BajaNomad - Mesa el Avion climb, Matomi Wash View, Up the Matomi canyon

Mesa el Avion climb, Matomi Wash View, Up the Matomi canyon

David K - 3-21-2004 at 10:35 PM

Mexitron has more great photos from the wild country south of Arroyo Matomi taken in 2003... They are added to his 1995 Matomi climb web page photo: http://community-2.webtv.net/thebaja/mexitron

The three new pictures start at http://community-2.webtv.net/thebaja/mexitron/page4.html

[Edited on 7-25-2004 by David K]

David K - 7-25-2004 at 09:28 AM

Four more photos added from Mexitron's camera of the hike up Matomi Canyon beyond the ranch. http://community-2.webtv.net/TheBaja/mexitron/page5.html

Thanks

bajalou - 7-25-2004 at 11:07 AM

Thanks David and Mexitron for the great pics. What an area!!!!

:biggrin:

David K - 7-25-2004 at 11:10 AM

Yah, they are good Lou... these were taken the day after we met Mexitron, Pappy, Huddo, and Taco de Baja in Parral Canyon.

bajalou - 7-25-2004 at 11:39 AM

I remember, David. It was a nice meet there - too bad we didn't have more time to trade "Baja Tales" with them as we did later around the fire.

:biggrin:

Drinking water

synch - 9-21-2004 at 11:34 AM

Those green pools were probably refreshing, but what about drinking water?

Is the standard backpacking filter adequate to prevent the bad stuff from getting consumed?
You had to be drinking tons of water...

Mexitron - 9-21-2004 at 06:40 PM

No problem with a water filter.....there's some cattle in the area so drinking straight is a little iffy.

Neal Johns - 9-21-2004 at 10:37 PM

Thanks, David K and Mexitron.
Great pictures not available elsewhere.

Water safety

thebajarunner - 9-22-2004 at 05:41 PM

Any Western hiker will tell you that "drinking straight" is an invitation to disaster, no matter how clean and clear the water appears.
We have a nasty little thing called Giardia, which is hosted in the small intestine and will graciously attack all kinds of internal organs.
A friend of mine drank nice clear clean sparkling stream water in the Sierras a couple years ago and died 6 months later from this little guy.
Green or clean, always use a filter, no matter how high you think you are in the mountains.

Baja Arriba!!

David K - 9-22-2004 at 05:49 PM

Then what did people do before these filters were invented... for a million or so years? Just die after drinking? Junipero Serra (and thousands more) walked from Loreto to San Francisco drinking from worse water sources than the one you describe (have you seen Yubay or Agua Dulce in dry years?).

I am not diss'ing you Dick, I believe you. But, I am curious... is that Giardia germ something new? Something Saddam mailed us before W stopped that from potentially happening?

what did people do???

thebajarunner - 9-22-2004 at 06:07 PM

David, there are two answers to that question...
1. Giardia seems to be a fairly recent curse upon our society. It spreads both through human and through animal waste, which explains why it has moved through the back country like it has.
Yeah, I can remember many, many hikes in Yosemite in the 50's, drinking out of every crick we crossed. Those days are gone.

2. My nephew is a MD/PhD- Chem. doing full time research at Stanford. I ask him questions like you asked about health in the "good old days." Dr. Joe always grins and says, "Uncle Dickie, back then an old man was 35 or 40, today an old man is 80 or 90 0r 100."

Look up Giardia on Google, it will ruin your day.

Baja Arriba!!

Mexitron - 9-22-2004 at 08:44 PM

You have to consider the source of the water, if lots of cattle are present, and also the amount of human activity. The Sierras are overrun by people and there is not much topsoil to absorb all the waste--so naturally the bacteria counts will be high.

However, on our trek to the Mission San Pedro Martir I drank right out of the Rio San Antonio, El Horno, and Segundo rivers with no problems( everybody else filtered their water, except the vaqueros). The source of those rivers is a fairly clean Sierra San Pedro Martir with few cattle........

David K - 9-22-2004 at 10:02 PM

Thanks Mexitron... that just proves, for hiking... Baja IS Better! :yes:

Barefoot in Chernobyl

thebajarunner - 9-23-2004 at 02:56 PM

You guys are scary!! Sounds like the smoker who knew someone who smoked and did not get cancer so cigs. must be o.k.!
Seriously, this Giardia is serious stuff, and it is not localized to the California Sierras.
Believe what you want, I just hope that others will heed the warning and buy a good filter or use the dreaded iodine pills.

Baja Arriba!!

Geothermal-Shane - 5-14-2005 at 11:48 PM

I was hiking with a friend through a large park in Los Angeles during the heavy winter rains- we came across a small flowing creek that seeped up from a hole in the ground and he drank the water unfiltered! He never had any problems...y' just don't know. Maybe it was his strong indiginous roots.

El Camote - 5-15-2005 at 11:04 AM

Giardia is nothing to mess with. The symptoms don't appear until a week after ingestion and then they hit like gangbusters. Giardia is stored in a cyst that can go dormant in the winter months and reappear in the spring. Prior to 1970 there was no known cases of Giardia but they believe it has always existed. Cryptosporidium is another parasite protozoan found in drinking water and is similar to Giardia but much more common and resistant to chlorine.

There's a great book out called "How To Sh*t In The Woods" - An environmentally sound approach to a lost art by Kathleen Meyer. It graphically describes how to deal with your poo-poo (sorry, too much time with the baby lately) in the outdoors dependent on soil and climate. Very appropriate toilet read. I'd give it 4 johnny mops up out of 5.

Speaking of Giardia, I once contracted a horrible travelers disease which makes you feel like you're stuck for an eternity in a New York airport...it's called LaGuardia! :spingrin: