Turtle Bay, Mexico

Friday, April 1, 2011

027-41.346 N
114-53.307 W

Ahoy from Turtle Bay, Mexico!

On Friday we pulled into Turtle Bay on our way down the Baja coast. We left Cedros island at around 7 AM in light fog and it more dense as the day progressed. I feel like we're cruising Maine in August as we've basically never seen any of the coastline. Once again I was very thankful for radar and AIS. The biggest problem is that the large ocean swells reflect the radar signals and appear as transitory targets. As a result you have to carefully watch the radar to determine what's a real target and what isn't. The small boats that the locals use often don't show up well on the radar, so it takes a lot of concentration to see patterns. Of course this is at the same time that you're supposed to be looking keeping a lookout...

Turtle Bay is one of the few protected harbors along the Baja coast. They also have diesel, which makes this a key stop for many people. As our tanks only hold 55 gallons and we have another 30 gallons in jury cans, we needed to stop there in order to be able to make it to Cabo San Lucas.

Around 3 PM we made the turn into Turtle Bay. The charts were fine and we had no issues getting in. However, we really couldn't see anything until just before we arrived at the anchorage area. There we found other boats and we could just barely see the shoreline. We tried calling the fuel panga, but got someone from the fuel dock, who, based upon my limited Spanish wanted us to come to the dock. The dock is much too tall for BlueJacket, so I said "no". I then set out in the dinghy to find the fuel dock and the fuel panga. I found the dock and discovered that he had dispatched the fuel panga to BlueJacket, so I raced back to find it pulling up to the boat. They have a Honda generator which runs the pump and meters the fuel. Somehow I took on 57 gallons and the tanks only hold 55 gallons at maximum! The price was good, only about $0.40 USD more than the non-discount price in Ensenada.

We wandered into town and met two crew members who were moving a racing boat back to CA. They showed us where the Internet cafe was, so we were able to get connected. I'm glad that they showed us as it would have been hard to find without them. The town itself is a typical run down, dusty Mexican town. We then went over to the racing boat for happy hour and got a tour of the boat. Let's just say that it's lacking a lot of amenities that Sue & I enjoy.

On Saturday we're headed to Asuncion, which is about 53 miles from here.

-- Geoff & Sue

Log ID: 1428