Ensenada Check-In and Lunch at El Rey Sol

Monday, December 2, 2024 — There were two main reasons why we usually went to Marina Coral instead of Maina Cruiseport whenever we were in Ensenada. The first was that Coral has a fuel dock, and they used to offer a discount on fuel if you stayed in their marina. However, Coral no longer offers this perk. In fact, it is currently cheaper to buy fuel in San Diego than in Ensenada!

The other reason is that Coral will help you with your Mexican check-in paperwork for a nominal fee. This service has paid off in spades for us in the past, especially when we needed help getting a new Temporary Import Permit (TIP) after our first one had expired (note to cruisers: Always make sure to renew your TIP prior to expiring. Getting another new one issued on the same boat can be a nightmare). 

Nowadays, Cruiseport offers a check-in service, too. Between the lack of fuel discount and the fact that we can get check-in services at Cruiseport, we may choose to go to Cruiseport in the future. While Coral is very nice, it’s also pricey, has serious surge issues, and is on the outskirts of town. Of course, Cruiseport has issues, too, particularly with soot from the cruise ships, noise and touts. You have to pick your poison.

Yesterday, the marina had told us to be at the marina office at 0930 to do the check-in. After they packaged up all of our paperwork for the authorities, they shuttled us into town, where all three offices (customs, immigration and port captain) are conveniently housed in one building. 

This was the busiest we’d ever seen it. We had to wait over an hour for our turn, but once we were served, the paperwork took the typical 45-minutes to process. 

Once we were done with that part of the paperwork process, we celebrated by having lunch at our beloved El Rey Sol. As always, the food was wonderful. 

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Santa Rosalia days 6 – 8

Here is the sunrise on Sunday (August 21).

Sunday was oppressively hot again. Eric got a very early start on the dive compressor. He reassembled the third stage. Sadly, the compressor still didn’t work. He took off the final pressure safety valve and cleaned it. It looks like this may be the part that is broken, but he doesn’t have a spare. He gave up on the project and put the compressor back into its mount, along with all the gear stored in around it. He was frustrated that he again put so much effort into the repair for nothing. There was another boat with the same compressor that left a couple day ago, and he is hoping to perhaps find them and try swapping in the part to verify it is the problem.

We wound up spending the day holed up on the boat, enjoying the A/C. Brett came over and the boys played. Christi and Eric did a few chores. In the evening, Eric went to the pool for social hour while the kids and Christi stayed at Kosmos.

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Park Passes, Dive Compressor, and Solar Ovens

On Tuesday morning (August 9), we left Puerto Escondido at 0830 to go to Loreto to get our park pass and do some more grocery shopping. We went to the park office first, arriving right before it was supposed to open at 0900. It was a good thing we hadn’t started the process yesterday; what we thought would take five-minutes took 1.5 hours to complete.

As part of the process, we had to go to the bank in the historic town center to pay for the pass. As we mentioned in the last post, Loreto was the first Spaniard settlement in the Californias, and was the capital until 1777. This is the Capital building.  

Here is a shot of the town center plaza

Some of the streets surrounding the plaza have tree canopies

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Islas Coronados to Puerto Escondido — And Alternator

On Friday morning (August 5), the water was again calm and clear when we awoke. We got Kosmos ready for sea first thing in the morning. This included bringing up and securing the dinghy, bringing in and securing the flopper stopper plates/paravane poles, bringing in the snubber line (which is basically a shock absorber for the anchor chain), securing all loose items on board, etc. We weren’t leaving early; we just wanted to have everything done before the tourist pangas started roaring past us, creating wakes. Then we went for a swim around the boat and saw a lot of fish, including a pair of puffers sitting on our chain at the bow of the boat.

We set off for Puerto Escondido a little before noon and arrived around 1500. It is less stressful for us to go someplace we’ve been before. This time we were assigned to a different dock. We spent a couple of hours at the pool and had dinner at the marina restaurant. In the evening, we got to know our new neighbors. 

Here is a picture of the sunset, looking at the north end of the bay. The topography of this picture is important for the next part of the story. While there are taller mountains to the west and south, the east and north parts of the bay are protected by low hills with gaps. 

On Saturday (August 6), in the wee hours of the morning, Eric was awoken again. He saw that wind picked up to 23 knots. There was lightning, thunder and later a heavy rain. Eric was shocked to see that the waves were big enough that they were splashing over the end dock where the big boats tie up.

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