Prolog
“Curiosity is the cure for boredom. There is no cure for curiosity.”
Dorothy Parker
Roughly half-way down its western coast, Baja thrusts a gigantic paw 75 miles westward into the Pacific Ocean. This appendage intercepts the southward flowing California Current and here, in an area called Malarrimo, can occasionally be found debris from across the world. Known as 'the junk yard of the Pacific' stories have been told of ship wrecks, glass fishing floats, even cars and airplanes, being found here – what undiscovered treasures might still await?
'The fewer men, the greater share of honor!”
Shakespeare, Henry V
Malarrimo – like a siren's call it beckoned for nearly 12 years. “Someday”, we said,” someday” but all too often “someday” never comes so I decided that in this – my 50th year – I would finally visit Malarrimo and see for myself. Mike committed to the trip as well and invitations were sent to our cadre of fellow explorers, pit crew, and Baja enthusiasts. The others made vain excuses such as 'work', 'I have to wash my hair' or 'birth of a first child', so that in the end it was just Mike and I.
Day One
If you plan for every contingency you have an event, not an adventure.
El Grande Quadrangular
Our plan – such as it was – was to spend the first day traveling to the vicinity of Malarrimo, explore the beach the next day and potentially the following day as well. Subsequently we would move west to Bahia Tortugas, Punta Eugenia, and then return north.
We crossed the border early Thursday morning and were sent to secondary inspection. It seems that I am always sent to secondary – it must be my ruffian-like good looks. After secondary...double-secret- secondary. Just in case the first guys missed something I suppose. Then south along the coast, just over an hour to Ensenada and a stop at the market for a few forgotten supplies.
We exchanged pleasantries with the attendant when we stopped for fuel in San Quintin. A gas stop in Mexico is like time traveling, returning to the past when an attendant pumped your gas for you. It allows a chance to practice ones Spanish language skills – their English will usually trump my Spanish. Often there will be a young boy at the station as well and he will climb onto the truck to clean windshield and windows and tip of a few pesos is customary for this service. Rather than count the number of liters the truck required we prefer to think of each gallon as opportunity for further adventure.
Continuing south we stopped at a small restaurant in El Rosario. Lobster burritos and red-coke: a $10.00 lunch in the U.S. costing barely half that. Finally entering the 'real Baja' we began to notice small ponds on the roadside and soon the landscape changed from the tans and browns familiar to summertime desert travel to verdant greens and lush chocolate colored soils. Frequent rains had caused a remarkable transformation; we even nicknamed one area the 'golf course'.
A 'short' 10 hours after crossing the border we stopped in the industrial town of Guerrero Negro for dinner at the famous Malarrimo Cafe. The cafe features artifacts that have been recovered from the beach. There were antique fishing floats, tails from target drone aircraft, oars, whale bones, vases and urns. Equipped with these 'visions of sugar plums' we continued our trek to our first camp of the night.
Our first camp was a generic area on the map somewhere near where we thought the road out to the beach should be. It was much easier to find on Google Earth than it was in dark! A spot was eventually selected, off the road and hidden (mostly) from the rare traffic, we settled in the for the night.
“Curiosity is the cure for boredom. There is no cure for curiosity.”
Dorothy Parker
Roughly half-way down its western coast, Baja thrusts a gigantic paw 75 miles westward into the Pacific Ocean. This appendage intercepts the southward flowing California Current and here, in an area called Malarrimo, can occasionally be found debris from across the world. Known as 'the junk yard of the Pacific' stories have been told of ship wrecks, glass fishing floats, even cars and airplanes, being found here – what undiscovered treasures might still await?
'The fewer men, the greater share of honor!”
Shakespeare, Henry V
Malarrimo – like a siren's call it beckoned for nearly 12 years. “Someday”, we said,” someday” but all too often “someday” never comes so I decided that in this – my 50th year – I would finally visit Malarrimo and see for myself. Mike committed to the trip as well and invitations were sent to our cadre of fellow explorers, pit crew, and Baja enthusiasts. The others made vain excuses such as 'work', 'I have to wash my hair' or 'birth of a first child', so that in the end it was just Mike and I.
Day One
If you plan for every contingency you have an event, not an adventure.
El Grande Quadrangular
Our plan – such as it was – was to spend the first day traveling to the vicinity of Malarrimo, explore the beach the next day and potentially the following day as well. Subsequently we would move west to Bahia Tortugas, Punta Eugenia, and then return north.
We crossed the border early Thursday morning and were sent to secondary inspection. It seems that I am always sent to secondary – it must be my ruffian-like good looks. After secondary...double-secret- secondary. Just in case the first guys missed something I suppose. Then south along the coast, just over an hour to Ensenada and a stop at the market for a few forgotten supplies.
We exchanged pleasantries with the attendant when we stopped for fuel in San Quintin. A gas stop in Mexico is like time traveling, returning to the past when an attendant pumped your gas for you. It allows a chance to practice ones Spanish language skills – their English will usually trump my Spanish. Often there will be a young boy at the station as well and he will climb onto the truck to clean windshield and windows and tip of a few pesos is customary for this service. Rather than count the number of liters the truck required we prefer to think of each gallon as opportunity for further adventure.
Continuing south we stopped at a small restaurant in El Rosario. Lobster burritos and red-coke: a $10.00 lunch in the U.S. costing barely half that. Finally entering the 'real Baja' we began to notice small ponds on the roadside and soon the landscape changed from the tans and browns familiar to summertime desert travel to verdant greens and lush chocolate colored soils. Frequent rains had caused a remarkable transformation; we even nicknamed one area the 'golf course'.
A 'short' 10 hours after crossing the border we stopped in the industrial town of Guerrero Negro for dinner at the famous Malarrimo Cafe. The cafe features artifacts that have been recovered from the beach. There were antique fishing floats, tails from target drone aircraft, oars, whale bones, vases and urns. Equipped with these 'visions of sugar plums' we continued our trek to our first camp of the night.
Our first camp was a generic area on the map somewhere near where we thought the road out to the beach should be. It was much easier to find on Google Earth than it was in dark! A spot was eventually selected, off the road and hidden (mostly) from the rare traffic, we settled in the for the night.
