California Overland Desert Excursions

12/31/2024

Happy New Year, Everyone!

May 2025 lead you on a new exciting adventure, full of fun and wonderful, life-changing experiences.

Looking back at the previous year, despite some setbacks, the joy has come from the support of so many of you. Thank you for all of that!

More news to come.

09/21/2024

**Important Message from Joe, Owner of California Overland**

Hi Everybody!

Some of you may have noticed that there has not been much activity here for quite a while.

That’s because we have been dealing with a big challenge.

Unfortunately, just as the high season was approaching in February we suffered an insurance crisis. Our insurance company of almost 20 years stopped covering all Jeep tours—despite us never having a claim and a perfect safety record.

Many of you know that a lot of insurance companies have left the state. And with all the natural disasters around the country apparently the ones that remain have become extremely risk adverse. Despite our immaculate safety record, we somehow ended up in a category that most commercial insurers do not want to cover.

When the broker finally found a company, the quote came in at 6 times what we were paying before while a second insurer was close to 7 times!

Because, at this point, we were at the end of the policy, we had to cease operations.

As we’ve navigated this path, a few other brokers have taken up our cause as did the Anza Borrego Foundation. I’m very thankful to them, each of whom have worked hard to support us in keeping the business alive.

All that being said, California Overland is now faced with making a difficult decision:

1) Paying 3 times our previous insurance rate to keep the business intact as is.

2) Keeping a reasonable premium offered by one insurance company only—although that drastically reduces our fleet to 3 vehicles (Excursion Van and 2 Jeeps), substantially changing our business model.

3) Or lastly, ceasing operations and liquidating the business.

While we are working on this I wanted to let you in on it. It is a torturous decision. We had hoped, instead, to be planning a special 20th anniversary celebration next April. But you are part of our wonderful community and it feels good to let you in on all this. I am shooting to make my ultimate decision in the next two weeks. So please stay tuned. And thank you for all your support now and over the years!

Joe Raffetto, owner
California Overland Desert Excursions
"Roughing it at its Finest"

02/09/2024

In all my years in the desert I have always wanted to see coyotes in the act of howling during one of their symphonies. I have never seen that in all my many treks—until yesterday—right outside my front door. They brought it home to me! 😁

01/25/2024

It was beautiful clear skies the day after the storm that hit San Diego so hard. The Anza-Borrego Desert was spared the worst and perhaps this latest rain will foretell a good wildflower season this spring.

01/15/2024

Thanks for the shout out Borrego Springs Film Festival! Congratulations for what has been viewed as the best festival yet. Check our site for the latest productions we have worked with.

The area we call home becomes the perfect place for filmmakers to explore while they're in town. As Borregans we're proud that we get to offer our backyard as a playground to our guests. A morning hike or a sunrise trip to Font's point, the incredible landscape is there to enjoy. Special thanks t

01/12/2024

The Buildout, the latest feature film we worked on will be shown at the Borrego Springs Film Festival this weekend! The director Zeshaan Younus will be speaking on a panel.

01/03/2024

Staff trek to a remote and fascinating cave of pictographs.
This is what we do a lot on days off—explore new places. This really cool area has cave paintings that may represent an ancient total solar eclipse!

12/30/2023

Wishing you fun-filled holidays and a '24 full of great adventures from all of us at California Overland!

12/08/2023

Great time touring with a group of 25 geologists in November!

12/08/2023

It’s been an incredible start to the season with multiple large group tours - more requests in early Nov than we could accommodate!

First in Oct, we had the Salk Institute followed by back-to-back trips from November 4 through November 8, with an Irish enlightenment group, 25 geologists and 44 senior adventurers. Such a juxtaposition!