This is a short one this time as we were only here for 1 night after a 77-mile motor sail with about 2 hours of motorless sailing in between.

We left Santa Rosalia marina at 3:00am for this 12-hour leg which got us into this anchorage at 3:00pm averaging 6.5 knots. This allows us to slow down if needed to sail slowly in light wind or pull in a fish etc. and still have enough time to get into an anchorage before sundown.

Fun Fact: the picture for this post is of the sunrise, not the sunset for a change.

There are 3 anchorages within the San Francisquito area, we took the middle which is a very small nook of a protected anchorage with enough room for only a few boats. You can see this by clicking on the map to the right and zooming in to see the pin showing our position. We were the only one there for once although there were some campers on the beach and some homes on the hill above the beach. It was a very quiet and calm night with some loud coyotes on shore in the middle of the night.

Since it was only for 1 night and we wanted to get cracking up to the next anchorage, Puerto Don Juan, in the morning we should have flown the drone at this spot to get some better picture, but it was a little too breezy and time got away from us... Sorry, there are a few pix in the Gallery though.

Stay Tuned....
Dave and Michelle and El Gato Bosun
(The ships cat is doing great by the way, has not had any issues at all)

Howdy Folks,
We sailed from Santispac to the Santa Rosalia Marina, about 42 nautical miles, in about 7 hours. We originally planned to go halfway and stop at Punta Chivato but we didn't like the conditions as the wind and waves would be blowing right in there all night. Then we pulled into an anchorage called Sweet Pee Cove on Isla San Marcos but that wasn't too great either as the wind was up and the sea state was rolly. Onward to the Marina a day earlier than our reservation. With the use of Starlink we were able to call the Marina to see if they had a slip and they did.

Did we mention that 15 minutes out of the last anchorage the high output Balmar alternator started putting out over 16 volts? We thought it would be the external regulator but after testing with Balmar over the phone, it turned out to be an internal short circuit. This unit was 2.5 years old but the warranty is good for only 2 years. Figures!!! I disconnected the negative connection and would swap it out with the original Yanmar/Hitachi 60 amp alternator that we had in the spares once in the marina.

This marina is another of many Fonatur marinas that has been taken over by the Mexican Navy and no longer sells diesel to cruising yachts. This is typical because the fueling equipment, tanks, pumps etc is the newest equipment in all these marinas. Just doesn't make sense. Also the town is having a water crisis and there was no running water on the docks except for 1 hour from 6:30pm till 7:30pm one day we were there and the pressure was non existent. Not a huge deal for us as we made our tank water on the way. But others had to buy it from a local guy by the 5lb Garofan. There used to be a pool available but it looks like the water truck pumps the water into the pool and then its gravity fed to the dock plumbing. This explains the low water pressure. What water we did get to quickly rinse the boat sure left bad water spots. At least the electrical power worked well, for now... One good thing about the Fonatur marinas is the aluminum docks were in great shape. They use a light-colored plastic tile for the top deck with many holes to keep it cool. These dock fingers were quite narrow but they were the most stable dock fingers we've ever been on.

Our first trip to town was to fill one of our small 2.5lb propane tanks and since there was a grocery store across the street from the propane stop, we decided to do a small bit of provisioning with the backpack that had the propane tank in and another smaller backpack we had with us. We did pretty good but needed some other things the next day when we went into the town center to a different store that had a much better selection of things. Along the way we found the Thrifty Ice Cream store for some real Ice Cream which is hard to find down here.

This is a cool little town with a lot of history. Copper mining was its claim to fame back in the 1800's. The Church of Saint Bárbara in the middle of town is built out of steel and contains a plaque near its entrance that states it was designed by Gustav Eiffel of Eiffel Tower fame and was rediscovered taken apart in a Belgian warehouse after an exposition in Paris in 1889.

The church has a legendary history. It has been said that John D. Rockefeller commissioned the building directly from Eiffel for one of his mines in California. After a series of transport incidents, the ship transporting the building had to be forcefully docked on the Gulf of California and it was reconstructed between 1896-97 after being purchased by the Boleo Mining Company.

While we walked the town and finished our chores, Yesenya was busy doing our laundry. She picked it up at 9:00a.m. and said it would be back by 6:00 p.m. Perfect!!! We went up to the brewery in the marina complex to have a beer and wait with a few other cruisers who were having their laundry done as well. You will see in the pictures us signing the cruisers wall. So fun to see other names of boats and crews that you have meet along the way.

Next Stop: 77 miles to Bahia San Francisquito (say that 5 times fast) it was a 3:00 a.m. departure to get in at a reasonable hour.

Well, it's been a while since our last post, and we are now playing catch up with both the blogs and the pictures that go into the Gallery. There are now too many pictures in the Mulege file in the Gallery, this is after narrowing them down too, but we were there for quite a long time. We will try to keep them to a minimum going forward.

We had a good trip here to Bahia Concepcion/Santispac anchorage and even sailed for about an hour without the engine on. This is a rare thing in the Sea of Cortez with its fickle winds. The wind is either blowing way too hard, right on the nose or not at all. Upon approaching the anchorage, we were greeted and led in by several big grey Bottlenose dolphins riding our bow wave. That is such a great sight to see, it never gets old. Sorry we cannot get good pictures as they as apparently camera shy.

We spent 12 days at this anchorage waiting out some windy weather from all the storms that hit California. The Santispac anchorage is very well protected in all directions and here in the Sea of Cortez the winds come from "All Directions" throughout the days and nights, so it's best to find the anchorages that have best coverage. There are 3 other spots to the south, but they don't have as good of coverage.

There are 2 great restaurants on each end of the beach, Armandos (Our favorite) and Ana's, and in between them are camp sites where many folks come from the US, Canada and Mexico in all sorts of campers, vans, RV's and tents. During Easter week Mexico celebrates Semana Santi/"Holly Week" where people from all over the inland areas come to the beaches/water. There was even a fair that was set up while we were there. Whenever we asked when it started, we were always told "maybe manana." We don't even think they really knew so apparently, we left before it opened. Thats ok, we understand thousand come and it get pretty crazy with people, fireworks and even shooting off guns.

We passed the days touring the area by dinghy and found 3 natural hot springs in different locations. One was the furthest south and was watched over by vultures, bees and had bones in it. No thanks!!! The second one was so hot Michelle scalded her foot not realizing it was going to be so hot. No harm was done just shockingly hot. The last one was comfortable enough that Dave and a friend of ours got in and were shortly joined by locals who wanted to practice their English as well as us practice our Spanish. Or lack thereof.
A bit to the south at another anchorage we found a great restaurant called Nomadico which served a great breakfast. We had the Chilaquiles which is corn chips covered in a sauce with smoked tuna, avocado and an egg on top. Wow, was it good, it's better than it sounds.

One Saturday we decided to hitch a ride into Mulege (mule-eh-hay), the closest town about 20 minutes north. Michelle saw one of the RVs was heading to the front gate of the campground and asked how far Mulege was and in which direction, knowing these answers but looking to see if they would just take us. It worked; we got a ride in a 40' Bounder Diesel Pusher. This sweet couple was from Canada and on their way back home. They come down to this area every year to get out of the cold up north. They let us know that Saturdays are "Carnitas Day" at Danny's Taqueria and is a MUST DO. We found Danny's and agree, the Carnitas tacos are awesome, we even bought and extra Kilo to go which comes with all the fixings like salsas, and tortillas. Meals for 3 days. We then ran across a bakery/actually smelled it, that had fresh cinnamon rolls that we brought back for breakfast. Yum. Mulege is a cute little town, very authentic and rich in history, built along a river that dumps out at the Sea of Cortez. There is an anchorage there but its only good when there is no wind. The return trip was a success also as Michelle talked to another gringo couple at the market and asked if they were heading south. They were and we got a ride in the back seat of their Geo Tracker, a very small jeep style vehicle with the roof removed. Windy but Fun!!!

On another dinghy voyage we went into the lagoon that is lined with Mangroves. Only accessible at high tide, there were a number of schools of fish swimming around us, crabs, frogs and a lot of interesting birds in the mangroves. The closest thing to a Toucan we will see for a while.

Next post will be from the town of Santa Rosalia...
Adios,
Dave and Michelle

Howdy Folks,
We just wanted to put out a quick update letting you know that we are here in a nice, well protected anchorage to wait out some wind that is forecast to hit tonight into next week up at our next stop in Santa Rosalia. At this point it looks like we can leave on Tuesday or Wednesday tentatively, but it's all dependent on if things change, which they usually do. Oh well, we have plenty of provisions and its pretty nice here although the camp on the beach is supposed to get really crazy as its Semana Santi (Holy Week) from tomorrow through Easter Sunday. Where all the locals from all over Mexico come to beach's. We just saw a dozen carnival trucks pull into the campground. WOW! This should be interesting...Word in the anchorage is that you may need to save some people as when they come out on paddleboards or kayaks and can't get back due to the wind blowing them offshore, you may need to assist. Others have already done so.
We will update next week how it goes. Also, we will update the Gallery with pictures of this anchorage and Mulege.
Hope you enjoy.

Hola Amigos,

We left Puerto Escondido intent on just going about 20 miles to Isla Coronados just a few hours away. Instead, after circling through that anchorage we took advantage of the current pushing us north and kept on going to San Juanico about another 20 miles. Again, it was motorboat ride, didn't even take the sail cover off the mail sail. This time of the year it seems there is no wind or its too much wind. Other than that, it's right on the nose.

San Juanico is a beautiful anchorage with a nice beach and Pinnacle rocks that come right out of the water some from over 100' below. This makes for great wind and wave protection from most directions. When we pulled in, we found 4 other boats that we knew from other anchorages or boats that were in the Baja Ha-Ha with us. Right after we dropped the anchor a Seagull landed on our solar panels on the back of the boat, we quickly Sho'd him off but 2 others returned. Hmm, what to do? We needed a fake plastic snake but didn't have one. We did however have some short rigging line which sure looks like a snake to us. Strategically placed on the Bimini top worked like a charm - No more seagulls!

We went around the area in the dinghy and "stuck our face in the water" and looked under the surface at the reefs but didn't see much sea life so we didn't snorkel the area. We hiked up a trail from the beach to get a picture of Endless Summer in the anchorage from the hilltop and got close to the beautiful house that we learned is owned by the Walton family, of Walmart fame. We also came across a Cruisers Shrine where cruising boats that have stopped here put a memento for others to see. This one is in a tree close to the beach. Michelle out did herself using colored pens we have on board and colored the inside of a clam shell with our Endless Summer theme of the sunset with our names. It came out great and made a nice addition to the Cruisers Shrine.

On the trip back to the boat we spotted a wild horse and Burro walking along the beach. See pix in the Gallery.

Next stop - Playa Santipac in Bahia Concepcion

Adios,
Dave and Michelle

We motored up from Agua Verde to Puerto Escondido and picked up one of 117 mooring balls that are for rent for about $50US per day. We wanted to stay a few days to see Loreto and provision so luckily the weekly rate is better at $180US. It was no surprise the marina was full, but the office did say they could get us into a slip in the near future with a reservation but for more than double the price of a mooring ball. Luckily, we didn't need or want a marina slip.

The grounds of the marina were quite nice, with nice landscaping and buildings well maintained. There is one Restaurant that had pretty good Margaritas and a great burger but at gringo prices. We call it Mexico Disney style because it's so clean and nice. We were excited to hear there is pool and hot tub but were told by a cruiser a few weeks ago that the pool was quite small, and the hot tub has never seen hot water. It was completely closed off when we got there and couldn't even see it.

There is also a small store that has a surprising number of products on the shelves. We intended to go into Loreto to provision so we didn't pick up too much here as it's a bit more expensive than in town. There is also an office for the boat workers who we had dive the bottom and replace the prop zinc all for about $100us. This was double of what it cost in San Diego, but they did a good job, and we were just too busy to do it ourselves.

To get to Loreto we needed to use the shuttle which costs about $40US one way for the 20-minute ride. The ride back is best to use a Taxi which we used and bartered the price down to about $30US each time.

Loreto is a very old town, matter of fact there is a Mission here that is the very first one built of all the California Missions from here north up through Baja into San Diego to San Francisco Bay area. We forget how many there are but there are a lot. See pictures in the Gallery.

We then had a Margarita at a bar whose bar stools were swings!
A novel idea, way too much of a liability to have this in the states so it was a must do. We then walked the town center, the Malacon and the Mission before going to check out the two grocery stores for our provisioning trip 2 days later. We easily caught a cab back to the marina where we had some good fish tacos at the restaurant.

We went back to Loreto on Sunday to check out a popular farmers market but it was not there. Maybe it was every other Sunday or something, oh well. As it was provisioning day we went and did our grocery shopping at the Super Ley Express, the towns biggest market. Again the taxi just pulled up as we came out of the store with all our bags.

The next day was fueling day. We decided instead of bringing the boat to the fuel dock we'd use the diesel in the Jerry jugs, which we last filled in Turtle Bay, so wanted to use it up and refill them before putting back on deck. Then we would use the dinghy to refill them at the fuel dock. We use a really good Baja filter that was given to us from our friends at Oakland Yacht Club. This has 3 screens to remove particles, the last screen is so fine that water does not go through, but the diesel fuel does. We did find some particles the size of black pepper but no water. There was also no water or restriction shown on the vacuum gauge in the separator/filter. So far so good with the fuel here in Mx. Although still too expensive. It was about $7US per gallon here in Puerto Escondido. We took on 30 gallons of Diesel and 8 Gallons of Petrol used for the dinghy and generator when making water.

All in all it was a good stop to stock up on provisions, get fuel and rest for a few days but the big towns are just not really our thing.

Next stop, San Juanico where there is a nice anchorage among some large rocks and a house on the hill that we understand is owned by the Walton family of Walmart fame.

We separated the Gallery files into two different folders one is Puerto Escondido, and the other is Loreto so make sure you see both folders for the pictures.

Adios Amigos,
Dave and Michelle