Catching a ride

Catching a ride from a fellow traveler and headed south. A lovely Australian man that was 7 or so  months into his undefined travel time abroad. He had a great beast of an american van, Texas tumbleweed hair, and a devil may care attitude that made travel light and easy.

I do believe in the old adage " a person comes into your life for a reason" so i jumped on the opportunity of ditching the bus and taking a little different route into the wilds for a few days.

I had the important job of navigator:

with three maps and my smarts to boot we made several wrong turns, a few track backs but all in the name of adventure!

Mainland Mexico is very different from Baja, the streets are a mish-mash, maybe paved, maybe not, maybe it's a street that looks like a river washed out but people still drive on it.
I think getting out of Mazatlan was the biggest Challenge but once out the reward was well worth it. Misty mountains and swamp lands full of flowers. Sadly the roads have no shoulders to pull off of to photograph the flowers but take my word they were pristine little bits of white and purple, soft explosions frozen in motion on top of fluorescent green bed.

Here's the road we traveled down:

The first destination was Mexcaltitan, a drive and a boat ride for a small small shrimping town. We were definitely the gringos in town but this place was no stranger to our kind. I like off season for this reason, to imagine that I  am in some foreign land yet undiscovered by the eyes of others or the prying know it all the internet.

From the vaults

Hipster take note. Ensenada, Mexico 

Oldest bar in Ensenada

 Street food!

Loreto hates gluten.

Made it to the mainland!

Well I'm in Mazatlan and just wanted to drop everyone a note, I made it and I'm alive!

Thanks to everyone that chimed in when I was asking about the La Paz to Mazatlan ferry, but fate as it seems was taken out of my hands. I was was sitting, waiting for the time I thought I needed to leave to catch the ferry to Mazatlan, I had the day to waste, a cafe with A/C and decent internet connect so I was hunkering down for a few hours stay.
I had read the ferry left at 7pm and I needed to be there at least 2 hours early to get my ticket etc, so I figured 4 or 4:30 was a grand time to take a taxi.
So there I am, beautiful view, leisurely attitude and something in me said, hey you better check the website for the ferry. I really can't tell you where this little voice came from but boy am I glad I listend to it.
In my calm state I bring up the site and slowly piece together the website and oh shit, silly me, it seems the ferry leaves at 5pm not 7pm...oops!


Well seeing it was already almost 4pm I thought it best to panic, make a run for it and hope for the best.
I tossed the goods in the bag and made a mad dash for the street. True to life there is never a taxi or a police officer around when needed so I scanned the streets at a fast pace and finally spotted the yellow car I was hoping for. I flagged the man down and tried to haggle the price but shrugged off my inability to get him to lower it and pressed on. First we ran to my hostel to grab my big bag and then off south of town to the ferry terminal.

Well I made it there but things were closed, there was a line formed and boarding and me weighed down with my two bags. After a time I understood I had to walk an ass far away to buy a ticket for the ferry, I got there eventually and grabbed a seat. I tried to reserve a cabin based on the recommendations of all my friends at home but none were to be had. So I took what i could get and hoofed it back across the giant ferry yard to board.

Once I was back to boarding I was the only one there, a line of guards looked me up and down and I swear  too delight in having me heave my backpack on and off. At one point they took me up to a traffic light with only two colors, red and green, it had a button under it just like you would find at any street corner where you would press the button to get a walk signal.
Well the men had me press the button and it flared red, surprise surprise, they asked me to put down my bags and step aside. Instead of opening my overly stuffed bags the man put on winter knit gloves and began to press on my bag, feeling around like a doctor would on your abdomen.
After several half pushes he let me go. Run and wait run and wait.

I was loaded into the front seat of the taxi, oh no....

All's well that ends well, I made it to the ferry, insulted an Australian with a whale patch by being a geek and asking about whale wars, he turned out to be my seat mate and showed me the ropes on the long long crossing.
The inside of the cabin was set to kill with cold and they played random violent movies but the deck was warm and the stars are changing above my head. A random lightning storm scattered showers on our heads and chased us back in doors, but hours later I chased them away and watch a cloudy sunrise with a bad cup of coffee.

A snake eating a skirt, or the truth about my costuming.

watching the nature channel, a python feasting on a pig...

Clothing and costuming bundel, flip flop flown in for size comparison.

They gave me the "belly dancer" top sheet...

another day in Loreto