Winter brings the whale migration from Alaska, and the show they provide, all along the coast and into the Sea of Cortez is, quite simply, amazing. Offshore, you can see baby whale calves feeding with their mothers, sometimes just yards away from where you are standing.

The region of Cabo San Lucas and San Jose Del Cabo have the most beautiful rock cliff coast lines of Mexico, but are pricey for a retirement budget.  Todos Santos is about 45 miles up the Pacific coast on a new highway.  On the opposite coast is the Sea of Cortez which Jacques Cousteau once referred to as the most special body of water in the world for its diversity of marine life. La Paz nestles on the Bay of La Paz in the Sea of Cortez with a 50-yard line, upper deck seat for the annual whale migration.

La Paz and Todos Santos both have burgeoning expat communities but are the antithesis of one another in life-style.  One the bustling capital of Baja Sur and the other a small farming community.  The glamour area of Baja Sur is at the tip in the Cabo San Lucas and San Jose Del Cabo  region.  Because it is primarily a tourist area, the cost of living is a bit pricey compared to La Pazand Todos Santos, but they are within driving distance for a “day trip” or a weekend outing.

On that note, let us tell you a little more about what you can expect if you retire to Mexico in the south Baja area.

Living in Los Barriles, Mexico

Click here to view our directory of Los Barriles local resources Los Barriles makes our “Best Places to Live in Mexico” list for it’s close proximity to the U.S., it’s small town atmosphere, the large supportive English speaking expat community and it’s beautiful white sand beaches on the Sea of Cortez. Los Barriles is located […]

Los Cabos

Average Lifestyle Rating: B (range C – A)Click here to view our directory of Los Cabos local resources Los Cabos is a municipality at the southern tip of the Baja California peninsula that encompasses Cabo San Lucas and San José del Cabo (the municipal seat), as well as the twenty miles of beach area that […]

Living in La Paz

Average Lifestyle Rating: B (range D+ to A-)Click here to view our directory of La Paz local resources La Paz is the largest city in, and the capital of the state of Baja California Sur, and it is the fourth largest geographic MSA (metropolitan statistical area – a city and its burbs) in Mexico. With a population of 215,178 […]

Todos Santos

BIG Surf in a Small Beach Town Average Lifestyle Rating: B- (range C- to A-)Click here to view our directory of Todos Santos local resources Some old-hands believe that Todos Santos is not what it used to be (what is?). As its popularity has burgeoned and its gringo/mexicano ratio has tilted less sharply, it’s no longer […]

The following are opinions, arguments, and anecdotes from on-line American ex-pats in Mexico about the latest USSD Travel Warning for Mexico.

From Gary and Donna’s Pictorial Driving Guide to San Carlos, Mexico (http://www.mexicodrivingtips.com/)

Look closely at the data for the northwestern part of Mexico which had 42 Americans killed from all causes (there were at least four suicides) in the last three years combined. Those are the largest tourist areas of Northwest Mexico, excluding Tijuana. In Los Angeles County, there have been 103 murders in the last six months. In 2008, there were 324 homicides in L.A. County. People in Los Angeles would probably say that there are certain unsafe areas to avoid. According to the latest FBI crime statistics, Phoenix, Arizona is the kidnapping capital of the US. People in Phoenix would probably say that there are certain unsafe areas to avoid. People living in Mexico would say the same thing.

For more than a dozen years more than five major US Motor Coach Tour Companies travel the Mexican Copper Canyon route every week with around 40 older/retiree passengers per coach. They travel through Nogales to San Carlos, then through the Copper Canyon, then up through Chihuahua and Juarez. There is even one company that travels exclusively from El Paso/Juarez to the Canyon and back; the areas covered by news reports. That’s over 7000 tourists per year. In all those years, including 2009, there has not been one incidence of drug-related violence against any of them.

Recent FBI statistics show the murder rate per 100,000 inhabitants in Baltimore is 43.3, Washington DC is 29.1, and Detroit is 47.

Mexico, which suffered an especially violent year in 2008, recorded a murder rate of about 10 per 100,000 inhabitants. Life is, statistically, far more dangerous north of the border.

From Douglas Anthony Cooper’s article for the Huffington Post (http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/douglas-anthony-cooper/canada-attack-resort_b_1232486.html?just_reloaded=1)

Cooper, who lives in Mexico, shares his observations about living in “dangerous, murderous” Mexico.

. . . People ask me, regularly, how they can travel safely to Mexico. Here I have impeccable advice: follow this, and you’re pretty much guaranteed to keep your head. Taking notes? Good.

Do not, under any circumstances, take a job with a major drug cartel. Just say no. You do not want to be a hit man, or a mule, or even middle management — that’s how people get killed.

I mean it: that is how people get killed. Sunbathing, on the other hand, is oddly uneventful. Yes, there are a few places in Mexico that I would avoid, . . . Most border towns are not the destination of choice, except I suppose when brothel-hopping, in which case I’m told a soupçon of danger is bracing (and well-deserved).

. . . The San Francisco Chronicle has a useful list of places to avoid — mostly areas on the American border, and south along the Pacific Coast to the state of Guerrero. The Washington Post has another useful list: they add to this the entire state of Veracruz (which is very sad — it’s lovely). These two guides will steer you clear of all the places you have been reading about, including the very few resort towns that have become dangerous: Mazatlán, for instance, and Acapulco.

Again, however, this is a tiny part of Mexico. “Of 2,500 municipalities (what we call counties), only 80, or fewer than five per cent, have been affected by the drug war.”

Mexico’s homicide rate as a nation isn’t even world-class. The country is in fact something of a sissy relative to the thugs in the neighborhood. Before avoiding Mexico, cross the following nations off your list: Honduras, El Salvador, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Venezuela, Jamaica, Belize, Guatemala, Bahamas, Columbia, South Africa, Trinidad and Tobago, Brazil… ah, but I’m boring you. I shouldn’t be: All of these countries — and this is only half the list — are murderfests relative to Mexico. Some of these places are worse than Miami.

. . . You know how Los Angeles doesn’t have a whole lot in common with an Amish community in Pennsylvania? Well, multiply that difference a thousand-fold when comparing Ciudad Juarez (a genuinely dangerous place) to a Maya village in the state of Yucatán. In fact, you are quite a bit safer in this state — which includes the ruins of Chichen Itza and Uxmal — than you are in Canada. The national homicide rate in Canada is 1.85 victims per 100,000. Sorry, kids, but that’s a war zone relative to Yucatán: .5 in 100,000.

. . . The truth is that most of Canada is almost as safe as Yucatán.