1998/9 Baja, Mexico / California Trip

Merry Christmas! Santa Claus did deliver presents to the kids this morning. We woke up at 6:30 and the kids were awake waiting for us so they could open the presents. It seems as if Santa Claus gave the kids many presents that they could play with in the truck. Shawna got a camera and books while Jacob got a Nintendo cartridge for his Gameboy. It was a little different having Christmas in a hotel and in 70 degree weather rather than snow, but we all enjoyed the morning. We checked out of the hotel at 8:00 in the morning and went to Fiesta Tacoa Restaurant for breakfast. The waiter didn't speak English and the order got a little messed up but it was still OK. Cindy and I had Chicken Chilequiles with eggs and the kids had pancakes. Everybody was happy with the food. You would think most of the shops and restaurants would be closed on Christmas day but they weren't. People went about their day much as usual, but you could still feel it was a different kind of day. When business transactions weren't taking place, people were exchanging or opening presents. At our hotel we had to ask for extra towels and interrupt the owner's family gathering, but they didn't seem to mind. At the restaurant, a baby's playpen held gifts and when they weren't busy they would open gifts.

We walked around the marina and tourist shops for a little while. Calling mom was something we had promised her on Christmas day and that was an experience. You first have to find the right phone that will accept AT&T that would let us use our calling card to get the cheapest rates. There are different color phones that charge different prices. We finally found the right phone and then we had to figure out that we still had insert a few pesos to use the number that AT&T had told us to use to call to make a calling card call. We finally talked to mom and informed her that everything was going great, no problems as of yet and to have a great Christmas. We bought a couple mugs, a Mexican doll and an eagle for the kids before going back to the truck. We drove around the town more as there are lots of dirt roads just a few blocks from the main tourist area and also saw many families enjoying Christmas. As we drove out of town we caught a glimpse of a family with their garage door open. They were twirling a blindfolded person around getting ready to hit a piñata.

We left town around 11:30 am and it was about 70 degrees. We drove east along the coast line and would go to San Jose del Cabo. Here is a nice town that is still not real touristy yet, but will be soon. It has a main street with lots of shops. There were also many kids with new bikes and toys playing in the town plaza. After walking around a couple streets for an hour we left town and started on an unpaved sandy road. We had anticipated going east around the cape as this would take us by some new housing projects that were being built with a view overlooking the ocean. After passing the houses we were closer to the beach and stopped a couple times to walk to the ocean. You had to work your way thru sand dunes that were covered with cactus and other vegetation. Some times you could walk out to the water. Other times the sand dunes were too steep to get to the water. Finally about fifteen miles east of town a motorist stopped and told us the road was washed out ahead. We drove about a mile further and then turned around. There were donkeys along the side of the road and also one person driving a herd of cattle across the road. We found out later that if you took the gravel road near the airport that was north of here, you would bypass the wash out and be able to drive the loop around the peninsula. At the time we were unaware of that.

We got back to San Jose del Cabo one more time and saw families waiting to go into the church for Christmas mass all dressed in nice clothes. We drove on the outskirts of town and realized that this is a larger town then we thought. We finally decide to leave and went north on Highway 1 as we wanted to get to La Paz tonight. Santa Rosa, Santa Anita and Miraflores are small quiet farming villages off of the highway as we went north. We drove around each one for a couple minutes before continuing, you could tell they are not used to tourists as everybody looked at us as we drove by. The town of Santiago was further north and two miles off of the highway. We drove past palm trees, orchards and corn fields as this town is located on two hills. There is also a zoo here and there is supposed to be a gravel road that will take you to a canyon with a hot spring. We wanted to make La Paz by dusk and decided not to stop. If I'm down here again I would like to take these gravel roads into the Sierra de la Laguna mountains to the other side of the peninsula to Todos Santos. San Bartolo is another small town in a valley that currently survives on farming. The next town is San Antonio which was an old mining town for silver in the mid 1700's. El Triunfo is the next little village which was also known for mining and has an old smelter remaining. You can see many remains of old building in the hills and near the highway as you drive by El Truinfo.

We finally get into La Paz around 5:00 and the first thing we did was get more gas for tomorrow. After that we went down to the water and walked along the pier as it was getting dark. The pier had Christmas lights with metal benches, planters and the church bells also were going off. We ate dinner at Carlo's & Charlies. The food was good as Cindy had Lobster, I had a shrimp sauté and the kids had American food. They also had some swings that the kids could play on while we were waiting for food. That gave Cindy and I a chance to relax for a while. After dinner we drove around for an hour looking for a cheap hotel. At first we couldn't find anything cheap or expensive except for along the the waterfront. Finally we found Hotel Aquario that had a nice room for $40 in the downtown area. This was larger than the hotels that we had been staying at, had a swimming pool and appeared more Americanized than any place we had stayed at so far. We all went to bed around 9:00 as it had been a long day.

We drove only 200 miles today and 2800 total.