.
The grading of the road was immediately apparent. South of Campo la Costilla, we encountered many maquinas: earthmovers, bulldozer, dirt trucks. It was probably the most machines I'd ever seen in one place along this stretch. Piles of fill had been dumped on one side of the road, waiting for the grader to spread them out. We made fairly good time, no, very good time going over the sisters. When we got down to the Huerfanito Flats, it was even smoother. Crossing the hills south of the Cinco Islas Cafe required a little moderacion, but it was still in relatively good shape. I was amazed to see that the immense washout at Agua las Palmitas had been filled-in. I can't say that I think the effort was worth it, as the detour was no big deal, but what the heck. We rolled into camp at around quarter to four, a near record time. Going from Puertecitos to camp took only around an hour and twenty minutes. We unloaded, setup and got ready for some of Clara's chili. The bad news was that the wind was blowing about 35 miles per hour.
The next day dawned and it was clear as a bell. The Santa Ana winds that were blowing up in San Diego created a norther down here. The sea was whipped-up into a frenzy. No use worrying about launch windows. The wind, although stiff, was not so strong that you couldn't venture outside. We, in fact, so ventured and decided to hook up Pandro's trailer, as it's become to be known, to the main electrical system. Louis dug a ditch; I ran conduit and wired. Before long, a 50' run of #8 wire with breakers on both ends provided 12 volts and 24 amps to the new trailer. Now, Pandro and Tracy will have lights when they stay with us. Later that afternoon, Annie, Eddie and Donna arrived. Brian came down with his daughter and pal Ed and family from Colorado. They were staying at Ronnie's, as usual. Janet and her new friend also arrived to hang out at their casa, Roger's old house. Still no Baja Bruce. We had an unnerving episode that night with one of the locals who appeared to be a little more than drunk. He had a junky old gun he was playing with, but he was not threatening with it. We'd known him for years and we succeeded in sending him back home, after extracting his stuck vehicle from the sand. I hadn't seen him in about 4 years and hope we don't for another 4, at least.
That night, the winds died. When Thursday dawned, it was calm, but the sea was still pretty whipped-up and hostile to launching our small boats. I patched my hull and did a few other chores. Brian and his crew canvassed down on the beach. The rollers and breakers don't look too big from up here on the bluff, but when you get down on the beach, you'll think twice before launching into them. This is a panorama. As usual, I've reduced it to a 680 pixel wide image for viewing on this page. To see it at its full 510 pixel high size, click on the image. If you have a Javascript-enabled browser, a new window will pop up, that is scrollable and resizable. After viewing, just close the window as the original page remains in the background.
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Later that afternoon, the ladies watched the birds offshore. The large amount of bait in the water was obvious.
To the south, by the south point, the birds and breakers made a nice shot.
Up to the north, it was deceivingly calm.
Later that afternoon, Baja Bruce arrived. We enjoyed some great stargazing through his new telescope for the first few days. Then, the clouds blew in and obscured the sky. He had his laptop to process pictures and run an astronomy program. Here, he hangs out with a few members of the Havana Club.
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