Home

I have been home for almost 2 weeks now and I had a relaxing Christmas holiday with my family and friends. Everything is liked I wished it to be. In 5 weeks I will be travelling again, this time cyycling SE -Asia, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia for another 3 months. If you want to follow my tip go to ‘www.cycleasia.wordpress.com‘. I am looking forward to my new adventures and I would like to share them with my readers!

Joshua Tree National Park

 

 

The Joshua Tree

Joshua Tree was my last big event. On Thursday evening I arrived at Palm Springs, where I stayed again with my host Andrew. Friday morning I drove up to Yucca Valley  and entered the park for 15 $ entrance fee. Joshua Tree which is about 50mi x 20mi is part of the Mojave Desert and it is dominated by vast rock formations and the Joshua Tree. It is characteristic to the Mojave like the Saguaro Cactus to Baja Callifornia. I saw the Hidden Valley, where I followed a trail, Keys View, from where I could see Pam Springs and the St. Andreas Fault, I hiked up to Ryan Mountain and I paid a short visit to Cholla Cactus Garden. It was a phantastic visit and I got back by dusk. So at last I got what I wanted as I had not been very successful with visiting Yosemite and Sequoia NPs before!

This morning I returned my car at the airport car rental and I am waiting for my flight at 17.30 local time to Amsterdam and  then to Bremen. 

This has been an extraordinary adventure and I thank all the people who supported me during my trip!!!

Cholla Cactus Garden

 

View from Ryan Mountain

 

 

 

In Hidden Valley

Palm Springs II

 

On Highway 120 to Yosemite

Coming back from Los Cabos I hired a car for the last week. I wanted to make a round trip by going along the coast from LA to San Francisco and returning through the National Parks to LA. I wanted to see what I had managed during  that week going  from SF to LA on my bicycle and I was pretty impressed! The 2 days in SF I mainly spent with shopping, I needed new shoes as the soles of my biking boots were coming off and I needed some presents for those I had left back home! I as well enjoyed another drive to the Marin headlands for which I had to cross the Golden Gate Bridge. It was an amazing drive which I finished with a coffee in Sausalito. On Tuesday I wanted to go across Yosemite to Death Valley, but at Groveland I realized that Tioga Pass was already closed! So I decided to go along a minor road south to Mariposa, a small town, though a county capital! On wednesday I drove to Wofford  Heights which is on Lake Isabella in Sequoia NP. The only sequoias I saw were on the ridge, the flanks of the mountains down by the lake were mostly bare, just single  pines and poplars down in the valley. But I do not want to belittle what I saw: Parts of the landscape were exhilarating! This morning then I drove across Mojave Desert to Palm Springs where I will stay for 2 nights with my couchsurf host Andrew. . The places I came through today  were pretty depressing, lots of left properties and neglected houses, the only place that looked prosperous was Yucca Valley.  Tomorrow I will make a tour to Yoshua Tree NP.

On the Way to Sequoia NP

Wofford Heights on Lake Isabella

Christmas in Red Mountain

Mojave Desert

Todos Santos

 

Christmas Tree

Yesterday I got to Todos Santos, it was my last day of cycling. It was an unexpectedly hard day, firstly because of the light headwinds, secondly because of  a reading mistake and lack of appropriate signs – I went 15 kms the wrong direction! So I was almost about to give up and take a bus! On top of that most of the stretch was pretty boring, just straight ahead!

Restaurant in Todos Santos

 

Mountains

 

Todos Santos is a rural tourist town and unlike Los Cabos not swept by masses of American holiday makers accomodated in big luxury hotels. Many local and Northamerican artists have found their home there, and therfore the atmosphere is quite unique. Only the center has paved streets and the beach is just for walking – dangerous currents put swimmers at a great risk. On my way to the beach I talked to Alice and Edwin from Alberta who had been to Todos Santos several times, I met them again for dinner and we spent a pleasant evening together. 

Tomorrow I will take the bus to San Jose del Cabo and have to cycle 13 km to Los Cabos International Airport from where I take the plane to Los Angeles. On December 6th I will have a car for a tour to Death Valley, Mojave Desert and Yoshua Tree National Park. Will be back on Dec 14th! Looking forward to seeing all of you, baking biscuits and Stollen and enjoying the cold and candle lights!

———————————-

Getting to Cabo was not that easy, the first bus could not take me because there was no room for my bike!!! I got pretty nervous – what, if the second bus did not have any storage room left either? Cycling 120 km in 5 hours would have been impossible! But  my fears were unjustified, and so I got to Cabo in time . Bigger problems occurred at the airport, they wanted to charge me 50$ for overweight – although I am a fairly light weight person, plus the 50$ for the bike!!!.When I showed my reluctance, they asked me just to take one panier as hand luggage onto the plane. I chose the wrong one, the one with the tools for my bicycle which they did not allow on the plane. Before that I had successfully convinced the ladies who prechecked me not  to chuck the cajeta I had just bought  - caramelized goat milk spread , a local speciality, but semiliquid.  One of them simply put it into my computer case! So I had to check this bag in as well – but this time they did not try to charge me. I think the tip for the boys who had wrapped my bicycle had helped a bit. I was quite surprised that they had not discovered the full waterbottle on the screen which I still had in my rucksack when I got off the plane. I do not know what they see on these screens, but it does not seem to be much!

After a pleasant flight of 2 hours 10 I landed in LA at dusk and cycled to my hotel. For a cyclist customs are not a big problem, Everybody is full of admiration when someone with a heavily loaded bicycle shows up!

Espiritu Santo -Sea of Cortez

Desert

Espiritu Santo

 

Cliffs

 

 

Friday morning Swen, Kat and I, packed with food for 4 days and 3 10 l-containers of water, cycled down to the Baja California Outdoor Adventures BOA to start our kajak trip to Espiritu Santo, an uninhabited island north of La Paz which is a nature refuge. Mario drove us, our kajaks and 6 other people who he took on a day trip to Pichilingue . After we  had stowed away our things we  started our trip. I must admit I was pretty nervous and the other 2 as well, because we had never been on such a sea trip before. But everything went fine. After having lunch at the head of the peninsula we decided to cross the same day as the sea was pretty calm. We had to paddle against the waves but made the 6 1/2 kms in 1 1/2 hours.  Before having dinner – pasta with cheese, a pineapple for dessert and lots of cookies in between -  and setting up our camp on the long white beach we explored our island. We climbed to the top of that first peninsula and took a lot of photos of plants and landscape. We enjoyed our campfire and the calmness around us, there was nobody there except us! The 2nd day we explored the bays of the west coast and made it almost to the top of the island before we decided to camp. Except for 4 Americans beyond their seventies who camped there we did not meet anybody. The 3rd day we returned slowly and went snorkeling twice, I saw many fish I had seen in the Seattle aquarium. On the beach we camped that night we met Wendy who guided 2 Canadians on a 4-day trip – the manager of BOA would have liked us on that trip as well, but it was 415 $ – instead of 120$ rent for me and bit more for the double of Swen and Kat. After a long paddling day we got back to the shop at 3.45pm, happy that we had had such a great adventure.

Camping on Espiritu Santo

 

 

Arrival on Espiritu Santo

 

Last Rest

La Paz

 

Across the Hills from Loreto

After a 120 km ride yesterday morning I got to Ciudad Insurgentes at about 3 pm, 5minutes later I sat on the bus to LaPaz. I had skipped the rest of the stretch, 230 kms,  because I wanted to win a bit of time for our kayak trip, besides that, the landscape ther was pretty boring. I met Swen -now without his wisdom tooth – and Kat  at the barber’s shop where they were staying with this 70-year-old cycling enthusiast: His wife had banned all these cycling friends from the house because she is sick of all these strangers around her. So I ended up unrolling my sleeping bag in a barber’s shop. I should not have done it, I was still effected by my cold and had been thisty as well, and a shop floor is not that cosy. This morning we had a Mexican breakfast at his recreation grounds nearby, a hut with cooking facilities and some trees, it seems to be his retreat from the world. After booking in at a nearby hotel we organized our kayak trip to Espiritu Santo, which is going to be a real highlight! It is time for shopping now!

Mexican Breakfast at the Barber

Paradise Beach

 

On the Road to Loreto II

 

 

       

Kat, Swen, Bill, Frederic & Caty

Sushi

I spent 2 great days at Bill’s, I was not the only couchsurfer at his, I met Caty and Frederic from Belgium and to my delight Kat and Swen again! We spent a relaxing Saturday together, Bill drove me to a liquor store where I bought a bottle of rum while Kat was boiling rice for our sushi night. Later everyone tried to roll sushi with shrips, avocado and cucumber and we had good fun. In the end everybody was a bit drunk and the party was over when Frederic had told his bad boy stories.

Kat, Swen and I decided to leave on Sunday morning to spent a day/ night on the beach. After 45 km we found our a paradise, a small, hardly accessible white beach with mangroves and pelicans darting for fish. In the evening we had a camp fire after eating pasta with a hot tuna tomato sauce, cockies and tea for dessert. It was sooooo relaxing. The only reason for leaving was Swen’s wisdom tooth which was hurting. He needed it pulled out.

But we made plans: we are renting seakayaks for going on a 4-day trip to Espiritu Santu on Friday, hopefully his tooth will be removed by then and he is fit. While they made it to La Paz today by hitch-hiking there, I stopped at Loreto and will have a nice day in a historic town, before I will hitch-hike to La Paz as well. Not because I am sick of cycling but because of kayaking and the stretch from here to there is said to be a boring plain.

Leaving Paradise Beach

 

Our Paradise Beach El Requeson

On the Road to Loreto