I Want To Be In Baja

I’m sorry I haven’t written in a long time.  Due the media publishing so much negative information, I felt like things had just gotten bogged down and decided to hold off.  This has not stopped my traveling to EL Dorado and just to let people know, although business has felt the impact by the economy, people are still taking one day at a time and it is still a wonderful place to be.  I went down in June, July, and August, and although the days are warm, it does cool off in the evening and  one can be entertained just by going out at night to enjoy the stars in the  sky.

Building continues at El Dorado ranch and I will come back from time to time to update progress at El Dorado Ranch.  If anyone ever has any questions, you can always e-mail me at nancy@ICleanUglyCredit.com (my US job) and I will be happy to assist you.

I was listening to some of the chat on the El Dorado Ranch Yahoo Group this week and one of the subjects that came up was the rules governing what you could or could not bring into Mexico with you. There seemed to be some confusion over the Mexican customs rules and a couple of people had their goods confiscated at the border because they weren’t aware of the regulations. One thing that came out of the conversation, though, was a very useful website resource that will answer all of your questions, which I thought I would share with you so you don’t have the same problems. So if you want to know what you have to do when crossing the border, what you can bring in duty free, what items you need to declare, what goods are prohibited, the rules on temporary vehicle importation, and so on this will be a valuable resource for you - knowledge is power, as they say!

Click Here - Mexican Border Crossings - Passengers Arriving By Land

And, happy traveling!

San Felipe, Baja - One of the Baja resorts to have suffered a 75% drop in tourism revenue this year.

If anyone still has concerns over traveling to Mexico in general, or Baja in particular, I would direct you to read a new report published this week called  Baja California, Mexico: Impact of U.S. Media, an Analysis by Scott Hanning and Jeffrey Werner, Emerson Strategic Communication Group. Baja, which relies heavily on tourism dollars from U.S. visitors, has suffered a decline of 75% in their revenue this year - a subject we have visited many times. The analysis makes clear that fear of drug cartel violence, and later of  the H1N1 flu virus, has kept huge numbers of visitors away.  What is also made clear is that these fears were wholly unjustified and unnecessarily overblown by the U.S. media.

“One critical fact remains clear, however: there is no evidence or history of tourists being harmed by cartel-related violence. Further, the threat of so-called “spillover” violence into the border states that spawned a great deal of coverage in the pre-April period has failed to materialize.  Nor has Mexico become the failed state so vigorously predicted earlier in the year.  None of these facts are actively reported to the American public.”

If the reports of drug cartel violence are still a concern for you, please read this report. I would also venture to suggest that you might like to think about what other stories in the press might be exaggerated - and why.  The fear of North Korean missiles reaching Hawaii is the latest one that springs to mind. There are factions within this country that have a vested interest in keeping people  fearful - don’t buy into their lies. It is you who ends up being the loser if you do.

I saw the following comment on the El Dorado Ranch Yahoo Group the other day and couldn’t help chuckling at the ironic comment from one of the residents which highlights the utter ridiculousness of the recent scare stories in the American Press about Mexico -

“I was just watching the news. In the U.S. last night several Police officers were shot and killed. If you value your life and the safety of your family you will not visit the U.S. It is very unsafe there”.

Is America descending into a failed state!!!!! With the number of shootings in the news recently you would be forgiven for thinking so. But no-one would seriously believe such a story.  However, such was the hysterical rubbish being put out about Mexico very recently. Don’t believe any of it. In fact it just serves to question the validity of any news put out by the mainstream American press. Get your news from a more reliable source, like the BBC World Service.

In a piece of good news, it seems that El Dorado Ranch developer, Pat Butler, is confident enough in Mexico’s stability that he is investing further funding into both El Dorado Ranch and another project in Mazatlan -  see http://www.homesgofast.com/view_news/1428/ 

“We really feel once the economy turns around there will be a pent up demand from the baby boomers,” said Butler, who was quoted in the New York Times. 

Yep - that certainly includes me. And the American Press is certainly penting up my demand to to go build my house down in Baja.  Idiots!

After all the nonsense that has been written lately about the dangers of visiting Mexico - “a potentially failed state”, and all the other nonsense that has appeared in the mainstream press lately, it is nice to see a more measured story for a change!  Thank you ABC News’ Maria Finn for her story entitled  Safe Travels in Sensational Mexico - Remember: ‘It’s Not a Theme Park, It’s a Sovereign Country With Laws.’  And thank you to the El Dorado Ranch Yahoo Group member who bought this story to my attention.

 
In response to the mounting negative U.S. news coverage of danger for tourists coming to Baja, Mexico’s Secretary of Tourism, Oscar Escobedo Carignan, released this letter which clearly spells out the tranquility and safety of the port of San Felipe. Evidently, the 15,000 or so visitors to the Baja 250 race last weekend (more about which forthcoming from Nancy), arrived and left safely and had a good time while they were there.  

Unfortunately, the bad publicity has meant that San Felipe is going to be much quieter than usual for this year’s Spring Break.  Let’s hope that that the drug cartel problem can be sorted out this year and that it is not going to just drag on and on.  Hopefully, President Obama’s visit in April will elicit some cross-border cooperation in this regard - afterall, who is it that is buying the drugs?  Who is it that is supplying the cartels with guns?  This is not purely a Mexican problem.

Thanks to Ed from the El Dorado Ranch Yahoo Group for the above picture.

No-one can help but be aware of the recent news over the escalating violence between the powerful Mexican drug cartels and the Mexican government - violence that is now spilling over into various towns in the United States.  However, I couldn’t believe my ears the other day when the TV news reported that the Pentagon feared that Mexico could quickly become a “failed state”.  What a load of absolute rubbish! Calderon’s reaction was rightly indignant when it appeared in a story in theweek.com - 

“Look who’s talking, said Mexico City’s Excelsior in an editorial. It takes two to make a cross-border crisis. Almost all of the drug gang violence is concentrated in cities along the U.S. border. In the words of President Felipe Calderón: “A good housecleaning is also needed on the other side of the border. To bring in the drugs, the cartels require corrupt U.S., not Mexican, authorities.” Plus, let’s not forget that the weapons the cartels use to kill Mexicans are smuggled in from America — even U.S. officials admit that”.

No-one is arguing that that the problem is not a bad one, but I see it as a strong Mexican government tackling a situation that badly needs tackling.  It will inevitably lead to more violence in the short term, but if the power of the drug cartels is not curtailed then no-one will be safe, which ever side of the border you live on.

It is certainly true that this year’s Spring Breakers are being steared away from their usual Mexican haunts because of the drug violence, but it is mainly a border problem, not one that is affecting all of Mexico. In a story in the Los Angeles Times it reported that “Summer Winter Action Tours (SWAT) has been sending students to Mexico for the last 12 years and, in a website post, insists that “San Felipe is one of the safest destinations in all of Baja California and Mexico.”

The Pentagon and the press would serve the situation better with a bit of perspective and a call to action from the US side of the border to help Calderon, instead of this irresponsible and groundless fear-mongering.

Mexico's President Felipe Calderon Getting it Right.

It is nice to see that the doom and gloom of the U.S. economy does not seem to be transferring to our southern neighbours in Mexico. The old saying that goes “when the U.S. economy sneezes, Mexico catches a cold” (the saying is equally applied to Britain as well), does not seem to be working out in the same way, at least not according to Mike Lane in his recent article “Mexico Set To Become Major Player” (although it certainly has in Britain!).  Mexico’s resilience is certainly encouraging for those of us who have a vested interest in El Dorado Ranch, near San Felipe in Baja!

Mr. Lane attributes Mexico’s resilience to both its latest President, Felipe Calderon and to its huge program of public works.  ”Ongoing investment in basic infrastructure far exceeds that of the U.S.”, he says, bringing the “employment opportunities and infrastructure required for a developing nation”. Calderon has also implemented much needed modernization within the government run national oil and gas company, Pemex. Although low prices and demand have hurt Mexico’s income in the short run, the changes have put Pemex on a good footing for the inevitable upswing in the global economy.

As economic opportunities increase within Mexico, Mr. Lane forsees a decline in the need for its citizens to migrate north in search of employment. Also, the drug trafficking problem the U.S. press are always so keen to talk about is resolutely being tackled by Calderon’s government and affects only a very small proportion of the Mexican population overall. There may not be many good news stories here in the U.S. but it is nice to hear that Mexico is doing well despite us. I know where I’d rather be at the moment!