|
| |
| |
|
SAN FELIPE |
| |
With so few places in northern Baja boasting a decent beach and
reasonable public transport, the prospect of SAN FELIPE , a growing Sea
of Cortés resort on a dead-end road 200km south of Mexicali, might seem
attractive. But its appeal is limited: the entire bay is strung with RV
parks, and the dunes between here and the encircling folded ridges of
the San Pedro Martin mountains reverberate to the screaming engines of
dune buggies and balloon-tyred trikes. If you are planning to continue
south down Baja, then do just that. But San Felipe does have good
swimming - at least at high tide - and if you are confined to the north,
it's the best place to rent a catamaran or just relax for a day or so.
San Felipe first came to the attention of fishermen who, in the early
1950s, took advantage of the new tarmac road - built to serve the
American radar station to the south on what is now called Punta Radar -
to exploit the vast schools of tortuava, a species now fished onto the
endangered list. Since the 1980s, the fishing village has grown to
accommodate the November-to-April influx of holiday-makers from north of
the border and college students on Spring Break. Apart from lying on the
beach, you can rent dirt bikes and trikes from a couple of places along
the malecón (around US$20 an hour), catamarans (similar price; just ask
along the beach wherever you see one), or indulge in a little sport
fishing on tours from a couple of places at the northern end of the
malecón.
If the road through the cactus desert south of here to Hwy-1 ever gets
improved to the point that it can be negotiated by low-clearance
vehicles, this could become an interesting alternative route to southern
Baja, but for the moment the hamlet of Puertecitos , 85km south (no
public transport), is as far as ordinary cars can get - and even then
with difficulty.
|
|
