 This is seriously the most brutal bike route I have ever done or heard of in my life. See this squiggly line here? That is the Baha Divide route. And I'm going to start where I left off about halfway down the peninsula. Exactly where I wanted to be right here when I had this whole thing in vision. This is this These are the moments in life where all the hard work pays off. All the waking up early in the pedaling and just suffering through a hot day. Bam. Right here. This is it. Now I know some of you out there might be thinking why on earth are you going back to Baha? Weren't you pretty miserable last time you did that ride, Ryan? Let's go. Jesus, come on, man. The answer is yes. It was very difficult pushing my bike through endless sand, riding washboard roads till I was so shooken up my brain was scrambled. And yeah, it's hard. It's hard out there. It's also very hot and it's very desolate and it's very in the middle of nowhere is the word for the Baha Divide of all the bike rides I've ever done. I've never done something like Baha where you're completely out there very far from any type of civilization. At points, sometimes you go through towns, which is great. And that's how you get food and resupply and water and that kind of stuff. But for the most part, you are out there. Push in the bike. This is freaking brutal. Brutal. Some of the toughest pedaling I've ever done. Not just today, but the whole, the whole thing. Baha Divide, you are the real deal. So the answer to why I'm going is because I love challenging myself. There's actually a lot of reasons why I'm going. I love Mexico. I love the people. I love speaking Spanish. I love the food. I love the music. Baha is a lot warmer than Boulder right now. It is January here and it is cold. So I'm excited to be somewhere warm. And I'm just, I think it's going to be a great way to start out the year 2020, a new decade on a solo adventure out there on my own and just, you know, sleep it under the beautiful stars and being out in nature. The sound of the ocean makes me very, very happy. It kind of calms you down. I think this road's going to fall the coast for a little bit. I'm going to enjoy this. You know, I look back at the footage of my previous Baha trips and it fills my heart with joy. I have an emotional connection to this place. Baha is magical, pure and simple. Now the hard part is where do I choose to camp? Which piece of sand, huh? Yeah, this is incredible. Yeah, it's hard, but you learn a lot about yourself when you go through tough stuff and there's no better feeling in the world than having a long day and getting to your campsite and eating beans and just being like, ah, I did it. I figured it out another day on planet earth and it was a beautiful one and it tested me and here I am smiling and camping and laying under the stars. Oh man, this is so good. You see this amazing sunset? You see this amazing life? It's a good day. Very good day. I'm going to sleep well, but I can't wait for the stars to come out. I also really enjoy how simple life is when you're traveling by bike. There's not a whole lot to it. You just wake up every day and you pedal and you have everything you need on your bike and it just feels really good to be self-reliant and out there and just really enjoying the simplicity of things. Yes! And of course, when you're on a bike trip by yourself, you have lots of time to think. I'm going to have lots of conversations with myself. I'm going to figure out life in these upcoming weeks in Baja and I look forward to those times because in my day-to-day life, it's pretty chaotic and messy and there's people pulling me lots of different directions, so bike life is just simple and beautiful. You got this. Well, that's parted. And I stopped because I was so miserable. I had saddle sores. I was exhausted. There's a lot of other factors. I had just run a 100-mile race the week before, so I was just, my body was tired. I've been thinking a lot about this decision. I've been thinking about it for the last few days, the last week, and I am deciding not to continue south on my bicycle. I'm at peace with this decision. I'm happy with what I accomplished down here. It was everything I wanted and more. I fell more in love with Mexico, with the Mexican people, with nature. It was only 14 days. It was shorter than I expected. I was thinking about three weeks of adventure down here, but I definitely lived a lifetime of experiences in just these 14 days. I'm going to wake up every day and not know where I'm going to end up or who I'm going to meet or where I'm going to eat or any of those things. In comparison to the San Juan hut to hut rides that I did this fall, there will definitely not be a magical hut off in the desert full of food and water for me. I'm going to really have to be relying on my outdoor skills and my adventure skills. That means I'm going to have to have my bike packed with lots of food at all times and lots of water at all times because there are distances between towns that sometimes takes two or three days. So your bike needs to be ready to rock in case you have a mechanical and you get stuck out in the middle of nowhere for a couple of days or whatever might happen. Oh, my little tire nightmare came true. Popped it real good on that downhill. Pam launched my peanut butter out of the bike too. Before leaving on this grand adventure, I thought it might be smart to get some tips from one of the best bike packers, bike pack racing people on the planet, Laelle Wilcox. She's also the one that developed this route along with Nicholas Carmen back in two or three years ago. So I thought she would be the one to talk to you about all tips and tricks regarding Baja. I love that stretch. You're going into the missions. Yeah. So is the second half of it nice? Oh, it's so good. It's it's challenging for sure. Lots of climbing kind of rock at times. But I really love that section. It's cool because you end up with seeing a lot of fresh water frequently. Oh, cool. The way seas you're like, how is water here? It's the middle of the desert and you get there and then there are palm trees and oasis. And that's really cool. It's going to be fun. But it was definitely one of the bigger challenges of my bike packing life. I've done a lot of bike rides and the Baja beat me up. I guess advice I would say for a tour is like ride like a couple really hard days and then take a half day off. Okay, cool. And eat tacos and recover. Yeah. That route actually isn't that much fun at like a really hammer pace. Like I did like an FKT on it and I've never been more miserable in my life. It's so painful. I was in so much pain. I was like, why am I doing this to myself? This is terrible. It's a fun ride, but it's more fun at like a touring pace where you're not like stressed about getting anywhere. It's like, I mean, at some point you do have like a fire to get places because you're like, well, I really need water. Yeah. It's like, you have to get there for water. But then it's like, once you get to the water place or the food place or a place to rest, like rest for a little while. Yeah. And then come back to it with energy. I lost my mental energy to deal with it. It breaks you down. But you like just take more time and then come back to it a bit refreshed. Like, Oh, this is fun again. Yeah. You know, so it's like you kind of taking it on too, in a too focused of a way is not that good. It is just not as much fun. You know, you really enjoy the place you are because there's, you don't really get much help there. You know, it's like kind of wide open spaces without people without resources, which is like part of the beauty of it. Like that freedom. But then when you, when something goes wrong, you're like, Oh, it's just me. It's just me. I really appreciate you taking the time to chat with me. Yeah, absolutely. Good luck on your getting ready. Yes. I hope it's fun this time. I hope it's fun too. I'm going to channel some of the Lael strength for sure. Oh, you've got it. And just if you're not having fun, take a day off or do something different. Lael is awesome. There's no other way to put it. She is an awesome human being. And I really appreciate her taking the time to do this little Skype session with me. I don't really know her. I just wrote her an email and said, Hey, my name is Ryan and I have this YouTube channel. I'm going to go to Baja. Can you help me out? She said, Yeah, of course. And I know she probably gets a lot of requests to do this type of stuff. So I really appreciate her time. But I also really appreciate what she's done for the sport of bike packing. She is incredible. Her feet are mind blowing. What she, she had one at one point had the FKT of the Baja divide in like 12 days or something. I can't even imagine doing this entire route in 12 days. It's so cool. So Lael, thank you very much from the bottom of my heart. Keep on pedaling and keep on spreading that bike love. You know, there's a quote that's really been resonating with me recently. And I think it goes like this. It's a ship is safe in harbor, but that's not what ships are for. And that's really, it's hit me the last couple of weeks. It's like, that's right. I could sit in Boulder. I could do short adventures here and there. But that's the safe way. And I want to, I want to push myself. That's how I become a better person all around is when I challenge myself when I go a little bit past my limits, when things I'm faced with things that are hard, I really get to practice problem solving skills. And all of these things really help me in my day to day life when I'm not on an adventure. My heart is having a, having a good workout today between the sand and these uphills. And the, I can't even talk the heat. Damn, this is hard. All right. So here's how it's all going to happen. I'm going to put this Trek 1120 in a box. I'm going to pack up all my stuff and go to the airport here in Denver, fly to San Diego, put the bike together, ride my bike across the border to the bus station in Tijuana, get on a bus for about 15 hours, which will take me halfway down the peninsula to the exact spot where I stopped two years ago. And I will start riding. I think I have about 900 miles left to go depending on which, you know, routes I take. I'm guessing it's going to take two to three weeks. And I'm really excited about all this. And I'm really excited to share the adventure with you. But I will not be posting videos while I'm out there editing while on an adventure is just so hard. So I'm going to come home with all the footage and then I will put it together. So you're going to have to be a little bit patient for the next three to four weeks. I'm sorry. But you just got to know that I'm having the time of my life out there in Baja every now and then I'll be able to share some updates and stories on my Instagram. So be sure to follow me at dozer is my handle. Oh, and here's another really big thing. I am completely open to the idea of giving this bike away at the end of the trip. If any of you out there know of somebody or an organization that works with people that want to ride bikes at the southern tip of Baja, let me know. I do not want to give this bike to some gringo who just wants to buy a bike. I want to give this bike to somebody who would never have a chance at having a bike like this. So if I can find the right person, I will definitely be happy to give it away to them. But it has to really be the right person. I'm looking at that some sort of a local or a young person that's getting into bikes. And like I said, somebody who would never be able to have a bike like this without it being given to them. So let me know if you know of any organizations or people down there in southern Baja that might appreciate this bicycle. I want it to be a life-changing gift for them because I know how beautiful the machine this is and I would love to to share the wealth. So thank you all for watching this video. If you want to watch my old Baja videos to get you all primed up for this adventure, I will link those below. And like I said, get off your couch and get out there. I hope you're doing some of your own adventures and we'll be kind of in the same wavelength. I'll be sleeping under the stars. You'll be sleeping under the stars. It'll all be great. All right, nos vemos. There it goes. The last rays of the sun. There it is. Goodbye, sun. Thank you for a beautiful day.