I finally put together a short video of the whales that visited us at Scammon's Lagoon, in Baja, Mexico.
But I guess I should start at the beginning.
We left on a Friday March 24th, and drove to California, spending the night in Yuma, Arizona. Shangri-La was not what I expected, more like Shangri-blah, but it was only overnight. We drove on the next day to Potrero County Park in California. Part of our journey was on State Route 94, with BIG signs saying no trucks or RV's over 40 feet allowed. Well, we drive an RV, yes, it has a truck engine, and it is 45 feet long, hum.... It was a little scary, unbeknownst to us, this section of the road is known for it's curves, climbs and boulders. But we made it to Potrero unscathed!
We spent the night in Potrero, and met up with our little caravan group. Our tour was through "Baja Winters" touring company. John and Becky Smith are the tour operators and made this a great experience for all of us.
On Sunday, March 26th, five motorhomes, with Becky and John in the lead (in their truck), we went to the border crossing at Tecate, Mexico. We stopped and exchanged dollars for pesos before crossing the border. Then each one of us crossed through. As Ian and I crossed through, one of our cats decided to use the litter box, in a big way. It is a unique way to prevent border guards from spending time in your rig inspecting it. It really smelled bad...
From there, we all met at a grocery store parking lot, after that, we all followed the "wagon master". We all had CB radios, Becky called out stop signs, stop lights, potholes, 18 wheelers and crazy drivers. Also, pointing out local flora, fauna and the occasional stray animal in the road.
Deceptively nice roads.
Our 1st night was in Estero, on a beautiful bay.
We went to a natural blowhole called La Bufadora, that turned out to be a huge area for vendors to sell trinkets. The tide was out, and the blowhole wasn't "blowing", oh well, it was a nice drive and an interesting area.
We had an excellent meal, at the resort restaurant. Afterwards, it was a beautiful walk back to our rig. I then proceeded to the incredibly hot, hot tub, with just bubbles and stars all around. It was so quiet a peaceful. Then a group of folks showed up with coolers, music and their kids. It was late, I went back to our rig.
The next morning we drove to our next camping spot. To my delight, it was directly on the beach! We pulled our rig up to the dune that peered over the ocean. The RV park is called El Pabellon.
This is the view from our front window.
I'm standing on the dune looking back at our motorhome.
Unfortunately, it was really windy!
We were going to have a potluck on the beach but Ian and I ended up inviting everyone to our rig. We now know we can feed, and sit, 14 people comfortably in our motorhome! With a few extra chairs, we all shared a potluck meal along with tamales and margaritas supplied by Baja Winters!
The next day was a long trek down to Guerrero Negro. With Becky calling out the crazy drivers, 18 wheelers, donkeys, dogs, cacti, potholes and people bicycling the wrong way on the road. We carefully watched the edges of the road, actually, there are no edges of the road, just a ragged drop off.
We went through some beautiful scenery of boulders and cacti
After a long drive, often at under 40 mph, we made it to our next campground.
Malarrimo
This campground also has a wonderful restaurant, hotel rooms and RV sites with iffy water and spotty power. But, they also were the providers of the whale tours! So we couldn't ask for more! We all decided to eat dinner there our first night even though we were all eating there again the next night courtesy of Baja Winters!
But the real attraction, was the whales!
To have these massive creatures, come up to you, is a once in a lifetime experience for me. To think that humans virtually hunted these whales to extinction. In this lagoon, the mother whales come up to your boat first. They turn on their sides and look at you, then she would allow us to stroke her. She then allowed her baby to come up to us. She actually would go under her baby, and lift the calf up to us. No one seems to understand this behavior, but to have a 40 to 45 foot whale, look you in the eye, and bring her young to you, is life changing.
We were able to spend 2 days visiting the whales, an experience none of us will ever forget.
After our second day of visiting the whales, we packed up and drove up to Rancho Santa Ynez Ranch. We were served a "bunkhouse" dinner and stayed overnight in their fields. It was a wonderful quiet place to stay after the excitement of 2 days of whales.
The next day we drove up to Santo Tomas Winery, we were able to park near the vines and had a "Sensory Wine Tasting Tour". I really enjoyed their wines and ended up purchasing a case! Ahhh, consumables, not collectables! Life is good. Ok, I did get a wine glass also. I have to many wine glasses and had to give one to Lisa, one of the wonderful folks on this trip. I hope she enjoys it!
Our last night was spent at Rancho Sordo Mudo. They have an RV park that take donations in lieu of money. They run a school for deaf children. Ian purchased many things that they needed. I'm glad we could do some good.
We spent the afternoon visiting wineries, eating at an amazing food truck at a winery, driving down crazy dirt roads and looking at the beautiful views of the wine country.
The next morning, a few of us chose to eat breakfast with the children and the staff at Rancho Sordo Mudo. It was a humbling experience and we were so impressed at the dedication of this mission. http://ranchosordomudo.com/
We decided to leave after breakfast and pass on the other vineyards we were to visit. Thank goodness we did. We broke down in El Centro, California and had to have our muffler system put back on our RV. That, is another story!
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