Blog Q: It’s kind of like a never ending party—with some boat repairs and a hurricane thrown in! How you figure out which boats have cool people to visit and which have the solitary pirate to avoid?
A: We think this year has been more social than most. Because of the hurricane, the cruisers were forced to congregate together in Bahia de Los Angeles when we’d normally be spread out. Everyone was eager to talk to one another in order to get feedback and advice on how to prepare, and more importantly, so that there was a friendship established with people who could help you if you needed it.
It also helped that a woman on one of the boats is a social coordinator by nature. She coordinated the majority of the cruiser social events, made fantastic food to share, etc. She is truly amazing and it wouldn’t be a non-stop party without her.
Finally, the lack of bugs in the Bahia de Los Angeles area lent itself to the socializing. It’s a lot harder to get together when you are being eaten alive by bugs that bite/sting.
That said, when people are not feeling social, they simply ignore the announcements on the radio that a party has been planned. We actually did that on Sunday (the 18th), when we went to The Village. The rest of the fleet had gone to La Mona for another party, but at that moment in time, we were craving civilization.
Here is the sunrise on Tuesday, September 20
Not long after we woke up, we left for Puerto Refugio, which is an anchorage on the northern part of Isla Angel de la Guarda. It will be the northernmost point of our Baja adventure.
It was a great day for us to go because there was light wind, and the swells were going our way. However, due to the light winds, it was not a good day for the sailors, so we headed up there alone. Several boats said they’d meet us up there when the wind was more cooperative for sailing.
It was a 7-hour ride, and most of the time it was calm. At the very end, as we turned a corner, we did experience some mildly uncomfortable head seas, but it didn’t last long.
We pulled into the beautiful anchorage that looked exactly like the picture in the cruising guide.
The anchorage is naturally divided by rocks into three separate sections. There is a barrier island that is a sea lion rookery about 2 miles away from the shore. The random rock to the right of the photo looks like a squirrel at certain angles.
We dropped anchor in the middle of the middle section, not far from a lone sailboat. We were dismayed to see that the temperature was 91 degrees with 76% humidity… and the forecast said it was only going to cool down to a low of 88 degrees at night. Ugh.
Shortly after dropping anchor, while we were getting situated, Eric saw a dinghy headed our way – with two children that looked to be close in age to Keith! We were so excited! They’d been out snorkeling and were stopping by to say hi on their way back to their boat.
They’d been in San Felipe for hurricane season and were heading back south now. They warned us that mosquitos and no-nos were a problem, especially at night. No-nos are so small that they get through the screens, so we immediately closed all the windows and hatches and turned on the a/c.
We were all feeling off kilter from the passage and heat, so it was an early night for us. Here are couple of sunset photos.
