Cabo San Lucas, Mexico -- 4/98  

Encouraged by low airfares and an invitation from my old friend, Temo Ramirez, owner of Pacific Coast Adventures, Chris and I booked ourselves to Cabo San Lucas for a week. Fred joined us two days later as the trappings of the real world still had a hold on him.

Though it was the tail end of spring break we were able to secure accommodations through the Internet. When in Cabo, I prefer to stay at Plaza Las Glorias. It's not tremendously fancy but is well located, on the harbor right in front of the marina with the main street of town behind it - everything you could want within easy walking distance. Vacation Spot set us up with a privately owned two bedroom condo / timeshare that is part of the Plaza Las Glorias complex.  
  We quickly settled into a daily routine that matched our mood for the week: wake up, walk downstairs to Pacific Coast Adventures & dive, return to the condo and sit on the balcony for a lazy afternoon of watching the world go by, wander into town later for a meal and then visit several of the town's evening establishments.

Our search for good meals, good values and fun places was made simple by getting to know the street-side "concierges". Their main function of course, is to rope folks into timeshare presentations, but in truth, most are friendly and good fun to talk once you kill the sales pitch. They certainly know the area and are more than willing to point you in the right direction for whatever you seek.

In short order we decided the places off the main strip frequented more often by locals than tourists suited us better. The meals at Felix's and La Quesedilla were exceptional for local fare and The Jungle Bar became our night time hangout.

  Our days of diving with Pacific Coast Adventures were exceptional, primarily due to the staff who were tons of fun. Temo dove with us our first day out and then Roberto accompanied us for the rest of the week. Roberto is just one of their very seasoned dive masters / instructors and a very nice guy with a great sense of humor! The diving in Cabo is fair, there is only one living reef at Cabo Pulmo - a two hour drive but worth it! Most of the sites offer boulder strewn ocean floors or walls rising out of the sea at Land's End populated by schooling fish, moray eels, and bottom dwellers like stingrays and the poisonous stone fish.

 

Over the course of the week we dove a variety of sites:

 
     
The Blow Hole and an unnamed site thirty minutes by boat to the west of the Cabo harbor.   Gorfino (sic), a very deep dive several hundred yards off Land's End.

 

 
Neptune' Finger, Sand Falls and Pelican Rock, all at the harbor's outside edge.

 

  We also took a day excursion to Gordo Banks to look for whale sharks and hammerheads but were disappointed. This site can be exceptional but requires a thirty minute drive and then a LONG boat ride to an underwater mountain top.

On another day excursion, a two hour drive northeast of Cabo San Lucas brought us to Cabo Pulmo, truly a beautiful area. A series of five reefs parallel the gorgeous beach which is populated by a small community of locals that depend on occasional divers for the economy. There are also a few transient gringos that camp out there because, "after all, everyone has to be somewhere!".

It was here we had our best dives, guitar fish, eels, and schooling fish of all varieties were plentiful. The reefs were dramatic with numerous overhangs, swim-throughs and crevices to explore and poke into.

 

Photo courtesy of Fred Gerbino

On our last day in town we decided to take advantage of a late afternoon flight home by going deep-sea fishing. Out before dawn, I hooked into a 150 lb. marlin as the sun came up. Forty-five minutes later he was finally alongside for this photo and then released. Later we came upon huge schools of tuna being herded by pods of dolphins in a cooperative feeding effort. On our return, pelicans and sea gulls swooped past the boat hoping for scraps from our catch for an easy meal.

 
    Photo courtesy of Chris Pritchard
 

Cabo San Lucas is an easy place. By that, I mean you can arrive one day, be relaxed and part of the community by the next. People are friendly, easy to talk to and at the week's end we were greeted like old friends each evening as we strolled the town and visited our favorite hangouts.

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© 1998 John Petrak