Jan 21--A Little Update From Last Night, and Today's Ride to Rancho Piedra Blanca

So, the wind did blow last night. It was coming from one direction (the side that I put my sand stakes in). At about 2:30am I was rudely awakened by the wind blowing from the other direction, and unceremoniously blowing my tent over on its side with me in it! All of a sudden all my stuff went from one side of my tent to the other, and I was laying on the door that was on the ground. The moment the wind eased just a bit, I rolled the tent back upright, moved my sleeping pad and myself over to the windward side to weight the tent down. Obviously, the stakes had been pulled up. Both vestibules were flapping in the wind. Then it started to rain. I'd brought my bike shoes, camp shoes, and dromedary bag into my tent (along with a bunch of sand). I layed down, and waited for the rain to stop. Fortunately, it didn't rain all that long. After it quit, I got out to put the stakes back in. The windward stakes were on the other side of the tent. I got everything staked down as best I could, then crawled back in my tent and went back to sleep.

When we got up in the morning (not much of a sunrise, sadly), Harry found his bike tipped over, and one of his dry bags torn to shreds. A bunch of his food was gone (some scattered around). Neither Brent or I heard anything, but it would have been hard to hear over the flapping of the tents. We don't know if it was one of Pancho's dogs, or a coyote.

Now, onto today's ride. We got lucky with just a tiny bit of rain early on in the ride. The road continued to be horribly washboarded, and also gently climbing. We moved away from the Coast, heading inland for the next several days.

The road became quite sandy, which is pretty easy to ride with our three inch tires. We popped out onto a very wide road, and turned into the wind. Even though it was just a little after 11:00, we stopped for some lunch. Harry had been behind us, and as we were getting ready to continue, he caught up. He ate some lunch too, and caught up to us not long after we took off.

We were steadily climbing again. Then the real climbing began.

Looking back where we had climbed

We continued climbing with short bits of easier riding. Then we looked ahead and saw what was coming up. Basically, it looked like a concrete wall.

See that white line in the distance? Yeah, we had to go up that. At least it was concrete. It would have been a pusher if it had been dirt. 

Finally, we arrived at Rancho Piedra Blanca. It is a working ranch that is also an ecotourism place. They have cabins, showers, and a great covered spot for our tents. They also have a small tienda where we bought sodas, and snacks. We were going to eat in the "restaurant", but the owner's wife is the cook, and she is not here. Believe it or not, I managed to understand all that in Spanish! I was even able to tell him it was no problem, we had our own food! Obviously, they have wifi too. In fact, it is the best wifi I think I've had the entire trip! 

Our little cabana

An orange tree!

It's a cool place, seemingly out in the middle of nowhere! Tomorrow we head to Vizcaino.