Feb 21, 2026
Note – I wrote most of this on February 22nd, and completed it on the 26th – much has happened in between. This is Part 1 of the Baja trip blog…sorry, you will have to wait for the rest of the story since I’m still working my way back home.
I left for the first of my major 2026 trips on a beautiful Saturday morning, with high hopes for this long awaited trip. My plan was to drive down I-5 to Valencia (North of LA) on the 21st and stay at a nice hotel, then drive on Sunday to the hotel in San Diego where a van from Baja Jones will pick the group up on the 23rd, and travel to the airport in Ensenada. Great plan. It did not work out quite the way I expected it to. Read on.
I drove down to Valencia on Saturday since driving all the way to San Diego in one trip is much further than I like to go in one day. I find it difficult now to drive one distance by myself – I miss my co-pilot. It was about a 5.5 hour drive, and I made it in time for happy hour at the hotel. I had a nice dinner at the bar, and two small glasses of beer, and headed back to my room. All good so far. When I was getting ready for bed, I got really dizzy and my heart was pounding. Not good. My heart beat was way over 100, and remained high. I was absolutely panicked and had no idea what to do – I tried to relax, but that did not help, so I eventually called 911. I do have heart related issues – these were classic symptoms of a tachycardia event, so I knew that I needed to have a physician check me out. An ambulance ride was not high on my list for this trip but I had no choice. There is nothing quite like being carted out on a gurney through a hotel lobby to an ambulance.
A long story short – they checked me out thoroughly at the ER – my EKG’s, X-Ray and blood tests were all normal, so there were no indications that I had a heart attack. Always good news. My blood pressure was high, but not at a dangerous level and it had been elevated of late. The doctor said it was probably due to long and short-term stress and dehydration from the drive, and the alcohol and caffeine did not help either. He recommended that I see my cardiologist soon, and also said I could go ahead with the trip.
The best part of this incident is that I got to experience the joy of being all alone in the ER. This facility had most of the patients on beds stationed along the walls and I was lucky enough to be where the police gathered with prisoners who needed medical attention. I got to listen to all the “Bro” talk from the officers, and the endless chatter from the handcuffed detainees. I was not about to tell the police to be quiet, but some poor patient, who was in incredible pain from a passing kidney stone screamed out “Shut Up”. That worked for a while. I’ve heard that passing a stone is the male equivalent of giving birth. I hope never to have that experience.
Now I understand why Jan hated going to the hospital, but at least she had me by her side each time. Having support from a family member or friend really helps while you are lying there, waiting for hours for test results. She was always there for me whenever I did something stupid (rock climbing accident, bicycle accidents, etc.) This was my first time experiencing the ER solo. It sucks.
I was eventually discharged and made it back to the hotel via UBER around 4:00AM. I was in no rush to leave the next day, so I managed to get a few hours of sleep. I considered briefly just heading home the next morning, but decided that I just needed to relax and stop worrying about the trip ahead. I really did want to see the whales. So, I headed off to San Diego later in the morning – just a 2-3 hour trip, depending on LA traffic.
Shortly after I arrived at the hotel, I checked my mail and found some additional, untimely bad news. I had read about the killing of a Mexican cartel lord in the news feeds, and the reprisal gang violence which had spread across Mexico. The owner of Baja Jones (Keith Jones) had sent out an e-mail providing some detail on the impact of our trip, and also included a copy of the State Department warning for a bunch of the Mexican states impacted by the violence. The two Baja states were listed at levels 2 and 3, with the latter suggesting to reconsider travel. Hmmm.
I spent some time reading through the news reports, and to me at least, it appeared that all the violence was centered in the mainland states, not in either of the Baja states. But, there is still risk in going, possibly of being stranded in Mexico for a while. Keith had contacted his transportation companies, and there were no reported incidents in the places we travel through so for now, the trip was still on. One more thing to worry about, and stress was something I was trying to avoid. I had bought some calming gummies (no THC) on the way down and started popping those early on. After thinking this over for a few minutes (I did not have a lot of time, the vans were taking off at 7:00AM), I decided that if we could make it the airport without incident, we would be OK. Guerrero Negro was in an extremely remote part of Baja – not exactly a hot spot for tourism or the drug trade. So, I packed up my duffel bag, checked my pulse (almost normal), put a handful of gummies in my pocket, and headed down to the lobby. The two vans were in the parking lot – time to leave for Ensenada and start the adventure.
The Traveling Widower 