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DavidE
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3814
Registered: 12-1-2003
Location: Baja California México
Member Is Offline
Mood: 'At home we demand facts and get them. In Mexico one subsists on rumor and never demands anything.' Charles Flandrau,
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Pipe Dreams
One is to formulate a voluntary $, $$, $$$, $$$$ legend to be requested by readers when a description of hotel or restaurants is given.
I've read too many account on other forums (and sometimes even Baja Nomad) that go something like this.
"The hotel is an outstanding bargain. Cheap beyond belief. Everyone stays there"
After numerous pokings and proddings, the price is finally extracted using cyber bamboo splinters "Only a hundred dollars!"
I just watched a video on the Wall Street Journal that features the construction of a ONE HUNDRED NINETY THOUSAND square foot mansion. The time share
tycoon building it ran into hard times and admitted "We had to downscale a lot. It's still the same size with 50 bedrooms and 70 baths, but now it is
not so unique".
Many expats cannot afford even fifty dollar a night digs. It would be nice, for about ten nights until the month's money ran out. Nothing wrong with
having money either. But I get forlorn reading sbout "The Most Fantastic Deal In All Mexico" only to find out it is way way way way way way (is that
enough way's?) out of my league. But not right away of course. Getting the price takes dynamite and honey on the tongue.
Mexico is one of the last refuges for people like me. I love the people, I love the country but I must live Mexican campesino 24/7. No El Presidente
suites, no six-course extravanganzas, or five dollar shots of tequila. I simply have to do the best I can on what I've got.
I do not begrudge more fortunate people when they converse about their likes and dislikes. I read accounts of five hundred dollar hotel rooms and
eight hundred dollar fishing boat trips with great interest. Like accounts of what someone's fifty thousand dollar maxxed out diesel 4X4 does on a
desert trip.
But when someone comes along and posts. "Oh my God! That was the best chinese food I EVER had! Twenty different dishes. The price? It was
embarrassing! How can they do it?"
This now has grabbed my total and complete attention. There is a chance here for a genuine daydream. Affordable.
So then the extraction process begins. Along the way comes "Gee I'm not real sure but it was something like twenty dollars a person. Harry put it on
his credit card".
I always remember there are A LOT of people who read this forum. Lurkers who decide not to participate. Many live in Mexico or want to live in Mexico.
They would LOVE to be able to get a handle on affordability. They like me, simply shrug at the hundred dollar a pop bargains, but like me become a
little distraught when "price is no object because it isn't mentioned"
A Lot To See And A Lot To Do
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Bill Collector
Nomad
Posts: 374
Registered: 1-13-2004
Location: Buena Vista, BCS
Member Is Offline
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Very well written.
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motoged
Elite Nomad
Posts: 6481
Registered: 7-31-2006
Location: Kamloops, BC
Member Is Offline
Mood: Gettin' Better
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Yeah, I wish I had more money, too. 
Don't believe everything you think....
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woody with a view
PITA Nomad
Posts: 15940
Registered: 11-8-2004
Location: Looking at the Coronado Islands
Member Is Offline
Mood: Everchangin'
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Baja Cactus in El Rosario ***** for the room $ for the price = $30/night
Villa Bahia in LA Bay *** for the room $$$ for the price = $60-80/night
Posada Don Diego in Vicente Guerrero ** for the room $ for the price = $35/night *** for the restraunt!
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sancho
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 2524
Registered: 10-6-2004
Location: OC So Cal
Member Is Offline
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I'm probably emotionally stuck somewhere '89 Baja,
$3 for a case of beer, when turning in a case of empties,
early '80's I remember a Motel in Loreto, I believe
it was called the Salviaterra, $2.75 dollars a nite,
the Hotel Perla La Paz, around around $14, was looking
for a room in Ensenada last summer, a Sat., town full, at a
average Motel called Las Dunas, $120 a nite,
took the Cabo/P Vallarta ferry, '87, $11 for 2 people,
campground in town San Felipe now around $30 a nite
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wessongroup
Platinum Nomad
Posts: 21152
Registered: 8-9-2009
Location: Mission Viejo
Member Is Offline
Mood: Suicide Hot line ... please hold
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Hear ya sancho, try the early 60's .. 
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Osprey
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3694
Registered: 5-23-2004
Location: Baja Ca. Sur
Member Is Offline
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It was fun sometimes to pretend we had a lot of money. One trip to Loreto fishing for a week: stopped in Calexico and bought $2 million pesos = almost
$600 bucks. Took 2 rooms at the old mission on the beach, put everything on the card including all meals/drinks/3 fishing trips. Checkout bill =
$1,750,000 pesos ($527 bucks). I think the rooms were $25 bucks so we must have had about skitty eight hundred drinks.
On another level: all those hotels around the globe with rooms from $500 to $5,000 a night. I have always wondered just how many bizzillionaires there
are to keep all those places in business. Now with lots of T.V. news about public sector benefit packages I'm beginning to think it is not just rich
and famous CEOs and their families but government workers from around the world.
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Mula
Super Nomad
Posts: 1663
Registered: 8-16-2011
Location: San Nicolas y Lopez Mateos
Member Is Offline
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Lots and lots of good times in the days without much money.
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El Jefe
Super Nomad
Posts: 1027
Registered: 10-27-2003
Location: South East Cape
Member Is Offline
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Sounds like you drank the right wing coolaid Osprey. Yep, those damn gubment workers are just as bad as the robber barons. By God we outta swat them
down! We should pay our cops and firefighters in the USA like they do in Mexico. That would fix the economy. And them money grubbing burrocrats, all
they do is, well, I don't know all day.
Throw em all out on the streets with the welfare queens! We don't need no gubment anyways.
But don't touch us that's already retired. I like my generous pension.
No b-tchin\' in the Baja.
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DavidE
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3814
Registered: 12-1-2003
Location: Baja California México
Member Is Offline
Mood: 'At home we demand facts and get them. In Mexico one subsists on rumor and never demands anything.' Charles Flandrau,
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Mexico has got to preserve the heart and soul of herself. Campesinos and indigenas cannot pay two dollars for a stack or tortillas so they must rely
on their milpa, a cornfield. Seed is still possible from last harvest's kernels but fertilizer is costly. I paid almost (eqvt) thirty dollars for a
thirty pound costal of 15-15-15 and this is beyond the reach of most.
If you like breads or pastry, it's time to purchase a 50 lb sack of flour. Speculators are going to drive the cost of a loaf of bread (Wonder or
Bimbo) to above four dollars and most likely five by this winter. Premium whole grain bread will cost eight to ten dollars a loaf. Same thing for
corn. Mexico imports thousands of tons of corn every year to turn into masa. The government needs to get off it's a$$ down here and build a huge
fertilizer plant. They also need to make transportation less expensive; three dollar a gallon diesel means nothing when it costs a 22-wheeler four
thousand dollars in tolls to cross the country. Or take four times as long, take the liebre road and do four thousand dollars worth of damage to
chassis and tires.
Gasoline used to cost thirty cents a gallon. Now it's three dollars. Many people earn ten dollars a day. Does this mean they earned a dollar a day
back when gasoline was thirty one cents? A kilo of tortillas cost 12 cents. Now you cannot find a soda for anything under a dollar. Poor people are
being driven to a standard of living not seen since the Porfirian and maybe not even then. I remember giving Gilberto a 200 peso coin to purchase a
pop for me in 1989. When the peso was at 2240. Nine cents? Inflation has driven prices up nine hundred percent in US DOLLARS?
The only thing I can say for certain is that the wackos have rich fodder to feed fanatic followers. Al Qaeda imams illustrate the evils of western
society that prey on the poor. How do you defend against a truth? The USA and Mexico and I daresay Canada, are totally unlike what they were in the
1960's and 70's. If Lyndon Johnson would have attempted to pass MediCare today or even five years ago, it would have failed. What the hell, even
Social Security would fail a vote. It's pure Darwinism, with fear and financial lust at the helm.
Could you survive (never mind live) on a social security income? Think about it. There are folks out there that are determined to be the first
quadrillionaire.
A Lot To See And A Lot To Do
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Lee
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3601
Registered: 10-2-2006
Location: High in the Colorado Rockies
Member Is Offline
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Kilo of tortillas in Todos $1.20. Organic greens/veggies $10/week. I can catch enough fish to feed myself everyday for a long time. I
splurge on beer/tequila at Costco. Living is easy and cheap in BCS.
I don't dream about $700/day fishing excursions or whether the crowd at Rancho Pescadero are happy with their $200-$500/night rooms and $8.00 margs.
(I see them on the beach; they don't look happy.)
Oh, and surfing is free. Life really is good for some.
Find your niche. It's there.
http://www.ranchopescadero.com/
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DavidE
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3814
Registered: 12-1-2003
Location: Baja California México
Member Is Offline
Mood: 'At home we demand facts and get them. In Mexico one subsists on rumor and never demands anything.' Charles Flandrau,
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I checked out the presidential suite at the gran bay hotel on bahia navidad in 1997. Top of the tower with its own elevator. FOUR THOUSAND DOLLARS A
NIGHT.
The tour was conducted before the finishing work was complete. Televisions everywhere even when sitting on the pot. Same for telephones; his and
her's.
The bathroom door opened on it's own accord. Light switch sockets were badly chipped out you could see chipped marble past the plate. Weak water
pressure. The room had below the window A/C units that hummed so bad you couldn't talk when they were started which by the way made the fluorescent
lamps in the bathroom go out for a few seconds. But the faucets and escutcheon plates were gold, the mirrors were beautifully etched and the wind
rattled the front french style door.
I actually returned in 2006. Walked up to the poolside bar and ordered a screwdriver. Yuk! It was made from "Florida 7" box orange juice. Seven
dollars. The hotel has no beach. Zero. But an overclorinated pool. Huevos Rancheros would have cost fourteen dollars. Fresh squeezed (2 oz?) OJ six
bucks. The maseros had white shirts with creases that would have cut bread.
Grand pretend opulence. Was it the baño in the finsiterra in san lucas that had two urinals diagonal each other in one corner?
Luxury to me are neighbors who say Buenas Dias David! and mean it. Luxury to me is going to the store yesterday and having three young men on the
sidewalk, stop, shake my hand and ask me if I was visiting. When I told them I have been here for four months they were astonished. I told them I
don't get around much. All three wished me the best of health and fortune shook my hand again and continued on their way. Four months and I am barely
getting settled in.
I'm sitting here, listening to the surf boom, hiss, and murmur. Louder waves rattle the widows while the loudest cause the house to pop and complain.
Shari, just stopped by and snagged her loaned-out coffee grinder. She then spent time tying up my tomato vines that are loaded both the romas and the
beefsteak cannot support more "fruit". I evidently paid correct homage to the god of maize because the original stress test stand is six feet, and the
for-real patch is now knee-high. The lettuce patch is taking its sweet time, but slower growing lettuce always turns out sweeter. The cantaloupe
planting now has a large re-bar girder crossing it to form a huge trellis if and when the plants emerge. Tomorrow and for the next few days (at my
snail's pace) come the fabrication of the white potato and baby potato patches. Four months from now the weather is going to cool and I will be
swimming in spuds.
A Lot To See And A Lot To Do
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wiltonh
Nomad
Posts: 306
Registered: 2-2-2007
Member Is Offline
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Just picked up a guy at the airport in Portland. He had spent 3 weeks in Europe. He was complaining about how little the American dollar was worth
over there.
He was on a tour where breakfast and dinner were supplied. He said the cheapest lunch they could find was $40 US and they went as high as $80 US.
Water is not supplied so it cost $10 US for 1.5 liters of water.
Gas was between $8 and $9 per gallon.
Makes Baja look real cheap.
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Osprey
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3694
Registered: 5-23-2004
Location: Baja Ca. Sur
Member Is Offline
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Jefe, your political bias is shining brightly -- your post indicates you are one world class conclusion jumper. I would love to have you compete at
the London Olypics and do us proud.
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jbcoug
Senior Nomad
Posts: 709
Registered: 9-24-2006
Location: Vancouver, WA
Member Is Offline
Mood: Needing Baja!
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There is a lot to appreciate about this thread. We all long for the good old days when things were cheap. I often think back about how cheap things
were and share that info with my students. They are usually amazed by those prices. Then I think a little more and remember that my first job out of
high school in 1970, I grossed $250 a month. It's all relative I guess. There was a lot to like in those simpler times. I'd be perfectly happy to have
more time in Baja to live like DavidE on a tight budget. It's not all about how much money you have to spend.
John
\"The average dog is a nicer person than the average person.\" Andy Rooney
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shari
Select Nomad
Posts: 13052
Registered: 3-10-2006
Location: bahia asuncion, baja sur
Member Is Offline
Mood: there is no reality except the one contained within us "Herman Hesse"
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Like Lee said..."Find your niche". Living in baja certainly makes it possible for...ummm....people of lesser means...to live like kings. I count my
blessing daily to be able to live in front of the sea, eat abalone, lobster, sushi, fresh fish, seafood, veggies and fruit and be surrounded by
caring, loving amigos y familia.
As David mentioned, it is a strain for the normal folk here to keep up with inflation and rising costs of everything, but they are used to struggle
and deal with it. We share the bounty when it comes...like spare fish, extra produce and help each other make ends meet.
After I left David's yesterday, I went down to the beach...there were several families like this one carrying bags hoping to find a treasure....pismo
clams that wash up on the beach after a big swell....free!
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El Jefe
Super Nomad
Posts: 1027
Registered: 10-27-2003
Location: South East Cape
Member Is Offline
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Yes Osprey, you are correct, my conclusion jumping was indeed showing on that post. Sometimes I just get a little tired of all the government worker
bashing that goes on in certain media and elsewhere. I spent a career working for a city with some of the best, hardest working people I ever met. I
saw public funds well spent on all kinds of good services and public works projects. Folks like their services and like their streets and curbs and
gutters and parks etc. We tried our best to give them what they wanted.
My bias, government is mostly good. Let's make it even better.
Sorry for the rant.
And sorry DavidE for sidetracking your thread. I try not to do that.
[Edited on 7-16-2012 by El Jefe]
No b-tchin\' in the Baja.
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vandenberg
Elite Nomad
Posts: 5118
Registered: 6-21-2005
Location: Nopolo
Member Is Offline
Mood: mellow
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Whenever running a little short on funds, I always remind myself that " money is the root of all evil ".
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Martyman
Super Nomad
Posts: 1904
Registered: 9-10-2004
Member Is Offline
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| Quote: | Originally posted by wiltonh
Just picked up a guy at the airport in Portland. He had spent 3 weeks in Europe. He was complaining about how little the American dollar was worth
over there.
He was on a tour where breakfast and dinner were supplied. He said the cheapest lunch they could find was $40 US and they went as high as $80 US.
Water is not supplied so it cost $10 US for 1.5 liters of water.
Gas was between $8 and $9 per gallon.
Makes Baja look real cheap. |
Europe is not cheap but bottled water is cheaper. Pizza in Italy is cheap. $40 included appetizers and wine if you go tothe right place. Sorry
pal...your friend is an idiot
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tripledigitken
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 4848
Registered: 9-27-2006
Member Is Offline
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| Quote: | Originally posted by Martyman
| Quote: | Originally posted by wiltonh
Just picked up a guy at the airport in Portland. He had spent 3 weeks in Europe. He was complaining about how little the American dollar was worth
over there.
He was on a tour where breakfast and dinner were supplied. He said the cheapest lunch they could find was $40 US and they went as high as $80 US.
Water is not supplied so it cost $10 US for 1.5 liters of water.
Gas was between $8 and $9 per gallon.
Makes Baja look real cheap. |
Europe is not cheap but bottled water is cheaper. Pizza in Italy is cheap. $40 included appetizers and wine if you go tothe right place. Sorry
pal...your friend is an idiot |
I think part of the answer was "he was on a tour". You are usually going to pay more for food and hotel when on a tour.
We booked our own hotels and picked the restaurants that looked good or were recommended to us.
Our experience was completely different in 2009 and 2010, in Germany/Belguim and Spain respectively. In both countries for similar lodging and meals
the costs were less than road trips in the US. Staying in Best Western level rooms and sit down meals as a reference.
Ken
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