Dolphins

We encounter Dolphins every year while cruising, however, this year was exceptional.  I had my new camera (thanks Carey and Jon) ready whey they surfed our bow and got a good close up before they sounded.  In the hour and a half voyage from Isla Carmen to Isla Coronado, we had hundreds of dolphins off the bow all the way into the bay at the Coronados. I did get some good video but so far I have not had much luck posting it to our blog.   The Coronados have a resident pod of dolphins who come thru every morning and evening. 

Isla Carmen and Canyon

Isla Carmen is one of the largest islands in the Sea of Cortez, lying just off of Loreto. We left Puerto Escondido after LoretoFest and headed a couple hours out to Puerto Ballandra on Isla Carmen, a beautiful anchorage with a narrow entrance that opens up into a large bay with a crescent white sand beach.  In the first photo Linda is standing just behind the beach with the Canyon behind her.  An interesting array of flora and fauna. The round cave was just one that looked to be ideal for a mountain lion (we did see the skin and bones remants of a recent kill by some predator).  Besides the cacuts, there are unusal trees with white bark (I could not identify them) woodpeckers and interesting desert flowers.  You can hike about 4 miles across the island thru the canyon to the
 other side of the bay.  We got too hot and ran low on water so we came back and jumped in the drink.

Biker Chicks and a Cruiser Love Story

Our old friend, Frank Howard, a fellow Cal owner of the vessel Snowgoose, bought a Honda Gold Wing bike in 2009, just after we brought Snowgoose back up from Huatulco, and he has since put over 70,000 miles on it traveling around the US (literally from Coast to Coast). Sorry Frank, no Photo of the bike. Frank gave Linda a ride from La Paz to Cabo and back to visit the CostCo 
(Linda's favorite).  When our friend Helen learned of this adventure, she started calling Linda the "biker chick". When we visited Loreto with our new friends Barry and Connie, I had to take a photo in the "Bikers Bar" of Linda and Connie hamming it up.  Barry and Connie are an amazing story.  They met in their early twenties while both were backpacking around Europe and North Africa.  They stayed at Barry's place in 
 London, before Connie returned to the U.S.  She married an old boyfriend (who she divorced a year later) and sent Barry a "Dear John" letter.  Barry left England for the US and got as far as the Canary Islands where he signed on as crew (his first sailing experience) .  He enjoyed it so much, he made a career of sailing and has done 4 solo transpacs (San Francisco to Hawaii).  The boat in the third photo is the one he has most recently used.  Meanwhile, Connie looked for him in London but he had left.  Barry ended up in Vancouver Canada.  After she retired, Connie began to search for Barry on line and found him in Vancouver. He had never married and she had never remarried.  They met again 40 years later and have been cruising together for the last 3 years.  Amazing story.

More Cooper and Parker

 As you can see from the photos we loved having Cat and Coop and Parker on board.  The kids loved the Beach Club and once Cooper discovered the joys of snorkeling, we could not keep him out of the bay.  Both are exceptional athletes, as are their parents (Chad had done 4 Ironman Triathalons) Cat does the bike and swim portions but can't run with her bad hips.  Coop is an exceptional base-
 ball player.  Parker competes in triathalons and road races with the fastest kids in America.  She inherited her parents natural stride and regularly beats the boys in her age group (10-12).  Coop could hit a pitched baseball when he was 3!  We look forward to having them on board again next season.  We will be on the mainland so they can try surfing and boogie boarding.

Cat, Cooper and Parker

 Our daughter Cathy arrived in early April with Cooper (12) and Parker (10).  We had a great week together. Parker is on the bow as we approach Lobos Anchorage.  We had a great sail out of the marina until about 1/2 mile out of the anchorage.  Cat still looks like the athlete that she has always been.  Cooper loved the dingy and spent lots of time buzzing everyone 
 around the anchorage and the marina.  Both kids loved snorkeling in the clear waters.  It was a little cold, but Parker fit Linda's shorty and Cooper could wear her full wet suit.  Leaving the anchorage, Cooper handled the boat, communicating with me using our new headsets (which save a lot of yelling and make anchoring an oh so pleasant experience).

Ralph and Helen of Moondrifter and Dingy Repairs

 Our friends Ralph and Helen of the SeaWind Catamaran, Moondrifter, arrived in March, and joined us for cocktails at the Costa Baja Country Club which overlooks all of La Paz Bay, and has the best sunsets in Baja (see the photo in previous post) Ralph and Helen joined us for dinner at two of the marina restaurants before heading north to San Carlos, and then a brief trip to their home in Wickenburg,
 Arizona.  They returned to the Sea of Cortez in April and we met again in Puerto Escondido at Loretofest. 
The repairs we made to the dingy in 2011 did not hold over the summer, so we had Baja Inflatables replace the rub rail, fix some of the leaks and repair the leak in our ocean view plastic bottom.  After 3 tries, we used marine tex to hold the platic in place and in the photo, Linda is applying 5200 to the  inside of the dingy.  It all worked well this season, and we were able to use the ocean view to show the grandkids the fish in the clear waters of the bay. I put our new Honda 2 horse outboard on the dingy in preparation for the arrival of our daughter Cat and her two kids, Cooper and Parker.  We ended up leaving the 2 horse on the dingy for the whole season, and finally put the 15 horse on in San Carlos to dive and snorkel the nearby coves.

Return to La Paz for 2012 Cruise

 We returned to La Paz in mid February, just in time for the Mardi Gras Carnival, which lasted 5 days, with the children's parade on the last day.  We did not get close enough to get good photos of the floats and the parade, but there was a carnival atmosphere (with lots of loud music)rides, and the Mexican version of Carnival junk food.  We spent the next couple of days putting the sails back on
 checking all the systems, taking the pickling chemicals out of the watermaker, and starting the engine, genset, refrigerator, freezer, airconditioners fore and aft, and everything worked fine!  We hung out in La Paz and at Costa Baja, kayaking around the area and relaxing at the Beach Club where Linda made a new friend, Fernanda.  We celebrated her pregnancy with a mini baby shower at t
 restaurant where her fiancee works as the manager.  We reaquainted ourselves with La Paz (we were only here for a short time in May of last year) and prepared to host Cat and her two kids, Cooper and Parker.  I put the new Honda 2 horse outboard on the dingy so Cooper and Parker could buzz around.  The 15 horse would be a little too much for begining sailors

La Paz Costa Baja

We arrived in La Paz after a short sail with successful fishing, to find our friends Doug and Marcie, getting their boat ready to put on Dockwise to take it back to Seattle where they plan to sell it and stay in condos in Mazatlan, like a lot of other cruisers who swallow the anchor. We had a nice last dinner with them at one of the many restaurants in beutiul Costa Baja marina, one of the nicest on the coast, as the photos from 2010 attest. I swam in the lap pool until the hotel manager decided that cruisers would have to pay a day fee for the use of the facilities (even though the marina and hotel have the same owner, and advertise the use of the pool, spa and weight room for both). We probably won't stay here again until they come to their senses. We were thrilled a couple of days later when Jim and Chris of La Ballona arrived, and spent the night in Costa Baja to be with us, before moving the boat to marina Palmira. We arranged for the van from the hotel to take us up to the beautiul new club house which overlooks all of La Paz Bay. There is a Gary Player designed golf course, but we were the only patrons of the club which closes at 7 pm. Jim and Chris came by the next morning on their way to Palmira to say good bye. We spent a relaxing couple of weeks buttoning the boat up for the summer.

Ensenad Grande

Apparently we did not take photos at Evaristo, which after our first less than pleasant anchoring attempt, turned out to be a good choice with the first cove all to ourselves. We departed the next morning for Ensenada Grande on Espiritu Santu, sadly our last anchorage before heading into a marina at La Paz. We have both enjoyed being on the hook as you can tell from the first photo. We had another great sunset, and even though a corumwel (southwesterly wind) blew into the anchorage, we seemed to have the best spot and spent a calm night. We visited the crew on Angel after exploring ashore. Baja Adventures maintains a camp here for the tourist who sleep in tents ashore and kayak around the islands. We hosted Christian and Rick of Angel for cocktails. Angel is a Cheoy Lee 48 yawl, which the owner sails as much as possible. Christian is Swiss and spends the summer house sitting in the Pacific Baja town of San Juanico (not the anchorage on the east coast) for the owner of Angel. In anticipation of leaving the boat in La Paz, Linda gave them a lot of the stuff in our freezer. On the way in to La Paz the next day, I caught a couple of bonita on the lure I made in the fishing seminar at Loreto Fest. They seemed to prefer it to the lures I purchased.

Los Gatos

On the recommendation of Christian (who is standing on the bow of the yawl Angel in the first photo) we next anchored in Los Gatos, red rocks, kind of like Sedona on the ocean. We met Jody and Doug on La Gitana (the gypsy) a Westsail 32 on their first year cruising. They joined us for cocktails on Iron Rose. I took the kayak around to the 3 coves of Los Gatos and snorkeled around the clear green water. A very pleasant, calm anchorage. We are really enjoying cruising Baja where nothing is more than 3 or 4 hours away to the next great anchorage. Next stop San Evaristo. In the past we have always anchored at Isla San Franciso, opposite the east coast. This time we plan to stop at the little village of Evaristo, near the big salt mines.

Bahia Agua Verde

Roca Solitaria marks the entrance to Bahia Agua Verde, a beutiful big sheltered bay, reminiscent of Lake Powell, with it's surrounding mountains, and structures in the bay, like Gunsight and Padre Bay on Powell. This is the only place where we have had dolphins surf the bow wake on our dingy, which has happened on two different visits. On the first, our son Jon was able to put on a mask and dive in before I could get the dinghy motor shut down. The dolphins sounded at once. We anchored in the south cove this time in the lee of the small rock island in the second photo. We met Christian who was crewing on a friends yawl which they sailed into the ancorage on a light breeze he convinced us to stop at Los Gatos (the next series of photos). As usual, we enjoyed the sunset. The Agua Verde Yacht Club, an informal group of cruisers was founded here. There is a small tienda a couple of miles up the road that serves the small village that we visited when we were first here in 1996. One of the best books about Baja, The King of the Moon was written about this area. Always a pleasure to visit.