Cabo Pulmo

Cabo Pulmo is a village rather than a resort town: a scatter of low buildings, a few palapa restaurants and a dirt main street, with limited power and services. Diving runs on pangas launched straight off the beach, pushed into the surf by truck, and the ride to most sites takes minutes rather than an hour. Two-tank mornings are the standard shape of a day, and boats return to the same stretch of sand between dives, so gear stays simple and turnaround is quick.

The reef is a set of rocky ridges running roughly parallel to the shoreline, with hard coral growing in patches on that rock rather than forming continuous structure. The inshore fingers are shallow and calm enough that snorkellers work them alongside divers; the outer ridges sit deeper, catch more water movement and hold the larger schools. Sand channels between the ridges keep navigation simple, and the sunken trawler is the main piece of structure that is not natural rock.

The park is a no-take reserve, and its rules shape a dive day more than the terrain does. Operators need park authorisation, a guide goes with every group, gloves and contact with the reef are out, boats use fixed moorings rather than anchors, and the number of divers on a site at once is limited. What that produces underwater is fish that hold their ground: schools keep their shape as divers approach, and larger residents sit close enough that wide-angle work does not involve chasing anything.

It suits newer divers and families, with sites running from about 3 to 25 metres in generally mild current, and rewards anyone more interested in fish density than in visibility figures, because the water is often green and particulate. More experienced divers sometimes find the site list repetitive across a full week, so many treat the village as a two- or three-day stop on a wider East Cape trip. Evenings are quiet: no dive-town bar scene, and an early start expected the next morning.