Aside from creature comforts of necessities like a bed, a place to cook, sit and a place to go to the bathroom, the real essence of designing an expedition camper for long-term travel is all about storage space for parts, supplies and travel gear. One of the most important first accessories many of us add to any Overland Travel vehicle is a good bumper.

A carefully designed bumper can have many functions in addition to keeping a deer or a wandering cow out of your radiator on a dark night in Baja California. A design like our BUCKSTOP bumper holds our WARN 16.5 ton winch, (in a locked compartment), with its roller fairlead, the Hella driving and fog lights, the front camera, the Go Pro camera, two 2¼” receivers and factory tow receptacles. Taking advantage of its box construction which gives the bumper its ultimate strength, it also provides two lockable sealed compartments on each side for spare parts and travel equipment. Securely bolted to the frame of the truck, any winching, pulling or lifting with a High Lift Jack takes the support directly from the frame. An incorporated rock guard protects the power steering cooling unit. If you’re looking for a bumper or are designing your own, check out the photos with captions for some ideas you might consider.

So, what’s going on with The Turtle Expedition? Well, it finally stopped snowing! Three feet in front of our garage slowed us down a little bit.

By this time last year, we thought we’d already be cruising around Argentina and Chile in South America, looking for a small herd of 35,000 sheep waiting to be sheared, so we could camp in the middle of them for a drone shot! The Turtle V was fully packed and ready to roll out of the garage in April 2020. Well, the Pandemic shut all borders so while we were digging out from the winter blizzards, we had a chance to re-evaluate the performance of The Turtle V following our last major adventure, The Trans-Eurasian Odyssey, driving the Silk Road from Portugal to China, ocean to ocean, wheels on the ground, 26 countries/40,000 miles! 

Honestly, if we were going to build a new Turtle VI, very little would be changed, but since Land Rover days, we have become accustomed to a few more accessories on the road of adventure. Simple stuff we take for granted today, like computers, digital cameras, 12-V fans, multiple interior lights, water pumps, a compressor refrigerator, hot water heaters, air compressors— the list goes on.

Everything on this table requires some kind of 12-V DC or 110 -V AC power. Even anticipating the weather in South America, it’s unlikely we will experience temperatures like we had in Turkmenistan at The Burning Hole, 135°F—–or minus 87°F in Siberia!!

We decided it was time to do a complete overhaul on our electrical system. We contacted the Zero Declination experts in Reno, NV, not too far from our home. The owner, KP Pawley and his assistant, Zac, had all the answers we were searching for, and to our advantage, they knew how to install the replacement upgrade equipment correctly and how to properly program them.

KP Pawley suggested we replace our aging two BP 85-watt solar panels with three Go-Power/Dometic 100-watt panels, essentially tripling our solar power. 

That was just the beginning. A new Blue Sky 3000i Solar Boost controller was installed and our PROsine 2.0 converter/inverter was replaced by a more efficient Victron Energy MultiPlus Compact unit to keep our batteries charged when plugged in and to supply us with a reliable source of 110-V AC power for charging the many batteries that require that today.

Along with modern technology, the Victron BMV-712 Smart monitor has built-in Bluetooth capabilities that allows us to monitor all important data on our cell phone.

Speaking of batteries, they are basically the heart of our electrical system, the reservoir where power is stored. As we began researching the upgrading of our electrical system, it became obvious that it was time to switch from AGM batteries to Lithium.

The Battle Born Lithium Batteries are rated at 100 Ah each. Our old AGMs were rated only at 68 Ah, (actually 34 Ah because only 50% is usable). By replacing four AGM 68 Ah batteries with three 100 Ah Battle Born Lithium batteries, we doubled the amount of power storage available.

The Battle Born 100 Amp LiFePOs weigh only 31 lbs., compared to over 50 lbs. for our AGMs.

The battery bank supplies 12-V power to our Blue Sea circuit board which contains individual breakers for every electrical outlet in the camper including lights, water pump, heaters, doorstep,12-V plugs and USB plugs. The MultiPlus Compact can supply on-demand 120-V AC power to our multiple outlets for any accessory batteries we might be recharging.

Yes, we are packing now. As we will explore the backroads of South America, we are confident that our electrical system will keep up with us. Even if we run into long days without sun, we had ordered our F-550 7.3L Power Stroke engine with Ford’s “ambulance package” which includes dual alternators.

A single 135-amp alternator with a standard internal regulator charges the starting batteries for the engine and the second alternator, rated at 200 amps, is controlled by using a Balmar Remote Marine regulator that charges only the camper batteries. In preparation for our next adventure both alternators were bench checked and bearings & brushes were replaced.

Gates Green Stripe FLEETRUNNER MICRO-V BELTs with their special compound provide unmatched flexibility, stability, load carrying capacity and belt life. They have proven themselves reliable for over 100,000 miles. I don’t even know why we carry a spare.

For their proven reliability during our 40,000 miles, 26 country, two-year expedition, we will keep Odyssey batteries in the engine compartment for starting the engine and operating other important equipment like our WARN winch, our Hella auxiliary driving lights and our Extreme Outback dual air compressors.

We will be updating everyone on our website, Facebook, and Instagram as our progress moves forward to a shipping date from the USA to Montevideo, Uruguay or Zarate, Argentina where we will continue south to the tip in search of a herd of sheep. How long will we be gone? You may recall our guideline from John Steinbeck’s Travels With Charlie. “Don’t Take the Trip. Let the Trip Take You” See you all on the road!

Few Overlanders will argue that the Navistar 7.3 L diesel is probably one of the best engines Ford has ever offered. In 1999, it was quite an honor that Navistar presented us with the One Millionth Power Stroke Engine for our Turtle V Expedition F-550 truck. As great an engine the 7.3 L is, we did make a few modifications to improve its function and reliability on long overland adventures. Now with over 200,000 miles on the odometer, some of them include:

These are a few changes that we made before and after our 2-year/26-country/40,000-mile Silk Road/Trans-Eurasian expedition. Of course, there were hundreds of other modifications done to the truck: On the suspension, clutch, U-joints, bearings, hubs, driveshafts, differentials—– It’s a long list.  If you’d like to see The Turtle V up close or ask us questions, be sure and stop by. https://www.overlandexpo.com/pacific-northwest/ 

https://www.turtleexpedition.com/the-turtle-v-update-1-engine-2019  

“BREAKING NEWS!” As they say on the evening news. After several years of absence from the amazing Overland Expo, The Turtle Expedition will be attending this year’s Overland Expo in Bend, Oregon, July 8-10, 2022. Our Turtle V Expedition truck and camper will be there for you to take a closer look. Monika and I will be presenting our informative “How to Stay healthy & Happy on the Road of Adventure” and participating in a couple of roundtable discussion groups. It will be a great time for us to reconnect with old friends, Turtle Expedition fans and meet many new ones or just getting back into the amazing world of “Overlanding” again. Hope to see you there! Check it out at:

Instructor Spotlight: Gary & Monika Wescott of the Turtle Expedition

I remember my first car, a British green Austin Healey Sprite, Mark II. It was so cool! When I parked in my high school parking lot among all the 55 Chevys, Pontiac Grand Prixs and a mix of older Fords, it was one of a kind! Pony cars like Mustangs and Camaros had not been born yet. Friends would stare inside and comment, “Wow! bucket seats, and look at the gauges! Even a tachometer!”

Alas, at my home, it never saw a garage, and washing it twice a week did not keep the pitch, bird crap and the burning rays of sun from blotching its shiny paint, cracking its slick tonneau cover or clouding the plastic rear window on its manual convertible top. The tires soon took their toll in the summer sun. My ride suffered as all unprotected cars do. A car cover never crossed my mind.

COVERCRAFT arrives in
the Pamir Mountains of Tajikistan

Fast forward 60 years. A good friend of ours, Sheroz Naimov, recently bought his first car. It was very special because people in the small town of Khorog, Tajikistan seldom owned cars. It is a beautiful Toyota Corolla Fielder, a popular model in Japan, gently used in near-new condition. The model is unknown here in the States. No problem. With a few measurements and a little research, Covercraft can make a custom cover for anything.

Knowing how proud Sheroz is of his first car, I recalled my Austin Healy Sprite, and then thought about the weather. Sheroz has no garage to park his pride, and in Khorog, Tajikistan he has weather to deal with. At 7,000 feet in the shadows of the Pamir Mountains, peaks over 24,000 feet loom on the horizon, some of the highest in the world. Half the remote country of Tajikistan is over 10,500 feet. Residents who live in the region have often called it The Roof of the World. The ultraviolet rays at these altitudes can be destructive. They eat dashboards and seats for lunch, and tires for dinner. Winters can be brutal, with snow measured in feet, not inches.

Thanks to Covercraft’s custom cover,
The Turtle V is protected from the elements

Since most of The Turtle Expedition vehicles have been protected by Covercraft Custom Covers, we know that even if the Corolla Fielder is not a common model in their extensive computer files, with a few measurements, Covercraft could make a cover for anything. 

They even made a cover for our mascot, Lonesome George II. https://www.turtleexpedition.com/covercraft-helps-lonesome-george-ii/

Sheroz was surprised and extremely pleased that now there is way to protect his new ride. We don’t know what you drive, but whether it’s a fancy pony car or an expedition camper, if you value it, Covercraft can make a custom cover for it. At the very least, it will save you hours of washing and waxing.

Even when we’re going out to a movie with our everyday car, people laugh when pull the cover out of the trunk. I smile and tell them, “Hey, it takes me one minute to cover this car and an hour to wash it. Do the math.

And yes, Covercraft does make a cover for a 1962 Austin Healey Sprite Mark II if you own one.

The Turtle Expedition’s South American adventure has been postponed. Yes, to our great disappointment, we have realized that our long-planned expedition to South America is currently impractical. Why? Well, from some of the personal contacts we have in Chile and Argentina, the news is not good.

A Warning from Southern Chile

A gentleman who actually owns a sheep ranch in the south of Chile wrote:

The last of things you should do is carry on with your planned trip for this year. For the moment things are pretty rough here, and only God knows how things will be for the time you plan to travel. It’s not only the Corona virus, but as a consequence in all Latin American countries, there will be hunger and many riots which will make it very unsafe to move around. If I were you, I’d let some time go by so things settle down and come back to normal.

Disappointing but sound advice. Our bucket list for South America was long and complicated. Perhaps it started back in 1989 as we were driving north from the most southern tip in South America toward Buenos Aires. The immense landscapes of Patagonia and the Pampas were astounding. So open and so huge, you could see the curvature of the earth as you looked toward a distant horizon. These vast plains of the Pampas extend westward across central Argentina from the Atlantic coast to the Andean foothills. The name comes from a Quechua word meaning “flat surface.”

Traffic Jam in Patagonia, Jan. 1989

It was only about 4 o’clock on a warm January afternoon. The sun still high overhead, reminding us that the seasons were reversed.  We came across a huge herd of hundreds of sheep in the middle of the road. Carefully and slowly pushing our way through the chorus of baa, baa, baaing, on the far side we saw the shepherd, sitting by his wagon with his horse, two big dogs and a large leg of lamb roasting on a steel post in front of a fire. We waived, drove another quarter of a mile, and I looked at Monika and said, “Hey, we gotta camp there.” Turning around, we pulled off on the side of the road and met the Basque shepherd who welcomed our company. Interestingly, he had no interest in sharing our Chilean wine, but we did have rice and a salad which he gladly accepted and offered us to sit by his fire and slice off chunks of roasted lamb for dinner.

Sheep shearing, an annual Event

As we talked with him in the soft evening light, he told us about the once a year event when all the sheep from local ranches were brought to shearing sheds, as many as 35,000 at one time. There are great parties, music, beautiful horses, a gathering of shepherds and no doubt an endless supply of wonderful food including roasted lamb. The idea of attending such an amazing event was planted in our minds, and perhaps became one of our most important goals as we planned our second South American adventure.

Fast-forward 30 years and many interruptions, including driving around the world twice. Just a thought of parking our truck in the middle of thousands of sheep and taking a drone picture was enough to spur our wandering imagination on. Our bucket list was growing.

30 Years Later – our Bucket List

Being that far south, Monika would have to see the Emperor penguins on the continent of Antarctica, an impossible place to drive in our truck. Too far to swim, but several tours depart from Ushuaia. Still adding to our list, before we said goodbye to Argentina, we would have to take a few Tango lessons.

Oruro, Bolivia

Leaving the tip of Tierra del Fuego, it would be a long drive north to Bolivia to witness the exciting Carnival in February that occurs high in the Bolivian altiplano city of Oruro. Famous for the devil dancers with their huge masks, it would be a must-see. We had been to the Carnival in Rio in 1989 so Oruro was waiting for us. No doubt there would be adventures and new friends along the way.

Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia

Since we would be in Bolivia, of course we had to drive across the Salar de Uyuni, the largest salt desert in the world. These salt flats cover 12,000 square kilometers and contain about 10 billion tons of salt, remnants of an ancient lake that dried up.

Pantanal

A little further north, we wanted to visit the Pantanal, the world’s largest wetland. Encompassing some 210,000 square kilometers (4,633 sq. miles), or about 42 million acres, the Pantanal covers an area slightly larger than nine U.S. states and sprawls across three countries—Bolivia, Brazil, and Paraguay. It is one of the world’s largest and most diverse freshwater wetland ecosystems.

The famous Argentine Beef

In the meantime, all that driving will certainly build up an appetite. To be sure, we will not miss any chance to enjoy the famous Argentine beef, widely known for being incomparably tender and richly flavored. Argentinian cattle feed on the plentiful grass of the Pampas, not on corn in stock yards. No need to mentioned that Argentine wines, along with their competitors in Chile, have some of the best vintages in the world to accompany a good T- bone, medium rare please!

A Trans South American Route?

As long as we were driving all over the place on this diverse continent called South America, to top off our bucket list, why not try a “Trans South American Route”, just for fun, ocean to ocean, maybe from the most western point you can see on the map, Talara on the far Pacific Coast of Peru, to Joåo Pessoa in Brazil, poking into the Atlantic. Just getting over the Andes and through the Amazon basin could be an exciting trip. If someone else has found this route there will be a trail to follow.

So, there you have enough reasons, any one of which could justify an extended overland adventure, not to mention all the unknown happenings along the way.

The Turtle V is Expedition Ready

The Turtle V is currently completely “Expedition Ready”. Clothing for 4-seasons, medical supplies, basic travel food supplies—they are packed. All critical systems have been checked, inspected, restored or replaced following our two-year 40,000-mile Trans-Eurasian/Silk Road expedition, https://www.turtleexpedition.com/cabo-da-roca-portugal-sept-10-2013/ . Tires, brakes, suspension, clutch, U-joints, hubs, steering system, all filters, transmissions, differentials, air condition—the list is much longer.

Equally important, the day to day living components in the Tortuga Camper like the refrigerator, stove, water filters, windows, fans, heaters and electrical system have been modified as needed. We even replaced all the foam in the well-used camper cushions and bed. And here it sits at our home base, safely waiting under its Covercraft blanket, patiently tapping fingers on the driveway.

Staying flexible

With the undeniable dangers of traveling to South America during this pandemic, we realized that it’s kind of silly to spend several thousand dollars shipping our truck from Houston, Texas to Uruguay if we can’t do everything we had dreamed of. In addition, our original itinerary called for us to return and move back into our home in mid-2021. Why? You may recall, if you’ve been following our blogs, there is the young girl we are sponsoring in Tajikistan. She will be graduating from her high school’s 11^th grade in June, 2021, and we have invited her to come to California so that she can attend 12^th grade in an American school. I won’t even begin to tell you the complications of getting her the visa she needs and determining which of three different schools near our home she could attend. On top of that I’ll bet you can imagine what it is going to be for Monika and me to have an 18-year-old girl living with us full-time for a year, a life-changing experience no doubt for all three of us.

The Children of the Pamirs Education fund

If that does not keep us busy, thanks to our DonorBox, The Children of the Pamirs Education fund we are also helping other young kids to get the education they otherwise could not afford. If you would like to help, click on the link above or drop us a note.

Being responsible – Staying safe -Dreaming now – Traveling later

Stay tuned. The excitement that’s coming up in our lives may seem much more challenging than just driving around South America for a year. That adventure is still on our calendar, but it might have to wait until this pandemic is under control, possibly not until 2022/2023. Can you wait?

Photos other than The Turtle V were open sourced from the Internet.            We gave photo credit wherever we could.

IMPORTANT UPDATE

YOU CAN ORDER YOUR OWN FACE SHIELD FROM XPEL.COM

XPEL® is an important sponsor of The Turtle Expedition. Their custom film protection products keep rock and bug chips from damaging our vehicles. They offer computerized custom hood & headlight kits for nearly every vehicle out there. Their film stops the oxidation that typically clouds headlights. Their TracWrap protects our dual-pane Seitz/Dometic windows on the Turtle Expedition Tortuga camper from mesquite, olive and other hungry tree and bush thorns.

!!!Hats off to XPEL!!!

We have recently learned that XPEL is now using their stock of materials and their expertise to produce Face Shields from existing TPU-based (Thermoplastic Polyurethane) products on hand. This different purpose for their protective films, normally used in the automotive industry, could prove to be invaluable for the urgent need for PPE, (Personal Protective Equipment), worldwide.

They will be offered at their cost to medical personell and first responders while supply chains of other products are constrained.

XPEL® – The industry leaders of self-healing PPF, high performance window tint, ceramic coating, and surface protection solutions. #PROTECTEVERYTHINGwww.xpel.com/faceshield

Time warp back to 1988 on the Galapagos Islands when we had a personal introduction to Lonesome George, the last known survivor of the giant Galapagos Tortoise, (C.n.abingdoni), on the Pinta Island. On January 25, 2012, Lonesome George died at an estimated age of 100 years, not that old for a Galapagos tortoise. They can reach 200.

In the 16th century, there were more than 250,000 tortoises in the Galapagos. Their ability to survive without food or water for up to a year was part of their downfall. When pirates, whalers and fur sealers discovered that they could have fresh meat for their long voyages by storing live giant tortoises in the holds of their ships, the species was doomed. They were also exploited for their oil, which was used to light lamps and in the 20^th century for sun cream!

Our Mascot – The Galapagos Tortoise

The Galapagos tortoise has been our mascot since Land Rover days. The Turtle One was called La Tortuga Azul , (The Blue Turtle), and thus was born The Turtle Expedition, Unltd., as we traveled the world slowly with our house on our back and our adventures were clearly “Unlimited”.

Readers like you who have followed us around the globe for decades—or maybe for just a few years—in magazines like Four Wheeler, Off-Road, Power Stroke Registry, Trailer Life and Overland Journal, or similar publications in 10 different countries, you know the kind of roads we drive. You’ve seen us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and at www.turtleexpedition.com. At shows like SEMA in Las Vegas and Overland Expo in Arizona, a common question is, “Wow, how do you keep this truck so clean?” The sarcastic answer with some truth is, we take a rag and wipe off the dirt.

On the road, we carry a “wash kit” with a tire brush, a long handle brush, a bucket and a few Carrand™ Professional drying and detailing towels and a couple of Carrand Water Blades. Seriously, if you are still using an old bath towel or a leather chamois to dry your vehicle you may still be playing music on 8-tracks! For quick clean-ups we make room for a couple of packs of disposable Glossers by CleanTools. A small can of Turtle Wax Bug & Tar Remover can work when elbow grease fails.

Lonesome George II finds a Home

We don’t like a dirty truck, and we know, whether or not they have a personality, clean vehicles run better. Find us a river, a lake or a hose on the side of the road, or in the case of a special creek in the mountains of Tajikistan where we had a little help, it’s wash day. (https://www.turtleexpedition.com/along-the-pamir-highway-tajikistan-8-july-2014/) & (https://www.turtleexpedition.com/the-magic-girl-of-the-pamirs-update-november-2018/).

So that’s half the answer of how we keep an expedition vehicle that has logged over 200,000 miles looking sorta like new! But we are not on the road all the time. When we are home in California, we do have a garage which is often half full of our furniture when we are gone for years at a time and our house is rented. Protecting our vehicles from the crud of bird doo, pitch, dust, tree pollen and the damaging ultraviolet rays and heat of the sun is clearly a job for Covercraft. Since 1965, Covercraft has been the #1 source for custom automotive protection worldwide. Their vast line of quality products include Custom Car Covers, Custom Seat Covers, Dash Covers, full and half Pickup Covers and Custom just about anything you want to protect, including expensive tires and totally one-off custom vehicles like our own Turtle Expedition trucks.

Now fast forward 32 years since we met Lonesome George at his home in the Galapagos, or 48 years since we drove away from South Lake Tahoe in our trusty Land Rover, La Tortuga Azul. At a local garden supply store we recently discovered a near exact replica of Lonesome George. Thanks to a forklift and a couple of body-builder friends, this 300-lb tortoise has a new safe home in front of our office.

Lonesome George II likes his Neck rubbed

Then we started thinking. Since we will be gone over a year in South America, wouldn’t it be nice to have some kind of cover over Lonesome George II to keep the birds from using his shell for a bathroom. If Covercraft can make custom covers for everything from giant travel trailers to custom expedition campers to motorcycles, maybe they could make a special custom cover for Lonesome George II. We took a few measurements. “Of course”, they said! Made from their WeatherShield HP Cover material, our mascot will be protected from rain, snow and bird poop in our absence. If you have anything you need to protect, Covercraft has the answer.We again thank and congratulate Covercraft for shifting their manufacturing from quality car and seat covers to protective gear for medical personnel and first responders to help fight the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Reptile Magazine: Lonesome George dies

We have just learned that Covercraft, one of our sponsors, has shifted their manufacturing from quality car and seat covers to protective gear for medical personnel and first responders. Congratulations. Let’s all follow their moto: Together we can do this!

Check out their COVID-19 update in the top bar of their website. www.covercraft.com

Gary is working on a blog about the custom made quality Covercraft covers for our turtles, The Turtle V and Lonesome George II. More news on Lonesome George II soon……in the meantime

Let’s all stay home as much as we can, keep practicing social distancing and washing our hands!

Stay safe and healthy,

Gary and Monika

Heading south from Cataviña and Rancho Santa Inez, our next stop was Mulegé to hopefully get internet. Many overland travelers have become infected with the dependency on internet and like any addiction, it’s hard to stop. As we continue our sponsorship for Masha, the young girl in Tajikistan, it’s fun to WhatsApp with her once a week or when we happen to have a good connection, allowing for the fact that she is 12 time zones away! In fact, thanks to readers like you, we are now able to help three other young children to get a better education through our Donor Box The Children of the Pamirs Education Fund.

In a sense, we were continuing down “memory lane”.

Mulegé

A stop at the Hotel Serenidad outside the quaint town of Mulegé was a must. Mulegé is about 620 miles south of the border at San Diego, if you were wondering. It was here that Monika and I first met in 1977. The campground includes hot showers and even a laundromat. Unfortunately we did miss the weekly pig roast, which includes a salad, beans, tamales, flour tortillas, pork ribs, a dessert and one small margarita or one beer. All you can eat for only $15.00 bucks while a mariachi band entertains. What a deal!! Yes, they did have internet.

Moving on down the beautiful coastline of the Sea of Cortez, we stopped at one of our favorite beaches to camp for a week or so. We had borrowed a Sea Eagle FastTrack Angler Pro inflatable kayak, which would insure an endless supply of fresh fish. The problem was that every traveler who camped near us wanted to know more about The Turtle V and there were a hundred questions. Most could be answered by referring people to the 9-part blog we recently posted covering all the details of building our fifth expedition truck, The Turtle V. (https://www.turtleexpedition.com/the-turtle-v-update-9-vehicle-specs-2019/). Remember there are nine parts!

Then and Now

In the morning, before the curious travelers started asking questions, we had time to catch dinner. It took us about 10 minutes to quickly inflate the Sea Eagle using their unique 2-stage double action Bravo 4 pump. Front & rear twin fishing rod holders and elastic tie-downs kept light gear out of our way. Waterproof bags clipped onto the back of the comfortable seats for camera and a water bottle. Paddling out to where we could see rocks in the clear water, the Sea Eagle was perfect to explore the shore line. With its removable skeg in combination with the external, rigid, inflatable “Needle Knife Keel “, it tracked straight and stable, even in light wind and small waves or chop. Using some flashy lures or pieces of scrap fish from the previous day, the trigger fish and small sea bass were happy to take the bait. The foam padded removable floor prevented punctures from fish splines. Back in camp, cleanup was easy thanks to the removable floor and big drain holes aft. Using the 2-stage double action pump, deflating was a 5-minute job.

Loreto

Heading further south in search of a new adventure and good internet we reached the old fishing village of Loreto, now a modern tourist destination with an international airport and a port for cruise ships. Juan María de Salvatierra was a Catholic missionary to the Americas. On October 15^th, 1697, with one small boat and a crew and six soldiers, he landed at a place called Conchó (probably meaning waterhole), where he laid the foundation of Mission Nuestra Señora de Loreto, the first of the Baja California missions, a chain that would eventually reach all the way to San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco and end in Sonoma, California. Following the long-term religious policies of Spain in what they called their “Spanish America”, the missionaries forced the indigenous Californians to live in settlements called “reductions” or “rancherías” that were located close to the missions. (cheap labor). If you look up the word “reduction”, it sounds similar to a “concentration camp” like the Chinese are currently using to reduce the population of Muslims in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.

Mission San Francisco Javier

Many of the Indians succumbed to diseases like smallpox, typhoid, measles brought over by the Spanish. Their numbers were drastically “reduced” and their traditional way of life was disrupted. European fruits, vegetables, sheep, horses and ranching were introduced. The missions have been accused by critics of various abuses and oppression. In the end, the missions had mixed results in their objectives: to convert, educate, and transform the native peoples into Spanish colonial citizens. There is a great poster in a café outside of Ensenada. It reads.”Viva Zapata Cabrones! La Revolution no esta terminada”. (“Viva Zapata Assholes! The Revolution is not finished.”). Over the years we have visited many of the old Baja missions. One of our favorites is Mission San Francisco Javier in the rugged mountains west of Loreto. We recalled that the 20-mile dirt road serpentined up under steep cliffs, around hair-pin corners and splashed through knee-deep arroyos. The village was quiet at night except for the town generator which ran till 10:00 pm, their only source of electricity. We stopped along the way to revisit our friends Bule and Angelina, an old couple at their little ranch on the side of the road. Bule, now in his 80s, had been a tour guide leading people into the Baja backcountry where original California families still live a life as they did 100 years ago. These ranches have no roads to them. Pack mules must be used to reach them on what could be an eight day round trip. This has always intrigued us and we were happy to see that Bule still had the contacts who could take us on such an adventure someday.

The beautiful route up the mountain is now paved all the way to the San Javier but still every bit as spectacular. We were pleased to see that the little community had not changed. Power is no longer from a noisy generator. The beautiful mission, first founded in 1699 and later moved in 1710, was the second to be built in Baja California. It is as impressive as ever. Its hand carved belfry, spires, and altars required many years of construction. Its three gold-leaf altars, surrounded by eight life-size oil paintings, were shipped from mainland Mexico and then carried by mules into this remote location. With a backdrop of steep cliffs soaring hundreds of feet behind it, light filters through the peninsula’s first stained glass windows. It is praised as the finest preserved stone mission on the Baja peninsula. Easy to miss, a short walk behind the church we found the remnants of the first orchard planted in Baja California. Its lone survivor is a stately olive tree estimated at 400 years old. If you want to feel young, wrap your arms around a 400-year-old olive tree.

Baja’s oldest Olive Orchard (400 years!)

Still following old memories, we had learned of another ranch in the mountains where they were also still tanning and dying leather in the old way using tannins found in various types of vegetation, particularly the Palo Blanco tree. We had seen some beautiful saddles and clothing, (jackets and chaps), hand stitched, (no electricity!) at Mulegé’s 314^th anniversary fair. The name La Trinidad stuck in our mind. Following somewhat vague instructions, we ended up pushing through squeaking mesquite trees on a two-track.

The famous Trinidad Deer

Yes, there was a ranch called La Trinidad, but no leather tanning. Instead, it turned out to be the location of one of most famous prehistoric rock art pictographs in Baja. The Trinidad Deer, a UNESCO World Heritage site, is attributed to a highly developed pre-Hispanic group of people known as the Guachimis who lived in the area from 100 BC to 1300 AD. The ocher colored Trinidad Deer on a rock wall in the Sierra de Guadalupe cave is renowned by archeologists for its perfect dimensions and symmetry.

Normally you need a permit obtained in Mulegé and maybe a guide to visit the site. We had just stumble onto it. We were welcomed by the owner of the ranch, Dr. Leonel Orozco Avilés, who happened to be visiting that weekend. It was late in the day, and as an exception, he kindly allowed us to camp for the night. He was a wealth of knowledge about prehistoric rock art of this cave and all of Baja, some of which we had visited on a previous trip. The next morning, his ranch manager registered our passports in a big book and we paid the mandatory fee before trekking up to the cave with him and his young son as guides. Going back out the main two-track, we took the precaution of covering our side Seitz windows with XPEL TRACWRAP, to keep them safe from the hungry mesquite tree thorns. I guess we will visit the ranch where they do the tanning another day.

It was time to head back to our home base now. We had done enough shaking and enough damage to The Turtle V to give us confidence that it was ready for another year-long expedition in South America. We made a quick stop in Mulegé to pick up some supplies, a ½ kilo warm corn tortillas and some fresh local goat cheese. Parking was easy across from the tortilla factory and near the little supermarket. It’s a walk-around town, and yes, there is an Internet café. The Mulegé Mission was the third in the Baja chain.

Coco’s Corner

Moving north, the quiet town of San Ignacio made a great overnight stop by the plaza and we could fill up our water from the faucets by the church in the morning. Of course there was great internet in the new hotel just a block out of town.

Back on Highway 1, we took the turn off on the new section of Hwy. 5, as yet unpaved, to reach our old friend Coco at Coco’s Corner. He was as jolly as ever and doing just fine. Coco’s Corner has been slightly modernized but the old trappings of dozens of girls’ underwear still hung from the rafters and one of our original Turtle Expedition posters retains a proud place on the wall. Looking at the other decorations in his little kitchen, I spotted another girly poster that showed that Coco was still the character loved by thousands of Baja travelers.

Catching Triggerfish at Gonzaga Bay

The old sand two-track out of Coco’s Corner is still better than the “improved” gravel. Once the pavement started to appear we stopped to air up the tires and continued on to another one of our favorite waypoints, Gonzaga Bay. Gonzaga is surely one of the nicest beaches in all of Baja California for walking and swimming.

We were getting low on fresh fish by now. Rather than inflate our Sea Eagle inflatable kayak for just a quick fishing trip, we hopped in José’s panga and motored out into the bay by the rocks. He knew exactly what we were looking for: triggerfish! We landed 10 or 12 in less than an hour. Back on shore, José even gave us a lesson on a quick way to clean them resulting in a pile of nice fillets with no bones. (Ask for him at Alfonsina’s Hotel desk.)

A storm was brewing so we headed out early toward San Felipe. The newly paved road was in a state of disaster, thanks to what appeared to be poor engineering. The last hurricane pretty much wiped out every bridge or viaduct. We lost count of the detours after about 18. Turning west on Highway 3 north of San Felipe, the road was in much better shape. Still no shoulders and very narrow but not as many big semi trucks roaring past us. To our surprise, we even had some snow going over one of the passes. The long line at the Tecate border crossing was boring, but much faster than the one at Tijuana. Remnants of Trump’s unfinished famous wall reminded us we were about to reenter California. Showing our passports, we were through in less than a minute.

Stay tuned as we head for South America where we’ll spend at least a year exploring interior portions of Uruguay, Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, and maybe a little of Peru. We hope you will travel with us at www.turtleexpedition.com, which is currently being remodeled to make it easier for those of you who follow us on cell phones, pods and pads. As they say in Mexico, “Hasta Luego”.