Shark attack

La Mona, Bahia de los Angeles, BC, Mexico

After a few days parked just off of the village of Bahia de los Angeles, we have moved some 5 miles south to the SE corner of the bay, a beach known as La Mona. It is much quieter here, without the local pangas zooming back and forth past us at all hours of the day and night. A couple of mornings by the village, particularly on Sunday morning, we found ourselves surrounded by fishing boats, trolling and casting for bait before heading out to deeper water to catch bigger prey - a little disconcerting for Susanne who was sleeping in the cockpit and awoke to find a couple of local pangas filled with fishermen watching her from a few feet away.

The highlight of our stay by the village was a visit by some whale sharks. There were 3 of them slowly cruising around the boats at anchor, with some tourist boats following them and jumping in the water to swim with them. These fish are about 15 to 20 feet long and are mostly mouth. They just swim very slowly along at the surface of the water with their mouth wide open, to catch the tiny organisms that keep them fed. They are absolutely magnificent to see up close. After all of the local boats and tourists had left, one of the sharks came by our boat several times and actually collided with our dinghy (which was tied on behind and was swinging around with us as we were sailing around our anchor in a light wind at the time). I got some great pictures but was not able to post them as what internet connection we previously had, had now gone away.

Here in La Mona there is only one other boat currently at anchor, so we have the place pretty much to ourselves. Being at the end of the large bay, it would appear to be very exposed from the NW, but so far the only winds we have seen have been from the East and NE and we have not had any problem. The winds are very welcome here too as it is very hot and humid. We hit a high of 41C a couple of days ago, although it has been much cooler since - normally around 37 or 38 as a high, dropping to around 30 at night. Yesterday we took the dinghy to shore, along with our pump - it seems that the poor thing is losing some of its integrity in the sun, especially the high-pressure inflatable floor. I pumped it back up but it most likely will not last. Note: Most of the cruisers we have met down here refer to their dinghies as "deflatables"; I wonder why?

The marine life here at La Mona has been spectacular. We had a large pod of dolphins passing back and forth past our boat most of the day yesterday, hunting for food we assume. There are a couple of whale sharks that are cruising around, but have not gotten very close to us as yet. And there are quite a few rays of some kind that leap out of the water and do acrobatic tricks in the air - we have no idea why, but they do put on quite a show. At night the phosphorescence of the water is incredible - the fish darting all around and leaping out of the water make for a sort of fireworks display on the surface - we sat and watched this for a long time last night. All and all, this is our favorite anchorage in the BLA area so far.

{GMST}28|54|N|113|29.5|W|Playa La Mona, BC, Mexico|Playa La Mona, BC, Mexico{GEND}

Calm before the storm?

Bahia de los Angeles Village, BC, Mexico

We had a very nice peaceful night anchored here off of the village of BLA.  Listening to the experienced cruisers on the radio nets and in person, we hear that this can be a very tricky place to be at times.

This area of the Sea of Cortez is subject to violent, but short-lived squalls called Chabascos, usually accompanied by thunder, lightning, rain and strong winds.  These are summertime convection storms that can come up with very little warning; in some ways not so different from what we have seen in the prairies back in Alberta.  So far, we have only experienced the edge of one such blow, while we were safely tucked in at Puerto Don Juan - the winds there never exceeded 30 knots, but we heard that some nearby areas were hit by up to 50 and 60 knot winds.  One boat limped into the anchorage with broken back stays and shrouds and a mast that was being held up only by jury-rigged lines, so we do try and keep an eye on the sky at all times.  Not sure what we would do different though.

To make matters worse, here off the village of BLA they often experience another type of wind called an Elefante.  These are localized, strong, westerly winds that funnel through the valleys between the high mountains on the peninsula - basically what we would call a katabatic wind.  They are usually experienced when both the west and easy coast of the Baja peninsula are experiencing calm conditions, exactly like we have now.  Rumor has it that these winds can top 100 mph and last for several hours, but only occur in a few specific spots along this east coast, including where we are right now.  So far, we have not seen any sign of these winds either, but that is most likely what we caught the edge of during our overnight passage from San Francisquito about a week ago - they were westerly winds that fortunately never exceeded 25 knots where we were at the time.

Regardless of the risks, we have decided to stay put here for another day.  This morning we were off the Guillermo's for breakfast before some further exploration of the village - I think we have seen most of it now (it is not that large).

Here are a few pics from the last few weeks...

Sailing Close-hauled north of Santa Rosalia

Sunset on overnight passage

The usual dolphin escort

I would post more pictures but this Internet connection really sucks.   What you here see has taken me the best part of 2 hours to upload, and even using our little Toshiba netbook, this does take power we can ill afford right now.  Maybe tomorrow?

{GMST}28|57|N|113|33|W|Bahia de los Angeles Village, BC, Mexico|Bahia de los Angeles Village, BC, Mexico{GEND}
 

Blah blah BLA

Bahia de los Angeles Village, BC, Mexico

Today we made the big move all the way to Bahia de los Angeles Village (hereinafter referred to as BLA), a trip of more than 6 miles.  No wind to speak of so we made the trip in a little over an hour using the engine.  These days we do need to use the engine once in a while anyway, just to keep the batteries full - our solar power is just not quite adequate for our needs right now - a bit disappointing!

We were led to believe that there would be phone service here by the village (an thus our investment in our Internet stick would be of some use) but no such luck.  I did manage to find an Internet connection via my big wifi antenna which, while it is not the greatest, is better than no connection at all.  Now that we have the connection we are able to catch up to what is happening in the world.  Apparently as soon as we stopped watching, the entire economy of the USA has gone into the dumpster, dragging the US and Canadian stock markets down with it.  Maybe we were better off not knowing.  I guess we are a little bit poorer now, but being down here in the Sea of Cortez it somehow does not seem all that important.

As soon as we got our anchor down here in BLA, we took the dinghy to shore to grab lunch at Guillermo's restaurant, then headed off to the market to stock up on a few essentials - primarily fruits and veggies.  I made the strategic mistake of deciding we did not need the motor on the dinghy for the short haul to the beach.  What I failed to take into consideration was the effort involved in rowing back to the boat against the prevailing wind and waves - inflatable dinghies are notoriously bad as rowing dinghies.  Somehow we made it back OK - placing Susanne in the bow to block the water from coming into the boat and not letting me get wet was an inspired move.  Of course as soon as we got back the wind died and seas calmed down.

{GMST}28|57|N|113|33|W|Bahia de los Angeles Village, BC, Mexico|Bahia de los Angeles Village, BC, Mexico{GEND}

Time passes

Puerto Don Juan, BC, Mexico

Puerto Don Juan is one of the north Sea of Cortez's best natural hurricane holes, with protection from wind and waves from all directions. Of course this means that when there is no hurricane, this is just a very quiet, peaceful spot to watch time slowly pass - nothing too exciting ever happens here.

We have done some exploring - there is a hike from this bay to the next one over at Ensenada el Quemado. We chose an overcast day because otherwise the hot sun can be somewhat overwhelming. The only wildlife we saw were a lot of little crabs scurrying along the beach and a pack of four coyotes that like to come down to the shoreline at low tide, foraging for food. When we did this hike, we were the only boat in the bay, but by our third night here there were another 6 boats sharing the anchorage, so at least we have some company now.

The weather has been really quite nice. A little cooler here at night than it was down around Santa Rosalia, making it easier to sleep. When I say cool, it has dipped as low as 27C at times - the daytime highs are still hovering closer to 35. People tell us it is likely to get hotter over the next couple of months. At this point we are not sure we are really very prepared for that kind of heat, but only time will tell. Oh, and a real first for us since getting to Mexico - we had some real live actual rain around 6AM one morning - it lasted almost 5 minutes; quite a deluge by local standards. Just enough to get us scrambling to get all the portlights and hatches closed, then open them all again before we suffocated.

Today, we went clamming. This is a strenuous exercise, consisting of taking the dinghy ashore during low tide and just walking around in the sand with your bare feet, dislodging the huge quantity of clams that hide no more than an inch below the surface. 5 minutes will net you as many clams as you could possibly want. We had some steamed clams for lunch and Sue is working on some clam chowder for later. Note: This is the first time we have actually utilized the harvest from the sea. I have dragged a fishing line in the water a bit, but so far no takers.

To add some excitement to our lives we will most likely move the boat over to the Village of Bahia de los Angeles in the next couple of days - rumor has it that Friday is "veggie" day.

{GMST}28|56.5|N|113|27|W|Puerto Don Juan, BC, Mexico|Puerto Don Juan, BC, Mexico{GEND}

Fast passage

Puerto Don Juan, BC, Mexico

What a difference a couple of days can make.

Our two nights at San Francisquito were a rocky and rolly trial. The wind blew from a variety of directions, from East, SE, SW, West and even NW at times. There did not appear to be much swell but what there was kept us either rocking from end to end or rolling back and forth alternately as the boat sailed around as it is wont to do whenever the wind blows. Our anchorage was very secure but we found it hard to get much sleep due to the motion. We thought about trying to get into the smaller inner bay (Cala San Francisquito) which was more sheltered, but there were already several boats in there and it is a very small bay.

When we left San Francisquito, we were determined to find an anchorage with a better chance of calm seas, which really left only one alternative - Puerto Don Juan - about 46 miles further to the north-west. With this in mind, we left early, around 7:30AM, so we would have time to do some sailing.

 For whatever reason, we had virtually no wind (nothing over 5 knots) for the entire day, so we ended up just motoring the whole way, arriving in Puerto Don Juan around 2:30PM - a very fast passage for us.

Being only 7 miles from the village of Bahia de Los Angeles, we are now effectively as far north as we planned to go for this hurricane season. Now we just have to figure out what to do with ourselves for the next couple of months. Note: We were the only boat in the anchorage when we arrived and, so far, only one other boat has come in after us (coincidently, also from Nanaimo). We suspect that the bulk of the boats are currently just around the corner at La Mona, where they are going to have some sort of full moon party tomorrow - not sure it is our cup of tea though.

{GMST}28|56.5|N|113|27|W|Puerto Don Juan, BC, Mexico|Puerto Don Juan, BC, Mexico{GEND}