One of my old stomping grounds is in the news, and not in a good way. I have been on the Sea of Cortez–or Vermilion Sea–when she decides to rock and roll, and it’s not a pleasant experience. When el torito struck the Erik, I’m sure there wasn’t much, if any, notice. Fortunately, it wasn’t far offshore, and some were able to make shore and walk for help.

The Erik runs out of San Felipe, Baja. It’s not a small craft, and was built by the Dutch to handle the often chaotic North Sea.

I can highly recommend the somewhat isolated and small fishing village of San Felipe as a quick weekend cross-border ride. I’ve always enjoyed my time spent in San Felipe. The Sol was good, the fish tacos were excellent, the water was drinkable, and the ambiance wasn’t bad either. As always, a smile and some ability to speak the local language wouldn’t hurt, but most everyone you’ll encounter can speak some English.

I’ve ridden the Baja from north to south and back again many times. In particular, I enjoyed being in La Paz the most, and wouldn’t hesitate to return in the slightest. La Paz is a city of around 250,000, but it maintains a vibe that is much smaller. It’s off the beaten path of the more popular Cabo destinations, and thus escapes much of the revelry and party atmosphere that Cabo visitors have come to expect. In other words, La Paz is a joy to experience, but as always, your mileage may vary.

This trip, as with the 2001 ride, proved relatively uneventful for the most part. I knew a little more Spanish so that helped quite a bit.

I can’t recommend riding the Baja roads at night, unless you’re in a city or town. Traffic is just too unpredictable, and headlights and signal lights appear to be an option that not many choose out in the boondocks.

The fuel was all good, and although not always available from a gas station, it caused me no problems. For the most part here is no high-octane fuel, except in the larger centers.

As always, the food was pretty good, although I tend to get a little tired of the Mexican fare from time to time. That’s easily remedied in the larger centers.

The road blocks are a bit of a pain but they are mostly paved turnoffs. The troops are polite and even though there is no English spoken they make known what they want to look at and into, so it’s only a matter of opening bags and letting them look. I had no problems.

Border crossings both ways were relatively uneventful except for the northern crossing at Nogales. I was truly surprised by the truck jam here and the fact that you had to ride around them to the car crossing. I had no problem re-entering the United States.

And yes, I’ll do it again one day!

February 11-13, 2006

After another overnight in Loreto I made a last minute decision to proceed to Santa Rosalia and take the overnight ferry across to Guaymas and then head north to Nogales and the border. I needed a vehicle permit to do that, but it was Sunday. After trying my Spanish out at the ferry office, the attendant called the local Banjercito girl to come in and write up a permit for me. She required photocopies of my passport, driver’s licence and insurance card, which I was able to provide. She also wanted a copy of my tourist visa, but since I had no copies of that, she consented to make one for me.

I was on my way.

The Santa Rosalia ferry as of this writing (February 2006) is scheduled for Tuesday, Friday and Sunday night departures at 8 p.m., but after talking to a biker who had gotten off the late-arriving ferry I learned that the seas were very rough during his daylight crossing. This would delay the departure.

Motorcycles are loaded first, then the rest of the vehicles. After strapping down the bike, I headed up to my cabin hoping that I’d get a good night’s sleep. Unfortunately, that wasn’t to be the case. The scow listed badly from side to side in the rough sea crossing, and I was kept awake most of the night as we cruised across the Sea of Cortez. Needless to say, I was extremely happy to see the breakwater of Guaymas approaching at nine in the morning.

After a quick topoff in Guaymas, I rode north on the four-lane highway all the way to Nogales. I was very surprised by the trucks waiting to enter the U.S. They were lined up for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of feet, blocking all of the approach lanes to the border. I finally crossed over into the oncoming lanes to get past the trucks and into the car lanes. Apparently this is now standard procedure to get over the line.

While idling away in the lane, I witnessed a Border Patrol agent wrestle a pedestrian to the ground and escort him back to the Mexican side.

Welcome to America!

I finally tired of the tourist nonsense and packed up to ride north. There’s fuel on the way out if you choose, or you can ride approximately 30 miles to Todos Santos and fuel there. The M19 runs north along the Pacific coast and it can be a little cool first thing in the morning. After my early departure I decided to stop for breakfast at Todos.

The Hotel California is decidedly a bad place to do that. The service was horrible and the meal only so-so. When I finally got my “toast” it wasn’t even brown, but it was nice and hard. I wondered if it was yesterday’s bread leftovers.

There’s a legend floating around that the Hotel California is one and the same as sung about in the song. This isn’t true in the slightest and has in fact been denied by the band.

Across the street from ‘that’ Hotel California, the former owner of the original Hotel California has a very nice place to eat, with a streetside patio. I wish I had gone in there, but I had to sample the ambiance of the old Hotel. A mistake, to be sure, for one can still wander around the old hotel and not eat. Take my advice, and if you must, eat across the street.

I checked out a small market just up the street, but found nothing remarkable. Just more of the same. Todos Santos is just another tourist town albeit on a much smaller scale than Cabo.

Back in the saddle again and I was headed for Loreto one more time. At the west end of La Paz there’s plenty of fuel all the way to the airport cutoff, so don’t be worried about turning off the highway and going into La Paz.

The ride north was uneventful.