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“not only was ecomundo closed, it was fully abandoned and in fact party collapsed!” |
sally had discovered a wonderful-sounding resort called "ecomundo" on the gulf side of baja. so it was with great excitement that we decended on highway 1 as it made its decent from the high desert to the coast.
the first town we passed through was called santa rosalia. we didn´t stop, but apparently the town proper, which is off the main road, is quite gorgeous. from the highway the most noteable site in town in the gigantic rusting ruins of the mine factory, and it´s an amazing sight to fans of industrial decay. the second town, just as cute, is mulegè (MOO-lah-hey).
just south of mulegè one finds dozens of beachs called "playas", and each playa has a name. thousands of americans flock to these playas for verying lenths of stays, from tent campers like ourselves, to rv travelers, to the motorboat and dirtbike crowd, to the settle down and build a house crowd. most beachs are semi-commercialized to varying degrees, from us$5/night camping under a palapa (a kind of palm-frond shade structure), to full-on mini-resorts like ecomundo with its sturdy "honeymoon suite" palapas (us $33/night), juice bar, kayak rentals, cafe, and internet service.
to our dismay ecomundo was closed when we arrived. we crashed out at the nearby playa escondido (us$7/night, some palapas available), which although relative crowded was pretty quiet.
the next day we hiked over the short hill to find that not only was ecomundo closed, it was fully abandoned and in fact party collapsed! we met a couple yashpaul and hiedi from oregon who had stayed the night there, and we adopted the palapa next to them. thus was "eco-squato" born!
by the time we left we had been joined by a family from seattle, a couple from venice beach, a german couple scouting for a house to buy, a older road-wisened couple in their vw bus, and luke and tianna from chico, california. all standing palapas were filled and a few people camped. we scrounged driftwood for a fire and i mcgivered the some of the solar back to functionality, although i could not find good working batteries. we cleaned the toilets and added buckets of water for the flush since the water tanks were empty.
over the next few days talks with the friend amaericans in the houses on the other half of the beach filled us in on the sad demise of ecomundo. started as a eco-conscious resort by an ex-berkeley professor who nows lives in thailand, and he had last leased it out for $2k/month to a greg and tanya who managed it. after the year lease came up negotiations broke down and the couple moved on. shortly after that a small hurricane struck this coast and many of the structures were damaged. a further three months of neglect and petty theft further contributed to the decay. and here we were.
even so the placed looked almost ready for business. a dozen kayaks stood chained to a trailer and a further dozen were inside the open building. solar panels adorded the roof, and the battery banks were mostly intact but lacking cables. water and propane systems looked good but empty. there´s a large bar and kitchen. scuba gear and wetsuits were in racks. even the satellite internet and dish were still present.
we did our best to clean the months of dog shit and rodent poo out of the buildings and otherwise try to make the place nice than we left it.
we stayed from solstice through the day after christmas and made several friends there. it was nice, but in the end we were happy to move on and experience a bit more of baja.
one further interesting note. soon after we arrived, we relized that the first couple we met knew people in common with us. yoshpaul used to live on pepe´s land in humboldt county and bought the schoolbus he lived in from there, and furthermore he knows joseph and alexa, the later from when she was a child. wow! and then right before we left we discoved that the last couple to arrive, tianna and luke from chico, also knew joseph and alexa, and luke has been friends with joseph for years! to add further to the humbldt magic, the six of us all occupied the three adjacent "bridal suite" palapas. now tell me, what are the odds of that!
previous travel blog entry
gypsyrob says:
I stayed at the same spot a few days later, much by chance. Interested in learning if the magic is over or if eco-mundo lives on.