October 17

Mainland to Baja Crossing

Baja Ferries operations are complicated, nothing is simple or straight forward, but we’re loaded and happy to make the last crossing of the next 3 days.  Happy to pass an uncomfortable night in the brightly lit, cold cafeteria, happy to trade humid heat for electric cold. Departing 1.5hrs behind schedule, we pulled away from dock at 1:30am, exhausted.  The kids curled up on an air mattress under the table and slept.  No thanks again to the Pandemic, most public spaces were closed off to passengers.  Truck drivers used all the outdoor benches to sleep on and all the cabins were all occupied, so our place was in the cafeteria.  I managed an hour or two of head bobbing sleep, Tim got maybe 20 mins. 

The early morning light outlined the rugged Baja coast, we are close, though it would be another 2 hours after docking before we were allowed to disembark.  This time the kids had to come with me.  Passing though security and immigration passport check, I had to explain why the kids passports were in the truck with Tim, in Spanish wasn’t the easiest, too difficult they waved us through.  

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It’s a different kind of heat here, dryer and more intense feeling, less humid, at 9am the thermometer reads 32’C.   Making our way back to the Maranatha Campground, the same place where we met Dad back in January.   Parked beneath a shady tree we slung the hammocks and kicked back, today we would do nothing.

Chance meeting

The next morning as we were think about leaving, a truck like Bruce pulled in.  Our first time meeting other travellers in months.  Fabia & Gianni are from Switzerland and had spent the past 7 months surviving lockdown in the scorching Baja summer.   With no wind in the forecast, there wasn’t any hurry to get to La Ventana, so we decided to stay and spend a few days with them enjoying the company and hearing of their many hair raising adventure stories from years on the road.  

They were waiting for a new set of shocks for their truck to arrive.  After exhausting 2 weeks of searching for the right parts in Mexico & US they ended up ordering them from Germany, arriving via UPS in only 5 days!  Curious, Tim removed Bruce’s front shocks confirming his suspicion that ours too were completely dead, able to compress and expand effortlessly by hand.  I guess we need new shocks too!  

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Los Muertotis was Fabia’s favourite beach, so we headed over there for a couple of days.   Nothing but sand, water and a big hairy spider.  The water was divine for swimming and Jaxon finally go to go fishing.  From years of casting with his Spider-Man rod he sent that hook impressively far.  Casting from the shore and steadily reeling it in to cast again and again.  Disappointed he didn’t catch anything.  That evening Tim caught a tasty wee fish that we cooked over the bbq for dinner.   

We’re up early, 6am, with the time change it’s easy, on the mainland it was an hour difference.    Atop the cactus beside us two big Turkey Vultures were sunning themselves holding their wings out to dry their feathers and Jaxon spotted pod of dolphins swimming along the bay, I love this about the Baja, so much wild life both on and off shore.

Last night we had a visitor pass through camp, this kind of wild life ain’t my favourite. A large, hairy, 8 legged Tarantula!  I’d like to think he was just going for a nice moonlit walk on the cool sand and not looking for a new home.  He wasn’t happy about being guided away with the broom and stood up to fight.  We tucked our feet up for the rest of the evening.  

October 25th, Day 365!

It’s been 12 months since we left home!  We’ve seen and done so much,  it’s been an amazing year. We have all grown, the children are older and we are wiser, as we don’t age, lol!

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La Ventana

Now camped on the beach in La Ventana and happy to be here. In Pre-Covid times, the campground’s front row would be full by now.  For the past 20 yrs the same people have been coming here seasonally for wind sports.  First it was windsurfing, then kiteboarding, then foiling and now the trend is towards foiling with a wing, I wonder what will be next?!   The average age of the seasoners here is probably 55, the oldest is pushing 80 and still rips on the water each day.  Everyone is fit and active, setting up their camp with all the comforts.  But, because of Covid, 75% of campers have decided to stay home under the ‘no travel’ advisory.   

Bonus for us as we’ve got a prime position, front row, beach front camping.  Perfect for the kids to play and for us to go kiting.  Our neighbours are Gail & Clarke, a retired couple in their 70’s, from Washington have given us the use of an extra ‘sail shed’, a metal frame portable shelter/tent.  Along with the use of, large tarps to create some relatively sand free space and best of all, an on-demand, gas powered, hot water heater. Having a hot shower is a game changer, as soon the wind and water temperatures will cool down.  Tim has built us a long table for cooking, complete with a plumbed in kitchen sink. We’re comfortable and won’t be going anywhere anytime soon.  

Gotta go, the wind is blowing…..

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