Baja 2010, Cabo Pulmo

Wow! We really lucked out. Hurricane Frank stopped the diving for a few days just before we got to Cabo Pulmo and now another tropical storm is due shortly but we got our last two dives in early this (Friday) morning.

Baja 2010 #5

We've stayed the past week at Cabo Pulmo Beach Resort which has a dive center right there. We are some of the few staying here. Most divers and snorkellers come out from the big resorts in Cabo San Lucas just for a single day.

Cabo Pulmo has the only live coral reef in Baja. It's about a 1.5 hour drive from Cabo, mostly paved but the last 10 km is a very rough washboard dirt road. There's not much here apart from the small resort and a few privately owned homes. Five very casual small restaurants serving Mexican food (and Mexican beer -- dos cervesas por favor!) and lots of seafood dishes. But it is small town Mexico - no avocado (so no guacamole!) one place, no lettuce (so no salad) at another place, and one little place that advertised the best seafood in town, with no seafood! (which didn't bother us, being vegetarian) But Nancy's had a great salad with avocado and mango, yum! Caballero's had good food. And La Palapa was a great spot for a cold beer overlooking the beach. There's also a tiny grocery store. The resort uses solar power and a generator (but only during the day).


Our thatched roof bungalow is very nice, one big room with bed, comfy couch, dining table and kitchen area, plus the bathroom. It has an air conditioner but it struggles to fight the heat. It's about 30c inside but that still feels cool compared to 40c outside. We keep the door to the bathroom closed to minimize the area we're cooling so it turns into a sauna. And no, it's not a dry heat - it's very humid. There's also a patio complete with table and hammock.

Getting out to the diving is certainly different than any other place we've been. The boat is right on the sandy beach and pushed into the water by a 4WD truck. And pulled out the same way with a tow rope.

The sheer volume of fish here has been amazing. Lots of big schools of fish such as big eye jack and bright yellow panamic porkfish. Saw lots of green moray eels, (some up to 6 ft long), huge groupers, bumphead parrotfish, balloon fish and several kinds of stingrays. Also saw a bright orange clarion angelfish, a balloon fish with it's spines all puffed out, and a tiger shark which everyone was quite excited about.

We were surprised how many divers and snorkelers were coming out from Cabo, since this is the slow season. Unlike Loreto, where most of the divers were fairly experienced, here there seemed to be a lot of beginners.

Overall, I think we like Loreto a little better, but it was definitely worth coming here to see the reef and the huge numbers of fish. And being so isolated, it's a very peaceful spot.