unrequited love, the silver caps of his teeth
glinting as he flashes a mischievous grin.
Nary thrums out the base line and exchanges
a smile with Guadelupe. I rock along in my
chair and sip another cup of Linda’s strong,
dark coffee, content to be in the shade.
Come afternoon, Nary and Chema are once
again sweating through the daily grind to
make sure all their cattle are fed. Wielding
pitchforks, we rake cholla cactuses into
small fires to burn the spines off and fling
smouldering chunks to the cows, which
crash into each other to get a bite. It takes
three hours for us to feed them all, then Nary
sets off in search of barrel cactus for his
mules and horses. In lockstep, we hike across
the ravine to an even higher mesa, which is
laden with volcanic rock split by the sun.
The sky is pitch-black by the time we’re
done, so Nary hacks off a dead limb of organ
pipe cactus and sets it alight for the walk
home. It burns red and white against an inky
sky flecked with constellations. “Lámpara de
ranchero,” he exclaims. Rancher’s torch.Due south
Just after dawn, Trudi and I bid our hosts
farewell and meander back to the highway
for the long drive south. Our destination: San
Javier, a colonial-era farming village nestled inthe mountains west of Loreto. One of Trudi’s
closest vaquero friends, Dario Higuera Meza,
a saddle-maker, and several other old hands
are having a reunion at Rancho Viejo cattle
ranch. The plan is to sit around an open fire as
the friends share stories over mezcal, a potent
Mexican spirit distilled from the agave plant.
The potholed road wends its way across
dusty, wind-blown flats before dropping
into the town of San Ignacio. The sleepy
oasis boasts a palm-fringed lagoon that’s a
UNESCO World Heritage Centre and Latin
America’s largest wildlife sanctuary. In winter,
gray whales migrate to its warm waters from
Alaska to mate and calve. But with no whales
to spot in high summer, we cool off with ice
cream cones and take cover under the massive
Indian laurels that cloak the main plaza, then
walk over to Casa Lereé, a museum-cum-
bookshop run by Jane Ames, a local historian
and good friend of Trudi’s. Jane is a font of
knowledge on all things Baja, her living room a
treasure trove of vintage photographs, books,
handicrafts and hiking maps.
Pressing on to the coast, the highway
plunges us down the Cuesta del Infierno (the
‘slope of hell’) to the Sea of Cortés and the
mining town of Santa Rosalía. At first glance,
it’s doesn’t seem like a place to linger in.
Rusted hulks of industrial machinery line theFROM LEFT: Nary milks
his cows at Rancho
Mesa San Esteban; Trudi
Angell, the founder of
the Saddling South tour
company; Nary lights an
improvised torch made
from a piece of cactus
while searching for food
for his cattle
116 nationalgeographic.co.uk/travel
MEXICO