Well, we're back. Back from laid back Mexico, dancing rattlesnakes, jumping manta rays, sleeping sea lions, and other various critters. Back from five nights under the Mexican sky, shitting in the ocean, and learning to sea kayak. What a nice trip!
Mexico right now may not appeal to a lot of folks due to its consistent drug and violence problems (
http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/pa/pa_3028.html), but Baja is still a nice place to visit. We flew over Mexico City to La Paz, the 'capital' of Baja, spent two nights at the very nice
Fiesta Inn. It was quiet with a beautiful pool and a cool bar. Good to get into the Mexican rythm.
La Paz certainly has seen better days. Not sure what happened, but many of the downtown bars and restaurants are closed. It doesn't appear to be dangerous, but noisy. We wouldn't have wanted to stay in a downtown hotel. The
Fiesta Inn subsidizes the taxi to the hotel and has a shuttle to the downtown bus terminal.
Something we took advantage off by taking a six-hour bus ride up to
Loreto, which is right at the
UNESCO marine park. The bus ride is nothing too unpleasant, but also not very exciting. Only the last bit when descending from the the
Sierra de La Giganta Mountains down the coastal area, which is spectacular. I almost forgot: We did have a scheduled stop for the Mexican Army to search the bus for drugs. We all had to leave the bus and then dogs went through the luggage and passenger area. They had photos of their past successes up, but I have to believe they'll only catch really stupid drug dealers this way. I wish them luck, though, as Mexico seems too nice a country to succumb to the drug lords.
We met up with our kayak instructor,
Ginni Callahan and April, the third student in our group for a debrief and dinner. Pack sacks were provided for the six-day journey and it became clear that this would be a real expedition. Ginni, I re-discovered, was the famous person in
This is the Sea, the one faithfully migrating every year with the birds from the NorthWest of the United States all the way to Baja. One of the side benefits for a student seems to be that Ginni coaches sea kayaking all year long and has done so for more than fourteen years! BTW, her company,
Columbia River Kayaking did a marvelous job in getting some first-rate british sea kayaks down to Mexico along with everything an expeditious sea kayaker might need for a five-nighter out in the open.
We headed out the next day shortly before noon as the packing took quite some work. I was working hard to fit all the cooking gear in my kayak, while the girls took care of the fresh produce. Honestly, it was not clear to me that we needed the cutting boards, dutch oven, or the large pot I had to find space for. If it had been up to me, we would have lived off dried food for five days. It would have been a great loss. A complete cooking plan was ready and executed almost perfectly, including vegetables, juice, and even two cakes (the mistakenly named German chocolate cake being decidedly the better of the two).
First day out and we saw a whale and a large group of dolphins in the distance. The dolphins were seemingly on a mission and sounded like a train rushing by. One of many encounters with wildlife. We went around the top of Danzante island, then crossed over to the southside of Carmen, our island for the next three days. We camped at a sandy beach, finding out that our tent was really not meant to house two grown adults, then set out to go around the very southern tip to our next camp ground. Wind came up at around 6 knots and it became hard with fully loaded boats to make progress. This being Mexico, we decided it was time for a siesta. We waited out the wind and ended up on our beach for the night.
The next day, we had our first rolling class. Ginni led us through the initial movements and made us feel comfortable wetting our skalps. Later that day, we left the campsite to explore the eastern part of Carmen. Coming back, we paddled slowly into the dusk, slowed down by the spector of jumping mantas! I never knew these guys wanted to fly, but apparently, these elegant creatures do have a sense of humor, flapping their wings and splashing back into the water. Arriving in the dark at our beach, I was happy Ginni knew this place intimately. I would have paddled straight past the campsite and that would have made for a long night indeed.
By noon time, we had seen whales again, paddled close to a sleeping sea lion, and saw a sea turtle. The afternoon we crossed over back to Danzante, where we would spend two more nights. Wind was blowing and waves were up to two feet high. We were practicing our steering skills and later even a bit of surfing.
After a nice night on a pebble beach, we left the camp site and went around the southern tip of Danzante. We had learned the bow and stern rudder. Now, we were practicing these skills rock hopping around the boulders at the bottom of Danzante's cliffs. A little water feature at the tip of Danzante allowed us to practice crossing an Eddy line. Lunch was at a park beach, where we practiced rolling again. Success! I managed to roll a couple of times and Yuki mastered the Balance Brace!
Heading up to a ridge for a view across the island and the Sea of Cortez, I came close to loosing it. I almost stepped on two rattle snakes and apparently jumped immediately. The snakes were 'dancing' on their behinds and curling around each other while falling down the path towards us. Checking later online, I found out that these were two male snakes battling over territory. We didn't dare to jump them or steer off the path. While the snakes spoiled our hike up the ridge, we were quite happy with the discovery (Want to see them dancing? Watch the video at
April's Flickr show!)
The next morning was our last breakfast on Danzante and of our trip. The weather was not too great with some drizzle. Surely welcome in the desert, but not necessarily what we expected. We had visitors that morning,
Klaus Kommoss and his wife, Parvin, stopped by having just caught three beautiful yellow-fins. The two have been coming down to Baja for years as well.
Finally, we headed back to Rattlesnake Beach, Ginni's base, stopping by Bird Poop island for a view of, oh well, bird poop, and its source. On Rattlesnake Beach, we unpacked and went straight back into the water for our final rolling class. I confirmed that my roll was still there, even with no initial setup. I also confirmed that it only worked on one side.
Afterwards - the hot shower, a shafe, and clean clothes. Aahh! The spoils of civilization! We met again as a group for dinner in a nice restaurant. Ginni brought her laptop with the videos of our forward strokes, bow and stern rudder skills. This was a nice closure and showed the progress we made over the six days.
We flew down to Cabo St Lucas then for a final night in Mexico before heading back with a direct flight to Newark. The airline was
Aereo Calafia and the plane was a little bigger than one of the jitneys in our town. Yuki got to sit behind the pilot with a panoramic view of all of the places we had kayaked to. So, all was good, except I still think the check-in guy ripped us off with the luggage over weight charge. One and a half great flying hours later, we landed in Cabo St Lucas (NOT the International Airport mind you). We got to see the 'slums' of Cabo St Lucas, which stretch up into the desert from the coast. Building boom or not, it feels like a third world country right there.
We stayed in the very big and fashionable
Finisterra. Yuki thought we could walk to
Lovers Beach to enjoy the sunset. So, we walked along the beach until we realized that we would have to do some climbing across steep rocks. Then, to get out of the beach, we had to go through yet another development and convince the security guard that we only wanted to exit. Next morning, we tried again, this time on the marina side. No luck, rocks were blocking the way. We ended up walking around the marina, which seemed longer than the evening before without any people and on a hungry stomach. Finally, on Medano Beach, we caught a glass bottom boat, which took us past
Lovers Beach and the famous arch. I think we are finally even (remember
Koh Phangan).
Cabos' International airport is surprisingly far away from Cabo St Lucas. You really do need to plan in an hour of driving with a shuttle. Otherwise, the return trip was uneventful with the exception of a crying kid in business class. (Warning: Do not read, if you are easily offended) Why on earth do people bring small children on a plane to a vacation spot, if they can't control them? I can understand families needing to travel to their hometowns to show off their offspring, but I do not appreciate being submitted to five hours of incessant crying, when going to a vacation resort.
