We waited a few extra days in Mazatlan while another norther came roaring down the Sea of Cortez. We took advantage of one last long walk from the marina to the malecon and into centro. We stopped at a palapa restaurant on the beach and had the Zarandeado; a whole fish split head to tail and grilled over hot coals. Zarandeado is a specialty in Mazatlán and surprisingly we had not had it yet, although we’ve made a similar dish at home. It was cooked simply with charred rings of roma tomatoes, onion and poblano peppers. Very good. The day before we left we saw a flock of six flamingos fly over the boat in the marina and had dinner with a group of cruisers that night.
We left Mazatlán in the morning and headed north up the coast in order to get a good wind angle so that we could try to sail across the Sea of Cortez. We buddy boated with friends on a catamaran for the first day going directly into rough seas and 18 knots of wind for almost a full 24 hours. Solitude’s bow was getting completely buried in swell and sending sheets of water down the cabin top. I guess this is what they mean when they say “bashing north”. We did this all day, over night and past sunrise. Once we reached the Altata channel entrance area, we made our turn to start across the sea. During the night a pelican landed on the bimini staring right down at us in the cockpit only an arms length away. We shoo’d it away and he came back again landing on the dinghy motor that was mounted to the stern rail. These birds are pretty good size and their long, sharp beaks are a little intimidating that close up. Luckily he did not stick around.
Just after sunrise we peeled off from our friends and set a heading for Bahia de Los Muertos as they headed slightly north to an anchorage closer to La Paz. They hailed us on the radio, we chatted about the evening watch and wished each other safe travels. We look forward to crossing paths again. We were able to sail all day and made great progress across the sea. When the winds died off after sunset we motored the rest of the way and arrived in Bahia de Los Muertos at sunrise.
Muertos is idyllic! The bright blue, “gin clear”water is a very big change from the Pacific side of mainland Mexico. In the anchorage you can see the anchor sitting on the bottom in 25’ of water. The dry dessert air provides clear views of the mountains with no haze like we saw in more tropical areas of mainland Mexico. We were the only boat in the bay when we arrived and the white sand beach was full of camper vans and tents for the Semana Santa (Easter) holiday. We cleaned up the interior of the boat, had hot showers onboard and headed in for Baja fish tacos on the beach. Just what our bellies needed!
After four days we were running low on fruits and veggies and thought we might walk the five miles or so to the closest tienda. The road out of Bahia de Los Muertos is desolate, there is nothing but Cardon cactus for miles. We did pass a small, run down gatehouse at the entrance to the Gran Sueño Resort; a 2010 development that never took off and is under new ownership as of last year. We met Saul, a wonderfully happy and friendly man who works at the gatehouse. We learned that Saul manages the manually-lifted entrance gate and he also lives in the gatehouse. The gatehouse couldn’t have been bigger than 4’ x 6’. The manager of the resort brings jugs of water to Saul for drinking and to shower “by the tree”. He occasionally sleeps a few hrs at night and a few hrs during the day, otherwise he’s up and lifts the gate for the very few vehicles that come thru each day. We chatted in Spanish and when he heard we were walking he offered us water and suggested we wait there for a ride, many people hitchhike and finding a ride is easy. Wanting to stretch our legs we thanked Saul and continued on our way. Another mile up the road we were turned around when three barking dogs came running towards us. When we reached Saul again we decided we would take his advice and wait for a ride. He pulled around a chair with a blown out seat and motioned for us to sit, that he would have a ride for us in minutes. Saul arranged for us to hop in the truck with the General Manager of the resort who came thru a few minutes later with other maintenance staff. We were able to get out to the tienda, grab our provisions and get a ride back to the beach when the Gran Sueño truck and staff came back by the tienda 45 mins later after picking up some cactus at a ranch further down the way. When we passed by Saul’s gatehouse on the way to the beach, we dropped off a bag we put together from the tienda with juices and snacks and Jim shared our sincere appreciation and thanked him for his help.
During our visit in Muertos we saw dolphins, sea lions, wahoo (ono, for our friends in Hawaii) and moray eels all right in the anchorage. On our dinghy ride we saw large groups of spotted rays swimming wing to wing directly below us; the only way I can describe that experience is that it looked like printed sheets of wallpaper in endless rows. It hardly looked real. We also caught several coral hawkfish from the dinghy and returned them safely to the sea. What a place.
SV Solitude 