Isla Coronados to Santa Rosalia

We next visited Isla Coronados where we enjoyed each of its three comfortable anchorages. The island is a volcanic cone where a track to the summit is a good early morning walk that provides a wonderful panoramic view and a good signal from the cell phone tower at distant Loreto. Tramping in this part of Mexico is always hot, dry, rocky under foot and thorny. The rocky terrain makes the heat more intense so good footwear and and plenty of drinking water are essential. We began the tramp from the western anchorage having rowed ashore at 0630. The ascent took about an hour and a half and the descent a little less than half that time. At the summit we enjoyed several conversations with friends and family via WhatsApp.

 

At the summit of Isla Coronados looking towards the anchorage, Taiko is down there somewhere.

At the eastern anchorage Renate embarked upon her first on-board sewing project. To accommodate this a robust sewing station had to be contrived as our saloon table supports would likely buckle under the weight of the sewing machine. The best spot for this was above deck with Renate sitting in the cockpit, her feet in the foot well, while the sewing machine was supported by the table top laid across a length of 4x2 timber, that doubles as my on board work bench, and the rear cockpit locker. She sewed comfortably like this for two days, the downside is that it restricts access to tools and materials in the cockpit lockers.

The improvised sewing table.

With no access to tools I could only relax. While exploring the bay by dinghy I was able to get quite close to a pod of dolphins. Dolphins are always a pleasure to behold but this, quite large, pod was not to be distracted from this serious business of feeding and were completely disinterested in interaction with humans.

Rowing backwards while dolphin watching.

This pod of dolphins seems to live permanently around Isla Coronados. They passed by very closely while we were in the southern anchorage; I could tell that it was the same pod because it was possible to recognise an individual with an unusually upright dorsal fin. Conditions in the Sea of Cortez must be abundant for dolphins as the pods we see are usually much larger than we are accustomed to seeing off the Northland coast of New Zealand. There are also quite a number of young ones among them.

Sailing close to a large pod of dolphins.

Back in the western anchorage of Isla Coronados Renate had another sewing day where she made some rope bags for the cockpit. She made them out of left overs from the sail making and mesh material salvaged from the old sail covers. They look very smart. She has become a keen seamstress now that she has complete confidence in the Sail-rite sewing machine. Two unfortunate things occurred in this anchorage. Firstly, Renate's phone was flicked overboard by the released main halyard and though it was retrieved, in a single lucky dive, rinsed immediately in fresh water and set to dry in a bag of rice, it has never revived. Secondly, Renate had to make an trip to Loreto on Susimi for emergency dental work to repair a broken filling. The work was done expertly for a very reasonable price, about 25% of what one would pay in New Zealand.

The drowning of the phone occurred while I was working on the sails in an attempt to rid ourselves of the diagonal creases in the top two panels of each sail when close hauled. This unsightly problem does nothing to improve our sailing performance.

The unsightly creases.

I concluded that the parallelogram shape of the panels was being distorted by the increased downward force of the sheets when the sails are hauled in tight and that on this point of sailing, the yard and the triangular panels of the sails would have to be peaked up a little bit more. To achieve this I fitted a dedicated throat hauling parrel and a separate luff hauling parrel. This has improved the situation but has not illuminated the problem completely. Later, on re-reading Arne Knarveland's files we decided to fit Hong Kong parrels to help prevent the distortion of the upper panels. As I write in Santa Rosalia these are untested.

On the 8^th of June I bottled a batch of beer and we readied the boat leave Isla Coronados in the company of Pablo. There was light wind from the SE so we sailed 'wing and wong' trying to make the best of the light conditions, bound San Juanico, about twenty miles away. The wind steadily built during the day into the twenty knot range to give us a nice comfortable downwind run to the next anchorage. Eventually it became necessary to reef to mainsail by two panels and to our surprise the actually went faster at a sustained 7 to 7.5 knots and gained a more comfortable motion. We were much pleased and encouraged by our ship's performance. At the anchorage there was much licking of wounds from the brisk conditions by our Bermudan rigged counterparts who struggled to steer a good course and keep their headsails full.

San Juanico is another beautiful anchorage but is often troubled by swell. We were lucky to have some calm days with little swell and were able to enjoy some nice walks ashore and good rock garden snorkelling. Here we also celebrated Renate's birthday with a wonderful pot luck dinner with ten guests aboard.

Food was served.

Music was made.

Taiko's hull had begun to look a little bit green and few barnacles had started to become obvious on and around the rudder. I have had the policy of removing early signs of fouling while the water is warm enough not to make the job of in-water cleaning thoroughly daunting and unpleasant. On this occasion Paul, from Susimi, lent me his home built Hookah system, made entirely from parts available from Home Depot. Being able to breathe made the job so much easier and less tiring that I have resolved to assemble one for myself at the earliest opportunity.

While enjoying the company of others at this anchorage we took the crews' of three other yachts for an afternoon sail on Taiko. Regrettably, the wind was really far too light for the purpose. None the less the comments that followed were positive, such as “it tacks so easily”, “I couldn't do that with my boat”,and “ this thing kicks ass going down wind”. Ultimately I was asked “ do you know of any junk rigged boats for sale?”. Regrettably, I did not.

On our last day at San Juanico the anchorage became too swelly for comfort so we moved a mile or two around the corner to La Ramada, which was far less susceptible to the swell, to spend a final dinner evening with our friends on Pablo. As always this was fun and entertaining, but tinged with sadness that they were to begin heading south back to La Paz as we were to continue our journey northwards.

The following day we left La Ramada at 0615 bound for Bahia de Concepción. We anchored at 1900 in Bahia Santo Domingo inside Bahia de Concepción, having sailed the 43Nm in variable SE wind with an average speed of 3.6 knots and a maximum speed of 6.2 knots. A long but pleasant day's sail. Santo Domingo is a few miles from the small town of Mulege where good cell phone coverage is available, consequently two yachts, Susimi and Ayana, were there appreciatively making use of this service; as we did as soon as things were stowed away after the evening meal.

Arriving Bahia Santo Domingo. Photo: Hazel from Susimi.

The following few days were spent in the numerous anchorages of Bahia de Concepción enjoying the usual activities of snorkelling, walking ashore and socialising.

 

Nice snorkelling!

 A fine view of the anchorage after a strenuous climb. Taiko furthest in the background.

Hazel and myself getting ready for snorkeling.

While at Bahia de Concepción we took the opportunity to take Hazel and Paul, from Susimi, and Gabe, from Ayana, for another sail on Taiko. This time there was a reasonable breeze and pleasant afternoon was enjoyed. Hazel is a very experienced racing helms woman. At Taiko's helm she had a very nice touch and steered the unfamiliar, to her, rig to windward adeptly. Junkies will be pleased to note her comments, which were:

1. You could race this around the buoys.
2. You would do well on handicap.
3. You wouldn't be the slowest.
4. It's a fast boat.

Praise indeed!

It was soon time to move on again and after a pleasant sail in moderate SE wind we made a brief rendezvous with Ayana and Susimi at Isla San Marcos, ten miles from the quaint old mining town of Santa Rosalia. Here we discovered a problem with our anchor windlass so we decided to motor to the government owned marina at Santa Rosalia to fix the problem. It turned out to be quite easy to remove and replace some sheared off bolts and reshape the chain stripper so that the chain no long jammed the windlass while in operation. The most difficult part was removing the below deck gear box and motor from the chain locker's small access port aft of the fore mast. We tried for hours to do so and had given up thinking we would have to cut a bigger hole in the bulk head or remove the foremast. Susimi Paul came aboard to look at the problem. He took some measurements and considered the whole thing. Then he tried different positions and in few minutes removed the unit, shaft first and upside down out of the locker. We were very pleased to fix the problem quickly. We are thankful and happy, it saved us a lot of time and nerves, a lot of logistics and ourselves thousands of dollars.

Another nagging problem has been the expiry of our Mexican tourist visas. Happily the local immigration office, given the difficulty of Covid-19 restrictions, was able to extend our visas until December for 'humanitarian reasons'.

Santa Rosalia, a neat little mining town

 

While here we also undertook some other projects. Renate did some sewing repairs to clothing and shopping bags and also made a new cover for the chart plotter. We finally got around to installing split sheeting on the mainsail and installing Hong Kong parrels on both sails. We also stripped and resealed the galley sink bench and the wood trim in the heads. With the galley out of action we were forced to enjoy the local cuisine ashore for a couple of days. 

A special treat, good ice cream!
We often visited this shop because the scoops were big and the waffle was very tasty.
The temperatures here, in Baja California Sur are slowly picking up and we have around 30`C below deck. In town they rose to 40`C.
An ice cream is a welcome change!

Paul, Hazel, Renate and I enjoy a delicious ice cream.

 

Tomorrow we prepare to leave for further north. We are unsure where we will next be able to make a blog post. For keen readers of this blog I have added an email feed that will notify you when a new blog is posted.

I am looking forward to sailing again!