Santa Rosalia

We stayed one night at a campground just south of Santa Rosalia. 

It had a shell beach, not soft sand.

Fishing boats at the ready. It would have been good kayaking here if we were staying longer.

But it was a good birding place.

Vermillion Flycatcher

Pretty sunrise

White-crowned sparrow in the morning light.

The fishing crew is ready...

There they go!

Big gnarly cedar trees grow here.

Verdin

A view of Tres Virgenes Volcanoes in the distance.

A pair of Gila Woodpeckers.

Costa Hummingbird

In the morning we rode in Beth's RV to visit Santa Rosalia. It is recommended to park along the highway and not drive into the city.

So we parked here where it says "No truck parking," and hoped they don't consider an RV as a truck.

Santa Rosalia was once (and is again) a copper mining town. We walk by old mining tunnels. 

The settlement was started by the French. This church was designed by Gustave Eiffel, better known by the Eiffel Tower in Paris.

The church was pre-fabricated in France and shipped around Cape Horn, South America to Baja.

It arrived and was assembled in Santa Rosalia in 1895-97.

Inside the church.

Side view

We walked through the historic district where many of the buildings were built from lumber imported from the Pacific Northwest.

Shoe-shine stand

French-stlye bakery

Smelled good, but we didn't buy anything.

Photo of the old church in its heyday.

We did stop for ice cream.

Downtown plaza

Government building.

From Santa Rosalia we drove to San Ignacio, where we spent 4 nights camped by the lagoon. I'll do two separate blog posts about the adventures there.