via satellite
We're "off the grid" again and it feels good! La Paz was nice, but I really enjoy the natural beauty of Baja a lot more.
Yesterday we sailed north from La Paz along the west coast of Isla Espiritu Santo. I say "sailed" because we were actually able to sail the first half of the trip even though it was upwind, but at an angle that Intermezzo can handle without complaining and dragging her feet. The wind was right on the nose for the second half and Intermezzo just doesn't consider sailing that way ladylike, so we motored. The silver lining of motoring was that this allowed us to take a detour between some beautiful small islands lying just off the coast of the main island. Renee took a million pictures which I will post when we have broadband again.
We are anchored in Caleta Partida with about eight other boats. This anchorage is in the gap (partida) between Isla Espiritu and the smaller island just north of it, Isla Partida. It is geologically the crater of a long extinct volcano, which is evident by the steep topography of surrounding hills. It is very peaceful, even with the other boats around us and plenty of breeze to keep it nice and cool. Today we are going to do some amphibious exploring, hiking the south ridge of the anchorage this morning and snorkeling a reef at the north point in the afternoon. I tell you, all the effort it takes to obtain material for this blog makes for a tough life.
We're starting to plan our itinerary for the next couple of weeks. There a so many beautiful and interesting places to see! It's hard to choose which ones that fit within the time we have before we need to set sail south to Puerto Vallarta for the holidays. The town of Loreto is our next milestone, which is about 100 miles north of us, with lots and lots of neat places in between. It's about 500 miles from Loreto to Puerto Vallarta, which is a substantial distance to sail and we need to take into account sitting out bad weather somewhere along the way. By my reckoning, this gives us about 17 days to explore the Sea of Cortez. That may sound like a lot, but it will mean passing up three places of interest for every one that we are able to explore and probably not getting much further north than Loreto. Sounds like we'll be coming back here someday!
