Join Us For The San Felipe Shrimp Ride
San Felipe Shrimp Ride
Oct. 21st – Nov. 2nd 2025
The Baja Oasis San Felipe Shrimp Ride has been a long time coming. The staff at the Baja Oasis has been working hard for over 3 years to develop a route from our lodge to San Felipe with minimal race course whoops. Basically something fun and enjoyable for all skill levels. It all started 3 years ago with a phone call from a friend who was scared to ride from our lodge to San Felipe. We knew at that moment that we had to set out to create an enjoyable route to get to the legendary San Felipe beaches. The biggest lead came from Baja champion Steve Hengeveld. He remembered racing a patch of racecourse on the east side of the 5 freeway. He told us to go take a look because it hadn’t been raised in over 30 years and should be fun and smooth. So off we went and scouted for the old route. It was like a needle in a haystack trying to find this grown over route in a huge, vast desert. We scoured Google earth, then rode, then scoured getting further discouraged each time. Then last season in a turn of Fate, our friend Shane showed up to the lodge with a Robinson helicopter. he was Jonesing for adventure and had just the tool for the job. First we skirted the western mountain slope looking for an easy southern exit from Laguna Salada. Bingo, the old gold mine road was still in decent shape and provided the perfect southeast heading to exit the lakebed. Next we turned east of the highway hovering above the salty marsh just north of the Sea of Cortez. As we headed south, what we found was perfect! We found a straight shot smooth dirt road that took us all the way to the white sand beaches north of San Felipe.The Shrimp Ride Route
Now the only question was how to unveil this route? We rode it a few times and perfected the route with friends, burning in a motorcycle trail to follow. The fall season has perfect weather so and the shrimp festival is Halloween weekend this year, so it was an easy decision. Our neighbors on the river wanted to come and it inspired us to open this event for UTV’s. After all this route caters well to a UTV, so we figured why not? This will allow most anyone to attend the event and enjoy the fruit of our labor. This new route takes you over the mountains and down the Laguna Salada dry lake bed. Then you’ll traverse back over the mountains through an abandoned gold mine. There we will have a food and fuel pit near the highway before heading east on this forgotten route towards San Felipe. You will finish the day ripping down the white sand beach and into Pete’s camp for finish line drinks. We are fortunate for this event, the Stella del Mar Hotel has opened up the entire compound to us. This hotel sits right on the white sand beach and has an amazing restaurant bar with ocean views. They have very secure parking and plush hotel rooms. It’s a San Felipe staple that we are proud to include. We have been working close with the owners to run an event to their establishment and we believe this is the perfect opportunity with their proximity and relationship to the Shrimp Festival.
Breakdown Of Day 1 and Day 2
On day two of this event we will ride a simple Loop down to the Chenowth lodge. Of course we will take the beach to this museum/ restaurant bar and hopefully listen to some of the owner, Lynn’s stories about the old days of Baja racing. This will be a simple and relatively short Loop so we can get back, shower up and enjoy the Shrimp festival Saturday night.
The final day we will charge back up the beach and run the legendary route in reverse, deviating from the main path so off-roaders can see new trails. The ride will finish back at the Baja Oasis Lodge, where you’ll have the option to stay the night or head north.
The San Felipe Annual Shrimp Festival
San Felipe has been a major hub for off-roading for countless years and to pair that with it’s annual shrimp festival will be a blast. The shrimp festival celebrates San Felipe’s fishing heritage. It happens each fall during the final shrimp harvest of the season. The shrimp are harvested in late October before the water gets cold and they hibernate into the mud below the ocean floor. San Felipe is known to have some of the largest, most delicious shrimp in the world. During this shrimp festival they prepare shrimp every way imaginable and the food will surely be a highlight. There is live music and they close down the main beach boulevard for this huge fiesta.
If guests want to come a day or two early they can relax along the river at the lodge or warm up their off road skills on one of our many loops. The volcano loop is a crowd favorite because it takes guests straight to a fantastic taco shop in the nearby town of Carranza. This loop then points north towards a prehistoric volcano and past the largest geothermal plant in the world. Once you summit the volcano, the 360 degree views of the valley will make the trek worth while. You can look west towards the Sierra Cucapah Mountains, gaze across the miles of farmland, or take a better perspective of the geothermal plant. The second half of the ride takes enthusiasts across the desert landscape to a small town by the name of El Faro. Here you can find the best pastor tacos you’ll ever eat. Last you can simply ride the highway back to camp, or make more dust along the Cucapah Mountains.