11/11/2011 -- Los Frailes - Los Muertos

We got up at 0500 and had the sails set by 0545.  There were five boats within 150 feet of us with one right on our hook, but the wind cooperated by shifting enough that we got the anchor up without having to fend off the offending vessel...I had told the crew of that boat the night before that depending on the morning breeze we might need to clear them off our hook in the morning...they heard our chain coming in and were on deck in case we needed them to move...

The wind was 10-15kts out of the NW so we tacked offshore to avoid the reef that protrudes east of cabo Pulmo...the bad news is that we were headed east of north and needed to get west of north to lay Los Muertos...about 0700 the wind shifted out of the wnw and increased to 16 kts...we were in hog heaven sailing at 8kts over the ground and making a course a little west of north...this lasted for about an hour until the wind slowly shifted back to the nw and dropped to about 8 kts...

With the courses we've had to lay, Mexican sailing has been no wind or wind on the nose...that's what happens when you want to get to a certain location...in our case, La Paz.  The folks who went to the mainland had a broad reach in a nice breeze with following seas!  We're now motor sailing toward Los Muertos...Danny's doing a great job on the helm keeping the breeze just enough off the nose to keep the main from slatting...the seas are relatively calm and we're making about 5.5 kts vmg...it could be a lot worse...thank god for Mr. Diesel...

If Los Muertos is as good as we hope, we'll hang there for a day or two then head up to La Paz just long enough to figure out were all the facilities are (like the airport and Costco!...we're almost out of granola!)...then we'll head out to check out some of the more secluded anchorages...

Part 2:

About an hour after this morning’s post, the wind came up, shifted  to the NE enough for us to sail and we sailed right in to the anchorage as Los Muertos at 1330...the last 90 minutes we were close reaching at 8.5 kts...a great way to end the trip.

There were only about eight boats here when we arrived and there are about 20 here now...with three more coming over the horizon...they won't make it by dark...This anchorage is open to the east and south and protected from the North and West...right now the wind is from the east, but it's light and not a problem...probably just the normal north winds refracting around the headland...

We heard on the radio that there's a restaurant within walking (hiking) distance...we'll have to check that out tomorrow...we're all ready to try some prepared Mexican food again...

We broke into John Ingle’s Tequila today upon our arrival and lifted a toast to him...