Cabo San Lucas at the tip of the Baja peninsula is the newest Mexican playground for Americans. It's new, it's hip, it's got lots of sunshine and nightlife. It's easy to fly in and fly out and never have to see any of the more distressed parts of Baja. I call this insular tourism.

What about the rest of Baja? Would you drive down to Ensenada to enjoy the harvest and wine festivals that run the first two weeks of August?

Would you ride your bike from Rosarito to Ensenada in the region's annual 50-mile bicycle ride that attracts more than 7,500 riders?

How about Tijuana? Thought of spending a weekend at one of its upscale hotels, shopping on Avenida Revolucion and dining around the town's amazing restaurants?

When I tell people that I love Mexico they nod and say, "Oh yeah, Cancun is great," or "Cabo rocks." Of course, I love those places too, but Cancun, like Cabo, is insular. You rarely leave the region, you never see the real Mexico outside the tourism zones.

I love Mexico. I love the people, the food, the weather, the diverse geography, the history, the architecture, the Mexico outside the tourist zones.

Am I afraid of being stopped at one of the check-points the Mexican government has set up to halt drug and arms trafficking? I'm careful and concerned, but I'm not afraid.

Am I afraid of being gunned down by a Tijuana drug lord? I don't hang out in the neighborhoods where this occasionally happens, just like I don't hang out in the gang-infested neighborhoods in my own slice of Southern California. So, no, I'm not afraid; I'm wise in my travels.

Am I afraid of being pulled over by a corrupt Federale or Mexican cop, paying an extortion fee or being hauled to jail? One of my American contacts in Mexico recently told me that in his 30 years of frequent travel in Mexico, he's never been pulled over. Not once. While this does happen on some of the roads where the new governmental crackdowns haven't yet been fulfilled, it still doesn't scare me away from visiting Baja.

In yesterday's Destination West feature in the Press-Enterprise I covered Rosarito Beach. My husband and I took our son and five of his college friends from Kansas to Rosarito. We drove straight through Tijuana and down into Rosarito without incident. (Unless you call my missing the turn to the scenic tollroad bypass an incident.)

No one person got hammered by the cops, or by drugs and alcohol for that matter. They played, we played. We ate at the lobster village, shopped the mercado, toured Baja Studios and soaked in the Jacuzzi at the legendary Rosarito Beach Hotel (alas, the Pacific was too cold that weekend).

In coming months, I'll be covering Ensenada's wine and harvest festivals, a tour of the Guadalupe Valley wine country, and a getaway at Rancho Los Chabacanos, one of the most magical nature lodges on earth.

So back to my original question: What about the rest of Baja; would you go to Rosarito?

1 Comments

john elder robison on June 28, 2008 8:02 PM said:

I agree these resorts are a totally different Mexico than the place where 99.99% of the Mexicans live.

My first wife was an anthropologist who worked in Chiapas. We saw places you reached by burro, where they still worship the old gods.

I agree, it's a totally different experience, but I suspect the Cancun experience has developed and prospered because that's what today's tourists call for

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