San Pedro Bahia
08 May 2014
mac
4/17/2014-4/19/2014
27 56N 111 09W
15 mile run north to San Pedro Bahia (bay). Good sail on the way up averaging close to 7 knots with some help from the small tidal current. Wendy caught a Bonito. This is a mile long crescent shaped bay with good anchoring in the sand at 10-30 feet. A good space to avoid the Easter celebrations over the weekend. We are told it get crazy like “spring break” in the US. Dan and Shirley from Island Time met up with us in the pm. We tucked in at the south end expecting southerlies for the next couple of days.
I awoke to an unusual noise about 2am. It’s amazing how the brain filters out the known and brings some new sound to your attention. I flashed the flood light at the water and saw that we were surrounded by squid on the surface. Hundreds of them about 8-12” long. They were feeding on fingerling fish, as best I could tell. I assume these were young Humboldt squid which are reported to live for about a year and grow up to 6 feet in full length. There used to be a big fishery in them in the Baja for many years and then one year they just disappeared to Pacific side never to be seen again. Maybe they are back. They come up out of the depths at night to feed. Every year during the fishery there would be a report of a fisherman falling overboard at night after a misstep and being attacked and killed by squid they were fishing for that night. Interesting story; the squid hunt in groups and are incredibly aggressive they say.
We picked this place because you can’t get to the beach from the roads so it should be quiet. But wouldn’t you know, a church group from Guaymas showed up in a collection of pangas and set up tents on the beach. They were at the other end of the bay so not a problem. We stopped by with Dan and Shirley to say hello. Great group of kids and pastors; anxious to speak English and ask about our sailing adventures. Some had returned from the US recently; many were born there. All were in some kind of school—learning English, welding, fishing ecology, etc., focused on the future. Fairly common story of families returning home from the US. Reasons aren’t always clear, “just seemed easier…”.