THE BASH.....Bahia de Tortugas

After rounding Cabo Falso to go north to San Diego there are very few really good anchorages on the Pacific side of the Baja. Once  past Cabo  Falso we never saw a white cap all the way to Turtle Bay aka Bahia de Tortugas. Normally on a bash I would stop at Bahia Santa Maria or Bahia Magdalena, but when it is calm you just keep going. We pulled into Bahia Tortugas and we were here for seven days waiting for a decent window to go North. 

 

Bahia de Tortugas is one of those places where you ask yourself why anybody lives there. Apparently there used to be a cannery set up upon the 19th century company town model. The workers threatened to go on strike to get paid and the owners closed the cannery . Jobs today revolve around the fishing industry.

 

 Turtle Bay is one of the few good natural harbors on the coast with almost a mile at the opening. We actually entered at night without any trouble.

 Northern point of the harbor.

 This orphan seal pup was a constant presence in town. Chuck and Jan of Wind Watcher were constantly trying to keep the pup off their boat. They sleep with the bottom hatchboard off and one night Chuck woke up and the seal had crawled into the boat and was snoring on the cabin sole. Took quite an effort to make the sleepy seal get out of the boat. The locals at the fuel dock have been feeding the seal and it will lay in your lap and sleep if you let it. I am not sure if it will make it as it is quite young to be separated from it's  mother but hopefully next Fall it will be there. I am not a big seal fan but this youngster does pull the heart strings.

North from La Paz

 The Baja reminds me of the SW United States with water. As one travels North from La Paz the scenery becomes very rugged and constantly changing as the sun makes it's transit.

 Another shot of boat with village of Agua Verde in background.

 Roca Solataire, entrance to Agua Verde.

 Passing by the anchorage of Dos Gatos.

Las Frailles to Bahia de Muertos

 Approaching the Baja Peninsula from the east, Frailles is the usual first stop for cruisers who sail from Mazatlán. If you motor you can make points further North but the best I have ever achieved just sailing is Los Frailles. Of course if you were to get a Southerly a more northerly point can be achieved. When you leave Mazatlán for Baja , early on it appears you can sil more Northerly but the four times I have made this trip as you close the coast the wind tends to blow more NW to West.

 Anchored in Frailles. The beach landing can be rough here as the Pacific swell reaches his far into the SEa of Cortez. As you go North the swell disappears.

 The beach at Los Muertos ,which is about 40 miles North of Los Frailles.

 Looking the other way on the beach.

The Gran Sueno Resort is in Los Frailles and is very friendly to cruisers. WIFI is good and the bar has a great train collection. Unfortunately those pictures of the resort are so blurry as to be useless. Cannot remember if drinking commenced before or after I started taking pictures.

traveling to Agua Verde

 I have been way too slack about the blog. Bandwidth in Mexico can be hard to achieve so now I am in Indio, California using LJ's internet. We left the boat in San Diego ,California on a mooring. The bash from Cabo took 16 days as we were stuck  in Bahia de Tortugas for 7 days waiting on a weather window. After leaving Mazatlán we traveled to the Sea to spend about a month. My favorite place was Agua Verde, which means green water. I will jump around the sea as I add to the blog so the timeline will be off but the pictures speak for themselves.

 We traveled with two other boats. On Air , Burton and Debby  and dog Zula and June and Dennis on the Shamaness. On Air is the Piver Tri.

 Local resident in Agua Verde

 Le Chat Beaute at anchor, notice the beach umbrella. Shade is a good thing in the Sea.

A crested night heron was a frequent visitor to the boat.

Cruisers Birthday

 The birthday boy. Dennis Clifton, 68 today and Captain of the Shamaness!

 Bike Week in Mazatlán and this is one of the characters.

 Mazatlán is a very large city with a quaint older section with many lovely old buildings.

 The church of the immaculate conception.

 No trip to Mazatlán is complete without a stop by the Mercado Pinos Suarez. Built in 1899 it has most of the original structure including cast iron columns. Meat ,clothing and vegetables and almost anything you need on a daily basis can be found if you know where to look.

 One of several meat markets or carneceria.

Lots of heads of pigs and cows about. Fresh head cheese is a specialty.

Menu of one of the restaurants on the second floor of the Mercado. 49 pesos or about $3.25 for a full meal including rice and beans.

Banderras Bay Regatta

 The Vallarta Yacht Club is the host of the Banderas Bay Regatta, a cruiser , fun sailboat race. Paradise Village Marina provided half price slip rentals for the week of the festivities. I was fortunate to be crew on Iolani, a S&S 48 foot ketch. The owners ,Barry and Sylvia, had raced the boat in the SF Bay area. The above photo is of a dustpan dredge that is continually dredging the channel into the marina. When we returned from the first race is was low tide and we touched bottom on the entrance. Draft was 6.5 feet.

 This was one of our competitors, Scout. She was a faster boat so she gave us some rating points that luckily we never needed.

 Warm up for the first day of racing.

 The happy crew of Iolani checking on the competition. Foreground is Dave of Aussie Rules, the tactician for the crew. Barry ,far right, was the driver and he and Dave made an excellent team. Both very keen racers and experienced. The fact everyone on the boat was a cruiser use to sailboats gave us an advantage, coupled with Barry and Dave we were a formidable team.

 Competition under asymmetrical. A Benateau  49 that was quite fast and stripped of all cruising gear. They beat us by 7 seconds on  day 2 , but we corrected out as winner.

 Winds were light and we unsure if we could finish in time. Note grinder hold boom to keep the main full. We did finish in time as the race committee shorten the last uphill leg.

Scout coming on a little too late. Our competitors only carried asymmetrical chutes. We had both types and were able to sail deeper on the downwind legs and without having to gybe. So we won the Regatta. Going into the last day only one boat could knock us off, Talion, a gulfstar 50. We beat them by 6minutes 45 and if it had of been 7 minutes we would have taken second.

Puerto Vallarta

 Guess what day it was in PV? Oh yea lots of silly old blokes about on St Paddy's Day. Much entertaining.

 On the beach this stone artist balances beach rock for pesos. Have seen the same man performing his art in La Cruz.

A local resident unconcerned with the goings on.