Oct/Nov 2023 – Traditional Baja Fun in San Felipe
- Trevor
- Dec 11, 2023
- 10 min read
Continuing our travels from Rosarito, we wanted to explore south through Mexico’s Baja Peninsula, but it’s still pretty hot in most of the peninsula in October. We decided to head a few hours southeast to San Felipe, a small desert town on the Gulf of California. San Felipe may be the smallest town that we’ve spent a month in, but it did not disappoint. We quickly fell in love with the small-town charm, the hospitality, and the multiple activities centered around the malecon. We had some hot days in the 90s during the first week of our trip, but the weather became much more temperate (high 70s, low 80s) for the majority of our stay.
We originally tried to book a condo north of town. The unit was in a mostly-expat community, and it looked like it would be easy to walk Gunner around the neighborhood. However, the AirBNB host rejected our request and let us know that he had recently listed his property for sale and was no longer taking bookings. Instead, we went with our second choice, south of the main part of town. For both of our bookings, we did have some concerns about being farther from town, but we were drawn to amenities like king-sized beds and swimming pools. Most locations in Mexico have double beds, but Gunner likes to sleep with us, so we prefer to get a place with at least a queen bed. We didn’t end up using the pool, but it was nice to know it was available since the temps were in the 90s when we arrived.
Our chosen condo at Cali’s Baja Condos was actually more of a casita - a small unit behind a main house where our hosts lived. That setup was a bit of a change for us, as we have never stayed in a traditional “BnB” inside someone else’s home, and only stayed in a second unit on the host’s property one previous time (a second-floor unit last year in Oaxaca). We are happy to report that all went well living so close to our hosts, and we felt very fortunate where we ended up.
Our condo was a ground-floor unit in a two-story building, which I specifically requested when we booked. Having a ground-floor unit makes it easier to move all of our belongings in/out, and is also easier when taking Gunner out multiple times per day. Our condo was clean and cozy, but would be better suited for short stays rather than full-time living. The bedroom and kitchen were nice, but the main living area was a bit cramped. The dining area was very small, and the living space was dominated by 2 couches and a table. We often felt that we were stepping over Gunner and his bed. We had a medium-sized TV and reasonable wifi – it was fast enough for anything we needed, though it would occasionally lag or go out. The property did not have any grass, so we would take Gunner past the main house, out the gate, and into the street to do his business, similar to many other places we have stayed in Mexico. We also had access to a rooftop patio, which was nice for sunset pictures. Our front door had a nice screen door, which is a rarity in Mexico, and allowed us to leave the door open and get a cool breeze into the condo in the mornings and evenings. Gunner also liked laying by the screen and often went outside and laid in front of our door. Our condo had an AC unit that we often used mid-day, and we had access to the hosts’ washer and dryer for laundry.
The neighborhood around our condo was decent. The homes appeared to be custom, rather than part of a tract development. Unfortunately, there was not a lot of upkeep on the streets themselves, with lots of potholes and sections of gravel. A few of the neighbors had dogs, and some of them were free-roaming, so we didn’t really walk Gunner in our neighborhood.
Since we couldn’t walk Gunner around the condo, we started each day with a 2-mile drive into town. We would find a spot to park on the malecon, and would then walk a 1-mile loop around the malecon and through the local business district. Gunner did really well on these walks and seemed to enjoy the area. Speaking of the malecon, Sandy and I really enjoyed the area as well. The boardwalk had restaurants and shops down one side and was open to the gulf on the opposite side. The entire area was kept clean and we could almost always find parking for free. The malecon was also the location for many of the public gatherings that we went to.
The Halloween and Día de Muertos parade was one of our first events during our time in San Felipe. Many of the local observed Día de Muertos, but not to the extent that we saw in Oaxaca. It’s a smaller gathering, and many of the people celebrated with a more American-style Halloween. On the evening of the 31st, people gather in the bars along the malecon and kids walk by trick-or-treating, and it looked like the kids were having a lot of fun.
The next major event was San Felipe’s annual Festival de Camaron (Shrimp Festival). Located at the north end of the Sea of Cortez, shrimping is a pretty big industry. We could see boats coming and going every day, and we could often see their lights if we looked out into the sea at night. During the three-day festival, we wandered the malecon, sampling multiple dishes, looking at booths for local businesses, and listening to a lot of live music. Somewhat controversially, the city charged an admission fee of 100 pesos ($6) per person per day. The festival also sold a "tasting ticket", but we found that we preferred to order directly from the menus, and all of the food stalls were reasonably priced.
San Felipe also has a bit of a baseball/softball culture. We had a fun day watching a small tournament that served as a fundraiser for the local league. From items I’ve seen posted on Facebook, it seems that games and tournaments are a fairly regular occurrence there.
Perhaps the most classicly-Baja, Sandy and I got to watch two off-road races during our month-long stay. On the day we arrived, the NORRA 500 was racing from Ensenada to San Felipe. Part of the course parallelled the highway, so Sandy got to watch a few of the race trucks while I kept my eyes on the road. The next day, the races left in stages, and we walked about 10 minutes from our condo to a lookout point where we could watch the cars, trucks, and buggies race by. It was a very entertaining way to start our time in San Felipe!
When planning our trip, I realized that the Baja 1000 would be racing from La Paz to Ensenada on the weekend of our departure from San Felipe. We didn’t think this would be a problem, but our AirBNB hosts advised us to delay our departure. In fact, they actually comped us an extra night to encourage us to stay, and we were glad that we did. We went out to the desert with some new friends and watched a large number of trucks, buggies, UTVs, and motorbikes race by. Most of the drivers are part of a team for the 1,300-mile race, so they only have to drive for a few hundred miles, and they have a full pit crew to help them along the way. However, some of the motorcycle racers ride “Ironman”, meaning that they race the entire distance, without stopping, which can take up to 50 hours to complete! We really got behind those guys when they raced by. One rider came by asking for chain lube, so we got to be part of the action, helping out as an ad-hoc pit crew. We especially liked the Flying Dutchman, who rode without a pit crew, relying on the generosity of others, and completing the race in just over 48 hours.
In addition to watching the Baja races, we got a chance to experience the desert for ourselves. Our AirBNB hosts also run an adventure tour company, so we signed up for one of their rides. We took a 3-hour tour through the desert, down dirt roads, over bumps and jumps, and through the nearby Valle de Los Gigantes – Valley of the Giants. In this valley, we rode past many varieties of cactus, including the huge Cardon cactuses that give the valley its name. The desert adventure was well worth the cost of $110 each, plus tip, which included our ride, tamales, water, beer, mezcal, and a souvenir dust-blocking bandana.
Sandy and I also got a fair amount of beach time in San Felipe. The beaches were typically very wide, nearly empty of people, and covered with shells and sand dollars. Sandy loved wandering the sand, scouring the beaches for unique shells for her collection, and to give to our grandkids.
Though San Felipe is a small town, there is no shortage of food and beverage options, especially along the malecon. Most of our meals were traditional Mexican dishes, often including seafood. By the end of our trip, it was clear that our favorite places included Dos Mares for seafood tacos and Kikiriki for traditional tacos. At the Taco Factory, Sandy discovered the “papona” – basically a twice-baked potato, loaded, plus asada or pastor. We also enjoyed some Italian food at Alfredo’s, originally established by the creator of fettucine Alfredo! I ordered the namesake dish, and it was very good. Sandy had cioppino, which was also very good and loaded with a variety of seafood. We also recommend the San Felipe Brewery north of town, which has a great variety of beer, very reasonable prices, and some good rotating food options.
Overall, food pricing in San Felipe was in-line with our expectations for Mexico. Meals out were generally less than 500 pesos ($30), including drinks. There are only two major grocery stores in town, but we preferred and recommend Calimax as our go-to store. It had all of the grocery staples that we look for – fruits, vegetables, tortillas, dry cereal, etc. Our main grocery cost overrun was the frozen blueberries that we often add to our breakfast cereal. With no Costco or Sam’s nearby, we probably paid about triple our normal price, about $10, for a 1-lb bag. In total, our food costs averaged $34 per day, or right at $1,000 for the month.
Our experience with bottled water was a bit unique in San Felipe. We typically buy large 20-liter bottles of water, exchanging our empties, for somewhere between 35-60 pesos ($2-$3.50) per bottle. In San Felipe, we quickly discovered that none of the bottlers that we’re familiar with provide water in the stores. According to our AirBNB hosts, the local water is very good, and everyone uses a water distributor, where they refill your empty bottle on the spot, from a pipe, from…somewhere. We have seen these distributors in other cities, but have passed them by, preferring the mass-bottlers, feeling that we’re getting better quality control. Going upon the recommendation of our hosts, we got our water bottles refilled at Israel water, for the low-low price of 15 pesos ($0.85), and had no issues during the duration of our stay.
San Felipe is packed with expats. It’s a very popular destination because it’s only about two hours south of Mexicali, and is a hub for off-road racing in Baja. On most days that we were in town, we would see handfuls of expats shopping or dining, as well as a large number that appeared to be tourists visiting for the day or weekend. However, for major events like Halloween or the Shrimp Festival, the number of expats visibly swelled. And for race weekends, San Felipe could actually be called crowded, with race trucks and trailers, racers, and pit crews dominating the streets and restaurants. We also found that most of the expats lived north of town, and the San Felipe Brewery often felt like a little America in Mexico.
With our casita-style condo, we saw our hosts quite a bit. They were very nice and invited us on a lot of outings. We took a few trips to a beach hotel for lunch, had a couple of Monday Night Football potlucks, and went to a few happy hour events, typically at the Baja Mar. We definitely made a lot of new friends during our stay.
Our costs in San Felipe were very reasonable, with only our condo above our typical average spend. At $1,800 for the month, we are starting to see a trend for housing costs in the Baja peninsula! Our hosts did recommend to us that in addition to AirBNB, we could save money by using their listing on Booking.com, or they also take reservations directly. If we returned to San Felipe, we will definitely be giving them a call, but I am still hesitant to make our monthly condo bookings directly with an unknown party by text, or through Facebook, etc. We haven’t had any issues through AirBNB, but it feels like we have a bit of added security vs. making our reservations directly with owners. Out of curiosity, I did look up our condo on Booking, and they were right - for the random future time period I selected, the Booking price was a few hundred dollars less than AirBNB, so I’ll be sure to look there when planning our future travels.
Gasoline prices have been fairly stable throughout our travels in Mexico, and were about 22.5 pesos per liter, or about $5/gallon. We did a fair amount of driving during our stay – 3 trips to the beach hotel, a few trips to the brewery and beach north of town, and typically 10 miles per day on our trips into town for Gunner’s walk and again for lunch or shopping – which resulted in us spending 500 pesos ($28) on gas on a weekly basis.
Overall, we really enjoyed our stay in San Felipe, and would definitely return for another visit. There always seemed to be events happening in and around town, so it was easy to build a mix of days out with days of rest. Regarding our quest for a longer-term location, we do have some concerns about San Felipe. Its desert location means that temps are very hot between May and October. Also, as a small town, there are not many healthcare providers. For any major medical care, most people travel north to Mexicali, or across the border to El Centro. Last, shopping options for grocery and household supplies are limited. We would likely need to travel north to Mexicali every couple of months to visit stores like Costco. If we end up settling in the Baja Peninsula in a couple of years, San Felipe would be a great spot, if we make a plan for the hot summer months and can feel comfortable with the amenities that are missing in the small town.
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