Day 27 Ciudad Insurgentes to San Ignacio - Halfway up Baja Peninsula

 

We have made it about halfway up the Baja Peninsula in two days of driving. It really helped to spend two nights at Four Points RV Park 

It was sad to leave our Friends but once we were on the road the thrill of adventure and the pull of being home in a week or so helped propel us down the road (under 80 KPH!). A constant reminder to take it slowly and be prepared for anything are the numerous roadside memorials for people who have died on the highway. Hispanic culture honors the deceased so much more than we do in the U.S. (the Disney movie Coco depicts this well). They believe the spirits are with us and they build quite elaborate little houses as memorials.

 

We saw a lot of private security vehicles on the road, presumably picking up money from stores after the Mexican Semana Santa (Holy Week)  holiday where lots of people go on vacation.

We saw a lot of soldiers when we stopped at a supermercado in Lareto. Some wear black face masks and all carry big AK-47 guns. They look very intimidating and never laugh at my jokes (which I don't tell). They have a very Dirty Harry vibe. "Adelante Punk, hazme el día." (Go ahead punk, make my day.)

We listened to music and marveled at the scenery.  I actually enjoy the challenging road, especially through the mountains and we are all handling it better on the way back now that I'm keeping it under 80 km max and not popping wheelies in the motorhome to impress the locals.

We arrived in San Ignacio and are staying at the same beautiful oasis campground  we stayed at 2 weeks ago, 2 blocks from downtown. We looked forward to seeing the little black town dog who loved hanging out with us last time. We backed into our spot with a beautiful view of  palm trees and the huge lava deposit next to the campground.

After popping out, and taking the Boys for a walk we headed downtown to one of the few places we have found IPA beer. The little town was bustling and all the outside tables, except one were taken. We ordered two Baja Brewing IPA's and some chips and salsa. There were 2 young people sitting next to us and we saw the little black dog. Oliver and Julia are from Vancouver Island and we connected right away so we joined them at their table. They are staying next to us at the campground. We were delighted to find they are adopting "Izzie" the black dog, (for San Ignacio). Julia recently graduated with a degree in wildlife biology and is working remotely on data entry. They have been traveling since February and are staying in Baja until June

We went back to the campground and we mentioned that the Falcon 9 launch was happening at 7:30.  (We saw another launch when we were camping on the beach at Bahia de Concepcion a couple weeks ago. Everyone was dazzled by the display.

We invited Julia and Oliver over for dinner and had fun chatting with them. Afterwards, we settled in for some time with Comet as the Boys snoozed next to us. Tomorrow will be a challenging day as the road from Guerrero Negro to Catavina was really bad but hopefully it will be better this time now that I've learned not to break the sound barrier in the motorhome.