Photo by Jeff Hester of National Geographic
If you have never been to Cabo Pulmo, this stunning
photograph by National Geographic photographer Jeff Hester should give you all the
reason you need.
“I believe this is what
our oceans should look like”said Hester and who could argue with him on that
point. “For this particular image, I wanted to show some scale ... so I had my
wife, seen in the foreground, swim ahead of me.”
Cabo Pulmo National Park is located just 60 miles north of
Los Cabos.
This jewel of the East Cape region of Baja California Sur
stretches five miles from the northernmost tip, Pulmo Point, to the
southernmost tip, Los Frailes. Surrounded by undeveloped desert and a stunning
mountain range, the pristine beaches of Cabo Pulmo Park give way to a shallow
bay that cradles one of the three living reefs (and the only hard coral reef)
in all of North America.
For many years, this precious place was unprotected, but
through the tenacious efforts of the Cabo Pulmo community, in 1995 it was
finally designated a National Marine Park by the Mexican government. Over the
past 10 years, the park has endured pressures from commercial fishing and abuse
from irresponsible visitors. Additionally, in a region where the locals live on
the seafood they catch by hand, enforcing a ban on fishing presents a real
challenge.
However, both Mexican and American residents are committed
to protecting the marine environment and promoting sustainable fishing
practices.
The reef, estimated to be 20,000 years old, is the
northernmost coral reef in the eastern Pacific. The reef has a number of
fingers of hard coral occurring in progressively deeper water offshore.