The Baja Slide

Bahia  Santa Maria--You're not in
the Northwest any more, Toto

Two months, ten days and 2,300 miles has taken us from Elliott Bay Marina to Cabo San Lucas. But it was the last 776 miles from San Diego to Cabo that were the most challenging for us. Back home in northwest cruising, we considered 40 miles to be a good day with many marinas and anchorages to choose between upon arrival. Cruising down the US West Coast, 100 miles became the norm, with one trek of 180 miles, and every night we could tie up at a marina rather than anchoring out. Cruising the west side of the Baja peninsula has been a wholly different experience--stretching it out more—with only one marina and several 175-mile overnight passages.

On top of this you have the ever present Northwest swell. For southbound cruisers, this usually just means a gentle lifting of the boat and a little help on down the course. However, this is where our

Panga and Passenger

little buddy Salty comes into the picture. Being part schnauzer, his Germanic stubbornness refuses to let him piddle on the boat. Instead he insists on getting to the beach 2-3 timers a day, in between 20-30 hour passages, requiring us to do beach landings with our dinghy. We have had considerable difficulty mastering a dinghy landing with the ocean swell, even in a semi-protected anchorage. Even a tiny swell approaching the beach becomes a two-foot breaker as it drives on to the beach, getting us soaked and, on one particularly ill-timed launch, flipped us entirely over. At least the water is warm! We eventually learned the virtue of patience and waiting for a mellower set of waves, but leaving the beach seems to always come with a bit of terror.

Also, due to having Salty aboard, we stopped more often than most Baja cruisers. This was one of the

Sunset at Sea

reasons that we chose to not join in the annual Baja Ha Ha, a flotilla cruise to Cabo in which a few hundred boats make the jump together. The social side of meeting other boaters would have been nice, but the Ha Ha only stops twice, once at Turtle Bay and once at Bahia Santa Maria, with legs up to 330 miles long. We needed more stops, more time, and we wanted to do it our way.

We used the guide books to get us down the Baja coast, but none of them talk about cruising with a pet. Indeed, we saw few other boats with a pooch aboard. We found that this was also true of cruising the East Coast and the Caribbean, in that the guide books made scant or no mention of the extra steps needed when cruising with Fido. However, for us, traveling with Salty does make it interesting and we would have it no other way.

We are now rounding the corner into Cabo San Lucas and are eagerly looking forward to savoring civilized Mexico. The stark passage sliding down the Baja coast is astern, complete with its six overnight passages, and we can now settle into the Mexican life that has been our objective.

Hasta al Proximo Tiempo!

Roger, Lynne, and Salty

You can reach us at 206-755-4193 or email rdwerner47@gmail.com

Golden State Cruising

Monterey by Moon Light

Cruising from Seattle to Mexico seems to consist of a series of varied stages. First is the journey down the inhospitable coast lines of Washington, Oregon and Northern California—a passage often fraught with gales, huge seas, and long gaps between tiny fishing ports. Then comes the Bay Area, with its glittering urbanity. Next comes Southern California, with an array of pleasant yachting communities and welcoming reciprocal yacht clubs. And our next passage appears to be the desolate Pacific coast of the Baja peninsula, a description of which will come with our next posting. The variety has been stimulating and has helped to add interest to passages that otherwise might be rather monotonous.

Lynne and Salty at Morro Beach

It has been a month since we last sent out our last posting from Monterey Bay, as we began a longish 100-mile passage along Big Sur. We ended that passage at Morro Bay, one of our favorite stops. After tying up at the Morro Bay Yacht Club, we found a perfect playground for Salty on the sand spit across the channel. We also hooked up with a like-minded cruising couple, Robert and Sheila aboard their sail boat The Good Rain, from Nanaimo, also headed to Mexico. This also gave us a good spot to plan our way around the last of the four challenging West Coast Capes (the first three being Cape Flattery, Cape Blanco, and Cape Mendocino). Once again, the

Roger's Halloween Costume

weather was benign and we motored past an often tumultuous Cape Conception. Our only excitement came when we split between two on- coming freighters, about one mile to either side of us. Thank goodness for AIS, our collision avoidance electronics!

We spent the next two weeks with our son’s family—Andy, Lorraine, and Clark—in Oxnard. As a Harbor Patrol Officer, Andy was able to get us great moorage very near their home. While there, we had a very hospitable stay with the Pacific Corinthian yacht Club, took a jaunt out to Anacapa Island, and hiked up in the hills behind Ventura. All in all, it was a relaxing vacation within a vacation. From Oxnard, we went the “26 Miles to Santa Catalina” where we found a few secluded anchorages and

Goat Harbor, Catalina Island

 did a town stop at Avalon. In Avalon we did a night out at the Casino, seeing a Tom Cruz movie (2 stars) and taking in the 1929 organ recital (4 stars).  Then it was off to San Diego, stopping in at several lovely beach side towns—Long Beach, Newport, Dana Point and Oceanside. As we write this, we are at Silver Gate Yacht Club in San Diego—perhaps the friendliest yacht club we have been to yet! It is time for a bit of last minute chores and then on Thursday it is time to head south across the border and on to Baja California.

Hasta Luego!

Roger, Lynne, and Salty

Give us a call at 206-755-4193 or email rdwerner47@gmail.com