Ensanada to Laguna Hanson
There was every conceivable noise and sound last night. The hostel is in the middle of town and I swear there was a police station just down the road. I could hear sirens all night long. We woke and got all of our gear back onto the bikes, which took quite some time. We had to shove the bikes into a very narrow alley (so narrow the panniers had to come off in order to fit) that could be locked.
La Bufadora is a natural blowhole in the rocks at the point on the southern end of Todos Santos Bay. It is quite the tourist attraction, with bus loads of tourists coming and going throughout the day. Everyone has to walk down this path that was like running the peddler's gauntlet. One could buy just about anything imaginable from these barking, persistent enterprising folks. With that attraction checked off of our list, we needed to get out of town! Saturday midday in Ensenada is not the time one should be trying to cross town to get to Highway 3! We were slowed by a funeral procession, blocked by emergency vehicles, and nearly sideswiped by a VW bug.
Producer Todd Bruce
Things really calmed down once we were off the pavement and onto the dirt roads heading to Laguna Hanson for the night. Or so we thought... We had a crash course in driving these heavy bikes in just a thin layer of sand; our GPS coordinates were definitely off by .3 to .5 miles, and we had our first dumping of a bike. I was in front and trying to negotiate too many ruts and washouts when I had to slam on my brakes to keep from launching into a chasm. JT, in an attempt not to hit me, did a 5 mph pitch and into the sand he and the bike went. Luckily, the only damage sustained was the sheering off of one of the fuel bottles. JT's pride was bent, but he was glad to get it over with, as it was the first spill. We arrived to find a perfect camp out of the wind right next to a group of large boulders.
Laguna Hanson was full and there were several rafts of duck out on the water. The lake is named after a Norwegian that was the first white man to see this lake. He built a nice ranch just down the hill from the lake in the late 1800s. That ranch is now, and was in 1905, called Rancho El Rayo. When Nelson and Goldman came through here, the ranch was the only place during their trek where they were confronted with unfriendliness and a disagreeable attitude.