WHAT PLANET IS THIS?

When we were planning this trip we both had a picture in our minds of what the desert in the Baja would look like - cowboys, rolling tumbleweeds, dust storms and mirages.  But it was so very different.  What we ended up experiencing cannot really be put into words, but what we will say is that it is totally breathtaking and something that we will not soon forget!!

As we drove the terrain kept changing - for a while it would be sand and scrub brush then bizarre looking cactuses and then fields of massive boulders, deposited there by who knows what.  Every time we went over a mountain range the colors would change - you never knew what you were going to see!!

check out the scale - this is not a hill, its a massive pile of rocks

We kept stopping to take pictures and get a closer look at all these plants.  We were VERY cautious of every step we took as there were many holes in the ground that could contain any number of dangerous creatures - snakes, scorpians, spiders etc etc (everything we hate)

This was a really long drive, we were unprepared for this stretch of road. We didn't expect the towns we drove through to have no services or the road to be as long as it was.  Our first mistake was that we left too late in the day, we were glad to have our jerry cans with us as stations had run out of diesel.  As it was, we ended up breaking our golden rule and we drove for an hour in the dark looking for a place to sleep.  Fortunately, our four headlights lit up about a kilometer in front of us and about a hundred feet on either side of the road allowing us to see the cows and horses.  That night we ended up resting our heads at a Pemex gas station with our fellow truckers.  (We now regret not buying foam mats to sleep on in the back of the truck!)  To keep ourselves entertained we watched four episodes of 'Breaking Bad'.

After driving through the desert, we crested our last hill and the Sea of Cortez came into view - amazing!!!

We are now in Loreto, Baja Sur, a nice little town with almost everything we are looking for.  We found a cute hotel and are the only guests.  We need some time to recharge, it has been in total twenty days of driving to get to this point.  Its time to slow down our pace and to start soaking up what Baja has to offer.