baja 500 2010

[viter]

We all met up at the border in San Ysidro around 8am on Saturday, exchanged some money into pesos and proceeded to cross the border. The blue whale of an F250 got pulled into secondary but after about 5 minutes we were on our way rolling along the border fence on the Tijuana side. The road down to Ensenada was beautiful as usual. One military checkpoint and about an hour later we were pulling into Ensenada and saw this contraption of a transport system pulling huge tuna pen along the road - 4 semi's connected with rope so they will not get too far from each other moving at around 5mph.

The usual tourist area in Ensenada was a party zone with racers and fans everywhere.

It was right around 10am now - 4-wheel vehicles were just about to start and you could hear helicopters taking off around the start area ready to follow their race teams. We snaked around little streets to find a spot to watch the start of the race right by the first bridge the racers go under when they first hit the dirt in the wash in the center of Ensenada. Even though the place was already full with spectators a cop let us into a blocked off street and we were able to find a spot right on the bank of the wash just as a roar loud enough to hurt your ears announced beginning of the race of the first trophy truck.

 

[viter]

We watched at that spot for a little while and then decided to try to find a spot to watch by the famous jump, which was just about a mile away. Unfortunately though by the time we got there it was not that impressive as trophy trucks and class 1's have already gone through and the other vehicles weren't getting that much air. At least we can say now that we've seen it.
So we left the race area and headed south on hwy 1.
We saw quite a few interesting vehicles on our way out, like this interesting land cruiser 60

and an ultimate adventure GMC from four wheeler magazine - http://4wheeloffroad.automotive.com...008-four-wheeling-road-trip-part-2/index.html

quick break for lunch at acambaro (note - apparently when they say barbeque in that place they really mean soup with meat inside) and we were back on our way to San Vicente

 

[viter]

A half an hour or so later we arrived at San Vicente. My friend Jesse arranged for us to stay with his friend Larry from Baja Trail Rides - http://www.bajatrailrides.com It turns out Larry is originally from LA where he lived all his life until retiring a few years ago to Baja to enjoy riding his dirtbike and his trucks and beetles while also guiding other riders on tours. Larry was great to us - let us stay at the house he is building (having a shower is extremely unusual for my baja trips, so this was pure luxury), showed us best places to eat and guided us around to both watch the race and go on a scouting adventure next morning.

As few of the guys were suiting up to get on the dirtbikes, Larry was showing us his vehicles - he has a nice 2wd pre-runner style long travel older model toyota, as well as a little beetle that apparently goes just about everywhere, and a few other trucks. He also has a cat that he sometimes takes for rides with him on his bike and a few dogs. Well, unsuspecting me who is usually quite good with dogs, I was walking around in between two trucks trying to check out the rear suspension on toyota and I guess happened to scare once of his dogs - maybe the dog thought I was blocking her exits. So it decided to try out my leg for an early lunch. The dog snapped at my leg and ran away before I could figure out what happened. Luckily she wasn't really trying to bite me - I just got a hole in the jeans and a slight scratch on the leg resembling an imprint of dog's jaws. All the dogs, including the one that bit me, were really mellow and nice to everyone for the remainder of our stay there.

Once everyone was ready to go Larry showed us which dirt road to take to the ocean coast, while him and a few other guys took off on dirtbikes through some single track. The dirt road was pretty fun, but we ran into some local traffic.

Eventually we found our way to the coast and the racecourse. We found a cool spot right next to a shortcut that would make race vehicles attack a very short but very steep hill. We could now relax, have some beer and wait for the racers to show up.

bike riders and quads were first

 

[viter]

and then came the main attraction - trophy trucks and class 1 buggies

 

[viter]

we moved along the racecourse to watch the race from different spots and to get to Erendira and the road back to the hwy. apparently there were some major rains this last winter in baja and they washed away the main road into erendira as well as the backway access road, leaving the people there cut off for a few weeks until heavy equipment could cut new road out of the side of the hill. I've been to Erendira before and the portion of the road closer to the village is unrecognizable - nothing left of the origianl paved road, the wash is now huge (not much water but very wide from the flooding in winter), and the new road is literally cut out of the side of the hill. on the way back to the hwy we noticed a 2wd totally stock tundra on street tiures stuck in the wash in the middle of nowhere - I have no idea why the driver decided to drive in there. Another driver (unrelated to the guy stuck) was getting ready to pull the tundra with a big winch mounted on his chevy. He was going to pull him diagonally and up the hill back to the road because as it turned oiut his winch line wasn;t quite long enough to pull the tundra back straight to the firm ground in the wash itself. We had an extra winch cable just lying in the bed of the truck (it's been lying there unused for years) so we offered it to the driver of the chevy so he could make a much easier straight pull from the wash. He gladly accepted and winched the tundra out without any hassle.

The good samaritans in the chevy were so glad we stopped to help them pull that guy out that they even gave us some beer and their team T-shirts before we split up onn the highway!

We finished off our day with some great pizza at Larry's friend's restaurant that was kept open late just for us, plus some beers around the fire at Larry's place afterwards!

 

[viter]

Next morning Larry took us for an adventure in the canyon that used to have a road that went through the wash in the canyon and then up into the mountains. The rains washed away the road and according to Larry nobody has driven that road since then as it hasn't been repaired. So this was going to be a scouting mission - we'll just go as far as we can.

The wash in teh canyon was pretty cool - you first drop into the typical sany wash, but later it narrows down and you have to drive on the rocks and cross the creek multiple times. The crossings were very shallow but has sandy bottom and in a few places it was quicksand, so guys on bikes would scout out the crossings before I would attempt it in my truck.

as you can see it was good we did this way, cause even bikes could get stuck.
my truck was the only 4-wheel vehicle so it wqas important not to get stuck, cause then guys on dirtbikes would have to go all the wya back to San Vicente to get a friend with a 4wd truck to pull me out. majority of crossings were OK, but a few had me on the gas as I could feel the truck starting to sink down.

Jesse shot this video - http://img193.imageshack.us/img193/7976/mov00293p.mp4

as well as quite a few others. more of his videos and pics are here - http://www.ttora.com/forum/showthread.php?t=157081&page=4
my other friend's pics are here - http://picasaweb.google.com/chriscobain37/2010Baja500?authkey=Gv1sRgCKzUz4G3gbXBVA&feat=directlink#
my pics - http://s30.photobucket.com/albums/c320/ua_taco/baja 500 2010/?start=20

as you can see I am using pics from everybody for the story

 

[viter]

btw, it turns out that some farmers actually live in that canyon (Larry has agreement with them to use the roads) - it must have been very tough for them during flooding.

after half a dozen creek crossings and picking best line through the rockgardens the flooding left behind we made to the point where the road was supposed to go up into the mountains, the only problem was the bank was washed away and the easiest way to get to the road up on the hill was a 10 foot high almost vertical dirt bank. we considered knocking down the dirt a bit with a shovel and winching to a big tree couple ghundreed feet further up the hill, but after taking into account the fact that the rest of the road upo the mountain was in unknown condition and we still wanted to cross the border today before dark we decided to turn around, but not before guys on bikes had some fun on that hill climb we thought of winching up in the truck.

 

[viter]

so we had to backtrack thorugh the canyon to get back to San Vicente, pack up and leave, but ofcourse not before an mandatory group photo

the trip back was pretty uneventfull, except for some good food right by the highway on the outskirts of Ensenada.

the border line in Tijuana was long - it took us three hours, during which we played the game of chicken with other vehicles trying to cut in front of you in line whenever any opening appears, considered buying a biomechanical donkey, enjoyed some churros, and ended up right behind a race truck that was driven by a coworker of my friend Chris who was riding with me in my truck on this trip.

crossing back into US and driving on the freeway felt good yet weird at the same time - somehow it seems just about after every baja off-road trip for a day or two I feel like I am coming back into a strange world that I am not quite a part of - and it's not because I have a green card but rather just a feeling that the daily problems you normally worry about are all of a sudden not as important and everything is chill. I guess it's the spirit of baja following me across the fence. till next trip...

 

[bajasurf]

Viter: Thanks for the great photo story. I noticed that you have photos of the Roger Norman Trophy truck ( red and black)3 times. Just as he is about to start the race, during the race (Saturday)and at the border crossing when you are leaving Baja. Terrific post and very enjoyable to read and view your photos. Thanks, George

 

[1leglance]

great trip report...
it sounds like it would be fun to go and watch the Baja...
And tips for seeing the 1000 in November?

 

[efuentes]

Great report, thanks

 

[Regcabguy]

Thanks. Boy I can't believe all the water still flowing into the Erendira area. Was this from the winter or have the mts. been experiencing thunderstorms? My friend was in Punta Chavato last week and it was miserably humid.