Todos Santos Day Trip from Cabo: I'd Go for the Long Lunch

By Cabo Wander

Friends who are planning a second or third trip to Cabo always ask me the same thing. Is Todos Santos worth giving up a beach day for?

My answer is yes, with conditions. It's worth the drive if you treat it as a long lunch in a small old town with a beach stop on the way home, you go in your own rental car, and you go on a weekday late in the week, when the kitchens are all open. I wouldn't go for the Hotel California, I wouldn't go for the shopping, and I wouldn't go on a coach tour that hands you an hour of free time somewhere between a blanket shop and a pearl shop.

Todos Santos is a town for eating and wandering, and it has almost nothing you'd call a sight. That took me a couple of visits to work out. The whole historic center takes about an hour and a half to see. Every time I've loved the day, I did something slow there, like a lunch in a garden, a coffee, or half an hour in a gallery. The times it fell flat, I'd gone looking for attractions and found a church, a plaza and a hotel with a famous name.

It's number six on my list of things to do in Cabo, and it's the day out of town I'd pick first. So let's get into how to do it well.

Is It Worth It?

For the right person it's the best day out of Los Cabos, and for the wrong one it's a wasted day. I'd rather you knew which one you are before you rent the car.

A day visitor gets a shady old center a few blocks square, built in brick by sugar families more than a century ago. There are several good places to eat, which is a lot for a town of about 7,000 people, and a handful of real galleries mixed in with a bigger number of souvenir shops. And fifteen minutes back down the road there's a surf beach with one corner where you can get into the Pacific.

That's the whole list. I've had friends call it the best day of their week, and I've had one who was done in thirty minutes and told me the drive was the good part. What I've noticed is that the happy ones ate a long lunch, and the bored ones either took a tour or came for the sights.

It's also a better day from Cabo San Lucas than from San José del Cabo. San José already has a plaza, a mission church and gallery streets of its own, and honestly its old town is the bigger and more interesting of the two. I cover it in my San José del Cabo guide. From there, Todos Santos is 75 to 90 minutes each way to see a smaller version of what's outside your hotel. If you're based in San José, go for the beach and the lunch, or look at a Cabo Pulmo day trip, which is the other long drive and a very different kind of day.

Todos Santos has the Pueblo Mágico label, which is a tourism designation, and older blog posts still describe a sleepy, cheap artists' town. It's still small and low-rise, with no big resorts. It's also been discovered for a long time now. Prices in the center are Cabo prices, new condos are going up around it, and the town is growing faster than its water supply. I still like it a lot. I just wouldn't go expecting a bargain or a secret.

How I'd Do the Day

I do the town first, lunch in the middle and Cerritos on the way home. Most plans you'll see run it the other way around, with the beach in the morning, and every tour runs its own order of shop, shop, hotel, lunch, home.

These times are for a winter day from a hotel near Médano Beach. They shift with the season. The one rule that doesn't move is that you're back in Cabo San Lucas before dark, and in late fall and winter it gets dark before six.

Around 8:00. Pick up the car, fill the tank in town and head north on Highway 19.
About 8:45. Coffee in Pescadero, in the garden at Baja Beans. Give it twenty or thirty minutes.
About 9:30. Todos Santos. Park on a side street two or three blocks from the Hotel California and leave the car there.
9:30 to 11:30. Walk the center. The plaza and church, the theater, the gallery streets, and the Hotel California last, for the photo.
11:30, if lunch is tacos. Go to Tacos George's now, before the fish runs out.
1:00, if lunch is the main event. Jazamango when it opens, or Oystera at any hour. Allow an hour and a half. Every lunch I'd consider, and which days each is shut, is in where to eat in Todos Santos.
About 2:30. If you have time, drive a few minutes south to Punta Lobos to see if the fishing boats are coming in.
About 3:00. Cerritos, fifteen minutes back down the highway. Walk, wade in the corner if the flag allows it, or have a taco.
4:15 to 4:30. Leave the beach.
About 5:15. Back in Cabo San Lucas with the light going.

Here's why I do it in that order.

The town is nearly empty before about 10:30. The tour vans leave Cabo San Lucas around nine and roll in at about eleven, and from then until two the sidewalk outside the Hotel California is full of groups following a guide. That busy patch is only about three blocks wide, but it's the three blocks you came to see. At 9:30 you get the same streets cool and quiet, and you can park.

The food runs on that clock too. The best fish tacos in town are sold from mid-morning to mid-afternoon and sell out before closing. The serious lunch places don't open until early afternoon. So the town has to be the middle of your day either way, and a morning at the beach just leaves you arriving with the vans.

Putting Cerritos last also shortens the drive home, because the beach is already ten or fifteen minutes back toward Cabo. That buys you a little daylight at the end of the day, which is when you need it. And you're not walking around a town with salt on your skin.

There are two times I'd change it.

If somebody is taking a surf lesson, do Cerritos first, at 8:30 or 9. The water is calmer in the morning. Then drive up for lunch around one, skip the long walk or do a short one, and leave town by about four.

In the hot months, from July to September, keep the same order and move everything earlier. Be in town by 8:30, be out by 11:30, spend the hot hours at Cerritos and be home by three.

The day has dull parts too. The plaza at noon is hot and empty. The church takes ten minutes. And the drive home is the tightest part of the whole day, so lunch can't drift past three.

The Drive

This is the easiest highway drive in the region, and it's a pretty one. Highway 19 is a free four-lane road that runs up the Pacific coast from the north edge of Cabo San Lucas. You'll read that it's a toll road, and it isn't. Once you're past the last roundabouts it's cactus, mountains on your right and the ocean showing up on your left.

Plan on about an hour to Todos Santos, which is a little under 50 miles, and a bit more door to door from a hotel near Médano. Pescadero and Cerritos come up 10 to 15 minutes before town. The "45 minutes" you'll see quoted is really the time to Cerritos.

From San José, add about half an hour each way. You either drive the Corridor through Cabo San Lucas or take the toll bypass from the airport road, which joins Highway 19 north of San Lucas. The booth on the bypass wants cash, so carry pesos.

A few things I do every time:

Fill up before you leave Cabo San Lucas. The round trip is about 100 miles and uses less than US$20 of gas in a small car, so one tank is plenty. I just don't like hunting for a station on a day trip.
Download the map. I wouldn't count on a signal the whole way.
Remember the signs are in kilometers.
Bring pesos in small bills. The taco stands and the parking attendant at the beach are cash.

I don't drive this road after dark, and that rule shapes the whole day. It runs through open ranch land, the fencing is patchy, and livestock wander onto the highway at night. In late November the sun sets around 5:30, so in winter that means leaving town by about 4:15 at the very latest, or Cerritos by 4:30. In early July the sun is up past seven and you have a lot more room. I talk about night driving and the other real risks here in is Cabo safe.

If you haven't rented here before, the price you see online isn't the price you'll pay, and I explain the insurance in renting a car in Cabo. And if you look at the map and notice La Paz is only about an hour past Todos Santos on the same road, please don't try to add it to this day. I go through that one in my La Paz day trip post.

The Town on Foot

The historic center is a small grid you can cross in a few minutes, and a slow loop of all of it takes 60 to 90 minutes. That's the right amount of time to give it. Any longer and you're filling time until lunch.

Start at the plaza. The church sits on it, on the site of an eighteenth-century mission, though the building you walk into has been rebuilt and extended over the years and it's plain inside. The old theater is on the plaza too, and around the corner there's a cultural center in a former schoolhouse with murals in the courtyard and a small museum. I'd look in if the door is open, and I wouldn't plan around it, because I've never been able to pin down its hours.

Then walk the streets behind it. What I like best here is the buildings themselves. The town got rich on sugar cane, and the brick houses those families built are still standing, a lot of them now hotels and restaurants. You can still spot an old mill chimney or two.

The galleries are on those same few streets. Galería de Todos Santos is the one I'd walk into first. It's been open for about thirty years and shows a dozen or so painters, most of them Mexican.

The shopping is good for original paintings, and for looking. For souvenirs it isn't. You'll be offered the same striped blanket and the same painted ceramic skull you saw on the marina in Cabo San Lucas. I've seen nice hand-tooled leather bags, and that's about where my shopping list ends. If browsing is your main reason for coming, I'd save the drive.

Street parking is free as far as I've ever seen, and the blocks around the Hotel California are the hardest place in town to find a space. Don't circle, just park two or three streets away and walk.

The Hotel California

It has nothing to do with the Eagles song. The song is the most common reason people make this drive, and you'll still find tours selling it as the place from the song.

The hotel opened under the name Hotel California in 1950, which is a good quarter century before the song came out. It later traded under a different name and went back to the old one in 2001. The band has said plainly that there's no connection. They took the hotel to court over it, in part because Eagles songs were being played on the property, and their complaint listed the T-shirts, the posters and the refrigerator magnets. The case ended with the hotel dropping its US trademark application and keeping its name.

As a stop, it's a red-walled building on the main corner with a courtyard, a bar that's open to people who aren't staying there, and a gift shop. Walk through the lobby to the courtyard, take the picture of the sign, look at the magnets and go. It took me ten minutes.

I don't mind it at all as a photo. I'd just hate for you to drive an hour for one.

Where to Eat

The food is the best reason to come, so this is the part to plan before you leave Cabo. The day of the week and the time of day matter more than anything else. Closing days here are scattered across Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, and a couple of the well-known names don't serve lunch at all. Check the place you've picked the day before you go.

The Long Lunch

Jazamango is the lunch I'd build the day around. It's chef Javier Plascencia's garden restaurant, a few minutes from the center, with tables set beside the herb beds and a wood oven going. I'd order the short rib empanada and the house ceviche to start, and then the grilled octopus or the roast suckling pig. On Sundays there's lamb barbacoa. It's good, and the garden and the service are a big part of why. It isn't flawless. I've had a dish there that was swimming in butter, and the kitchen can close earlier than the posted hours, so I wouldn't turn up late. It opens for lunch in the early afternoon and it's closed one day midweek. I've seen that day given as two different days, so check. For a one o'clock table on a winter weekend, book ahead. It's the priciest of my picks.

Oystera is the one I'd pick for the setting, and it's the safe choice on any day, because it's open straight through from mid-morning to evening, every day. It's an oyster and champagne bar in an old sugar mill, with a garden patio and its own parking lot. Order the oysters, raw or grilled with chili butter, and maybe a shrimp cocktail, and stop there. Once I've gone past the oysters I've been let down. The shrimp tacos were dry and the cocktails were weak. It's expensive for what it is, and I'd still go back for a dozen oysters in that courtyard.

Cocina de Campo by Agricole is the easiest stop on the route, because it's right on the highway in Pescadero, on a working organic farm with a farm shop attached. It's open-air with a wood oven, and the duck confit tacos and the wood-fired pizza are what I'd order. I know it less well than the other two, and it's been uneven on portions and prices, so I'd treat it as a convenient stop and not as the lunch to build the day around. Its hours are listed differently in different places, including which midweek day it takes off, and I'd check before any trip in late summer.

All three are sit-down prices, about what you'd pay for a nice lunch in Cabo. If you're building a whole trip around eating, my Cabo picks are in the best restaurants in Cabo.

The Taco Lunch

Tacos George's is the cheap lunch, and it comes with a deadline. It's a stand on the main street that sells battered fish tacos and battered shrimp tacos, and that's the whole menu. It's open from mid-morning to mid-afternoon, it often sells out well before closing, and it shuts on the big Mexican holidays. Cash only. For me it's the best fish taco in town, and the only way to miss it is to show up at 2:30.

Santo Chilote is my backup when George's has run out, because it stays open into the evening. It's two blocks from the Hotel California, with fish and shrimp tacos you dress yourself at the toppings bar, plus ceviche and aguachile. The coconut shrimp taco is the one that's been recommended to me longest. Cash only here too.

Tacos y Mariscos El Sinaloense is the third one I'd send you to, for fish and shrimp tacos and the ceviche tostadas. It's closed on Mondays.

Don't expect the taco prices you've been paying at a cart in Cabo San Lucas. The center of Todos Santos charges more for nearly everything.

Coffee and Breakfast

Baja Beans in Pescadero is where I stop on the way up. They roast on site, you sit in a quiet garden under a palapa, and the avocado toast is really good. On Sundays there's usually a farmers' and craft market there with live music, which makes it a longer stop.

If you'd like breakfast with an ocean view, Benno at Hotel San Cristóbal serves one on the beach at Punta Lobos, and you don't have to be a hotel guest. It's a peaceful spot and the service is lovely. Please note that it serves breakfast and dinner only. I see it recommended for a day-trip lunch all the time, and there's no lunch to have.

Cerritos Beach

Cerritos is the beach stop on this day, and it's a surf beach with one corner you can swim in. It's about 8 miles south of Todos Santos, 10 or 15 minutes back toward Cabo. Where to swim, where to park and what a surf lesson costs are in my Cerritos Beach guide.

What I love about it is that it's the one place on this whole Pacific coast where regular people get in the water. It's wide and sandy, beginners are wobbling to their feet on longboards all along it, and late in the afternoon the light is gorgeous.

If you want to swim, walk north to the cove under the rocky point, by the big yellow hotel. It's shallow and sandy there and the waves are gentler. In high season there are lifeguards, and I stay in front of them, on a small day, and only when the flag allows it. The rest of the beach has a rip current. The channel where the surfers paddle out is that current, so look at where they're going and swim somewhere else. Even in the corner there's some undertow, so keep kids close.

I'm consistent about this in the best swimmable beaches in Cabo, where Cerritos sits under the beaches you can't really swim at. If swimming is the goal of your day, the coves near Cabo are closer and safer.

Older posts describe an empty surf break, and that's changed. Cerritos is a busy beach with services now. There are restaurants, a pharmacy and even an OXXO close to the sand, plus surf schools, umbrellas for rent and people selling drinks and massages. New condos are going up around it. I don't mind the bustle. It's just good to know it's not a deserted beach anymore.

A few practical things:

Parking. You turn off the highway onto dirt. You may be charged a small fee to park near the sand, or you can use the free spots on the main street and walk a bit. Either way it's a longer walk from the car than you expect.
The sand gets HOT. In the warm months, wear your flip-flops right down to the water.
Bathrooms. Plan on buying something at a restaurant to use one.
Surf lessons. There are several schools working right on the beach. As a rough guide, a group lesson runs about US$60 and a private one about US$85, and I'd confirm the price on the day.
Dogs. Some days there are a lot of loose ones, and some days I haven't seen any.

For food, Barracuda Cantina is where I'd go. It's a taco truck with a bar, a three-minute walk back from the beach, so don't look for it on the sand. The fish taco of the day and the ceviche are both excellent, there's a fried avocado taco if you're done with fish, and the mezcal margarita is small and strong. That last one is for the passenger. It opens around noon, it's closed one day midweek, and in high season it sometimes closes early because the fish has run out.

The Other Beaches

None of the other beaches around Todos Santos are for swimming. They're all open Pacific, with heavy shore break and strong currents. You may see one or two of them described online as sheltered or swimmable, and I wouldn't believe it. The local rule is the one I follow, which is that if the people who live here aren't in the water, I'm not either.

Each one is still good for something.

Punta Lobos. About two miles south of town, beside Hotel San Cristóbal. This is where the fishing fleet works off the sand, and in the afternoon the open boats come in fast and run right up the beach. You can buy fish, and there are sea lions on the rocks. I can't give you a time for the boats, so treat it as a quick look if you're passing. Stay well back from the water.
La Cachora. About ten minutes west of the center at the end of a dirt road. It's dunes and a long, empty beach to walk, and in winter there are whales offshore. If that's what you came for, you'll get a much closer look from a boat, which I cover in whale watching in Cabo.
La Pastora. North of town on a rough dirt road. It's a surf break for experienced surfers, with a restaurant on the sand called The Green Room, where you eat seafood with your feet in the sand. It's at its best at sunset, which is exactly when a day-tripper should be on the highway.
Las Tunas. Northwest of town. This is where the sea turtle camp is, and I'll come back to it under staying the night.
San Pedrito and Las Palmas. Between Todos Santos and Pescadero. San Pedrito is for experienced surfers, and Las Palmas is a walk through a palm oasis to the beach.

On a basic rental policy, the tires, the glass and the underside of the car are usually on you, so think about that before you take a low car out on the dirt roads to La Pastora or the turtle camp.

Without a Car

You can do it, and I'd think hard about which version.

A Group Tour

Tours run about US$90 to $150 a person. My problem with them is the free time. On the big coach versions it can be as little as one hour in town, inside a day that runs close to ten hours from the first hotel pickup to the last drop-off. The rest goes to collecting people, a blanket-weaving workshop, a pearl shop where the selling can get pushy, and a tequila tasting on the way out. The ones built for cruise passengers give you even less. None of them stop at Cerritos or Pescadero.

The guides are good, and I've heard nothing but nice things about them. And a few of the smaller tours do give you two hours or more on your own.

So if you're booking one, ask three things:

How many minutes of free time do I get in town? "Free time to explore" with no number attached is the answer to be suspicious of.
Is lunch included? On some tours it's an extra, and it's a set meal at the Hotel California.
How many shop stops are there, and what's the first pickup time?

There are also combo tours that add a camel ride to a shorter visit to the town. That's two half-experiences, and my thoughts on the camel part are in Cabo ATV and camel tours.

A Driver for the Day

This is the option I like best for a group. A Suburban and a driver for a full day runs roughly US$450 to $600 before the tip. You choose every stop, Cerritos included, and everyone gets a margarita at lunch. With four people it's about the same per head as the tour, and with five or six it's cheaper. For two, it's a lot of money.

The Coach

A long-distance coach line called Águila runs between Cabo San Lucas and Todos Santos. The ride is about an hour and a quarter, the fare is roughly 150 to 275 pesos each way, and it lets you off on the main street a few blocks from the plaza. The terminal in Cabo San Lucas is on the edge of town and nowhere near the marina, so you'd take an Uber to it.

It gets you to the town and nothing else. There's no practical way to add the beach or Pescadero. And I can't give you a timetable, because I've never found two that agree. So I think the coach works much better for an overnight than for a day trip. If you do use it for the day, get the return times at the terminal before you buy anything, and know when the last one leaves before you sit down to lunch.

Uber

Uber will take you there. It won't bring you home, and I wouldn't plan a day around hoping it does. All of these, with the prices for getting around the rest of Los Cabos, are in getting around Cabo.

What It Costs for Two

This is my own rough arithmetic for two people. It's meant to show you the shape of it, so please don't hold me to the dollar.

By rental car:

The car for one day, insurance in: about US$60 to $100
Gas: under US$20
Parking at Cerritos: nothing, or a few dollars
Coffee in Pescadero: about US$10 to $20
Lunch: tacos and a beer at the low end, or a long lunch with a drink each at the high end

That comes to about US$110 to $190 with a taco lunch, or about US$180 to $300 with the long lunch. The lunch part of that is my estimate. Two group surf lessons would add roughly another US$120 to $170.

By group tour: about US$215 to $380 for two, once you've added tips for the guide and driver and a lunch where it isn't included.

So for two people, the car costs about the same as the tour or less, and it gets you Cerritos, Pescadero, your own choice of lunch and four or five hours on your own schedule where the tour gives you one. What the tour buys you is somebody else doing the driving and a drink with lunch. It doesn't save you money.

If you're on your own, it flips. One seat on a tour or on the coach is cheaper than a car. And for four or more, price the driver.

Where a day like this sits in the budget for the whole trip is in how much Cabo costs.

When to Go

The best day is a Thursday or a Friday between November and April. Saturday works too.

The day of the week matters more here than in most places. Thursday through Saturday is when everything is open. Monday to Wednesday has closures scattered through it, so one of my taco picks is shut on Mondays, and Jazamango and the taco truck at Cerritos each take a day off midweek. Sunday is a good day in its own way. You get the market at Baja Beans and the barbacoa at Jazamango, and you also get a full beach at Cerritos.

By season, here's how it goes:

November to February. The best walking weather of the year, with cool mornings, so bring a layer. This is high season for the restaurants, so book the one o'clock table. The ocean at Cerritos is in the low to mid 70s and the surf is bigger. The days are short, and this is when the leave-by-4:15 rule really applies. One week in winter the town hosts a music festival and fills up for it, so rooms and tables are harder to get.
March and April. Warm, dry and a little quieter after the winter peak. The water is at its coldest of the year, about 71°F, and the Pacific side gets windy. Over Easter week the beaches are packed with families.
May and June. Quiet, dry and warming up, with long days. Some galleries start keeping shorter weeks.
July to September. It's hot by late morning and humid, a good many restaurants close for weeks or cut their hours, and the plaza is empty. I'd make it a morning or skip it. This is also when a storm swell can close the beaches and a big rain can send water across the roads.
October. Places reopen through the month, and not everything is back until November.

Whenever you go, be in town before 10:30. The tour groups are there from roughly eleven to two.

The rest of the calendar, storms included, is in the best time to visit Cabo.

Staying the Night

If you finish this post wishing the day were longer, stay over. There are a few things that just don't fit into a day trip that gets you home before dark, and they're some of the best things about the place.

The first is the evening. The plaza that's hot and deserted at noon fills up after dark, right when the day-trippers have gone home. Dinner at Jazamango or Benno, or sunset with your feet in the sand at La Pastora, all belong to people who are sleeping here.

The second is the turtles. From roughly December to March, a volunteer group called Tortugueros Las Playitas releases sea turtle hatchlings on the beach at Las Tunas at sunset. It's free and open to everybody, and they're glad of a donation. You get there about half an hour before sunset, park where the dirt road ends and walk in. You'll see it listed in day-trip itineraries, and it doesn't work as one, because it's dark when the release ends and you'd be driving the highway at night.

For a place to sleep, Hotel San Cristóbal is the one I can point you to. It's a design-forward hotel right on the beach at Punta Lobos, a few minutes south of town, where you can watch the fishermen work from your lounger. The beach isn't swimmable, so it's a pool hotel, and it's expensive. The rest of my picks, in town and out, are in the best hotels in Todos Santos.

Beyond that, there's a real range. There are small hotels in the old brick houses in the center, where you can walk to dinner, a very high-end, adults-only place out in the farmland south of town, and surf hotels at Cerritos. Rooms go from around a hundred dollars a night to several hundred. Don't think of it as a cheaper alternative to Cabo, because it isn't one.

Who Should Skip It

I'd rather talk you out of this now than have you find out at 11:15 on the plaza.

You're coming for the Hotel California. It's ten minutes and a gift shop. If you go anyway, go knowing that.
You want a swimming day. It's a long drive to a beach that's less safe than the coves you left behind.
You're a shopper. Unless you're in the market for an original painting, the stock is the same as in Cabo.
You don't drive and you have four or five days. I'd skip the coach tour and take a second swim morning. My 5-day Cabo itinerary has that trade in it.
You're staying in San José's old town. You already have the plaza and the galleries. Go only if the lunch or a surf lesson is the draw.
You're here from July to September. A morning at most.
You're off a cruise ship. The ship's excursion gives you less than an hour on your own. A swim near the marina is a better use of six hours.
You have kids under ten. The town will bore them in half an hour. Cerritos is the draw for them, with care, so make it a beach day with a taco stop.

The people who should absolutely go are couples or friends based in Cabo San Lucas who have a car and like a long lunch, and anyone who plans trips around food. Beginner surfers should go too, and they should make Cerritos the main event and treat the town as lunch.

The Verdict

Todos Santos is worth the drive as a long lunch in a small old town, with a coffee stop on the way up and a beach stop on the way home. It isn't worth it as a sightseeing day, and I think that mismatch is why people come back with such different opinions of it.

What I love is the food, the brick buildings, the shade and how quiet the streets are at 9:30 in the morning. What I wish were different is the clock. The town is at its liveliest in the evening, and the road home means a day-tripper never sees that. I also wish it were still the inexpensive little place the old blog posts describe.

I'd do it again on every trip where I have a spare day and a car, and the next time, I'd stay the night.

Here's where I'd send you:

Based in Cabo San Lucas, with a car, and you like to eat: go. Thursday or Friday, town first.
You surf, or want to learn: go, and do Cerritos in the morning.
A group of four to six: hire a driver for the day and let everybody have a drink at lunch.
Based in San José: it's optional. Go for the lunch and the beach, or pick the other long drive.
No car, short trip: skip it, or take a tour only after you've asked how many minutes of free time you get.
You love food and have a night to spare: stay over.

So, the day from start to finish: rent a car for the day, leave at 8, gas up first. Coffee at Baja Beans in Pescadero. Park a few blocks from the Hotel California and walk the town before the tours show up at 11. Fish tacos at George's before they sell out, or book Jazamango for 1 and check it's open that day. Hotel California is a photo, it's got nothing to do with the song. Cerritos on the way back, only swim in the corner under the point. Off the beach by 4:30... you want to be home before dark.

Quick Answers

Is Todos Santos worth a day trip from Cabo? Yes, if you like food, old buildings and a quiet walk, and you go by car. If you want sights or things to do, probably not. The town itself takes about an hour and a half to see.

How far is Todos Santos from Cabo San Lucas? A little under 50 miles on Highway 19, a free four-lane road. Plan on about an hour, and 75 to 90 minutes from San José. Cerritos is 10 to 15 minutes before town.

Is the Hotel California in Todos Santos the one from the Eagles song? No. The hotel had the name long before the song was written, there's no connection between them, and the band has said so. It's a ten-minute photo stop.

Can you swim at Cerritos? In one corner, under the rocky point at the north end, in front of the lifeguards, on a small day and when the flag allows it. The rest of the beach has a rip current, and none of the other beaches near Todos Santos are for swimming.

Can I get to Todos Santos without a car? Yes, on a group tour for about US$90 to $150 a person, with a private driver for the day, or on the Águila coach. An Uber will take you there but won't bring you back.