Motorcycle Tour of Baja, California, Mexico
  From Oregon to Cabo San Lucas & Back
19 days, 3,706 miles/5964 km. March 2020

Man and woman on beautiful, sunny beach net to water

It's a trip Stefan (coyotetrips) has dreamed of ever since we moved to the USA 10 years ago. It's a trip I've never felt ready to do before, until recently.

We toured Baja, California, Mexico on our motorcycles. It was glorious. I LOVE MEXICO.

map of our route in BajaMexico is my third country riding my own motorcycle. It's Stefan's 40th. And completing the trip means I have ridden my motorcycle all the way from Cabo San Lucas to Watson Lake in The Yukon, Canada - almost 6000 miles (though I took several years to do that entire route, on three different trips).

Long before our trip, Stefan researched the weather in the Baja Peninsula and felt that March would be the best month to go: the rains would be coming to an end and it wouldn't be stupid hot yet (we really hate heat).

Because we weren't sure what the weather would be, we debated between taking our regular motorcycle jackets or our mesh jackets. We went with our regular motorcycle jackets and it was TOTALLY the right decision for the weather we encountered.

We decided to stick with paved roads in Baja, California, and that meant doing all of Ruta Uno - Route One. It's the only paved road that goes the entire length of the peninsula. On the way back up, we steered off to the newly fully-paved Ruta Cinco - Route Five - that goes up the Eastern Coast, and then took Ruta Tres - Route Three - from North of San Felipe to Ensenada. We crossed over the border between the USA and Mexico, both coming and going, at Tecate.

We thought about camping on this trip, even just some of the time. We love camping by motorcycle, and the stars at night in a remote Mexican campground must be AMAZING. A couple of people raved online about how easy it was to camp in Baja. But we ultimately chose not to, and we're really glad we didn't camp, because on the trip, we rarely saw tent-friendly camp sites - or any camp sites at all, or any places we would feel comfortable camping rough. Also, a couple of nights, there was a great deal of rain and wind in Mexico. But note: hotels are expensive in Baja - the cheapest we had was $40, the most expensive was $100. We should have gotten a Mexican smart phone and used Air B & B or booked hotels online for far, far cheaper rates.

The biggest challenges of the motorcycle ride in Baja?

I list these challenges for those folks wondering if Baja would be too hard as a motorcycle rider, if you need a dual sport to do it, etc. I couldn't have done it in my first two years of riding, because of these challenges. Taking an off road riding course helped tremendously in many of those scenarios I just named. But, honestly, riding in freezing temperatures, with snow and rain falling, in Northern California and Southern Oregon on this trip was often just as hard as anything we experienced in Baja. So, in short: yes, you could do this ride on a non-dual sport - and many, many people do.

And we're already planning another trip to a different part of Mexico! Such a beautiful country.

Our trip in summary:

I reviewed all but two of the Mexico hotels on Trip Advisor.

The photos of our trip are here. 

And here are some videos from our trip:

The loading of the motorcycles.

Departure from Los Angeles, heading for Tecate.

Parking the bikes on the last night in Mexico.

Goodbye, Mexico.

Snow and puppies in Weed, California.

But here is the full story behind our trip, the EPIC TRAVELOGUE FOR OUR MOTORCYCLE MEXICO ADVENTURE, which provides more than you would EVER want to know and only three people actually read.

Some advice if you want your own Mexico Motorcycle Adventure

We used Google Docs as our central place for key information for the trip: maps with historical sites and gas stations, proof of travel health insurance, copies of our Mexican tourist "cards", copies of our motorcycle titles and DMV registrations, printouts of our regular health insurance cards, passports, driver's licenses, and on and on. We also had a spreadsheet there of everything we needed to do to prepare for the trip, noting progress on each item as weeks passed. 

I also used Evernote for key information, like emergency numbers, consulate numbers, etc., because all of that info could easily be downloaded to my Android phone before the trip and be available offline.

As of 2020, the highways in Baja - Ruta Uno, Dos, Tres and Cinco (Highways 1, 2, 3 and 5) are in FANTASTIC shape - except through San Felipe, which is riddled with massive, dangerous potholes.

Topes - speed bumps - are usually marked with both a sign and paint.

There are a LOT of stop signs - alto - and they are not always easy to see. I got to where I just assumed, even in a small settlement, that an intersection was going to have a stop sign, even if I didn't see it, and I did the Mexican stop if there was a lot of traffic and everyone else was doing it - but if I was by myself, I stopped properly every time, in case a cop was watching. The rumor we heard was that in Tecate, the police - the federales - target foreign motorcyclists specifically for doing a Mexican stop, so in any big city, stop at any stop sign and count to three.

Almost every OXXO or PEMEX has a clean bathroom, but there are NO rest areas and very few places on remote roads to pull over - and you shouldn't pull over in any empty overlook or park (more on that under "Safety" further on).

PEMEX employees we encountered were wonderful. They were chatty, patient with my Spanish, informative, funny, friendly - we could count on them to be helpful when we needed them to be, always.

Most military and police checkpoints will wave you through, because you are on a motorcycle, but never assume they are going to do so. Always wait for someone to very definitely, obvously wave you through before you drive through. Be respectful. The questions you will be asked if you are stopped: do you speak Spanish, what city did you just come from, where are you going, and what's your nationality.

Mexico uses kilometers and most speed limits are 80 kmh - 50 mph. But everyone goes as fast as they can, and it's WAY more than 50 mph. There is a custom when someone comes up behind you: you keep driving but you go over onto the shoulder, and you turn on your left hand turn signal, and that tells the driver behind you that it's okay to pass. Truck drivers will do this for you when you come up behind them and want to pass. The truck drivers of Mexico were AWESOME, by the way - so respectful of us. So appreciated (take that, Canada!).

Arroyos - those sudden little rivers running across roads and paths - show up after many hours of rain, meaning that you may not encounter any on a day it's raining, but you may encounter them many hours later or the day AFTER rain.

Many hotels in Baja are party hotels: even the nicest looking hotel may, once night falls, end up having blaring loud music and party goers yelling by the pool, from the bar (that earlier was your peaceful restaurant), from the patio, from a garden terrace, etc., until 2am or even later. This didn't happen to us, but I realized, reading reviews of hotels after we were back in the USA, that two hotels we loved for being so picturesque and quiet are, in fact, rarely quiet and are considered party hotels. If quiet is important to you, research and book places to stay before you leave - Air B & B might be a better option for you.

Every hotel where we stayed with the exception of one (Rice and Beans), had excellent Internet access. That means you could, in theory, book your hotels in advance by a day or two each evening from wherever you are staying. But you really should have a phone that gives you Internet access in any town, so you can check GoogleMaps to find hotels you have booked in advance or use Air B & B. For hotels that you want to book in advance in Tecate, Ensenada, San Felipe, Loreto, Todos Santos, La Paz and Cabo, have the address, phone number and directions handy offline - those towns are big enough that most people CANNOT tell you where a particular hotel is, or even where a particular street is. In our case, we also needed the phone to check State Department warnings about COVID19. We didn't get a phone that would work without Internet access in Mexico and it was a BIG mistake - we wasted a lot of time lost, searching for a hotel we wanted to stay at, or over-paying at hotels when it would have been cheaper to book online or stay in an Air B & B.

Take two pairs of ear plugs, in case you lose a pair. I also sometimes took an over-the-counter allergy medicine to help me sleep as well. Sleep is so beyond important - you need to be sharp and alert when riding a motorcycle, always, no matter where. 

Build in some days in your trip for a motorcycle breakdown, or a day of whale watching, or a day of kayaking or snorkeling, or days of whatever it is you like to do.

Key info I had printed out and downloaded to my phone:

I also had a private Twitter list that has all of the Twitter accounts I wanted to be able to read quickly while on the road, like:

Safety

Precautions we took - and precautions we didn't take but probably should have:

We saw this video after our trip, and it is chilling: a couple was robbed in October 2019, in broad daylight, on a scenic pullout on the toll road just out of Tijuana. The guy has been going to Mexico for more than 40 years and this is the first time this has happened to him. In a followup video, he blames himself entirely for it happening, and I think that's just wrong: he was robbed because some very horrible people targeted him, and that can happen anywhere, including right here in the USA. But because of this video, I realize we took some chances we didn't even know we were taking, and I adjusted my safety recommendations accordingly here on this page.

Here is the full story (narrative) about our trip.

Also see blogs and links we found helpful.

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