Ice - fix a flat - welding - gas - boat storage - satellital internet.
15 August 2015 | Santa Rosalia
Vandy
The morning that we decided to explore Bahia San Francisquito, we buzzed over to a nearby sandy beach, where we picked among the charred remnants of trash fires and marveled at the size of a mound of clam shells piled up there. Apparently this was a popular party beach at one time. Lizards skittered under bushes and a crab poked out of his hidey hole, but except for a few paw prints and dried rabbit droppings, there were no other signs of animal life on the beach. We hiked up a small sandy hill and surveyed the bay, its differing depths revealed through the shifting of colors from aquamarine to darker turquoise and finally to dark blue.
Back in our dinghy, we scooted around the corner and into the little nook known as Cala San Francisquito, a shallow, milky-green appendix off the main bay. A few houses lined the beach at the back, where we pulled our dinghy up and tied it to a conveniently located, half-buried tire, for safekeeping while we took a walk up the nearby dirt road.
A sign a little ways up the road indicated that this area was private property, owned by Alberto V. Lucero, probably the same Alberto ('Beto) that our friends in San Ignacio told us to say hello to if we saw him. The sign further promised that the following items and services were available: "ice - fix a flat - welding - gas - boat storage - satellital internet." A small sign, "Oficina," (office) pointed toward 'Beto's compound, but as the day was already hot, we opted to forego these conveniences for the moment, deciding to follow instead a faded sign that read "Soda and Cerveza," with an arrow pointing down the road that disappeared over the hill.
About a half hour later, the dirt track we were following climbed a cactus-studded hill from which we could see a deserted dirt airstrip and some abandoned outbuildings, with a beach beyond. The possibility of our getting a "Soda and Cerveza" dropped dramatically, pretty much to nothing. We'd known from the start that the likelihood of finding a "Soda and Cerveza" at the end of our walk was dubious at best, but we'd wanted to see the airstrip and resort anyway. Oh well. We pulled our water bottle out of our backpack and each took a long drink of the warm water.
Rocks covered with faded white paint were arranged to form words along the airstrip: GAS, read one. PLAYA SAN FRANCISQUITO read another. We saw a large tank, probably for the GAS, up on a hill, partially shaded by a wood and sheet-metal structure that was partially collapsed. We saw a building on a knoll, whose construction reminded us of a roadside rest area facility, which might have been the resort building, but we didn't climb up to investigate further. It appeared to be vacant.
As we walked along the cracked, wind-blown, rock-strewn dirt airstrip toward the beach, I felt a little sad at the disparity between this forlorn place and the vibrant oasis that it had been in its heyday, when private aviators had flown in to enjoy a few days of R&R in this remote resort. All it lacked was some tumbleweeds and skulking coyotes to complete the picture of a ghost town. Was it because of the season, or was it a more permanent closure? We don't know.
We'd heard from our friend, Gary, at Ignacio Springs, that in its attempt to quell drug trafficking, the Mexican government had tightened customs restrictions on outlying airstrips, making the paperwork involved in travel to these sites by private aviators so onerous as to effectively shut them down, along with the bustling resorts that catered to them.
We walked all the way to the beach, where a few scraggly, palm-thatched umbrellas rustled in the sea breeze. We still held some hope that one of the delapidated buildings might have a cold "Soda and Cerveza" waiting for us. But no. The beached pangas, nets, and fishing paraphernalia clearly indicated that this was a fish camp, NOT a resort.
After a long, hot walk back to the cala beach to retrieve our dinghy, we buzzed back to SCOOTS, where we each had a cold soda, then jumped into the refreshing (80 degrees!) water to cool off.
If we're still here in a few days, we might come back to 'Beto's place on the cala, and ask him what the story is with the resort. We might also ask him if, along with the other offerings on his sign, he might have a cold soda or cerveza he could sell us. That would be nice.