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My history with Baja
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My history with Baja
Hola Todos,
Here’s a little of my history with Baja.
I started going down to Ensenada in the mid 50’s with my Dad to fish the half day boats. Later on, in high school, me and my buddies would go to a surf break we called 3M’s which was about 6 or so miles north of Ensenada. After high school I continued exploring deeper into the peninsula, surfing and fishing on the Pacific and Cortez sides.
Fast forward to December of 2003 when I sold my business and retired. The sale closed on a Wednesday at noon and immediately myself and a friend headed south. My friend, Dennis, a devout Catholic, was a docent at the San Antonio Mission. He wanted to explore the missions in Baja and Baja Sur, so we spent the next 3 weeks traversing the peninsula and visiting as many as we could.
Later in 2004 myself and a couple of buddies started a Prosthetic and Orthotic clinic in La Paz sponsored by the La Balandra Rotary Club. Over the first few trips we brought down donated machinery and supplies. We have a full on workshop where we cast/measure patients for artificial limbs and orthopedic braces. Our gatekeeper for the clinic, Dr. Alejandro Aguirre Chavez, screens all of the patients we see at the clinic. When we first started, Alejandro asked us for a 5 year commitment, but here we are 18 years later LO we’re still going strong. On average, we hold 2 clinics per year of 2 weeks duration, 1 in the spring and 1 in the fall.
Since we were committed to going down twice a year my wife and I bought a small beach lot in Bahía Asunción where we can spend time both before and after our clinics. We parked our old 5th wheel trailer and love to spend the time near shore fishing and fishing from the beach, exploring for Indian artifacts and fossils, and enjoying the great food at many of the restaurants in town. If you’re ever in our little pueblo when we’re there, please stop by and say “hola!”
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7 Replies
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Awesome introduction and story! And I didn’t know you had a place in Asuncion – fabulous! Really glad to have you onboard and enjoy your posts.
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I remember reading your post about the La Paz clinics, that is so amazing! Being retired, I would imagine that on your trips down you the option of enjoying extended stays? We are working on getting there, hoping to spend at least half our time in Baja eventually.
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Most of the time we’re able to make some side trips. One of the best ones was visiting San Francisco de la Sierra and taking a 3 day trip into one of the canyons to see a petroglyph along with several cave painting sites. Took about a half day to ride by mule in order to get to that canyon (Santa Teresa?). Us 4 clinic volunteers had 2 guides and 4 pack donkeys to carry all of our gear, which we donated to the guides at the return to the village. My wife had packed 6 ribeye steaks on dry ice that we grilled and shared with the guides on the first night.
One of our volunteers, Dr. Bob Haining, a Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation specialist had the elders of the pueblo call for an impromptu clinic when we returned from the canyon (all communication up there is done by ship to shore radio). Since we were taking down donations we were able to fit a plastic drop foot brace to a stroke victim and an osteoarthritis knee brace to an old vaquero who could barely walk. I still remember him dancing in the dirt lot kicking up dust as we drove off! Turned out that one of our guides (Angel Arce) was a cousin of Juan Arce who operates sport fishing charters in Bahía Asunción. Angel’s son has Cerebral Palsy and was attending a special ed school in Loreto, where he was living with his uncle. He had braces made by a Shriners hospital in Alta California a few years before that needed replacement as he had outgrown them. We met him at his uncle’s paint store and measured and took molds of his legs below the knees, then took them to our clinic lab and fabricated new braces which we delivered on our return from La Paz. All in all, one of the most enjoyable of many dozens of trips down there over the past 67 or so years.
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What a great trip combining fun, exploration and helping others. Epic.
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Nice! So you leave the 5th wheel in Asuncion? No worries about theft when left for long periods?
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The only trouble we’ve had occurred about a year ago. I had built a “man cave” under the front hangover section of the trailer and a couple of numbskulls ripped off part of the plywood. Stole some wetsuits, fishing gear, and tools. As soon as my neighbors discovered what had happened they reinforced the wood and secured it back into place with wood screwse.
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Thank you for sharing that and love your story!
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