Location: Puerto
Escondido, Sea of Cortez, Baja, Mexico
Wow! We have heard a
lot of good things from other cruisers about the Sea of Cortez. Now we understand why. Here on the Baja side,
there are numerous attractive anchorages to choose from, depending on what you
want to do and what direction the wind is blowing. The sea life is abundant. We have seen blue whales, dolphins, sea
lions, and stingrays along with seabirds, songbirds and fish. We’ve hiked, swam, snorkeled, fished, explored
beaches, and small Mexican towns, all in the short time that we’ve been here. The weather is pleasant - warm during the
days (70s / low 80s) and cool at night (60s).
The scenery is desert – arid with plants and cacti that don’t require
much water; colorful cliffs with layers of reds, ochres, browns, blacks
(obsidian), grays and whites that change as the light of day changes; white
sand beaches, rocky beaches and beaches covered with shells. We started at Isla San Francisco after crossing
from Topolobampo on the mainland and subsequently worked our way as far north
as Santa Rosalia. Now we are headed
south towards La Paz and Cabo San Lucas.
So, onto the details and the photos…
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Seabiscuit at anchor, Isla San Francisco with the
mountains of the Baja peninsula in the back ground |
Our first stop on the Baja side was Isla San Francisco (Feb.
27
th), about 45 miles north of La Paz. We anchored on the west side of the
island. We took the dinghy to shore and
hiked up the ridge toward the south side of the island and then back down to
the beach on the east side. We saw a
huge osprey nest along with a collection of driftwood, shells and bird and fish
bones. Then we hiked back across a salt
flat to the dinghy and the boat.
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| Hiking, Isla San Francisco |
Our next stop was Bahia Amortajada (on the southwest side of
Isla San Jose) where we anchored for a few hours, took a dinghy ride through
the mangroves and had lunch. Because of
the mangroves, the cruising guide reports that the no-see-ums are thick around
dusk, so we didn’t want to stay here for the night. After lunch, we heaved anchor, cruised north
to Mangle Solo (on the northwest side of Isla San Jose) and dropped the
hook. We hopped into the water to scrub
some of the slime off the boat bottom and then swam into shore to inspect the
beach.
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Heron near the mangroves at Bahia Amortajada with
a cordon cactus forest in the back ground |
It was raining when we woke up
the next morning, so we moved north and anchored up at Punta San Marte (on the
Baja peninsula). It started drizzling again
as the sun was setting so we sat up on monkey island and watched as a double
rainbow appeared.
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| Punta San Marte |
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| Double rainbow, Punta San Marte |
We usually check the weather each morning and the wind was
supposed to blow from the north for the next few days so we pulled into Puerto
Escondido (March 4th), a protected harbor on the Baja peninsula, to
wait out the wind. While there we did
boat chores, laundry and took advantage of the internet. The town of Loreto is about 15 miles north,
so one day we decided to go into town to get some groceries. Puerto Escondido was somebody’s dream
resort. They built a nice marina
building and dock space for about 10 boats.
There are wide, landscaped streets and you can see the lot lines platted
out. Somewhere along the way, they lost
their funding as there are many uncompleted construction projects and derelict
abandoned buildings. The bay used to be
filled with mooring balls for visiting yachts, but most of them have disappeared
or are unmaintained. Now there are some
new private docks being put in, the mini-mart at the marina recently reopened
and a new restaurant in the marina building opened while we were there. There are a lot of RVers camped nearby and
between them and the boaters, they have formed a small community. So… the afternoon before we planned to go
into Loreto, I stopped at the afternoon social circle to ask the best way to
get to town. The responses were not very
encouraging; there is no local taxi service and the buses are unreliable. Sometimes you can catch a ride with someone
headed that way but demand is high and resources are slim. The next morning, we decided to walk the mile
out to Hwy 1 to try and catch a bus. We
wait about 45 minutes and no buses came along.
A local family, who had been fishing at Escondido, stopped and picked us
up. They asked if we were waiting for a
bus and then laughed when we told them yes.
They dropped us off in the center of town. We wandered around, had a cup of coffee,
stopped at the church, walked along the waterfront, had some lunch and, after
we confirmed that we could get a taxi ride back to Escondido, did our grocery
shopping.
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| The mission in Loreto |
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| A pig roasting for a street festival in Loreto |
Loreto is a nice friendly town – small enough to be walkable
but with amenities to support tourism along with the local community. It was established in 1697 by a group of
Jesuit missionaries and was the location of the first mission of the
Californias. Above the entrance to the
church it says “Cabeza y Madre de las Misiones de Baja y Alta California” (Head
and Mother of the Missions of Lower and Upper California). Loreto used to be the state capital of region
but in 1829 it was hit by a hurricane and the capital was moved to La Paz. Today it seems to be a center for outdoor
tourist activities including kayaking and whale watching.
The next morning we docked and filled up our fresh water
tank, then cruised out of the Puerto Escondido harbor. As we were leaving, we witnessed blue whales
spouting from all around the boat. We
got out into deep water and cut the engine so that we could drift and watch
them feed.
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| A blue whale spouting outside Puerto Escondido harbor |
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| The vertebrae of a blue whale as it dives back underwater |
We anchored up in Puerto
Ballandra (on the west side of Isla Carmen) mid-afternoon.
Monday morning, we packed a picnic lunch and hiked up an
arroyo to an old cistern. Then a dinghy
ride out to the entrance of the bay to see the whales and an afternoon
swim. Tuesday we moved north about 8
miles to the south side of Isla Coronados.
After lunch, we went ashore for a hike and made our way up to the top of
island, an extinct volcano – elevation 928 feet.
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| Hiking on Isla Carmen |
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| Oyster catcher, Puerto Ballandra, Isla Carmen |
Wednesday (March 11th), we heaved anchor and headed
north to San Juanico. The seas were a
little lumpy, especially after all of the calm weather we have had. We anchored up just before lunch. S/V
‘Quick’, some sailboaters we met in Escondido, called us on the radio as we
arrived and offered to share some local knowledge with us. We met them on the beach later that afternoon
and walked to a small farm where they make goat cheese and sell fresh veggies
right out of the garden. It’s amazing to
see a prosperous farm like that carved out of the desert. They used drip irrigation to water and
compost to build their soil and to fertilize.
We bought fresh beets, onions, goat cheese, garlic and cilantro.
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| A group of dolphins |
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| Goats at the farm near San Juanico |
The next day we went ashore for a hike along the beach and
up a ridge line. The colors and shapes
of the rocks and hills are spectacular, especially as the light changes and
different colors become dominant. The
bioluminescence here is amazing – we sprayed water from our hose into the sea
water around us and it lit up like a fireworks finale.
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| Rock formations at San Juanico |
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| Rock formations at San Juanico |
Friday (March 13) we headed north into Bahia Concepcion, a
large, narrow bay protected on the east by a peninsula almost 25 miles long and
on the west by Baja. We anchored near
Playa Santispac where the beach was filled with RVers. We spotted two small restaurants ashore so
decided to eat at Armando’s tonight and then try Anna’s Saturday night. Once we got settled at Armando’s we discovered
that they are having a pig roast on Sunday, so we decided to stay an extra day
in the anchorage for that. The food at
both restaurants turned out to be mediocre (including the pig roast) but it was
nice to get off the boat for a few meals.
We also did some beach walking and dinghy exploring before heading to
our next destination, Santa Rosalia.
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| Armando's restaurant, Playa Santispac, Bahia Concepcion |
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| Dave, exploring in the dinghy, Bahia Concepcion |
Santa Rosalia is our northernmost destination for this side
of the Sea of Cortez. It is an old
copper mining town and we’ve been told that the mine has recently
re-opened. Most of the buildings in town
are of French design and were built to house employees of the original French
company that operated the mine. They are built out of wood that was shipped in
from Canada and the Pacific Northwest by the same ships that carried the copper
out of the town. We docked at the marina
inside the town’s harbor for a few days, explored the town, tried out a few
restaurants and did some boat chores.
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| A crucible from the old copper smelter, Santa Rosalia. |
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The church in Santa Rosalia, designed by Eiffel
(i.e. the same guy who designed the Eiffel Tower
in Paris). |
Thursday (March 19th), we left Santa Rosalia in
the morning and headed south to anchor near Punta Chivato. Along the shoreline, there are several nice
houses, a dirt landing strip, airplane hangars and what looks like a desert
version of a nine-hole golf course (nothing green, only red flags marking each
hole) along with an abandoned resort hotel.
We took the dinghy ashore to walk along the beach and through the
resort. The shells along the beach were
amazing; just about every size, shape and color you could imagine – cowry,
oyster, clam, conch, whelks, etc.
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| A great shelling beach, Punto Chivato. |
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| Dolphins riding the bow wake. |
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| A sea lion at rest |
We heaved anchor Saturday morning (March 21st)
and headed south back to the anchorage at San Juanico. So far, it is one of our favorites. We stayed for a few days and hiked up the
road to a different, larger farm and bought some fresh vegetables. The water is super clear and we saw groups of
rays swimming back and forth, rays jumping, and dolphins and sea lions chasing
fish.
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| A lone ray, San Juanico |
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| A group of rays, San Juanico |
Tuesday morning (March 24th)
we continued south and anchored on the west side of Isla Coronados. We launched the dinghy, got out our
snorkeling gear and headed over to the rocks near the beach.
Today (March 25th), we cruised to Loreto for some
groceries. Loreto is a fair weather
anchorage with no protection from north, south or east winds. Most boats wanting to re-provision anchor
near the town in the morning, do their shopping and then get underway again
before the afternoon winds pick-up. We
anchored outside the town’s breakwater which encloses a small harbor used for
shallow draft fishing pangas. A
medium-size cruise ship ‘Safari Endeavor’ was also anchored outside; the crew
was busy ferrying the cruise passengers into town on the ship’s zodiacs. We dinghied into the harbor, walked to the
grocery store, bought our supplies, took a taxi back to the harbor, dinghied
back out to the boat, heaved anchor and headed south to Puerto Escondido. We’ll stay the night here, use the fast
internet, do a load of laundry, load water and then head south again in the
morning.
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| Statue of sea lions on the breakwater, Loreto. |
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The main walking street in Loreto with the
mission bell tower in the back ground |
