The weather was starting to get colder each morning. This morning was pretty cold and wet.

I had an awesome breakfast burrito in the Cantina for breakfast. They have wireless at the Cantina and rent out a laptop for a few bucks. I wrote a few emails over breakfast to check in at home.

After that Brian went out in his kayak to play in the surf.  I was chilling out in camp watching Brian mess around in the surf and I got lucky enough to catch Brian with my Rebel XT crashing through a small wave.  I wish I had clicked a few more images, because he actually rolled his yak in this wave.  He insisted this was a large wave, but after close examination, this wave is pretty weak.  Sorry Brian, the photographic evidence is clear!!  That’s all good though, because even smaller surf crashed me three times back at Cabo Pulmo! 

There were a lot of surfers this morning too. I want to learn how to surf someday...

After lunch we packed up and headed north. We stopped and re-iced up Brian's cooler again and then took the road north toward Laguna San Ignacio.  We got some advice in town that it might be better to not follow the myriad of roads in the salt flats in case we took a wrong turn and broke through to the muck below.  We were told that just beyond the fishcamp at El Datil, right where the road passes the many mounds of clam shells, there was a higher road that avoided much of the trickier salt flats. Just as described, we saw this road right outside the fishcamp that climbs a small dune.  Up on top was really sandy and sort of slow going, but at least it was dry without a chance of me making a mistake and getting us stuck. 

I had arranged a potential meeting at the whale camp with some friends of mine from San Diego, Robb & Cat. As we got closer, I tried hailing them on the 2-meter radio and after a few attempts I reached them! They were already at Antonio’s Ecotours waiting for us. 

Antonio’s Ecotours is located on La Fridera point on Laguna San Ignacio.  Antonio’s is one of the older fishcamps / whaling camps in the area.  It’s not the nicest place on the lagoon, but he and his family are wonderful and their cooks are really good.

Here is Robb's sweet 80 series with a roof-top-tent.

Once we arrived we all got introduced and caught up on the details of our trips thus far.  Being into surfing and having his board with him, Robb was really interested in the route I took from San Juanico.  It especially interested him that it only took three hours from Laguna San Ignacio!  They had plans to start north the next day though, so San Jaunico will have to wait for another trip for them. 

We explored the beach around camp at sunset looking at the numerous whale bones.

We decided to have dinner prepared by Antonio’s people and I had the seafood combination.  It was a plate of garlic scallops and shrimp, rice & beans with tortillas.  It was a bit on the expensive side (13 bucks), but well worth it.  The environmental educator at Antonio's, I forget her name, stays with Antonio and his family during the whale season.  She said that Antonio is trying to get a new website going and wants to get more all-inclusive style trips booked at his place.  They had several new cabins built since I was there last in 2004.  Progress is happening all over Baja, and even remote Laguna San Ignacio is not immune to it.  The local people really take a vested interest in their world famous whales and I think that they will handle the growth in a sustainable way.