Cabo San Lucas sits at the very tip of the Baja California peninsula, 1,700 kilometres south of the United States border, where the Pacific Ocean meets the Sea of Cortez. The meeting point is marked by El Arco, a granite arch at Land's End that you can only reach by boat, with sea lions on the rocks below it.
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Jacques Cousteau called the Sea of Cortez the aquarium of the world, and the marine life is the real reason to be here: grey and humpback whales calving between December and April, whale sharks, mobula rays that leap out of the water in shoals. The land is Sonoran desert running straight into the sea, so this is cactus and rock rather than jungle. And the single most useful thing to know before you arrive is that a great many of the beaches here are not swimmable, because the Pacific side has ferocious undertow. Knowing which is which is the difference between a good week and a dangerous one.
What Makes Cabo San Lucas Different to Pack For
Most beaches are for looking at, not swimming
The Pacific side beaches, including the aptly named Playa del Divorcio, have powerful undertow and are officially not for swimming. The Sea of Cortez side is calm: Playa del Amor at Land's End, Medano Beach in town, Chileno and Santa Maria toward San Jose del Cabo. Beaches carry colour coded flags and a sign stating whether swimming is permitted at all.
Read the sign at every single beach. People drown here, and they drown on the ones that look inviting.
Desert sun and desert dryness
This is the Sonoran desert. Summer runs 30°C to 35°C with humidity, winter is a beautiful 22°C to 27°C by day and cool at night, and rainfall is minimal. The sun at 22 degrees north over pale rock and water is severe, and the dry air dehydrates you without making you sweat visibly.
Evenings from December to March are genuinely cool, dropping to 12°C or so, and a merino wool base layer for women covers those and the early boat departures for whale watching.
Hurricane season is real here
The Pacific hurricane season runs roughly June to November, with September and October the peak. Los Cabos has taken direct hits, most severely Odile in 2014, and storms close the marina, cancel flights and flood roads.
It is two towns, not one
Cabo San Lucas is the marina, the nightlife and the resorts. San Jose del Cabo, half an hour east, is a colonial town with an art district and a different pace entirely. The corridor between them holds most of the big hotels. Choose deliberately.
Recommended Tours and Experiences
The Cabo San Lucas Packing List
Footwear
Flip flops and water shoes, the latter for the rocky entries at Chileno and Santa Maria and for the boat landings at Playa del Amor, which is a wet landing onto sand between rocks.
For the desert trails, the Sierra de la Laguna or the walk out at Cabo Pulmo, waterproof hiking shoes are the right tool, and closed shoes generally in the desert because of cactus spines and, occasionally, snakes.
Clothing
Light and loose for the heat, with long sleeves for sun protection rather than warmth. A warm layer and long trousers for winter evenings and boat mornings, which genuinely surprise people.
Resort casual covers almost everything. San Jose del Cabo's galleries and the better restaurants in both towns lean smarter in the evening, and a few have a dress code.
For sun
A wide brim sun hat with a chin strap for the boats, high factor reef safe sunscreen, good sunglasses and lip balm. A rash vest is the best purchase you will make for a snorkelling day, because this sun will get through anything you reapply.
For rain
A packable rain jacket if you are travelling between June and November. Outside that, you will not see rain.
For the water
Snorkel and mask if you have them, since Chileno and Santa Maria are protected bays with good snorkelling straight off the beach. A dry bag for boat trips. Motion sickness tablets for whale watching, because the swell off Land's End is real.
Practical
Pesos in cash, and be aware that many places quote in US dollars at a poor rate, so paying in pesos is usually cheaper. A reusable bottle, since tap water is not drinkable. Sunscreen is expensive locally, so bring it. Book whale watching in season ahead.
What to Wear at Key Sites
El Arco and Land's End
The granite arch at the tip of the peninsula, with Playa del Amor on the Sea of Cortez side and Playa del Divorcio on the Pacific side, a few dozen metres apart, plus a sea lion colony.
Practically: reachable only by boat, and this is the clearest illustration of the whole beach problem. Lovers Beach on the calm side is swimmable; Divorce Beach on the Pacific side, a short walk across the sand, has lethal undertow and is signed against swimming. People cross from one to the other and get into trouble. Water taxis from the marina are cheap; agree the pickup time and the price before you get in. It is a wet landing.
Medano Beach
The main town beach on the bay, swimmable, lined with restaurants and loud with jet skis and vendors.
Practically: this is the safe swimming beach in town and it is busy and commercial. Vendor pressure is constant and persistent but good natured, and a clear no repeated works. Watch the jet ski traffic when swimming.
Whale watching
Grey whales and humpbacks are present from roughly December to April, with humpbacks breaching close to shore, and the season is the main reason to come in winter.
Practically: boats leave early and it is cold on the water at seven in the morning in January. Take a warm layer and a windproof. Choose an operator that observes the legal approach distance. Larger boats are more comfortable, zodiacs get closer and are wetter.
Chileno and Santa Maria
Two protected bays on the corridor toward San Jose del Cabo, both good for snorkelling straight off the sand and both with reef close in.
Practically: the best swimming and snorkelling near town. Parking is limited and fills early. There are few facilities, so take water and shade. Reef safe sunscreen matters here because the reef is right there.
San Jose del Cabo
A colonial town half an hour east, with a mission church on a plaza, an art district that holds a Thursday night art walk in season, and an estuary that is a bird reserve.
Practically: quieter, prettier and considerably more Mexican in feel than Cabo San Lucas. Shoulders and knees for the church. This is where to eat.
Cabo Pulmo and the desert
Two hours northeast, a national marine park protecting one of the few hard coral reefs in the eastern Pacific, recovered dramatically after local fishermen agreed to stop fishing it. Inland, the Sierra de la Laguna rises to over 2,000 metres.
Practically: the road to Cabo Pulmo is partly unpaved and a long day. It is genuinely one of the great conservation stories and the diving is excellent. The Sierra de la Laguna is proper mountain terrain with no services.
What Not to Bring
Leave the assumption that a beach with sand on it is a beach you can swim from. This is the single most important thing on this page.
Leave the expectation of jungle, because this is desert. Leave non reef safe sunscreen for the protected bays. Leave a hat without a strap on a boat. And leave a hurricane season trip without travel insurance and a flexible booking.
Essential Resources for Women in Cabo San Lucas
Emergency numbers in Mexico: 911 is the national emergency number and works nationwide, with English speaking operators generally available in Los Cabos. 078 is the Green Angels tourist assistance line for roadside help. For a marine emergency, the Mexican Navy coordinates search and rescue through 911.
Tourist support: Los Cabos has a tourist police presence, and Mexico operates a national tourist assistance line on 078 with English speakers. A theft requires a denuncia filed with the Ministerio Publico for any insurance claim or passport replacement, and the tourist office can help you navigate it.
US Consulate: there is a US Consular Agency in Los Cabos, in Cabo San Lucas, which handles routine services, with the US Consulate General in Tijuana and the Embassy in Mexico City above it, all at mx.usembassy.gov. Having an agency in town makes this one of the easier Mexican destinations for consular help. Enrol in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program at step.state.gov before you travel.
Main hospital or clinic: Blue Net Hospital and H+ Los Cabos are the private hospitals used by visitors, both with English speaking staff and international insurance desks, plus the public IMSS hospital. Standards at the private hospitals are good. Payment up front is normal and bills are substantial, so travel insurance matters, and check it covers diving, snorkelling and any watersport you intend.
Official health authority: the Mexican Secretaria de Salud at gob.mx/salud, with the national meteorological service for hurricane tracking during the season.
US State Department travel advisory for Mexico: current advisory level and detail. Read it directly rather than relying on this page, and note that it assigns different levels to each Mexican state rather than to the country.
UK FCDO travel advice for Mexico: entry requirements, safety and health guidance. This one is worth reading closely because the geography matters enormously in Mexico: the FCDO advises against all but essential travel to Chihuahua, Colima, Guerrero, Michoacan, Sinaloa, Tamaulipas and Zacatecas, and to Tecate in Baja California. It states explicitly that Baja California SUR, which is the state Cabo San Lucas is in, is not affected by those warnings.
Official tourism authority: the Mexican tourism board at visitmexico.com, with the Los Cabos tourism board for beach flag status and the list of which beaches are designated safe for swimming, which is the page to actually look at.
Solo women safety assessment: Cabo San Lucas is a comfortable destination for a woman travelling alone, and Baja California Sur is one of the safest states in Mexico, with a violent crime rate far below the states that dominate international coverage. The tourist corridor is heavily policed, the resorts and the marina are secure, English is widely spoken, and there is a US consular agency in town. Solo travellers are common and day tours make it easy to be social. Street harassment exists in the ordinary Latin American form of comments and persistent vendor attention, and is more about sales pressure than anything else; a firm no works. Timeshare touts at the airport and along the marina are aggressive and dishonest rather than dangerous, and the correct response is to keep walking. The nightlife on the marina strip is heavy drinking and aimed at a young American crowd, and the standard cautions apply there with force: watch your drink poured, do not leave it, stay with people you came with, and take a taxi rather than walking back alone late. Drink spiking is reported in Mexican resort nightlife. Use Uber or a hotel taxi rather than an unmarked car, and agree the fare in advance with a street taxi. Petty theft is the commonest crime, mostly from beaches and hotel rooms. The genuinely dangerous thing here is not crime, it is the water. The Pacific side beaches have lethal undertow, several are signed against swimming entirely, and people drown in Los Cabos every year including strong swimmers who underestimated Divorce Beach. Obey the flags and the signs absolutely, swim only on the Sea of Cortez side, and never swim alone or after drinking. In hurricane season, follow local instructions promptly. And in the desert, take more water than seems necessary and wear closed shoes.
Reading On
Cabo San Lucas is the easiest introduction to Baja and the best whale watching in Mexico, and it works best paired with San Jose del Cabo for a week. The Mexico travel guide for women is the parent for the country and the Mexico packing list for women covers a trip across it. On the other side of the country, the Cancun travel guide for women and the Tulum travel guide for women cover the Caribbean coast, and the Campeche packing list for women the walled city on the Gulf. Inland, the Mexico City travel guide for women covers the capital at 2,240 metres and the Oaxaca travel guide for women the southern highlands. The travel packing guide for women is the parent for all destinations. For why a thin wool layer belongs in a bag packed for the desert, where the nights drop sharply, the best merino wool base layers for women explains the fibre, and the Roman Trail collection is where the tops themselves live.
If the outer journey is calling you, the inner one usually is too. Explore SoulMap at romantrail.com/blogs/soulmap.
