The following long article is intended to help separate those who will not be happy on an adventure vacation with Baja Jones from those who will enjoy what we have to offer. Like every business we want you to buy our product. But unlike many businesses we absolutely do not want to have anyone along who will be dissatisfied with the type of vacation tours and expeditions that we organize. For us the better situation is to have someone who would not be satisfied with our trips, ask us to cancel after they have read this article.That way both parties are left with no residual issues. Thank you for taking time to read this article and to think about the coming adventure trip. I promise me and my staff do our best to put together an excellent tour.
A key ingredient in successful adventure travel is for the participant to be prepared both mentally and physically for the unexpected. Brinigng with you an attitude that is calm, laid back, relaxed and open to what ever comes next can enhance any adventure trip. Our itineraries are meticulously detailed, but frequently have changes because of weather, animal behavior or other situations we deem sufficient to make a change. Changes to the itinerary are at our sole discretion.
Due diligence is a phrase you expect to hear mentioned by a lawyer in relationship to buying some property or business, not about vacation plans. But performing your due diligence research before you go on any vacation can give you the information you need to be fully prepared for the new experience.
For some people this research might cause them to change their plans because they don’t like something they discovered about their coming trip. For others it just means they will bring a pair of rain pants along that they might have left home, or a pair of gloves they never would have thought to bring along if they hadn’t done their own due diligence.
As adventure specialists with more than 20 years of real world adventure travel experience we have learned that the more informed our group members are before they arrive, the more likely they are to have a great vacation adventure.
Expectations and anticipation of things to come are part of human nature. Most travelers are excited and filled with anticipation for the new experiences they will take part in on their coming trip. Many vacationers have high expectations. Some of these high expectations come from viewing photos and reading stories about where they will be traveling.
A story would not be so interesting if the writer just related the mundane daily happenings she went through every day while on her 5 or 10 day adventure. On most trips excitement and thrills don’t come non-stop minute upon minute, hour upon hour and day after day. With luck, hours or days of normalcy are followed by moments, minutes or brief hours of intense excitement. This is the time from her vacation that the travel writer will tell you about when writing on her travel blog or for some magazine.
We travel writers and photographers throw away hundreds of photos of empty water or empty blue sky. We don’t want to post a photo of the town garbage dump when trying to entice someone along on our adventure trip. We want to put up the photo of the baby gorilla playing with our hair while we crouch motionless in a clump of bamboo. We want to put up the photo of ourselves kissing the baby gray whale next to the boat.
As obsessed professionals we photographers might sit for hours and days on end waiting to get that one perfect shot of the most thrilling trip highlight we can imagine. With luck, your adventure will have some or all of those same experiences that you have seen and read about. But then again it might not.
So many factors can influence or change the environment at any specific locale from day to day and from year to year. Animal behavior, feeding patterns, migration schedules and mating rituals can all be affected by global warming, development, tourism, bad weather conditions, drought, flood, or even by political unrest.
In Baja California Sur, Mexico where we do winter whale watching tours a condition known as El niño occurs every few years. This warming of tropical Pacific Ocean water causes severe climate changes across North America. Where we do our Baja whale watching the most noticeable difference during an El nino condition is that rainfall will increase by perhaps two to ten times the normal number of rain days. Where we typically might get two or three days of rain, El niño might bring 10 to 20 days of winter rainfall.
Wind and waves are always factors that affect the quality of whale watching at any location anywhere in the world. The windier the weather, the more difficult it is to see things in the water. Wind can cause boat trip delays or cancellations. Sudden and unexpected wind storms can cause boats to run for shelter, abruptly ending a planned whale watching event. Thankfully wind seldom causes cancellation of gray whale boat trips, while on the Sea of Cortez cancellations are more common for the blue whale watching boat trips.
These are all factors that can affect your trip, but cannot be controlled. Other factors generally considered controllable, can also affect your adventure vacation. Since most adventure tours take place in remote or less developed areas, the condition of the equipment used is not always up to the standards of your homeland. In fact the conditions might be less than you would find in a more developed town in the same country or region.
Sometimes government officials or police or others in a position of authority may arbitrarily or without advanced notice change regulations or change the established protocols of some activity. Roads are closed for construction or for political reasons, opening or closing times are changed, limits on daily numbers of people might suddenly be set without notice or without regard to the resulting chaos for travelers.
An example is the recent change in policy by the Chinese government that now does not allow hotels to use air conditioning or heating in the month of October. This creates some uncomfortable days and nights for tourists.
Adventure travel usually takes place in less developed, remote locations. It is uncommon, perhaps impossible, to have the type of adventures that Baja Jones seeks out in a 4 or 5 star resort setting.
Baja Jones Adventure Travel was started by an adventurer who has hiked, boated, kayaked, canoed, and traveled in remote and sometimes dangerous locales around the world since his teen years. Solo adventures have taken him high into the Sierra Nevada Mountains, to the parched deserts of Arizona and Nevada and into the rainforest capped volcanic mountains of Hawaii. Keith presently lives part of each year on a small and remote Philippine island in a bamboo hut located in a small native village just steps from the sea.
This is the person who was key to developing the vacation adventure tour that you will soon be traveling on. His personality and beliefs about what adventure travel is all about are reflected in the itinerary of the tour.
Adventure travel is not for everyone. We believe these tours are within the physical capabilities of anyone who can walk unassisted short distances. These adventure tours are not hiking challenges nor are they athletic tests of endurance. Being in a physically fit condition will make it easier for you, but being out of shape will not stop you from enjoying the trip.
These adventure trips do take place in remote locations where tourist infrastructure is not well developed. This means that you will not have a Disney-like experience. The success of your adventure is to a certain extent dependent on you, your attitude and your preparations both physical and mental. Be prepared for things like bad roads and bad weather. Come along understanding that the accommodations may have been built in a far off and distant place where even getting the construction materials to the building site might have been an adventure and a challenge for the builder. Don’t expect our guide to carry your bags to your room (unless you have a physical handicap or physical limitation that requires our help, then we will give you any all help necessary willingly and without any drama).
The laws of the country will surely be different than in your homeland. The customs and cultural background probably will be quite different too. Things you take for granted at home such as safe tap water, roads without potholes, sidewalks that don’t have rebar sticking up out of them, electricity that always works and high speed wifi connections everywhere, are probably not so common where you will be traveling to.
Keep your mind open to the experiences as they unfold minute by minute and you will surely have a memorable adventure trip wherever you are traveling with us.
Thank you for taking time to read this too wordy article. We hope you are more excited than before about joining us.
