Feb 2024 – Grey Whales in Puerto San Carlos and Blue Whales in Loreto

Puerto San Carlos

Now well into our return trip north, we are taking some time to explore a few of the towns that we drove past on our trip south. Our first stop was a short, four-night stay in the tiny Pacific-coast town of Puerto San Carlos. There are a number of small towns along the coast that are popular tourist stops for people looking to see grey whales. Based on some quick research, we chose San Carlos, approximately 2 ½ hours north from La Paz. San Carlos does not actually face the Pacific Ocean, but is semi-protected by the large Magdalena Bay.

There are a few Airbnb properties in San Carlos, but for our short stay, we opted for a hotel instead. (No discounts for a short Airbnb stay, and the added cleaning fees often push the daily rate up quickly.) Using google maps, we chose the Hotel Vista Mag-Bay, right on the coast. The property had good reviews, nice photos, and the location seemed like it would be easy to walk Gunner along the beach. Our four-night stay was only $336 – not bad for high season, and this cost includes their dog fee and a simple continental breakfast each morning.

With our hotel selected, we started looking for grey whale tour operators. It turned out that the hotel owners also run a tour company, and after a few conversations and some basic research, we ended up booking with them. The owner, Pepe, and his company, Friendly Whale Tours, did not disappoint. We started early, with transportation provided from the hotel – in the boat on a trailer! We rode about a mile to a nearby beach, then launched into Magdalena Bay for our tour. Over the next 7 hours, we saw sea lions, a small island full of birds, and at least 20 or 30 grey whales! We saw most of the whales from a distance, sometimes as close as 100-200 yards. Many were solo, but some were travelling in pods of 3 or 4. After a couple of hours, we got very lucky. Pepe was monitoring his CB radio and heard that a different tour operator had found a friendly whale. We went to their location and were able to get along-side a 30-ft grey whale. She bounced from boat to boat, seemingly wanting to be petted, or to rub her barnacle-encrusted skin against the boats. In total, our boat had three separate opportunities to see this grey whale up close before heading to lunch on nearby Magdalena Island, followed by another short boat ride back to Puerto San Carlos. Pepe provided a great tour, with equally great pricing – they actually discount the rate as more people sign up for the tour. With our boat of 7 people, Sandy and I paid $147 for the 2 of us, including our tip to Pepe at the end of the tour.

Grey whale tail

Sandy petting a friendly whale

Grey whale head and eye

This is as good of a spot as any to talk about our current underwater camera setup. Last year, I used a Fuji Finepix digital camera while snorkeling, etc. At some point, one of the seals went bad and the camera ended up dying. We considered a few different options for a replacement, and ended up settling on a knockoff GoPro-style action camera, the Akaso Brave 4. The price-point was really good too – camera, underwater housing, and all accessories for < $100 through Amazon. One of the accessories I bought is a floating handle that makes it easy to aim the camera while swimming, or hold the camera underwater from a boat. I’ve tested the floating feature, and the handle is buoyant enough to keep the camera floating on the surface of the ocean. I don’t think the camera has the lens or image quality of a name-brand GoPro, but we consider it good enough for now, and can always upgrade if we end up using the camera a lot.

The main difference using an action camera vs. a handheld camera is that instead of taking lots of photos and an occasional video, I instead record a lot of videos that we later process into highlights and still photos. This has meant a steep learning curve and testing various settings on the camera. Right now, I’m using the built-in underwater mode that does some basic color correction, and am shooting in 1280p so that I can increase the framerate to 120 frames per second. (blah-blah-blah, all it means is that by using the highest possible framerate, the swimming animals look smooth instead of jerky). Additionally, Sandy has been working with a post-processing software called AquaColorFix, specifically designed to adjust the color in underwater photos and videos. And I finally decided that free video editing software wasn’t doing what we wanted, so I purchased Wondershare Filmora, which has a lot of features to clip and zoom the videos, perform additional color corrections, and choose additional export settings to keep the action as smooth as possible. The additional software cost another $100 and overall, we’re happy with our new solution to capture our underwater memories.

Back to San Carlos – we had planned three days in town and only one whale tour. We thought about taking a second tour but decided that we were very fortunate with our up-close experience and didn’t want to take the risk of a lesser tour. Instead, we spent the next two days exploring the town, walking the beach, and relaxing at our hotel. The town itself is very small, with no real tourist stops, and only a couple of touristy photo ops. We later learned that a nearby fish-processing plant and a tortilleria may offer unadvertised tours, if you know who to ask. Actually, our host Pepe has a vision to expand the tourist economy of Puerto San Carlos, and has been thinking of ways to advertise or promote some of these other experiences.

Sandy and I found a couple of decent restaurants in San Carlos, and ended up returning to each one a second time during our stay. Of those, we highly recommend La Pasadita, in the middle of town, for a flavorful Mexican dinner at great prices – between 300 and 400 pesos ($18-$24 USD) for the two of us, including drinks and tip.

Overall, San Carlos was a very nice small town, great for a quick touristy visit, but not what we’re looking for in an extended-stay destination. The hotel and tour are highly recommended for anyone with some flexibility in their schedule and a desire to see, and hopefully pet, grey whales!

Loreto

From Puerto San Carlos, we drove a couple of hours east, across the Baja peninsula, to the small city of Loreto. We had stopped here for one night on our trip south and wanted to give it a better look on our trip back north. Loreto was the original capital of California (not Baja California, but of the original California territory, before the countries of Mexico and the United States were established). Loreto sits on the Sea of Cortez, and while not protected by a bay, it does get some shelter from a number of nearby islands.

Finding good lodging in Loreto was a bit of a challenge. Many of the hotels are not pet friendly, and there are a surprisingly low number of properties on Airbnb. We commented a few times that Loreto feels like it’s at a tipping point from local hideaway to tourist destination. Most homes are for full-time or seasonal living, not marketed as short-term rental properties in the winter. Of the handful of properties that we found available for our stay, one appeared run-down, one had very poor reviews, two were across the highway and out of town, leaving one small casita as our only option. We booked it, with some concerns about areas to walk Gunner and the lack of nearby food and entertainment options, but we quickly settled in and made the best of our location.

Our condo/casita had a small sitting area and kitchen in one room, with a separate bedroom and attached bathroom. The sitting area was fairly narrow, but we were able to stack most of our belongings along the wall opposite a couch. Oddly (to us), the hosts mounted the single TV on the bedroom wall, rather than opposite the couch. Maybe some guests prefer this setup, but we would rather sit to watch TV, rather than lay on the bed.

Gunner resting at the condo

The condo did not have a washer or dryer, but we found a good, reasonably-priced laundromat, providing next-day full-service wash/dry/fold for 100 pesos ($6 USD) per load. There were two highlights to the condo we chose. First was the internet – with speeds over 100 mbps, it was the fastest and most reliable internet connection that we’ve had in the entire peninsula. Even the hosts were not sure how they were able to get such good internet, but my theory is that we were located across the street from the fire station and around the corner from the police station, so perhaps the condo was able to tie into some very good city infrastructure. The second highlight of our condo was the large yard and palapa. Most days we could sit outside in the shade and let Gunner wander free within our gated yard. He seemed to enjoy laying outside, both in the sun and in the shade.

As I noted, there were a lot of city facilities near our condo. The area felt very safe and secure, and was well-lit at night. There were also a number of other homes, along with a collection of local dogs, in the opposite direction. This made it difficult to walk Gunner in that direction, so we instead opted for a C-shaped out-and-back route avoiding dogs as much as possible. We normally walked 1 mile in the morning, then a shorter walk after dark, depending on Gunner’s willingness and interest.

Our condo was about a mile west from the revitalized center of town. Sandy and I would typically take a midday 15- to 20-minute walk into town for lunch or to explore. Though we were initially concerned about our location away from town, it ended up working out well. We would walk past a number of local businesses and a few restaurants to reach the Loreto “andador” – walking mall. The city was in the process of tearing out and reconstructing a portion of the andador, which affected a bit of our walk and access to some of the shops, but if it matches the completed portions, it will look very nice once finished.

Many of the shops along the andador sell touristy trinket items and t-shirts. There are also a lot of restaurants and a few bars. At the center of town, the andador passes by the Mission of Our Lady of Loreto / Parroquia de Nuestra Señora de Loreto – one of the original Jesuit missions, which has been reconstructed and added to over the years. The modern church has added a large bell tower, and the former living quarters have been converted into a nice museum that we toured for the reasonable price of 75 pesos ($4.50 USD) each.

Loreto mission, early 1900's

Loreto mission, March 2024

Continuing east along the andador, we would walk past the Loreto City Hall and then into the large central town plaza. Note – one section inside the city hall is covered in murals and is well-worth the 10-minute stop. Loreto’s central plaza is surrounded by restaurants, cafes, and hotels, including our favorite local spot, Zopilote Brewing.

Mural in Loreto City Hall

Andador, near the malecon

Further east, the andador goes past more shops, (somewhat surprisingly) some RV parks, and then opens up to a seaside road and a malecon (boardwalk). The malecon in Loreto is less than a mile long, passing more hotels, restaurants, the city marina, and finally a public beach. We were surprised to see a few empty lots along this stretch, still waiting for visionaries to invest in a new restaurants or hotels. The malecon is very low-key; we rarely saw anyone selling trinkets or snacks, and were only asked about our interest in boat tours as we were passing the marina.

Sandy and I found a few good spots to eat in Loreto, but overall, we found the restaurant and grocery options to be a bit lacking. We ate at a wide range of restaurants, including a Uruguayan spot and a southern U.S. inspired soul food spot. Worth mentioning, and recommended, is the previously-noted Zopilote, with good craft beers and a selection of pizzas, tacos, and salads. We also really enjoyed the Mexican dishes at Orlando’s – one of the few places that we ate at more than once. We found a really good bacon-avocado cheeseburger deal at Augie’s, which included fries and a beer, for the low-low price of 199 pesos ($12 USD), and we tried our first Mexican gorditas at Gorditas Loreto. A gordita is similar to a thick tortilla, sliced open to create a pouch, which is filled with your choice of stews or fillings. We tried five different gorditas and agreed that poblano chiles and cheese was our favorite. The place was a bargain, with each gordita priced at only 30 pesos ($1.80). Including drinks, the two of us had lunch for only 235 pesos ($14 USD)! Other local restaurants were also reasonably priced, typically 300-400 pesos ($18-$24 USD) for the two of us, but we found most of the food to be bland or mediocre. Any specialty restaurant, including those along the andador, was marketed towards tourists and we often felt that the meals were still mediocre but overpriced, typically between 500-700 pesos ($30-$42 USD).

Loreto has three main grocery stores, none of which were ever fully stocked or reliably had good produce. We typically visited multiple stores as we stocked up on our staples, such as bananas, apples, and cereal. We were very excited to find mangos back in season, only to find the stores empty of them a week later, but in stock again a week after that. Prices were similar to other places we’ve been, we just weren’t able to easily find the items we were looking for.

We saw a good number of expats in Loreto. Many were passing through, or had driven up from Los Cabos or La Paz for a short visit. But we also learned that Loreto has a decent snowbird population, and were surprised to hear that there is an international airport with at least two weekly direct flights to the U.S. There are a couple of large condo developments south of town, the closer catering to a mid-tier golf and beach community, and the farther catering to high-end visitors with an all-inclusive option.

Speaking of the golf and beach retreats, Sandy and I were offered a chance to tour the high-end community. Yes, it was a timeshare pitch. We typically decline these offers, but this seemed low-pressure, and the salesman offered a nearby island tour with whale watching, sea lions, and lunch (“a $200 value!”) for our visit. New in town, and perhaps not thinking clearly, we accepted the offer. The company sent a taxi to our condo for the 30-minute drive to the new community. The area is very nice, with luxury multi-story condos and a golf course nestled between some steep mountains and the sea. We had a nice breakfast (after which our sales associate suggested I leave the tip???), followed by a tour of the various units, and then a sales pitch. The entire visit was low-pressure, and they stayed pretty close to their promised 90-minute pitch, which we declined. Two days later, we were on our “free” boat tour!

Our boat ride started soon after sunrise, and we headed out into the Sea of Cortez with our guide. We quickly found some humpback whales and were able to watch them surface and breathe for a bit. Unfortunately, we did not get any grand shows or close-ups, and since it was a multi-purpose ride, we quickly left the whales and headed towards the nearby Isla Coronado. On the far side of the island, we found a large sea lion colony. Apparently, some tours will let you swim with them, but ours did not, and we continued around the small island, with views of some very unique rock formations and an eagle’s nest. We then landed at a small island beach, where our guide provided us an assortment of drinks and snacks (we had pre-ordered ceviche). Though the water was a bit cloudy, I snorkeled a bit and saw a typical selection of reef fish, as well as some scorpion fish and sea stars. Sandy relaxed on the beach, where she met another local guide, who we ended up contacting for a blue whale tour later in our visit. As I noted, the island tour was free, though we did have to purchase bracelets to allow entry into the protected marine zone around Loreto for 115 pesos ($7 USD) each.

For our blue whale tour, we again met just after sunrise. Unfortunately, the weather was cloudy, which made it hard to see whales surfacing and spouting. Our two guides worked quite hard, but most of our encounters were a long distance away. Apparently blue whales are notoriously stand-offish and hard to see up close (though our guide showed us a video of a blue whale swimming next to their boat the previous day!) Our guides’ tenacity paid off - toward the end of our tour, we were rewarded with a big blue whale, swimming and showing off its gigantic tale, not once, but twice, within a few hundred yards of our boat. We definitely splurged on this tour, 1,950 pesos ($115 USD) each, and a total cost of $272 after adding our tip to our guides and another set of marine zone bracelets. We agreed that it was an expensive tour, but we think it was worth the opportunity to see enormous blue whales in their own environment, and you never know how that type of trip will turn out.

The final excursion that Sandy and I wanted to take was a day trip to some local prehistoric cave paintings. For some reason, this tour ended up being a bit of a headache to arrange. Our timeshare salesman offered to set up a combo tour for us, but then the details of the tour changed, then the availability changed…. We aren’t sure if he was giving us the runaround or was just an unfortunate middleman, but after 10 days of back-and-forth, he kindly returned our deposit and we ended up booking with another company. That company booked us on a group tour on a Sunday, but we later discovered that the rest of our group had been scheduled for the tour on Saturday. In the end, Sandy and I had a private tour to the Canipolé cave paintings and rock art. We started with a 1-hour drive

Rock art - Luis and Sandy

across the desert and into the mountains, followed by an easy 1-hour hike up a dry-wash riverbed. During the hike, we learned a lot about the local plants from our guide, Luis, who worked for two years as a coyote in the Arizona desert! At the end of our hike, we saw a large collection of colorful cave paintings of sea creatures, land animals, people, and stars. Luis seemed to know what all of the paintings represented and also told us a bit about the Guaycura indigenous culture. After the paintings, we then got to see a bit of rock art, with more sea and land animals carved into large basalt boulders. After our hike back to our van, we had a picnic lunch before our drive back to Loreto. We paid $182 for this tour, including our tip to Luis. Overall, we considered the tour to be a bit over-priced for the experience, and we also felt a bit rushed at the paintings and carvings.

Other than the mission and attached museum, we only found one other attraction in town. One block away from the main centro, there is an old stone house, shown as “La Casa de Piedra” in google maps. This house is apparently the first building in Loreto, and is now a small, private, family-run museum of sorts. We had a bit of a tour from a young man whose great-grandmother grew up in the house. The inside is mainly a collection of interesting, old town photos, as well as an extensive collection of unique sea shells. We paid 50 pesos ($3 USD) as a voluntary donation, and Sandy also bought some postcards from their small gift shop.

We also checked out a couple of beaches in the area. Our first visit was to Playa La Darsena, right in town. We went on a Sunday, expecting the area to be crowded with locals, based on our experiences in other towns. We were surprised to find a popular, yet not crowded beach, and even more surprised that we were able to find a free parking spot right by the beach, and were then able to grab one of the few public palm-frond palapas for shade. The beach was coarse salt-and-pepper sand, and we didn’t end up going into the water because we thought it would be too cold.

While in the stone house museum, our guide had told us that most of their shells came from Playa Ligui, so we also checked out that beach. Playa Ligui is about 20 minutes south of town and accessed by sandy unpaved roads that were in good condition. On our first trip, the beach was packed with RVs! It is fairly common to see RVs on the beaches, because all of Mexico’s beaches are public and the camping is free. The couple of people that we talked to had been there for a few days and were planning to head to Loreto for two nights to clean up, fill up their freshwater tanks, buy groceries, then come back out. At Playa Ligui, Gunner and I sat on the beach while Sandy searched for shells. She was not disappointed, and found a lot of unique shells, with intricate designs that could be mistaken for being hand-painted. While there, we were also fortunate enough to see some humpback whales playing in the sea. A cow and calf worked their way across, breaching, splashing, and playing for over half an hour. It was a great show! We returned to Playa Ligui twice more during our trip. The RVs had all moved on and Sandy continued to find nice shells, but we didn’t see any more whales.

Playa Darsena, quiet Sunday

Playa Ligui, packed with RVs

Gunner at Playa Ligui

Our last field trip was to the small town of San Javier, about 45 minutes west of Loreto. The drive itself was very nice, on a two-lane, nicely paved highway winding up a canyon through some steep, craggy mountains covered in cactus and other desert plants. At the top of the canyon, we headed across a high plain before starting into another canyon. There, we found the small town of San Javier, home to the Misión San Francisco Javier de Viggé-Biaundó. The original mission has moved and been restored a few times, with a Baroque style church now on the site. Both the exterior and interior were reminiscent of the churches we’ve seen on the mainland – with ornate stonework in the walls and ceiling, and gold-plated areas around the altar. The mission site was chosen for its Mediterranean climate, somewhat like an oasis within the mountains. The missionaries grew grapes, dates, and olives, and one of the original olive trees behind the mission is still producing fruit. San Javier is a nicer town than we had expected, and we think that travelers to the area could probably spend 1, or even 2, nights there.

Beautiful mountain drive

Mission oasis in San Javier

The numbers

Loreto is a reasonably priced small city to visit in the Baja peninsula. Our condo for our 3-week stay was $1,384, or $66 per night. We often try to stay for at least 4 weeks to get a monthly discount, but these hosts only provided a weekly discount of $40 per week, and nothing extra for a full month. That worked fine for us, because the shorter stay fit well within our larger itinerary for heading north. Total food costs were only $40/day in Loreto, 10% less than our costs in La Paz. As expected, entertainment continues to be higher than planned - $560 for the 3-week stay, averaging out to $26/day! There’s just too many interesting sights and marine animals to see here in the peninsula! Gas in Loreto was almost 25 pesos per liter (about $5.60 USD per gallon), about 10% higher than we’ve paid elsewhere on our trip. Also, we continue to experience negative impacts of the exchange rate, as Mexico’s economy out-performs the United States’. When we entered Mexico in the fall, we were getting about 18 pesos per dollar. By the end of the year, we were getting about 17 pesos per dollar, and while in Loreto, the rate fell below 17, to about 16.9 pesos per dollar. Compared to our previous years’ trips to Mexico, when we were getting 20 pesos per dollar, our costs have increased by 15%, just due to the exchange rate. With those exchange rates, inflation, and our extra entertainment costs, our total daily spend (destination-specific costs, i.e. no cell-phone bills, insurance, clothes, etc.) came in at $137/day vs. our plan of $130/day.

Since I’m talking about costs, I might as well expand on my experiences of paying with my cell phone. As we travel Mexico, we pay for almost everything with cash (lodging is typically our only non-cash expense). Just like in the U.S., handing over a credit card has risks, and we want to avoid having to get a replacement card shipped to us since we’re always on the move. We have seen an increasing number of people paying by card in restaurants, but I don’t want to carry a card in my wallet, again fearing loss or theft. However, restaurants in Mexico always bring the card reader to the table, rather than taking the card away to process the charge. And the card readers are all chip enabled, so… since my current phone supports NFC and Google Pay, I thought I’d try to figure out the technology. There was a short learning curve, supported by a few patient vendors, and a phone call to Chase, but we are now paying for about half of our meals electronically. It’s very simple to turn on the NFC chip, tap my phone, and have instant approval using a virtual code (and not our actual credit card number). Then turn the chip back off, and there’s theoretically no risk of theft of our card details or physical cards. Since meals are easily our largest cash expense, the result has been less trips to the bank and much easier accounting and tracking of our spending. Side note – we still pay our tip in cash after confirming with multiple servers that this is what they prefer.

Would we recommend Loreto as a tourist destination, and would we return? Yes, but with some hesitations. When we passed through town on our way south last year, we really wanted to like Loreto. But during our first-week’s explorations this year, we felt that it didn’t have the charm and attractiveness of some of the other places we’ve been. Loreto feels like a large beach town that has been discovered by tourists, and is just on the edge of being developed into a more substantial tourist destination. There are not a lot of options for lodging or variety of food, but it’s apparent that many of the businesses are getting a face-lift, and are also charging higher tourist prices to their clients. Over our three-week stay, we did warm up to Loreto a bit. The town is easily walkable, has some great opportunities to explore the sea, and has all of the basics that we needed, but it remains lower on our list of destinations because of the lack of food options, local culture, and personality.