On top of the rock

On top of the rock
Our Cliff

Wednesday, December 23, 2009

WHY ARE WE HERE?

To truly understand what we are doing I need to back up about 4 years to how this all began. To those of you who know Maurice and I well you will be re-living things you have heard before. You may want to skip this part, but for posterity, here are the details.

November 2005

Maurice and I had decided that when the magical year of 2009 ended I was going to take early retirement from a successful and fabulously satisfying career selling radio advertising. The only decision we needed to make was “where” this retirement would take place. I had always wanted to have a B&B. Something small that I could take care of myself. A place where people would come, enjoy, relax and feel like they were special. I also wanted to live on the ocean. This part of the dream Maurice also shared, but he was not so keen on cleaning up after people and having to wait on strangers!!!!...but, ah!...The Ocean. There is nothing like the sound of the waves pounding the shore, the smell of the sea, and the vastness of the horizon when you look out over the ocean. San Diego would have been our first choice. We traveled there for years and endlessly dreamt of living there. For us, the escalating cost of buying a place there made this dream one that would not come true. So in November, 2005, after a stay in San Diego, we had decided to rent a car and drive down the Baja to a place called Todos Santos. Neither one of us had ever been there before. In fact the furthest south I had been into the Baja was Ensenada. Since this first time in the Baja, when I was 23, I do not think I have ever been the same.!!!! I spent one afternoon in Hussong’s Cantina, in Ensenada....but as my friend Maria would say when contemplating whether to share a long, detailed story, “that’s a whole nother bottle of wine!”.

Our drive down the Baja would take us three days to get to our destination. The 1600kms had to be driven during the day light so not to risk running over cows that tend to sleep on the highway at night. We learned animals do this, attempting to get the warmth of the tarred road, after the sun sets in the desert.

I have to say that the northern Baja did nothing for us. We did not really talk about it but that first day and ½ I kept thinking there is no way I am living here! The towns we would pass through were small, poor, dirty, and made me feel sad. Our first night we stayed in Guerro Negro, at a wonderful hotel, ate succulent fish and drank cold beer. The fact that the room we had lacked warm water and only had one light bulb was not quite so important after our memorable dinner there. Day two took us to Mulege. I had planned for us to be there on our return trip as well since they have a pig roast on Saturday nights that their web site boasted as “famous”. Driving down the dirt road to take us the our hotel was is really the first time we looked at each other and said, “WHAT THE HECK ARE WE DOING!!!” Yes this place, too, is old, dusty, dirty and really in need of a huge facelift. Since there were no options for us, we stayed there and headed out the next day to see our first potential place of retirement...not too optimistically.

We had made arrangements to meet a man who was offering in a private sale, an acre lot of land on the ocean. From what we saw on the internet it seemed spectacularly beautiful, albeit out of our price range. There is only one highway descending down the Baja. We ventured off the highway, for about 50 minutes before we got to the property. Our instincts were right about this haven. It was beyond beautiful. We loved it. Loved the owner and for the first time in a couple of days felt a little elated at our options. Of course reality hit as we drove the 50 minutes back to the highway. Do we really want to spend money on a place that took 50 minutes on a wash board road to get to? It was too expensive and reclusive and, we decided, was not what we were looking for. The next morning we had made arrangements to meet with a realtor to show us 12 properties around the Todos Santos area. Maybe there we would feel something??? Maybe not. We ventured on to Todos Santos but since we had spent so much time at this first place we were very delayed and did not enter the city til dark.

Let me tell you there is nothing more fearful than driving for the first time, in the Baja at night. It is dark. There was no moon, no light pollution; nothing. After a three day drive filled with mountain switchbacks and literally 100’s of road side gravesites I could not get into this small town of 5000 people quick enough.. Maurice is a brave confident driver. He did let me share the driving on occasion during our trip down, but even he was nervous.

We entered town, spotted the place we would have dinner, than set out to find the small casita we had reserved for our three nights in town.

Todos Santos at night is quiet. It was dark and not a lot of things were open. Except for the main road thru town nothing is paved. Our rental car, a silver PT Cruiser, already angry with us for the 100 km we took it off-roading earlier in the day, was really rebelling up and down the rutted, pitted roads of Todos Santos trying to find a “green gated house“, which held our casita.

Night morphed into day and before our 10am meeting with the realtor, and while Maurice was showering, I jumped in the car to get a feel of this town called Todos Santos, meaning “All Saints.”

What had attracted me to this location, during my internet investigations, were the facts it was small, untouched by the tourism that had taken over Cabo, and writers of this place described it as “an artists haven for ex-patriots from the US and Canada“. “Casual, fresh and lovely“. What more would you want for your retirement.

During this morning, unlike the night before, I was shocked to see the activity in town. Its claim to fame is “Hotel California” which the Eagles sang of. Around the few streets that border “Hotel California” was construction, with people working, fixing, and restoring this town’s amazing old buildings. Todos Santos excited me so much I could hardly wait to get back to Maurice. I ran into the casitas yelling, “THIS IS GOING TO BE OUR NEW HOME!!!” Not convinced by me, Maurice and I left to meet our realtor, Rick, and his lovely wife Lucy.

As I said, we had made arrangements to see 12 places with him, the furthest south being in Ellias Calles, about 50 minutes north of Cabo San Lucas, and 20 minutes south of Todos Santos. At each place we went we diligently took notes and listed the pros and cons of the location. Each place was on the ocean, yet each place offered many cons, along with the pros. After 4 stops Rick, whom we quickly grew to trust, showed us the info on a place which was to be our next stop as we edged back north towards Todos Santos. The place actually had a name. It was called “Wuthering Heights”. I had definitely noticed this place on MLS but it was so out of our price range I quickly put it our of my head. When I told him this he said the price had just been lowered to “close” to what we may afford.

As a side bar, you may notice I say “I” a lot, instead of “we”. Maurice is very contemplative and analytical. I am the opposite. All the excitement, the investigating of things that got us this far he has left to me. He would not have the desire to dream or talk about a town that he has not seen. He would not be the type of man to contemplate, “what ifs”; that is my job. So really up until this point Maurice has been a contributor to the list of pros and cons and not much else.

On the drive to “Wuthering Heights” Rick filled us in. “There are problems” he said. There is no road to the property so we will drive as far as we can then we will have to walk to the place. There is no electricity or even options for this since there is no electricity in this part of the Baja. Of course there is no water either. Of course with each of these statements we thought, O.K. This place is not for us.

As we drove up towards “Wuthering Heights” we turned off the main road and pass squatters. There were possibly 4 different squatters. It is hard to tell if the “structures” we passed were actually occupied or not. There were rusty cars, lots of garbage and tar lean-tos. The area is all desert as I said before so driving toward the ocean, which is where this property is, is not that appealing to be honest with you. Dry, lots of dead vegetation etc. The drive back to the property is only about 1 mile. Rick and Lucy had a big pick-up truck that took us up a dangerous steep incline, and from the windshield all we could see was they sky.

So up this path we grind. If we ever thought any road we had seen so far was bad this one was by far the worse we had seen. OMG this place had more problems than Rick even shared with us. Since he and Lucy had driven here before to “check it out for us”, he was well acquainted with this “showing”.

So out of the truck we climb. The “road” we are on is so steep and it is very hard to get out of the truck. We lean on each other and attempt to close the truck doors against the effort of the gravity that is successfully stopping us from shutting them.

Than we hear it. The sound of the surf. After the mile trek to this point we almost forgot we had driven our way back to the ocean. When we climb up the 10 meters, or so, to the top it crested into the most spectacular view we had ever seen. We were perched on top of a cliff that looked to the south, along the ocean and it was magnificent. Maurice and I looked at each other and said silently…..”is this it???” When I started babbling about how amazing this was Rick informed us that we still had not gotten to the land we were to look at. We had to walk there. So across the top of the cliff we gingerly found our footing for about 250 meters, or 1000 feet to “Wuthering Heights”. From this vantage point you not only could see the south beach but the north beach as well. We were standing in the most perfect spot on earth.

In front of us was the ocean, turn our heads to the north and the ocean went on forever, and the same to the south. If we looked towards the road, which is east, you see the vast range of the Sierra de la Laguna mountains. Perched on a 65 meter high cliff, was truly a 360 degree view of wonder. We looked at each other and said out loud “THIS IS IT”, “Rick we are buying this”.

“But there is no road. How will you get here? How will you get water, electricity??”, he said. We told him we would work it out. We were going to live here.

This is how it began for us. Four years later, with non-stop effort we now have a road, that is passable and will be properly completed after the work on top is done. We have a septic system, not connected, but in the ground. We have a building permit. We have gone through the environmental impact study, which took almost a year and cost $14,000 and which allowed us to change this cliff that has stood this way for 1000’s of years. Every little cactus that was considered to be endangered was marked and re-located in black plastic bags so the road could be put in. We, too, paid for this relocation. Of course we were not living here so after all the expense and effort no one involved with the “saving of the environment” thought about keeping these little guys alive so they all died anyway…..under a larger cactus, 100’s of them, in their little black bags. They still sit there, waiting to be cleared away.

By the way, we also now have 23 palm trees.

2 comments:

  1. Shelby, Rocco checks your blog each evening for new updates...the vivid descriptions of your new life are greatly anticipated, appreciated and enjoyed! We're preparing for a quiet family dinner to usher in the New Year...what do you think will be in the cards for you and Maurice this New Year's Eve in Todos Santos?
    Much love, Donna and Rocco xo

    ReplyDelete