Seventeen days on the Sea of Cortez, zero orcas, and every reason to stay sober anyway. Here is what Baja taught me about purpose over pressure.
After a long day out on the ocean, it is easy to want to stretch it a little longer, to trade stories with the people you just spent it with on the boat. Come out for some cold beers. Unwind. Keep the good energy going. After long, salt-crusted days scanning for orcas, that kind of camaraderie is the natural rhythm down here, and I understand the pull of it completely. I smiled, thanked them, and said I was good. And meant it. No lecture. No explanation beyond what was needed. Just a clean, warm no.
That happened more than once across 17 days on a wildlife expedition in Baja California Sur, Mexico. Based out of La Ventana, close enough to the Cabo scene to feel its gravity, far enough to stay out of its orbit. Around the water at sunrise most days, scanning for orcas and other wildlife, searching for sperm whales, lying on the bow, watching bottlenose dolphins move through the blue. Long, salt-crusted days. The kind that leave you tired in the best possible way.
And then, at the end of those days, the social pull would kick in. Drinks back in town. Plant medicines making the rounds. "Magic" mushrooms are offered with the same generosity as the cold beers. This is part of the culture down there for some, and I say that without judgment. People seek connection, depth, and presence. This much we already know. I understand that impulse completely. I just found my path to those same things a different way a long time ago, and no longer seek them in my connections today.
Why I Was Really There
After 19 years sober, a hangover was never the real risk. I am not white-knuckling sobriety at a beach party in Mexico. The risk was something quieter and more costly: losing the clarity that the whole trip was built around.
I was there to give myself every opportunity to try to swim with orcas. To be on the water every single day if I needed to be. And to experience whatever magical wildlife the universe wanted to bless me with. That was the mission. If you are drinking the night before, you might miss the boat, literally or figuratively. If you are altered, you might miss the awareness. The sperm whale that surfaces for 30 seconds. The feeling of dancing with over a thousand mobula in a fever. Being part of a group, one of many instead of the focus being on one. One big living organism, alive, truly alive. The moment an oceanic manta turns at you and time does something strange.
You cannot be half-present for that. Or rather, you can be, but why would you?
Sobriety on a trip like this is not a sacrifice. It is a strategy. It is the thing that keeps the mission intact. My body was my instrument out there, and I needed it tuned.
How I Stayed Connected Without Drinking
Here is what I want to push back on, gently: the idea that you need a substance to build real connection with people.
I joined for dinners. I traded plenty of stories and stayed with people for the sunsets. We walked through a cactus forest looking for rattlesnakes. I hung out at the dive shop. I had some awesome local cakes at a nearby coffee shop, slugging down a cold brew to cap off a beautiful day with whoever wanted to join me. I asked questions, listened, shared my own, laughed until my chest hurt. Nobody who mattered cared what was in my cup. And the ones who pushed a little, I just stayed warm and direct. No is a full sentence, and you can deliver it with a smile.
Social settings are one of the most common relapse triggers for people in recovery, and I understand why. But here is what I have found: showing up sober in party-heavy environments makes you more present than almost anyone in the room. People feel that. They open up differently to someone who is actually listening, actually there. Some of the most honest conversations I have had in my life happened in spaces where everyone else was altered and I was not.
Some people were genuinely curious about my sober story. They wanted to know how I got sober, what got me into it in the first place, what my life looks like now, whether I run retreats, and what Nomadic Addictt is all about. That kind of curiosity, met with honesty, is its own form of connection.
I do not carry judgment for people who choose to drink or use. Not even a little. That is their path, their body, their trip. What I carry is clarity about my own, and that makes all the difference.
If you are working through your own version of this, whether traveling sober for the first time or the fiftieth, the sober travel resources at Nomadic Addictt exist exactly for this reason. You are not alone in figuring this out on the road.
The Orcas Never Came. Then They Did.
Seventeen days. Zero orca sightings.
I want to sit with that for a second, because it matters more than it might seem. We searched every day. We were out there in the right season, in the right geography, with experienced guides who know these waters. And the orcas simply did not show.
The day I left Baja, 30 sperm whales were spotted. The day after, five female orcas were in the area.
You cannot make this stuff up.
Here is the thing I have had to learn, and keep relearning: you do not get a guaranteed return on showing up. Paying for an expedition does not entitle you to the wildlife. Being sober and clear and committed does not guarantee the orcas appear on cue. Nature does not owe you a highlight reel.
Shakespeare put it better than I ever could, through the voice of Polonius in Hamlet: to thine own self be true. That line is not about getting what you want. It is about staying aligned with who you are regardless of what you get.
I stayed sober on that trip because it is who I am, because it serves my purpose, because it keeps me present for whatever shows up, orca or no orca. The mission was not only to find wildlife. The mission was to be the kind of person who could be fully there when it mattered. That part I got right.
Some things you only understand fully once you have done the internal work to get honest with yourself. If that resonates and you want to go deeper on the identity side of this, my book Love Unlocked explores that work in depth, and I write more about it over at zacspowart.com.
What the Sea Keeps Teaching Me
Baja is one of those places that strips things down fast. Salt water, big skies, creatures that do not care about your itinerary. It has a way of asking you: what are you actually here for?
I knew my answer before I arrived, and I held it through every sunset invitation, every passed bottle, every well-meaning offer. Not rigidly. Not defensively. Just clearly.
That clarity is the gift sobriety keeps giving me, trip after trip, year after year.
So here is the question I want to leave you with: when you strip away the social pressure and the substance and the noise, what is the real reason you are showing up for the experiences you choose? And are you protecting that reason, or quietly trading it away for belonging that was never actually conditional on your choices to begin with?
Interested in 1:1 sober coaching, sober companionship, or custom tailored sober retreats?
Whether you are navigating early sobriety, planning your first sober trip, or looking for someone to walk alongside you, I am here. Learn more at Nomadic Addictt or start the conversation.