Hello Dan & Lisa,
We have been back at our home in Alberta now for over a week and find ourselves still kind of wishing we were back on Baja following along with the caravan! We didn’t know how we would feel about this group travel experience as we consider ourselves to be very experienced travellers and were a bit worried that we might feel stifled with the set itinerary and/or group dynamics. Happy to report that it took no time at all to fall into the rhythm of the caravan and feel comfortable being “followers”. We believe this is due in no small part to Freddie Washington’s calm and ever patient leadership. He told us right from the start his philosophy that we were all brothers and sisters just from different mothers and he made great effort every day to connect with everyone to be sure we were getting what we needed to best enjoy the experience. It seemed that nothing was too small an issue and Freddie was working to solve it. We felt completely safe at all times with Freddie leading the way and greatly appreciated his warnings of truckers, potholes and animals coming at us. Its easy to see that one could become complacent with the attention needed on those roads and perhaps get themselves in some difficulty. We found the speed of travel to be perfect and the timing of stops quite adequate considering the complexity of the group. While some may not agree we felt that the order of rigs and speed of travel reflected Freddie’s wisdom and experience of travelling on Baja and would be happy to follow him anywhere!
We would like to add as well that we felt that Lolis was a huge asset to the caravan along with her daughter Fernanda who was a great help with translation. We greatly enjoyed Loli’s culinary efforts and were amazed at what she could produce out of a small RV kitchen for so many people! We consider ourselves lucky to have had such a great team leading us on this adventure!
The Pre-Trip Information provided was very clear on what to expect at the various RV parks and dry camping so we were quite happy with this aspect. There was ample space for all rigs at each spot and Freddie worked to accommodate everyone’s needs.
The Baja Amigos Tour Book provided is very comprehensive and contains a lot of good information some of which we’ve yet to read but certainly will as we reflect upon our trip. We did do some studying of Spanish pre-trip using free apps etc. which are readily available. We are quite accustomed to using a currency converter app and found that to be helpful as well. Our Can-USA-Mex cell plan on one of our phones thru Telus worked well where there was cell phone coverage and as well Glen purchased a Telcel SIM card with 30 days of service and ample data for $40 CAD which worked perfectly for him. We had no issues using our credit cards/bank cards throughout the trip. I had doubled the suggested amount of pesos to start out with and found that to be a good amount and liked not having to be worried about obtaining more pesos along the way where it was not always possible. We did of course get a few more pesos towards the end of the trip.
We thoroughly enjoyed our trip and will certainly be recommending Baja Amigos to anyone who asks! Thanks so much!
Cheers,
Dawn & Glen
