Cabo San Lucas and Rancho Verde

Sunday, February 18, 2007

We hadn’t heard anything good about Cabo San Lucas except the Costco store and the Vagabundos del Mar RV Park, so we decided to check it out by car before committing ourselves to camping there. Good thing we did! The drive there was very slow, over mountains and behind big trucks.The RV Park was well-groomed and beautifully landscaped, but other than that, it was like being in a stateside trailer park—teeny sites and RVs lined up with almost no space between them. No thanks! The harbor at Cabo San Lucas is beautiful, but marred by high rise hotels and resorts that block the view of the water. We didn’t go into the downtown tourist area, since Steve is not a big fan of that kind of shopping, or any kind for that matter.

I am only slightly embarrassed to say we enjoyed Costco immensely. It is set up just exactly like the ones in the US, so we knew where to find everything, even though all the signs were in Spanish. All the DVDs had Spanish titles—Pantera Rosa (The Pinik Panther) and Los Simpsons. We were going to buy one if it had been dubbed in Spanish, but no, they were the regular English versions with Spanish subtitles. The books were mostly in Spanish, though, including all the Harry Potters. I looked for some baby books for Jackson in Spanish, but they didn’t have any. There were also lots of local products—torta rolls, chocolate flan instead of 3-layer chocolate cake, and a whole aisle of jumbo-size cans of chili peppers. The food court surprised me—I thought it would have Mexican food, but no—the offerings were just like the ones at home—pizza and hot dogs and very berry sundaes.

So, we decided to pass on camping in Cabo, and instead, headed back toward LaPaz to drop down to Los Bariles on the Sea of Cortez side. On the way, we got sidetracked, and haven’t made it there yet. We stopped for a “quick overnight” at Rancho Verde RV Haven, in the mountains about 20 miles from Los Bariles, and fell in love with the place. The campsites are huge, with lots of trees and greenery. There are about 15 sites total in the park, and only 3 others are occupied—we can’t even see our neighbors from our spot. Right outside our picture window is a little tree, where I’ve suspended my bird feeders and speared chunks of oranges on the branches. We get orioles and hummingbirds galore, and the other birds are beginning to find us too. The hooded orioles are probably my favorites so far. They are bright yellow-orange in color, with black and white wings and tail, and an elegant, velvet black mask that extends like a bib under their chins. They have a sweet tooth, I mean beak, and love the oranges. They also raid the hummingbird feeder for nectar, but have a hard go of it because their beaks are too big to get all the way in to effectively suck out the nectar, so they have to content themselves with little sips at a time.

There are miles and miles of dirt roads and hiking trails here, which we’ve only barely begun to explore. We’ve heard from some others camped here (yep, more Canadians) that Los Bariles is very expensive and not that great, so we’re going in by car today to check it out, buy groceries, and do laundry. If we like it better than the Canadians do (there is a beach), we might move. Otherwise, we’re very happy where we are, and will probably stay until Wednesday, and then maybe go back to Playa El Tecolote for a few days before meandering our way back north.