Cabo!

There was some debating about Cabo. It's a tourist trap and expensive to stay at the marina and many cruisers skip it altogether BUT we have been out for three weeks now since Ensenada and plan on cruising slowly through the anchorages on the way to La Paz. I am eager to have a long hot shower and put on a nice dress and go out to dinner. I also am desperate to find some WIFI so I can upload pics and our laundry has been building up- soon I will be able to wash it on deck and dry it in the warm sunshine but right now, the bag is threatening to sink the boat. Jon never passes up an opportunity to make me happy so he agrees- This is how a wise captain gets a wife to live on a boat!
We look at the weather. Our constant issue is that we can't just leave on overly mellow days because our engine is old and we don't want to have to use it too much, if we don't have to. We need days with wind. The next few days look incredibly calm but since we took a bit of a beating on the way down, I beg  Jon to go for it now. I am eager to have a slow, gentle sail, use our asymmetrical in the day and have some calm seas. Jon has to think hard about it because Cabo Falso, the very end of  the Baja Penninsula, can be a formidable cape- one should try to round it just after dawn to avoid  the daily build up of wind and seas that are so common there. Jon studies the weather and puzzles our timing. We planned to leave on the 23rd.
We all had a sleep in the morning after Kai's b-day and I cooked up some food in prep of our up coming next leg- it would be shorter but still two nights. the kids fished all morning off the boat and Hunter caught a baby barracuda, which was a thankfully, a manageable size to get off the hook. We let him go after much observation by Kai. At 3:00 pm Jon poked his head out the hatch and looked around. He had been bent over the Nav desk for awhile. "if we weigh anchor in the next forty five minutes, our timing should be perfect." The wind had shifted slightly and right now was now better than our planned departure.
Exactly forty five minutes later we were sailing for the entrance of the bay...
The sun was setting and the sea outside the bay was like GLASS. There was barely enough wind to keep our sails full but we were moving along at 4 knots. We sat in deck and watched pods of dolphins play as the sun set. The stars were coming out. It was heaven...
The passage was a milk run. When we finally got far enough off shore to shape our course, we were twenty miles out and the seas were like a giant puddle. The first twenty four hours, sleeping in your bunk off watch was like sleeping in your bed at home. When the swell picked up eventually, it was nothing. The winds were light at times but always enough to keep moving. At night, we don't fly the spinnaker so we do slow down but it was all part of Jon's master plan and sure enough, 36 hours later I watched the sunrise as we approached Cabo Falso.

Sunrise over Cabo Falso

The first thing I saw as sunlight poured over the mountains and across the waves were two giant blows about three hundred yards away.  Two humpbacks spent the last part of my watch with me before I woke Jon up from his off watch. We were surrounded by sea birds and spinner dolphins as we drank our coffees on deck. I threw in our hook and the kids came running on deck every time someone spotted another whale spout on the horizon. By 7 am it was HOT! It took two hours to pass the cape and sure enough, it picked up as we did. Suddenly it was blowing 23 knots and the seas were choppy and whitecaps, just lovely sailing but you could see how in stronger conditions or later in the day it could get crazy out here. Hunter came on deck and looked around at the rushing waves . " little bigger?" i said. "This isn't big, it's perfect!" said Hunter. Good little sailor. The kids LOVE the boat. No matter what. They are so used to it now, they don't even want to go ashore unless it's a beach. When we say we're getting underway, they are thrilled to be sailing again. Which is awesome because you can never guarantee everyone is going to love it-but they do, which is great.
Just as we were rounding the cape, a huge humpback breached about 500 yards away and then right at that moment BAM! A strike on the line! We jumped into action. Jon played the fish, the rest of us sprang around to bring in sails and Kai kicked on the engine and drove the boat to help his dad land it. Twenty minutes later, in the gusting wind and seas, we had our first FISH on deck! We had no idea what it was but we GOT IT! Kai told us it was a big-eye tuna and he turned out to be right. They aren't as good eating as yellow tail  but we gutted it and I fillet it for the practice. It might seem wasteful but I didn't want to butcher our first yellowtail or mahimahi without having honed my skills a bit. An hour later we passed Neptune's Finger and the lands end arch. The bay was jammed with tourist boats and the beach covered in hotels but it was 86 degrees out, we had a caught a fish and we had just sailed down the entire west coast of the Baja Peninsula! Hot showers and dinner at a nice restaurant awaited us...Oh, happy days.

the one that didn't get away

love

spotting whales

more love

cheers!