Honeymoon Cove on Isla Danzante was another delightful spot. There were a number of boats already anchored in the cove, so we headed south past all of them and ended up in another one-boat-spot. Nothing better than having an isolated spot with clear water, lots of fish and warm sunny days to enjoy the water.
The fish we are seeing are similar to the ones we saw in the Caribbean with graceful angels, hundreds of sergeant majors, hogfish, groupers, tangs, parrotfish, and the small strikingly beautiful damselfish. With such good clarity in the water, we could watch the puffer fish and rays rest on the ocean floor. The dolphins swim in huge pods and we can hear the slow drone of the whale’s song in the early mornings. We have nicknamed the rays “popcorn rays” as they jump out of the water and bellyflop on the surface. We enjoy the pelicans gliding along the surface and nosediving in for their meals. Our grandson told us that the brown pelican is an endangered species, but they are pretty plentiful down here, as are the cormorants, boobies, and frigates.
The water is almost always flat calm and the wind is rarely over 6 knots. We have been able to sail about half of the time when the wind is from the south and increases up to 10 knots. There are anchorages about every 10-15 miles and we can laze along at 3 knots without hurrying to get somewhere.
Weather-wise, every day is pretty much like the day before with the air and water temperatures gaining about 3 degrees a week. We have seen fog in the distance but have not been caught in it and occasionally the sky gets some cirrus clouds that burn off in the mornings. There is usually a slight breeze in the afternoon to cool you off and we could jump in the water when we needed a real cool-down. Nearly perfect. In fact, I am amused to hear other cruisers get concerned when the wind is expected to pipe up to 10-15 knots. They tend to hunker down in these high winds.
We headed into a different kind of anchorage in Escondido. There is no town to speak of here, but the marina has a small area with slips, and controls the mooring field in a large, protected lagoon-like area. There are over a hundred fifty moorings and a number of cruisers call this place home. There are canals and roads built near the marina in a stalled development. Lots of concrete, even lighting in place but only one shell of a building. It is an easy (although expensive) trip into Loreto from here, but they do have internet, a small store and fuel. If a hurricane is headed up into the Sea, the mooring field fills up fast. There were about 30 boats here with us. We filled up our tanks and the fruit bowls and spent 2 restful nights under the watchful peaks of Sierra de la Giganta.
From Escondido, we did some daily hops around Isla Danzante with overnight stops in Marquer where we were hosted to a great dolphin show right off the boat complete with jumps and flips, to Punta Colorado where I nursed a rare cold/flu, to Bahia Salinas and the old salt mine recently converted into a marine ecology research facility, to Puerto de la Lancha on the north with its rocky caves, and finally to Ballandra with its long beaches and, unfortunately, nightly noseeums. We were surprised to have Ballandra all to ourselves and spent the morning exploring the beaches and rocky reef edges before heading across the channel in the afternoon breezes to Loreto.
We had a delightful 6 knot sail in 10 knot winds for 2 hours.
We anchored off of Loreto and spent the next day exploring this charming pueblo. Loreto is the site of the first mission in the Californias. Having seen most of the missions up in our state, we were pleased to see the original, complete with its historic bell. This is a tourist town and they do an excellent job of marketing Mexican charm. Huge neatly trimmed ficus trees and stately palms shade immaculate concrete streets decorated with historical designs at the intersections. We relaxed in a sidewalk café, enjoyed people watching in the early morning heat, walked the entire downtown, had lunch, and then hit three stores to get some fresh food supplies.
From Loreto we continued our northward trek to Isla Coronados, a park frequented by tour boats from Loreto. We spent two nights here, enjoying the white sand beach early in the morning before the boats arrived. This is a popular spot for cruisers and we met a number of new folks as well as meeting up with some we knew previously. Then it was onward to Punta Mangles with its abandoned half-finished resort building. We had hoped to do some shell shopping on the beach, but the waves made beach docking a bit too dangerous so we enjoyed from afar. We also had hoped to spend some time around the corner at San Juanico, but as we headed into the anchoragehe next day , the wind picked up and the water was pretty rolly so we pulled up the sail and continued on to San Nicolas without engines. We thought that this northern anchorage would be protected from the 15 knot south winds, but as we rounded Punta San Antonio, the wind started howling over 25 knots and we dropped anchor about 300 feet from shore. The point did protect us from fetch, but the wind continued for the rest of that afternoon so it was a stay-on-the boat day. Not the way I expected Rog to spend Father’s Day, but he did get in a good sail!
The trip from San Nicolas up into Bahia Concepcion was calm and smooth. We leisurely did a 7 hour motorsail for 34 miles up the coast and anchored in the surprisingly shallow Santo Domingo, joining 4 other boats. “Mariposa” had 2 kids aboard and they were wakeboarding behind the dinghy as we arrived. Dario on “Ballena” came by with a huge pail of chocolate clams which we cooked up for our evening treat. (I still can’t seem to enjoy mussels but Rog enjoyed them.) From Domingo, we could see the fogbank north of us in the mornings and actually had about an hour of fog ourselves at dawn once. We sailed the 10 miles down into the bay, tacking back and forth to Playa el Burro. We left early the next day to explore before the sun got unbearably hot. Across Highway One, which runs along the coast here, we hiked up a rocky hill looking for petroglyphs left by the Indians who knows how long ago. I had just about given up when Rog discovered them. There were about 20 rocks with primitive drawings of fish, cactus and people. Some wise guy had also done one of a goat much more recently. I also hit a number of the large “iron bell rocks” and sent loud gongs resonating across the anchorage.
The sun was getting higher in the sky so we stopped at El Burro, a roadside café, for a cold drink and rest. Then we crossed back over the highway and explored the beach. This is an RV stop and there are about 20 crude “vacation homes” built right at the water’s edge. There are roads built for other sites; either for tents, trailers or more “homes” and a small stable for the resident burro. We had planned to finish our exploring with lunch at Bertha’s Restaurant, but there was a sign that she was closed until 3pm on Thursdays. Yep, today was Thursday. We took a dinghy ride over to Playa Coyote, then headed back to NEOS with plans to sail back up to Domingo if the wind came up. Tom of “Camelot” came by and we chatted about his plans to continue south and cross the canal into the Caribbean. At 4pm, the wind picked up and we raised sails. Tom was out in his dinghy and I called him over and gave him a memory stick with info on the passage south, then we were off to tack up the bay. We actually had to reef the main as the wind topped 20 knots. As usual, with NEOS style, we again had to tack up into the wind. Not good timing, but we had a really nice sail with the wind dying just as we arrived at Domingo.
The next day we headed up to Punta Chivato. This is rich gringo territory. Large homes along the coast, a huge hotel on the point and a dirt airstrip for everyone to fly in for the weekend.
With the weather heating up, we had started to sleep out on the trampolines and we woke up the next morning to the sound of boats heading out to fish. Not pangas this time: sport fishing boats full of gringos. After breakfast, I looked out and saw about 50 of them milling around NEOS. Turns out we were at the starting gate for a fishing regatta. After they left, we headed out for a dinghy ride. Another reputed shell beach here, but we couldn’t get in with the rollers.
After our leisurely ride, we headed up to SweetPea Cove on Isla San Marcos. There were 5 other boats already anchored and we snuck up at the north end of them only to have a boat anchor on either side of us before the day was through. We spent two relaxing days swimming and reading before heading into Santa Rosalia for fresh supplies.
Rosalia is an historic copper mining town with a large breakwater area where we anchored off of the old marina. Highway 1 runs along the malecon and Rog counted 200 panga boats tied off to the edges and the piers. To our north is a large commercial pier with huge freighters that come and go. Bottom line: one noisy place. Our first night sleeping outside was a restless one. Pangas come and go all night with usual engine noise and fishermen clatter. Our second night was much more peaceful with earplugs in place. We spent our first day exploring the town and provisioning. Compagnie du Boleo, a French company, ran the mines here until 1954. Since then, many of the buildings and mining facilities are in disrepair. The town is decorated with old train engines, smelting pots, and rock crushers. We visited the free museum as well as the Iglesia Santa Barbara, desgned by Gustave Eiffel. The church was built in Brussels, dissembled and rebuilt here in Santa Rosalia in 1897. We stopped for the obligatory ice cream, bought a kilo of tortillas at the tortilleria, checked out the Fonatur marina prices, picked up some groceries at the government ISSSTE store, then stopped for lunch near the plaza. We spent an hour or more cooling off in their air conditioning watching Mexico’s version of MTV, then headed over to a fruit stand near the malecon for the bulk of our groceries. Then back to the marina for ice and water and we were done for the day.
The next day Rog changed the oil and fuel filters after breakfast. Since the marina has internet, we plan to top off our fuel tanks and then head into the marina to do some internet and post this log before heading back to Sweet Pea Cove to wait for a weather window north. We have a prospective buyer talking to our broker. If we can agree on a price window, he may come see the boat next week. So we have a few days of north winds to wait for that decision.
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