 Come on. Let's go. Oh Jesus. Come on, man. Let's try this again. Come on. Let's go. This is seriously the most brutal bike route I have ever done or heard of in my life. How people find joy out of this, I do not know. The locations it gets you to, amazing. The actual bike riding, torture. It's fun to look back at myself at a time not too long ago and realize how far I've come. And I'm not talking about miles pedaled. The way I react to difficulty is much different now. I'm seriously having one of those. Why am I out here right now moments? Like this is not fun. My first attempt at the Baja Divide in 2017 was eye-opening. It was really hard and I wasn't ready for it. This is freaking brutal. Brutal. Some of the toughest pedaling I've ever done. Not just today, but the whole the whole thing. Baja Divide, you are the real deal. Up until that adventure, all of my bike travel had been on paved roads, which is way easier than riding through sand. It's really cool. Back in 2010, I had the time of my life riding a thousand miles on the main highway from Tijuana to Cabo. And my love for that experience is what inspired me to return and ride the Baja Divide. This plate right here is heaven to Mr. Ryan Van Duzer. I was looking forward to trying out a more remote challenge, but halfway through the route, I quit. 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. My body and mind were beaten down. This was my first time ever quitting something that I had set out to complete. It was humbling, but that challenge planted a seed for more off-road bicycle adventures. And as I gained experience, I knew that I'd someday return to Baja. Three years later, in January of 2020, I picked up where I left off with the intention of completing the route. This time, I was better prepared, mostly mentally. I embraced the sand and washboards by simply going slower and not fighting it. I mean, this desert is magical. Going slower allows you to enjoy these stunning landscapes. The chill out and go slow method made a huge difference, and my second run at the Baja Divide was much more enjoyable. This is also when I met John and Mira. Who's this? Yeah, that's Mira. I am so glad I met you. Yeah, me too. You're an inspiration. This is an incredible story. Unfortunately, on my birthday of all days, my rear hub on my Trek 1120 blew up in La Paz, and I wasn't able to complete the ride. Now in January 2024, I'm back once again to finally complete my epic experience on the Baja Divide. I'm riding the Cape Loop, which travels 225 miles around the southern tip of the peninsula. One major change this time around is my bike. I'm riding the Priority 600X, which I designed with my friends at Priority Bicycles. The idea for this low-maintenance adventure machine was actually born in Baja after my frustrations with the Trek 1120. The biggest improvement is the drivetrain. The pinion gearbox is completely protected from getting mucked up by the sand and dust, and the gate's carbon drive won't ever need to be lubed, which is something that I had to do numerous times a day on my Trek. Oh, and having front suspension is also a huge bonus. It'll take the edge off these rowdy roads. All right, are you ready for some Baja magic? Let's do this. Hello everybody. I'm back in Baja, and I'm pretty happy about it. This is what my cockpit looks like. I have a water bottle right here. I've got my Garmin, the one with solar, super cool. GoPro is always clamped on the bars for easy access. I have my tent up front, and in the back I have the Aero Rack. One side is holding all my camping gear. The other side holds all of my clothes. I have an extra bottle of water right here. I have another Nalgene right here, and on my back right there I'm carrying two and a half liters of water. Also my drone to keep it safe. I've got my Green Guru upcycled bags here, here, and here. In this pocket I mostly carry all of my food. Of course, there's a bag of beans at the ready at all times. Got some Nutella and lots of other goodies. Also my camera batteries and everything. I like to keep the weight, the heavy weight centered on the bike, especially when going through sand. My tires could be wider. They really recommend three-inch wide tires for the Baja divide. These are 2.4, but they will do the job. I am wearing flat pedal shoes, not SPD, and that is pretty much because I am on and off the bike constantly pushing my bike, and also check out these socks. I'm wearing my brand new Ole Ole Ole socks, 100% Merino wool, made by my friends in Colorado called 0.6. If you want a pair of these, I will put a link in the description. All of the money is going to be donated to bike packing routes. I started today in a small town called Los Barriles, and I'm going to do the loop all 225 miles and end up there. How did I get here? You might ask, well, my good friend Skip was coming down here anyway to stay with his family for a couple months, and we drove down the entire peninsula together for the past three days. Here's my friend Skip. Hello, Skip. We're driving to Baja. Actually, we're in Baja. Look at that. And you know what the coolest thing is? We were camping out one night looking at the stars, and I saw a rocket go by. It looked like a UFO. I was wondering what the heck it was. And it was one of those SpaceX Falcon 9 launches, and it was one of the coolest things I've ever seen. So this trip is already off to a great start, and now it's time to ride bikes. You know, I'm in my happy place. I love Mexico. I love beans. I love bikes. I love Baja. Let's go have some fun. Slow going, but that's why I came here to go kind of slow. Yep. I'm definitely back in Baja. You can't be riding the Baja divide without a little sand or a lot of sand. That's all right. It's all part of the fun. When I first came down here, well, in 2017, it's hard to get started after you stop. I remember hitting sand, and it really bummed me out, but I kind of fought it back then. I tried to just power through it, but now you just got to go slow, and it just kind of smoothed everything out, even though you go slow. That's all right. And if you look at my trail all the way down the road, it's pretty squiggly because you're just trying to keep your balance the whole time. Let's see. It feels good to be back. I love this place. I love the whole peninsula. I love the weird cactus cacti. I love the beautiful vistas. I love Baja. I love Mexico. It's one of my happy places for sure. I actually have a tailwind right now, and it's really nice because it helps push me through this sand, and it's a little bit downhill. When I got here, I didn't know which direction I was going to go. I can go either way, right, north or south, and we got here yesterday. My friend Skip looked at the wind. He's like, you should go south. You don't want a headwind. I said, yeah, that makes sense. So that's why I'm going south. I'm going with the wind. Riding Baja takes a lot of finesse, and it's all about learning how to navigate sand and washboards. And there are some moments that really kind of suck because it's really deep sand, and you have to just push your bike. You've got to get off. In other moments, like right now, it's smooth, and it can all change in a matter of minutes or seconds sometimes. Can't get too comfortable out here. I just came around the corner and look at the color of this water. Man, that looks stunning. You know, I have to get off my bike and check this out. I'm a Colorado boy. We don't get a lot of ocean time. I hear a little bike bell, and I see this guy up on the road, and I came up to talk to him. His name is François from Belgium, and you've been traveling a long time. Yeah, I have. We'll ask us to hear. Wow. How's that journey been? It's been great. It's been lots of different people meeting lots of beautiful places. Just great. What inspired you to get on your bike and do such a huge trip? This. I mean, it's beautiful. And not working because I just graduated, so taking some time off before working was a motivation as well. How long has it taken you to get down here? Five months. And how much longer do you think it'll take? Probably a year. A year to get all the way to the bottom of South America? At least that's why I kind of promised family I might be home for next Christmas. What's been the best part of this experience? Probably the people and places. I wish you all the best on your journey, my friend. Yeah, you're gonna love it. All the way to South America. I just get inspired by people. I get inspired by their stories. They pump me up. It's people from all over the world just following their dreams and hitting the road. I had the same exact mindset when I was leaving the Peace Corps in 2005. I wanted to go on a big bike adventure and it led to an entire life of going on multiple bike adventures. And I'm really grateful for it. I'm grateful for having found the joy and the magic of bicycle touring and traveling by bike. Speaking of that, let's go travel by bike that way. You know, one of the only things I like about riding in sand is the whoosh sound as you pedal through it. It's very subtle, but I like it. I was just thinking about my friend back there from Belgium and how he said he just graduated and he's hitting the road and fulfilling a dream of traveling. And I was thinking back just now, my first big trip from Honduras to Boulder, I was 25 years old. And right now, in two weeks, I turned 45, 20 years ago. That's crazy. Really is. And I'm really grateful for that ride and that experience and what it led to. I had no idea when I embarked on that adventure that it would lead to a lifetime of adventures and storytelling and connecting with humans all over the world. And that ride really, I always tell people, it made me feel so alive every single day. I felt alive because I was, you know, outside in the sun, in the rain, in the wind, camping, under the stars, meeting people, making friends, eating all sorts of good food. And every day was new and exciting. Every day was a new adventure. I had no idea what was going to happen or where I was going to go or sleep. I was just making it up as I went. And I loved that feeling of freedom. And here I am 20 years later, still doing it. And I'm just super grateful for that experience. On that 4,000 mile adventure, I learned how to be self-sufficient in a way that I'd never been before. I learned how to communicate with humans, strangers, and trust in them and look for the good in everybody. Because I was out there in the middle of nowhere. I depended on a lot of people's help to get me to that finish line in Boulder. And everywhere I went, I met wonderful humans. And if you meet any bike packer out there, bike traveler, they'll tell you that their favorite part of this really is connecting with people. There are indeed wonderful humans all over this planet. And it really built up my confidence in humanity. You know, you watch the news even back then and it's scary and it's dark and it's violent. Then you hit the road on your own and you see the world and you meet people all over the place and you realize, you know what? Humanity is in pretty good shape. And I've taken that attitude all over the world. I've taken that passion for connecting with humans on every single one of my travels. And it's led to lots of wonderful friendships. And maybe sometimes just a friendship that lasts, you know, 20 minutes. But sometimes that's, that's all you need. You have this beautiful moment with somebody. You connect and you say goodbye and I'll wish you well and maybe you'll never see them again. But that's okay. It's all good. Car, you know, on this ride, this route down here in Cape Loop, what I've noticed so far is there's way more humans down here than any other part of the Baja Dvide. Most of the Baja Dvide is very isolated. And I knew coming down here that there'd be lots of tourists and travelers. This is a big destination spot. There's beach towns and resort towns, Cabo San Lucas and lots of people down here. So, you know, I was curious what it would be like. And this is pretty much what I thought it would be like, people everywhere, which is okay. It's cool. I understand why people would come down here. It's beautiful. It's awesome. There's another one, car. But I do, I do miss, man, that is loud. I do miss the isolated nature of the rest of the Baja Dvide. Just, it's usually just you on your bike and the open road. So I'm riding by, I've just passed Cabo Pulmo. There's not a whole lot going on in this area. And then I see this gigantic truck and tank. And there's always an interesting guy when you see something like this. This is my new friend Michael. What's up, buddy? What's going on? What the heck is this? Welcome to Los Freiles. What is this? Your spot? Is this where you hang? Is this where you live? Unless I'm riding the Baja Dvide, this is where I'm hanging. Absolutely. So tell me what this is all about. What you're doing? That's my third year down here. I've lived full time on the road. And, yeah, I mean, just got the toys. You got to have a motorcycle when you're down here to get groceries. You got to have a bike to keep in shape. And you got to have a pet turtle. Are you serious? You have a turtle in here? Yeah. I was about to ask you if I could jump in, but I guess yeah, no water in here. I think he's in his little house. He's in his little house. Oh, look at it. There he is. Hey, buddy. What's his name? His name is Vu and he's 10 years old. Well, almost 10. And he's been traveling with me on the road. No way. He loves it for how long? Well, he's been on the road for about three months. So we'll see what happens. And that's where he lives. Well, he lives inside the truck at night time. Okay. And then during the day, we let him outside because he's a desert tortoise. So he loves it. You know, he loves this environment. The climate is great. Why did you pick this spot out of all spots in Baja to set up camp? I'm a big fan of going where you know somebody that knows the local stuff. And I met this couple in Massachusetts and they're like, Hey Mike, you should come down and visit us. So I did. And I came down here three years ago and I was actually driving around the world and somehow I got stuck in Baja. What do you love most about Baja? You know what I like? Desert climate is my favorite. But where can you go where you get mountains behind you? You got an ocean right here and you've got the desert all in one place. That's what I like about it. Yeah, yeah, definitely. And so there's other people obviously that live around here and we've got about a maybe a dozen. I'll call them, we call them the royal regulars. And then down the other side of the road, you have like what we call the transients. Those are the van life people, the overlanders that come through. Bahadaviders that are riding. We got people riding motorcycles to Argentina, bicycles. We even had this a couple of weeks ago, we had a couple of people that were hiking, believe it or not, from Alaska to Argentina. I love that man. And so you'll stay here for how long? Last year I stayed here for seven months. It doesn't get old. Yeah, but it probably gets hot. It does, yeah. So summer you probably don't want to be here between I would say June and you know, hurricane seasons August, September. So that's not when you want to be here. Well, I, you know, I can't just look at that and not want to see what's inside. We can definitely go inside. Let's do it. Oh yeah. Come on on brother. This is amazing. Come on in. Dang. Let me turn some lights on. Whoa. So we got some lights. We could turn them on here. Touch screen. Whoa. This is way, way more modern than I would, I would guess. Wow. Look at this. Look at that computer. You have a nice iMac right there. So I see, look, we're even like, we're even like doing YouTube right now. You're making videos right now. Look at that. So you're a YouTuber. I am. Yes. What's your channel? Drive the globe. Drive the globe and what's it about? Just your life on the road. Life on the road, building trucks, little bicycling, a little everything. And you, you built all this? I did. Yeah, this summer, this truck I built in three months, used to be a military truck. It was a flatbed. Wow. So we had to put a box on it. We had to build out the whole inside. Geez. Look at this place. This is insane. This is nicer than my house. But you know what it is? It's IKEA. Oh, it is. It's IKEA cabinets. I love it. That's Swedish. I love Swedish stuff. You got a fridge underneath the sink. No way. You got up here, we got a microwave. Oh, that's cute. Gotta have that. Gotta have that for sure. You got, you know, oven, regular oven. No way. What are you cooking there? Whatever. Christmas dinner, turkeys. Burner top, coffee machine. But most importantly, and the reason that I, I kind of wanted, over the years, I've done lots of trips in Africa and Europe and Central America and whatnot, with different trucks, mostly landrovers. Yeah. What I learned over the years is I don't like to have to set up and take down. Gotcha. So this truck you roll in and everything is ready to go. And my big thing was I wanted a real shower. Okay, right on. Come down here. Whoa. This is a real shower. Look at that. I feel like I'm in a fancy hotel. That's right. Look at that. Even the roof, the ceiling, look at that detail, man. Amazon. Really? It's all plastic. Yeah. I wanted, I wanted a dry bath. So, you know, a regular toilet room, water closet, whatever you want to call it, but separate bathroom, separate shower, bed that I don't have to set up at the end, beginning of every day, you know. I gotta ask, what's the gas mileage like? So, fuel economy on this is obviously not super great. It gets about eight miles a gallon though, which is, you know, it's not too bad. It's diesel. Like I said, I tend to drive, I'm like an immersion person. I like to like really take in my places that I visit. So, I tend to stay longer. So, I drive less. A lot of van lifers, they bounce around every single day. So, you know, you can save some fuel economy by not driving all the time. That's midland rover. That's going across the Sahara. So, that's obviously Egypt. Yeah. And then you can see on the wall some of the prior rates. Oh, yeah. Look at that. Oh, there's that in Mexico somewhere. That is in Mexico. That's Guatemala, I think. Oh, yeah. Man. That's the Arctic Circle. That's up at the Arctic Circle. How long have you been traveling like this? I actually originally started traveling in the early 90s. I went, I got a one way, he can't make it up. I got a one way ticket to, from New York City to Morocco. And we ended up staying over there for a year. Wow. And that was backpacking though. That was like backpacking, taking a camel, taking a train, no car. Yeah. No matter where you are in the world, everybody's the same. No matter what language they speak or what they do, it's just, there's always great stories, right? So, and that's what I like as the people. That's awesome, man. You mind if I camp in your front yard tonight? Absolutely. You're definitely welcome. I want to camp next to your tour. I did the Baja Divide actually, well, this year, early this year, January, well last year, I guess now, January, February of 23. Wow. Yep. Right on. And so you invite Baja Dividers to your truck to give them a high five? So we have become like an official stop, I think on the Baja Divide route now, because I had posted it on the Facebook group. And yeah, we probably had at least three dozen riders stop by here this year already. So it's been good. And I noticed you have a Christmas tree over here. Yeah. I'm a big fan of Christmas decorations. I want to go check, I want to go check this out here. Look at that. I like that. Okay, that was enough. I kind of feel like I'm at a fancy spa now, because neighbor Daniel is letting me do what? Come on in, shower time here in the Arroyo. Look at that. And it's hot water. It is an on-demand hot water, propane fired, runs out of this nice big tank right here. Wow. Pull it out from the well and get you a hot shower any time you want. So the little thing's in life. It's nice. I can't thank you enough, brother. Of course. So he's going in for the night. He's going in. It's time for bed. Wait, let me go. It's Turtle Baja Midnight. He lives under my counter. Oh, really? Did I show you that? No. Oh, I want to see that. Oh, no way. Look at that. Like a little mouse hole. There he goes. And he knows where to go. Well, he usually does. See you, buddy. Look at that. Have a good night. Oh, and look at this. We're making a fire. This is going to be a cozy sabado higante. Look at that. And this is Jen, the neighbor. Hi, Jen. What's up? How's it going? It's going good. You're also like a van life. Nomad, yeah. Nomad type person. Full time on the road. And you're all three friends. All three friends. I love it. I love it. So where do you get all the fresh veggies? We actually get all the fresh veggies delivered here in the Arroyo from a local guy that owns a, obviously it's organic because everything's organic farm down the road. Wow. And he just comes and takes care of you guys every week? Every Thursday he'll come by with, it's always like an assortment of different stuff, but most of the time it's lettuce and squash and tomatoes. Guys, this is crazy. I thought I was going to eat cold tortillas and cold beans tonight. This is deluxe. I'm so glad I found you. Cheers, everybody. Thank you so much. This is amazing. Whoo. And it's time to sleep, you know. Yeah, I'll take it. 37 miles. Pretty easy first day. Probably the easiest day I've ever had on the Baja Divide. It was flat, maybe even a little bit downhill. Some sand here and there, but it really wasn't that bad. Tomorrow is going to be more difficult. No doubt, but this was a good warm-up and I'm just happy to be back here. It just feels right. I feel at home. Buenas noches. Hello, my friends. I hope you're having an awesome start to 2024. Thank you so much for watching this video. There will be many more to come from the Baja Divide Cape Loop. This episode was really fun to create because I got to go down memory lane and I hope you enjoyed it as well. I am here to ask you for your help. If you want to join my Patreon, I would really appreciate it. What you will get are early release videos, videos with no ads, and direct access to chat with me and ask me questions about absolutely anything. You'll have the satisfaction of knowing that you're keeping this channel alive and thriving. I rarely do branded content deals, essentially because I don't want to constantly be selling stuff to you and turn my channel into a big commercial. I do have merch from time to time, but I don't make any money from the merch. Everything we create with priority bikes, we donate to awesome bicycle nonprofits. So please consider joining my Patreon. You can do it for as little as $3 a month. And if you can't, all good, no problem. These videos will always be free for everybody to watch. So stay tuned for the next one. And high five, right? Boom!