So imagine an Italian Archie Bunker bellowing, "You're goin' WHERE?!?!"
My
aging dad – and many of my much younger friends – couldn't quite fathom
why my husband and I were heading to Rosarito Beach for a long weekend
with our 5-year-old daughter in August. Swine flu! Shootouts! Drug
wars! Kidnappings! Carjackings! All this, and worse, had become
synonymous in their minds with the Mexican border area around Tijuana.
I
confess to having an overly emotional attachment to Rosarito. It was
more than 20 years ago that I made my first foray into Baja after
moving to California, and it was a revelation – there was a foreign
country with a different language … right down the block! I dragged
friends there for firsthand lessons on border issues, I bought handmade
furniture from artisans there, I got married there nine years ago, and
my husband and I vowed to return every year to celebrate our
anniversary.
Whoops. Our last foray to Baja was in 2005.
Before our daughter. Before cartel kingpin Javier Arellano Felix was
nabbed and a savage war of succession erupted around Tijuana among the
druglord wanna-be's eager to replace him.
go to original
But as Tijuana's
underbelly was exposed, Rosarito tried to separate itself from the
mayhem. Over the past two years, the city has replaced much of its
(notoriously corrupt) police force, created a new tourist police
detail, added a tourist assistance bureau and employed a 24-hour-a-day
ombudsman to handle complaints. This month, Rosarito Beach will debut a
"mediation center," so English-speakers can air complaints in their own
language and settle disputes quickly.
Violence, the city
fathers say, is a far more common occurrence in Los Angeles than it is
down there. And who thinks twice about going to Los Angeles? Add to
this the lure of oceanfront rooms that go, midweek, for as low as
$19.25 a night (to mark the Rosarito Beach Hotel's 1925 opening), and
many resorts' offers of free shuttles from San Ysidro/Chula Vista (on
our side of the fence), and it's a lure this lapsed Baja lover simply
could not resist.
A DIFFERENT BAJA NORTE
We
passed up the free-shuttle offer; Talavera flower pots beckoned, and we
planned to cart as many home from Rosarito's stalls as our 12-year-old
RAV4 could carry.
We've never had to wait in a line to get into
Mexico before last month. It was only 10 minutes or so until the little
traffic light gave us the green PASE, but nonetheless we were waved
over for further inspection by Mexican agents with machine guns. They
scoured our passports (don't forget these), matching pictures to faces,
and then meticulously matched the VIN number on my car's dashboard to
the VIN number on the Mexican auto insurance policy we had bought just
minutes earlier (don't forget that, either). But we were waved on with
a smile, and proceeded straight down the toll road to Rosarito,
skirting Tijuana.
In 2000, our wedding was at a funky little
backwater just south of the city. Calafia – set breathtakingly on a
bluff perched over the sapphire Pacific – was a bit Mission San Juan
Capistrano meets Aging Trailer Park. An outdoor restaurant tumbled down
the bluffs into a pirate ship/dance floor, a rambling collection of
double-wides was dressed up as hotel rooms, and everything was stitched
together by brilliant clouds of pink and purple bougainvillea and
rough-hewn grottoes beneath heavy-limbed trees. Half of the plastic
chairs arranged on the lawn for our wedding guests said TECATE in red
letters. A dirt bluff stacked with random junk was next door.
There
was no true "luxury" there just a few years ago. So imagine our utter,
unadulterated shock as we approached the Calafia turnoff and found A
MASSIVE 22-STORY LUXURY TOWER where our sweet little wedding site used
to be.
Shrieking and moaning, we proceeded, slack-jawed, down
the turnoff, gawking at the colossal Las Olas Grand. Las Vegas big with
two infinity pools, private beach, state-of-the-art glass-walled
fitness center jutting into the ocean and uber-luxury accommodations
(travertine floors, granite countertops, stainless steel appliances).
What on earth had happened in our absence?! It wasn't until we had
rolled past Las Olas that we realized our funky little Calafia was
still there, just hidden behind this tourista Gigantor.
Luxury
condo-hotel towers have sprouted shockingly amid Baja's modest Mexican
funk, as if the universe opened up a crack and chunks of Miami Beach
came shooting up through the Baja bluffs. They have names like La
Elegancia, Club Marena, Calafia Resort, Las Palmas, La Jolla Real … as
if some developer just woke up and said, "Mi dios! The coast is lovely
here, and it's only 20 miles from San Diego!" The place is not quite
transformed, but the startling juxtaposition of old and new made it
feel odd for us.
FACE-LIFT FOR
THE AGING STARLET
The
main game along this stretch of coast has long been the storied
Rosarito Beach Hotel, even as Hollywood sheen gave way to spring-break
careen. We last stayed here in 2000 while scoping out where to park our
wedding guests. The bed was hard, the poolside music was blaring, the
funky smell was unidentifiable. We realized we had grown a bit old for
the scene, fleeing farther south to the likes of Las Rocas and Las
Rosas resorts. But here we were, eager to check out the Rosarito Beach
Hotel's own Gigantor, the new, 18-story Pacifico Tower. Built last year
to cater to the sort of traveler who would be aghast at a stray rodent
in the room or an invasive swarm of ants – things that were par for the
course at some funkier Baja digs.
We had no reservations. It
was the weekend of the first Rosarito Beach Pro-Am surf contest,
complete with $10,000 in prizes. We grabbed a one-bedroom condo on the
Pacifico's 15th floor for $149 a night for three nights. We had to wear
yellow wrist bracelets (faintly reminiscent of spring break) so
security would know we belonged; but the room came with two free
margaritas each day and hotel restaurant coupons that could cut dinner
bills nearly in half.
As we walked from the old hotel to the
new tower, Pacifico seemed to have that old Rosarito thing going: Where
there were supposed to be giant glass doors opening into the lobby, no
glass had been installed yet. No matter. Once into the lobby, it felt
bizarrely like the five-star Kahala resort in Hawaii where I had stayed
a few years back: high-ceilinged, exclusive, uber-chic. Off the lobby
was a nicely equipped fitness room and a hipster bar with neon and pool
tables called "The Joint." Outside was a gorgeous, sapphire-colored
heated swimming pool, flanked by two sapphire hot tubs and an outdoor
bar. None of that spring-break red vinyl patio furniture here, but
handsome blond faux-wicker.
Goodness. The Rosarito Beach Hotel was all grown up.
The
elevator whisked us to the 15th floor and – ears popping – we stepped
out. Through the hallway windows we saw, for the first time, how far
back into the hills Rosarito rambles, and what a big town it really is.
Then
to our "suite." The first thing that struck us was the stunning ocean
view from such a dizzying height; then we absorbed how utterly hip,
stylish, minimalist the place was. Floors are Mexican stonework; bed, a
heavenly, low-slung platform; sofa, modern leather. On the living room
wall hung one highly stylized painting of a flamenco dancer; beside it,
a heavy, wooden-framed, floor-to-ceiling mirror. There was one
flat-screen TV in the living area, and another in the bedroom; the
bedroom's sliding doors could be opened to make the spaces flow into
one another, or closed to make a separate room. Our extra-large,
glass-enclosed balcony offered expansive views of sand and ocean (and
the more traditional Baja architecture that rambled down the coast); it
felt giddy to be dangling so high above the beach.
CHANGE OF ATMOSPHERE
When
my friend, colleague and avowed Baja-lover Marla Jo Fisher was here
last year, she found Rosarito to be deserted and faintly depressing. It
didn't feel that way at all anymore. True, the town wasn't crawling
with drunken American college students, but that's a good thing.
Rosarito was being enjoyed by her own people – Mexican families staying
at the Pacifico Tower, eating in the restaurants, playing on the beach.
There were a good number of Americans, but we had that feeling of being
much deeper into Mexico – where, you know, there are mostly Mexicans.
We loved it.
We didn't take any special precautions, except to
avoid driving at night. We strolled the main drag, visited the Fox
movie studio, bargained in the bazaar. We ate fish tacos at the corner
taco stand (where gringos still drink beer with breakfast), gave the
mariachis a few bucks to sing "Guadalajara" at El Nido. A highlight was
Saturday night, when a stage rose beside the Pacifico Tower's lovely
pool; bistro tables with crisp white tablecloths were set up at its
edge; and a poolside flamenco show, by candlelight, began. The couple
at the table behind us were nose-to-nose in ecstasy the entire time.
This
month, the hotel is hosting Havana nights and tango nights. There's
baby-sitting available for just $25 for four hours, and a kids club to
help keep children occupied during the day if Mom and Dad have other
plans.
We didn't want to leave. We soaked up the view (and the
chocolate fondue) at Calafia, and stocked up on as many gorgeous,
hand-painted Talavera pots as our RAV4 could hold (13, it turns out,
for $400). Our ride back to El Norte was uneventful, and it took only
about an hour (and one bag of too-greasy churros) to slip back across
the border.
We were commiserating with folks at Calafia about
that monstrosity that sprouted next door like Jack's beanstalk. But
here's my secret confession: I'm dying to stay at Las Olas Grand for
New Year's. Feliz Nuevo Ano! It is divine to be back under Baja's
eclectic spell.