Part 6: Mission San Francisco Borja to Punta Final

20110303

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The Trip

The mission tour was pretty cool and we saw nearly everything there was to see at that site.  When the tour was complete, we headed out to Bahia Los Angles for diesel, ice and a supply stop.  From there, we backtracked to Mex 1, then north to the turnoff for Bahia Gonzaga on the gulf side.  Our destination was Punta Final on the south side of Gonzaga bay.

The road from Mex 1 to Gonzaga truly sucked.  While graded, it was heavily traveled and badly washborded.  The entire group agreed that this was one of the worst segments that we suffered during the trip.  OK, the second worst.  The worst would come tomorrow.

The Photos

The photos below are what we saw.

The terrain around the mission had some nice stands of cactus.  Near the mission, the road was recently graded allowing a comfortable 15 mph travel speed.  Nearly light-speed for baja.

This is a bud from one of the many species of cholla that exist in baja.  These do the devil's work.  The spines are long and strong and have microscopic barbs on the end to catch on animal tissue.  The buds "migrate" by sticking into the flesh on passing animals and when the spines soak in sufficient moisture, the barbs retract and allow the bud to fall off the animal.  The bud then grows in its new location.  These are bad, bad news.  And being from Arizona where there is plenty of cholla, I have many awful stories about it.

We stopped short of the pavement to air up.

Bob got this shot of the 1017 in transit.

Our first view of Bahia Los Angeles.  Note the white island in the center.  It is white due to bird droppings.

The bay is quite beautiful although LA Bay has grown a bit since the last time I was here 15 years ago.

We hit the Pemex for diesel and the mercado for ice and other important supplies like Ruffles and pan dulce.  Then we went to the beach to have lunch.

While we were at the beach, the Mexican Marines came by in their new U4000 unimog.

You cannot see in this reduced size photo, but the crew in the front are smiling.  We wanted them to stop, but they did not.

We saddle up to leave after lunch and Dan suffers a mechanical failure on his step.  A benign failure, but given the height of the truck it makes ingress and egress a hassle.  I have broken off steps on both sides of my 1300L, but I sheared the mounting bolts on rocks rather than fatiguing the mount itself.

WTF is this?  Oh, only rebar sticking out of the road from some unfinished concrete work below the surface of the road.  The black trash bag was the "marker" for this obstacle.  If you hit this, you WILL get a flat.


Our path took us past the "famous" Coco's Corner.  Coco has overpriced beer, sodas and rooms if you end up stranded after dark on your motorcycle.  The rooms are the pickup campers on the ground.

The viewing area for the TV.  Also note the spray paint artwork on the shacks in the rear of the photo.

There were some interesting photos on the wall.

We arrived at Punta Final near sunset and camped on the beach.  The bay at PF is shown in the photo above.

This fellow was very friendly although a bit mangy.  We did feed and water him and he drank several 16 oz glasses of water which is a lot for that sized animal.  Several of the team heard him fighting with the coyotes during the night and he had fresh, bleeding sores, so we figured that he was bit by them.

Kai cooked us great steaks for dinner and we had a calm night, one of the few on this trip.  Next morning was bright, clear and hot.  Above, a view up the beach at Punta Final the following morning.

There are small sand dunes at the point so we drove there for a photo.

The road from Mex 1 to Gonzaga truly sucked.  This road is heavily traveled by Americans who think they are running the Baja 1000 so they go too fast with high tire pressure.  The results are world-class wash boards that make travel quite uncomfortable.

Next objective: Guadalupe Canyon.

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Photos and Text Copyright Bill Caid 2011, all rights reserved.
For your enjoyment only, not for commercial use.