Recommend March 2011 - (Page 22)

BAjA airventures T sarah muñoz 22 march 2011 onsite review october 2010 Three tiny planes pick us up at Brown Field Municipal Airport in San Diego. Our pilots are well trained and sun-kissed, and will also act as our guides and activities counselors in the coming week. These triple threats will make sure our journey into the middle of Baja’s nowhere comes with all the excitement that “nowhere” has in store. Even getting to Las Animas Wilderness Lodge, Baja Airventures’ private getaway, is an adventure: a brief stop in the town of San Felipe to pass through immigration and customs as you enter Mexico, then continuing on to a nondescript airstrip by Bahia de Los Angeles, then a 40-minute panga ride into Las Animas. There’s something liberating about not being able to check your email or take a call for a week. Even the most “connected” of us have no choice but to let go and jump into whatever is happening around us. Have clients leave their expectations of creature comforts behind and get ready for a week of “anything goes.” Our fellow travelers are a mixed bunch, some with more experience roughing it than others, but all enchanted by the scenery around them. The land is dry but not barren. If they’re lucky, the locals see a couple of inches of rain a year, but that is also one of the attributes of Baja—it’s an arid, yet still bountiful landscape of different shades of reds and browns, one of our favorites anywhere. We have never seen such consistently starry skies as we see in Baja every single night. Luckily, there is not one light anywhere around us. Not one. Not even on the horizon, miles and miles away. You have to really be in the spirit of things to appreciate what this type of escape offers and doesn’t offer. The yurts at Las Animas are steps away from the beach, each with its own balcony, composting toilet and shower. There’s also a bigger, common yurt for meals, impromptu powwows and late-night star gazing or lounging. What we didn’t find and managed to do without—running water, a cell phone signal, Internet, a TV, or electricity, except for a couple of hours a day when the generator is running in the main yurt, when you can charge your camera batteries and smuggled iPad. We shared a shower bag with our yurt-mate and kept an eye on our use of water, following the guides’ example and bathing in the ocean before rinsing off in our shower (we’d love to see an outdoor shower by each yurt—still rustic but not confining—to go with the whole back-to-basics motif). There are so many ways in which to pass the time here—swim, kayak, hike, sail, fish, snorkel. Each of these comes with new surprises and you’re free to choose your pleasures each day. During whale shark recommend.com http://www.recommend.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Recommend March 2011

Editor's Notes/Agent Speak
Hotel Desk
Tour Talk
Disney Dream
Ixtapa-Zihuatanejo, Mexico
Baja Airventures
Central Gems of Japan
2011 Guide to Latin America
The Tastier Side of Central Japan
Ireland With Brian Moore International Tours
Exploring Antiquity: Egypt, Israel & Jordan
Sailing Into Antiquity on the Nile
Florida's Ever-Changing Hotel Landscape
Riding North America's Rails
Small Ships in the Old South
Turks & Caicos Keeps Expanding
St. Lucia—Beyond the Pitons

Recommend March 2011