The 34th annual Fiesta de la Pitaya in Miraflores will open with something new this year: a commemorative parade through the center of this small Sierra de la Laguna farming community. The procession starts at 5 p.m. on Saturday, July 18, departing from the Mercadito de las Mujeres and ending at the Casa de la Cultura, named for the late local educator Francisca Monroy Vda. de Collins. The route covers Calle Carrera, Calle Libertad, and Avenida Unión in the town’s colonia Centro. Local festival queens will ride in classic cars alongside musicians, stilt-walking performers, and a traditional rondalla ensemble.
34 Years of Celebrating the Sierra’s Cactus Fruit Harvest
The Fiesta de la Pitaya Miraflores dates back to 1992, when residents of this community of roughly 3,000 people organized a celebration around the annual pitaya harvest. Pitaya is the fruit of the columnar cacti that cover the foothills of the Sierra de la Laguna, the mountain range that forms the spine of the Cape Region. The fruit, sometimes called “pitahaya dulce” in Baja California Sur, comes in shades of deep red, magenta, and yellow. It ripens during a narrow summer window, typically from late June through August, depending on rainfall.
For centuries, the pitaya held enormous importance for the indigenous Pericú and Guaycura peoples who inhabited the southern cape. Jesuit missionaries documented that the pitaya harvest season was the most abundant food period of the year for these groups. The missionaries called it the season of “pitahayas,” noting that entire communities would relocate to follow the ripening fruit across the desert landscape. That deep cultural connection to the fruit persists in the ranching communities of the Sierra de la Laguna today.
Miraflores sits about 70 kilometers northeast of Cabo San Lucas, along the road that connects the tourist corridor to the town of Santiago and the Sierra’s hiking trails. The community has long been known for its leather workshops, where artisans produce saddles, belts, and huarache sandals. But the pitaya festival has become the town’s signature cultural event. Over three decades, it has grown from a small local gathering into a multi-day celebration that typically includes cooking contests, live music, rodeo events, and displays of pitaya-based foods and drinks.
The fruit itself is striking. Each pitaya cactus produces only a handful of fruits per season, and harvesters use long poles to pick them from the tops of tall, spiny columns. The flesh is sweet and juicy, with a texture similar to kiwi. In Miraflores, locals make pitaya jam, pitaya ice cream, pitaya wine, and agua fresca from the fruit. Some ranchers still follow the old practice of drying the seeds and grinding them into a flour called “second harvest,” a technique inherited from the peninsula’s original inhabitants.
Miraflores Sits One Hour From the Tourist Corridor
Getting to Miraflores from San José del Cabo takes about 45 minutes by car. From Cabo San Lucas, the drive is roughly an hour. The route follows Highway 1 north to the turnoff at Las Cuevas, then a paved two-lane road east into the foothills. The town has no hotels geared toward tourists, but Santiago, about 15 minutes farther up the road, has a few small inns. Most visitors make the trip as a day outing.
The parade on July 18 marks the opening event of the broader festival, which typically runs for several days. Municipal authorities have not yet released a full schedule for the remaining events. The Los Cabos municipal government organized the parade through the Miraflores municipal delegation and ICA, the municipality’s cultural institute. In past years, the festival has included a pitaya queen coronation, cooking competitions using the fruit, and performances by regional norteño and banda groups.
Miraflores sits at the edge of the Sierra de la Laguna Biosphere Reserve, a UNESCO-recognized protected area that contains the only tropical dry forest in the Baja California peninsula. The town serves as one of several jumping-off points for hikes into the reserve, which peaks at 2,090 meters above sea level. Visitors coming for the parade may want to combine the trip with a stop at one of the leather workshops on the main road through town, where artisans sell handmade goods at a fraction of resort-zone prices.
The July 18 parade begins at 5 p.m. to avoid the worst of the summer heat, which regularly exceeds 38°C (100°F) in the Cape Region’s inland valleys during July. The full festival schedule is expected in the coming days from the Los Cabos municipal government, which published the parade announcement on its official website.