Sailing to Bandaras Bay

Our first stop after leaving Guaymas was Playa Algodones (Cotton Beach), a nice anchorage north of San Carlos. We spent five days there getting our sea legs, finishing small projects on the boat and enjoying the tourist scene. The beach was fine sand, Finn and I enjoyed a small hike and we all watched many kite boarders catching the wind. Stephan especially enjoyed the social scene at the Soggy Peso Bar!

Finn and I at the top of our hike. Yes, that's Wildflower.

Enjoyed a day with our good friends, Helen, Oscar,
and Millie (the dog!)

Playita Algodones

Our first day out of Playa Algodones was very pleasant. However, by the end of the second day, not only had our auxilliary rudder bent in two but we realized a gale was catching up to us. At its worst, we experienced 30 knot winds and a 12-15 foot swell. Instead of trying to hand-steer through it, we decided to heave to. This means putting the boat into the wind with just the mizzen sail up, beam on to the swell. We "drifted" for the next 40 hours, going SW about 1 knot/hour and enduring severe sideways rolling. Though we felt like corks rolling around in a washing machine, we managed to watch Lord of the Rings 2 the second afternoon.

IPOD's are a great tool on passage!

When it was comfortable again, we headed to Isla San Fransisco (Baja side) to regroup. We spent a nice day and a half on this island; fishing, hiking, fixing the broken auxiliary rudder and getting much needed showers. Stephan was the winner on this fishing trip, pulling in two Pargos, the bigger of which we enjoyed for dinner. The water was the turquoise blue we remembered from last year and we all enjoyed a refreshing swim after an amazing hike along the cliffs.

Isla San Fransisco

After two nights of good rest, we set sail again for Bandaras Bay. The rudder rebroke on the first afternoon, so we took three hour watches and resigned ourselves to hand-steering again. After complaints of tired legs, Joe rigged our bucket hammock from the mizzen boom. Steph and I got good at steering with our feet! Joe rebuilt the rudder again on the third day and it held through the night-halleluiah! It took us full three days (450 miles) to sail from Isla SF to Bandaras Bay, though this part of the trip was very comfortable. We all felt like we had gained our sea legs in the storm and were able to enjoy normal activities like reading, eating and playing games to wile away the time. Joe and Stephan were disappointed to not hook anything more substantial than a few bonita on this passage.

Aren't they cute?

We saw several beautiful sunsets!

Steph's Pargo


The good ship Wildflower!

Someone's found their sea legs!

We were greeted by a humpback whale and bow-surfing dolphins on our approach to Punta Mita (the NW tip of Bandaras Bay). We are looking forward to resting the boat and ourselves, finding friends and surfing. We truly feel like our vacation can start now!