Miles WynnWood Welsh texted me at 8:45 pm.
“Hey, we are down at the bar in Bahia. You guys
joining?”
No, and it’s a long story. Last April, the Northern California Land Rover Club set off on the 4th Annual Overland Event, this year to Baja California, Mexico.
We crossed the border early on and made it to a Mexican enthusiast’s cabin. Our friends, Oscar and Martin, had cooked up a feast of pozole, grilled meats and cheese. Ominously, club member Johann Krieger had locked his LR3 with the keys inside; that evening we MacGyver’d a solution using fencing wire, kitchen utensils and door shims to unlock the center door lock button.
The next day we headed down to Mike’s Sky Rancho, the famous stopover point for the Baja off-road races. We followed the very scenic Las Truchas Trail, meandering at first alongside a babbling brook, then with a forest at our sides. As we began our climb out of the valley, the road became narrow and the sides sloped off steeply. While not technically extreme, the trail required good tire placement.
Dave Mitchell’s LR4, towing an adventure trailer, took up the challenge. A call soon came over the radio that the trailer had spilled over. Over the course of the next six hours, we slowly crawled our way over the route — only tipping the trailer twice more. Meanwhile in the back, Kevin’s L322 was getting a workout. As we weaved our way up and out of the canyon, his low-profile tires caught a rock in the sidewall, requiring installation of his spare.
We summited the San Pedro Mountains, then rolled on down toward the Pacific Coast. On the beach, the birds scattered and the sand flew as the Land Rovers plowed along the ocean’s edge. With the windows down, the smell of salt in the air refreshed us for the four, serene miles along the sea. At the end of the beach, the LR4 and adventure trailer bogged down in the deep sand, requiring a quick recovery. Picking our way through the volcanic boulders with the ocean crashing at our sides, we arrived at Punta Cangrejo. We celebrated by camping along the ocean; the high winds died out at nightfall, leaving us with only the sound of waves crashing to interrupt our musings.
The next morning, Johann, Wood, Kevin Yankton and Robert Dingli left camp to cannonball down to the surf village of Santa Rosalita. Ivan Morelos, Sasha Sher, Dave Mitchell and I tackled the longest off-road section, 70 miles of remote backcountry roads. We’d have no cell service, no support and no fuel for 300 miles. It would be a long day, with our expected arrival at Bahia just after dark.
Leaving the town of El Rosario, farm fields gave way to silty hills, then a narrow track with a deep, eroded ditch off to the left. For just a moment, I took my eyes off the trail to confirm the next turn, when abruptly, we were sideways. My young son Henry awoke from his nap with, “Dad? You crashed?” “No buddy, “Snowflake” (our Range Rover Classic) is just taking a trail nap.”
Continuing on our route, I heard a large “BANG” from behind. Ivan rolled to a stop. His differential had blown, punching a couple holes in the housing. A quick map consultation offered equal challenges forward or back, so we determined to plow ahead to Cataviña, where Ivan’s friend Nathan had a Discovery I parts car sitting out back. Ivan locked his LT230 and powered along in front wheel drive.
Progress from this point was slow.
The track terminated in a box canyon, where we spent hours admiring the 2,000–3,000 year-old pictographs in the caverns. When we returned to the Land Rovers around 5:00 pm, the long shadows meant we would not make it to Bahia until well after dark.
Soon we were picking our way across the cactus-dotted plateau. We had finally edged our way into the Valle de los Cirios — one of the world’s most biodiverse deserts. The landscape brought on a special aura as birds flitted between the tall cacti and the cirios [Mexican cottonwood trees -ed]. Dr. Seuss himself could not have drawn a crazier looking tree, unique to the Baja Peninsula. All around us was the special flavor of wonder that only the desert brings.
Soon, the first of three hill climbs loomed ahead. Out came the Bubba Rope and “Snowflake” pulls Ivan along once more. On the second hill climb, “Snowflake” lost traction but served as a strong winch anchor. Hill number three garnered the reaction, “Wow, that’s a big one.” The climb started gradually, then hooked a U-turn, culminating in a 90-degree turn to the right running straight up the side of the mountain. We cleared the corners and made it halfway up the last climb before “Snowflake” lost traction. The rear of the Range Rover bounced with a loud “Bang!”
Despite engaging the emergency brake, “Snowflake” rolled back. Standing on the brake pedal, I had my wife Theresa unload Henry to stand safely outside. Ivan held my driveshaft, which now resembled a Tootsie Roll, asking,“Hey man, is this yours?” Because “Snowflake” has a Borg Warner viscous transfer case, the missing rear driveshaft would allow the Range Rover to roll backwards. And of course, my winch controller lay buried in the recovery gear bag behind me.
Ivan and I performed driver seat gymnastics. While he managed to get on the brakes, I dug out the controller. Sasha scanned the hillside for an anchor. There. Was. Nothing. A good distance ahead off to the right stood a small cirio. With some trepidation, we slowly transferred “Snowflake’s” weight to the cirio which creaked in protest.
We dragged out every recovery strap. Far ahead, Daniel Sher struggled to clamber to the top, scouting for an anchor. Not a single winch point, and boulder fields occupied both sides of the road; we could either go up or down, but not around to recover the lead vehicles from above. Suddenly, Daniel shouted that he had found an elephant cacti just past the summit. This would be a long pull, requiring every strap: 285 feet of it, plus 45 feet of winch line. Even then, it took three of us tugging on elasticized straps to connect the shackles, then 6 yanks to get “Snowflake” to the summit.
Ivan’s Range Rover Classic sat too far from our total length of recovery line, so for the next half hour, wheels chocked with boulders, leg screaming from pressing the brake pedal, I watched a spectacular sunset in my rearview mirror as I held “Snowflake” steady as an anchor. Dave’s LR4 and trailer, and Robert’s LR3, with their traction aides, scrambled up the hill.
Once on top, we determined that a round-trip drive to Cataviña would require 6-7 hours, mostly at night, and would leave us without a functional vehicle. Bagging that, we decided we would camp at the summit for the night. The Starlink became invaluable as internet access made a recovery plan possible.
We sent messages out to the other group. When they would have service we did not know.
I received a response from Wood at 8:45 pm. His text read, “Hey, we are down at the bar in Bahia, you guys joining?”
Our reply — “Uh, no, and we need you to bring us a differential from a guy in Cataviña.”
The crew agreed to leave Bahia in the morning. Nathan would be ready with the Discovery I differential and an additional Starlink to maintain communication. I still needed a driveshaft. Not to worry, Ivan said, “I think I have a driveshaft in my garage in Tijuana.” We videochatted with Ivan’s wife, Alejandra, who found the driveshaft in the garage. Parts plan in place, we settled into camp. This accident forced us to camp in arguably the most beautiful spot on the entire trip.
Memo to the Vatican: we nominate Alejandra for sainthood. She left Tijuana at 4:00 am and barreled the 300 miles to Cataviña. By 11:30 am, the required field repair parts were headed our way. Prepping the Land Rovers for the parts swap, we found the differential spider gears fractured in half and used JB Weld to patch holes in the axle casing.
Daniel and Dave let out whoops of joy when they spotted the Rovers on a far-off ridge. By 2:45 pm, Nathan and Ivan had begun tackling the rebuild of the good differential into the configuration needed for the Range Rover while I swapped in the new driveshaft.
The next morning, we woke up late on the beaches of the Sea of Cortez. The crystal clear waters made this our little slice of paradise. Throughout the day you could find us fishing, swimming — and just lazing on the beach watching the tide roll in. Later in the afternoon we were treated by the locals coming by and preparing Piña Coladas for us.
A few days later, we crossed back into the US. We set up camp and made one great last night out of it. In the end, we had one heck of an adventure, full of triumph, tribulation and appreciation for the kindness of the international Land Rover community.
NCLR Baja 2025
- Trip lead – Miles Wynn, ’90 Range Rover Classic [Theresa, Henry Wynn], Los Gatos, CA
- Co-Lead – Sasha Sher, ’05 LR3 HD [Anna, Daniel and Nina Sher], Scotts Valley, CA
- Sergio Villa, ’87 Range Rover Classic (Orange paint) Tijuana, Mexico
- Mike Foster, ’91 Land Rover 110 2-door [Leigh Anne Foster] Reno, NV
- Wood Welsh, ’91 Discovery II, Santa Rosa, CA
- Ivan Morelos, ’93 Range Rover Classic (Green paint) [Memo Vidrio], Tijuana, Mexico
- Johann Kreiger, ’07 LR3 HSE, Los Gatos, CA
- Robert Dingli, ’08 LR3 (Hub repair) Cupertino, CA
- Kevin Yankton, ’08 L322 Park City, UT
- David Mitchell, ’11 LR4 w/Bantam trailer [Don Mitchell] San Francisco, CA
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