The Bilodeaus Go...

Well we took the long drive today from Guerro Negro (which we just can’t seem to like no matter how hard we try) to San Quintin. It is about a 400 kilometer stretch and it took us a while because it is through the mountains.  Anyway, we absolutely loved the boulders on both sides of the road. It really looks like a giant spilled his marbles all over the place. There are literally full sized mountains just made from rocks! He even dropped some on the road to create some of the biggest potholes I have ever seen.  After that we stopped at a routine military checkpoint and they had us get out of the car which is pretty normal, but this time they wanted us to pop up the camper even! We were really not interested in doing that, but they carry assault rifles so we prepared to humor them. Ty went to the back to get the crank out of the car… and it wasn’t there! Holy shizzz this is the moment I have been dreading this entire trip! I LEFT THE CRANK IN THE BACK AFTER TAKING IT DOWN AN...

Mulege (Prounounced Moo-lah-hay) is a cute little town on the brink of the desert and the ocean. We loved exploring the town and passing through their really narrow roads. Just as you are passing the town on the highway, there is a beautiful large arch that you must pass through to get anywhere in the city. We obviously had to take a picture in front of it. Only problem was that we were standing on the highway while we did.. haha safety first! Once we got into the town we saw a storefront that said "Homemade ice cream and treats: Almost free!" Well, we had to stop and see what they had. Holy cannoli. We got two large pastry breads stuffed with meat, cheese, and sauce and a homemade strawberry ice cream on a cone for the equivalent of $3.30! Best ever. So we drove out to the lighthouse and hiked up to the top to enjoy our lunch. Let me just say, it was quite windy up there so please pardon the hair situations. The view was beautiful and totally worth it. Driving back throu...

It has officially been eight days since we have had a proper shower.... I do not know how we allowed it to go on for so long! I think we must have just gotten caught up in the heat of the days and the coolness of the ocean to realize that we have not been actually washed. Just rinsed by the salty water on the sea of Cortez. Yuck. The new spot we are at will take care of that for us though. We have been living so primitively for such a long time that we decided to spoil ourselves a little bit. In the beautiful city of Mulege where we are staying, we now have hot showers (our number one priority), electricity (so we can recharge all our lanterns that we've been using), a pool (like we'll actually use it being so close to the ocean, but it's a nice amenity, and wifi IN the camper. I never thought I'd see those days again! All for a whopping $10 a night. I think we hit the big time with this spot. We can't wait to check out the city and see what else it has to offer! ...

We spent five days at the most beautiful place we have yet to see on the Baja peninsula. The pictures do not do it any sort of justice. This bay was our goal. This is how far south we wanted to make it, and we did! We met up with Tim and Victoria here again and went for a hike on an island that you can walk to at low tide. It was crazy how clear and blue and beautiful the water was. I'm not kidding you, these pictures make the water look gray compared to how it actually looks in real life... The sun beat down on us all day long and though it was windy, we were happy as clams. There were some hot springs just around the corner from where we made camp so we walked over there to give ourselves a little R & R and rinse off our unshowered bodies...   Every morning there were vendors from the neighboring city that would come by to sell their handmade products, vegetables, fruits, and fish. It was so easy for us to stay on the beach all day! We couldn't even run ...

On our drive from San Ignacio to Bahia de Concepcion we stopped in a city called Santa Rosalía. This city is so unique to this area. It was founded in the 1880s by a French mining company that mined copper ore. The city has a major french influence.  Most of the buildings are "french colonial " style instead of being built by cement and cinder blocks are actually made of wood imported from the states. The main reason that we stopped here is because there is a famous french bakery in the middle of the town.  We could smell the bread for blocks and blocks. The smell literally reminded me of when I was in France. We bought a handful of baguettes and rolls and sweetbreads and enjoyed them immensely.   Another reason we decided to stop in this town is because of the mission church.  The Santa Rosalía church was designed and prefabricated in France then shipped to the Baja around Cape Horn! Here's the kicker: the church was designed by A. G. Eiffel.  Many of you may ...

Every winter from January through March the grey whales of the pacific come to three lagoons in Baja California Sur to mate with one another and have their babies from the previous years mating (a grey whales gestation is 13 months!). Since we were going to be at one of the lagoons in the scheduled time of year, we figured it would be a crime to not take advantage of it. We made some friends from Oregon in our new campsite in San Ignacio and we got together and took the trip out to the lagoon. I do not know what else to say but "wow". Those whales were absolutely spectacular! There were 202 grey whales in the lagoon on the day that we went. They jumped and belly-flopped and spouted and sprayed and and mated and played and flicked water with their tales! One whale got almost close enough for us to touch her, but she sprayed her blowhole water all over us instead. It was a riot! I don't know if it's because we watched Jurassic World right before we came out here... but ...

We continued further south to a small town called San Ignacio. We camped at this beautiful campsite called Los Petates that was right on the edge of a pond. The pond brought all sorts of ducks, bull frogs, swans, and as I like to call them "birds of prey".  It is actually crazy the bird watching that can be done in this region. We see hawks, ospreys, eagles, falcons, etc on a daily basis. Today we even caught a bird of prey snatch a duck right out of the pond and carry it over to kill and eat it... Wild.   This town is an oasis in the desert. It is completely surrounded by date palm trees even though north, south, east, and west of it is all desert. I mean dry desert (you should see the cracks on the heels of my feet...gross). Anyway, the mission church is this town is one of the things that drew us in because the guidebook boasts of it having FOUR foot wide walls. We totally thought it was an exaggeration, but we had to check it out ourselves.  L...