Three Hikes

Baja has many opportunities for hiking – the challenge sometimes is finding them. If you have limited time, go with a guide (link); most tourist hotels can find one for you. This is a good plan for extended hikes because hiking trails can be confused with cattle trails. If you want to do it yourself, you can find trails on maps and blog posts and by word-of-mouth.

This post highlights three recent hikes. Hike #1 – Sol de Mayo – appears on low-resolution maps of the Sierra La Laguna Biosphere Reserve. The maps can’t be used for navigation. We learned about hike #2 – Arroyo Palmillas – on the Baja Pony Express (link), an English-language website with news, information and announcements for the gringo community. We learned about hike #3 – Sendero sin Nombre – by word of mouth.

Sol de Mayo

Located near the town of Santiago (KM 85 on the Transpeninsular Highway) on the east side of the Sierra La Laguna Biosphere Reserve, Cañon de la Zorra (Fox Canyon) is best known for its waterfall (cascada). Rancho Ecológico Sol de Mayo and has an entry fee of USD $6. Hike upstream from the waterfall (elevation about 275 m) and you'll find pools and wetlands and a beautiful canyon.

Entrance to Rancho Ecológico Sol de Mayo

Feliz Navidad

El Tríunfo

Located at 1,700 ft (518 m) on the Transpeninsular Highway between La Paz and San Jose del Cabo, El Tríunfo (The Triumph) was a bustling mining town in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Today it is much smaller (pop. 327) and quieter, and many buildings are just brightly-painted brick facades. The mining-era ruins are extensive and well known, and include a smokestack designed by Gustave Eiffel. Tourists are also drawn to the “piano museum” and the Café El Tríunfo, owned by an ex-biker from California (his motorcycle is in the lobby).

The Transpeninsular Highway through El Tríunfo

Descanso

Descanso is a place of rest, “a cross placed at the site of a violent, unexpected death, in memoriam" (link). Driving in Mexico you can't miss them – small (and not so small) homemade crosses, shrines and memorials to those killed in highway accidents. Roadside memorials are are often clustered around dangerous curves.

Dangerous curve on the Transpeninsular Highway

Roadside crosses belong to a long tradition of public memorialization of private grief (Everett 2002) and are found in many countries, including Chile, where they are known as animitas (link), Ireland (link), the U.S. Southwest (link) and Canada (Belshaw and Purvey 2009), but they are rooted in the Hispanic culture (link). During Spanish colonization of the Americas, people that died along the way were buried and the sites were marked with crosses sanctifying the ground. Descansos in New Mexico date back to the 1700s (Everett 2002).