Up the Sea 1.4. Bahía de los Ángeles to Puerto Refugio.
We skipped Puerto Don Juan, which fooled us not to be a seductive anchorage, instead it looked barren and hot. This bay has only a narrow entrance from the sea and is the best hurricane shelter in the area, so we wanted to check it out on our way to Bahía de los Ángeles. We were ready for civilization and got to the village of Bahía de los Ángeles an hour later during late morning.
Deserts are not meant to be lived in by humans and as soon as we had anchored and settled in, as if to make point, a strong wind started blowing from land. About 35C/95F hot and dry, with gust up to 40 knots, the winds made us feel like we were in an North African oasis rather than on a boat surrounded by water. These winds here are called Elefantes, after a trunk-like cloud forming sometimes before they start blowing, and are pushed from the Pacific across the deserts of Baja and appear in the upper Sea of Cortez as localized storms, so localized that they can’t be predicted.
We waited out the winds on the boat, which took the whole night. In hindsight it would have been better to stay at Puerto Don Juan where our buddy boat Coastal Drifter spent a lovely night. They had found a secluded beach and plenty of fish, which they cooked for dinner. Our loss! The winds died down with the sunrise and shifted to a light breeze coming from the East, the sea, so that we could lift the anchor and move closer to the village.
We dinghied ashore and found yet another outpost, this time it reminded me of some of my favorite places in California, the Anza Borrego Desert or 29 Palms Oasis, but at a large dark blue sea. At the foot of the Sierra Aqua de Soda, Bahía de los Ángeles is nestled between the Sea of Cortez and the mountains. A couple of hotels and restaurants, some gringo vacation homes, some super markets and a small museum and housing for the 800 people, who live in Bahía, were situated along the shoreline with amazing views of the bay and islands beyond. It was very laid back, Bahia de los Ángeles is Baja total. No cell phone service, no ATMs, few luxuries. Americans come down here for the desert, the beauty, the heat, the remoteness, others for the fishing and the cheap drinking. One expat guy spent years off road racing on Baja and was showing his wife the peninsula. A couple of guys were on their way from Austin, Texas, to Cabo San Lucas on motorcycles. A group of Australian surfers came through and also Southern Californian surfers. I had a long chat with a large group of men and women who came here for a week of fishing. They will take a large freezer trunk of fish back to Orange County to last them three months. I had watched them going out with the local fishermen at sunrise and they were back four hours later with seventeen yellowtails. ‘Just gotta know when to stop.’ they said.
Bahía was good for us. We explored the town, met up with other cruisers and land folk, hung out at a restaurant at the beach with Wifi and caught up on news and emails. ‘I could stay here a month’, I said, when I sat down at a table overlocking the beach and the bay. It felt like we had arrived.
After four days of relaxation bliss, we headed out again to a beach not far away, Bahía La Gringa, aptly named after the Americans who come to vacation here. We took a younger couple for the sail up to Gringa, who were curious about life on board. They relaxed very fast into the movement of the boat and the splashing of the waves against the hull and wondered if they should be cruisers. We spent the short sail talking about expectations and choices in life and how others only marginally can advise us in what is right for us.
La Gringa Beach was large. Lots of room for several campers and fishermen, for Gringo vacation homes and beach palapas and it still looked vast. Early evening drag racers turned the sand dunes for a short while into a scene from Mad Max and right after someone on the beach turned up his classical music. Quiet a diverse scene on ‘Whitie Beach’.
That night it blew again, first from the West, an Elefante, then from the East, because of thunderstorms there and when those ended the Elefante took over again. We were swinging around in the middle. The storms weren’t too violent, but brought hot, dry air again.
Next day’s travel brought lots of visual pleasures. We went through the Canal de Ballenas, Channel of Whales, were we actually saw a whale. It was a fin whale, fishing in one spot for quite a while, much to our pleasure. Then we sailed for several hours first past an island with a non-active volcano and past another island with such a rich geological mixture that ‘It looks like a melted ice cream cake of many, many flavors refrozen’ as Phil put it. We came to a place which was out if this world, so remote, stark and beautiful was it. We went through a narrow channel between two islands where every beach in every cove was different in color, textures and shapes. Puerto Refugio. What a unique place. So unique in fact that we stayed despite of bees and noseeums, we even had lounge picnics on Coastal Drifters’ main deck under a bright moon. I decided now to let them sting me until I am saturated with venom and they smell themselves and take me for one of their own. I will report back if that works. Radu, Debbie and Phil never get bitten, just me and Ethan. We are bait. Not fair.
The next morning I woke up missing Samba. She had been with me for over two thousand days during which we went on five thousand and more walks. I cared for her and she was on my side throughout last years’ ordeal. Her sweet nature and her Terrier spunk made her my perfect companion. I loved the non-verbal understanding we had, especially during the time I couldn’t talk and she was already deaf. We were quite a pair.
Before sunset that night, 16th of July 2016, Radu and I went to a beach on Ísla Ángel de la Guardia, the Island of the Guardian Angel, and had a little ceremony for Samba and buried a small clay pot holding a lock of her fur, her dog tags and her rope leach in one of the most beautiful spots we have seen thus far. A pelican was guarding the beach and became part of the ceremony as he was following us everywhere until we left. A couple of times he tried to snip at my feet, but Radu fended him off. Samba has now a guard and protector!
We got up the next day to get ready to leave for Puerto Peñasco early afternoon. The passage should take us around seventeen to twenty hours and we want to arrive during the morning to find a marina to stay at the following week. Coastal Drifter had left early, but when I got in the cockpit to eat breakfast, they were back. Past the shelter of the island, winds were blowing over 20 knots with two to three meter waves, very unpleasant weather for a long sail, so they came back for the refuge of Puerto Refugio. We checked the weather report and sure enough over night a storm front had shifted and drifted now over the Sea. We made the best out of the unexpectedly gained day in this hot paradise and enjoyed the bay and played Rommée in the afternoon. Can’t remember when I played last a game of cards. So fun.
The weather was more kind the following day and we left Puerto Refugio early afternoon for a full moon passage to Puerto Peñasco.
12-19 JULY 2016
