- Had to blow up my pad during the night – Humidity or temp change?
- Can hear cows everywhere and so many birds – Heard a pair of owls before bed
- Ran into Don and Julia – Juneau alaska
- Had to scurry under a barbed wire fence
What Happened
Today was honestly more of a slog than I thought it would be. I woke up to all of my things being significantly more wet than they were when I went to sleep, I guess that’s what happens when the relative humidity is about 75% all the time. I waited until the sun came up to start moving, I really didn’t want to have to navigate a more difficult area in the dark – and I’m glad that I did. By the time the sun was fully up, I was having a more difficult time route finding than in the past. The route through this section was significantly more difficult to find and stay on. Most of the time when my Garmin head unit tells me that I’m off trail, I kind of ignore it and think that it has lost GPS for a moment. That multiple points this morning, it saved my bacon by telling me and then allowing me to look at my phone. The route snaked between “road“ and savel: sandy gravel. That’s just what I happened to call it and I’m sticking with it.
It honestly made me really happy that I pushed so hard yesterday and was able to cover the amount of miles that I did. While I didn’t get the best sleep, my back really hurts, I think that I would’ve been more upset today had I not made it into town. The miles were slow and most of the time I was in some form of sand. There were some points today, where even going downhill and pedaling, I had a hard time keeping enough momentum to push through the sand. This wore me down pretty good and the sand coupled with the abnormally hot temperatures really took a toll. I felt like I was unable to drink enough water or stay hydrated, even though I ran out of water by the time I reached town.
Oh and I had to sneak under a barbed wire fence….
In town, things didn’t go so swimmingly either. I had a hard time finding somewhere to eat. Even though I got to town right around noon, that seemed to be the time when most places closed. I got honked at multiple times which was new for me – one car even followed me a little bit and continued to honk at me. Sorry, no one in Mexico has stopped at a stop sign so I wasn’t going to either when you were 50ft away from it.
The first place I went to for lunch literally served the people in front of me food and then told me that the kitchen was closed – they were only speaking Spanish but I was told multiple times “closed”. I sat in that cafe for a minute just bewildered and perplexed because everyone around me was having food delivered to them. After using their restroom, I headed back out for food. I tried my best to find places on google – which is a hard thing here because that’s pretty misleading most of the time – and eventually landed on some place near the beach I wanted to go.
I got there a little after 1pm – when google said they opened and they were absolutely closed. The owners saw me and said they could make me hamburger if I was cool without table service – so I did that. The burger was pretty good and the fries were perfect. Not the big meal I was envisioning – but it ended up holding me over, so that’s something.
After lunch I went and got some more water and new tortillas – the ones from last night were horrible – then headed down to the beach. This beach access is pretty good, but was quite populated during the day. I also came to the conclusion that i liked the gulf of California side more: I am able to read facing the water (my body casts a shadow that I then put my feet into), I can snorkel, and I think that side is just prettier. Not to say this side isn’t pretty or the ocean is not nice, I am just spoiled.
The highlight today was absolutely getting to see whales tails, arms, and breaching. I had called Grace a few minutes before I spotted the first whale and we continued to talk while I saw the whole experience. That was the one thing, above all else, that I wanted to see during my time in Baja. I’ve waited years- both in dreaming about Baja and when I was on hwy 1 – of being able to see whales. I am hoping this continues!!
I am camping on the beach tonight with my tent fully zipped down – which makes me sad. The low tonight is only 70 so I am not even using my summer bag. It’s going to be a hot one
in a very tragic turn of events, it seems as if I may have lost my journal entry from yesterday. Notion was off-line when I made the entry and it’s not showing up anymore 🙁
It came back thank god
Pics
Originally recorded on 2025-12-27.