Los Barriles – Kite Boarding Capital of the World

This is a great place to get a taste of America if you’ve been traveling the more Mexican stretches of Baja like we had been. There is a great deli that carries good bread and deli meat. Real deli meat, not that processed, chopped, reformed, cheap ham and turkey stuff they sell everywhere else in Baja. English is spoken by the majority of people and the town certainly has a more gringofied feel than anywhere else we’ve been. You could even order out for pizza!3

If you have a 4×4 or side by side this is also the place for you. Everyone rides them everywhere, through town, on the beach, through the campgrounds, hundreds of them, all day. Also if your into to windsurfing or kite boarding this has to be one of the capitals for it in all the world. The mountains are shaped into a natural funnel that provides very steady and consistent winds. At any one time there were at least fifty people out on the water. How they keep from hooking each others kites is beyond me, lol. It looks like fun but I hear it’s extremely difficult and expensive.

We stayed at Martin Verdugos a large RV park and hotel right on the beach. The best part was the beautiful pool and bar area right on the beach where you could watch the others kite board. We were able to get into there with our 35ft fifth wheel without any trouble although the drive through town is a bit tight. It cost 400 pesos or $25 a night with full hookups and they even had functional WiFi (read: can upload pictures but don’t expect to stream anything). They also have seemingly endless hot water and good pressure in their showers, a Baja first! Most of the RVers there seem like they were staying for a while if not the season. Besides us I only saw one or two people come or go.

There is another park on the beach with the RV spaces more spread out for the same price but out of town(and with no pool). I doubt their showers are as good either. There is also a Arroyo you can boondock in for free, there were quite a few people out there but beware of the soft sand. Also all the spots on the beach were taken up by people there for the season. Although camping a bit further back isn’t really that bad because then at least you get some protection from that steady wind.

A word of warning, if your continuing south do not follow Google’s advice and continue straight to get back to 1, make the right at the square and get back on the same way you came. First the road turns to dirt, then there are some low hanging trees, then it narrows, and finally there are some very sharp, severely banked turns. Ask me how I know! Luckily I somehow I made it through with a whole inch to spare as the trailer was sliding down the banked turn towards the edge of the road 🙁 If you think that sounds stressful, wait for our next article about Cabo Pulmo 😉

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Tim

Graduate of the accounting school at the University of Georgia and now a real estate investor and agent. I have loved to travel since I was a kid and have dreamed of traveling full-time since then.

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