AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2014 - 62

The dirt strip at Hotel Serenidad has long been a favorite among Baja pilots, and aircraft are
Getting here in a Cessna 185 involved
crossing the border near San Diego, flying
150 nm southeast to San Felipe to fill the
tanks and clear Mexican customs, then following the emerald Sea of Cortez coastline
for 283 nm to Mulegé for an overnight stay.
This morning, a scenic 30-minute traverse
of the craggy peninsula at first light brought
us the rest of the way. John Kounis, founder
of Pilot Getaways magazine, owns and
flies the Cessna 185 and is an experienced
Baja traveler but, as with AOPA Senior
Photographer Mike Fizer and me, this is his
first landing at the whale sanctuary.
"We're really getting lucky with the
weather because there's often fog and a
low marine layer on the west coast," Kounis
says. "Glad we don't have to deal with any
of that today."
Visibility is unlimited, and a steady and
dry five-knot breeze comes from the northeast. The graded dirt runway is about 50
feet wide and 5,000 feet long, but a soft,

HOTEL SERENIDAD in the town
of Mulegé on the Sea of Cortez
has long been a favorite among
Baja travelers-and a short aerial
traverse of the peninsula gets you
to the whale sanctuary on the
Pacific. A Cessna Caravan (above)
brings visitors from San Diego,
California.
62 | AOPA PILOT January 2014

sandy portion is blocked by a barrier of
tires. That leaves about 3,000 feet of usable
runway for the 185, more than enough as
Kounis approaches at 65 KIAS, touches
down at 50, and uses less than 1,000 feet
of runway on rollout.
All aircraft at nontowered strips in
Baja use 122.8 MHz as a CTAF, but the frequency has been quiet all morning. Two
other airplanes, a Cessna 208 Caravan and
a Mexican-registered Twin Commander,
are parked in front of the airport's lone
wooden shack. We taxi there and shut
down in a cloud of dust.
WE HAVEN'T MADE RESERVATIONS with any
of the companies that offer whale-watching tours here, and we aren't sure how we're
going to make the three-mile trip to the
bay. But those uncertainties are instantly
resolved as a yellow former school bus carrying a dozen U.S. visitors deposits them at
the Caravan for their flight home. A Baja

Expeditions guide, Alejandro "Alex" Romero,
offers us a ride in his Chevy pickup, three
places on a boat leaving in 30 minutes, and
lunch-all for $50 apiece. (There's also a $20
landing fee at San Ignacio.)
Romero tells us there are about 250
whales in the sanctuary, and up to a dozen
skiffs, or "pangas," are allowed into the preserve at a given time.
The whale watching camp is rustic
compared to the full-service resorts that
have become almost synonymous with
Mexico tourism. But at a time when traditional resorts are struggling from lingering
U.S. economic weakness and fear of drug
violence, Baja Adventures' three- and fiveday "eco-tours" here are booked months in
advance. Visitors typically board vans in San
Diego, drive across the border to Tijuana
International Airport, and fly about 2.5 hours
in a chartered Caravan to get here. Or they
provide their own transportation and stay in
the wooden safari-style huts on the bay.

AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2014

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