Slow Baja - Baja Adventures Tijuana Taco Meetup With Javier Alejandro Inzunza And Polo Sanmiguel

Episode Date: July 29, 2021

Javier Alejandro Inzunza and Leopoldo (Polo) Sanmiguel are passionate about sharing the stark beauty of Baja with the world. The Tijuana-based duo created the beautiful travel site Baja Adventures, "To inspire people to live in a more sustainable way by adventuring into The Baja Peninsula and rediscovering the unique bond between themselves and nature." On a recent trip to San Diego, I reached out to Javier -we had been trying to get together for months and hadn't been able to make it work. I suggested that I drive down for tacos. Polo and Javi changed their schedules to make time for me, and I booked a one-day policy on Baja Bound Insurance. Less than five minutes later, I was on my way to meet them in Tijuana. We met at Taconazo, a fantastic local taqueria. I ordered an Al Pastor taco and a carne asada taco. The Al Pastor was sublime, cut right off the giant trompo, and served with a fat slice of pineapple. The carne asada came with cheese and guacamole and was divine! Stuffed from our lunch, we adjourned to Javier's nearby loft to continue the conversation over a few cold beers. Follow Baja Adventures on Instagram Follow Baja Adventures on Facebook

Hey, this is Michael Emery. Thanks for tuning into the Slow Baja. This podcast is powered by Tequila Fortaleza, handmade in small batches, and hands down, my favorite tequila. Hey, I want to tell you about your new must-have accessory for your next Baja trip. Benchmark Maps has released a beautiful, beautiful Baja California Road and Recreation Atlas. It's a 72-page large format book of detailed maps and recreation guides that makes the perfect planning tool for exploring Baja. Pick yours up at Benchmarkmaps.com. First of all, cheers, cheers. We're having a cold takate.

Javier. Thank you. You were going to say cheese with a mic. Yeah, I was going to make your phone it. We had some great tacos at Taco Nazo. Is that how you say it? Yeah, Taco Naso. Taco Naso.

Hey, before we get too far, let's just go around here, introduce ourselves. Looks like mic levels are good. It's slow Baja. I'm in Tijuana, and I'm with Javier and Polo, and we're going to introduce them. They're going to introduce themselves. We're going to talk about their Baja adventures, and I'm delighted to be here. So take it away, Javier. My name is Javier, and I'm a native friend from Tijuana, but I was also partially raised in San Diego for a couple of years, and then I came back to Tijuana, and it's just really cool that we can celebrate and being able to talk right now about all the adventures in Baja, California,

and I also in San Diego, California, and it's a pleasure to be here. He's talking and having some cold tucatus. Polo, say hello. So, hello, guys. How's it going? My name is Leopoldo. I was born in Raysing Tijuana,

and since the kid had always been passionate, identified with the Baja Peninsula. I love just nature being the Sierra, the Syracuse, the Pacific Ocean. I think it's a magical place to explore and find yourself and just give the value to nature and the underworld.

And I'm super glad you came down here. Thank you very much. Thank you for come down here to our city. And I'm pretty glad to know people that have had, like, explore Baja Peninsula in a more pristine way. I think I'm pretty jealous, really. You have the opportunity to see it with more dirt roads and more dirty tacos and more people exploring and having adventures.

Right now, I think we're very, well, spoiled, you know. It's a different way to explore Baja, and well, thank you for coming down here. Well, I want to say how delighted I am, and I'm going to overuse that word many times today, I'm sure. But we started off as sort of Instagram friends. You guys have a great site, Baja Adventures on Instagram, and so I'm looking at what your adventures and what you're up to. And then we actually met on the road. I was driving back from the Baja XL, and Ted and I were just hot-footing it for Ensonata, We had massages scheduled at Ensenada massage, and we were driving literally as fast as that land cruiser can go.

And we're pulling into some small town south of Ensenada. And I'm checking out you guys in your FGA cruiser. And I thought, hey, hey, wait a second. I think I know those guys. Yeah. You were in your truck, I think, with the dogs. I was in a truck with the dogs. That's correct.

And then we passed right. And he was like, that's a cool looking car. And then we saw the stickers. I was like, oh, slow Baja. And then we was like, hey, how's it going from car to car? I guess we were in, what's in Mañadero? We were passing through Manadero in this. In the southern area, I've been it enough.

So a quick exchange of hellos and stickers and whatnot, and I was delighted to see the Slow Baja stickers made it on your truck, so that's impressive polo. But today we're trying to find a time to come down and have an adventure with you, and I just couldn't pull it off, but today the adventure was tacos. And can you tell me about this taco shop? Because it was excellent. Taconazzo, it's a pretty good place to just go, sit down, it's clean, and they have a good taste again.

And usually the locations are pretty easy to access as well. Sometimes the parking is kind of hard, but at the same time, you know, service is good, fast, tacos are good. And like you were talking about tacos at Frank, those are amazing, but sometimes it's just to hassle to get there. Yeah. Just for the, you know, to get into tacos and then. This tacos, they don't have stickers because we're in Tijuana, but they're pretty good. Because I was saying, like, if you want to get a good place in Baja, and you just want to find out if it's a good place or not,

you definitely just need to see if they have stickers. Well, this one doesn't have stickers, but they have four places in the city, and they're pretty good, really. So how would you explain the Tijuana style of tacos or the Baja style of tacos? Wow. It's a hard one. It's different here. It is different.

And they're their best, definitely. Absolutely. No doubt about it. I don't know if it's the ingredients, the idea of making the tacos. But it's, I mean, you go to Oda Center of the Republic and it's just tacos, but even the tortillas, you know, it tastes a little bit weird. We can start with the tortilla. Yeah, let's start with a tortilla. First of all, it's the size.

It's not like huge, it's not super small. It's a medium and good size for your hand, you know? It's a hand size time, right? They don't have two tortillas. They only have one. And also, the way they cook the assata, which is like the most common one. that we get, they make it, it's like pretty, not super thin, but it's not thick, you know, it's a good, good size.

And at the same time, they don't make it like super small squares. It's, it's like medium size, you know. Gives your mouth a little something to work on. Exactly. They put good onion, they put good sauce, avocado. It's not like real avocado. It's, it's wacamole. Yeah.

And by the end, they just put beans, which is, well, I like to. put beans. Not everyone puts beans, but I love it. It's frioles. Like an extra. Frijolos de la Oya. They're not refritos. I don't know how you say in the English. Fried? Not refried beans. Refried. They're pinto beans.

I don't know how you cry. Yes. That's a good question. Yeah, but. You should probably ask Wikipedia in one of the real. So you mix it up, everything, and well, now you have your Tijuana-style taco. Yeah. That's a thing. It's a thing. It's a thing. It's a thing.

I guess it goes all the way down to, even in Cobbles, it has a couple of nice tacos. Yes, but I don't know. They put tons of love in this one. Yeah, I know, and it's quick, and they love to do them, and it's just like, here's their taco, and then it's just amazing. And there's people who judge, like, the avocado, the wacamole they do. Like, we have a friend Hermann, you remember Herman?

He's like, oh, I don't like the wakomola there. And I was like, what are you talking about? It's delicious. They don't put that much water, some of those places. Yeah, they put more water, and there's more liquid. This one is more, like, pure avocado, and sometimes they put, like, onion and cilantro, and they mix it up a little bit. A little bit of mayo.

Wow. And the line, definitely. So you guys do wilderness adventures, but we're off on a taco tangent now, which I love, because there are so many reasons that people come to Baja. I like to talk about all of them, and tacos are certainly one of my real passions, but let's get on to you guys are young. Both under 30, 20. 26 years old.

Polo, you're 26. 29. So tell me about. So tell me about how you guys formed Baja Adventures and let's get right into what kind of work you guys do. Okay. You want a story? You want to start? Go ahead. I can start. I can start. Look, I was saying to you, like, years ago, I started like traveling basically with my dad and my brothers, my stepbrothers. We used to have like dingy boats, inflatable boats, like sodiacs, and we used to go a lot to Gonzaga Bay. That's how I started

traveling down here in Baja. And since that moment, like I saw Gonzaga Bay. I remember my dad told him, like, are we going work? He said, we were going to a hotel. And I always love to see like pools and play in the pool. And I ask him, is there any pools? And he told me, yeah, there's a huge one. So we got into Alphoncina's resort. We got into the night. You know, it was like a third row, like three hours. And I remember we stopped by Catalina, like in the Hotel Santa Maria. Yeah, like this pretty small hotel was like a quick stop where you get your ice cream Yeah, popsicles. Popsicles, you know, and it was getting dark.

And after that, we drove like an hour after that, and we drove through the dirt road, Launa Chapal, to Alfoncina, to the Bonzaga Bay. And, well, we get there, like, after a crazy adventure. And, well, the sun was rising up, and I just want to go to the pool. And I asked my dad, where is the pool? He told me, it was right there, you know? He pointed me to the Theo Cortez, the very important. And I was like, okay.

It was like my first interaction with the sea. And I remember me that bringing the boat and we started going to the small bay, like the small beaches, sorry. And it was pretty impressive for me. Like really just being nature and no cell phone. If you want to call, I want to call my mom and we need to go to the store to get the satellite phone. You know, it was different, you know, just way different to being set. So after that, years ago, like years after that, sorry, I started traveling more with myself,

with Javier, with friends, and we just have the idea of, like, showing people the amazing places Baja has, and, like, nobody put attention on it. Like, they just want to, I remember, like, the first time I saw, like, people going to the potato share block, which is a place in San Diego, a famous hike trail, and people from Tijuana across the border make like hours in the line drove all the way down to this place a hiking spot which is like an hour from the border and what they pay in dollars invest tons of money and time and like why are you going to that place which is beautiful but we also have this beautiful place down here you should give the valley to the state and the place you live so we just start sharing pictures

and videos of the our pictures basically and after that we start working with circuit territorialism and like campaigns we start we got with certifications as a guide and we start bringing down people in tours to Bay of LA to Sierra San Pedro Puerto Marti, Maya Guadalupe we start doing more trips for ourselves to recognize the area locations

and basically that's what we do like tours and also productions basically like making creating content for companies or the same secretary tourism which is in here in Baja California yeah Javier did get it right he did get it right and it's just I'm just

going to piggyback from one of his comments, Polo started with the sea. He had a lot of cool adventures with the sea. I started mostly with the off-road type of adventures, and it was always an adventure because my dad had a buggy one time, then he had a beetle, but he fixed it as a, you know, off-road beetle was pretty cool. I love that car. I had like a really, really cool roof rack. It was, the car was green and had a jello roof rack. And I remember I used to just jump in and we'll it was really cool so we did like a lot of cool off-road adventures even one time my dad bought it in the whole jeep and we fixed it and uh i remember my dad i was so you know so small that uh i didn't uh get to see outside of the car so my dad will like snug in a bunch of jackets actually you can see the jacket

that's hang out over there that's my dad's jacket and uh i used to you know put him like on the well he used to do it for me for pillows so i can you know see it on the outside of the car and we always had really cool adventures and it was him with a with a couple of friends one of them is my godfather and they always had like this really cool routes we will leave like a crazy times you know like three four a m we'll get there at the place at night and it was always such a cool adventure because you definitely felt disconnected because there was nothing at that time you know having a satellite phone it was like a luxury and uh and then the the real little you know hotel you know hotel or the little cabins that you used to get to in Baja,

they didn't have anything. The closest town was maybe, I don't know, Ensenada, San Quintin, it depends where we were you at, that you could actually get a phone and call somebody. So you were always basically, not on your own, because you always had friends with you that knew, like, oh, this happened to me once, and I fixed it like this, and this happened like that,

and we had to take the car over there. So I guess that's how I started with my dad, and I was probably six or seven years old. And it was always an adventure, probably the similar as Polo, that I was expecting something where they was just like, oh, shoot, we're actually going to sleep here in the middle of all these bushes, and the cars are just parked there. And it was pretty cool. Pretty crazy stories, too, like, sometime, one time, like, military came up. I don't know where, nothing negative, but it's just, you know, in Baja, as we all know, like, sometimes, you know, military is used as long enforcement, like off-roading with humbis and stuff. So it's pretty cool.

And yeah, just, I guess what I like about Baja is how it's still connected to the wilderness, that it was, you know, a dream in the couple of years back, not a couple of long time ago. In California, you still get that wild feel here in Baja, California. And just to cut it back a little bit shorter, I met Polo in one of those trips. We went to, what was it, Laguna Hanson? Yeah. I already met him before, but I met, we went to Launa Hanson. Other kind of adventure.

That was, yeah, that was like a different kind of adventure. It was divided between two groups. The people who loved outdoors and camping, and then there was the other people who loved partying. So I remember we divided the camp between two, and then in the middle, we have like a middle ground that everyone could like enjoy themselves, you know, have a drink and party a little bit

and then go to sleep. So I think it was a natural, right? That we were in your black F-150 Lobo truck and we got there from one round and then Alfred or our friend told us let's go and take another route. You don't have a four-wheel drive? It's okay.

We can make it. And let me tell you, it was kind of an adventure. And that's how I met Polo. And after that trip, I think we spoke, we sat down. I was like, dude, I think not only we should do it as a hobby, I think it's our hobby, but why don't we do something more with it? So, because we love doing these adventures. And not only do we want to communicate the amazing things that we are,

but we also want to educate people about the responsible way of adventuring, right? Because people think about, oh, I'm just going to go an adventure, you get a bowie knife and cut some trees. And I was like, no, like, you need to do certain things that's sustainable. And, you know, try to make a positive impact with you as the adventure guide or leader. Because a lot of times people take other people who have no idea about how to put a tent, about how to make a responsible fire pit. Those little details that, you know, and that's when I started talking with Polo about it,

to do something with, you know, cool with Bahá Adventures. You know, we can't wait to drive our old Land Cruiser down to Baja, and when we go, we go with Baja Bound Insurance. Their website's fast and easy to use, Baja Baja Bound Insurance, serving Mexico Travelers since 1994. Hey, do you have a 4x4? You love off-road racing. You've got to join Slow Baja in the Nora 500.

It's Ensenada to Ensenada, three great days, October 7th through 10th. Kurt LaDuke, Off-road Hall of Famer, leads the class. If we can do it in our old truck, you can do it. Get your street legal 4x4, get into the Safari class, and I'll see you in Ensenada. More info at nora.com. That's www.n-O-R-R-A-com or on Slow Baja.

And so Baja Adventures is very cool and had a pretty tough year, I'd imagine, with COVID. So what kind of adventures did you have last year and what do you plan for the future? I guess the adventure we had last year was mostly individual adventures, right? It was me, you, probably another car. Everyone was under car using masks.

And I guess the last adventures that we did was when you went to it to Erendera? No, no, no, no. Like last year's adventures, we didn't make any trips for people. But we worked with Secretary Tourism. They hire us, they hire a company that makes films, like movies in general. And they hire us to share them locations. And like, I think the position it's called like... Logistics.

Like location manager. Yeah, your location scouts. Scouting, basically. So we help them with scouting for the campaign of this year of Secretary of tourism. And now they also hire us Rosarito and other brands like products. And yeah, for just creating publicity for them and sharing those experiences or products in our social media. And we'll share it to the people that it's a good place. Rosarito, most of the people, they just think Rosarito's a place for party, for

Papas and Beer and to the beach, but if you go to the Sierra area with the countryside, it's beautiful. Like there's tons of things you can do a horseback rise, you can go rock climbing, you can do mountain biking, you can do overland, yeah. So it's pretty cool and we want to share and help Rosarito to share those places with that. Yeah, I guess that's a really good point. That's another thing that we want to share in Baja. It's not only partying in Baja, It's, you know, exploring really hidden places that you can get this amazing cheese in the middle of nowhere. And it's like a really popular cheese between the people from the community. Like, you know, in the Gatanoano, it's like the ranch was right there and we got this really good cheese and we loved it.

And I guess inviting people always, it's in our, you know, in our back of our head. It's, you know, trying to invite people to do it in a sustainable way and here's their way to do it. Like, you don't even have to think about it. Just, you know, be safe about it. you know, make sure your car has sufficient oil or, you know, those little things before you leave, and you know, be safe about it, have fun, and if you have any questions,

just send us a quick. The cool thing about this, for example, this campaign with Rosarito was also that, like a lot of people, they want to go out, but they don't want to go that far, for example, Bale, FD, and we live in the city here in Tijuana, and we need this mini adventure. We want to just get out, get some fresh air.

Well, we never look at it. Like, the countryside of Tijuana of Tijuana, the countryside Rosarito, and these places are beautiful, really. They have deer, they have like, rattlesnakes, they have this ranchal life. You can experience, and you can see cows, you can make a horseback ride.

You can, like, talk with people there, like growing bees and the honey, like... Jellies, Jamaica Jelly. It was amazing. So it was pretty cool to start getting to know more the places that are near in our area, also. Because we always want to go, like, Catavia and Biazza, in Baja Mesa Liga.

I don't know, Baja Sur, but why do we need to go that far we have all these places as well? Like, and it was cool to experience and to get the know the owners of those ranchers and they want to get more publicity because they want to get people in those places and show that what they have in here. So working with Rosalito was pretty fun. We're still working with it and we want to make more content for other places in here as well. So within an hour from here, from Tijuana, you can be into real will

I mean, you know. You can be without fun sign-on. Yeah. It's a true, yeah. Let's say it again. And we have friends, well, like, has that friends that they say, like years ago, they used to make, like, treps all the way to Cabo and started from Tijuana and since the dirt road in motorcycles, like in buggies without, like driving without license plates. And it's the beautiful thing about here. So we want to, we want to look for those places as well.

Yeah. And I guess that brings us back to one of your original questions is what trips we have planned on the future is we have two trips that we want to plan. I guess it's the same type of trip, but it's basically taking people's on excursions. And one of them is going to be Uber Landing, if you have a Jeep, or if you're a Toyota or a Jeep fan, you know, we take any if you want to go. But as long as you have an off-road vehicle that you want to test out, you want to go and explore, learn how to do certain things with the off-road vehicle. Because we have had some friends that, you know, they have their trucks. but they don't usually know how to properly use them off-road. That's one of the trips, and we were going to name it, Oberlanding, in Baja.

At the same time, you want to do a vintage type of motorcycle rides. And when I say vintage, it's like maybe Scrambleers type of old school. And, for example, I have an XR-650, and that one will be considered kind of a vintage at 2000, and it's been to Kabul. And it's pretty cool, and I need to do that as well. My uncle took that bike, and those are the two types of trips we want to do right now. But we don't want to make it, like, only off-road. We want to share people the experience of being in expedition,

but at the same time, like being able to have this encounters with animals, like for example, stopping by Los Angeles and swim with the well shark, for example. Or get to know the small, the small communities and probably get a food class or like cooking or get to, I don't know, to make a horseback, right? Like making the expedition in your own car, because I really love the expeditions in your car. Like, it's, it's cool. It's cool. Like, you prepare to be autonomous, autonomous, basically.

Self-sufficient. Self-sufficient. That's a little bit. But at the same time, we're helping you to make this. Obviously, like we're going to help you. But I love the way that you just travel in your own car. It's different. And now with COVID, like, if you're in your own car, it's like you can be more.

I guess what you're trying to mean is you get two experiences, obviously off-roading, but at the same time you get the experience in something that's only to Baja, you go fishing, maybe you get a drought or something, I don't know, you bring it back to the shore and we have this chef that's just going to teach you how to, you know, prepare it in a specific Baja style. Or if you want to, like if we're in a motorcycle trip, then you stop in Guerrero Negro, where you can go and see the gray wells and that's going to be a double, right? And protect the area that we have because, you know, Baja is well-known.

known for being a place to just Avrode. You know, and you can, whatever you want, you're going to pastor the dunes. You want to pastor the forest. You want to pastor anywhere, the rivers. You can do it because there's nobody seeing you watching you. Or even the government is not going to do nothing, really.

But it's also like to teach people that we have pristine places, but we need to protect them. And probably can pastor, like the Alvro trails, but we are not going make a huge impact in those places. We want to give the valley to the...

Tread lightly is the way we say it. You're going to have low impact, no impact. Exactly. Yeah. Let's see here. You're looking for an opener. Javier's bringing the second round of beer. We get some raja brewing.

We've got some locals now, Agamala. It's got a red IPA, the Mareha Roja. How would you say that? Merea Roja. I need to have one more beer to loosen my tongue. Maraya Roja. And then we have Harry Palanco, another red ale. And then a Baja brewing amber ale.

Peli rojo. Peli roja. So let's talk about, let's transition out of the wild and get back into the wilds of Tijuana. The food, beer, crazy scene here. It's good. I mean, it's happening. Yes. Right here.

What's it like for you, young, young, good-looking guys like you going out in Tijuana? I mean, is it feel like it's opening up finally after a year? Yeah, it's definitely opening up. I saw people in restaurants without masks. The staff is wearing masks, so it's just like San Francisco now here. I read recently that all adults have been vaccinated. here so you're if that's we got a lot of vaccines yeah if that is indeed true that's fabulous

what's it feeling like well it's weird you know I think it's in general all part of the world must have this same feeling but just being able to be back outside skip really but the same time I don't know COVID hit us you know yeah it's you hard yeah besides Tijuana It's a place where we get people from all around the world, really. A lot of people get here from Central Mexico, from Southern Latin America, to cross the board to get this dream job, dream opportunity. Well, now being able to be back outside, it's weird. I don't know.

I love it. I love being outside, but I prefer still being outside nature, you know? Polo's not vaccinated. He's a little worried. I don't really. We're already vaccinated here. His dad's a doctor. His dad's doctor, he's good to go.

But, yeah, I guess for me, the feeling was mutual. Like, I'm not really of a party scene type of person, but I do enjoy the restaurants and the breweries here in Tijuana, and it was kind of a, I don't want to say a shame, but it was kind of hard because there's so many cool restaurants, so many cool breweries they can go and check out new beers. And I don't know, with COVID, it was, like, a lot of restrictions, a lot of you can't.

And I guess the coolest part that we were able to go off-roading and an adventure, the only thing is at the beginning of it, then we were really, really, I guess, careful in going to other communities because we didn't want to spread the disease. So we were taking our extreme measures of, you know, using a mask, if we were going somewhere else because early on we investigated that the COVID got you know transmitted by air so we always wore our masks and there was like and is it N95 masks so just to make sure that we weren't doing anything you know that would affect the communities and we we actually limited going to know for to Baye Los

Angeles to Gonzaga and we went to like really specific places just to camp by ourselves and if we bought any groceries it was here in Tijuana but yeah I guess going back to the to the question is here in Tijuana I think it's amazing. Oh, Baja that we have like this really, really, I'm going to use the word, cool restaurants and not only cool looking, but also deliciously made creative plates. And you find this cranberry sauce that it's made with some duck. And you're like, what?

That's actually a really creative person, an artist, I guess, chef. And yeah, and we have, you know, Baye, Tijuana, and Tanada. The Bahamette food style. It's amazing, really. And it really does seem like it's, um, it's endemic now. It seems like it's deeply rooted. It's here.

And it's not when I used to come to Tijuana when I was, back when I was your age kids. I'd come down here. No, I mean, it was, there was so much here that was for Americans, gringoes, coming in for the day. Yes. And it was, you know, cheap drinks and big plates and all that. And it just really strikes me now is that Tijuana's grown up. And it's for the Tijuanaense.

It's for the people here. Well, that's true. Like, Momba, California, it depends a lot of tourism, right? But now, after COVID, we have had more local tourism, like exploring their own state. That's true. But the only thing, have you been to Bayou, for example? Yes, I have, but I haven't spent enough time there. But what was your impression about that place?

Well, you know, I grew up, yeah, it's a good, huh? That's good, sorry. Sorry, we're drinking these red beers. You know, I grew up very near to the Napa Valley, Sonoma Valley, so I've seen the wine boom in California. And when you used to just drive in the 70s, when I would drive to Napa, and there would be lots and lots and lots of open space from where I lived, which is only less than an hour away. And now when you drive, well, you know, this is protected by the land trust. And then there's just vineyards and vineyards and vineyards and wineries and wineries and restaurants. And so it's in 30 years, 40 years, it's really grown to be quite crazy, frankly.

I mean, you know, Napa is a wine Disneyland. It doesn't feel real. It doesn't feel rural. Well, I'm asking you this because I have this same impression of Bayo-Wa, Lupe. I really love the place. I really love the food. The wine is amazing. But the thing is a place right now is giving more importance to the tourism so they can use a toilet.

The water is more used in the toilet than in the same one right now. Baja, we don't have water. Right. The water that we get depends from the Colorado River. Yeah. You're not getting that water. It's getting used before it gets here. We're not getting any kind of water, you know.

So I feel right now it's super commercialized. And I love the place. I love people coming down here, but I think we're not going to, we're not taking a good route, you know? Well, what's interesting to me, and I'll defer to you, obviously, being local and spending much more time there than I have,

but what is still interesting to me, whether it's 120 wineries and 160 inns or 160 wineries and 120 inns, whatever that number is, I don't have it right, but it's... More than 200, definitely. That's crazy. But there's still dirt roads. And there's still small operations.

So not everything is a well-funded, highly advertised commercial operation. So for me, for Slow Baja, I want to go with you guys and find out who's doing the... Oops. Yeah, the Mexican alarm here. Who's doing the interesting wine, you know, whether it's... it's the Hertheles doing the naked wines or something. What's happening that I'm not seeing? That's what I'm interested in.

And so while I agree with you that it's concerning about what's happening and the draw of tourism may not be sustainable, it may already surpassed instability now, and there's no chance of sustainability. But before it's ruined completely, I want to spend a couple of good days drinking wine there and checking it out. And I hate to say it that way, but I do.

I do. I guess it's just one of the important factors of humanity in the planet. I don't want to get there too deep into it, but I do get both sides of the coin that it's a place where the wine is already doing, it's booming, it's tourism, but at the same time you're like, okay, it's impacting the land in it and the surrounding lands. Because as we said, water is one of the most important elements that we're missing here in California, Baja California,

and we don't have a natural water supply. So I guess it's just one of those things that I wish there was a little bit more organization. And I do get your point, you wanna go and taste some of those wines before they get overly consumed or something like that, but at the same time, I will recommend them with the hotels and the restaurants are pretty good.

But I'll let Polo, he was gonna make a comment right now. I don't wanna generalize, Obviously, there's good people trying to make good projects or since years ago, they started this small winery now they have grown up during the years, right? But what I feel is that right now, people is going more to Baye Guaalupe because it's the trend, not because they wanna get wine.

Actually, they're not even asking for wine. They're asking for cheap cocktails, what you say, right? And they just wanna get the picture in the Baye Waalupe because it's something fancy and because their friends went and they wanna be part of the same, movement right that's one thing and the other thing is as like I think like businessmen they just want to try to buy land and make this hotel resort or

whatever because people are paying 300 400 500 dollars per night in the hotel room which is expensive right it's a good business it's okay but it's it's losing the mission of the place right and I don't want that to happen in Obama imagine if this happens to O'Bah like San Juanico, I don't know, Gonzaga Bay, a built in the central list. Like, these pre-steen places are amazing, but we don't want this happens

to other parts of Baja Peninsula. So let's talk about your next adventure. You've got a vintage motorcycle rally going into Enrindira. I need to really work on that. It catches me every time. Erendira? And so that's a beautiful little spot.

When you drive over the dirt road, from is it San Telmo is that where you would go over from there? Santo Tomas yes Santo Tomas excuse me so Santo Tomas you're over the dirt you come up right right above on the cliffs and you're looking down at the beach it's all good that's an amazing view it is and yeah is that Calavera beach play a Calaver but we're going to call it's called Rancho la Concha oh this weekend no not this weekend uh this weekend for the 4th of july we're going to go with a little scouting trip you're going to go with san kintin they're going to correct me if I'm

Rompolo he's one with you usually with logistics. And we're going to come back from San Quintin and we're going to see some of the routes to get to Erendira, to Rancho La Concha, which is where we want to take the vintage riders that like crazy adventures. We're going to go sleep to San Quintin.

And after that, we're going to drive up to Camaloo and then I'm going to head to the dirt road of all the Pacific coast, basically, which is Camalue, Colonnette, well, San Delmo, Colonnette. You pass through Quattro Casas, and then you get to, San Antonio La Pleas Antonio, Cordonnette, then you get to Arendira, and then you get to Santo Tomas.

It's a pretty good place. Like all that dirt roads are amazing and the cliffs and the beaches are beautiful. Well, let's talk about dirt roads for a little bit. That's what really interests me. That's why I come. Honestly, I think it's amazing in Compandre Trail and the roads we were just talking about. They're an awful lot of dirt roads still in Baja. Yes. Yeah. And these are public roads. Yeah, most of the time Well, sometimes we get into Like ranches, but you need to Open the gate and close it, right?

But Usually you can get in, but He's being respectful, like they go and ask Like who is yours? Oh, my name is so-and-so and I'm going to I don't know, play out of that or not. Or just get 50 pesos like $3 or $4 and everything cool, right? Everything cool, right? It's part of the deal, right?

Yeah. You're passing through the ranch. So it's not common. in my life in San Francisco that I'm driving around on dirt roads. But again, you know, very close to where we are here in a major city, they're dirt roads, that you guys can be sort of out, as I say, desolation on a doorstep. And it's, you know, it's out and about.

And you can be out and see one car, two cars or no cars. Probably in your 40 minutes without traffic, if you can get to an off road and then they come back. Yes. And they start your day working. If you're at that, you know, aficionado, which I think I, based on the look, of your both of your eyes I think you are but yes basically yeah we have a lot of

off-roading and as Polo is and you know just being respectful with the hidatarios sometimes they do get pissed but most of the time you're like you know cool because it's a sometimes it's good for them because people usually take him stuff or food you know new even news news and even pay you know a hundred pesos sixty pesos you go into a place and it's a good revenue yes definitely all right Well, we're going to wrap up. You guys have been pretty generous with some taco time and a couple of beers. If you were, I'm looking at you, Javier, if you've got one spot and you're taking your buddy or you're taking your girl, you're taking your dogs, and you're going for four days.

Okay. Where are you going? Four days? Four days. Okay, sir. Give me a three-night four-day. Honestly, I will go to by Yale, Los Angeles. because there's a lot of things to do there.

You know, not only chill, but you can also do some adventure stuff, and you can go exploring some of the caves and some stuff. So I will probably go to Baye-Los Angeles, take my dogs so they can run like crazy, and, you know, have a good time with a couple of friends as well. I like it. And when you're there, are you camping? It depends.

If we're going to go... So give me three options. We have two options. We have the, you know, like the most, like, chill option, which we're going to go to the hotel. We've got some AC. We're going to have some, you know, a little bit, chill. Camp Porchalon definitely. This time of year AC is important. Yeah, because it gets really hot.

It gets really hot. That's this one I'm saying this, listener. And if we're going to go, you know, like a little more, you know, four by four rugged, we'll definitely go camping and I would love to experience going camping to one of the beaches. Obviously, you know, leave no trace principles and stuff. And then just organize logistics, so that Panguro can go and pick me up on the, you know, the third day and obviously have all the safety measures, like maybe a satellite phone in case something happens. But those will be my two options in Bay of LA. Like either camping, yes, but I will go to one of the beaches, one of the islands, actually. Or even to one of the beaches you can get into the car or stay at a hotel,

and then from the hotel just move around. It can be my center point. And you had mentioned Archelon. So let's talk about that a little bit. It's kind of a cool spot. It's really cool, yeah. It's really cool. I think that people are also amazing.

And I think not only cool, but I think the location is perfect. So it's cabin. it's camping both of them both of them yeah i mean i'm sorry i'm saying yes oh yes there's yes there's yes there's yes there's all those yeah indeed um so

yeah i like comfort alone yeah when you get there you get this really cool vibe it's just been there for a couple of years you know many years and you know you see this all as polo was saying at the beginning of this podcast you see stickers but instead of it's like you see stickers but you see all the things

you say maybe like an old beat up gas tank they're still being used or you see this old hat sombrero that's hanging there, and that hat and sombrero has a specific story of who took it there and why they put it there. And Campocheon has that. And, you know, the people who are little Camberchalon are pretty amazing people.

And the location is pretty cool too. You can get to the town really quick, or you can go to the Gringa. It's like right over there. So it's pretty cool. I like it. And if you can do car camping or you can do regular camping or, you know, getting a nice camp.

Yeah, cabins and hotels. and whatnot. Polo. Three days, three nights, four days. Where are you going? Probably already said about Baye Los Angeles, which I think is a good place. But if you don't want to go that far, I think La Mision is a good place to visit, really. We just sometimes, we went to, we go to Ensonada, we go to Bayo Guadalu. We passed there, but we never see that place. And it's a beautiful place. Like we have the beach, we have the story, the stuadio. Yeah.

We have the, like, Marty Harryman. She has this horse. fat rides in Rancho La Pila, which is amazing. You can go hiking, you can go rock climbing, you can do tons of things, really. You want to go to Baye? You can go to Baye. You want to go to Ensenada? It's like a place which is in a very strategic location. So, and you don't want to drive that far.

You don't want to invest that much time in the road. That mission is a good place, really. La Mission is just north of Ensenada, right? It's a town which is always being fight between Enzana and Rosarito. Like half of the town, it's part of Rosarito and half it's part of Enzana. It's weird. Yeah, big beach, estuary.

You can do kayaking. You can do surf. You can do horseback riding. You can do everything in that, like four days. Like one day you can be a fancy baye, another day you can be beach, another you can be in Estuario. Although they can do ranching, you know, like chilling, maybe a cool four horseback ride. And I think Polo, that's a really good point you make him there. You want to go to Baye?

Let's go to Baye. It's 30 minutes from us. You can go anywhere that place. Well, guys, I really appreciate you spending a little time with me on a Monday. I enjoyed the tacos. I hope we're going to have some fun after we turn the microphones off. And to find you guys, Instagram, it's Baja Adventures. Yeah.

Yeah. Where else? The same A of Baja is the same A of Adventures. So it's Baja B adventures. Say it again. So Baja B ventures. like we skip one eight basically. Skip the adventures.

I got you. I got you. There's not two A's in a row. You'll find it. Your algorithm will pop you right up. If you like slow Baja, I'm sure if you type in Baja, that second A, if you miss it or type it in, Baja Adventures will pop up. It's full of beautiful pictures of great adventures. And I'm delighted to be here.

Javier, anywhere else to find you guys on the internet? Bajaadventures.com. Bajaadventures.com. The same. Baja, Dibet, Yeah, Baja, drop that second A, the adventures. All right, thanks guys. It's been fun.

Thank you. Pleasure, let's go for a little cheers before we leave. Ching, Ching, ching. What do you say here when you say cheers? Salute. Salud. Or the whole chimichanga of it. It's a Monday, so we're chilling.

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