San Jose del Cabo (Baja California Mexico)

San Jose del Cabo is a city in Mexico's Baja California Sur state, with population around 100,000 (metro over 300,000). The road distance to the more popular cruise port Cabo San Lucas is approx 33 km (20 mi), or around 30 min drive.

As cruise port, San Jose del Cabo offers a large, well-protected (by two breakwaters) deepwater marina harbour serving pleasure boats and mega-yachts. A popular sports fishing and diving location is Gorda Banks (just off San Jose del Cabo Marina). Being a tender cruise port, larger ships to San Jose del Cabo anchor at sea and their passengers are transported/ferried to the Yacht Marina via tender boats.

San Jose del Cabo and Cabo San Lucas form a major tourism travel destination, with over 900,000 annual hotel guests. Both cities are served by Los Cabos International Airport. The airport serves domestic flights connecting to Mexico City, Culiacan, Los Mochis, Guadalajara, El Bajio, Loreto, Tijuana, Mazatlan, Monterrey. International flights connect with Canada (Toronto, Calgary, Vancouver, Victoria BC, Edmonton, Kelowna, Montreal, Ottawa), USA (Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco, San Jose, Portland Oregon, Sacramento, Seattle, Milwaukee, Atlanta, Salt Lake City, Detroit, Minneapolis-St Paul, NYC, Chicago, Denver, Las Vegas, Austin, Baltimore, Dallas, Houston, Washington DC) and UK (London).

San Jose del Cabo was established as a Catholic church mission in 1730. Nearby Rio San Jose (river) was useful to the Spaniards as a freshwater source for their galleons (large, multi-decked sailing ships) traveling between North America and Asia (Philippines). Rio San Jose empties into an estuary in southern Baja, after flowing underground for 39 km (24 mi) from Sierra de la Laguna (mountains). For over 250 years, the river was used for drinking water and irrigation. Until early-20th-century, the river used to flow above ground. Sand bar (length ~1 km) divides the estuary from San Jose del Cabo Bay (Sea of Cortez).