April, 2019
Todos Santos, BCS, Mexico

I worked at a startup in San Francisco 22 years ago.  The number two at the company was a great guy my own age named Darrell.  Over the next five years I worked directly for Darrell, or for the various companies he was in, a total of five times.  We’ve kept in touch over the years and met up once in Southern California, maybe 8-10 years ago.

Darrell, his wife Lily, and son are now living f/t in a custom built “overland” or “expedition” motorhome.  It’s exceptionally well built.  Check it out.  As we exchanged emails in March, he invited me to visit them in Baja.  So I did.

We met up in Todos Santos where I rented what turned out to be a fantastic bungalow in a private 4-acre walled compound with a gate to which I had a remote control.  As the one bungalow is the only available rental at the place, I had the entire compound to myself.  Note that this was not overly expensive – about the price of a good room in town. 

The first night I arrived at Darrell and Lily’s beach camp spot and enjoyed wine with them as the sun set over the Pacific.  Latter Darrell grilled steaks, while Lily made vegetables, quesadillas, and guacamole.  Extraordinarily relaxing.

 

Darrell and Lily are digital nomads, doing work that requires good WiFi, which they did not have at the beach.  There was plenty of room in at my place, so I put Darrell in touch with the property manager and hours later their large rig was parked 100’ from my bungalow.

Over the next few days I got better acquainted with Lily (who I had met only briefly back in the day), got to know their son, and reminisced with Darrell.  He and I had worked together with dozens of people over five years.  I left tech and lost track of nearly all of them, but he has largely stayed in touch.  Much fun catching up.

Todos Santos is a small town an hour north of Cabo San Lucas catering exclusively to tourists, though not nearly so crazy as CSL.  The population in about 6,500, but el centro is only about ten square blocks.  I’m told this is just past peak season as most northern climes are getting pleasant, so many fewer people fleeing the cold north.  The streets were remarkably free of crowds and the weather was spectacular.  Many excellent restaurants with food that is pricy by Baja standards, but not overly priced by U.S. standards.

In short, I had a purely wonderful time with good friends, with more good food and wine than was prudent.  The weather was slightly balmy during the day with pleasantly cool nights.  In a word, perfect.

Dinner the last night was fantastic.  Some very friendly locals directed us to El Refugio.  They had a printed menu for their homemade mescal, but as the dishes changed daily, the extremely gregarious owner said that she was the menu for food and there were just three items that night.  When she described them, we all realized there were actually only two (shrimp three ways, and posole), but other guests said we could not go wrong with either.  The mescal was a bit strong for all of us, but the real kicker was the owner proudly delivering to the table a small bowl of fried crickets.  Lily and I demurred, but Darrell was more adventurous.

Darrell gets the nod for Quote of the Day. “Shit, I think I’ve got a leg stuck in my teeth.”

Now I’m back in Spokane, where it is drizzly and in the forties.  Dreaming Baja dreams.