Heading South
09 January 2009 | LaPaz, Mexico
John Warren

We left San Carlos at 12:01AM a week ago tomorrow. Ya see...you're not supposed to leave port on a Friday...so we left one minute after midnight. We crossed the Sea of Cortez on what is called the Northern Crossing and arrived San Juanico approximately 15 hours later after a night of relatively calm seas. We dropped our anchor at exactly 3:00PM on Saturday afternoon. It was very nice being on Warren Peace once again after she had been sitting in her cradle for six months. Being back on the water was a comfortable feeling and very relaxing.
We are on a fairly fast track to Barra de Navidad as quickly as possible considering the winter weather so we left San Juanico very early the next morning. We then motorsailed to Aqua Verde...another beautiful anchorage on the Baja. The weather and winds came in late that night we so stayed two days in Aqua Verde to avoid lumpy seas from the winds.
After waiting out bad weather for a day, we departed for Isla San Francisco...a very long day on the water, but that part of the Baja coast line is breath taking and made up for the long hours. The mountains on the Baja are spectacular, rugged, dramatic and colorful. You have to see them to experience their beauty. On the same day, we also saw several whales and many hundreds of dolphin swimming north. By late that afternoon we had arrived our anchorage and dropped Warren Peace's anchor once again. We are now so close to LaPaz that you can hear their local radio traffic on the VHF.
On Wednesday we decided to motor on into LaPaz, but once we got out on the sea we quickly changed our minds. We were suddenly in 20+ kts of wind and 4 ft seas eventually building to 5-6 ft seas at short intervals...very uncomfortable. We diverted to Isla Partida for yet one more beautiful anchorage and night full of stars. At this point we were only 20 miles from LaPaz and decided that we could get up early the next morning and head on to the marina...and the seas would have calmed down considerably. We had a spectacular sunset at Isla Partida.
The next morning we raised our anchor and motored to Marina Costabaja in LaPaz...a short 20 miles. www.costabajaresort.com/marina_costabaja.php
To date we have traveled about 1/3 (243 nautical miles) of our planned route to Barra de Navidad in just under a week. We need to be in Barra by February 1st as our reservastion starts then for the entire month. We are going at a fairly fast pace because when bad weather comes, we could be pinned down at an anchorage for three or four days at a time....we need to plan for that and take down time in consideration for our passage to Barra.
The boat is working very well with few issues to attend to. We have been on such a fast pace going south that we haven't even started our water maker...we have had plenty of water from our water tanks.
Sharon and I are having fun being back on Warren Peace as we love being on the water. The night times are peaceful on the water...the moon and stars shine brite...the sea life is breath taking when you see it up close. Whales swim slowly and majestically through the water, huge rays do flips out of the water all day long and then there are hundreds of dolphins that just cover the surface of the sea...swimming in herds. When you see so many dolphins on the surface, you just wonder how many are below the surface. The sea is an incredible world in itself...if you haven't experienced it...you should.
We plan to depart for the mainland around the middle of next week. We have already refueled and done our banking. We will do some more provisioning....and then we just wait for the next weather window. The weather for next week looks good starting on Tuesday and should hold for three to four days.
I will try to update the blog as we sail across the sea back into the Pacific Ocean. We miss you all and will keep the blog updated as often as we can.
Love to our family...take care all....