However, we didn’t love the marina. We were on an end tie, and it was a long walk to the boat from the gate — we estimate a full quarter mile. One of our friends commented that at night the dock was eerie — that it looked like the hallway from “The Shining.”

Our slip was exposed to the bay and very rocky — so much so that Christi had to leave the boat every afternoon when the wind picked up because she couldn’t take the rocking! There was no wireless Internet (well, technically there was but it was broken and the marina staff had no interest in fixing it), which made it tougher for Christi to write when she was onboard. The parking options were limited and ungodly expensive, making it challenging to have friends and family come over to visit. Laundry was also a problem. Because we were at the end, the electricity voltage was too low to run our washing machine. The marina’s washing machine had the hot and cold water set backwards, and of course, all cycles had a cold water final rinse, so all our delicate clothes took horrible beatings in the very hot rinse water. The marina staff seemed uninterested in fixing that problem, too, despite the fact it could have been resolved in literally five minutes.

After a month of spending every afternoon in Internet cafes unsuccessfully trying to work on the book (Christi is easily distracted by things going on around her; she really needs to write in isolation), Christi put her foot down and demanded that we move to another marina. Eric didn’t want to move, but realizing that it was useless to argue with a pregnant woman, he relented. With help and advice from our friends in the Bay area, we re-visited our options and decided Jack London Square Marina in Oakland was the best bet for Eric since it was close to both the ferry and the BART (train). Miraculously, they had space available.

On the morning of September 28, we untied the lines and headed east across the bay to the relatively narrow channel that separates Alameda Island from Oakland on the main land. The channel was a natural estuary that was widened and deepened in 1852 so that wharves could be built on the Oakland waterfront. In 1874, the channel was further dredged to make Oakland a deep water port. Over the years, they continued to deepen and widen the channel. In In 1962, Oakland became the first major port on the US Pacific Coast to have container ship terminals. Today the Port of Oakland is the fifth busiest container port in the United States.

We passed the container port. Though much smaller than many of the other container ports we’ve seen around the world (ie Singapore and Oman), it was still imposing. Jack London Square was not far beyond. We pulled into the small basin and were shocked to see the marina was virtually empty, with only a handful of boats. When we checked into the office we were told that a boat show had just ended two days prior. All the tenants had been kicked out for the show and most had not yet returned.

Right away, we were happy with the marina. Our slip was steps away from shore. The marina was protected from the main bay, and while the marina did get some occasional big rolls from the ferries and ships, it was relatively calm overall. Oakland is generally sunnier, warmer, and less windy than San Francisco, and we reveled in the warm afternoon sun as we tied up the lines.

Oakland is an area undergoing gentrification, and Jack London Square is one of the recently renovated areas. It is adorable! Once upon a time it was part of the industrial shipping area, but now it is a lively pedestrian area sporting a a variety of shops, restaurants, hotel and ferry terminal, along with the marina. Unfortunately, we didn’t take many photos of the square, but here are a couple shots.

The square is named after the famous American author Jack London, who grew up in Oakland near the waterfront and spent much of his youth working as a sailor and oyster pirate based out of what is now Jack London Square. London made notes for his books while sitting at Heinold’s First and Last Chance Saloon, built in 1883 from the timbers of a whaling ship. Heingold’s is still there, now a National Literary Landmark, that preserves the rustic character from the earlier era. It is an odd tiny wooden building with a few tables outside that stands out from the rest of the modern buildings surrounding it.

London eventually moved to Alaska. Interestingly enough, an adoring fan went to Alaska and found London’s log cabin. He had the cabin dismantled and brought back to California. The tiny cabin (the one here may only be a replica; the information about it is conflicting) sits in the middle of the square, next to Heingold’s bar.

This is part 7 of an 11 part series on our time in the San Francisco area. Read part 6 here and part 8 here. 

One of the fun tourist activities we did was to take Kosmos overnight to Angel Island State Park, located about a mile south of Tiburon, near the Golden Gate Bridge. We chose an unusually clear and warm day to go over there. Here is a shot of our nephew and his girlfriend on the bow of Kosmos with the Golden Gate Bridge in the background.

Here is Kosmos moored in Ayala Cove, on the north side of the island. The moorings were different than any others we’ve seen before and were difficult to tie onto. Fortunately, the kind gentleman next to us hopped into his dinghy and helped us get tied up. The park requires boats to tie both front and back to the moorings, so it would have been double tough without his help! The fee to stay on the moorings was about $30 per night.

We took a bus tour of the island, where there was a fascinating narration on the history. Over the years, it has been used for an assortment of purposes. When the bay was originally “discovered” by the Spaniards in 1769, the island was inhabited by Native Americans, who had probably resided there for 3,000 years. As San Francisco grew and more whalers and trade ships pulled in, the timber on the island was stripped. After Mexico became an independent nation, in 1839 the Mexican governor granted the island to a private citizen who used it as a livestock ranch.

After the US government took control of the area, in 1850 the US courts gave the land to the American military. Angel Island was part of the “Bay Area Defense System” for one hundred years. Camp Reynolds was opened on the west side of the island and became a recruiting and processing depot, but it wasn’t well maintained. Here are a couple shots of the few remaining buildings from Camp Reynolds:

Fort McDowell was built on the southeast side of the island in 1900 to replace the crumbling Camp Reynolds.

From 1892 – 1946, Ayala Cove (north side) was used as a hospital cove. Incoming ships stopped here before entering the Port of San Francisco, where they underwent fumigation. Passengers suspected of being ill were quarantined on the island until it was clear they were healthy. Thanks to better sanitation and medical care in the early twentieth century, the need for a quarantine port waned and it was closed. Here are a couple shots of restored buildings from the quarantine camp:

In 1910, the government also opened an immigration station on the northeast side of the island. It kind of sounds like it was something of an internment camp, where immigrants of Asian original were essentially imprisoned for weeks, months, or even years before being allowed into the US. Here is a photo, though sadly, the buildings are obscured by the heavy fence that surrounds the camp.

The immigration station closed during World War II because Fort McDowell was expanded to cover the entire island (except the quarantine area, apparently). We can’t remember if this photo was of Fort McDowell or the Immigration Station, but since it is a cool old building, we’re posting it anyway.

After the last of the troops came home from the war in 1946, Fort McDowell closed. In 1954, another base was opened on the south side, this one housing missiles for the cold war. The base closed in 1962 and the island became a state park. It looks like there are also currently a couple small coast guard stations on the island, as well.

As you can see from the photos above, there are some incredible views of the Bay Area from the island. Here is a shot looking north of what we think is Belvedere Cove, with Belvedere on the left and Tiburon (one of the highest dollar neighborhoods in the country) on the right.

Here are Eric and Christi looking west with the Golden Gate Bridge behind them

Looking south at downtown San Francisco and the Bay Bridge

Looking east towards Oakland

This is part 5 of an 11 part series on our time in San Francisco. Read part 4 here and part 6 here. 

Many people have asked us why they should buy our book if they can read our blog for free. Just like Part 1, the book is very different from the blog. Here are a few of the differences between the two:

• Prologue: Picks up where the Prologue of Part 1 left off. It focuses primarily on the research we did as we planned for our journey and addresses the majority of the questions we were most frequently asked.
• Several new stories from the journey – And there are some really good ones!
• Many details have been added that were best left undisclosed while we were still on the journey (sometimes we didn’t want our parents worrying about us; sometimes we didn’t want to incriminate ourselves!)
• In Retrospect sections with great insights — so you can see the situation through the eyes of a newbie as we learn, while simultaneously seeing the same situation through the eyes of experience.
• Streamlined stories – some complained our posts were too long and detailed, the book is a condensed version they will enjoy more.
• Formatting is first person, through Christi’s eyes – Some complained they didn’t like the third person format, so they will enjoy the book more.
• Actual dates on each post. On the blog, the dates are not real time, which is a significant piece of information for anyone hoping to follow in our footsteps.
• All profits will go to our cruising fund. The more books we sell, the sooner you can start reading about our next journey! So, buy one and get all your friends to buy one, too!

People have also asked us why we broke the series up into four books instead of only three. We had very different experiences in each of the four world regions, so it was best for each region to have its own volume.

• In the South Pacific, Part 1, we spent most of our time in sparsely populated areas communing with nature. And we did a lot of rough sea time, learning about boating the hard way.
•  In Asia, Part 2, we were mostly in densely populated areas building cultural bridges. Our sea experiences were also different from the Pacific, with both our best and worst passages occurring in this region.

• Prologue: How we formed the dream and the early planning stages.
• The entire 21 day passage from San Diego to Nuka Hiva has been re-written. At that point, the blog was in real time and we didn’t want people to worry about us. But the truth was that it was tough!
• Many new stories from the journey – And there are some really good ones!
• In Retrospect sections with great insights — so you can see the situation through the eyes of a newbie as we learn, while simultaneously seeing the same situation through the eyes of experience.
• Streamlined stories – some complained our posts were too long and detailed, and the book is a condensed version they will enjoy more.
• Formatting is first person, through Christi’s eyes – Some complained they didn’t like the third person format, so they will enjoy the book more.
• Actual dates on each post. On the blog, the dates are not real time, which is a significant piece of information for anyone hoping to follow in our footsteps.
• All profits will go to our cruising fund. The more books we sell, the sooner you can start reading about our next journey! So, buy one and get all your friends to buy one, too!

At first the seas were ugly. Eric was really sick and Christi was green. It is kind of surprising to us how fast we lose our tolerance to the ocean. The longer we sit in port, the more likely we are to be green when we do finally go out again.

The seas slowly but surely calmed down throughout the night, and by dawn it was pretty darn flat outside. It was foggy out. Not so foggy that there was no visibility, but foggy enough that we couldn’t see the mountainous Mexican coastline at all. And we were running pretty close to shore.

We got to the US border at around 0900. We were expecting a coast guard cutter to be sitting on the border, ready to question us, but nothing was around except a fishing boat. All was quiet. On a clear day, you can see Point Loma from the border, but because of the fog, we couldn’t see it until almost 1100. We couldn’t see downtown until we were almost all the way to Point Loma.

We made a quick detour over to the outermost channel marker buoys. Two years ago we had videotaped ourselves leaving, and took footage of the markers. Now we were taking the same footage, but coming from the other direction. We turned into the channel for San Diego bay. Our San Diego to San Diego world circumnavigation was now officially complete. The journey is now officially over.

We had often wondered exactly how we would feel at this second. Would we be sad, glad, excited? But, surprisingly, we were both pretty mellow and totally unemotional. Maybe it was because we were tired from only 2 hours of sleep. But the lack of emotion was definitely more than just being tired. The glow and euphoria of completing the circumnavigation had faded after a few days in Ensenada.

In all honesty, at that second, it felt more like we had been in Ensenada for a 10 day vacation and that we were heading back to San Diego to go back to the usual work routine, just like we used to do before we left. It felt like we had never done the circumnavigation, that life was still status quo and hadn’t changed for us at all. Everything about this run had felt the same as before. Everything in the bay looked the same as before. It was like we had instantly stepped back into our old life and our old routine. It was kind of surreal.

We pulled in to the channel a little before 1200 and were tied up to the customs dock by 1215. You call the customs office on a phone and give them all your pertinent information, and then they send agents to inspect the boat. It took about an hour for the two customs agents to arrive. When they boarded, they explained that they had already done a background check on us and the boat and had classified us a “low risk”. The paperwork took about 45 minutes. The female agent questioned Christi and the male agent questioned Eric in separate rooms. They asked each of us the same questions separately to make sure we gave the same answers. Then they went through the boat with a little hand held gizmo that detects explosives. We asked what they do for people who aren’t “low risk” and were told they bring dogs and sometimes will confiscate the boat and tear it apart. Lovely.

We can honestly say that these agents were probably the strictest we have encountered in the entire world. They had no sense of humor. They emanated an aura that said “we’re going to find what you are hiding and bust you”. We’ve never had any feeling like that before anywhere else in the world. Even when we have encountered curt officials with no sense of humor (rare), they usually just want to do their job and leave, they aren’t trying to bust you.

Then we went to or slip and tied up. The first thing we did was get lunch from a favorite local sandwich shop and pick up our mail. Next, we went to a car dealership to buy a car. Eric had long ago chosen what he wanted. Since diesel had served us so well around the world, we got a 2009 Jetta turbo diesel.

We went over to Coronado to check out the dock where our “welcoming” was going to be tomorrow. They have been rebuilt in the time we were gone, so we wanted to make sure they were going to work out OK. The new docks are fine. We managed to stay up until 2200, then crashed hard.

Emotionally, our feelings varied throughout the day. One moment we’d feel like we never left and the journey never happened, at another moment we’d feel like we can’t believe we are home for good. Honestly, in a lot of ways we are having a hard time with the concept that we aren’t going to be traveling anymore. It really hasn’t sunk in yet.

We have to admit that being in San Diego feels good, mostly because it is so comfortable here. In Ensenada we felt like we were wearing an old pair of jeans. Here were feel like we are wearing flannel pajamas.

We walked by the new construction near the marina and were kind of surprised to see that little is done beyond the frame. This project has been planned for several years now, and grading work had begun while we had Kosmos here. And, come to think of it, the sign was gone. There used to be a big sign saying a museum was going to be built here. We wonder if that means the museum project has been abandoned.

Along the rest of the walk, everything else looked much the same. Several buildings were occupied by different businesses than before, but the buildings still look the same. There are a lot of coffee houses now. Coffee houses must be the new rage.

The restaurant was every bit as good as we remembered it. Eric and Trevor had one of Eric’s favorites, which is a frittata served in a bowl and smothered in a tomato sauce with cactus, red bell pepper (capsicum), black olives, cilantro and green onions. The cactus pieces could easily be mistaken for green bell peppers, though they are more bitter.

Christi tried a new dish, eggs scrambled with shredded manta ray meat, peppers, tomato and onion. We’ve never eaten manta ray before and she thought she’d try something new. It was very fishy.

By the time we got back, the marina office had opened. We went to Kosmos to grab our check in paperwork. As we started down the dock, we saw Stephanie and Lance pulling away from the dock. We went running down the dock, calling out “hi and bye”. They replied that they were getting fuel and would be back soon.

We picked up the paperwork and Eric went to the office to check in. The dock master is gone, but has been replaced with someone who is totally sweet. She went through our paperwork and made sure everything was in order. Then she got a package ready for us to take to the Port Captain’s office.

While Eric was in the office, Trevor packed his bags. He is going to take a bus to the border. His car is parked in San Diego, so from the border he’ll take public transit to where his car is parked. Trevor is really excited to be going home so much earlier than anticipated, both because he misses his girlfriend and because he has a lot of work to do that has been piling up while he has been gone.

The three of us all walked out of the marina together. On the street, Trevor hailed a cab to take him to the bus station and we all said our goodbyes. Eric and Christi strolled down the main drag to the other end of downtown, where the Port Captain’s office is located. We know we keep harping on this, but it felt so good to know exactly where we were going, so good to be somewhere familiar.

As we walked, we laughed about the first time we came to Ensenada http://kosmos.liveflux.net/blog/2006/05/20/first-night-run-and-ensenada/ with Kosmos. Eric had driven the boat down from Dana Point with a couple crew, Tom and Jeff. The path of least resistance to getting Tom and Jeff back to Dana Point was for Christi to drive to Ensenada in her car, pick them up, and then deliver the crew back to Dana Point.

Christi had never driven in Mexico before. She was terrified about driving down after all the bad stories we have heard about reckless drivers and crooked cops that stop tourists to demand bribes. She carefully followed the speed limit and obeyed every traffic sign, even though it infuriated the other drivers around her. She was driving incredibly defensively and considered the other drivers “scary” since they didn’t drive as politely as US drivers tend to. Somehow, she took a wrong turn and wound up on the free road south instead of the toll road south. Supposedly, the free road was laden with banditos that would rob cars stopped at red lights. She was in something of a panic every time she hit a light. Eventually, she saw an entrance to the toll road and was relieved – until she saw that the toll booths had several few armed soldiers around them. The soldiers terrified her and she expected to be shaken down for money above and beyond the toll booth fees by them. She was a wreck the whole drive down and pretty much everything seemed to frighten her. But she made it to Ensenada with absolutely no problems and realized that driving in Mexico isn’t nearly as bad as all the hype makes it out to be.

She was waiting at the marina when Kosmos pulled in. The four of us drove to the officials together, which are conveniently housed in one building. We went round and round and round trying to find the office. Had we walked, we would have found it with no problems, but we had chosen not to walk because somehow we felt incredibly vulnerable being out on the street with our precious boat documentation in hand.

When we did finally find it, we were nervous wrecks. We were both absolutely terrified of checking in. What if they asked for bribes? Could they deny us entry and make us go back to the States if we didn’t pay the bribes? What if there was something wrong with the paperwork? Would they arrest us and permanently confiscate our boat? After all, this is a foreign country where the crooked officials can do anything they wanted, right?

We almost passed out when it turned out there was indeed a SNAFU with our paperwork. Since our boat was brand new, we hadn’t gotten the original hard copy of the coast guard certification in the mail yet. We were trying to check in using a fax copy f the certification, which the Mexican officials wouldn’t accept. Oh, Lord, here comes the request for the bribe in order to take a fax copy. Our worst fears had come true! The boat was going to be confiscated!

But no one had asked for a bribe and they never alluded to confiscation. They simply wanted to verify that the boat wasn’t stolen and is legally flagged. We were so on edge over our irrational fears that we were about ready to have a heart attack over the “horrible ordeal”. But, with a few phone calls to the right people, the issue was all cleared up in a couple of hours. The officials were pleasant and didn’t seem at all like they were “out to get us”. They were simply trying to do their job. We were the ones who made the situation stressful by overreacting to something that was truly no big deal. In retrospect, we should have been thanking them for their diligence, not freaking out about it.

In so many ways we are different people now. The Christi and Eric of today wouldn’t have stressed at all about the SNAFU. We would have calmly made the phone calls and patiently waited for the clearance to take place. We can’t believe how much we feared “foreign” and “different” only 3 years ago. Now we embrace both. And we think we were silly to ever be afraid of those things. It is funny how illogical the fear emotion is. Humans on the whole generally don’t fear things that are truly dangerous but familiar, like rush hour traffic. But humans tend to fear the unfamiliar, even if it is perfectly safe. Humans tend to let the smallest and most obscure negative stories about the unfamiliar to become bigger deals in our minds than they are in reality, which increases the clouds in our already clouded vision as to what is safe and unsafe.

Anyway, back to our day. The Port Captain took less than 5 minutes, and we enjoyed our leisurely stroll back. We got back from the port captain’s office about the same time Stephanie and Lance got back from fueling up. Because the blog is so far behind real time, they thought we were in the Caribbean right now, so they were absolutely shocked when they had seen our boat next to them this morning. Here our the two Nordies, side by side

We visited with them some, then they offered to take us out to lunch to celebrate our accomplishment, which was very nice of them. Interestingly, they picked a seafood restaurant we have eaten at only once before, with Richard and another couple that own a Nordhavn 40. The only two times we have been to this place were both with Nordhavn owners. What a small world.

While we were out, we noticed that the town seems to be dead. There aren’t many tourists around at all. The cruise ship is in, but it seems like not very many people are getting off the cruise ship to walk around town. Stephanie and Lance told us that the combination of Americans having less money for vacations, the drug wars, the tomatoes with salmonella, and the kidnapping stories have had a devastating impact on the tourist industry in Ensenada. We had forgotten about the salmonella outbreak last year. Tomatoes infected with salmonella have been a big problem in the US for the last 10+ years, with most of the contaminated food coming from Virginia. Did people stop going to Virginia? No. But last year’s contamination was traced back to Mexico and now people are afraid to come here. How sad. Ensenada is such a great place. What we think is even more sad is that the people on the cruise ship are already here, but are so encompassed by fear that they are missing out on a neat cultural opportunity. As Eric said “You can’t run from the lows in life without also running from the highs, too”.

The afternoon and evening were low key. Eric rinsed the boat. Christi tidied some inside. We played on the internet and watched a movie. BTW, the internet here is really good and pretty cheap.

We are still reveling in our achievement and keep referring to each other as “circumnavigator”.

The most odd thing that happened today was a private jet flew by so low that it showed up on radar. It was definitely flying at less than 1,000 feet, and maybe was even as low as 500 feet.

We were all in incredibly high spirits all day. Christi and Eric were on cloud nine, really. The stars have to have aligned for us for this run, because everything about this leg has been so perfect in every way (except Trevor being sick, of course). The amazing weather. Completing the Baja run in about 1/3 to 1/4 of the time we had anticipated it would take since we didn’t have to stop. Seeing the whales. And now we were literally counting the minutes until our circumnavigation was complete. Just when we thought it couldn’t get any better, it did. We got word from Eric’s company that a project he has worked on for the last 8 years has finally come to fruition. Wow. His project and our circumnavigation are basically done the same day. That is just unbelievable! It is seriously too good to be true! As you can imagine, after we got that news, we were beyond elated. And Trevor was so excited to be sharing the joy with us.

At 18:29 exactly, we officially reached a point we had been to before. We crossed the circumnavigation line, near the island of Todos Santos at 31- 46N and 116-46W.

It’s real. We did it.

Our chart plotter numbers each and every waypoint we enter into it. After we got to that mark, we made a course change to follow our previous line back into Ensenada harbor. That was waypoint number 892. Once back on the line, the next course change was at waypoint number 6. Number 6! It seems like a lifetime ago in so many ways. Even though Ensenada is not our home, we spent three months there with Kosmos and we absolutely fell in love with the town, so we were elated about being back there again.

We approached the Ensenada harbor entrance at around 1945, just as the sun was getting to be low in the sky. The breakwater is different from when we were last here. Thank God we made it before dark. When we first made the decision to speed up to try to get to Ensenada before the weather turned bad, we had debated long and hard. We knew we were cutting it really close and that more likely than not we’d arrive after dark. What had ultimately swayed the decision was the fact that since we had been to Ensenada before, we felt comfortable with making a night entrance. But, now that we see the breakwater is different, making our charts off, a night entrance would have been very stressful. Had we not arrived before dark, we would have done circles in the bay all night in rapidly deteriorating weather. That was yet another thing that went right today. We still can’t get over how perfectly everything has worked out for us and how much good news has abounded.

There was a funky looking huge boat near the breakwater entrance. The machine was in operation and we could see the various mechanical parts moving as it inched along painfully slow. We figure must be a dredger.

But, despite the breakwater wall being different, most everything else looks the same. The giant Mexican flag that Ensenada is famous for was flying proudly. A cruise ship was in port. Sigh. The one and only thing we don’t like about this marina is that the cruise ships park next door to it. Those big ships put out a lot of soot that makes the boats in the marina really dirty.

When we were near the breakwater, Eric called the marina on radio. No response. Eric decided we need to advertise our accomplishment and put out our 30,000 mile pennant on Kosmos’ bow (Jeff had brought it to us when we were in Panama even though it was premature at that point. He had faith in us to make it to the 30K mark, though).

Inside the breakwater, we did notice that the sunken ship in the middle of the bay (clearly marked on charts) looks different somehow. Maybe it is more sunken than it was before. We seem to remember it being more obvious than it looked now. We also noticed some new construction around the marina on a plot of land that used to be vacant.

We pulled into the marina and tied up at an empty floating dock normally used for very large yachts. We were bursting with pride. We felt like there should be a tickertape parade through the middle of town to celebrate. Everyone should be celebrating with us on this magical day!

A security guard came running over to us and whisked Eric off to write down our boat info and to find us a slip. Here is a shot of the sunset in the marina.

While Eric was gone, Christi and Trevor danced up and down the dock, with Christi repeating over and over again, “We’re circumnavigators!!! Woo hooo!!!!” She just couldn’t contain her excitement! After the initial burst of energy died off, they watched the sea lions on one of the other docks. There were 4 sea lions laying on it, and clearly they have claimed that dock as their own. They were excitedly barking away, and a juvenile was playing in the water next to the dock. It was so cute to watch.

Eric saw that our old slip was empty and asked if we could move there. The guard said sure. Eric had noticed that there was a Nordhavn 40 located two slips down, in the same spot that Richard (crew member for the Pacific crossing) used to keep his boat. We untied and pulled around to the slip, passing the sea lions. As we neared the 40, we got a look at the name on the back and were thrilled to see the boat belongs to our friends Stephanie and Lance. Yay! We were going to be welcomed home by old friends!

We barely finished tying up before the last bits of twilight were completely gone and it was totally dark out. We have such good timing today! We immediately cleaned up and went to dinner. Christi even put on a skirt since it was such a special occasion. We did knock on Stephanie and Lance’s door to invite them to join us, but they didn’t seem to be home.

This is the first time in 2 full years where we have arrived in a port already knowing the lay of the land. This is the first time in two years where we didn’t have to go exploring. Obviously, we think exploring is a lot of fun, but it felt really good to know exactly where we wanted to go for dinner, exactly where the restaurant was, and exactly how to get there. We are almost reveling in the familiarity. To use an analogy, going to a new port is like wearing a brand new pair of jeans. You are excited about your jeans, but they are stiff and a little uncomfortable. Each day you wear them, they become more and more comfortable. Each new port is exciting, but there is a level of discomfort in trying to learn a new place. Arriving in Ensenada feels like putting on our oldest and most comfy pair of jeans.

So, where did we go to celebrate such a momentous occasion? We went to one of our favorite restaurants, called Los Valeros, which is a short walk from the marina. It was nice to have some old favorite foods. One of the things we love about this restaurant is the awesome creamy cilantro salad dressing. It is still just as good. Being in our old slip added to the nostalgia of the whole dinner experience. The entire dinner event, walk and all, felt to us like we had been transported back in time by 2.5 years.

Over dinner, we debated about when we should return to San Diego. Eric really wants to arrive back on a Saturday so that friends and family can come out and celebrate with us. We talked about going back this Saturday, but decided it would be better to go back next Saturday. We are both worn out from the extreme amount of sea time we did over the last month. We know that the minute we arrive back to “regular life” in the States, we will be busy all the time, so if we wanted some time to rest, we needed to stay here.

We were all exhausted and we totally crashed right after dinner.

Eric and Christi woke up this morning at 0100, having gotten only 3.5 hours of sleep. We immediately went to work getting the boat ready to go. We decided to let Trevor sleep for a little longer, but we got him up an hour later and had him help us.

We mentioned in yesterday’s post that the wind completely died in the evening. The forecast said the calm would last a couple of days. We were taking advantage of this opportunity to make a 36 hour run up the coast to the next suitable anchorage, Magdalenda Bay. We were all feeling pretty grim as we prepared the boat for sea. We have been dreading this last leg for so long, and now it was finally time to face the nightmare.

We pulled up anchor at 0300. The moon was half full and provided decent visibility. There was zero wind as we pulled out of the bay and headed towards the notoriously evil Cabo Falso, the very tip of Baja California. Cabo Falso is a notorious wind tunnel where the wind blows much, much stronger than anywhere else on the run. Many boats get stuck there for days and even weeks because the wind there is often just too strong to make rounding the peninsula possible.

As promised, as we began to round the peninsula, the wind instantly jumped up to 15 knots and the waves suddenly became sharp and tumultuous. Trevor instantly got sick – really sick. The increased wind and sharp waves only lasted a few minutes, though. Once we had fully rounded the tip, the wind died back down and the seas smoothed out into long swells with virtually no wind chop. While the ride wasn’t by any means calm, it really was pretty good, considering. Yes, we were hobby horsing away, but Christi and Eric found it to be tolerable, and not even close to the “uncomfortable” category. Christi and Eric figured Trevor would be feeling better in no time.

There were several boats out fishing and we stayed far away from them all. We chose to take a rhumb line to Magdalena Bay rather than hugging the shore. It would shave off a few miles, and we prefer to be farther out, anyway. At 0400, we rolled up 30,000 miles on the odometer. On this journey, we have spent 196 days at sea, which is 27% of the total time. Or conversely, we have spent 73% of our time in port.

After the sun came up, the wind was light but the seas started to build. By 1100, the swells had gotten bigger, averaging 2 – 4 feet, but were quite lazy and gentle, and coming at long intervals. This motion is such a contrast to the sharp and breaking waves that we experienced coming into Cabo. Of course, we were still hobby horsing some from the mild wind chop, but not that bad. Christi and Eric thought the ride was still pretty darn good, at least relatively speaking, but poor Trevor is still sick as a dog. He is passed out on the couch in the salon (living room), and every time he attempts to move or eat, he winds up feeding the fish. The hobby horsing is too much for him to sleep in the forward stateroom. Christi and Eric already knew that we have built up a tolerance to the seas, but seeing how sick Trevor was when we felt great really drove home just how much of a tolerance we have developed. More than we ever thought possible.

In the early afternoon the wind came back, getting up to 20 – 21 knots apparent. The wind chop picked up and the hobby horsing worsened, but the swells seem to be no worse. While the ride was not as good as before, it was still tolerable. We were making better than expected time, so we were on track to pull into Bahia Magdalena in the early morning instead of the early afternoon. Since we will probably arrive before sun up, we switched our destination to Santa Maria Bay, just a few miles north of Magdalena Bay. We would definitely be to Santa Maria after sunrise.

After dark, the wind chop started to die down. We figured Trevor would feel better, but he didn’t. He was sick all night. It was a dark, night, too. The moon must have been hiding behind clouds, because it never peeked out.

Day 2

At roughly 0530, we passed the site where a Nordhavn 62 sunk, just off the entrance to Magdalena Bay. We’re told that you can see the remains of the hull at low tide. But, it was still dark out, so we missed out on the chance to see it. Eric said it probably would have creeped him out, anyway. At that moment, the wind was at 1 – 2 knots. The wind chop was gone, and the swells were still gentle and lazy. Eric and Christi thought it was a pretty darn good ride considering the fact that we were in head seas, but poor Trevor was still sick.

Shortly afterwards, we checked the weather and saw that the calm winds were supposed to last another couple of days. Should we skip Bahia Magdalena and keep going? The next suitable anchorage is called Turtle Bay and was another 2 days beyond Bahia Santa Maria. As tempting as it was to keep going, we decided we needed to stop. It had been well over 24 hours since Trevor had kept anything down, and we were seriously worried about dehydration. We decided that for his sake, we absolutely needed to get to shore so we could get some liquids in him.

At 0630, we got disconcertingly close to a panga. It didn’t show up on radar until we were practically on top of it. Fortunately, we saw it in time and took evasive action. Those little boats can be so scary! Trevor spotted dolphins this morning, which was exciting.

Around 0700, Trevor got up. We were so relieved to see him move. He wasn’t dead yet! Phew. Then he actually ate a couple bites of food and kept it down. Praise the Lord and hallelujah! We were so relieved to know he wasn’t going to die. How would we have explained that one to his family? Trevor said he felt OK now and agreed it was best to keep going. So, we changed course, doing a rhumb line to Turtle Bay, as was recommended for power boats in the Baja Bash guidebook.

In the early afternoon we spotted about a dozen sea lions all sort of floating along in the water. They were in a fairly small radius of one another, but scattered about, none too close to any other. Here is one sea lion floating on his back with his fins sticking up.

We went outside to look at them and realized the water was full of little red sea creatures. We have no idea what they are. They look kind of like big red spiders or red crawdads or maybe baby lobsters. They are a vibrant red and swim using a weird motion. We suspect the sea lions were munching down on the little red guys.

The vast majority of the ride today we have had light winds on the nose (1 – 6 knots real at most) and the seas are quite calm. We did hit several localized convergence zones where the wind came from an odd direction for a few minutes, or picked up drastically for a few minutes, or both. In every case, the book had warned us of these zones and so the change was expected. As soon as we passed through the small zones, the wind would go back to what it was before.

Of course, we are still getting consistent swell from the north and are bouncing some. Relatively speaking, it is a nice ride for head seas, though there is a bit too much bouncing for it to be “comfortable”. To put the amount of bouncing into perspective, if we put a cup on the table, it will fall over within a minute or two. But if we put a cup on a piece of grippy that is on the table, it stays in place. Our speed has been better than expected, too.

While Trevor is feeling better, he is still not feeling good. He still is spending most of his time sleeping, only up for a couple hours at a time. He isn’t eating or drinking much, either. He also hasn’t kept everything down, but he has at least kept enough down that we know he won’t die. We are still a little worried about him.

The sunset was pretty. The clouds turned all red and the whole sky was awash in color. It was another dark night. Conditions were consistent pretty much all night. Eric made a new friend on the VHF. He is a single hander also doing the run north and he and Eric keep each other entertained with long talks on Eric’s watches.

We met the dock master. It just so happens that he wrote a book on how to do the Baja Bash, so we bought a copy from him. Knowing we have a book full of pointers is making us feel a little less nervous about the last leg.

Next on the “to do” list was to go to the airport to pick up Trevor, who is going to be crewing for us to Ensenada. It turned out his flight was early, so he was waiting outside and ready to go when we pulled up. That was easy! By now it was lunch time and we were ready to eat again. Patrick took us to a non-touristy part of town, a place where local Mexicans live as opposed to the ex-pat/tourist communities we have mostly seen so far. This section of town looks a lot like La Crucecita and has a blue-collar, lower middle class feel to it. Here is a street shot to give you a feel for what it looks like.

Patrick took us to a restaurant that serves only one thing: carnitas. Carnitas are shredded pork fried in lard and coca-cola, and seasoned with salt. The restaurant is basically a concrete patio with plastic patio tables and chairs. Off to the side is a small, open kitchen where a woman was making fresh tortillas on a grill. Yum… fresh tortillas. This was going to be good. It had to be.

Like the al pastor meat restaurant in Huatulco, the menu offered carnitas served in a number of different styles, such as tacos or burritos. We took Patrick’s advice and skipped the individual meals and simply ordered a kilo of meat for the 4 of us to share. It was served with several baskets of tortillas, four kinds of salsa, radishes, limes, jalapenos, onions and cilantro to build your own taco creation. We like carnitas a lot in general, but these are definitely some of the best we have ever had. And, it is cheap! Patrick said that this place will often have a line around the block.

While we were eating, some mariachi singers came out and performed. Mariachi singers are pretty common in Mexican restaurants. They wear traditional Mexican costumes and play traditional songs, and will take requests if you tip them. They add some local culture to the meal.

After lunch Patrick took us to the historic part of San Jose del Cabo. The town was first established in 1730, though none of the buildings here today are anywhere near that old. And before that, pirates used to hide out here in between raids on Spanish ships. San Jose is kind of like Barra Navidad in that the village is old and charming, though it looks much different than Barra. The buildings here are mostly low one stories. The village actually looks a lot like the oldest parts of Del Mar and is really cute. There is an artist district that Patrick wanted to drive us through, but, unfortunately, the streets were blocked off so we couldn’t see it.

We didn’t actually stop in old San Jose, and after driving around some, we went back to Patrick’s condo, which is along the road between San Jose del Cabo and Cabo San Lucas. He has a great place on the beach with fabulous views. Here are Patrick, Trevor and Christi on the beach with Patrick’s condo complex in the background.

After a quick tour, we all piled back in the car and went back to Cabo San Lucas. The plan was to take a water taxi over to Kosmos so that we could give Patrick a tour and drop off our groceries and Trevor’s luggage, then go back to shore to get dinner.

We had to wait for a few minutes at the water taxi stand before we took off. We were surprised to see that there were a lot of sea lions in the water around all the boats. We watched them happily play, doing somersaults and flips and general frolicking. One sea lion was especially cute. He was lying on his back, with his feet, fins, and flippers sticking straight up out of the water. What a great life sea lions have!

On board Kosmos it was unbelievably rocky. There were a lot of jet skis, water taxis and glass bottom boats zooming by at high speeds, leaving behind big wakes that caused incredibly confused seas. We are so glad that we haven’t been on board all day. This anchorage is really uncomfortable by day. We were thankful that we were going to be back on shore before the obnoxious sunset cruises started, which would just add more discomfort to the setting.

We are always bummed when people see Kosmos for the first time when she is looking bad. After such a miserable passage, the inside was an absolute mess. The outside was completely encrusted in salt and dirt, even at the top of the pilot house! She was looking well used at the moment. We are just thankful that she cleans up so well. After a good scrub down, she’ll look new again.

Anyway, back on shore we went to dinner at a sushi restaurant inside the fancy mall. We tried a couple rolls with some Mexican flair that were definitely different from anything we have had before. One had scallops, shrimp tempura, tuna, smoked salmon, avocado and was topped with cilantro sauce. We liked that one a lot. We are big cilantro fans. The other had soft shell crab, mango, cilantro, mint, smoked salmon, asparagus, and cooked tuna. It was dry. We think if the tuna was raw it would have been much better.

The water taxis only run until 1800, and when we had come to shore, we had made arrangements with the taxi driver to take us back at 2000. He had agreed to it since it wouldn’t be dark yet, but had demanded payment up front. We thought the payment up front was reasonable. After all, if he waited around an extra 2 hours after work and we never showed up, he would have waited around for nothing.

Anyway, coming back from the restaurant, we got caught in horrible traffic. We started to panic as the clock went past 2000. At about 2010, we realized we could walk faster than we could drive and Patrick dropped us off where we happened to be, at a hotel on the boardwalk. We said a quick goodbye and ran around the outside of the hotel towards the boardwalk. We were crestfallen when we saw a big fence. Drat. Rather than wasting time back tracking, we jumped the fence, then ran down the boardwalk as fast as we could, arriving at the water taxi stand at 2020. The whole time we had been praying he would wait for us. Otherwise, we had no way at all to get back to Kosmos.

We were so relieved to see our driver at the stand, looking annoyed as heck as we ran up. He was furious that we were so late, keeping him from his family. Once again, we are amazed at how selfless most people are. The agreement was for him to wait until 2000, and it would have been perfectly justified if he went home at 2001 and refused to wait for us. But, he knew we would be stranded and he didn’t want to leave us in a bad situation, so he waited. We thanked him profusely and gave him a big tip.

On board Kosmos, we were rolling like crazy. There was no wind at all. The wind usually keeps you pointed into the waves, so you kind of bounce along them. But with no wind, the boat just rolls around in the waves. And we were really surprised by how wavy it was. We felt like we were at sea. It was no fun. Thank goodness we aren’t staying here.

We got Trevor situated and then all went to bed. We were planning an early morning departure and we needed to get as much sleep as we could.

We got ready and called a water taxi at 0730, figuring he’d get us to shore by 0800. The taxi showed up at 0800 and dropped us off at the water taxi stand, which was a good mile from where we had asked to be dropped off. Here is a shot of Kosmos and Cabo San Lucas from the water taxi.

We called Patrick and told him we were at the wrong place. He told us to stay put and he would find us. We checked out our surroundings while we waited. We were on a boardwalk that wraps around the man made harbor within the natural bay. As far as we could tell, the buildings along the boardwalk appeared to be an endless line of hotels and restaurants. Everything looked to be new and upscale. A cruise ship was in port, and there were lots of tourists walking up and down the boardwalk, along with a lot of touts selling tourist knick knacks and offering assorted tours.

Like Huatulco, Los Cabos is a large, sprawling area. And, similar to Huatulco, 30 years ago there was nothing in Los Cabos except three tiny fishing villages. And like Huatulco, the area has grown explosively in recent years, primarily as a result of tourism. The main tourist center is Cabo San Lucas, where we stood now. It is famous for great sportfishing and really wild bars where you can party hard until dawn.

A few minutes later, Patrick strolled up. It was nice to meet him in person. We walked over to his car and we drove a few blocks back to a popular breakfast haunt. Off the waterfront, it is not as upscale, but it is still nice. The few blocks we saw looks just like an average, middle class area in the US. There are a lot of cars on the road, and both traffic and parking seem to be a big problem. And, it seemed like most of the cars were SUV’s. Are we in LA or Cabo?

The restaurant has the self-proclaimed best French toast in the world. The bread is stuffed with cream cheese and topped with pecans and fruit. It is really darn good, but we still think the place in Nicaragua wins. We also got a lobster benedict and a crab cake benedict, which we’ve never seen before. They were both a typical benedict, with an English muffin, poached eggs and hollandaise sauce, they just swapped lobster/crab for the ham. We like seafood and benedicts, so we liked them a lot.

After breakfast, Patrick volunteered to shuttle us around as we did our errands, which was very kind of him. The first thing on the to-do list was to go to the Port Captain to check in. Patrick didn’t know where the Port Captain’s office is, but he figured it would be on the waterfront close to the marina. We decided to go to the marina to ask for directions. We hopped back in the car and parked at a mall just off the boardwalk, a couple miles away from where Patrick had picked us up. We walked through the mall to get to the boardwalk. The mall is super swanky, with beautiful fountains and high end stores.

When we commented about how “American” Cabo looks, Patrick said that Cabo San Lucas has been nicknamed “Beverly Baja”. The name definitely fits. Anyway, from the mall it was a short walk to the marina office, which is on the boardwalk. Interestingly, there is a boat yard right next to the mall. When we commented about that being odd, Patrick said he thinks the boat yard owner also owns the mall. Ah.

We were surprised when the marina told us that the Port Captain’s office was a few blocks inland. We guess the office in Bahia Navidad isn’t as unusual as we first thought. They gave us a map and we walked over to the office. Here is a street shot to give you a sense of what it looks like.

The Port Captain’s office was crowded and we had to wait a few minutes before being helped. We chatted with the others in line and found out some useful information. First, we could have had the Port Captain in Huatulco clear us for all ports up through Ensenada, which would have eliminated the need to check in and out of each port. Oh well. We gather the officials don’t like to do that since none of the port captains we checked in with ever volunteered that information. And, since our next stop is Ensenada anyway, it is too late to try it out now. Second, the moorings were privately owned and the land was on a 20 year lease from the government. When the lease was up, the government didn’t renew it, so now there are no more moorings. Third, now you are supposed to call API on the VHF to request permission to anchor before actually dropping the anchor. We committed a fairly serious no-no by anchoring without permission. Oops!

Next on the to-do list was to stock up on “bad sea” food – food that is easy to eat when it is rocky and miserable and your tummy isn’t happy. That is food like chocolate (tastes the same both directions), fruit, potato chips and crackers. We don’t even really like potato chips and almost never eat them on dry land. But they are great in rough seas!

Patrick drove us to a grocery store in one of the other towns in Los Cabos, called San Jose del Cabo. We took a highway that parallels the water northwest for a surprisingly long distance. We hadn’t quite realized how far apart the two towns are. The stretch of highway is interesting. The side closest to the water is hilly and rife with upscale development, and looks much like Dana Point or any other newer, expensive California beach community. We were shocked when Patrick told us the prices of the hotel rooms, condos and houses on that side of the road. They are the exact same prices you would pay for something comparable in Southern California. Unbelievable!

There are quite a few pockets of land that haven’t been built upon, but most of that land looks like it has been graded for development, so in a few years there may be no vacant land left at all on this side of the road. The other side of the road is almost like a different universe altogether. It looks just like California’s inland desert cities, such as Palmdale. The land is arid and dry, dotted with low growing scrubby and sparse plants. There is a lot of new construction, but there is still tons of vacant land left intact. The construction on this side looks more middle class than on the other side. The prices on this side of the road are significantly lower than the ocean side. One block literally saves you hundreds of thousands of dollars on a house!

The weather in Los Cabos is a bit unusual. It is very close to the Tropic of Cancer line, and the tropical storms don’t usually make it quite that far north (but tropical storms can happen and boats have been damaged in hurricanes that have tracked through here). But, since it is so far south, it also doesn’t normally get the cold Artic storms from the north, either. So, they just don’t get much rain at all.

To be continued…