By this Author: divatmotoros

In this series I will share some pics and technical details of cool camper vans, RVs and trailers we met. Let's start with a beautiful Barth bus from 1994. At first I thought it was fully restored but then chatting with the owner I realised it was in its original condition. I really liked the colors and the paint of it. Light blue stripes, exactly the same color I painted my trackracing motorbike 15 years ago. I also liked the small details like the flat front grille and the square headlights.

Let's review the brief history of Barth from Tin Can Tourists, the "Original Vintage Trailer and Camper Club" :

"Although relatively few Barth motorhomes were manufactured, the Barth name is well known among aficionados of high-end motorhomes. The company’s history can be traced to Bob Barth, who owned the Beeline Trailer Company. In 1963, Barth left Beeline to form the Barth Trailer Company, which was founded on the principle of building quality all-aluminum travel trailers. At the time, many travel trailers and almost all mobile homes used a wood frame with aluminum sheathing. Barth produced his all-aluminum trailers in his Milford, Indiana, factory from 1963 until 1968, when he sold the company to Mike Umbaugh.

Umbaugh, whose business experience was in banking and not RVs, saw the Barth Company as a solid investment opportunity. Immediately after acquiring the company, Umbaugh changed the focus from travel trailers (which he eventually phased out in 1970) to the growing motorhome market. Rather than try to compete with companies like Winnebago and GMC that sold a relatively affordable product, Umbaugh decided to produce a high-end motorhome for upscale buyers.

The Barth Company never produced more than 300 units per year, many of which were custom designed for the owners. Barth’s sales plummeted during and after the 1973 energy crisis as did the sales of all motorhomes. The company emerged from the crisis and altered its long-term vision by dedicating itself to manufacturing custom coaches designed for commercial purposes like mobile offices, medical support vehicles, dental labs, libraries, and remote TV production units. Throughout the 1980s and into the 1990s, Barth continued to manufacture motorhomes and specialized motor coaches but eventually ceased operations.

In 1998, the company’s assets were sold to Keith Leatherman, owner of Leatherman Construction, who intended to revive the company. Leatherman spent approximately half a million dollars retooling manufacturing equipment and making plans to move the factory to Albion, Indiana, but due to a lack of orders, he officially pulled the plug on February 13, 2001."

There is another interesting website (also quite old school, like the motorhome itself) at http://www.barthmobile.com/ where owners exchange information and tips, organize meetups and document sightings of this classic motorhome.

We are a bit more quiet recently on this blog for a good reason. We are writing, editing, rewriting and re-editing the stories of the trip of our lifetime. We are busy finishing the book,

"One Year of Camping - The Guide to Plan Your Escape".

It will be part handbook for those people, who are travelers at heart but did not make the big step yet. Moreover it will have our favorite tips and the best (and ugliest) stories of our trip. Here is a peek preview of the cover:

So please bear with us for now and make sure to sign up to be notified once the book is out.
Click here to sign up for the book in English or in Hungarian.

Expect it in May 2023!

We are spending our relaxed days at La Paz and entertain myself by hitting a pole when moving the trailer within the camp to a new site. There was a fairiy tight gate and I had to make a sharp turn right after the gate. The back of the trailer swings a lot and I know it, norrmally take good care of it, not this time. By misjudging it with about one inch the awning's mechanism hit the fence, and the screws at the bottom were ripped off.

Next day I went to Home Depot, purchased a bit larger screws and some glue to fill the holes before re-installing the screws. Borrowed a ladder at the camp and checked it at the top as well. It was manageable, I used the larger screws and put in some extra ones as some of the screws were missing the frame, not holding much force. Now it is better than it was.

Another even more entertaining program was an excursion to one of the most beautiful beaches of Baja California, according to its website. There is a limit on people allowed to the beach daily but we got lucky again, just like at Lake Moraine near Banff, Canada. We simply showed up at 15:00 pm and we were let in without hesitation (you have to leave at 17:00pm). It was not very full (it is the end of March) so we really enjoyed it. Shallow water, clean sand and some palapas for shade. And a breath taking scenery indeed!

After the famous beach closed we still wanted to check out a nearby beach called Playa El Tecolote. It was 5 minutes from Balandra and there were some beach-front restaurants and palapas for rent, many cars and a few campers. While Balandra was somewhat windy here the wind was really strong, I almost had diffficulties to open the door of the car when we stopped. That meant big waves too, it looked nice.

Another noce daytrip from El Sargento was Todos Santos whoch we skipped last time as our smallest kid was asleep in the car. On thet day we got great whale sight instead at Cabo San Lucas. We decided to return to Todos Santos another day and it was absolutely worth it.

It is a very nice small town with lots of arts, cafes and historic buildings.

One of the artist was creating and selling large and colorful sculptures from small mechanical hardware and nuts, bolts and springs. Echo fell in love with the colorful dogs for sure.

After enjoying a nice icecream we drove past the town and looked for a spot on the ocean side to watch the sunset. We found a small gem with fishing boats and plenty of pelicans and other birds eating the fish pieces thrown away. At the same time we have seen whales near the shore, they were puffing water into the air, just like last time at Cabo San Lucas.

We used the 8 seat capability of Fordy to make great excursions with the visiting grandparents. Our next stop was a nearby town called Los Barriles and Buenavista meaning nice view. Enroute we followed a pickup truck full of dogs who were happily barking left and right in the wind.

And the place was nice indeed, a great beach which is also a turtle hatching place in the middle of the summer. In July at nights thousands of small turtles leave their eggshells behind and storm to the sea at this beach. Now in February it was quiet and no signs of turtles, just a clever huge fish eating the plastic bottles at the beach.

As we walked in the sand a few local dogs made lasting friendship with Echo (which was much nicer than the last experience)

We have seen hige rocks and quite nice buildings on the seashore.

We finished the day with a nice taco dinner and a beautiful red sunset.

Originally we wanted to do a short trip to Todos Santos which is about one hour from our current camping. To speed up the morning we packed breakfast for the kids and left the campsite around 9:00. As we passed El Triunfo the road was a bit twisty and we climbed to a small mountain, but then it opened up and changed to a two lanes highway.

We were progressing quite fast and it was a pleasure to see the Pacific Ocean again! Our smallest boy fall asleep as we got almost to Todos Santos sonwe decided to use his sleeping time and drive on to Cabo San Lucas. We arrived smoothly and we stopped at a small square next to the Museum of Natural History where a family was jumping ropes. As our daughter just started to learn it we asked if she could join their practice session and so we did.

Afterwards we have walked a bit looking for a restaurant and stopped at the Crazy Lobster. The food was good and the waiters were wery kind sonwe enjoyed the shrimp fajitas and skewers, the tacos and a burger. After lunch we eanted to walk to the famous arch. When parked the man letting us into the parking started to chat and asked if we were interested in whale watching. Word followed word and we agreed.to go out with a boat. It was a bit windy and late afternoon so not the best timing but regardless we hoped to see some of those fantastic creatures.

The boat ride was a bit bumpy as we morored against the wind bit the rocks and scenery was really beautiful. After a few minutes we turned back, the ride became a bit smoother and we noticed the first blow of white not too far away. We got closer and we were amazed as the mighty and unearthy creatures floated above the surface and disappeared slowly.

After the thrilling encounter we headed back to the marina and seen manta rays jumping out of the water and flying like birds

After mooring we have watched as a man fed the sea lion with fish. The birds were quite eager to get it and one of them even stole a piece of fish from the man, despite his best efforts to save ot to the sea lion.

A day packed with excitement and fun! Somewhere I red that only 1% of the populatioj ever witnesses whales. I am not sure if it is true or not but we feel really priviliged to see them in their natural environment.

A quite unique phenomenon is found at the shores of the Sea of Cortez: hot water springs flow directly into the sea near the shoreline. You can see the hot steam rising from the sand and have to be careful: when the tide is low and the cold sea water is lower the hot water can be very hot to walk in! Visitors can build small ponds from the rocks to set the right mix of the colder sea water and the hot spring water and this was exactly what we did!

Before enjoying the water we climbed to the hills and had a look at the magnificient scenery. We also spotted whales coming up and submerging slowly, in a very royal manner. The back of the huge animals looked rugged and black and white as they slowly drifted along the coastline, about a hundred meters away.

We heard there is a carneval in La Paz at the Malecon, which is probably the best use of the scenic walkway. It is similar to the events at the end of the sunmer in Hungary, called "Búcsú" which I always awaited as a kid. Our kids enjoyed the air castles and jumped, jumped, jumped. My favourite was the bitcoin symbol on one of the castles and the proper Italian short espresso at Romeo&Juliet. Well, the icecream was not too bad either.

Talking to one of our fellow camper in Tango Azul she mentioned a little gem nearby called El Triunfo. A previous miners town famous for its already closed silver mine with nice museums, cafes and restaurants to check and just half an hour away from our current location, El Sargento. So we decided for a nice daytrip with the grandparents who visited us for a few weeks!

The road to El Triunfo was also quite narrow and there were two washouts where half of the lane was missing due to water damage. We have to drive very carefully and on our way back a cow was also wandering onto the road just in front of us. It would have been too late to brake as it was so close so I accelerated and raced away the cow in front of it, having just about half a meter clearance.

The small town did not dissapoint us, we have visited two museums. The first was Museo del Vaquero de las Californias (aka "The California Cowboy Museum", which is about the history of cattling, rancheros and ranches on the peninsula. It was interesting to learn how the Spanish "imported" cattle and horses to the newly discovered America and how deep the roots of herding cattle and goats was in the current Mexico, especially Baja California.

Then we had our sandwich lunch in front of a nice playground and the kids enjoyed some swings and slides to burn off their excess energy. Our next stop was the Mining and Mineral Museum (Museo Ruta de Plata, "Museum of the silver road".) On top of the historic displays it included a small room full of different precious gems and a statue of Saint Barbara, the saint of the miners and the English origin of the name of our daughter, Borbála in Hungarian.

We were glad to find the national flag of Hungary on the facade of the museum and a table conmemorating a few nations for international exhcanges and partnerships. Also a nice picture was on the wall about Punta Arena de la Ventana which we visited a few days ago.

To finish off our excursion we had a nice icecream and chatted with the lady serving our icecream. She was originally from California and had two beautiful black Cane Corso dogs. Looking frightening but gentle giants, at least those two there.

When staring into the distance from our campsite at Tango Azul RV Park we noticed a tiny needle in the distance. It was a lighthouse so after seeing some others in British Columbia we definetely wanted to check it out. It was not too far, about a 30 minutes drive and the last section was an unpaved 3 kilometers. Close to the lighthouse we met two campers stuck in the sand next to the road but they were already busy digging and a local men was helping them with a tow vehicle. We asked if we could help but they were ok. I was quite careful afterwards to park on a packed area, not leaving the road too much.

The wind was very strong and the clouds gave a very dramatic backdrop so it was worth going to see the place.