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. 

Continue reading

Keith’s Thoughts on Baja/Réflexions de Keith sur Baja

Overall, I like Baja California, Mexico It has it’s good parts and it’s bad parts. It has beautiful scenery (mostly rock formations… most plants we found were cactus or dead). 

Isla Coronados, August 4, 2022

Dans l’ensemble, j’ai aimé Baja California. Mexico a des bons cotés et des moins bons cotés. Il y a de très beaux paysages (plutôt des formations rocheuses…. La plupart des plantes qu’on a trouvé étaient des cactus ou étaient mortes). 

San Francisquito, August 26, 2022

As for civilization, La Paz is nice with good food and a beautiful malecon. Loreto is a good town, not too big and too small. Bahia  de Los Angeles is super small, but it is a good town nonetheless. But my favorite town is Santa Rosalia. It has good food, especially pastries, and is cute and small.  

Santa Rosalia’s waterfront on south end of town, October 10, 2022
Continue reading

The Last Leg Home — Our 8-Month Baja Adventure is Officially Over

(*Sorry for the delay in posting. Life got busy once we got back to San Diego)

On Sunday, March 5, we awoke at 0300 to do the last minute things to get Kosmos ready to go to sea. We untied at 0400. It was about 60-nautical miles from Marina Coral to the mouth of the San Diego Bay. Here was the sunrise

The day was mostly overcast and grey. Had we not done the previous difficult passages to Bahia Tortuga and Ensenada, we would have said that the conditions were rough, but compared to those two, sea conditions weren’t all that bad. We were hobby horsing a lot, but the swells weren’t giant nor the intervals rapid enough to make it a miserable ride. We were all functioning normally (for the most part). Here is a “sail” boat passing us… in 5 knots of head winds.

Continue reading

Ensenada, Days 3 and 4 — The New Science Museum and Back to the New Malecon

Friday, March 3 was a chore day for us. Here was the sunset.

On Saturday, March 4, we went to breakfast at our second favorite restaurant, Los Veleros. It is cheerfully decorated with bright, colorful paintings of sailboats. It was also packed. One of the reasons Los Veleros was so popular for breakfast was because they dropped off a tray of pastries at the table (the pastries weren’t included in the meal price, but you only paid for them if you ate them), and a quesadilla appetizer was included with the meals. We went there specifically to get the flaming fruit desserts, but we had forgotten that they don’t offer them at breakfast time.

After eating, we walked next door to the new science museum. It was a large building, and there was scaffolding up and construction workers outside working on the building, so it clearly was not completely done yet. Admission was about $3.50 USD.

Continue reading