Baja Mexico Trip 2015-2016. Part 5. Day Trip to Santa Ines, San José de Magdalena and Santa Rosalia

Day Trip to Santa Ines, San José de Magdalena and Santa Rosalia

The Road Less traveled. Wonderful country side and the Baja desert is so green.

Road down to Playa Santa Ines

Playa Santa Ines, BCS. MX

It is the 25th of November, and we decided to take a drive, and check out some of the little towns and the country side.


Liz was not 100%, she was battling an upset stomach and headaches.


However as the good sport as she is, some Tylenol and Pepto Bismal will fix things up. I promised to drive extra slow!


We head north from Coyote Beach. After Mulege, we drive another 15 km north then turn right to Playa Santa Ines.


The road is very rough, but the landscape is very beautiful with the cacti and desert.


The beach at Playa Santa Ines is miles and miles of white sand. It is so beautiful and not a person in sight.

Anders on Playa Santa Ines. He could barely stand the crowds.

Road up to San José de Magdalena

Road up to San José de Magdalena with a few wash outs here and there.

We walked the beach for about an hour and collected a bunch of really nice sea shells.


We were thinking of driving out to Punta Chivato but the washboard road was so bad, we decided to turn around and drive up to San José de Magdalena instead.



This is where the farmers grow a lot of garlic.



San José de Magdalena is a quaint little village high in the mountains and it was founded in 1774.



Originally it was supposed to be a mission to serve the Cocimi Indians. It did not last that long, it was closed in 1828 when the mission in Mulegé closed.

Garlic fields in San Jose de Magdalena, BCS. MX

Had to drive through a river to get to San José de Magdalena.

Coming back, there are beautiful vistas of the Bay of Conception.

This is a pretty good drive with paved roads just about all the way, except through the river and into the village.


Nothing was open when we got there.... Siesta I think!


So we just had a quick look around and headed back down to sea level again.



From there we drove into the city of Santa Rosalia.


Santa Rosalia was named after the Saint Rosalia. The reason for the name is not quite clear.


The Misión de Santa Rosalía is not located by or in the city, but rather in the town of Mulegé, about 100 km south, and the local parish is devoted to Santa Bárbara.... I give up, just too confusing.

During a pit stop I noticed a self threading screw in one of the back tires.

Luckily, it did not go through the whole tire, so no plug was needed.

The metallic Iglesia de Santa Barbara in Santa Rosalia

Walking around Santa Rosalia.

Santa Rosalía is a port city, and a regular ferry connects this town with Guaymas in the state of Sonora, on the other side of the Gulf of California or Sea of Cortez.


In my books Santa Rosalia has the roughest through road on the Baja. Just go slow, and I mean slow.


Now the town is pretty funky with some French influence. When you walk around in town you see all the houses made out of wood, like a small French village.


The town was founded in 1884 by a French mining company which ran a copper mine here until 1954.


The mining company built houses and installed the metallic Iglesia de Santa Bárbara. This is a very nice little church.


The legend has it that the church was designed by Gustave Eiffel who designed the Eiffel Tower. He was also involved in the design of the Statue of Liberty and many more structures.

We drove around and walked around town for about an hour. We picked up some fresh bread from a local bakery, and I even got myself an ice cream.

Moon rising over Coyote Beach.

Back at the camp, a swim is in order, then it's time to fire up the BBQ.

For more pictures check out our web album.