Balandra's infamous mushroom rock
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Balandra's infamous mushroom rock |
Anchored in Estero Balandra after our calm crossing of the Sea of Cortez from Mazatlan, we emerged from the v-berth after a nap that lasted into the afternoon. Putting our cockpit shade up in the brilliant sun we were greeted with what seemed like hundreds of tiny little black flies, "bobos" according to one book we had. They are the most annoying flies on earth; they don't bite but just crawl all over you, in your ears, up your nose and behind your glasses in their search for fresh water. Despite our beautiful surroundings -- clear aqua water, white sandy beaches against a dramatic rocky shoreline -- we stayed below huddling behind the safety of our bug screens.
The next day, we crept out, hoping the bugs wouldn't notice as we launched our dinghy to explore the bay. What a gorgeous place! Most of the interior of the bay is shoal, and you can see clearly to the bottom in over 20 feet of water. Ashore, we had a little hike around and of course visited the famous "mushroom rock" balancing precariously on the beach. Up on the hill above the beach, the views were breathtaking of the surrounding mountains and islands, all formed from beautiful multi-colored volcanic rock.
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Sailing towards Isla Espiritu Santo |
That night we experienced our first coromel, the southerly winds that blow 20-30 knots during the night in La Paz bay. Luckily the westerly hills of Balandra protected us from most of the waves, but many still found their way into the bay and we spent a largely sleepless rolly night listening to the intense wind gusts vibrate our mast. The Sea of Cortez is beautiful, but cruising here does not come without it's challenges!
By mid-morning the next day, the wind was still blowing lightly from the SW so we decided to take advantage of the breeze and sail up to Islas Espiritu Santo and Partida, just a few miles north. We sailed off the anchor with our big genoa and got about two miles out of Balandra when the wind died to nothing and we motored the last few hot miles to our anchorage at Partida Cove, the large anchorage fairly protected between the two islands (separated only by a very narrow and shallow passage).
Islas Espiritu Santo and Partida are very beautiful, formed of colorful red and purple volcanic rock, covered with delicate desert plants and cactus. Much of the bay is quite shallow, allowing the bottom to be seen clearly in most of the anchorage area through the lovely blue-green water, just a spectacular contrast with the red desert hills that surround the anchorage like being in a giant crater.
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Exploring the cool shallows |
Although largely calm during that day, our first night in Partida the SW winds came up again and we spent most of the night bouncing around, awake. By morning the wind was once again calm and we enjoyed another warm sunny 75 degree day. We still had to contend with lots of the tiny black bobo flies, which seemed to hang out on the boat mostly. We either had to be exploring on shore or locked up below with screens on all hatches to keep them off us.
We lost track of the days in Partida -- it was so quiet and peaceful and we were actually the only boat in there for a day. We would read and nap, hike around on shore, explore the caves in the cliffs, wade in the shallows, watch birds soaring overhead, snorkel around the boat. Such idyllic days surrounded by such gorgeous scenery!
On late Friday morning, we sailed back south toward La Paz, excited to start exploring the capital of Baja California Sur. As usual, we were able to slowly sail for a few miles out of our anchorage, but when our speed dropped below 1 knot and we couldn't steer any longer, the motor went on and we chugged toward La Paz. Once in La Paz channel (a dredged channel in the shallows surrounding La Paz about three miles long) we were greeted by large dolphins who played on our bow and all around the boat for at least 10 minutes. What a welcome!
We anchored among many boats in front of downtown La Paz, in what is called the "virtual marina". This is Marina Santa Cruz, currently a bunch of pilings in the water for an unfinished marina (like many projects in Mexico). For a small daily fee (about $3) we could tie our dinghy at the small dock, take showers, fill jerry cans with water, and use the trash bins.
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Alone in our grand anchorage |
First thing we headed in with the dinghy in search of cold beer, which we'd long since run out of. Our alert senses led us to the "Paradise Found Yacht Club", a great bar along the waterfront that caters to cruisers (and ex-cruisers considering many patrons sailed into La Paz years and years ago and never left). The club/bar had the best bar food we've ever had, in or out of Mexico, and we went back many times to sample the menu. Chinese food, pizza, huge burritos, meatloaf, Caesar salad, and the best cheeseburgers we've ever had anywhere (1/2 lb. hand formed patties with greasy bacon and all the goodies). There was even a computer with free internet you could use for a half hour at a time while sipping your cold beer. A big screen TV played CNN that we caught up with the war news on (actually disappointing as we'd been used to much better coverage via the shortwave radio programs from a variety of countries we listened to on the boat).
Second thing we did as soon as the "marina" office opened was to get our keys to the showers and take a couple of nice long ones.
On Monday we completed the dreaded paperwork dance, our pockets stuffed with all the pesos we'd need for fees. We paid the marina office, stopped at Immigration for some stamps on our paperwork, walked two miles to the Port Captain's office, walked two miles back into town to pay the port fees at the bank, then all the way back to the Port Captain to present our receipt. Ugh! Our pockets empty, we drowned our sorrows at the PFYC in Thai food.
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Enjoying a scrumptious frappacino |
We enjoyed exploring the city of La Paz, complete with all the goodies that a city of 100,000 people has -- a movie theater, large grocery stores, good coffee shops. Shopping in the grocery stores was a treat as most of the goods were brought down from California, which meant lots of American products we'd been missing for months on the mainland, including creamy sweet U.S. butter and tofu and turkey sausage! And the best of all -- Ben and Jerry's ice-cream!!!
For several days during the week, the wind howled down the several mile long estuary/anchorage and we finally got to experience first-hand the "La Paz Waltz". Basically, the current runs through the estuary up to 4 knots during the day and night, and when combined with the wind blowing, each boat wants to do it's own thing, the current moving some boats, the wind others. As our boat has relatively low freeboard and a full keel, the current always dictated which way Pelican was facing. This could cause her stern to face into the wind when the current was running against it -- even in 20 knots so the wind would howl down the companionway and the wind waves would slap against our stern loudly. Luckily there were no boats anchored too close to us so we had no close encounters with neighboring boats, what usually happens when boats decided to do their own dance at anchor instead of all facing the same way as they normally do.
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A typical stunning La Paz sunset |
For most of the week in La Paz, we checked off items on our long list of errands, such as doing our taxes on the internet, filling the boat with food for the next month and a half in the "outback" of the Sea of Cortez, searching the city for good cat litter and food, laundry, filling up with water and diesel. Before we knew it we had to do the paperwork dance in reverse to "check-out" of La Paz, including paying the same fees to the bank and all of it. What a drag this is about cruising in Mexico, having to check in and out of every port with a Port Captain (basically every town with a population over 100). We never paid a dime to cruise in Canada and in Mexico we'd paid almost $500US in fees and various licenses by this time and were getting slightly cranky about it, to say the least.
While temperatures had mostly been in the upper 70s, one crazy day in La Paz it reached 98 degrees! Thankfully the air was still dry, so we were fine sitting in the shade with a cool drink, but it sure reminded us that summer was on it's way in the Sea of Cortez.
In the Port Captain's office, we met a fun couple from California cruising on their Pacific Seacraft Dana 24 Solace. We got to talking with Todd and Susan and found we had something in common besides sailing. There was a little homeless beagle-type dog that had been wandering around the streets of La Paz, skinny as could be, nearly bald with mange, holding a hind lame leg up. She was so sadly pathetic, but when she looked up at you with her huge brown eyes your heart would absolutely melt. We'd run into this dog many times and she had begun to invade our thoughts at all hours of the day. We'd desperately wanted to help her out, but knowing we had no room for a sick dog on our small boat already populated with two cats, we could only hope she's be adopted by someone with the space and will to care for her.
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"Before" -- |
It turned out that this little dog had had the same effect on Todd and Susan and we all figured the little dog must be something special to be "speaking" to people so clearly. Luckily for this little pup, Susan is a veterinarian and decided to take the dog into a local vet to find out what kind of mange she had (i.e. if it was communicable or not to people). It turned out that the pup's mange was only from poor nutrition and not communicable to humans, so Susan and Todd decided to take her in and treat her with baths, shots, lots of food and some good sleep on nice soft blankets in their cockpit. It was such a heartwarming sight to see the little dog curled up in their cockpit, belly full for the first time in months probably, and so visibly thankful at her fortune to no longer be walking for miles searching for food on La Paz streets and no doubt sleeping on concrete.
A week later, we'd meet up with Solace and Susan and Todd at Isla San Francisco just north of La Paz. The pup found that boat life suited her just fine as we watched her riding happily around in the bow of their dinghy, ears flying back like a pro on her way to the beach. She'd already gained a few pounds, her fur had grown back in many places and she just looked so incredibly happy and grateful. What a sight! These two new friends of ours are sure respected by us for doing such a humane act. They have lit something within us to do some animal rescue work when when get back to Washington.
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La Paz's malecon |
Our last morning in La Paz we took what would be our last real shower for at least a month, made plans to meet up with new and old friends in the islands up north and motored (of course) in the calm air up to Isla Partida for another visit. On our way to Ensenada Grande on the north end of Isla Partida, we passed Partida cove and had some wind gusts come over the island from the east. We quickly raised our genoa and sailed the last two miles to Ensenada Grande. Yee haw!
We anchored in the south bight of Ensenada Grande, in about 15 feet of green water so clear we could watch puffer and needle fish swimming over the sandy bottom under the boat. Similar to Partida cove, but smaller, it was a very pretty bay with some lovely red smooth rocks along the north wall of the anchorage. That evening, the sky clouded up and we could see lightening flashes over the mainland as hot gusts of wind hit us. It was a gusty, slightly rolly night but overall we slept fairly well.
We woke the next morning to a very weird sound on our cabin top. We thought at first birds were flying overhead and pooping all over the place, but when Michael popped his head out of the hatch he found it was just rain! Little raindrops falling from the sky, all over the boat! What a foreign sight! We spent the day relaxing on the boat under a warm cloudy sky. What a lovely treat, lounging in the cockpit under our sun cover, while little rain showers would visit us throughout the day, the little pitter patter of raindrops on the water like music to our ears in this parched desert. A nice start to our trip north up the Sea of Cortez.
