The municipality of Comondú will hold its inaugural Vendimia Del Cinco Harvest Festival on Saturday, July 11, at Rancho El Chino, about 220 kilometers north of La Paz on Highway 1. The one-day event celebrates Del Cinco artisanal wine, made from 100% organic grapes grown in the community of La Toba in the Santo Domingo Valley. Admission costs 1,000 pesos (roughly $57 USD) and includes a bottle of Vino Del Cinco, a commemorative cup, food tastings, live music, and a traditional grape-stomping ceremony. For anyone who has only associated Baja wine with Valle de Guadalupe, 1,000 kilometers to the north, this Comondú harvest festival marks a different chapter entirely.
Santo Domingo Valley Grew Food Before It Grew Wine
Comondú, home to about 73,020 residents according to the 2020 census, sits in one of Baja California Sur’s most productive agricultural zones. The Santo Domingo Valley has supplied much of the peninsula’s wheat, chickpeas, cotton, and citrus since ejido-era irrigation projects in the mid-20th century transformed the desert plain. Ciudad Constitución, the municipality’s largest city, became a farming hub after the federal government built canal infrastructure in the 1960s and 1970s to draw water from underground aquifers.
But grape cultivation in the valley is relatively new. Viñedo Del Cinco, the vineyard behind the festival, grows its vines in La Toba, a small community east of Ciudad Constitución. The winery produces four labels, all from grapes it grows organically on its own land. Unlike the Valle de Guadalupe corridor in Baja California’s Ensenada municipality, where more than 150 wineries now compete for attention and vineyard acreage commands premium prices, the Santo Domingo Valley has no established wine tourism infrastructure. This festival is an explicit attempt to build one.
Maribel Collins, director of SETUE (Baja California Sur’s Ministry of Tourism and Economy), framed the event as an economic development play. “This harvest festival represents an opportunity to expand the reach of our products and strengthen the economic activity of our communities,” Collins said. State government backing through SETUE gives the effort institutional weight that similar grassroots food festivals in BCS have sometimes lacked.
25 Restaurants, Four Oyster Farms, and a Grape Stomp
The festival program goes well beyond wine. Organizers confirmed 25 restaurants, four oyster farms, and chefs from municipalities across BCS. The restaurant list includes Chamizzo, Coffee Break, Don Donas, NOVE Restaurants, Charos Seafood, Don Luis Croissant & More, Cecinas Medina’s, and SUCRÉ Pâtisserie, among others. Loreto will send several restaurants and members of its bar association, offering dishes inspired by the colonial city’s cuisine.
The four oyster farms include the Nativos de Zaragoza cooperative, which will pair its shellfish with Del Cinco wine tastings. Oyster farming has grown steadily along the BCS Pacific coast, particularly in the Bahía Magdalena estuary system near Comondú. Pairing local oysters with local wine gives the festival a terroir-driven identity that mirrors what Valle de Guadalupe built over the past two decades.
Entertainment includes a performance by the comedy group Los Huizapoles, and singer María García will headline the live music program. The grape-stomping ceremony, a harvest festival staple borrowed from European vendimia traditions, rounds out the day.
Tickets Available From Los Cabos to Loreto
Organizers set up a peninsula-wide ticket distribution network. In La Paz, tickets are sold at Las Tres Vírgenes, El Zarape, and Nacuii restaurants. In Todos Santos, Café La Perla has them. In Los Cabos, buyers can reach sommelier Hassan Mora directly. Ciudad Constitución tickets are at Óptica Laga, Loreto tickets at Café Olé, and La Toba tickets through the Telcel/Tecnocell Insurgentes distributor.
The wide distribution suggests organizers are targeting visitors from across BCS, not just locals. Highway 1 connects all these cities in a single corridor. Rancho El Chino sits roughly halfway between La Paz and Loreto, making a day trip feasible from either city. From Los Cabos, the drive is about three and a half hours north on Highway 1, a stretch that passes through El Triunfo and La Paz before reaching the Santo Domingo Valley.
For those already road-tripping the peninsula, Comondú offers stops beyond the festival itself. The twin oasis towns of San José de Comondú and San Miguel de Comondú, accessible via a winding mountain road from Highway 1, date to Jesuit mission settlements founded in the early 1700s. Mission San José de Comondú was established in 1708, and the oasis villages still produce figs, dates, and sugarcane using gravity-fed irrigation channels built centuries ago.
Organizers hope the festival becomes an annual event. If it does, it will join a growing calendar of BCS food and agriculture events that includes the Todos Santos Music Festival and the Loreto Food & Wine Festival. The next step depends on turnout July 11 at Rancho El Chino. This article draws on reporting by El Sudcaliforniano.