Baja Blog Fri- Sun, Mar 28 - 30 - Santa Barbara to Baja

 Thurs:  We put Mitsy in her junior suite at the Cat House Hotel without too many howls!

Longhorn Grill

Fri: We flew to Phoenix with no hassle from the pleasant TSA people.  In Phoenix someone forgot to screw the plane's potable water cap on so we had to return to the gate for a 5-minute repair, arriving in Tucson an hour late.  Hilary picked us up and we drove down to the town of Amado for dinner at the Longhorn Grill, ten miles south of Hil's house in Green Valley.

Sat:  I spent the morning struggling with Bob's computer as it wouldn't let me sign onto AOL, and then didn't recognize me as the blog owner.  Much swearing and panicking, but finally got it set up. Always Hell to use someone else's computer!

Temperature in the 90s so we didn’t get in a walk. We met our friend, Teri, whom we hadn’t seen in a while to catch up at the Quail Creek Grill during dinner.  

There was quite a good band playing with a lady almost our age, but with way more energy, who sang a bunch of Tina Turner songs with the same spirit and with such a sound level that we were fairly deaf when we left!

Sun:  Up at six and were ready to leave at eight.  Hil drove the whole way: 447 miles in 8 1/2 hours!   We headed up I-19 to I-10 past Tucson and then turned onto I-8 to Yuma.   Hil pulled off at Dateland so we could get one of their fabulous Date Shakes.

 By the cash register were some bags of Trump
Gummy Bears.  Not sure if they were pro or con, but we didn't want them to pollute our car in any case.

We headed straight south from Yuma on A-195, crossed the border into the city of San Luis Rio Colorado where in about 20 minutes we got our FMM forms, found the bank to pay for them and returned to the immigration office to get them finalized.   We got on Mexico toll road 2-D west, bypassed Mexicali and continued through many miles of farm land similar to the Imperial Valley.

We passed the north end of a huge dry lake, the Laguna Salada, and started up into the incredible boulder pile of the Sierra Juarez on a beautiful route through the mountains that looked on the map like spaghetti. Fortunately it was two lanes in each direction so we could pass the endless lines of big trucks grinding upwards.  We came into an area of rolling hills and mountains covered with more large boulders and valleys full of oaks, resembling very closely the backcountry of San Diego.

We bypassed Tecate and turned south on Route 3 and immediate started seeing vineyards.  

These continue to the coast but we stopped in the town of Francisco Zarco, and after driving around town a bit found our lovely hotel, Casa Entrevez.
 We were pretty tired by then and were ready for some food.  We backtracked a bit to a cafe called Valley 13 and had an OK meal of shrimp and fish, and Tecate beer as it’s the local specialty.

Hopefully, tomorrow will be a little more relaxed as we start exploring Baja.

Blogger note: don't know why Blogger shifts the font size, and why it highlights certain words!!??