Around Loreto

Espiritu anchored with friends at Isla Coronados 

The city of Loreto on the southeast coast of Baja Mexico is the center of culture and activity in the area. Fortunately there are several beautiful bays and islands in the immediate vicinity, so we've been checking them out.

Our first stop on this leg of our adventure was Agua Verde, south of Loreto. 

The beautiful bay and anchorage of Agua Verde

Don of Windcharmer and Chris marvel at the beauty

Espiritu, Windcharmer and Trovita went ashore to explore the tiny village.

Cows roam free on the beach

Little pink house

In tiny Mexican villages like this one, families turn one room of their home into a small market (or "tienda"). There were 3 home/tiendas in the village, selling a small selection of groceries and produce  out of their living room.

This bedroom, with children happily playing, opened 

directly into the "market" (AKA their living room)

Lisa and the goats, which roam freely through the village

So, not only are there cows, chickens and goats mooing, clucking and baaaaa-ing their 

way up and down the dusty streets of Agua Verde, there are also pigs and...

Turkeys! They've got the run of the place. 

Now that's what I call "free range."

Little blue church

There's a beautiful reef here, and it will always be known as the 

spot of my first spearfishing kill.

I was by myself when I bagged him (Chris was ashore exploring with the guys). I couldn't bring myself to take a selfie with the 2 pound wavyline grunt.

My first kill -- pupils fixed and dilated

I'm not a killer. I'm a gentle person, I hope. I don't like violence. But I do eat meat. And eating fish is necessary to stay alive in the isolated Sea of Cortez. So I knew I had to step up to the plate. 

Still, I wasn't looking forward to my first spear kill. Yes, I was proud and happy after the spear pierced the target, as I'd been working on my technique for weeks and had experienced dozens of misses.

But it's strange and sobering to see a living thing die painfully in front of you, at your own hand.

And yes, the fresh fish dinner went down good later on that night, bathed in butter and lime.

I suppose the trick is to never take the kill for granted -- to eat every morsel with gratitude and to show respect for the life so suddenly taken.

"Today is a good day to die." -- Chief Crazy Horse 

Next stop: Bahia Candeleros, a few miles north.

We got some internet at the beautiful resort on the beach at Candeleros

Desert views

We walked 2 miles on a dirt road to the village of Ligui.

Even though the village is super-small, there was still a teensy-weensy Catholic church.

church doors

We went inside, where a Jesus statue unlike any I've seen in Latin America greeted us.

Jesus loves bowling?

I know THIS Jesus loves bowling, but the original?

Actually, upon closer inspection I'm assuming that is our beloved Planet Earth that Jesus is holding, not a bowling ball. It's the fact that there are no landmasses and it's completely covered in water that threw me. 

Maybe Jesus is warning us about climate change in the little Ligui statue?

This little rowboat near the beach was named "Rosebud." Maybe it's from 

Charles Foster Kane's little known "Sea of Cortez" period? 

Flowers in the middle of the desert!

After a couple of days at Candoleros, we sailed north again.

We passed gorgeous mountains and rock formations as we sailed north

Next stop: Puerto Escondido.

We gassed up and did some shopping at the small Puerto Escondido tienda

You can anchor or grab a mooring here (both the same price -- $17US), and it's the place to be in a hurricane due to the excellent protection. But except for the tienda, laundry and internet, there's really nothing here. So we moved north.

Next stop: the Loreto waterfront

Since the conditions were calm, we anchored overnight here with several other boats 

and provisioned at the Ley Supermarket.

The town of Loreto is 400 years old 

From Loreto, we sailed only 6 miles north to our next destination: Isla Coronados.

Espiritu and several other boats settled in amidst the volcanic beauty of Isla Coronados

Tricia of Interabang leads us ashore on the 

lovingly maintained trail

Wood path to beach

View from the top. Chris looks down at the fleet, thinking "How did we get here?"

Happy 

Red kayaks

Dinghy and seagull

We spent a lovely afternoon with our old friends Derek and Tricia aboard Interabang. They're mentoring us regarding the ins 'n' outs of Baja Rummy -- a complicated, multi-deck card game of which mastery is sort of a prerequisite to be welcomed into the Sea of Cortez cruising community. 

What? You don't play Baja Rummy? Yes! Yes, we do!!!!

We're unclear whether it is legal or not to spearfish in these National Park islands around Loreto. We do know the fish counts in general are down -- way down -- so there are limits to commercial fishing for sure. Some say spearfishing here is OK as long as you have a license (which we all do), and other's say it's no longer allowed. Chris and I chose to simply enjoy the beauty and wait until we get farther north to spearfish again.

But some buddy boats here did hit the reefs...

The boys on family boats Cielo Grande and Shonigan speared several fish, 

and brought us a still wiggling grouper as a gift!

Wow.  Well, we of course accepted with gratitude, and we're still 

dining on her (him?) as of this writing. 

Speaking of s/v Shonigan, their  spirited and adorable 13 year old daughter 

Nina showed me her "room" aboard.

Teenager Nina's "room" aboard (AKA the v-berth)

So that's it for now. We're meeting new friends every day as we continue to sail north along southeastern Baja. More later! Hasta luego!

Puerto Los Gatos adventure

Espiritu rests in Puerto Los Gatos anchorage

After exploring a couple of Sea of Cortez islands, we were forced to turn back to La Paz to deal with an electrical navigation issue. 

Chris gets technical help from Paul of s/v Grace and Jeff of s/v Luminescence.

Back at Club Cruceros in La Paz, I perused the bulletin board for the latest cruising news. You might remember a few weeks ago I posted that one of the cruisers had anonymously posted a photo with push pins of a resplendent Donald Trump, having recently become the presumptive Republican nominee for president.

Today, the photo of Trump was gone, but in it's place pinned to the bulletin board was this:

Oh, dear. This is the rap group NWA

 (Niggas With Attitude -- yes, that is their actual name)

Need it be stated that there are no apparent African Americans, rap fans or anyone of African descent  currently in Club Cruceros or in the local cruising community.

Well, I'm not sure what the anonymous disgruntled cruiser with the Pushy Push Pins 

was trying to say, but I could guess. 

Sigh. The Push Pin Bandit may be a man of few words, but I guess his point is crystal clear. :-/

 Well, the good news is, after only a couple of days in La Paz Chris solved our chart plotter problem  and we headed north along the southeastern coast of Baja California.

First stop: San Evaristo, where we had tacos at adorable little Lupe's Restaurant --

note the sail and surfboard signs -- drawing in the cruisers.

View of the anchorage from Lupe's Restaurant

We had 16 cruising adults in various stages of inebriation at the restaurant, and only one cruising kid -- 12 year old Evan, spending a year aboard s/v Coastal Drifter with his grandparents.

I took pity on Evan being the only kid, and challenged him to a game of dominoes.

Not shockingly, Evan reigned victorious. Little did he know what an easy target I was.

Evan celebrates his "dominoes champ" status. I lose. Again. 

We painted a shell with the words "Espiritu 2016," and they hammered it 

to the wall with the hundreds of other shells. Cool. 

After a good night's sleep in the anchorage, we sailed north the next morning to our next destination: Puerto Los Gatos.

The breathtaking Sierra de Las Gargantas mountains gave us the feel 

of sailing up the Colorado River. 

The distinctive rock formations of Puerto Los Gatos

Safely at anchor, we headed for a hike with Don and Lisa of s/v Windcharmer.

The trail beckons to the right

All the way to the top!

Me and Lisa look down on s/v Espiritu, Windcharmer and Trovita

View from Espiritu at anchor 

Shades of Bryce Canyon in Utah

Wow! 

Later that evening, we went ashore for a beach bonfire and jam with our buddy boats plus s/v Coastal Drifter, who had joined the group.

Chris comes ashore 

We jammed, with special guest 12yo Evan (s/v Wind Charmer) on the wood flute

Roasting marshmallows with Lisa and Laurie

 of Windcharmer and Trovita

The next morning we did yoga on the beach with Don and Lisa of Windcharmer.

This is Lisa. She is 61 years old -- and kinda my idol. 

We're currently anchored at Loreto with 7 other sailboats. Our plan is to pull anchor in the next day or two and head ever north to explore more of the islands. 

Could be a couple of weeks until I'm online again. But no worries -- both potential hurricanes in the Eastern Pacific are weakening and turning away from us...so, all is well!

XOXO Chris and Liz, s/v Espiritu 

Jewel of the Sea of Cortez

                         "The ocean is made of water -- H20 
                          Two parts hydrogen, one part oxygen. 
                          But there is a third thing that makes it water --
                           and we don't know what that is." 

                                                                  -- D.H. Lawrence 

Espiritu rests at Isla San Francisco

Chris and I finally pulled anchor in La Paz a week ago and headed north to explore the Sea of Cortez.

For the first time on this trip, we flew the spinnaker.

The former bowman is happy

troubleshooting

This Wimpy Cruiser (moi) is always nervous about hoisting a spinnaker, as the memory is still fresh of countless horrifying, spinnaker-flying brushes with death during our racing days.

Whelp

Holy crap!

I think that's Leonardo DiCaprio at the top there...

As you can see, this innocent looking, usually brightly colored swath of sailcloth can wreak havoc like no other piece of equipment on the boat.

But it also makes you fly...

Yeeeee Haw!

Anyway, despite my fear I didn't fight Captain Chris because I knew how much he wanted to pop that damn spinny. Thankfully the wind was light so actually, I was happy too...

The spinnaker and me, anxiety free!

As the map shows, we started at La Paz (at the bottom in white letters). Our itinerary 

would include Isla Partida and Isla San Francisco.

First stop: Ensenada Grande at Isla Partida

For the first time, I strapped on our spearfishing gear at Isla Partida and headed for the reef. I plan on becoming an expert spearfisherman by the end of our summer in the sea. 

The visibility was unlimited, but the few remaining coral were not healthy appearing. 

I was shocked to see a deadly Crown of Thorns 

sea star devouring the reef on Isla Partida

We've seen documentaries on the Crown of Thorns. It's a sea star that feeds on coral, and it's proliferating and destroying coral reefs all over the world due to overfishing of its predators (large fish). 

I got off one shot from the speargun, which missed my target (a large parrotfish) by a mile.  I spent 15 minutes fumbling and bumbling in the sand trying to reload the thing, but this Wimpy Cruiser was too weak and incompetent, and reloading proved harder and more complicated than I originally thought.

 Ah, well. Looks like spaghetti for dinner tonight. 

The next morning, we headed ashore for a hike.

I was surprised by the greenery along the well kept trail

This desert hare let us get incredibly close. I've heard rabbit stew is tasty grub. 

Maybe I should go grab the speargun...? 

The geology of the island looked like a melting chocolate cake, which kinda put me in the mood for the tasty, decadent, sugary treat. Sadly, on a desert island in the Sea of Cortez, there is no actual chocolate cake anywhere to be found, which is probably a good thing.

This cave looks like it drops directly into hell. 

Needless to say, we did not enter.

Another gorgeous yet foreboding cave on Isla Partida

After a couple of lovely days here, we headed north for the short hop to Isla San Francisco. 

True story: We have 7,500 songs on our iPod. As we approached Isla San Francisco, I had the iPod on "shuffle." And what song should pop up?

"When the Lights Go Down In The City," by 80's supergroup Journey.

A song about...SAN FRANCISCO!

Lyrics to the song

And -- not only are we visiting Isla San Francisco, we're also on a JOURNEY!

Whoa.    ;-)

The Jewel of the Sea of Cortez

We climbed to the top of the mountain to get the de-riguer shot of Espiritu in the middle of the bay. There is a pretty good trail which we ecstatically climbed. We couldn't believe we were here. 

There was some dicey class IV-V rock scrambling at the very tippy top of the mountain (meaning there is at least a slight risk of death). Since we have mountaineering and rock climbing experience we took several deep breaths, planned our route together, and went for it.

 Emerging victorious from the exposed area, we bounded down the trail on the other side -- giddy with the life-affirming joy one earns after surviving slightly risky adventures in the wild.

Chris looks down on the trail winding before us on the hills below. 

That's a couple of hundred feet down on the right. 

A slightly bloody knee was my souvenir of the 

kinda-sorta-scary-but-worth-it climb

There are some salt mines on the island. As everyone knows, salt is 

my drug of choice (I can handle it, because my BP remains 116/70. Anyway, come-on, 

I've given up chocolate cake...what do you want from me?).

 I was in ecstasy!  

I felt like Tony Montana in Scarface. Only with salt. 

Chris gently holds the skeleton of one 

who had been here before

Day 2 of spearfishing -- still no kills but I did manage to reload the thing myself after much practice. Also, I had a couple of bounce-offs and I hit one poor guy in the eye before he scampered away in terror. 

Sigh. I actually tossed and turned that night worrying about the fate of the wrasse with the blown out eye. Was he in pain? Was there any way I could possibly bring him some tylenol? Or maybe a little fish-sized eyepatch?

Anyway, I'll keep working on my spearfishing skills. 

Yes. Spearfishing is sexy. 

That evening, we watched a spectacular full moon pop over the mountain at dusk.

A magical full moon lights up the bay just after sundown. 

After another night of fluky, sometimes quite blustery Coromel winds, we pulled anchor again to head north. But our chart plotter, which had been dogging us with malfunction after malfunction over the past several months, failed again. 

Captain Chris made the decision to turn around and return to La Paz to deal with the problem.

Sigh. 

It made me think of a quote I had recently read in People Magazine:

"All challenges can be met with joy."

I know, I know. People magazine? Sorry, I always cite my sources, no matter how embarrassing. Anyway, I don't even remember what the context was, but the quote was so simple and powerful that it stuck with me. 

We're a bit disappointed because our good friends aboard LeaHona, Interabang and pretty much every other buddy boat of ours have all sailed north. 

But I'm not completely alone...

Me and my buddy Angelica at our favorite 

local hangout Super Burro -- together again. 

So, for the time being, we're back in La Paz dealing with the chart plotter issue...with joy.