FIVE DAYS IN BAJA'S SAN PEDRO MARTIR-Easter Vacation-John Robinson
Arthur Walbridge North, noted author of Camp and Camping in Lower California (1910) termed Canyon El Cajon as "one of the two most diabolical caminos in Baja California". After struggling through thick brush, over boulders, and up and down steep ridges and slopes, five of us who tried this eastside approach to the San Pedro Martir are inclined to agree. We strongly recommend the much more pleasant westside approach via the Meling Ranch.
Sat. Apr 2, 11 of us, mostly DPS climbers, drove south below the precipitous eastern escarpment of the Sierra San Pedro Martin to Canyon El Cajon, allegedly the site of an old trail onto the plateau. Two days later, after an epic struggle briefly mentioned above, only five of the haggard party reached Santa Rosa, a serene and spacious meadow atop the tableland. Monday we descended the more gradual western slope of the range to the site of the long-abandoned Mission San Pedro Martir de Verona; from which the Sierra receives its name. Only the crumbling remnants of what were once sturdy stone walls remain of this most inaccessible mission in Baja. With mission diagrams taken from Peveril Mieg's Dominican Mission Frontier of Lower California(1935), it was interesting to survey the former layout of this beleaguered, short-lived mountain outpost of the padres.
