On our third day in Mexico we drove from Catavina, in the center of the Baja California peninsula, to Guerrero Negro, on the Pacific coast, where we grabbed some lunch. Guerrero Negro is a fairly charmless town whose principal industries are harvesting sea salt and servicing the tourists who come to whale-watch in the nearby Laguna Ojo de Liebre. (Whale-watching was out of season while we were in Mexico.) The town has some good restaurants, however, and we had some great seafood at one of the better of them, the Malarrimo.
Just north of Guerrero Negro is the boundary line between Baja California and Baja California Sur, where the magic of the peninsula really begins. We drove that day only as far as San Ignacio, back in the center of the peninsula on the way to the Mar de Cortés, because we were told that the last stretch of mountain road leading down to the east coast of the peninsula was challenging and not to be driven when tired. That proved to be an understatement.
San Ignacio grew up around a freshwater lagoon, which the Spanish missionaries tapped for irrigation. What they planted, in great abundance, were date palms, and so San Ignacio is a most improbable palm-shaded oasis in the middle of the desert. The town's once-famous dates have been undercut on the Mexican market by cheaper dates from abroad, so the town has a sleepy, vaguely depressed air, though it's still extremely charming, with a central square planted with tall shade trees and one of the most beautiful missions on the peninsula.
We ate our first lobster at an old restaurant in town that looked as though it had seen better days -- lobster tacos for me and a whole lobster for Harry.
The lobster in both forms was a bit over-cooked and over-priced but still delightful.
We stayed at yet another La Pinta inn, one of the few choices for accommodation in San Ignacio.
When we got to the town it was being spruced up for its annual date festival, to be held the following week, but there were no dates for sale anywhere we could find . . . because, we were told, "the date harvest isn't until October." The mystery of this only added to the slightly unreal loveliness of the place.
For previous Baja California trip reports, go here.
[Photos © 2007 Harry Rossi]