We left Chamela this morning and motored about 8 nautical miles to the tiny rocky anchorage of Paraíso. We are anchored just off the sandy beach of a boutique hotel, nestled between two rock points. There was one boat when we arrived here, plenty of room. Two more boats have arrived, including a big 50-foot catamaran. It's getting a bit crowded.
We enjoyed our three days in Chamela.
Friday we slept in after our overnight passage from La Cruz, then took the dinghy to visit the small islands in the middle of the bay. Our aim was to go snorkeling, but the visibility was not very good due to all the krill in the water. No wonder there are so many whales about. Still, we enjoyed a picnic on a rocky isolated beach, then a bit more time on a sandy beach with a few daytrippers lounding about.
Saturday we took a long walk along the long crescent beach of the bahía. The beach is over three miles long, fringed with small palapa restaurants, a few modest hotels, a handful of beach campgrounds and an estero lined with mangroves. It was long nice walk on a breezy sunny day. I had run along the beach barefoot the evening before and my feet were well abraded by the sand by the time we sat down at a palapa restaurant for a simple seafood lunch and beers. When we launched the dinghy to return to Intermezzo, I misjudged the surf and shipped a big wave over the bow. Fortunately Robin was there to block the wave from getting me wet.
Sunday we relaxed on the boat and go work done. I did my monthly administrative "paperwork", called my Dad, reviewed my to-do lists. Robin scrubbed the dinghy and got rid of the sand from the previous day's wave mishap.
Today's short passage was uneventful, though we did see a couple of whales "commuting" northwards. I'm glad we arrived when we did because I probably would not have stayed if there were as many boats here as there are now. We'll do some snorkeling, swim over to a tiny private beach, maybe inflate the kayaks to explore the rocky islets just outside the anchorage. No complaints.
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| View from Paraíso anchorage, big catamaran arriving to crowd us |
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| Picnic lunch beach in Bahía Chamela and our trusty dinghy, which I am naming "Intermeccito" |
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| Chamela islet shorelines, our sandy beach stop way off to the left in the distance. |
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| These boobies need tough feet to roost on spiny cacti |
