Baja California Sur, Mexico

From the big animal action off the remote Socorros to the tequila-infused nightlife of raucous Cabo, Baja California Sur is wild at heart. From the October 2008 issue of Scuba Diving Magazine.

When you land in Cabo San Lucas on May 5th–Cinco de Mayo!–you expect to be met with exploding piñatas, nonstop tequila shots and whooping mariachi bands. Cabo may seem the perfect place to party on Cinco de Mayo, but Baja doesn’t celebrate it as aggressively as you’d expect. That’s OK–it’s not every day you get to dive Baja California, and I still have to make the two-hour drive to La Paz and then wake early to catch the boat to Los Islotes. My dive buddy Steve and I cram 50 gallons of dive gear and personal effects into a 10-gallon Ford Ka. This is not a vehicle designed for hauling dive gear (think tennis shoe with wheels). Nonetheless, we motor up dusty Mexico 1, over arroyos, past agave, and right through the Tropic of Cancer toward La Paz.

The Baja peninsula hangs like a giant tail off the bottom of the U.S. state of California, suspended 800 miles out and forming an arid, rocky barrier between the sheltered Sea of Cortez to the east and wide-open Pacific Ocean to the west. In the grand scheme of things, it’s the world’s fourth-longest peninsula, and its isolation has helped it become the special place it is today. The 28th parallel slices the peninsula into two states: Baja California Norte to the north and Baja California Sur to the south. From the southern half, divers have access to stellar diving in both the Sea of Cortez and the Pacific.You can see it all from day boats and live-aboards that depart from La Paz and the twin resort cities of Cabo San Lucas and San Jose del Cabo.

During the past 20 years, the Mexican government poured pesos into Cabo’s tourism infrastructure, which had been nothing more than a sportfishing outpost. There’s been no looking back, and the corridor between Cabo San Lucas and San Jose del Cabo continues to go gangbusters. Like Cancun to the east, Cabo is reinventing itself with high-end resorts, spas and restaurants. Though it’s come a long way since Sammy Hagar opened Cabo Wabo in 1990, drive a couple miles out from the urban sprawl, and you’re right back in the middle of the Sonoran Desert and the Baja of yesteryear–pastoral, serene, simple.

We plan to spend the first part of our trip diving off the mainland from La Paz, Cabo Pulmo and Cabo San Lucas, and then hop onto the Solmar V live-aboard to dive the remote Revillagigedo Islands–aka Socorro–for a week. We’ve come to dive with wild things–mantas, dolphins, scalloped hammerhead sharks, schools of tuna and wahoo, sea lions, maybe even whale sharks–in a place that’s known for delivering big-time action.

La Paz

Though it’s about five times larger than Cabo, you’d never know it standing in the middle of La Paz, the capital and largest city of Baja California Sur. It’s gritty and real, with a working-class sensibility, colonial feel and a strong connection to the Sea of Cortez. We drive north along the coast, past seaside resorts like La Concha and the new Fiesta Inn, toward Club Cantamar in the small town of Pichilingue. We settle into our room with a couple of Tecates and watch the sun melt into the Bay of La Paz.

The next morning, we’re up early to pack in three dives–Los Islotes, Las Cuevas and the wreck of La Salvatierra. Los Islotes is arguably one of the greatest dives off mainland Baja and a mainstay for local dive ops. An hour-and-a-half boat ride from Cantamar, it’s where a colony of more than 200 California sea lions resides, just north of Isla Espiritu Santo. These pinnipeds aren’t afraid to get in your grill. They dart toward you, then veer off at the last second, and some even nip at your fins. Be careful around the big black bulls, as they’re extremely territorial and can often be aggressive.

We knock out a brief surface interval before making our second dive at Las Cuevas, The Caves. It’s a sparse site with little fish life, but the giant cave carved out of the rocky shore creates a sun-filled cathedral where we surface, take out our regulators and soak it all in. We watch as tour boats enter the cave, tourists gawk and wonder what the hell we’re doing there. Our third and final dive is La Salvatierra, a World War II-era U.S. Navy tank landing ship that sank in 1976 when it worked as a ferry hauling trucks between La Paz and Topolobampo on the mainland. It lies in the channel between the mainland and Isla Espiritu Santo, and the wreck is so packed with fish you can barely see the wreck or its cargo.

Cabo Pulmo

The next day, we stuff ourselves into the Ka and bounce toward the seaside hamlet of Cabo Pulmo. After some scenic curves, switchbacks and steep grades, we hit Los Barilles, then turn off the main road toward La Ribera to confront our first genuine Baja dirt road. After several axle-breaking bumps and dips, and even more expletives, we arrive in very tiny, very remote Cabo Pulmo.

Cabo Pulmo might not have a paved road, stoplight, or a Carlos ‘n Charlie’s, but the marine park just offshore boasts western North America’s only true coral reef system. It’s protected from the open Pacific, so water temps here can be slightly higher. The dive ops launch pangas off the beach, and you gear up on the 10- to 15-minute boat rides to the sites. Keep your eye on the horizon, as you’ll probably see mobula rays somersaulting out of the blue. Wild stuff when you first see it. We roll off the boat at El Bajo, and we’re immediately confronted by an enormous school of 100-plus cownose rays. Puffers and stingrays are everywhere. We also spot a golden grouper–endemic to Cabo Pulmo–a blaze orange version of the fish divers know and love.

Back at the resort, Steve and I kick back with a few Pacificos on the patio. Far from major urban centers, we can see so many stars that we can barely see the dark parts of the sky. My cell phone doesn’t work here, there’s no TV, internet, nada. I could get really used to Cabo Pulmo.

Cabo San Lucas

The next morning, I begrudgingly retrace our tracks back up the dirt road until it becomes paved, then hook south on Mexico 1. We hit San Jose del Cabo, and the tourist corridor it shares with Cabo San Lucas, passing one exclusive resort after another. We finally roll into the heart of town at rush hour, and after the quiet of Cabo Pulmo, we actually welcome the thought of seeing people, and lots of them. We don fresh shirts and head to La Fonda restaurant, with its traditional menu of pre-Hispanic appetizers including worms, ant eggs and grasshoppers. Hey, everything tastes better with hot salsa and a cold cerveza.

The next morning we check in with Amigos del Mar and head to the dive boat. We motor out of Cabo’s central marina, a bustling place jammed with all kinds of boats– fishing, glass bottom, whale-watching and booze-cruise–it takes on a Middle Eastern bazaar kind of atmosphere. It’s a relief when we get to Pelican Rock and enter the cool emerald water. A large exposed pinnacle marks the spot of this dive, one of Cabo’s most popular. It’s fishy, populated by loads of angelfish, goatfish and stingrays, and the occasional manta and turtle.

That night, Steve and I decide to sample Cabo’s legendary nightlife. But first, we have to lay down a base at our favorite Cabo eatery–Las Gardenias. This taco joint (ask your cab driver and he’ll know exactly where it is) serves up the best fish and shrimp tacos I’ve ever had. Plus, the dollar still goes a long way here; they’re only two bucks each (three for shrimp). Then it’s time to get jiggy, but we avoid the known traps–Giggling Marlin, Cabo Wabo, El Squid Roe–and instead kick it old-school at the Nowhere Bar and the Tiki Bar.

Revillagigedo Islands

Now comes the truly special part of our Baja adventure: the trip out to the Revillagigedo Islands, also known simply as “Socorro.” Socorro is actually one of four islands that make up the Revillagigedos, the others being San Benedicto, Roca Partida and Clarion. The archipelago is volcanic in origin, lies anywhere from 250 to 400 miles southwest of Cabo, and is home to so many endemic plant and animal species that it’s sometimes called Mexico’s “little Galapagos.” The islands range in size from diminutive Roca Partida, which measures 300 by 25 feet–smaller than a football field–to Socorro, which sprawls over a little more than 50 square miles. You can’t do it on a day boat, this is live-aboard country.

We arrive at Cabo’s central marina to load our gear onto the gleaming green-and-yellow Solmar V. We chat up our new dive buddies, set up dive and camera gear, and head down to our cabins for a good night’s sleep as we glide across the deep Pacific.

The afternoon after we leave Cabo we finally spot land–Land Ho!– Isla San Benedicto. Benedicto’s volcanic crown rises like Wyoming’s Devil’s Tower from the surrounding ocean. This is the spot of our first checkout dive, a site called El Fondeadero, or The Anchorage. We see some jacks and the burnt umber hue of the endemic clarion angelfish. We’ve got our sea legs back, and we’re ready to devour this Big Animal nirvana.

All four dives on our second day are on The Boiler, perhaps the Socorros’ signature and most famous dive site. A set of two pinnacles, one terraced in three steps, forms the backdrop for this amazing site. Within the first five minutes of the first dive, our dive group is approached by a pod of 15 bottlenose dolphins, and one comes in real close. We also encounter mantas, a snoozing white-tip reef shark and schools of jacks.

The next morning we’re at Socorro, and anticipation mounts as we’re handed our diving permits. We file into the pangas, motor to Cabo Pearce and backroll into the light chop. We descend to the lip of a small wall and look for action. We spot the hazy outline of a hammerhead, followed by more, then the ominous silhouette of an entire school. We complete the dive in silent awe, and return to the panga. Back in the water for another dive at Cabo Pearce, we hit the same spot, and are immediately met by another school of scalloped hammerheads. We follow the school for 10 or 15 minutes, when suddenly, the squeaky chirp of dolphins breaks the silence, and I’m met by a mask-ful of them. They stay and frolic for a moment or two, then disappear as quickly as they came.

Then we hightail it to a site called El Acuario, or The Aquarium. Dropping down the bow line, we land on a circular reef of sponge-covered rock. We take turns shooting an octopus that moves from cover to cover. We chase it with our cameras, and it quickly situates itself into a crack, taking on the appearance of the surrounding rock. A scorpionfish also comes into view, its well-camouflaged body meshing perfectly with its surroundings. It has frilly appendages around its mouth, much like the splendid toadfish of Cozumel. After playing with the local residents, we return to the bow line to make our safety stop. A silky shark stops to check us out, weaves in and out of our legs, zooms in close, then darts out of sight, only to return and repeat the process. We stay in the water for half an hour with it, snapping shots and hoping for a close pass.

We dive on Cabo Pearce again the next day, and a dolphin frolics with us for at least a minute, hanging vertically in the water column. Within five minutes of entering the water for the second dive, I see a silky and a hammerhead shark. We spend most of the dive chasing silhouettes, finning through the blue. After lunch, we pile into pangas and head for a site called Punta Tosca (or divided rock), near a jagged stretch of coastline with eerie lava formations. We drop down a granite-like wall, shot through with little cracks and crevices. There are morays dwelling in the voids, and urchins in every square inch of the rock face. Up over the wall and into the shallows, a jumbled maze of boulders creates a shelter for lobster and octopus.

That night we make the run to Roca Partida, arriving early in the morning. We watch the sun rise over the twin pinnacle, which looks a bit like the head of a manta with its two pectoral fins. We inhale breakfast and scramble to the dive deck. While motoring to the north side of Roca Partida, we’re encircled by sharks the whole time. We backroll into the best visibility we’ve had the entire trip–150, maybe even 200 feet–and the thickest fish life yet. We’re greeted by schools of jacks, tuna, wahoo–all the big stuff is present and accounted for. Sharks include Galapagos, silkies and hammerheads, as well as white-tips snoozing in the grottoes along the rock’s sheer face. Roca Partida is a rocky pinnacle, no bigger than two large houses side-by-side, and it’s the only structure within 75 miles. Imagine the marine life it attracts for its sheer desolation alone.

We rise before the sun to suit up and pile into the panga for the short ride to the Rock. We’re in the water by 7 a.m. and see everything we’ve seen before, just thicker and in deeper blue water. There is bioluminescence everywhere, and the jellyfish seem to be out in swarms. We see the usual cast of characters but I can’t help but fixate on the wrasse, grayish-beige in color, that form clouds so thick that you’re convinced they’re the only impediment to perfect visibility. Hammerheads, Galapagos and silky sharks are, again, everywhere. Back on our panga, we learn that divers on the other panga see whale sharks on their safety stop. Damn! Maybe next time.

On the last dive at the Rock, we drop in and are immediately greeted by a pair of mantas. They’re frisky and make close passes by me and some of the other divers. I’m convinced they know this is our last dive here and are putting on a show.

Back onboard the Solmar, we rinse our gear, and the boat begins the long steam back to Cabo. We’ve come to see big animals and Baja has not disappointed. This is truly wilderness diving, and I can’t wait until my next dive trip to these remarkable waters.