June 30 – July 29, 2013
We left San Juanico on Sunday, June 30, finally into new territory again. Our first stop was Bahia San Nicolas, and calling it a “Bahia” was a bit generous. It was basically a long stretch of beach on the Northside of a pretty predominant point called Punta Pulpito. It wasn’t a very glamorous anchorage, but it provided protection from the mostly southern wind, so that’s where all the cruising boats were congregating on the way up north. A very redeeming quality of this anchorage was the lobsters, and we had our first of many “lobster fests” on Exodus with Lady Carolina. After a couple nights we continued north and sailed around Point Concepcion into Bahia Concepcion, which is a very, very deep north-facing bay with many smaller bays along the edge of it to anchor. We made our way down to El Burro Cove, which is where the 4th of July Cruisers party was to take place. We maneuvered around the very crowded anchorage to the shore side, set anchor, and then consternated over whether we should stay or not, because we were pretty shallow, and we didn’t know what the tide swing was going to be. In the end, we moved over to the next anchorage, called Playa Coyote, with a lot more room, and to our pleasant surprise, Lady Carolina followed us over. The water there was insanely warm, and so was the air temperature, so we spent the entire day before the party hanging out in the water in the shade of Exodus between the two hulls. There’s a small community there at both El Burro Cove and Playa Coyote, with “houses” lining the shore and a couple small tiendas. The nearest town is Mulege to the North, but there’s not a good anchorage there, so most cruisers get there by hitchhiking. We never got around to trying that.
After a couple days at Playa Coyote and a great 4th of July party, we sailed further south into Bahia Concepcion down to Playa Ventura near Isla Requeson. There is a small hotel and restaurant there, so we had a late lunch/early dinner there with several other cruisers along with many Clamato drinks. Before we left Concepcion we spent of few nights at the Northern anchorage of Santo Domingo, but on the way, we made a quick day stop at Playa Santa Barbara to dive on a sunken sailboat. It ended up being a pretty disappointing dive due to low visibility, but it was pretty nice diving without needing any wetsuit whatsoever. At Santo Domingo it wasn’t quite as hot, but we were infiltrated by a colony of bees, so we moved to a “secret anchorage” just a little way south to get relief from the bees. Secret anchorages are those that aren’t mentioned in the guidebook, and usually cruisers don’t readily share their knowledge of them because they want to keep them low traffic areas, but in this case, Bill and Lisa on Beyond Reason took pity on us and shared this one.
When we left the Santo Domingo area we were headed for Isla San Marcos, but the wind totally died on us, so we ended up staying the night on the Northside of Punta Chivato. It really was just a rest stop, so as soon as the wind picked up the next day we got moving again. Our first stop on Isla San Marcos was a day stop at the Gypsum mining town at the Southwest end of the island. One of the first things we noticed about the town, after the cloud of gypsum hanging in the air, of course, was how clean the town was. We walked around for a while, but the tiendas were unfortunately closed. We scattered a bit, and as I was checking out the graveyard, Alex and Brenden come back to me and tell me that Dad got on a motorcycle with some guy and drove off that way. Then I notice the Lady Carolina family getting into a large pick-up truck with someone. I tell the boys to stay with me, and all I can think is, “what the heck is going on here?” Not too much later Tim pulls up on the back of a four-wheel ATV with two kids who didn’t speak any English, but they gave Tim a riding tour of part of the town, including the airstrip. Then they showed us where an open tienda was, but it was the type where there is a counter and not much of a selection. Don’t even think about fresh veggies. While Tim was playing around with the kids on the ATV, it turns out Lady Carolina was in a truck with the Director of the Mine and had arranged for us all to get a tour the following day. Score! We anchored for the evening up at Sweet Pea Cove, and then took Exodus back to the town the next day for the tour, and it was an amazing experience. We ended up staying at Sweet Pea cove for a few days where there was excellent snorkeling, and I finally saw a golden grouper. There were several boats in the anchorage, so Tim and I made the rounds in the dinghy and ended up having a big cocktail party on Exodus. One of the highlights of the anchorage, though, was the incredibly loud whales in the moonlight.
From Sweet Pea Cove we headed into Santa Rosalia for our first stay in a marina since leaving San Diego. We arrived on July 16 and left on July 30, and this included a several day road trip up to San Diego. Santa Rosalia is a nice little town with decent provisioning and air-conditioned restaurants. There was wifi at the marina office, so most days after getting all their boat work done the boys hung out up at the office, which was also air-conditioned.
When we left Santa Rosalia we were bound of Bahia de Los Angeles, where we would be spending the remainder of the summer months with the rest of the small group of cruisers, who like us, were planning to bear the heat, tropical storms, and Chubascos and stay in the sea for the summer.
Gresham Family Exodus 