My wife and I made our first trip to Mexico with my best friend Bill and his girlfriend way back in 2004. I won't bore you with the details of our vacation other than to make mention of our little excursion along the spine of Land's End.
From the first moment we hit our hotel with its beautiful view of El Arco Bill and I just knew we were going to climb the hill/mini-mountain you see in this picture. It was just a matter of 'when.' Luckily, the girls wanted to do some shopping and knew we'd just be dead weight so they gave us the green light to do what we wanted. the only special instructions we received were quite simple: don't get your selves killed. Uh, ok...
Bill and I wandered around the marina trying to figure out how to get up the thing as it was cordoned off by a very high fence and the black-uniformed federales waved their rifles around and politely told us "No!" when we asked them for some directions.
Undaunted, we made our way around mucho construction and into one of the big hotels on the Pacific side. We acted like we were guests and just waltzed right through the lobby and out onto the sands. From there it was easy to see where we needed to go. We headed down the strand and I found a suitable path up the cliff like face of the huge hill. It was rocky, slippery, fairly steep, but really not that difficult though it was near 100 degrees and I could hear Bill breathing like a cardiac patient in a TB ward. Once we got to the top Bill decided we couldn't go down the way we had come. I disagreed. However, as Bill pointed out it was my idea to climb the thing and as such it was my responsibility to find an easier,safer way down.
Bill complained that he was going to die from the heat before we reached the summit but I went to the top to see how rough it was going to be. Once over some boulders, the going was fairly easy and I was able to convince him that the hard part was over. He left his shady shelter beneath the boulders and made an ascent with me before collapsing near a very large white cross - that made me wonder grimly if it weren't set their for all the other stupid gringos who had dared to make the climb. Me, I was feeling fine and not even winded in the least but Bill had me a little worried as his skin had become more red than his hair. It would get worse for him.
The summit provided beautiful views in every direction. The locals had said that pirates often set their lookouts upon the summit for that very same reason and I could see why. Bill caught his wind after a lengthy sit down to admire the sites while I began to look for a "safer" way down. I must have went up and down about twenty washouts before I found one I knew he could make without too much difficulty.
The problem was that we couldn't head north because of the fence and the policia. Plus, one of the cops had said that an old man lived near the base and had dogs that he would sic on us if we trespassed too close to his home. I had gone a little more than halfway down the east side of the mini-mountain when - I shit you not - we heard dogs barking like crazy. Not liking the idea that we'd get munched on on the cliff face for all of Cabo to see we headed south. Now, they call it Land's End for a reason and even though the spiny ridge of hills and giant rock gets smaller as it is swallowed by the Pacific on one side and the Sea of Cortez on the other the drop offs on the bay side were still 50+ feet straight down into the water where more large rocks waited like hungry teeth. I finally found a way down on the west side, very near what is called Divorce Beach, and coaxed Bill down. By now, I was getting pretty warm myself and I knew Bill was feeling it something fierce. I scouted around while Bill took his sweet time descending to the death pit (that's what we called it - I love the heat but that bowl of sand and rock was HOT, like an oven) and found that we could walk through a small corridor between the rocks and make our way to the bay side. That was good because when we got to the bottom I realized that we couldn't have gotten back the way we came. The waves were too big to swim so we dragged our carcasses to the bay side and were planning on resting up for awhile and then trying to swim across the bay back to land. I was a little worried because of all the rocks beneath the surface plus, a hurricane was churning about 300 miles away somewhere to the west and creating waves that seemed to grow in size every ten minutes. Oh, I forgot to tell you about the sea lions. They were sunning themselves on many of the rocks which jutted from beneath the surface and several were swimming right by where we were planning to launch ourselves. So, swimming wasn't going to be easy especially in our condition.
For brevity's sake I have left out much of the humorous side-stories that occurred during these four hours, of which the sea-lions play a large role, and will focus on our "rescue." Luckily, a boat approached us on the little wisp of beach called Lover's beach. We thought they were coming to rescue us but actually they were ferrying a group of people to the beach who were trying to beat the storm and get some time in one of Cabo's main attractions. W couldn't believe our luck and jumped into the boat and headed home to La Villa hotel. Well, what Bill did can't be called jumping into the boat. He was nearly crushed between the boat and the rock wall as he clung onto the side, literally unable to pull himself up the side as he was so exhausted from the heat and the climb (not to mention a lifetime of smoking and drinking) . The boat fought frantically against waves that were seriously approaching twice our height. Luckily, we were able to pull Bill aboard like he was some floundering mackerel before he was squashed like a bug against the rocks.
The climb itself really wasn't difficult. It did prove to be treacherous footing now and then and fairly steep in places forcing us to use hands, feet and knees to get up some stretches of the cliff face. However, we severely underestimated the size of the thing and how quickly the temperature could climb. What we planned for was what you see in the picture, the other side of it was much larger than we thought.
I think it may be illegal to climb the peak and if it isn't then i know that it is frowned upon so be careful and look out for the dogs. It was a fun climb, a blast really, and aside from the very loose scree, the snakes and scorpions, plus some jackrabbits (long and skinny), it wasn't that dangerous. Wonderful views, cooling breezes, and fond memories helped make this the highlight of my trip.
the grub
