On the morning of Thursday, the 27th the ride
begins.
| Tom arrives on his fresh new R1200GS. This could be
the LAST picture of his pristine bike.... more to come! |
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| I wore the same boots that I wore for 2 years in South
America. While the other riders were doing their paper work at the
border, I got my boots polished and they LOOKED like new when this
gentleman was done! |
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Heading south on the large dry lake north of San
Felipe!
| We spent the first night in San Felipe. Chris, from
Texas, is starting to get in the Baja mood! |
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| Nothing beats a nice sunrise and the "Orange" of a
"still clean KTM". |
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| The other riders complained that I picked the hotel
based on the color of the place. Hey - they are smarter than I
thought! |
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| Tim, on his new BMW X-Challenge 650, ready to start the
adventure.. Tim was nice enough to let me ride the bike in Colorado,
and I was extremely impressed with the bike. Very stable. |
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| This is the beginning of the dirt road in the village of
Puertecitos (which is located about 60 miles South of San Felipe). |
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| The "Hot Springs" in Puertecitos. This hot pools get
rinsed out every high tide.
Tim and Chris.... |
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| The last picture of clean riding gear. Tim, Ronnie,
Chris and Steve. |
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| After ONE mile of dirt everybody is still feeling clean
and studly! Before the end of the day, three bikes quit and one
requires a truck to haul it to a hotel.
Any guesses which bike had to be loaded up?
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| I filled the gas tank completely up in San Felipe and
then we stopped for a few items.
The gas expanded and the canister got soaked and the bike starting
running bad.
Here Ronnie is draining the canister.
Thanks Ronnie! |
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Great roads for big bikes, but the shocks did get
hot! On the road from San Felipe to Alfonsina's (Gonzaga Bay)
| The "Good, Bad and the Ugly"? OK... Ugly, Ugly and
Ugly!
Kicking back at Alfonsina's. |
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| Ronnie looks concerned over the meal! It was good! |
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| Typical Alfonsina's sunrise (September 29th) |
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| Bikes are ready to roll and head to Catavina. |
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| Tim, on the road to Coco's Corner. |
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| Ronnie, in his typical good riding form. Hard to catch
a photo of Ronnie sitting.
Ronnie can get his airhead through some tough terrain (like the rocks
on the right side of the picture). |
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| Chris, on his KLR. |
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Maybe the R1200 is just too comfortable?
| If you ride a KLR, a bike like this can put a smile on
your face! We convinced Chris to keep the KLR and not trade for this
bike. |
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| The owner of Coco's Corner told us that it had been so
hot, that he had not seen very many bikes yet this year. He requested
that we help unload all the pictures from the storage truck so that he
could get ready for the season, which should start during the following
weeks. |
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| Anita Espinosa owns a restaurant in Rosario (the best
one in Baja). She serves lobster tacos, lobster omelets, lobster
burritos and everything else you can make with lobsters. This is the
footing of here first restaurant in Baja (open for business in 1936).
(note- on October 19th, 2007, I am heading back to Baja with Tom to
celebrate Anita's 100th birthday) |
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| In less than 20 miles, 3 of the 6 bikes stopped running
including the KLR, Honda 650 and BMW 650. |
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| The BMW experienced a TOTAL battery failure. The bike
was brand new, but Tim stated that he had heard of others that had the
same problem.
Luckily we had just made it back to the pavement.
The very first vehicle I tried to flag down, stopped.
Got to love Mexico! |
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| My KTM 950 is thinking: "Boy, am I lucky it isn't me in
the back of that truck"! |
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Regarding the BMW 650, we used a satellite phone to call 2 BMW
dealers back in the United States. We told them that the display
on the BMW gave a code of "A65". We told them we were stranded in
the center of Baja. They suggested that we bring the bike back to
the dealer and they could figure out what the failure was!
We decided that code "A65" means "YOU ARE SCREWED"!
I will let your imagination tell you what we thought of that
response! It reminded me why I rode an old airhead to South
America! |
| We finally got all the bikes to the La Pinta Hotel in
Catavina. The gentleman in the orange shirt (Alberto Heredia) has a
son which races Motocross in Ensenada.
He asked us to join him for Steak and Salmon!
How do you say NO to that! |
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| The next morning we figured out that the Honda will run
without a battery, so it was donated to the BMW. The Honda has no kick
starter, so it was "PUSH" starts until we could locate a new battery for
the BMW. |
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| On the 30th of September we head north to El Marmol,
which was a small village where onyx was mined. Ronnie and his
airhead. |
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| The reason we came to El Marmol is that it was the site
of one of the "Then and Now's". The guys were nice enough to give me a
few minutes to take a few pictures.
Many old trucks are slowly rusting away at the old mine. |
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| The Onyx in the background was "rock in process" at the
old mine. The Honda was always parked on the top of small hills to
minimize the need for push starting the bike. |
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Gringos on a joy ride.........
| Me, trying to locate the spot from where an old "Then
and Now" was photographed from..... All the "Old" pictures from El
Marmol were in the book "Baja California" by Ralph Hancock and Mike
McMahan (Mike was famous for his map making in Baja).
The book was printed in 1953. |
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The homes are all missing. You can see where
the home in the top right corner of the old picture once stood.
| This was the school house in El Marmol, made with solid
onyx stones. |
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| We could not find any of the students from the original
picture, so I had to have the "Amigos" fill in! If you look at the
stone behind Chris' head (sun glasses and black shirt), you can see a
stone with a white line through it -- the stone is very obvious in the
original picture.
All the stones to the left of the door could be identified. |
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| About 10 miles from the school house, we visited the
ranch "Tres Enriques". I asked this gentleman, at the ranch, if he
knew if the teacher or students where still alive and in this area. |
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| This is blown up from the old picture above. As it
turned out, the little girl in the lower left of the picture was his
sister.
HOW COOL!
She is now 60 years old and lives in Ensenada, Mexico.
I love this stuff!!!! |
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| I think this is a great way to meet the locals and get a
real flavor of land and people! |
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| Another picture of the old school house. |
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| Only a few walls survive. |
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| According to the gentleman that identified his sister,
Mr. and Mrs. Brown are long gone. |
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This picture was taken at the old docks where salt
was loaded onto ships in Guerrero Negro (largest evaporative salt mine in the
world, owned by the Japanese). Time to head to San Ignacio.
To continue on to San Ignacio, please hit the
"Next" button.....
  
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