Water on the Wrong Side

The road from Mexicali towards San Felipe is mostly straight and flat. The start of our Mexican adventure coming at us fast. Somewhere off to the east is the unseen mouth of the Colorado River. Here and there are wide salt flats. The ground is hard and dry and useless for much of anything. Soon we would see the Sea of Cortez (or is it the Gulf of California?). The first site of the ocean for several days, but it felt wrong to have it on the left-hand side of the car.

San Felipe is the first place of note that a traveller will come across. It’s a place that’s clearly grown up fast, a kind of scatter shot development scheme on the main strip leading into town. Apparently, this is shrimp harvesting territory and the edges of town are populated with yards perhaps belonging to fisherman – in need of the next big catch to convert them from dusty encampment or concrete bunker to something more established. Sarah’s not overly impressed, but I’m less concerned. Yes, it’s surely a hardscrabble set-up, but these are hardworking people finding their way. Better than the scene back home in many ways, a land of every expanding homeless.

The town itself is tidy and compact. We do a loop upon arrival, park at the malecón and search out beers. We’ve been driving for nearly a week and it feels like we’ve finally arrived somewhere. Gidget feels the change too. Mexico is a wonder for dog owners, in many ways. Freedom to roam, enter establishments, sit with you on a patio. There are also free range dogs to watch out for and San Felipe has a rich collection of them.

Camping was the plan and there were conveniently three or four of them lined up just north of town. We had to ask around, compare prices, because it just didn’t add up. Our quick peso-dollar conversion was still weak, but things seemed very expensive. For camping. In the end, we chose Kiki’s – which so happened to be the one I had researched – for 700 pesos a night! Again, we were confused, but too new to the country to put up a fuss. Later we learned that the Baja 1000 off-road race/challenge thingy was to start soon and was driving up costs. For comparison, I was expecting to pay 200 pesos max. 700 should be the price for a modest hotel room.

So, what was the camping like? Fine (the best word you’ll here from us on the subject). The pros: there were real bathrooms not far off; we had a picnic table and nice, flat place for our tent; the beach was right there; they kept it clean; our neighbours were swell (even though with their big rig we were living really close together). The negatives: it was bloody cold overnight and Gidget was hogging the blankets; terrible flies; someone had a party, night number two.

It was a time for adapting to a new rhythm. We would have to begin thinking about fuel and cash. For the money withdrawals we would also have to be vigilant. All of a sudden we were becoming forgetful, or more accurately, rushed. I had to remind myself to slow down: don’t forget your keys, your wallet, your bank card in the ATM. There were other things to adapt to, the driving for one. Time to loosen up, and re-evaluate the rules of the road. As you may read elsewhere, there’s a very complex dance of traffic gong on here, behind the apparent, lawless chaos. Then there is the noise, the street dogs (or worse, the owned dogs behind fences or too often roaming loose – street dogs have other things to worry about, owned dogs are mean), a whole vibe that we would have to ease into.

Not something we could tackle overnight and I was happy to just be in the moment and deal with this place. Again, I was glad I had planned out so much of our trip – it freed up brain space. And in San Felipe, we had help. Our camping neighbours were only a couple of days less green than us, on an extended sabbatical of their own. Where we chose minimalism, they went maximum, hauling a nice trailer around the continent. In the evenings they would invite us over for drinks – they even fed us on the second night – and it was pleasant to soak up the generosity from like-minded travellers.

There were no sites for us in San Felipe and it wasn’t hard to pull up and head out. Ahead of lay a long stretch without many (if any) real places to stop for fuel, accommodation, all of that stuff. But we were ready – a benefit of our little vehicle is the fuel economy. First, I had to take the wrong way out of town. No, that’s not right: first, I went the wrong way looking for gas, then the wrong way out of town, doubling back a second time. Mistakes will be made, a simple reality of life on the road, everything new unfolding in the moment.