The giants of Mesa del Carmen and the mechanic of San Ignacio

We were about 100 miles north of San Ignacio when the sixfingered giants confronted us.

Stuart had taken us 35 miles off the blacktop and our truck was positioned at the foot of a desert outcropping called Mesa del Carmen.

We’d already seen a full moon rise over this landscape and felt the temperature drop into the 30s. Now it was early morning. Following Stuart up a short, steep trail, van der Brug and I reached a cave, stopped and gawked.

Four oversized men and women stood above us, some with six fingers, all painted on the curving rock wall. The scene also included several deer and fish painted in red and black. To paint the people’s heads, the artist must have stood on scaffolding. Except, as Stuart pointed out, “There’s no lumber for, like, 100 miles.”

Hmm.

We carried our unanswered questions to the south and east, launching into a medley of old towns and beaches along the Gulf of California.

First up: San Ignacio, an oasis that must have looked like a mirage to desert-weary adventurers in the pre-highway years. More palms than people and figs on every menu. A gaggle of 18th century buildings huddled around the plaza. The population, around 1,500, hasn’t much changed in 50 years.

But the 21st century has arrived. I counted three overlanding trucks parked around the plaza, and three motorcycles outfitted for long rides. On the patio of El Rancho Grande restaurant, manager

Oscar Fischer, 28, told us how his great-grandfather, Frank Fischer, came to Baja from Germany in 1910.

“He came with a fishing ship, had a fight and deserted,” Fischer said. “He hid himself in the desert and spent two months to get here, God knows eating what.”

Fischer, who was already a skilled blacksmith, learned Spanish and taught himself to be a car mechanic. For decades, Baja adventurers sought him out. Fischer died just months before the highway finally opened, but to this day, half of the businesses in San Ignacio seem to be run by his grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Next up, an hour east of San Ignacio, was Santa Rosalía, where the Rothschild family bankrolled a copper mine in the 1880s, spawning a strangely Frenchified town.

As the highway approaches from the north, you glimpse the Gulf of California for the first time. But before the beauty can sink in, you’re surrounded by a dump and industrial zone. Then you turn right to go up the city’s main street and you’re surrounded by wooden buildings on a peninsula with precious but few trees. Where did the French get that wood?

Then you come to the town’s most startling building, which is not wood. It’s the Church of Santa Barbara, a prefab structure designed in Europe and made of metal. From the inside, it looks like a Quonset hut with stained-glass windows. Yet it is credited to Gustave Eiffel, who also designed a certain tower in Paris.

The third town in our medley was palm-shaded Mulegé, where I needed towing on that first Baja road trip. This time traffic ensnared us. Then a propane vendor stood us up. We bought firewood instead and blasted off again, because after so many citified hours, we were ready for the still, blue-green waters of Bahía de Concepción.