Isla San Jose

Thursday, May 12, 2011

024-54.856 N
110-37.703 W

Ahoy from the crew of the BlueJacket!

When you last heard from us, we had just had a rock and roll evening at the anchorage on the E side of Isla San Francisco. The only good thing about that was that we got an early start to the day. From there we headed to the S end of Isla San Jose where there's a large mangrove estuary. It's quite surprising to to find such a large mangrove in a desert location and the green really stands out against the brown hills.

After we had some breakfast, we hopped into the dingy so explore the mangrove lined channels which lead to a large lagoon. The biggest problem that we had was that it was almost dead low tide and getting in to the channels proved to be quite challenging as the motor kept hitting bottom. After several aborted attempts we finally found a channel which was deep enough to get us in and we set off exploring. At one point we had a flock of turkey vultures sitting in the trees above us and suddenly a fly buzzed my ear. I was immediately reminded of watching Walkabout, which was set in Australian Outback.

There are multiple channels which wind their way through mangroves to a large, deep lagoon which is probably close to 2 miles long. We shut off the motor and just drifted, listening to the sounds of nothingness and nature. It's very rare that you're in a location where there are very few sounds and nothing man-made. There are no high flying jets or roads or towns or anything. And you're in the desert where there isn't a lot of wildlife. It's a pretty unique situation.

After exploring the lagoon we headed back to the boat and had a good opportunity to view the "Cactus Forest" which runs all along the S end of Isla San Jose. The hills leading down to the water are filled with tall cacti and this goes on for miles and miles. Due to the cacti being on sloping hills, you get a great view of them as opposed to flat desert.

From there we headed to Punta Salina, which is the site of an abandoned salt mine and is now home to abandoned buildings and rusting equipment. The salt mines are low areas which were flooded with salt water and then allowed to dry. These stretch for miles and the water in them appears to be red due to bacteria, which provides quite the color contrast against the stark white dried salt and green plant life. I really enjoyed wandering around and photographing the area.

From there we headed across the channel separating Isla San Jose from the Baja. The winds typically build during the afternoon and funnel through this channel, so we had a spirited sail in 20-25 kts close hauled and 4 miles later we pulled into San Evaristo, but that's a report for another day.

-- Geoff & Sue

For the cruiser:

At the mangrove estuary we anchored in sand at 24-52.89N 110-34.47W in about 12' of water in the corner. Be very careful as it shoals quickly to the N and E.

At Punta Salina we anchored in sand at 24-54.856N 110-37.703W in about 15' of water just off the ruins of the dock.

Log ID: 1447