San Cosme

Parque Nacional Bahía de Loreto is the largest marine park (800 square miles) on Mexico’s Pacific Coast. Park regulations prohibit spearfishing (except for subsistence by Mexicans), so I was looking places to launch my kayak outside the park. I plotted the park’s boundaries in Google Earth (they’re not shown on local maps) and looked for access roads. The first good access to the Sea of Cortés south of the park was San Cosme, 26 miles from Loreto. The 13-mile road from the Transpeninsular Highway to San Cosme reminded me of the road to Caleta Agua Armargosa in Gene Kira's King of the Moon: A Novel About Baja California:

…men fought their way from the main road in the west, over the high mountains, and down the very cliffs themselves, to the floor of the canyon. It was not a legitimate road they cut, but more of a plunging, twisting trail clinging to the sides of the cliffs. Is was so narrow in places one could not get out of a pickup, for on one side the door would be stopped by the face of the cliff, while on the other, it would open over noting but air.

Feral burros along the road to San Cosme

Damselfish: Danger (and Sex) on the Reef

I was up before sunrise to go diving in Parque Nacional de Bahía Loreto (link). Driving south from Nopolo on Baja’s Transpeninsular Highway, I stopped at the Mirador (viewpoint) above the village of El Juncalito to check sea conditions. The winds were light from the north and the Sea of Cortés was calm. I turned off the highway where it turns inland and begins to climb. The dirt road to Ensenada Blanca drops down into an arroyo that drains a large canyon stirring up a cloud of dust. I wondered what the arroyo was like during a flash flood. 

Sunrise over Isla del Carmen from the Mirador above El Juncalito

Across the Sea of Cortés on Ferries

About a week before our six-month Mexican tourist visas expired, we drove up the east side of the Baja peninsula from Loreto to Santa Rosalía to catch the ferry to Guaymas on the mainland. We left late in the morning when the sun was high and the air was warm. It was Semana Santa (Easter Week) and we had been warned that the roads would be crowded with travelers. Mario, our neighbor just back from Mulege, told us that the beaches along the Sea of Cortés were packed with campers.

Playa El Requeson on Bahiá Concepcíon