Why did we make the move?

Over the months leading up to our departure, we had many people ask us:

“So… what made you decide to move to Mexico”?

A legit question. Along with us, many of our friends in Denver got married recently. It was really special to all be able to share this crazy chapter of life together. Most moved quickly to start the next chapter in their lives, onto buying their first home and having their first child. We could not be more happy and excited for them, but we found ourselves continually asking each other, “are you ready to do that yet?” It was a weird underlying feeling of uncertainty we both had at the same time (being 30 is fun, y’all). Then more questions… “Okay, so if we’re not ready for burbs and babies, what do we do?”

What became a joke about moving to Mexico at our wedding in November 2018 became a reality, just one short year later.

But why Cabo San Lucas?

We’re throwing it back to ‘91 where it all started. Kyle’s aunt & uncle won a trip and decided to use it to celebrate their honeymoon. In those days, Cabo was a sleepy fisherman’s village with only a few resorts, a restaurant or two and a whole lot of empty and unchartered beautiful beaches. They stayed at Club Cascadas, fell in love with the Baja and began to make it an annual trip.

In no time, the Turner, Frazier, Daly, and Ismert families all had timeshares at this ever-so-charming resort, one of the first hotels in Cabo. Kyle has been coming down to Cabo since his high school days with family, friends & business partners.

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The Cascadas staff is exceptional. Their friendly faces are a reason most guests continue to return year after year. We’ve made very close friends with a few of them.

We’ve watched their soccer games, had dinner in their homes, closed down the Cabo night clubs, and look forward to seeing their faces each year. They even came to our wedding. There is a reason they say “welcome home” when you arrive to Cascadas... they truly make you feel like they are your “home away from home”.

Read on for a trip down memory lane of the year’s we have shared together in Cabo.

A Look Back…

November 2015

Cabo has a dry, desert-like climate, very different from the eastern coast of Mexico like Tulum or Cancun where we’ve also vacationed. The southern Baja offers warm days, cool nights, less bugs & little humidity — all selling points for us to keep coming back every year to enjoy a week-long vacation on the Sea of Cortez.

Kyle was so excited to finally share his special family place with Leigh, especially knowing how much she loved the beach growing up at the Jersey Shore. It was her first trip to Cabo and it was also the first time she would be meeting Kyle’s parents.

At Cascada’s, most days are spent relaxing under a palapa, sharing 2-for-1 (or 4-for-2) buckets of cervezas (con limón). The hardest decision you make is what drink you want next… and when you want it… as a little blue flag just needs to be waved. After a day under the warm sun, we watch the sunset from the patio of our villa, “Perla 4” before heading down to dinner under the stars. A simply magical experience, especially surrounded by the ones you love.

Outside of the relaxation, this trip was jam packed with the most touristy things you can do for your first time in Cabo: parasailing, jet-skiing, vendor beach shopping, drinks at Mango Deck… just to name a few.

The icing on the cake for this trip had to be the Kansas City Royals World Series win, where they “took the crown” and we “took the shots”. Más tequila, por favor! It was quite the celebration.

“We Took the crown”

Royals World Series Watch Party at Club Cascadas

November 2016

2016 was another great year in the books in Cabo. So good, we even joked then about moving here. Maybe we knew it all along?! Swear we didn’t…

We kicked this year up a notch adventuring out from under our palapas and onto a glass bottom boat to Lovers Beach and Divorce Beach. We took in the sights of all the amazing rock formations. We also rented a Catamaran for a ride around the Sea of Cortez to celebrate Kristen’s birthday & the Turner/Daly wedding anniversaries. We cruised around El Arco, cliff-jumped off of Pelican Rock & snorkeled in Santa Maria Bay.

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In the afternoons and evenings, we got off the grounds and explored outside of Cascada’s to find great new restaurants like SUR (sushi, craft cocktails and a shoulder massage in a beach chair? Yes, please), live salsa music over craft cocktails at Bar Esquina, and open-flame, delicious Argentinean BBQ at Chamuyo. More exploring = further falling in love with this “home away from home”.

Hasta el próximo año, mis amigos.

November 2017

As the Denver winter closed in on us, we could not wait to get back to spending another week on the beach before the holidays. This time, we were coming back to Cabo engaged!

It was pretty clear in our minds that after our engagement in Dubai in May, there was no better place to get married than on a beach, and no better beach than Cabo San Lucas. We hired an amazing wedding planner earlier in the year and would use this year’s trip not only vacation, but also to explore potential venues.

But before the scouting, the typical Cabo fun. Family dinners out & another catamaran trip on the Sea of Cortez.

Towards the end of the trip, we took a day to visit a ton of resorts for the wedding, which ended up being super fun. We went up the coast to Los Cabos Hilton, Sheraton Hacidena, Cabo Surf, Cabo Azul and more.

Our planners recommended a last minute stop for cocktails to unwind and recap the day which lead us to Acre Baja. We were determined to get married on the sand, but once we stepped foot into Acre, we never looked back. Acre is an organic farm and palm tree paradise with on-site treehouses, swanky pool, 5-star restaurant, and an animal rescue operation (puppies, donkeys, peacocks & more!). Puppies literally ran up to us when we got there… how could we not fall in love?

Salud!

Celebratory cocktails and a shot of
Acre’s made-on-site mezcal.

We signed on the dotted line for a November 17, 2018 wedding date, exactly one year prior to the day. Before we left, we squeezed in an impromptu photo session to use for the launch of our wedding website.

November 2018

Fast forward to 2018 and it’s a different type of vacation. We would be sharing our special place of Los Cabos with 70 amazing family and friends this time around over a week-long wedding celebration.

Toasting the turners

Arriving at the Los Cabos airport for our wedding week!

We moved the party north to San Jose del Cabo, giving us a new place of Baja Sur to explore and fall in love with. Our favorite part of the destination wedding experience was seeing new faces arrive each day and getting to spend quality time with each and everyone of them. We hung pool-side, played beach volleyball, explored the Art Walk downtown, and partied over tapas and cocktails at Casa Calavera for our “Welcome Party”.

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The magical wedding day went down at Acre Baja, an organic farm and tropical oasis. A day in our lives that will truly be hard to top. We’ll save the remaining details for our full wedding tribute post, coming soon.

November 2019

After planning our wedding for over a year, it was weird to now have a break and align our focus onto something new. We began to discuss our next adventure.

We spent a day with a realtor looking at potential neighborhoods and homes in Denver. With the Denver market at its peak, it left us feeling very overwhelmed and discouraged. We found ourselves asking each other tons of questions. Is this right? Do we want to do this? Should we just sign another year lease in our apartment downtown?

We went back to the drawing board. We were very jealous of friends who had recently back-packed throughout Europe and Asia. It looked so fun, adventurous and freeing. Should we travel the world before we’re ready to settle down? Or maybe just plan a baller honeymoon abroad?

Cabo strikes again. After throwing in the towel on planning a Santorini trip (for now), we ended up honeymooning in our favorite place, using it as a chance for us to relax and think things through further. While there, we explored a few rental options, which went much better than expected and the dream started to become more of a reality.

After much debate, we decided to play the wild card and do something we had previously only joked about… move to Cabo full-time. Who wouldn’t want to give living in paradise a test run if the opportunity came about? The time was right. The time was now. Our digital, remote jobs gave the green light to allow us this freedom, which put the wheels in motion.

As we broke the news, we got a few judgmental looks... then a few “wait are you serious?” looks… which then lead to the sad looks. But then came the “holy crap, that’s so cool” and “we can’t wait to visit you” looks. There were also looks from Kennedy.

“Am I coming?”
“Are there squirrels in Cabo?”
“What about snow?”

So now fast forward and here we are today. Our November vacation month is now us sitting in our new (rented) home in Cabo, writing this blog and celebrating this amazing decision we have made.

We still catch ourselves thinking “How did we go from a wedding in Mexico to moving to Mexico?” If we’re being honest, it feels like a blur. It went from a subtle joke → to a few Google searches → to a “yes” from our jobs → to packing up the car. Now we’re out here rolling with the crazy waves Mexico decides to throw at us, and documenting it all along the way.

Check out the full story of our road trip here, where we plan out and break down each day of the drive with our experiences along the way.