6 Best Day Trips from Cabo San Lucas Mexico
Most people know Baja for it’s beautiful beaches or for the deserts but there is another side that not many tourist go to visit – the old villages. By Old Villages I mean Santiago, Todos Los Santos and Miraflores. I have been to many throughout Mexico and the villages in Baja are as beautiful as any that I have seen.
To get the to the many villages in South Baja you need to take the long loop of Highway 1 and Highway 19 and preferably with a 4 wheel drive so you can get to some of the more off-the-beaten-path places that you will discover on your journey. The loop runs several hundred miles but it can be done in two days. We decided that we could sit around the pool in Cabo or we could get in a jeep and see some fantastic sites. We chose the latter.
6 Best Day Trips from Cabo San Lucas
The best day trips from Cabo San Lucas can be reached by Car. I recommend the following locations and even providing a map on how to get to each one. From Cabo San Lucas you should visit 1) San Jose Del Cabo, 2) Mira Flores, 3) Santiago, 4) Las Barilles, 5) La Paz and 6) Todos Los Santos. These are the best locations and there are literally many other little roads that can take you exploring other parts of Baja while you travel to these destinations. If you would like the map of the best day trips click here: Best Day Trips from Cabo San Lucas Map.
Village 1 – MiraFlores Baja California
This sleepy little village showed us the type of scene that might unfold in a small place anywhere off the beaten path in Central Mexico. Consisting of very rural farming types, the community was small and friendly. Most people gathered round the small convenience store in the town. This old farmer had quite a pleasant smile and was friendly to us in every way.
An old man with the pleasant smile invited us to chat with him and to look at his beautiful mural behind him.
Village 2 – Santiago
Further down Highway 1 up the road towards La Paz we landed in Santiago Mexico. Another friendly town with a nice church, a zoo and plenty of broken down buildings. This place was a treasure trove of interesting places to visit and walk around in. No tourist seemed to frequent this place. We had the place to ourselves and it was wonderful.
A beautiful church in Santiago sits vacant awaiting the prayers of people in the village.
Village 3 – Agua Blanca
Passing through mountains and deserts on the way to La Paz there are beautiful little villages like Agua Blanca. It seemed many of the buildings were old and in disrepair but still beautiful to wander through.
Tu stands behind the facade of a falling building. Only a few walls were left standing.
Caffe El Triunfo where the Bandits of Mexico get their coffee
Village 4 – Todos Los Santos
As you drive into the town the signs welcome you and tell you that you are entering a magical place. And they are correct. Todos Los Santos is a magical place. So magical in fact that it became the inspiration for the Eagles Hotel California. The Hotel California is in fact in this little town and it looks like an amazing and beautiful place to stay.
We enjoyed our time in Todos Los Santos where it seemed everything was about art, music and the enjoyment of life. It is only 1 hour from Cabo San Lucas so we would highly recommend taking the time to visit this beautiful town.
Tu walks down the dirt streets of Todos Los Santos. You can see the buildings are old and quaint.
So many beautifully colored buildings. When you walk here, you walk into history and that is wonderful
Get out and explore villages outside of Cabo San Lucas.
So many people go to Cabo San Lucas and end up spending all of their time around the pool sipping Margaritas which is certainly nice. But it you have the time it is certainly worth the drives to explore some of the beautiful and interesting villages that are outside the town and off the beaten path.
Punta Lobos End of the Road
The jeep struggled through a rough patch of particularly sandy road. My fingers gripped around the wheel in panic while I wondered if I had made a mistake. Turning off a deserted road in the middle of the Baja Desert Coastline I was determined to show Tu some beaches off the beaten path.
This cowboy thinks he’s some kind of Chingon standing on his jeep in the middle of the desert. He is not. He is Gallo. A Chicken.
I glanced down at the 4-wheel drive gears realizing that I had no idea how to operate them and now we might be in trouble. We were at least 3 miles from the nearest town and if I got stuck it was going to be a long and miserable walk to find help.
I asked her if she thought we should turn around and she smiled at me and said, “You can do it”. Re-determined to make it happen I put the old jeep in neutral and decided to try my luck at getting us through the sandy dune of a what Mexican’s in these parts called a road. Somehow I got the 4 wheel drive into gear and all 4 wheels began to strain (slowly at first) over the fine sand. The engine sounded horrible but somehow pulled us through.
15 minutes later we were on Punta Lobos – a small but spectacular stretch of beach only inhabited by rusty fisherman, abandoned boats and vans and birds. This was Mexico. This was where we wanted to be and we were there. Sure we had a bit of a panic but we were on a beach where few tourist ever laid eyes on. This was the type of thing that would make the trip memorable.
Apparently, this would be us – Living in our Jeep had I not explored the use of 4 -Wheel Drive on the Jeep.
The Punta Lobos Panga. Old Men on the Sea do their extraordinary work in these small boats.
The waves were pounding the shore. We were too timid to set a foot in them for fear of being washed away.
How much did these birds care that we were there? No mucho.
30 seconds to Happy!
Darla demonstrates her amazing ability to brush off the sad clouds and get happy.
It only takes a few moments to completely change your attitude and get on with a good day when your sad.
Another valuable lesson from Darla.
French Photographers – Francois and Isabelle
I spent a bit of time yesterday with Francois and Isabelle. They came all the way from France and were in California to relax and capture all kinds of great photos of the beautiful state.
I met Francois originally when he was planning his trip out to San Diego. He was reading up on best places to take pictures and stumbled across a blog post I had written awhile back about the Top 15 Place to Photograph in San Diego.
I really got a kick out of meeting Francois and Isabelle, hearing about France and talking endlessly about photography. I took them to my favorite three spots in La Jolla: Windandsea Beach, La Jolla Cove and Scripps Pier. It was a great afternoon!
The Old Men and Their Mural
We were driving through a tiny village in South Baja Mexico when these two men started waving at us to come over. They saw me with their camera and they kept pointing to the mural behind them that they wanted me to take a picture of.
It looks like a mural painted by school children and it was about keeping Mexican Water Supplies clean I believe. You know they always say don’t drink the water in Mexico and I guess the kids that did the sign really got that.
These two old guys were funny. Not sure they had much to do all day except sit outside a small store and talk to each other. The old man with the cane pretended to play guitar with his cane while his friend smiled happily beside him. You can almost see from his smile how he thinks his friend is crazy. He was a little crazy I would have to say. Another great memory from Mexico.
Best Photographs of Cabo San Lucas Mexico
Tu and I just got back from an awesome weekend in Cabo San Lucas Mexico. Cabo San Lucas is a 2 hour flight from beautiful San Diego, California and a prominent location that many Californian’s go to visit. You can visit a completely new world by getting on a plane and taking a short two hour jump down Baja California to the very tip of the Peninsula.
Cabo San Lucas
Cabo San Lucas is known for its beaches, marine life, rocky coastline and scuba diving locations. Archaeological excavations have show evidence that the city has been populated for over 10,000 making it a fairly ancient and wonderful place.
According to legend, a Japanese Castaway located the place in 1842 known as Yenecamu (now Cabo San Lucas) and it only had two houses and 20 inhabitants. Talk about an isolated but beautiful place.
By 1917 a fishing village began growing in the area and to this day it is known as one of the best places to catch the most amazing fish. The warm waters and currents bring in the best of the best fish so many people still flock to this location to catch incredible fish.
In 1974, the Mexican government began a campaign to turn it into a pre-eminent tourist location in Mexico. And they have done just that. Today Cabo San Lucas is home to 69,000 and boast hundreds and thousands of visitors. It is truly a unique and beautiful place.
Our beautiful Hotel La Estancia
We hopped on Expedia and found a tremendous deal. For about $100 a night we found this 5 star hotel located on one of the most secluded and beautiful beaches in Cabo. There are 11 restaurants and a pool that is one of the most beautiful we have ever been to.
April 26, 2013
The trip was not only wonderful because of everything that we were going to do (and we did), but everything else that the trip promised to mean to us in our lives. I proposed to Tu on this trip. She said yes. Now we have a new favorite spot in the world to visit when we go on vacations. I joked with Tu that this was another date that I needed to remember. I am terrible with dates. If you doubt that just ask my sister Suzi. For Christmas one year, I gave her a calendar with everyone’s birthday’s noted. For years she would call my brothers and sisters to wish them a happy birthday only to find out that I had put the wrong dates for many of them. I better not do that with this date now!
The Locals
I tried to get pictures of locals on the trip too, which I did. There were lots of colorful and very nice people that we met along the way.
The Beauty of Cabo San Lucas
Cabo San Lucas is beautiful in many ways, from the beaches, to the downtown to the hotels. There is almost no location in this city that is not awe inspiring or beautiful. The most beautiful place is around the arches which have been carved by thousands of years of pounding waves. It is truly one of the most beautiful places in all of California.
We will be back
This was not our last trip to Cabo. It is a beautiful special place not only because of what it is but because of the place it holds in our heart. You can check out the entire gallery at this link – Best Photos of Cabo.
El Chingon De Cabo San Lucas
In Spanish “El Chingon” means badass. I was walking through Cabo when I made a turn through a less frequented part of the beach there.
I passed by 4 guys trying to do a picture of themselves with their cell phones. They saw my camera and they were all, “Tomo una Photo de nosostros” (Take a Photo of Us).
They were pretty happy that I agreed in fact we got some pretty good photos of them against a building that looked like it had been hit by a bomb.
When you get off the beaten path a bit, its amazing the photo opportunities that start to pop-up. Thats why I like to get off the beaten path a lot when doing photowalks.
Vive Mexico
We took a long weekend trip down to beautiful Cabo San Lucas. We’ll have to fill you in on all of the adventures but we rented a jeep and literally drove hundreds and hundreds of miles through lots of small towns, fishing villages, deserted beaches.
We saw so much and it was so much fun. What a beautiful trip.
