We finally (FINALLY!) left La Cruz on April 22nd. We were absolutely ready to get going after having spent over a month in and around Banderas Bay. We had made a brief trip over to Paradise Village Marina in Nuevo Vallarta, which was a very fun change of pace for a few days from La Cruz. Paradise Village is essentially a very touristy resort that happens to have a marina attached. It has three enormous pools and a giant crocodile water slide. There is also a gorgeous beach, a mall, restaurants, and oodles of other amenities. The marina itself is also really well run, with potable water at the dock, in-slip pump out, and excellent security. The Vallarta Yacht Club was also a lovely place to hang as well. While Paradise Village was a lot of fun, it felt in many ways like we could have been back in the United States. That’s not the worst thing for a few days, but when you’re sailing in Mexico, it seems a bit off after a while. I will say, LouLou was NOT happy when we left and had her biggest meltdown of the trip as we left the dock: “I want to go down the crocodile slide!!!!” Aw well.
After Paradise Village, we returned to the La Cruz anchorage and started our serious preparations to head north. We were waiting for a good weather window to leave, which really meant a few days where the north winds calmed down, or preferably switched to southerly wind, so we could actually sail north. Apparently, this normally happens a bit earlier, but this year it was closer to the end of April. We also really wanted to be sure the engine was working well after our difficult passage around Cabo Corrientes. So we (i.e. Jeff) added a Racor fuel filter and changed our old fuel filters to help with any gunk that may have accumulated in the fuel lines. So we finally, FINALLY(!), left La Cruz on April 22nd, and headed just about 10 miles away, to Punta Mita, located at the northern entrance to Banderas Bay.
Punta Mita turned out to be a huge surprise for us, especially having spent so much time just down the “road.” I had thought that it would be a really exposed, rolly anchorage – when it was in fact a gorgeous spot with glorious views and a beautiful, white sand beach. It was a wee bit rolly, but no worse than the La Cruz anchorage. We also went ashore and explored the sleepy town, which was a pleasant mix of Mexican tiendas, surf shops, and a few more upscale cafes. Honestly, if we had realized how nice it was in Punta Mita, we would have spent more time out there earlier!
After a few days, it looked like our weather window was opening and we decided to head up the coast to San Blas. I had gone back and forth about the best route north many, many times. Initially we were going to head straight offshore on an overnight passage to Isla Isabel. But this seemed a bit dicey having still not absolutely proven that our engine wouldn’t konk out again – especially important if we were going to beat into any north wind. We thought about Chacala, but while that is supposed to be gorgeous, it is also supposed to be super rolly and it is recommended using a stern anchor, which seemed like a lot of work for one night. So it seemed like San Blas could be a great option. San Blas would be about a 50 mile sail up the coast, with a wide open anchorage we had already visited. If anything happened with the engine, we could bail out into a number of smaller anchorages and also sail onto anchor in Matachen Bay. Many contingencies! So we set off, early in the morning, set the sails, rounded Punta Mita, and finally escaped Bandera Bay.
We sailed much of the trip up the coast, and arrived in San Blas just before sundown. I was thrilled to be there. It really is a gorgeous bay, if it wasn’t for the mean ole’ jejenes, tiny, nasty, biting insects. Anchoring well off the beach kept us from getting too many bites, but we still got a few – so we set off right at sunrise the next morning for Isla Isabel. This was only a 40-mile hop now, a comfortable morning ride. Early in this trip I caught a Jack Crevalle, our first big fish since Baja in the fall – hurray! Jack Crevalle aren’t the best eating, but we did fry it up and it wasn’t too bad. It just felt good to have actually caught it ourselves. Jeff did hook a dorado, but it got away – boo!
Around noon, we pulled into Isla Isabel, a tiny volcanic island about 30 miles off the coast. It is supposed to be a tricky anchorage due to poor holding over a rocky bottom, but we got lucky and found a great sandy patch right beside one of the beautiful, towering Monas, rocky islets just off the east coast of the island. We had surprisingly good protection there, with maybe less roll than we had had in San Blas. What a beautiful stop!
Mexico’s little Galapagos
The next morning, we dinghied around to the south side of the island to a small fishing village tucked in a little rocky bay. We parked the dinghy ashore and hiked up a steep trail to a ridge overlooking the whole island. What an incredible hike! Isabel is a national park, and it is known for its enormous bird population. So many birds! Hitchcock would be impressed. The most interesting bird was definitely the blue-footed booby, with its pale blue feet and nests all over the ground. There were also enormous frigate birds and terns everywhere. And I really mean everywhere! Bird nests every five feet. There were also tame iguanas running all over the ground. So wild! Kind of like a mini-Jurassic Park.
We ended up spending five nights in Isabel, way longer than we had expected. We had initially thought we would go north to Mazatlan and then cross over to Baja from there. But a southerly was predicted and we decided just to wait for that, especially since we had such a great spot in the little anchorage. Many of the other boats had the same plan as us, and often in the mornings we would dinghy around to each other’s boats and discuss weather and routes. One morning we hiked up into the interior of the island to see the water-filled volcanic crater – super cool! Many days we paddle boarded around the Monas and over to the rocky beach. Another morning Josie and I were getting ready to swim and saw a sea snake – yikes! That definitely gave us some pause before we jumped in for sure. The day before we left I cooked a bunch of food in preparation for our upcoming two day sail – enchilada casserole, fusilli pasta, and rice.
Finally, the morning came for us to set off on our 250 mile crossing to Ensenada de Muertos, a bay about 30 miles south of La Paz. We left Isabel around 7am, and slowly made our way north, sailing and motor sailing for much of the first day. It started out pretty much glassy calm. Dolphins followed us for many hours, and sea turtles floated by with birds on their backs. Night fell and the moon sparkled across the sea. We listened to MANY podcasts as we watched miles and miles of ocean slip by.
The second day we watched the sun rise and we were way out of sight of land. No engine needed today – the wind was the perfect angle. It was a bit rolly at times, but manageable. LouLou and I snuggled on the settee and watched some T.V. We tried to fish but weren’t too lucky with that. I kept trying to see the Baja coastline, expecting it to rise up to the west much sooner than it actually did. Jeff wrote in his journal and experimented with MidJourney. Josie binge-watched Outer Banks. Amazingly, we didn’t see one boat this entire day. I did see a shark fin slicing through the water though. That night I was definitely pretty tired. I don’t sleep all that well on passages. I can handle one night pretty well, but a second night is a lot. When it was my turn to go to sleep, the seas were beginning to settle down and I climbed in to our warm bunk – I felt like I was sleeping on a cloud. That was a good sleep.
When I woke up, the seas had completely calmed down and Jeff told me he could see land. Hurray! We were only about 30 miles from our destination. It was so wonderful to arrive in Muertos. It was funny too – almost all of the boats in the anchorage had been with us in Isabel.
Muertos is a lovely anchorage and the first place we saw the beautiful turquoise water that the Sea of Cortez is known for. We couldn’t really see it where we anchored, but when we dinghied ashore and looked behind us, the whole bay was sparkling blue-green. Just beautiful!
We spent that night resting after the long passage, and then in the morning we set off again, this time for La Paz. While this was a much shorter trip, it was a bit tricky sailing through the Cerralvo Channel. Fortunately, the wind was not funneling out of the north, but there were 20+ knot winds out of the west that we hit entering the channel. It was definitely some sporty sailing for sure. But Ohana is a good boat, and she sailed along, happily gliding through the white caps. After about two hours, the wind completely died, and so we motored. And then the wind returned, so we sailed. And then it died. And then it picked up. It was a very up and down ride! As we turned the corner into the San Lorenzo Channel, we spotted our friends on Sarama coming from the north. They had crossed from Mazatlan and stayed on Espiritu Santo for a few nights. It was really fun sailing side by side as we entered Bahia de La Paz together.
This was an exciting time, finally seeing all of the famous anchorages we had been reading about for so many years. We were really in the Sea of Cortez! And now all the anchorages would be so much closer together – 10 mile hops instead of 100 miles. Love it.
We reached La Paz around 4pm in the after and motored up the five mile long channel entering La Paz harbor. We had heard anchoring could be a bit weird here, so we weren’t quite sure what to expect. Some friends were already parked in the anchorage, so we steered over to meet them, but immediately aborted that attempt as the depth was only seven feet!! Yikes. Fortunately, another boat we had been in Isabel with pulled in beside us and showed us a good spot outside of Marina de la Paz, which is where we are now. It is mostly flat calm here, with glorious sunrises and sunsets. The La Paz waltz is definitely a real thing, due to the currents and the wind fighting against each other. But we seem to be holding well and we aren’t too near any other boats.
La Paz so far is lovely. We have some friends from down south who are here and we’ve enjoyed walking up and down the beautiful Malecon. Club Cruceros is a great spot for chatting with other cruisers. And there is a very cool beachside skate park for Josie. Also, the Dos Mares desert car race is going on right now – dune buggies everywhere! So all is well. We will stay here for a few more days to provision and then we are headed north, into the magical Sea of Cortez.
