Bajahowodd
Elite Nomad
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Todos Santos: All you want and less in a Baja getaway
Here's a link to the LA Times Travel page for Sunday. There are links to an article, a video and photos of Todos Santos. Any nomads in the video?? The
author comments about how much the town has grown since he was there in 1995. Duh! I recall someone posting a comment some time back that TS was
trying to be Sedona, what with the art galleries and boutique hotels.
one thing that I noticed is that as of the date of publication, R/T fare from LAX to SJD was as low as $170. At the same time, R/T LAX to La Paz was
$398. Go figure.
http://www.latimes.com/travel/
[Edited on 3-10-2010 by BajaNomad]
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desertcpl
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I was last in TS about 11 years ago,, my god it has grown,, looks like its getting a little like Sedona, expensive
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k-rico
Super Nomad
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Location: Playas de Tijuana
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That's my problem with the place, I can't afford it anymore.
Watched the video, wonder why they didn't showcase Shut Up Franks, my favorite hangout.
Should have bought back when they spoke Spanish there. Not that I know how.
Somebody please buy that 5 million dollar trailer park at Pedirto. I need a place to park my RV before it breaks down. I know 5 mil sounds expensive,
but hey, it's Todos Santos.
I like the place, well a little south, wish I was there.
[Edited on 3-8-2010 by k-rico]
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tiotomasbcs
Super Nomad
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Location: El Pescadero
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Please, I know it may be a little more Turisty, but... TS is a Mexican Town no matter whatthe Hobnobbers & Gurus say! Thank God the local
Mexican community is entrenched & strong. Agriculture & store owners for over 100years do not disappear. The Turistas & buses are
there 11 t0 3pm and gone!!The Galleries are well hidden and indescript. The Relators are scrambling & crumbling during the Crisis. Todos
& Pescadero are still peaceful & wild if you ignore the Artistic Blah-Blah! Fields Of green and Smiling Local Faces. Sedonna?! Madonna!
Gag me with some Hot Sauce & fish tacos! Peace, Tomas
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k-rico
Super Nomad
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Bring back Pedrito!! $3 a night palapas on the beach steps from the break, showers, toilets, pure well water, huge palapa bar/restaurant, swimming
pool, Pacifico ballenas in the shade of ancient mango trees along the Rio Pescadero.
Where's the time machine!!!
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BajaNews
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Todos Santos: All you want and less in a Baja getaway
http://articles.latimes.com/2010/mar/07/travel/la-tr-todossa...
Drowsy alternative to Cabo San Lucas offers serious solitude for spring break
March 07, 2010
By Christopher Reynolds
Once upon a time, say about 1972, Cabo San Lucas was a sleepy little fishing town at the southern tip of Baja California. Then came the paved highway,
the international airport, the marina, the golf courses, the raucous bars and well-heeled retreats. At the newest and perhaps fanciest, Capella
Pedregal, suites this spring start at a cool $675 per night.
In Cabo, you just might score the spring break you'll never forget or the one you won't remember.
And then there's Todos Santos, still small, still drowsy at most hours, wedged between the mountains and sea about 45 miles north of Cabo.
Its sugar mills, born amid a 19th century boom, died about 60 years ago. The paved highway didn't arrive until the mid-1980s, about the time the first
American expat artist, Charles Stewart, moved in. With no airport, no marina, no golf and virtually no nightlife, downtown amounts to just a few
blocks of newish galleries, inns and shops in oldish buildings. Outside town, cardσn cactuses stipple the hills, and miles of lonely beaches roar
under assault by waves so wicked that surfers and swimmers must pick their spots carefully.
Todos Santos, whose population might be as high as 15,000, depending on how many surrounding hamlets you include, is not where you come for action.
But if you're after Mexican flavor, Pacific solitude, desert vistas, fresh food and a seriously slow spring break, this might be your place.
"We close down at Baja midnight, which is 9 o'clock," said Lisa Harper, former chief executive of Gymboree and now proprietor of the Rancho Pescadero
hotel, about six miles south of town. "We're not up partying until all hours. We don't hang you upside down and give you shots of tequila from
holsters. It's a very calm, relaxed area. Lots of surfers, lots of expats. Lots of Italians with great food. Lots of fantastic Mexican food, great
galleries and artists."
Pat Cope, who arrived from Los Angeles to open a gallery with her husband, Michael, and infant son, Lane, remembers that "when we first moved here,
all I heard was roosters." Sixteen years later, Lane is contemplating colleges, and the roosters still greet each morning, Cope said, but "I don't
hear them."
Todos Santos, said Paula Colombo, co-owner of the Cafι Santa-Fι, "is real. Good and bad, it's real." Now that the recession has slowed the pace of
coastal vacation-home building outside town, Colombo added, "maybe we can settle down and do what we have to do to keep this place as magnificent as
it could be
an oasis in the desert."
My first stop was at Harper's Rancho Pescadero hotel (no warning given, full price paid). Billed as a different kind of "dude" ranch, it has been busy
since it opened in November 2009 with 12 rooms, a restaurant, a bar and a pool. If things keep going this well, Harper said, the hotel could add 15
units by year's end.
To reach the 15-acre site, you turn off two-lane Highway 19 at a Pemex station, drive a mile on a dirt/sand road, and stop just past the green fields
of basil. (The area sits on an aquifer that feeds many organic growing operations and keeps the place rich in chiles, mangoes, avocados and papayas.)
Once on the grounds, you can take refuge in your large room (the smallest is still more than 600 square feet) or your mostly private patio (but be
sure to reconcile your curtains with the neighbors' sightlines). Before long, you'll be sipping your welcome drink, strolling past the fire pit,
through the fledgling palm grove, to the dunes and the wide, lonely beach.
Don't jump in. Staffers warn guests not to swim at the hotel-adjacent beach because the tide is treacherous. But you can flop onto one of the Rancho
Pescadero daybeds on the dunes. Or walk at water's edge, especially near dawn or dusk, where you'll get the full effect of near-empty beach coastline:
pelicans gliding above the swells, offshore breezes blowing feathered foam off the whitecaps. As it happened, the waves were especially big and glassy
when I showed up.
In fact, it's a wonder I turned away long enough to spot the handwritten signs for the San Pedrito Surf Hotel, a few hundred yards north of Rancho
Pescadero. Beginning four years ago, manager Andy Keller told me, he and the other owners upgraded the beachfront site from a camping spot to a
seven-unit hotel (rates are $55-$200, a kitchen in every room), but it remains rustic: tile floors, stray flippers, a few shelves of well-thumbed
paperbacks, all at the end of another dirt road.
"I'm into the classic look," Keller said. "No red lights, no parking meters, no pavement....You have the dirt roads, you have the dogs with no collars
the proximity of the mountains, just beyond us here, and the ocean just behind me. It's the best of both worlds."
Out on the water that is, the San Pedrito surf break, known up and down the West Coast I spotted half a dozen euphoric young men carving waves
with their short boards, their tents tucked away down at the rocky north end of the beach.
If you can't surf like those guys but want to get into the ocean, you drive a couple of miles south (more dirt roads) to Cerritos Beach, which has
milder tides, beach gear for rent and the passable Cerritos Beach Club restaurant.
That beach, long empty, has been busy with development in the last few years. Just south of the restaurant, workers have completed about 10 Cerritos
Surf Colony bungalows, which are being sold as time-shares and rented at $125 nightly. About 60 more are planned.
On the cliff top just north, meanwhile, looms the immense yellow-orange Hacienda Cerritos, a 30,000-square-foot walled mansion that's unfortunately
visible for miles. Workers said it was built as a private home last year by Oregon developer Roger Pollock. Pollock's finances having become
complicated in the recession, the hacienda has been recast as a hotel, renting 11 rooms for $295 and up nightly. The tour befuddled me. Even with
multiple zero-horizon pools, a massive patio, handsome tiles and big ocean views, the place felt somehow iffy, more like a rental house than a hotel
and costlier than anything else I saw.
Downtown Todos Santos is much more affordable and easy to understand: the 18th century mission on the plaza, the galleries, shops and eateries on
narrow streets, mostly unpaved. I looked at paintings in Galeria Logan and Galeria Indigo, chatted with sculptor Benito Ortega as he worked in his
studio, checked out the noble workers and triumphant teacher in the 1930s mural at the Cultural Center. I picked up a book in English at El Tecolote
bookshop on the main drag, Juαrez, and sipped some cool gazpacho on the patio of Los Adobes de Todos Santos.
Toward the middle of the day, when the day-trippers from Cabo showed up in the greatest numbers, I drove out to Punta Lobos Beach, where you can buy
the fresh catch from the fishermen as they drag their boats ashore about 2:30 p.m. each day.
I have to admit this is no longer a town you can hold in the palm of your hand, which is what it seemed when I first visited in 1995. Todos Santos has
probably doubled in population since.
In 2006, local boosters managed to win a "Pueblo Mαgico" designation from national tourism officials, even though the label is usually reserved for
towns with older buildings and more of them, more elaborately restored. If highway improvements proceed as promised in the next few years, the driving
time to the Los Cabos airport could drop from one hour and 40 minutes to one hour.
But even so, there isn't a lodging here with more than 14 rooms. And though some have Wi-Fi and air-conditioning, most don't bother with guest phones
or TVs. I'm guessing that if you put two tourists in every guest bed in town, the population would grow by 500, tops.
Though the first Stewart, the first expat, has closed his gallery, there are about a dozen others, including Michael and Pat Cope's enduring Galeria
de Todos Santos.
Cafι Santa-Fι, the smart, tasty Italian restaurant that Ezio and Paula Colombo bravely started on the plaza in 1990, coexists with several other
well-loved eateries, including the top-notch Asian fusion cuisine of Michael's at the Gallery, now 4 years old. I also got a fix of down-home Mexican
cuisine at Miguel's, where since 2001 a local family has been serving widely admired chile rellenos in a dining room with dirt floors, a palapa roof
and walls of woven twigs.
On the main drag, the Hotel California traded for years on the false idea that it had inspired the Eagles' 1976 song of the same name. It got new
owners in 2001, and when they reopened the place a year later, 11 rooms, pool patio and restaurant were full of vibrant colors and festive atmosphere.
In otherwise muted Todos Santos, the Hotel California sounds a brassy note (as does the unsubtle Tequila's Sunrise bar and restaurant across the
street), but is a step up from the old days. And unlike many other lodgings, it doesn't ban children.
If you want grown-up gentility in the heart of town, go to the Todos Santos Inn, which has been open since 1997 on Calle Legaspi. It has eight rooms,
a restaurant and a tiny pool at the converted residence of a 19th century sugar baron (rates are $125-$325, breakfast included). Or you cast your gaze
across the street to the brick walls of the 14-suite Guaycura Hotel, expected to open in coming weeks, where management has put in elevators and is
said to be contemplating 24-hour room service.
"We came for the first time in '96, and it was much sleepier than it is now," Juerg Wiesendanger, formerly a Swiss financier, told me one morning. "We
went to look for a place to stay on the beach. Nothing. And we said, This has to change.' "
He and his wife, Libusche, moved here and went to work. In 2002, they opened the eight-room Posada la Poza, which sits at the edge of a lagoon and the
end of a long and winding dirt road. It has a popular rooftop lounge, a restaurant (El Gusto) and some of the town's quietest guest rooms, with
glimpses of La Poza Beach. The walls display Libusche's paintings.
On yet another dirt road that leads to the sea, London-born designer Jenny Armit in 2007 opened the four-unit Hotelito. It sits about midway between
town and La Cachora Beach, and its quartet of cottages ($90-$135 nightly) is done up in the minimalist-modern style of Mexican star architects Luis
Barragαn and Ricardo Legorreta. It has a dining patio, bar and pool, palm fronds here, hammocks there, carefully raked pebbles in between. I liked the
privacy, simplicity and quiet
for a while.
But my night at the Hotelito was the wrong night. In the wee hours of the morning, a chorus of crowing roosters piped up probably the offspring of
the birds that serenaded Pat Cope back in 1994. They never quite settled down, and neither did I.
When I met Armit over coffee later, she brought up the roosters and told me how the farmer across the street had brought the caged birds in, hundreds
of them, a few weeks ago. She sighed and said she was confident that problem would soon be solved, but she didn't yet know exactly how. If you run a
business in Todos Santos, it seems, crises like these come and go.
"And if you haven't got a sense of humor," Armit said with a winning grin, "you shouldn't live in Mexico."
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BajaRat
Super Nomad
Posts: 1303
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Location: SW Four Corners / Bahia Asuncion BCS
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Mood: Ready for some salt water with my Tecate
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Surfed and camped there since 1980. Time marches on. One memory was sitting in a mango tree by the beach wondering who it belonged to seeing there
was'nt a dwelling in sight for miles. That day was when I first discovered that the giant tarantula wasps needed to climb to a high perch and jump to
fly. Those were quiet sleepy days like a dream now, wind, mountains, sea, creatures flying and swimming by. Time marches on.
Lionel
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Bajahowodd
Elite Nomad
Posts: 9274
Registered: 12-15-2008
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Geez. I posted the link on Sunday. Just wish I had bought there back in '91 when I had the chance.
http://forums.bajanomad.com/viewthread.php?tid=44618#pid4992...
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Heather
Nomad
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Location: National City, CA
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we've got about 2000 square meters close to the beach at Los Cerritos. No money to do anything with it these days...guess we'll just hold onto it for
the kids! The best part is we traded a minivan for it. What do they say, never invest what you can't lose? It was ejido land, so don't know if
we'll ever get a title. Oh well, not much lost!
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grmpb
Nomad
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haven't been south of loreto in 15 years. i'm afraid to see what it looks like now!
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Lee
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3508
Registered: 10-2-2006
Location: High in the Colorado Rockies
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Relative to what?
| Quote: | Originally posted by k-rico
Bring back Pedrito!! $3 a night palapas on the beach steps from the break, showers, toilets, pure well water, huge palapa bar/restaurant, swimming
pool, Pacifico ballenas in the shade of ancient mango trees along the Rio Pescadero.
Where's the time machine!!! |
Unfortunately, Pedrito will likely be developed similar to Tequila Ranch down the road.
Still lots of ejido owned land between TS and Cerritos. Prices are over $1M for beach front homes but walking distance of the beach is still
doable and affordable.
More value down South (definitely better weather) and forget the Troubles up North.
Think an RV park is going in next to Tomas. When Pedrito is breaking, it's packed with campers bringing in their stuff as there are no
facilities.
So, it's still there. Bring the ballenas, water and surfboards. Much has changed but much is still the same.
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tiotomasbcs
Super Nomad
Posts: 1837
Registered: 7-30-2007
Location: El Pescadero
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Welcome to the board, gshan. 15 acre site down the road was purchased for somewhere around $50 m or approximately $500,00 per hectare! Beautiful
property on the beach. How much a nite?? Nice people but ..... Lazy Surfer area with mostly Beach Bums. I say that affectionately!! ps most
farming is not organic!
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k-rico
Super Nomad
Posts: 2079
Registered: 7-10-2008
Location: Playas de Tijuana
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| Quote: | Originally posted by Lee
| Quote: | Originally posted by k-rico
Bring back Pedrito!! $3 a night palapas on the beach steps from the break, showers, toilets, pure well water, huge palapa bar/restaurant, swimming
pool, Pacifico ballenas in the shade of ancient mango trees along the Rio Pescadero.
Where's the time machine!!! |
Think an RV park is going in next to Tomas. |
Perhaps that's a double whammy for Tomas. An RV park next door and if so, I'll be down there more often in the Ford Condominium. Fireworks, loud
music, tequila, etc. And I recently took the mufflers off of my quad so it goes faster. 
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tiotomasbcs
Super Nomad
Posts: 1837
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Location: El Pescadero
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At the moment, I'm establishing connections with US Pandillas & firearms connection! Bloods & Crips. Wait a minute, I'm not in LA! Should
be able to handle development concerns & loud neighbors! Prefer Slow Growth! RV park turned into Bodegas! Barcelona ! Ven aca! Queremos Paz
Y Tranquilidad. Pura Vida! Espero conocer mas Vagabundos y Nomads, K-Loco! Still crazy, After All These Years! Smiles, Tio
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Dizzy
Newbie
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Twenty-two years ago I pitched my tent on the beach at San Pedrito. Tomas was there with a cold beer and a smile. I've been back every year since.
A couple of months ago, the guys put the finishing touches on my little Surf Shack there...soon I'll be Tomas' loud neighbor! Looking forward to it
Tom. Saludos amigo.
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capt. mike
Elite Nomad
Posts: 8085
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Mood: Sling time!
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check out where rip 2 Tip crew stayed recently on dirt-newz.com
the Hacienda, will blow your mind.
formerly Ordained in Rev. Ewing\'s Church by Mail - busted on tax fraud.......
Now joined L. Ron Hoover\'s church of Appliantology
\"Remember there is a big difference between kneeling down and bending over....\"
www.facebook.com/michael.l.goering |
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Desertbull
Senior Nomad
Posts: 558
Registered: 8-27-2003
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| Quote: | | Originally posted by capt. mike check out where rip 2 Tip crew stayed recently on dirt-newz.com the Hacienda, will blow your mind.
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It was pretty sweet...
http://www.haciendacerritos.com/about.htm
http://vimeo.com/9285488
Tim
DREAM IT! PLAN IT! LIVE IT!
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