Puerto Salina to Bahia Tortuga

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December 29th 2009

Published: December 30th 2009

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Ansa and Echo

Coastline

The coast line between Puerto Salina and Bahia San Tomas

Puerto Salina

We ended up staying in Puerto Salina for a week, some of this time spent clearing in to Mexico, and the rest waiting for better weather. A low passed through, bringing 35 knot winds, so we stayed tied to the dock.
We left December 9, our next major destination being Bahia Tortuga, with over night stops at anchorages in Punta San Thomas, Bahia Colnett, Isla San Martin, Bahia San Carlos, and Isla Cedros.

Each leg is roughly 50 miles, so with 10 hours of daylight, we needed to average 5 knots. We sailed when we could, but the wind was generally against us, so there was a lot of motoring.

Punta San Thomas

We arrived at 1600 and anchored uneventfully. We saw no other boats en route and there was nothing on the shore. The anchorage was pretty rolly, so we had to secure even more things than normal. The thing I noticed first at this first anchorage was the stars. There was no light pollution, so the sky was pitch black with billions of stars. White stars, red stars, blue stars, yellow stars. It's been so long since I've been out in the boonies

Ansa under spinnaker

A very few times we have had the wind behind us.

that I had forgotten how many there are and that they come in colors. It was gorgeous.

Bahia Colnett

Arrived at 1530, anchored again, no problems. This anchorage was less rolly than Punta San Thomas, partly because we had learned from Punta San Thomas not to get to close to the cape we were hiding behind. You'd think you'd want to snuggle up close to get as much into the lee of the cape as you can, but there is a complication. The surf that is crashing on the northern and windward side of the cape comes rolling around the tip of the cape and changes direction by more than 90 degrees. The prevailing wind would be from the north and these waves were traveling east! Our pilot book calls this refraction of the surf. Five foot plus waves roll along the inside of the cape, (parallel to the beach!) along its whole length. We learned to stay at least a half a mile off to stay out of this stuff, which would roll your boat rail to rail.

An interesting side note for this place is that it is named for James Colnett, a British Navy

Three Rocks

These three rocks are just off Punta San Thomas. They do not show on our charts as a feature.

surveyor who was here in 1793. At this time the English and the Spanish were not on good terms, so British sailors faced impoundment of their vessels, imprisonment and possibly execution if they called into almost any South American port. The majority of the traffic at this time was whalers cruising the south Atlantic and the south Pacific hunting whales. They were based out of London and did two to three year trips to collect enough whale oil. The British government sent Colnett and his crew of 25 out in the 300 ton sloop "Rattler" to find safe watering and anchorage spots for the whalers. The only reason I know this is that Colnett is discussed in Patrick O'Brians novel "The Far Side of the World". The book is historical fiction, but O'Brian was a real scholar of the British Navy during this time frame.

Isla San Martin

We had flat seas and no wind all morning, so we made good time and decided to bypass this anchorage and continue on to the next place, Bahia San Quintin.

San Quintin

Arrived at 1645 and again noted the huge rollers refracting around the point. We stayed

Punta Colnett

The point that protects Bahia Colnett from northwest winds.

well away. Anchored and had a calm night with light winds and little rolling. I took my first shower ever on Ansa. Works fine ( I had replaced the fixture, the piping and the pressure water pump in San Diego). We arrived on 12/11 and it was so pleasant here we stayed the day of 12/12 and just relaxed and cleaned up the boats. I was entertained by the local wildlife. Ansa has a light on her stern that illuminates the boarding ladder to make it easier to come aboard from the dingy in the dark. I also keep this light on at night so the boat can been seen. Well, this light attracts fish. I kept hearing all this splashing noise and when I went and looked over the stern, there were hundreds of small fish (6-8 inches) milling about. A couple of hours later, I heard big splashes and breathing noises, and this time there was a seal gamboling about eating all the little fishes. Since then, I have had dolphins and pelicans visit to chow down on the fish this light seems to attract. Initially, Brian and I were only showing an anchor light, but it became

Bahia San Tomas

A windy, rolly place

readily apparent that on a moonless night with no shore lights to light up the sky, it is really, really dark. Our anchor lights look like just another star. Our white hulls are totally invisible. All these bays have the occasional fishing panga tearing about in the dark, so it seems sensible to make the boat more visible.

Bahia San Carlos

Arrived at 1645 and got settled down just before sunset. Absolutely nothing here, not even cell phone service. The night was very windy (40 kts) and rolly and generally unpleasant. Ansa pulled so hard on her chain that the bow roller bracket and the the chain stop were slightly bent. Not real serious, but it will need improvement. Every thing they say about needing good ground tackle is true! Overkill would be good. I didn't get a very good nights sleep wondering if something would break. It stayed windy the next day so we decided to stay put for a day. The next day it was still windy, but the barometer was high, there were no clouds, no indications of storm, so we decided this might be one of those places we read about that due to

Bahia Quintin

A lonely place.

the local geography (typically mountains) the winds were often much greater close to shore than out to sea. We left at dawn and sure enough, about 8 miles out the wind and sea calmed down and we had a normal ride.

Isla Cedros

Was about 86 miles away from Bahia San Carlos, so we planned an overnight trip, left at 1245 planning to arrive at Isla Cedros at dawn. By 0610 we were off the northern tip of Isla Cedros. We cruised down the eastern side of the island, looking at each of the anchorages and not liking any of them until 39 miles later, at 1030 we pulled into Bahia del Sur, at the southern tip of the island. This was a very protected, settled anchorage, but we had difficulties setting the anchors. We had no problems previous, and it turned out the bottom of this bay is largely covered in this tough wiry weed that our anchors have trouble penetrating. It took each of us four tries to get something reasonable going, and I, being tired and frustrated, managed to break the pawl carrier on my windlass because on my last attempt to anchor, I forgot

Sunrise

In Bahia San Quintin

to set the chain stop, and the setting load was put on the windlass. Oh well, another thing to fix in Cabo. I had to recover my chain and anchor by hand, stow it away, and replace it with chain / rode. I had to splice some rode together and backsplice the rode to the chain. This took most of the day, so we didn't leave for Bahia Tortuga until the 18th. Other than the weed, a very pleasant place. A couple of local fishermen came by the boat in their panga and wanted to trade me some lobster. They gave me four lobsters for a bottle of wine. One of the men threw the lobsters from their panga into the cockpit of Ansa. These lobsters were very active and immediately they each scurried backwards into the nearest corner and sat there waving their antennae at me. I stood in the middle of the cockpit looking at their beady little eyes, waving antenna and scrabbling legs and thought to myself, now what. I have never had anything to do with a lobster that didn't come cooked on a plate with a side of butter. I ran through in mind what

Ansa with dolphins

We have seen several pods of hundreds of dolphins crossing our path, and this is the best picture we have been able to get.

I would have to do to eat these critters. They looked like frightened puppies, cowering in the corners; their beady little eyes were getting to me. I waited till the lobstermen were out of sight, and then I put each of them back in the ocean. OK, you can laugh now. Next time, I think I'll ask the fishermen to give them to me muerte.

Bahia Tortuga (Turtle Bay)

Well there aren't any turtles here. But there is a fuel dock and a special panga with a 1000 liter tank that will come out to your boat and fill you up with diesel. This is the first place since Ensenada where fuel was available, so Brian and I both filled up. I took on 210 liters, which cost $162. These people are really accommodating. They will take pesos, dollars, even a credit card. What a deal. Brian and I took my dingy to the fuel dock and went ashore to scout around. The town is fairly dilapidated, with all streets being dirt, except for one paved road, which is the main road which leads to Highway 1, the main road down the length of Baja.

We walked

Islas Cedros

This is a typical view of the east coast of this 39 mile long island. It is about 30 miles off the coast of Baja.

by an open air restaurant which was selling carne asada tacos and another dish that Brian said was called al pastore. Turns out al pastore is spiced marinated pork that is somehow formed around a pineapple and then roasted on a vertical spit - looks like the the Greek gyro thing. We ate there and had the al pastore. The cook would slice off some of the meat, chop it up and grill it some more on a horizontal bbq and then put it in a tortilla with guacamole. Wow, was it good. We each had five of them. We stayed here a total of three days and sometimes took the water taxi to the fuel dock. It got a little bumpy at times and riding my little dingy is wet when it's bumpy. One day was provisioning day, and we went to four little grocery stores, buying what looked good to us at each. At the end of the day we went to a restaurant, which was really disappointing after our first experience at the open air restaurant. The two places we went to both had menus in Spanish and English, tho there were no English speakers. Anyway, we

Cedros

This is the town of Cedros on Cedros Island. It has a breakwater that forms a protected harbor. It's commercial only, no marina, so we didn't stop here.

had Mexican dinners and they were so insipid; I didn't think you could make Mexican food so bland and tasteless, and lukewarm. Brian's teapot had developed a leak, so we were on a mission to find another, none in any of the mercados, none in the hardware store, but at the restaurant we had lunch at, Brian was able to communicate to the cook what he wanted (by pointing to a teapot in her kitchen!) and she directed us to a flea market area where we found this gentleman with an array of all kinds of stuff, including one used teapot buried in the bottom of a cardboard box, which he sold to Brian for $3. He spoke quite a bit of English and took and interest in us when we told him we were headed for Panama. We chit chatted for a bit and then he decided to give us each an orange, which he had a big box of. Why not. We took the orange with a gracias. Really good orange. Another thing - tomatoes aren't as perfect looking as Safeway's here, but they are really taste good. I have developed a liking for sliced tomatoes with lime

Ansa in Islas Cedros

Here is where I destroyed my windlass.

juice. Limes are everywhere here and inexpensive compared to the US. On 12/22 we up anchored at 0600 heading for our next stop, Bahia Asuncion.

This blog entry is so late because we have not had internet access until we got where we are today, Bahia Magdelena.

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