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David K
Honored Nomad
Posts: 64722
Registered: 8-30-2002
Location: San Diego County
Member Is Offline
Mood: Have Baja Fever
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| Quote: | Originally posted by David K
| Quote: | Originally posted by DavidE
David,
Do you have a couple of maps comparing la cuesta del diablo from the early 60's as compared to today. Either my memory is fading or the early road was
not anywhere near the present paved road. Meaning at least a few hundred meters to a couple of miles. |
Hi David,
The old road is very near the highway and if you look at Google Earth you can follow the two and see where the highway goes over the top of the old
road of the 1960's you and I remember!
My dad, in a rush to get to Mulege to start fishing, drove through San Ignacio and down the grade at night!!! I was asleep for that, but he told me he
had to back up a few times just to make the hairpin turns in the grade down! The last place we saw in daylight that day was Rancho Los Angeles,
between El Arco and San Ignacio. |
Okay, here you go David... The Cuesta del Infierno (not Diablo), looking NORTH. The old road is at the bottom heading straight east then switchbacks
down. The new highway (this section was built in '72) turns northeast and goes into the canyon.
Is there interest in a post on the old road from San Ignacio to La Paz (via Comondu)?
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DavidE
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3814
Registered: 12-1-2003
Location: Baja California México
Member Is Offline
Mood: 'At home we demand facts and get them. In Mexico one subsists on rumor and never demands anything.' Charles Flandrau,
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The temperature was near 110F and sweat was dripping in my eyes. I could not then believe it was going to get worse, but the humidity ramped up. We
were in Jeep # 5 and the dust was incredible. The embankment side was vertical with a capital V in places with car size boulders just hanging there.
There was actually oiled gravel or pavement passing by Sta Rosalia. It was hard to tell. My butt was sore. The stack of Carta Blanca cases I was
sitting on were all empty and all the drivers and passengers were cranky and caked with dirt. We stopped at the sea and then waded-in clothes and all.
Tony lost his Bulova watch. It may still be out there, as it was gold or filled or something. We went into town dripping, and I bought an entire
Marqueta of hielo from the ice plant. It made a hell of a nice seat until everyone returned and knives and hatchets were used to carve it up to cool
the beer. The beer minus the bottle deposit was a little over nine cents U.S. Coca Cola cost seven cents.
After suffering 120+ degrees in breezeless Sta Rosalia, we hauled booty for Mulege. Two hours and fifty minutes. The big arroyo south of town was a
mess and only cargo trucks from La Paz were attempting to cross the debris and water. Everyone wanted to camp but I said screwit and paid a dollar
eighty cents (20 pesos) for a room, five foot bed, candle, virgin of guadalupe hanging on a wall, and gravity fed shower at the end of the corridor
along with the toilet that was flushed with a bucket. The spigot was fifty feet away so I filled it with shower water. Tacos cost seventeen cents for
two. They were made of machaca, and cabbage with nuclear-fuel-rod grade salsa. That night I learned two new words Peenche Zancudos! The windows had no
glass.
A Lot To See And A Lot To Do
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David K
Honored Nomad
Posts: 64722
Registered: 8-30-2002
Location: San Diego County
Member Is Offline
Mood: Have Baja Fever
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The Hotel Central or Hotel Frances on the mesa? I am guessing the Central!
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DavidE
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3814
Registered: 12-1-2003
Location: Baja California México
Member Is Offline
Mood: 'At home we demand facts and get them. In Mexico one subsists on rumor and never demands anything.' Charles Flandrau,
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One street south of the calle principal, then one half block east on the left side. Wood. Had a huge veranda. Wooden sidewalks. I bet I slept three
hours and woke up, grabbed the candle and went back to the shower. Owner had turned off the water. Fumbling around, found valve. Candle blew out.
Inched by braille to the regadera soaked in the shower, tried to find the valve again but could not. In the morning, a leak had drained the concrete
tank. The owner was not pleased. In the morning, there was nothing that looked like today's bolillo in the panaderia. I learned about sweet Mexican
bread and the worst powder (not powdered but powDER instant coffee) the water tasted like radiator drainings, the coffee worse, and the ice plant used
ammonia so the ice was uneatable. Back to Coca Cola. I was covered in insect bites, and at the time I did not know it but I was then doomed to spend
the next three days with Moctezuma's revenge. Ever unflap a pup tent fly (mosquitoes) and make a run for the brush ten times a night? Mangrove's ain't
cool to do stuff in. There seemed to be a lot more mangroves then. We stayed on Playa Los Cocos not Santispac. They were boiling water to purify it
for me to drink. Saltine crackers. Lomotil? Jajajajajaja! Try te de perro. Gallons of it. The sugar in the coke saved me I think. The day I left the
hotel I wandered down to the beach and that's when I got sunburned and did not get a stinking bite never mind a fish. Our insect repellent was
citronella and my sleeping bag (unzipped as a mattress) was kapok. Jim brought 2 jeep containers of white gas. I sacrificed my precious chamois
because everyone agreed that since I had sold my '53 Ford to come on the trip I did not need a chamois. So it was used as a pre-fuel-filter.
Rosa declared I looked like death-warmed-over so they conjured up a pot of caldo de siete mares. I had eaten so much abalone and lobster over on the
Pacific side that the clams and crab and fish (I think it was cabrilla) tasted great. They wanted to go into Mulege and see the prisoners go to their
jobs in town and I stayed behind. I spent the day in the water with a sheet wrapped around me to protect from the sun. The next day the group went
back to town and touring the prison I met a fellow through the bars in his cell that was not allowed to leave. He was convicted of rape. He told me he
made the mistake of getting frisky with the alcalde's daughter in Empalme, and he was sentenced to i forget how many years in el reclusorio. He sold
me a nice abalone shell all gussied up for ten cents.
I had seven or eight reels of 8mm movies of that trip including three just of the barrows on Malarrimo beach. The treasure trove. Tony's treasured
purple Japanese glass float, the box of morphine ampules, the ten foot (?) diameter redwood tree all shorn of bark and turning gray. Hundreds of left
foot only pink flip-flops. Someone had found the burgee of the submarine Wahoo there I found out later. It had floated all the way across the Pacific.
Every day was none to twenty adventures depending. It was a pain having to have Rosa translate everything. She grew tired of being the interpreter all
the time. Rancho Chapala, Los Arcos, the Castro Ranch, the Arces and Arce Arces of Mulege. When we rolled back into the driveway my clothes were
shredded, fishing rod broken by something in the jeep, reel clogged forever by the dust of Laguna Chapala, and a head totally intoxicated with Mexico.
A Lot To See And A Lot To Do
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David K
Honored Nomad
Posts: 64722
Registered: 8-30-2002
Location: San Diego County
Member Is Offline
Mood: Have Baja Fever
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| Quote: | Originally posted by DavidE
One street south of the calle principal, then one half block east on the left side. Wood. Had a huge veranda. Wooden sidewalks. I bet I slept three
hours and woke up, grabbed the candle and went back to the shower. Owner had turned off the water. Fumbling around, found valve. Candle blew out.
Inched by braille to the regadera soaked in the shower, tried to find the valve again but could not. In the morning, a leak had drained the concrete
tank. The owner was not pleased. In the morning, there was nothing that looked like today's bolillo in the panaderia. I learned about sweet Mexican
bread and the worst powder (not powdered but powDER instant coffee) the water tasted like radiator drainings, the coffee worse, and the ice plant used
ammonia so the ice was uneatable. Back to Coca Cola. I was covered in insect bites, and at the time I did not know it but I was then doomed to spend
the next three days with Moctezuma's revenge. Ever unflap a pup tent fly (mosquitoes) and make a run for the brush ten times a night? Mangrove's ain't
cool to do stuff in. There seemed to be a lot more mangroves then. We stayed on Playa Los Cocos not Santispac. They were boiling water to purify it
for me to drink. Saltine crackers. Lomotil? Jajajajajaja! Try te de perro. Gallons of it. The sugar in the coke saved me I think. The day I left the
hotel I wandered down to the beach and that's when I got sunburned and did not get a stinking bite never mind a fish. Our insect repellent was
citronella and my sleeping bag (unzipped as a mattress) was kapok. Jim brought 2 jeep containers of white gas. I sacrificed my precious chamois
because everyone agreed that since I had sold my '53 Ford to come on the trip I did not need a chamois. So it was used as a pre-fuel-filter.
Rosa declared I looked like death-warmed-over so they conjured up a pot of caldo de siete mares. I had eaten so much abalone and lobster over on the
Pacific side that the clams and crab and fish (I think it was cabrilla) tasted great. They wanted to go into Mulege and see the prisoners go to their
jobs in town and I stayed behind. I spent the day in the water with a sheet wrapped around me to protect from the sun. The next day the group went
back to town and touring the prison I met a fellow through the bars in his cell that was not allowed to leave. He was convicted of rape. He told me he
made the mistake of getting frisky with the alcalde's daughter in Empalme, and he was sentenced to i forget how many years in el reclusorio. He sold
me a nice abalone shell all gussied up for ten cents.
I had seven or eight reels of 8mm movies of that trip including three just of the barrows on Malarrimo beach. The treasure trove. Tony's treasured
purple Japanese glass float, the box of morphine ampules, the ten foot (?) diameter redwood tree all shorn of bark and turning gray. Hundreds of left
foot only pink flip-flops. Someone had found the burgee of the submarine Wahoo there I found out later. It had floated all the way across the Pacific.
Every day was none to twenty adventures depending. It was a pain having to have Rosa translate everything. She grew tired of being the interpreter all
the time. Rancho Chapala, Los Arcos, the Castro Ranch, the Arces and Arce Arces of Mulege. When we rolled back into the driveway my clothes were
shredded, fishing rod broken by something in the jeep, reel clogged forever by the dust of Laguna Chapala, and a head totally intoxicated with Mexico.
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You caught 'Baja Fever'... or at least the 'Baja Bug' with THAT trip! Any of the 8mm movies survive?
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DavidE
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3814
Registered: 12-1-2003
Location: Baja California México
Member Is Offline
Mood: 'At home we demand facts and get them. In Mexico one subsists on rumor and never demands anything.' Charles Flandrau,
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Sadly, no David. I had some stills made though and they are surviving in a friend's attic I hope, in Acme, Washington...
A Lot To See And A Lot To Do
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rts551
Elite Nomad
Posts: 6699
Registered: 9-5-2003
Member Is Offline
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sure wish you could bump your threads without it affecting todays posts. Maybe an option like "my threads"?
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BajaNomad
Super Administrator
Posts: 4994
Registered: 8-1-2002
Location: San Diego, CA
Member Is Offline
Mood: INTP-A
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Quote: Originally posted by rts551  | | sure wish you could bump your threads without it affecting todays posts. Maybe an option like "my threads"? |
Use the "Add to Favorites" link at the top of the page. You can keep a list of favorite threads for your personal review/reference.
fyi
When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people.
– Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel
We know we must go back if we live, and we don`t know why.
– John Steinbeck, Log from the Sea of Cortez
Affordable Domain Name Registration/Management & cPanel Web Hosting:
https://www.regionalinternet.com |
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rts551
Elite Nomad
Posts: 6699
Registered: 9-5-2003
Member Is Offline
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| Quote: Originally posted by BajaNomad | | Quote: Originally posted by rts551 | | sure wish you could bump your threads without it affecting todays posts. Maybe an option like "my threads"? |
Use the "Add to Favorites" link at the top of the page. You can keep a list of favorite threads for your personal review/reference.
fyi |
was actually looking for the opposite. I use "today's posts" to see something new....not numerous posts bumped.
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David K
Honored Nomad
Posts: 64722
Registered: 8-30-2002
Location: San Diego County
Member Is Offline
Mood: Have Baja Fever
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Part 4 bump
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