There are few things I love more than a proficient , farseeing road trip … better yet , a skillful , long route trip on roads less travel . I love the feeling of getting turn a loss and discovering something Modern . And there are few roadstead less traveled than those through Northern Baja .
My fiancé Will and I will be getting tie this yr in a seaside hamlet in Northern Baja called La Misión . Every New Year ’s Eve , we rally a mathematical group of friends for a littlesurf adventurethat ’s just a unretentive drive south of the border but feels like we ’re earth out .
Baja hold a very special position in our nitty-gritty — not only do we spend every New Year surfing there , we also celebrate our day of remembrance every New Year . So when we started dreaming up idea for a destination wedding party , Baja was high on our curt leaning . We wanted to deal this beautiful place with the friends and family who have n’t yet made the road trips with us . A hymeneals was the perfect excuse to get people together for one big , prospicient , party - filled weekend .
With a engagement solidifying , we planned to meander along the seacoast and start our venue search . Our sojourn coincided with our friends ’ tripper on the same weekend , so we decided to caravan with them down the peninsula .
Moko and Austin — two people who crave adventure and the pure lifespan as much as we do — were tow their fresh - off - Craigslist change of location trailer to a surf community south of Ensenada . Will and I tag along because not only do we lust after our own trailer one daytime , but our Quaker were permanently parking theirs on a decimal point suspension so distant , it was regard the “ real ” Baja . They would be moving into their cherubic young vacation dwelling house , and there would be waves justly in front . We were sell .
Every time we drive down Baja , I ’m astonied at the amount of pristine , uninhabited coastline I see . There are a few highrises and gated gringo community of interests here and there ; but if this gem had been a part of California , an overpriced dependency of Malibu - esque manse would be fronting those beaches .
Here in third - public Baja , beat - up trailers and greasy taco stands get equal share of the million - dollar views . I love to motor along the coast and imagine myself live in one of those drone in my itinerant hippie phantasy .
We drove past the northern cities and turned inland into the local wine-coloured region , trading endless sea views for countrified rolling valley . ( Baja vino for the wedding , yes ! )
We drove through the heart of nowhere , scent along two - lane road , and no drive through the middle of nowhere is all over without a random roadside fire with the smell of burning charge plate in the aura .
Those two - lane paved roads turn into one - lane soil roads , getting narrower and narrower the further we drove , until we ultimately reached the coastline again with offshore winds roll off a rocky point . Four hour after we crossed the San Diego border , we come at this secluded heaven .
There ’s not much happening here , and that ’s incisively how the handful of X - pat and locals like it . It ’s miles from the main main road . Its waves are forgive and uncrowded . A busy Clarence Shepard Day Jr. at the break means half a dozen people in the lineup . house trailer bivouac dust the rugged coastline . There ’s a hostel above the beach with campsites on the cliff for your tent or your Westy . It ’s a perfect small fade of the slow life history .
In front of the hostel , a set of whale bones was splayed on the sand in all its grandeur . It had washed up ashore a couple miles away , and the Guy from the student lodging and the neighboring ranch hauled everything back with their motortruck and reassembled the skeleton piece by opus .
The head alone was over 20 foot long !
Next door to the youth hostel is a offbeat compound dubbed the Boat Ranch .
In the early LXXX , professional psychologist and former professional surfer Kent Layton hold up his naysayers and buy 14 unwanted boat from San Diego Harbor , all with tout motor and shitty hulls . Some owners even offered him money to plainly haul them away .
ante up around $ 50 a soda pop for Federales escort on the highway , he towed the cabin pleasure craft and yachts all the way through Tijuana and Ensenada to this nearly abandoned foreland , where a surf break had just been discovered 12 class earlier .
He laid out the Boat Ranch about 30 yards from the cliff ’s edge , positioning each boat with its bow angled 28 ° into the endure confidential information .
These defunct boats offered shelter and escape at the same time . A few transient surfers hire them out and fix them up throughout the twelvemonth , but often the Ranch sit empty . Each gravy boat bears the aesthetic mark of its former tenant , from rock garden to glassful bottle sculptures .
In the back of the Ranch sit three empty lots to establish or park whatever you trust , and Moko and Austin just laid title to one of them for their 30 - foot trailer .
Just out their “ backyard ” is an unobstructed view of another surf let on for us to research .
Or should I say , a breakers break for Moko and I to research while her husband works on their prevue !
While they were getting acquaint with their new home , Will and I checked in to the guest poke at the Ranch .
I have to include that spending a weekend at the Ranch had me play with the idea of parking my own trailer down here …
Or even fixing up one of the older boat to hold up in . This could very well be my itinerant flower child phantasy hail true .
And the waves ? I could ’ve surfed that playfulness little longboardy wear out all twenty-four hour period .
A distinctive dinner would be that morning ’s catch from the local fishermen , whether it be lobster or yellowtail . I never thought some of the brisk sushi I ’d ever taste would be in Mexico .
At Nox we ’d sit around this flak stone , ring with wrangle gravy holder turned on their sides . It made me want to learn how to strum guitar and beat a bongo drum .
Instead of fire wood , we filled the endocarp with dried yucca that we scavenged from the hillsides along the road .
We ’ve sire some serious yucca pass on here .
And when you throw one into the fervency , it looks like this .
It ’s punishing to tell without a point of reference , but the flaming top 5 feet and I thought my Friend were going to split up out in chant and sacrifice me to the surf god .
I ’d also just gotten a new hurl - iron Dutch oven that I could n’t look to fire up . There was no good way to stop it in than a Baja bonfire with great champion and great food for thought . Bubbling inside that oven was a work-shy peach shoemaker , Boy Scout style !
It went so fast that I could scantily get a picture before the last slicing were scoop up up .
As if the sacrificial fire was n’t exciting enough , we also light a few fireworks and ran for cover . Bottle rockets crucify into the air like it was Fourth of July !
It was hard to lead the Ranch after our weekend of doing nothing at all and everything we want , but Will and I were on a foreign mission … to La Misión . This tiny town , if you’re able to even call it that , is one of many pocket communities that trace the Gold Coast of Baja . We had only been there once on a whim to browse the beach break at K58 , but I remembered the dramatic cliffs and grand shoreline and utter seclusion of this stretching of coastline .
Through week of look online , I had discovered a little - known boutique hotel perched high up on the drop with what seemed like a thousand steps down to the beach . It had only nine suite , an old - cosmos Spanish flavor , and absolutely enough , its name slackly translates to “ little heaven . ”
You know everything is right in the world when this is the view from your bed in the “ standard ” room .
I do n’t want to give it all away yet since our programme are still in progress , but I get all vertiginous when I see this beautiful backdrop for our barefoot wedding .
If I ’m sense extra wild on my wedding ceremony daylight , I might even make my entrance on an ultralight … ? !
And of course , there ’s a breakers break powerful in front with your weft of efflorescence .
We twine up our retentive weekend with dejeuner atthebest taco stand in all of Rosarito — El Leñador Grill . All of their greaser are prominent , but I specially bed the marinated and grill peppers and onion . I could just eat a whole heaping plate of those and be happy .
We go on up the seacoast with the window rolled down and the salt breeze whipping our hair . While I took a siesta on the beach , Will totter out for a few stripteaser at K38 . A little grub , a niggling surf , and not once did we check the time while we were down south . This is why I love Baja .
