Just Paul's Baja Fiesta Mas Fina

[fudgypup]

This shall serve as the ride report. We cross the border at Tecate Sunday morning around 10:00 am. Follow my SPOT or the others (Just Paul, CaliKarl, etc...).

Here is how Just Paul introduced the ride:


Hey Adv'ers,


Cain and Bartek and I are looking for 1 or 2 more riders to go on another epic Baja trip but nobody has stepped up.

Riding is alot more fun in a group of 4 to 6 riders and adds an extra level of safety if someone gets hurt or needs gas etc...

I have gone to Baja each year since 2008 around this time and had a great trip every time


The Trip will be 85% dirt

camp from the bike is also required..

130 Mile range is needed

you must know how to patch a tube and reinstall it on your bike or replace the tube with one that you are carrying

The riders right now are

Paul- Plated Honda 450x
Cain- Ktm 530exc
Bartek- Ktm 990
Fudgypup - BMW GSA
CaliKarl - BMW f800gs
Steve -
Mark -

Paul and Cain are good offroad riders and have been to Baja before
Bartek is a good offroad rider but this will be his first big trip offroad

The perfect match would be 1 or 2 more big bikes (800gs, 990, Etc) and 1 more smaller bike (450, 530) that is a faster rider.

The dates would be

Leave April 15th
Return home Saturday April 21st

We typically ride about 130 miles per day.. each day.

Thanks,

Paul

[fudgypup]

Little update here on day four here in El Rosario.

Im sure others will weigh in later with more details but lets just say the riding is epic! Everyone safe. No injuries, no flats.

Tomorrow is Camalu then Ojos Negros on friday

[David13]

Where's the photos?
I just came back from a ride down to Cabo. I entered the US at Tecate on Thursday, the 12th.
How is the weather? I had heavy wind, and in the nothern Baja area, cold.
I didn't get nice and warm really til I got to Guerrero Negro.
dc

[fudgypup]

Originally Posted by David13

Where's the photos?
I just came back from a ride down to Cabo. I entered the US at Tecate on Thursday, the 12th.
How is the weather? I had heavy wind, and in the nothern Baja area, cold.
I didn't get nice and warm really til I got to Guerrero Negro.
dc

Just got home minutes ago. Pictures, videos, reports to follow in the next few days from all 7 of us.

Weather was great

[fudgypup]

Total miles: 1398
223 miles today home from Ojos Negros.

[fudgypup]

I think this first day was 196 miles from our meetup point in La Mesa at Denny's. CaliKarl stayed at my place the night before and we left my place at 6:30 to meet up with them at 8:00.

Here we are ready to head out. Mostly small bikes except for CaliKarl's f800gs, Bartek's 990 and my GSA.



We got across the border at Tecate with no delay and quickly found our first dirt trail. There was still a lot of mud puddles from the rain a few days earlier. I went through this one and the bow wave it created seemed like I was in a submarine or something. Can't wait to see the pics/video from that one. Went through one military checkpoint with no trouble at all. The smaller bikes (Paul, Steve, Cain) and the 990 (Bartek) went on and left us slower guys to form our own group B. CaliKarl was having a difficult time with the mud so when we got down to hwy 3, we let him hit that on to Mike's Sky Ranch. Mark and I continued on up into the mountains for some snow.


Wild stallions must run free




I had my first of just two get-off's here in the slushy snow trying to find the firmer rut and found myself in the soft shoulder. Mark was kind enough to help me lift my pig back up.

We descended out of the mountains and found our way back to hwy 3 in a little town called Heroes de la Independencia and we passed a little tienda where they sold gas out of 55 gallon drums. I said "hey Mark, how about you get some gas?" and he say's he's good....

Meanwhile, 5 miles down the road...

That's right, he ran out of gas. I went ahead to Valle de Trinidad and got some gas and brought it back. I was behind some mental patient who kept crossing the center line and slowing down. Not sure if he was messing with me or drunk or what. That made me realize one of the biggest hazards down there are drivers.

I learned then that it's best to always get gas when you have the chance. We got fully gassed up in V. de Trinidad and took the longer (and tougher) way up to Mike's Sky Rancho just before dark


We were greeted there by everyone else and had a really good dinner, joined by some other dirt bikers who'd come up from San Felipe that day. They very kindly shared their high dollar tequila with us and I traded them one of my "little brown friends from Havana." Wish I took more pictures there but got this one

[fudgypup]

Here's a cool app I used on the trip called everytrail

It will show you the tracks I rode with pictures along the way.

[M1Jeep]

Originally Posted by fudgypup

Here's a cool app I used on the trip called everytrail

It will show you the tracks I rode with pictures along the way.

Looking good, Eric! I like how that program geo tags the pics (or vice versa?). I am sooooo over due for a baja trip.

[fudgypup]

Originally Posted by M1Jeep

Looking good, Eric! I like how that program geo tags the pics (or vice versa?). I am sooooo over due for a baja trip.

It geotagged all my iPhone pics but I had to manually place the pics I uploaded that were taken on my regular camera.

[fudgypup]

Had a great night's sleep at Mike's, even with the random sleep-talking of one of my roommates With a good desayuno in our bellies we headed out to San Felipe.


Passed this cool little rancho


And some ponies


We headed out to the dry lake bed after getting Karl some of Mark's gas (remember: always get gas when you can). Here's Karl approaching. He didn't know we wanted him to do a high speed pass


Here's Steve taking a shot at the GSA. He was doing these huge sweepers then came by us pretty fast


Group shot


We then stopped to get a Coke at Jose's


Karl and I thought the sand was a bit deep so we called BMW roadside assistance and got this road grader to come by and flatten it out a bit. That f'er didn't bring ANY Starbucks like we asked for, so naturally we had him fired on the spot.


Made it to San Felipe for a great meal at Rice and Beans

Stopped at Puertocitos for a pic


Bartek ended up riding up the beach from San Felipe for like 20 miles! Dude, that must have been amazing! We got a bit of beach riding in somewhere around there. Just make sure you turn SLOWLY on the GSA.

And made it to Gonzaga Bay where the Pemex was closed for the day.


Alphonsina's is a great place, even if it didn't have hot water


Had some AMAZING food here. That was typical of the food in Baja. It's ALL good.

[Just Paul]

Here are a few pics from Day 1

Our Route..




we leave Denny's and Mark is working on his bike... I said geez mark the trip has not started yet and your working on your bike.. he said it will be my last time ! this turned out not to be true. LOL





The Gang about to Enter the Dirt in Tecate... This was a great first day. My favorite day of the trip.. Mud, Snow, Jumps, Roosting !




Bartek and Cain fly by !



Just a great pic !



Steve !






Cool Statue !




Nothing in Baja is ever Finished including this castle




5 trips to Baja and I have never seen SNOW ! we got to ride in it for about 15 minutes but it was the greatest 15 minutes



Kick ass tacos in Valle de trinidad




Cain Crossing the stream at Mikes !



STEVE !! BRAAAB !



Half of our Gang

Bartek soaking the camera and me... lucky it was waterproof




Steaks at Mikes..



The END of Day 1

[ian408]

BMW Roadside assistance sucks

Is that white shit snow? This was South of the Border, right?

[Just Paul]

Originally Posted by ian408

BMW Roadside assistance sucks

Is that white shit snow? This was South of the Border, right?

It was SNOW and it was SOOO FUN !

Ian once again you missed an amazing trip... maybe next year

[fudgypup]

Woke up to a beautiful sunrise at Gonzaga Bay. For some reason I didn't get a picture of it but stay tuned; I'm sure someone will post theirs.

Made a stop at the local market for some water


Then posed for a group pic near the palapas


It wasn't long before we got to Coco's Corner. What an amazing guy he is.


He has a huge love of life and loves to talk to people. We loved his stories peppered with pinche this and pinche that. We got him talking about the trouble he had getting his passport and he eventually gave up at getting it. Another story was the dreams or out of body experiences he had while in a coma in the hospital. We were honored that he asked us to help him do some minor construction work while we were there. For a 75 year old guy with amputated legs, he does more than most people half his age. We got some cokes then posed for some funny bare-assed shot you might see later.

A mother cat and her two kittens Coco was taking care of


Mark and I chose to follow the small bikes on this brief trip to see the "fountain of youth." It's a spring that has drizzled out its minerals to form this huge white slab over who knows how long. Because the big bike route that day was rather boring, we decided to do it.




Anyone know the story with these random piles of shells by the side of the road? We saw these a few times along the way to the spring. This isn't all that near to the beach so I'm not sure what they were doing there.

Here's a video of it. I managed to find it in some reeds above.


Then got Mark and Bartek doing a small water crossing



Mark and I went back to Coco's because the trail got too tricky after that. That's when I had my second of two spills. It was coming through another water crossing. The other side was really steep so I got up a bit more momentum than usual and then hit a large rock and lost my balance. The water was less than knee deep so no big deal. We got back to Coco's and did a bit more construction before moving on to Cataviña.

The hotel in Cataviña was REALLY nice.



Paul had an idea to go check out this old abandoned mission, Santa Maria. It was supposed to have some kind of granite springs you could swim in. I thought he said it was 18 miles of highway but what he meant was single track. I did the right thing and turned around with Mark. Cain later came back saying we did the right thing because he eventually turned back too. Paul and Steve got back late and said oh yeah, it was super tough. This picture might look like it's flatter but this was pretty steep and rocky.


We had a great dinner that night and polished off the bottle of Cazadores Bartek bought in Gonzaga Bay. I met three GSA riders from Mexico and talked with them for quite a bit about riding the GSA in dirt. I told them about advrider, so hopefully they'll join in the fun.

[fudgypup]

This was to be our longest day and it started out great.


We did this leg out to the west coast, up the coast, back to the highway then the final leg was a 100 mile route back to the coast then up to El Rosario.

The desert in Baja is amazingly beautiful and filled with all kinds of cactus. I grew up in AZ and thought I'd seen a lot of saguaro cactus until I went here. It was like a garden. We also saw some snake tracks in the soft sand. Steve said he saw two black snakes while they passed the same area.




Here's Bartek coming down this steep hill a lot more gracefully than I did.


Lots of little fish camps along the coast. Here's some lobster traps all stacked up


I learned a few things about packing and that's whatever can explode in your panniers WILL. It was interesting explaining to the military checkpoints that my footpowder had exploded and that it wasn't cocaine. Of course two days later it was my lotion. MUCH harder to clean that stuff up. Good thing my clothes were sealed in a plastic bag.


Some big ass cactus down there. This one's only medium sized


We then hit some real GSA roads and the group found that I was long gone. Not that I'm that good a rider yet but now I understand when Jimmy Lewis says he smoked the smaller bikes in the longer straighter sections in Dakar when he rode a boxer engine.

Here's the gang discussing our next section. Mark and I opted out at this point. I was WIPED out, probably because of the heat that day combined with the Cazadores the night before. We got to Mama Espinosa's and I wanted to crawl into a corner and go to sleep right there. I showered and was in bed at 6:00 and slept 13 hours.


We stayed at the Baja Cactus Inn and it was really nice inside too.

That was is for day four. Day five Mark and I decided to backtrack and do that last 100 mile leg from the day before because the big bike route for that day was just slab up to Camalu. And that's when things got really interesting for us...