Slow Baja - Getting Dirty With Gerald Lee Savvy OffRoad

Episode Date: October 9, 2020

We met Gerald Lee in Ensenada, at the October 2019 NORRA 500 Rally. Lee and Kansas native, Miles Hasselquist, competed in a Ford Ranger pickup in the non-race, Savvy Safari 4x4 Class, for street-legal vehicles. It was Hasselquist's first trip to Baja, and Lee let him do all the driving. I've learned he's generous like that. Whenever we caught up with them, Hasselquist and Lee seemed to be in a smiling competition. With ear-to-ear grins, I wasn't sure if they were genuinely surprised our old Land Cruiser was still running or if they were having the time of their life. Lee grew up in Southern California, and like many who find themselves playing in the dirt as adults, started by racing motorcycles in his youth. Years later, when a friend gave him a Jeep, Lee wanted to modify it. He surveyed the burgeoning aftermarket offerings and decided to fabricate his own. Lee used lightweight aircraft-grade aluminum that's stronger and significantly lighter than the heavy steel parts that dominate the scene. What started as a hobby to improve his Jeep's performance became Savvy OffRoad, the leader in high-quality Jeep products and offroad racing vehicle construction and preparation. While Gerald is decided low-key about driving in NORRA events, he is a serious racer with multiple overall wins in the Every Man Challenge at the King of the Hammers. He's also had top drivers like Robby Gordon and Jessi Combs take the podium in Savvy OffRoad built racers. Visit the Savvy OffRoad website. Follow Savvy OffRoad on Instagram Follow Savvy OffRoad on Facebook Follow Savvy OffRoad on YouTube Visit the NORRA Mexican 1000 website.

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. Flo Baja is brought to you by the Baja XL rally. The Baja XL is the largest and longest amateur off-road rally on the Baja Peninsula.

It's 10 epic days. LA to Cabo to LA. Check it out at BajaxL.org. I'm here at Savi off-road in Corona, California. Gerald, with Gerald Lee, proprietor. Yes. You once told me this was your wife's business. Well, it's actually my son's business. Your son's business. Yes. All right. We met at the Nora Baja 500. We're in the shop, so there's some actual shop working going on here, and Gerald's going to tell us all about what the shop does and what Savi off-road does. But we met at the Baja 500, Nora, Mexican 500 last October.

Correct? Yes. Yes. And we were in the Savvy Safari class together. The Savvy Safari 4x4 class. I was in my old Land Cruiser, and you were in a brand new ranger. Yep. Tell me about savvy. What do you do?

How did you, how did you, you told me you were just born in San Francisco, right? Well, yeah, but I don't claim it. Exactly. We got on to that immediately. How did a boy from San Francisco get on to playing in the dirt? I actually, my father, my parents moved down to Hollywood, California when I was an infant. So that's where I grew up in Hollywood. And, you know, went through working at the studios, Hollywood High School, the whole nine yards.

And so when we went to college in Pomona, then got married, moved to the Valley. and then from the valley we decided that traffic was just horrendous you know no way to not for me the way the life I wanted so we moved down to Orange County and we moved down here we built the house

and we were surrounded by Orange Groves and 25 years later there's houses all around the house so we since have moved but that's how I got to start it with Orange County now and I met some cool people

and decided to one of my friends gave me a Jeep, a CJ and it's like, hey, let's go four-wheeling. All right, let's do it. We had always ridden motorcycles and off-road and raced our motocross motorcycles and did that type of thing.

The gateway drug. Yes. That's how it started. All kids ride motorcycles. That's how it starts. So, you know, and then later on life, we had stopped riding and stopped doing off-road, but then a good friend of mine, John Butler, decided he was going to give me a Jeep. he bought two and gave me one

so one for his buddy yeah gotta have a buddy to go do this it was history since then I mean you know as we as I we'll start of jeeping I realized I needed parts that were light and tough

you know because these things don't climb very well when they're you know boat anchors and that's born savvy off road savvy off road started building aluminum gas tanks kids bumpers and armor all out of

you know aircraft grade 61 aluminum. Previously, people were building aluminum products that are building out of 50-52, which is like tin foil, and it burns and breaks and bends quickly and easily

and it doesn't hold its form. So that started Savvy Off Road. During Savvy Off Road, I met a lot of industry people on Off Road, and I met John Curry. We had been wheeling together for years, and and and we heard, you know, the King of the Hammers,

we had all been watching King of the Hammers. His nephew, Casey Curry, did very well at the Hammers, at the King of Hammers. And then Dave Cole, the owner of King of the Hammers, you know, came with this ideal to develop a limited class, limited classes for manufacturers. So it's like, well, we got to do this. We're manufacturers of Jeep product.

We're going to race in the Everyman's Challenge at the King of the Hammers. So John and I built a Jeep LJ, Jeep Wrangler, LJ, and promptly over all the day, over modified cars in a stocked vehicle. Wow. Yeah. It's making a statement. Overall the first year, the very first year it was, well, it's not too bad. The next year, we overreled again.

But we had made that stocked vehicle. We just put a motor in a transmission in it, because the motor that was originally the stock motor, it was a really cool motor, but it didn't last. So we put just an LS3 in it and ran the car again. And now we're racing against full two buggies and, you know, pretty good people out there, but we overhauled again. Wow.

So it's like, wow, okay. Well, let's build a different car. And then that started. We built our 88, the famous 88, that is overall 6.000. times in that event. So it's, that's got us in the racing. Yeah, I would think so.

John had been racing Baja with his kids and, you know, in Cherokees and G-speed and all the stuff. I hadn't, but now it's like, okay, well, let's go race Nora. So we raced Nora in the 88 in the Ultra 4 class. And that ultra-4 class included unlimited

cars. But we ended up winning that class, too, in the 88. You know, we weren't the fastest, but we were the most reliable. And we would always finish the day and never have any issue. So that was Nora. And then we've since been racing. Jeep gave us a gladiator to race in the score series.

So we did very well in the score series. We actually won the World's Championship of the World Series in the Class 7F, the first Jeep gladiator ever race. So where do you go from there? So now we're building some 6,100 trucks to go play and get a little faster and get a little more knowledge on what we, you know, we do in Baja. And, but the gladiator is racing again this year, hopefully. We want to get another world championship for Jeep. Chief's been a very good sponsor and has helped us quite a bit in obtaining those goals.

So that's where we are today. Well, it's funny to see you driving a Ford Ranger, but that looks like that's your grocery getter. It's actually my son's Jeep. I just used it to try and take some parts to the powder coder. I actually drive a BMW, though, you know, a little off-road. Yeah. But, I mean, I do drive my gladiator, my drift gladiator. I have a drift glider that we built with Jeep, and it's a hellcat motor in it and lowered.

You know. I saw it in the shop. I took a walk by the time. And are you the drift driver as well? I can have a project. Yeah. You can get it sideways. You know, I don't mind giving that glory to other people.

That's great. You know, it's, you know, I've achieved everything I want in life. It's just, it's fun to let other people achieve some of that glory. So, you know, and that's why I had always been a big proponent of Jesse, Jesse Combs. She was one of our drivers. And, you know, she had always tried to race in the, you know, she had always tried to race in the the king in the hammers and never really had any good vehicles to drive. And so when we got her a vehicle that she could drive, she promptly overall, you know,

she did really well. And one of our bittersweet moments. Yeah, and I see it in your eyes for folks who aren't sitting here with us and able to look into your eyes. Yeah, I mean, what an unfortunate tragic story. So yesterday, they, you know, it was rolling all over the internet that Jesse was actually proclaimed the fastest woman in the world. Wow. Yeah, so she's, her record

is 522. And that's what she had set out to do. And she achieved it. Unfortunately, she lost her life. Yeah. On that day, on Alfred Lake. Well, getting off to a heavy start. But I'm looking in your eyes

and I'm thinking about the fun times in Baja. So where does Baja fit? You've done an awful lot of off-roading, obviously. So, where does Baja fit in the the lore of the off-road world. Right. I'm relatively new to Baja.

I've only spent about 10 years down there. Okay. And so we started doing trips with Kurt Ladoek. Yep. You know, Kurt Ladook has a little tour thing that he does, you know, and he's kind of... Baja legends. Yes, and it's a really fun, you know,

you take the wives, go down there, and just off-road your butt off, you know, and then see a lot of cool things that, you know, Kurt over the years has found and done, and he knows the back roads, and he takes us through areas that most people can't go through. You know, and good restaurants and decent hotels, and just a lot of fun.

And so when the Norg organization came to me and asked me, hey, you know, do you want to do a savvy safari? I'm like, well, okay, you know, but you got to be, to have Kurt leading it. Yeah. So we were fortunate to have Kurt and Mark Stahl on our trip. Yeah, not a bad duo. Yeah, right?

Exactly. So, you know, those two old veterans, you know, old guys and they're a great, great group, and they keep the tour, the Savvy Safari, very interesting. Yeah, it was interesting for me, you know, I wasn't expecting any handholding or, you know, anybody looking after us, you know, and had a couple of challenges getting down. down there and just not knowing like what's scrutiny going to be like. I've got an old truck, bench seats, you know, lap belts, you know, it's not a, it's not a safe vehicle to be doing this stuff.

So I thought, well, you know, if they tell me I can't drive in the event, well, I'm just going to drive in Baja anyways and have some fun. Well, then to actually show up on the morning of the event and meet Kirk, because I hadn't met you guys the night before. And to meet Kurt and, you know, have him look at me and when I'm wearing my pith helmet and driving this old thing and he's like, what's with this dude? But, you know, he could have big league me, but he was just awesome. He really was awesome.

And I haven't found anybody in my slow Baja world who has anything bad to say about Kurt Ladoog. No, no one does. He was really, you know, they cared. Here's a radio. You know, we're going to wait for you. You need my shirt. He'll give it to you. I mean, I mean, it's really, you know, and then Mark's buying tacos and Kurt's buying ice cream cones.

You know, it just was not expected. And when you think about how many jeeps are driving around looking like they could go to Baja on a moment's notice that are only going the mall it makes me think how does that safari class the savvy safari class grow to get people exposed with a veteran like kurt looking after you i mean it just seems like a no-brainer to get out there and have some fun in your for i mean if i can do it in mine anybody can do it with air conditioning and music and you know it's it was a good time so most people in the united states are worried about going to mexico and it's there's absolutely zero to go wrong in mexico as long as you stay out of Tijuana. Yeah, and you know, I'm I'm worried about not going to Mexico. Right. Me too.

That's 50% of mine daily worry. When am I going to Baja next? We have been so bummed out that they keep pushing the entry dates back, you know, so I just heard recently that they're having the 500 in August. That's, uh, that seems to be floating around the internet and I hope that, I hope that happens. Yep, we do too. I mean, you know, we're, because our truck's ready, you know, it's been ready for months, you know, so it gives us more time to build some other stuff, you know, that we'll take down there. But so for our safari, you know, that's in October. We're more hoping that everything will be back to normal by then, you know, and it gives us a little more time to build some cool stuff. So I've built an LJK. So it's an LJT, tub on a JK chassis. And then

and then we put an L.S. 3 in it. Break that? Yeah. And then what's under the hood? Of course there's going to be that. So now, I mean, it'll be a really fun Jeep to take down to Baja. Right. You know, because I'm actually changing the suspension right now to put long arms and a lot more wheel travel.

And so we can go out and really have fun. It really looks like you know what you're doing here at Savi off-road. It looks like you've got some beautiful vehicles. I'm looking down the line here. And tell me, I don't know if you can talk about her, if you've got an NDA on the tank. Tell me about the Resvani. So, you've got a couple of them here.

Ferris Ravani owns this company called Ravani Resvani Motors. And they build some custom vehicles. And these custom vehicles have all sorts of perks, and they can do all sorts of options, you know, from Stock JL, you know, with a custom Rizani. body to armored bulletproof glass smoke screens tack boxes uh you know oil slicks you name it they offer james bond stuff yes you know and along with with one is thick glass you know uh run flat tires and and then uh you know we put helifants in demon motors in hemis six fours and then

we leave in stock but you know a four thousand vehicle becomes a six thousand pound vehicle when you that armor. Yeah, you need a few extra horses under the hood. You need a little bit. I mean, a six four hemmy does fine. But, you know, this guy's paying $150, $200, $400,000, they don't care if they're going to spend $50 grand more for a motor. Right. You know, they want it all. And so Ferris built some cool vehicle. We just help, you know, we just help. He tells us what he wants to put in it. We put it in for him, you know. Um, got a land rover 110 over there. Yeah. So the land. Tucked in between a couple of jeeps. Yeah.

Land Rover 110, that's Jason Mamo's from Aquaman Dude. Okay. And he wants a diesel motor in his 110. So we're kind of doing that. So that's all kind of, you know, part of our, what we do here. And, you know, we've just finished season one of our show fresh out of time, you know, the airing on NBC in August. And we've been greenlit for the second season already.

Awesome. So, yeah. Stay busy. Yeah, right? I don't know why. Well, you've still got a gleam in your eyes, so you're finding time for it. It doesn't seem like you're cutting corners anywhere, so you're doing something right. Yeah, sometimes, though, it just, like, wears me down.

Okay. But the good definitely outweighs the bad. So let's get back to Savvy Safari class. Okay. What does it take for somebody to get in a modern four-wheel drive vehicle? and do that class in your mind. You know, we just require that you have a reliable vehicle. It could be two-wheel drive.

If you really want to work and make it down the Baja, you can use it. You know, you'll have friends there to yank you out of the tough spot. Exactly, exactly. You know, but we recommend four-wheel drive. Your trip will be so much more pleasurable. And air conditioning. Oh, well. I'm out.

I've got the four-wheel drive, but. We like air conditioning and comfort when we go down. there. You know, we all thought, like, man, Michael, he's a crazy man. Half, half, half crazy. The other half is Ford delays of fuel. Well, he's an iron man because, you know, that, doing 500 miles open air, land cruiser, you know, 30-inch tires, was like, wow, that's pretty awesome.

So, you know, my hat's off to you. Well, as I say, you know, like seriously, I mean, it's the vehicle in my garage, so that's where I'm doing it with. But if I can do it. Yes. Anybody in a modern, anything. Exactly. four-wheel drive push button all-time you know a forerunner a jeep uh you know anything come on down

no when that's what we try to do is like we prefer jeeps raptors pickup truck four-wheel drives you know anything anything's going to come back as long as you can be self-sustained if you want to go romp on your stuff you romp on your stuff just be prepared to fix it have your parts because right we're not going to be able to get you parked down there you know right you just be able to be ready you know bring whatever you want but just be ready for things that you know you're going to break And you did the event with Miles, how do you pronounce his last name? Haselquist. Haselquist.

Yes, Miles Hasakwitz. He works with... First time for him. Pardon? It was the first time for him. Yes. Oh, yeah. First time for him in Baja.

I mean, he lives in Kansas, and he helps announce Ultra Four King of the Hammer's and other events. But he had been dying at Chowtri Baja. So I let him drive my truck the whole time. He just loved it. He was currently near to ear. He was convinced. He was converted. No, he had a great time. He can go, he'll go.

Yeah. So it's and that's, you know, that's, I mean, for us and for Kurt, for all of us, you know, taking the Baja noobs is one of the most satisfying things that we can do. You know, show them what we love so much about Baja. Yeah. There's a lot to love. Yes, absolutely. The missions, the, the, the, just the environment, the culture, the off-roading, you know,

Everything is really, really interesting. You get away from it pretty quickly there. Like within a minute off that road, you're like, hey, you're out in the dirt doing it. Yeah, you drive out of Ensenada, south of Ensenada, and you're in the country. Yeah. Yeah. And that was pretty fun. I mean, honestly.

And doing it with some friends was really something that, you know, I had not spent a lot of time, you know, having people worry about me. Like, where's Michael and Ted? have they fallen off the face of the earth. We felt like we had to check in with our parents. Like, hey, we're just going out here. We'll be home soon. Don't worry. Keep following that road, Michael.

We'll meet you down there. We see your dust trails. We're going as fast as we can. It's 30 miles an hour. We've got it pinned. We've got it pinned. We'll see you soon. Yeah, day in the wash was interesting.

Yeah. Yeah, that was. But getting back to that, the food was great. People were great. The 500 was so easy, you're just back to the same hotel at night, and, you know, it was easy-peasy. So the thousand is a little more. We're going to, you know, it's city or town to town.

Town to town. But that's going to be fun, too. Yeah, so we, actually, I need to make reservations at the... Yeah, I was just thinking the same thing. Hotels on the way down. We better get some hotels booked. Well, Elisio, yes. Will give us a hotel list.

Oh, great. So then we can make reservations for the, the block. So I just stopped in on my way on my drive south. I stopped in and interviewed Mike Perlman at his home. So it's great to talk to him a little bit about the history of Nora. Right on. And what a terrific, you know, just that his dad dropped a V8 and a cruiser and said, hey, let's go play off road and then said, I can beat that record and didn't. But then said, you know what, we need to have a, we need to have a race. Let's have a race. I mean, like, a guy's a florist. That's just a cruise.

crazy idea. Like, let's have a race. Let's do it. And they did it. And it happened. Yeah. And here we are. You see his land cruiser? Yeah. It's too nice for me. Oh, no, me too. Too nice for me. Yeah. I like to play with my toys. Yeah. I keep it simple and, you know, reliable. And if it gets scraped, and it's dirty, whatever, that's what it's for. It's just a good old, good tool for that job. Yeah. So I am taking the Ranger and I'm taking a Subaru cross trek. I saw that over there. That's a little rally style. Yep. I'm going to be. take that down and see how it does.

Wow. We're testing the Falcon Wild Peak tires. It's a Wild Peak Trail tire. It's been very robust for us. I've been beating the hell out of that car, but, you know, it hasn't been Baja testing yet. Okay. And Baja testing still means something, doesn't it?

Yeah, it does. You know, because there's nothing like that really in the U.S. I mean, you know, you can race Reno to Vegas, but it's usually a race versus going to cruising down. Baja, you know, because you're on your own. You don't have pit crews and chase crews and stuff. You're on your own. I took a family trip down to Baja when my kids were very young. I had two-year-old twins and a four-year-old, and we got in our Honda minivan, and we drove. We were going to stay in La Paz for an extended period of time.

And the first day we got a flat. We had, you know, just a six-mile off-road section, whatever, the hotel we stayed at. And then we were going to see something. We're, you know, not far south of Ensonata. and first day flat. And my wife is just starting to like, but you could just see like the fear building up. I'm like, I don't know a problem. As soon as we get to the main road,

there'll be a tire guide. We can get it fixed. And, you know, so immediately. I mean, within a mile of meeting the, yeah, there's a tire repair guy.

And that's the thing you realize. And in Baja, there's somebody that's got the skills and got the tools and they're going to save your bacon if it's something relatively simple. I mean, again,

they're not going to have specialized parts for your vintage, you know, uh, triumph motorcycle or your what have you. But if you've got the parts, they've got the know-how and somebody's there and can help you out. And we didn't have, you know, touch wood, we didn't spend nine months traveling around Baja and mainland Mexico. And we didn't have another problem.

Wow. Great, you know, and that's day one, get it out of the way. And again, people in Baja, I think, are very generous and are there to, there to help. Yeah, no, I agree. I agree. You know, I've only seen. put it as well, I've never seen the bad side of Mexico, ever. And let's not.

Going down there, I have never seen a bad side of Mexico. So, you know, people worried about Mexico shouldn't be worried about Mexico because, you know, we've been doing it for years. And, you know, it's just, the only thing I dread is the crossing back into the U.S. Exactly. That's the only thing I dread. Yeah. You know, I hate to let this out of the bag, but we've used O-Time Mesa a couple times in the last. Last trips. Holy Toledo is painless. Yes. I mean you're driving you're you're used to do spend you know whatever 20 minutes 25 minutes more getting over there but no time in line just right one time we once in a while I've seen it bad. Yeah. You know the line lines all the way up against the border for you know a couple hours but that's only was a very rare occurrence.

Here at slow Baja we can't wait to drive our old land cruiser south of the border when we go we go we're We'll be going with Baja Bound Insurance. Their website's fast and easy to use. Check them out at Bajabound.com. That's Bajaubound.com, serving Mexico travelers since 1994. Hey, Baja tourism is picking up, and our friends at the Animal Pad and Tapp Act want to remind you when you're crossing the border, just say no to puppy peddlers.

I know they're cute, but the sooner we can end the demand, we can end the supply. For more information, check out theanimalpad.org. App Act on Instagram and Facebook. What do you do for fun? I mean, you seem pretty busy. You've got a clean in your eye. I've said it three times now.

You've got a lot going on. You're in a few businesses. How do you make time for just fun? So, you know, fun is downtime for me. We travel internationally, wherever we need to be, or wherever we want to be, you know, We're lucky enough we're able to do the things that we want to do. Looks like you've made some good decisions in life and businesses is still still.

My fun is just sitting on the beach. You know, I'm just going to relax and just get away from it all. Like, you know, we're planning a trip in August, and we're just going to go to the North Shore Hawaii. It's been eight, ten days up there and just relax. Terrific. Do a little surfing, do, you know, just cruising around. And you said this is your son's business. So tell me about your family.

So Michael, my oldest, runs Savvy Off Road. He does everything for Savvy Off Road, builds all the armor products and all the products we sell. Savvy Motorsports is all this stuff, all the jeeps and builds and all this stuff. That's the stuff that you're pointing out your window here. The stuff that's on the racks, the actual.

The actual stuff on real vehicles, making real vehicles custom from soup to nuts, whatever you need. Exactly. You guys look like you can achieve it here. We don't generally take on new business because we're so busy doing the existing business. And what we do with motorsports is build cool stuff or off-road. That's generally what we do. Cool, reliable stuff that wins. Yes.

You know, that's key. It's got to be, you know, have good suspensions, good reliable power plants, you know. It's function over form in our shop. It's always been that way, you know. And then we have Savvy Racing, which is our Ultra4 cars and desert trucks and stuff. So those are the three divisions of savvy. And tell me a little bit about Ultra4. That just seems to have exploded.

Ultra 4, yeah. I mean, we've been in the game for, what, 11 years now. So it's, it's, it's, ultra 4 is a car that you could build in the limited classes. That's a car you could build and you could take it, drive it there and drive it back after the race, you know, if it could survive. But Ultra4, the unlimited classes are just, I mean, some of the meanest vehicles on the planet. I mean, so how do I even explain Ultra4? You know, it's unlimited off-road vehicles. That's what it is.

You know, to be able to do a couple hundred miles in the desert and 100 miles in the technical rock crawling all on one vehicle and one day, the hardest race in the world. It's amazing, isn't it? Yeah. Getting back to Savvy here, what can't you do? Is there anything that, like you say, nope, we're not doing it? I don't really do a lot of.

of other vehicles besides jeeps, you know, we do a lot of jeeps, and that's our specialty. You know, we like to kind of keep it at that, you know, what we do best for the savvy motorsports division. Though we do take on special project for friends. Friends? Yeah. Aquaman. Friends. Gotcha.

All right. So, but normally, I'm a lot. normally it's all Jeep related, Jeep based. And being a land cruiser guy, looking over it a lot, there are a lot of jeeps on the road now. What, what happened?

So popular. What happened? When the JK came out, they became really popular. And then when the J.L came out, it's exploded because the JL is probably the most capable Jeep, Jeep has ever made. I mean, granted,

it's a minivan. but the way the suspension was built and designed, I mean, you put 35, 37-inch tires on with a little lift and you're off-road. And it appears to me that if you have a Jeep, you have to modify it and make it yours. That seems to be. That seems to be. I'm just looking in from the outside. I'm the last guy driving a totally stock land cruiser, but, you know, it seems to me if you have one,

you have to do something to make it yours, and that's where savvy fits in, right? You're creating a lot of great parts. Exactly right. though both my daughters um one's in college one's graduated both drive stock

four door jLs really yeah my daughter would be would love to be driving yeah so I mean for me it's easiest that they drive stock ones because I can easily fix them and you know and I don't really have to worry

about them right you know fathers never stop worrying right your daughters you know no matter what we're going to wait any of our any of my kids, I would always worry about it. I always, you know, give my left arm for, so.

So, three kids. Michael here? Michael, I have Melanie and Danielle are my two daughters. And then there's Emmy, my wife. All right. We got the whole savvy family. I appreciate you making some time for Slow Baja. I'm not going to take up too much more of your day.

If you're going to jump in one of these vehicles, and head off here. I mean, how, in Southern California, off-road mecca, how far are you from doing something in the dirt here? Is it, do you have to go to an off-road park, or is there still places that, you know, you can get out and get dusty and... So I just did a video shoot with the Subaru.

Your rally-style Subaru? Rally-style Subaru. We went to Klanghorn Trails. It's 20 minutes away. One more time on the name I didn't catch it. Clegg-horn. Oh, Kleg-Hong, yeah. It's right off the 15, as you start going up the Cone Pass, it's like the Clegghorn.

You can go right and go over the trails, and you can drive up to Big Bear, Lake Arrowhead, or go left and go down to this fabulous trail system that follows the wash down through that whole area. Very interesting area. And, you know, we just did a photo shoot with the, what I want to say, Falcon Centerline, Subaru, you know, and it was a good time, though. We had, you know, cool, cool video footage because there's the long-haul trains that go through that area, to go through that area. And so there's all sorts of crisscrossing that you have to do through the train tracks

to get, you know, can you get around. And interesting people back there, too. Interesting. And, you know, it's kind of like, wow, where all these people come from, you know, because it's back country. You know, like, you can go there, you can go to Johnson Valley.

I mean, Barstow and Sauter Wells. I mean, it's all within a couple hours, you know. And within a couple hours, you can be heading south of Tijuana and pretty soon you're off to great tacos.

Exactly. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah, three hours and three and a half hours we're in Ensenada. It's a little longer for me. Yeah.

That first day drive down from San Francisco and a land cruiser kills you. But then day two is pretty good. I thought you lived in San Diego. but you live in. No, my daughter's there for school. And my wife, my wife works in L.A.

Monday through Friday. So she's prior to Corona was flying down every, every week. Oh, man. She's got a place in downtown. All right. But since Corona, she's been working from the kitchen table like everybody else. Yeah, yeah. So Corona, the shop never stopped working.

Everybody didn't want to stay home. They all work, but we have plenty of social distancing here. You know, and, you know, and it was always, always said and implied that if you even feel sick, you stay home, you know, and no one got sick. Yeah, we're talking that for those who are going to listen some years from now, we're talking June 26th, 2020 here, so we're still in the midst of whatever we're in the midst of. Gerald and I are sitting across from each other with some microphone, long microphone

cord staying physically distant, but I understand it's, you're supposed to be physically distant, but socially not too distant. Right. So keep a smile on your face. Gerald's just about, I've worn out my welcome here, so I'm going to say thanks for making some time. Where's the best place for people to find you online, find out about savvy? Instagram is savvy off-road.

Facebook is savvy off-road. You know, I'm Gerald Lee. Call me whenever. You're accessible. I am accessible. You got right back to me. And I didn't even bring you any foredilays. I drank it all last night from celebrating a couple of birthdays. Well, Gerald Lee, thank you very much for making some time for the Slow Baja podcast,

and I look forward to seeing you in Baja. Look forward to it. All right, man, thanks. Hey, you guys know what to do. Please help us by subscribing, sharing, rating, all that stuff. And if you missed anything, you can find the links in the show notes at slowbaha.com. I'll be back before you know it. And if you want to receive notices on new episodes, please follow Slow Baja on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook for you old folks.