San Jose del Cabo

December 13th - 21st, 2018

We left Bahia Santa Maria with a gorgeous sunrise that I posted in the last blog. It was a glorious morning and one of my favorite things on this sailing journey. I have been fortunate enough to appreciate many beautiful sunrises and sunsets. They happen every day of course but this lifestyle affords the TIME to stop and appreciate Mother Nature’s glory. This transcends to multiple elements including the wind, the sea, the sun, the moon, the stars, the flora, the fauna, the marine life… Life is always soo busy that to “stop and smell the roses” gets more challenging than ever. I am a busy body and a planner. Stephen kindly calls me a “forward thinker” but that means I get so wrapped up in planning the next thing that I don’t enjoy the current moment. Back to that mindfulness talk again. Anyway, I am learning. 

Our sail to San Jose del Cabo was a motor and a sail. We had a mix of everything but an amazing display of marlins jumping out the water - we saw a ton of them and sea turtles drifting by.  We purposely did not put out our hand lines, scared we would hook one and when we tried, we did hook one - it bent the hook and we saw its huge tail slap the water and I was thinking “please break the line, please break the line!!”  It got away and I was grateful! Not sure if anyone has seen a boat with an aft cockpit?  There is not a lot of room for a tiny fish murder let alone anything proportionate to human size like a marlin.  SV Luego hooked 2 marlins on their sail down with their hand lines and lost their gear on each time.  But the did catch a dorado too - yummy. We had no luck even after passing marlin territory but some big wind/swell discouraged us from leaving lines out. It is also hard to complete the fish murder/clean up with a boat rolling back and forth/heeling over. 

We did buddy boat with SV Nanatuk on the way down. SV Luego was a 1/2 day ahead of us as well. We had some boobie birds hang out on the whisker pole for a ride down. We had 1, then 2, then 3. They rode for several hours with us and since they are pelagic birds they were able to move on when it got too rolly due to large seas instead of the poor birds we had on the way to Eureka that exhausted themselves and didn’t make it. 

We did get to San Jose del Cabo a bit too early around 3am and so we hung out outside the breakers to await daylight. We do not like going into a marine in the dark. We ended up having another big wind event during this time as well. Uggh. Stephen woke me up during his watch to hand steer while we made some sail changes. The autopilot couldn’t handle the switchy winds/swell direction.  Eventually, I went back to sleep and awoke to him hove to and he did all the dishes, straightened up the boat and made it look like a nice place to be again. He is a smart man and I realized how much he liked sailing and wanted me to like it too even when I am sleep deprived. 

Once we arrived at the marine, SV Arctos, Madrone and Luego were all there. We celebrated with some good margaritas and the Thursday Art Walk downtown. The town center was decorated for the holidays and each street had a simple string of white lights to make it very quaint. We did not stop in Cabo San Lucas on purpose.  We wanted smaller and quainter and San Jose fit the bill. There was great art and a town of cute shops/restaurants. Definitely more “gringoesque” ( i made up that word) but that was ok. We had a table of 14 for dinner and there were some serious tequila drinkers in this group. 

The next couple of days were filled with some good runs on the beach, fishing, snorkeling, attempts at spear fishing and lots of taco eating ( we did find a local joint for tacos for $25 pesos or $1.25 a piece that was soo good and flan there too was awesome). We did split a 2-day car rental with Nanatuk to get us to El Chorro Hot Springs in Santiago with a coastal road trip back around.  We did drive through the Tropic of Cancer:)- there was a sign -  so that was cool as we sailed through it as well. We had a great time seeing the inland sights. I do want to plug The La Marina Inn with an attached restaurant called Georges, it is FABULOUS and walking distance to the marina! Amazing jalapeño margaritas, mole sauce, and creamy poblano enchiladas - so good. Not the cheapest but certainly the best! I almost forgot we enjoyed the farmers market on Saturday and Stephen was able to acquire a recipe for tuna tacos that really was a tomato based stew and an epicurean delight. We noted that green olives are used in cooking here more than we knew and adds a saltiness that we personally like. The market had music, art, jewelry, big glass jugs of aqua de frescas and some fruit and veggies, but it definitely was more crafts than local produce. There was a stand of papel amate ( paper art) from the nuju villagers of the San Pablito mountains. If I was flying home or had more room on the boat this would have been a purchase - it is beautiful! 

This destination we realized was where different future plans were being thought out. All of us wanted to get to this point, some starting from as far north as Alaska and others just leaving out of Ventura. But beyond this decisions were not concrete.  Anyway, each boat has different time frames for travel - some limited for returns to work and others with no care about time or destination. Stephen and I originally had plans to go the Marquesas the end of March/beg of April but we feel like we would be rushed seeing Mexico now. We feel like we just got here and realized how quickly time can pass especially when weather affects your travel plans significantly. Additionally, we figured we would just head into the Sea of Cortez after Cabo before realizing the winds up there during this time of year are no joke and often get 30-40 knots and blow like that for several days. It is advised to go to La Paz in Spring and Fall by the guide books ( whoops - we felt so good about our planning but missed that). Dave and Kelly tried to go to La Paz after leaving Bahia Santa Maria and turned around due to getting 28 knots on the nose and decided to go to San Jose del Cabo. So now we decided to head to the mainland, do the traditional cruising itinerary which is head to the mainland and then head up into the Sea of Cortez in the Spring when the winds chill out and then slowly make our way up with plans to leave the boat in June 2019. 

We did decide to do a 2nd cruising season here returning to Mexico in November 2019,  and we are happy about it. We feel like we will get a good chance to see Mexico and not feel rushed and then head to the South Pacific in March 2020. Again, this is all tentative as life happens along the way. We say if we still having fun, have the finances, and good health we will continue the journey. Happiness is having someone to love, something to do and something to look forward to - I stole that from Too Soon Old, Too Late Smart book by Gordon Livingston. 

Hydrovane plug - Ha! Nanatuk in the background

Our Yukon friends Heather and Mike - we grew fond of these guys! They did leave and head to La Paz as they only have a year and plan to go Marquesas, Hawaii and back up to Alaska where the boat resides in Skagway. 

1 boobie

2 boobies

and 3! 

Entering the breakers to the marina entrance after a LONG night

Celebrating arrival with Dave and Kelly from SV Arctos

This church was beautiful inside and I was lucky enough to hear the children's choir practicing. It was heavenly to listen to. We did hear a story about a priest who attempted to bring religion to the local people. He was murdered by the local people and this is noted in the a picture in the tiles above the entrance. He tried to tell the local people that polygamy was not ok. We learned this on a tour from a dedicated local named Chris who is 5th generation and does free tours to get folks interested in San Jose del Cabo. He was very articulate and captivated the audience for an hour and 30 minutes no problem! Highly recommend!! We walked all over town and learned so much about the history of San Jose.  

Beach next to the marina - great to run on. Nasty shore break FYI

Fun  night out with lots of other cruisers. We played the sentence game after dinner - one of my favorites. The Montana folks and Canadians are gamers for sure. I learned this game in MT and it was the Yukon folks who presented it. We laughed a lot! 

Farmers Market day! 

Shopping at La Comer - more of a gringo store but had everything we needed! We had 2 carts - yep! We had not shopped since Ensenada. Now...how to fit all this on a boat - oh yeah and wipe down all fruits and veggies with Microdyn and get rid of ALL of your packaging!! Shopping to me is fun and not fun - just like at home but worse. 

This cross lights up at night with fun colors! Stephen's mother Renee is very religious and used to be a Nun. I let her know this cross was right next to the marina to reassure her of her prayers! 

This sandy road was the type of road we drove for our entire drive after leaving Hwy 1 to head to Santiago. There was no pavement we encountered except for a random section about 100 ft. We drove from San Jose del Cabo north to Santiago and then headed east to the coast and then south to make a loop drive back to San Jose.  It was an easy to drive for the most part and yeah for google maps that works offline! 

Our rental! 

El Chorro Hot Springs area in Santiago.  There was also Santa Rita hot springs in the neighborhood but they were closed on Wednesday and it happened to be Wednesday. This is at base of Agua Caliente Canyon. 

This is part of a biosphere and there is a local fee of $20 pesos per person. We got some local honey as well from the local Ejido. 

Our Yukon friends Heather and Mike on SV Nanatuk! We spent a lot of time with these guys.

The temp was not too hot - most of the hot water was coming out the rocks behind Stephen and Heather. I'm guessing 102 ish from the rocks. I actually liked it because I usually get too hot and you could move around in the pool and pick your temp. If you dug in the sand where you were sitting you could get hot water too. My heels were getting hot just being buried in the sand. 

Heather and Mike are birdies so they break out the bird book and we learned a lot from them about the local birds. We think these were the white faced Ibis. I did download the Audubon app. 

Outside of Santiago, San Jorge Valley area. 

Palomar restaurant in Santiago

Crested Caracara falcon on top of cactus

North of Los Frailes - beach off the coastal road

Turtle Bay, Bahia Asuncion and Bahia Santa Maria

What has happened since we left Ensenada? 

Behind on blogging due to no internet but finally catching up:)

Well the last time I posted we had just left Ensenada. It has been a really fun last couple of weeks. Stephen and I made the big passage to Bahia San Bartolome (Turtle Bay) 367 nm in one passage. Sailing was fantastic and we barely used the engine. We were thinking that this is how it is supposed to be!! No motoring and sailing in 10-15 knots with some warmer weather! yahoo!

To get us even more excited, we caught 2 big eye tuna at the same time on each hand line,  shortly after we were offshore. Wow!! This handline fishing is easy - they just bite and we pull them in on the line. We threw one back and kept one. Sustainable fishing. Our 1st fish taco from fish we caught! How exciting! We made fish tacos, poke, fish and eggs. Now we can feed ourselves - perfect.

When we arrived in Turtle Bay we only stopped for the night and then made a shorter passage of 48nm to Bahia de la Asuncion.  Again, we had fabulous sailing and actually right before we got in there was really BIG swell and we were cruising at 8-11 knots. The hydrovane was starting to get squirrelly and we knew it was too much for our electric autopilot so we decided to hand steer. We had not had big conditions like that since Neah Bay. It was fun but also the fine line of we didn’t want it any bigger. We came into the anchorage in the dark and we were greeted by a large family of seals dancing in the phosphorescence as well as flying fish and squid that even landed on top of our deck. I was on the bow with a spotlight to make sure there were no obstacles or dangers for us setting anchor. I had a spectacular show of the marine nightlife for sure. It was magical. 

We had never had so many seals surround our boat and stay with us for the entire ride in. These seals continued with their curious visiting every morning and EVERY night. It was routine that at night they would gather around our boat doing barrel rolls, popping their heads up and darting back and forth on the circumference of Soulstice.  I have some video but have given up on uploading a video with blogger. They like to play with the anchor chain and I got used to hearing them breathe at night because I like to keep the port light open next to where I sleep. It is this pushing and pulling of air in and out of their mouths you hear each time they hit the water’s surface and I missed it when we left. They would frolick under the boat and blow large bubbles that you could hear all night long. It became a noise I looked forward to actually at night. Like we had night time guardians of the boat. 

Although, these little mischievous creatures did decide to steal our manta hook!!! somehow… they managed to get the shackle off. This is a device we have attached to our snubber line which is a line used to help take the stress off the windless and absorb any shock load in higher winds. It is a nice tool so I don’t have to tie a knot with a very thick line, about 1 1/2 inches thick that gets very difficult to untie when I retrieve it after being anchored out for some time. I did not find them as cute after this because they added some work for me again when anchoring. 

Stephen and I were hesitant to take our dinghy to shore as there was a good surf break daily. We got the number for an expat named Shari Bondy who we telephoned and she said, “sure!”  to everything we requested. This was a ride into shore with a provisioning and fuel stop. She also said we should stop at her favorite shrimp taco place. Juan, her husband, picked us up in his panga and brought us to shore. We got some shopping done, filled 2 jerry cans of diesel and then had a great afternoon talking to locals and enjoying shrimp tacos. They had these pickled carrots as a side for the tacos that were delicious. Shari took us to her place which is a home adjacent to a bufadoro. It is a  magnificent piece of property that sits on a point that has crashing waves and would be a home costing millions in the States. She had many skeletal decorations from great beach finds decorating her rock wall and large whale bones that glorified the entrance to her house. We had a beer and hung out with Juan, his friend Gabriel, who was a blind accordion player ( he lost his vision to diabetic retinopathy) and a Canadian hitchhiker who was staying at Shari’s campground down the road. When we went back to the Soulstice we both agreed we truly were enjoying Mexico and we might extend our stay for 2 cruising seasons here. 

One night we got a big surprise as Nanatuk, our Yukon Canadian friends, Heather and Mike arrived in Asuncion.  They left before us in Ensenada but made stops to Isla San Martin and Isla Cedros. We were so excited to hang out with them. We did venture to shore the next day with their dinghy and definitely had a wet exit:) The shore landings are a skill in progress! We had a great walk in town, had some local food at a restaurant called Marias and a nice long walk on the beach. Dan, a gentleman we met the day before with Shari, originally from San Diego but moved to Asuncion,  kindly gifted us some fish that was sweet like crab and made fabulous fish tacos.  We think it was cod? The crazy thing is we are NEVER tired of fish tacos - ha! Stephen bought a lot of tortillas in Asuncion and initially I did say, “ do we really need that many tortillas?” and I was grateful later we stocked up. 

After some weather passed, Nanatuk and Soulstice decided to venture to Bahia Santa Maria. We had friends ( SV Luego and SV Arctos) who had been in Bahia San Juanico for over a week, surfing and hanging out. They were going to move onto Bahia Santa Maria. We decided to skip San Juanico and meet up with them. This was another 200 nm journey and unfortunately no wind. We did wait out some weather in Asuncion and then found ourselves with a LONG motor to Santa Maria - uggh! One great event though was catching a Bonita early that morning on the Dude ( an improvised lure made from a smoke jumpers parachute steering toggle and written with Sharpie “ the Dude” on it with a fish hook.  Bonita have lots of sharp teeth - see below). I also caught my first yellowfin tuna shortly before getting to the anchorage. 

After arriving to Bahia Santa Maria, we were ready to stay for a while! This was a great playground with mountains to hike, fishing to be done, an estuary with mangroves to explore and some surfing! Yep, we surfed with our paddleboards and had a blast. There were many other boats in the anchorage and all young couples with similar itineraries of just have fun and no serious plans. One day, 12 of us enjoyed a day of surfing in some very gentle waves.  I really had a good time and look forward to surfing elsewhere. We snorkeled and hiked! Happy hour on the beach and potlucks were happening on different boats. Fishing off the dinghy with a proud reward of 2 shad that made again some more delicious fish tacos. Everyone had fish and was willing to share! We all had tuna and shared ideas of tuna casserole and tuna fish sandwiches as other ways to utilize your tuna - ha! Our Nanatuk friends got some clams on the beach and made us a delicious clam pasta with alfredo sauce for our last night there- soooo good!  

We met some new couples and some others we met from previous anchorages and marinas - SV Madrone ( Angie and Mike), SV Reunion ( Joel and Sara) and SV (? forgot their name) ( Tris and Mel from Ventura). We are all hopscotching down the coast. For being on the hook so long we still had plenty of water, plenty of fuel and food. The beer count was low to None - YIKES but we had whiskey and rum - pheew and I had some wine left from my Guadalupe Valley wine visit. Others had tequila and margaritas were still being made! By the way, the limes of Mexico are so much more savory then the States I might add.  We all agreed this lifestyle was really fun but to enjoy it with so many other like-minded folks really made it special! 

We are off now to San Jose del Cabo which is another 200 nm where we will head to a marina. Some dreaded chores await like laundry but Beer will be replenished and hopefully we catch some fish on the way. We are getting into Dorado territory and marlin territory. Not really looking for a Marlin… but Dorado would be great!

- This blog is belated and I will do another post as we are in San Jose del Cabo and the gang meets up again. More fun to be had and no laundromat ( had to pay for my laundry to be washed and folded for me- darn👍). 

Hello Big Eye Tuna! 

Fishing in Ascuncion! 

Soulstice in Bahia Asuncion

Shari's camp in Asuncion

Shari's entrance to her house- WOW! this is her Front Yard so to speak

Whale bone vertebrae as decoration - She studies the whale population

My best attempt at getting a shot of the blow hole - was 3 -4 times that height 

I was memorized by her corner lot;) 

Gabriel can play a mean accordion

Juan and Jose going to paddle to Panga 

Nanatuk arrived just before sunset

Mike and Heather - The Yukon couple we have come to know and love! Super fun and big hearts

This is actually Nanatuk the morning we buddy boated to Bahia Santa Maria

Bonita!!!

Yikes!! watch your fingers

Yep a bit of strained face holding my flopping around tuna for the pic:) he wasn't that strong but I felt bad holding him down. Even though I love to eat fish and even game meat - I struggle with the murder part - and in truth did not do the deed. I ask Stephen do the deed. We do thank each fish for their life - we really do as we are grateful. 

Everyone sharing their tuna - This is Dave and Kelly's tuna on SV Arctos - having once again some fish tacos. SOOOO Good! 

Stephen enjoying his sky chair in Bahia 

Bahia Santa Maria

Hard working Fisherman - These guys are up at sunrise and come home at sundown

Potluck on Soulstice! finally remembering to get pics of these events- learn to take pic before too many cocktails- we did a thai green curry with fish as main dish ( mike and heather SV Nanatuk on far left , followed by Brad and Sonni SV Luego and Kelly and Dave (blocked out by Stephen's happy face) on SV Arctos). 

Stephen may have had too many drinks that night? Ha!

Stephen and Brad and Pip the dog from SV Luego - Bahia Santa Maria group hike day

Pip and Mac are SV Luego's dogs - Sonni - on the far right - dog mom - was a former equestrian veternarian in Idaho - 

It is always fun to see a barren mountain side and then to find some hidden gem - not sure what kind of cactus  plant but beautiful. 

Bahia Santa Maria- picture from inside the estuary with the Mangroves

Fishing camp inside the Estuary. These folks work really hard- they are Very limited with resources - the other sailboats including us gifted peanut butter, cookies, soccer balls to the kids, batteries and coloring books/pens. What we did notice was everyone smiling, the kids laughing and playing outside. It doesn't take much to be happy. I just 

Inside the estuary - the clarity of the water was amazing. We saw soo many fish in here and the local fisherman had nets on the perimeters of the estuary. 

The yellow and red ball are bouys for the fishing nets below. That is an egret in flight

Blue heron

 Morning we left Santa Maria the sunrise was off the hook gorgeous!! Holy WoW!