Loreto: Agua Verde – “The Best of the Sea of Cortez”

Late April-Early May, 2011 - We left Isla San Francisco to head north knowing that a "Norther" (several days of big north

winds and seas) was due to arrive in a few days.  So in the back of our minds at each anchorage we visited we asked

ourselves "would this be okay in northerly blow?"

Our first stop was San Evaristo, a small pair of coves on either

side of a fishing camp that houses a few families.  As the sun was

setting a panga loaded with people came out to visit our boat.  It

turned out to be a family, including a baby.

"Negocios!!  Quieren langostas?" (Let's do business!  Do you want

lobster?).  I explained that we don't really like lobster but we love fish.

To my astonishment, the young driver told me they had no fish on the boat but he would be back in an hour with some for us.

When they came back, as promised, it was dark.  A young girl held up the toddler.  "Escucha!" (Listen!") she said, and then

prompted the toddler to say "langosta," the word for lobster.  "Gosta" the little girl said hesitantly.  The mom beamed at me

with pride and everyone in the boat laughed.  There's nothing so cute as a baby struggling to say its first words, even when

they don't quite say them right.  If only my feeble efforts at Spanish were met with such delight!

We decided to move further north and stopped at Puerto Los Gatos.

This is a stunning cove, just big enough for a few boats, where

beautiful, smoothly rounded red rocks roll down to the water.

Before we had a chance to explore ashore, we were suddenly

chased out of the anchorage by a horde of thirsty bees.  They

buzzed all over Groovy looking for fresh water.  There are so many

fresh water sources fit for a bee on our boat (faucets, shower

heads, sinks and toilets) that it was easier for us to leave the cove

than to persuade the bees to leave the boat.

The Baja coast along this

stretch pierces the sky in

enormous, jagged

mountains, cliffs and rock

formations.  In many places

the carved rock faces are

striated in a rainbow of

whites, reds and browns.

We stopped briefly at Ensenada de la Ballena, also known as Bahía Berrendo, a

small gravel beach tucked into the south side of a craggy point.  High up on the cliffs

is a perfectly round hole giving the point its name "Oarlock Point" or "Punta Gavilán."

There is a small sea cave in this bay as well,

and we snuck inside and listened to the waves

echoing off the back walls.

Lots of little bright red legged crabs crawled

around the inside of the cave.

It still amazes me to see this junction of the

desert and the sea.  A large stand of cactus

filled a valley behind the beach and ran up the sides of two mountains.

Here and there, tucked into the beach rocks, we found baby cactus

taking root.

A little further on

we came across

a whale's pelvic

bone.  It was very

well preserved,

with individual

vertebrae and

some very long

narrow bones

resting nearby.

There are three anchorages in this area

that offer north wind protection, and we

chose the prettiest one, Bahía Santa

Marta, to wait out the Norther.  There was a beach with a

collection of palm trees at one end, and the red rocks

rising behind the beach were layered.  In hindsight a

better choice would have been Bahía San Marcial (also

known as Bahía San Marte).  But you don't necessarily

know these things ahead of time.

Once the wind started to blow it seemed like it would

never let up.  We saw gusts over 30 mph, and later we

heard that a few miles north in Puerto Escondido where

"Loreto Fest" was taking place the gusts got into the 40's.

The last day of their activities had to be canceled as no

one wanted to leave their boat.  Some boats broke off

their mooring lines and other boats dragged their anchors.

We had no such trouble, but the swell was merciless.

Groovy rocked and rolled and the two of us fell all over ourselves

and each other as we tried to move about the boat.

I snuck off in the porta-bote just to get a change of scenery during

each of the three days, but the conditions were downright scary in

the dink and I didn't go far.  Our anchor chain got hung up under some

rocks and pinned the boat on a very short leash for a while.  This made the

jerking motion even worse as the bow of the boat yanked at the chain like

a wild dog.  At one point Mark came up into the cockpit asking if I'd seen

the kitchen knife.  We use this knife many times every day, and it never

goes missing.  "I left it on the counter..."  I said.  He found it stuck in the

floor like a javelin.  The force of one of the boat's rolls had flung it off the

counter with such power it had landed point down and stuck in the floor

about a quarter inch.  Thwang!!!

We were grateful when the norther finally blew itself out.  Rounding the

point we finally made radio contact with the rest of the cruising fleet and

were relieved to hear human voices and stories once again.  We

discovered this had been supposed to be a "mild late-season norther," and it caught everyone a

bit off guard.  Everybody was amazed that a blow like this could hit with such ferocity as late as

early May.

When we arrived in idyllic Agua

Verde, where the water was

smooth and the wind just a

pleasant breeze, it occurred to

us that the Sea of Cortez has a

Jeckyll and Hyde soul.  One

minute the Sea is a raging

terror, and the next minute it

is a tranquil paradise.

We took the dinghy out at

daybreak one morning and

slipped across mirrored water.

The rock pinnacle "Roca Solitaria"

stands sentinel at the mouth of

Agua Verde bay, and it stood out

in sharp relief against the striped

rock cliffs on the shore behind it.  I

was reminded of "Point Imperial"

at the Grand Canyon's North

Rim.  But the glassy water at the

foot of the cliffs planted this place

firmly in the Sea.

Agua Verde is very popular, offering

three unique and delightful spots to drop

the hook.  The boats were dwarfed by

the rocky mountains rising behind them.

We took a hike up and over the hills that

rise behind the northern beach.  The

views looking back down at the bay were

breathtaking.

Wandering into the village one morning,

we walked the dusty streets.  The

nearest town, Loreto, is 60 miles away,

25 miles of which is a mountainous a dirt

road.  This little fishing village is isolated

and close-knit.

Goats wander freely, their little bells tinkling as they walk.  Spring

had been good to the goats, and almost all the goats we saw were

mothers with their babies.

Days are hot and still, and everyone takes shelter in any kind of shade

they can find.  We passed a school and watched the children walking

home in their tidy little uniforms carrying their school papers and

backpacks.

We were in need of a few

supplies and had heard that

Maria's Tienda (Maria's Store)

had a few supplies.  The only

thing that distinguished Maria's

Tienda from the surrounding

homes was a little bit of writing

outside the door on the front wall.

She had some staples, but not what we were looking for, so she sent us

on to the other village store, telling us to look for a red building.  "Mini-

Market Miguelito" was much better marked and a group of moms was

hanging around inside chatting with each other.  These village stores are

not supermarkets or even convenience stores, by any stretch of the

imagination, but the few shelves had a surprising variety of items.

When I asked about vegetables I was led outside to some

large top-loading refrigerators under the trees outside.  I

peered in one and was astonished to find peppers, celery,

cucumbers and apples.  What impressed me even more is

that these refrigerators -- as well as almost every building in

town -- were powered by a solar panel or two outside.  A

simple wire ran from the panels to the charge controller, car battery and inverter.

Agua Verde lives and dies by fishing, and the dads went out in

their pangas twice a day six days a week to fish.  Early in the

morning the men would suit up in bright orange foul weather

gear and cast off, waving goodbye to their wives on shore.  In

the early afternoon they would return and a whole commercial

exchange would take place.  Fish were unloaded from the boats

and carefully counted and loaded into coolers in pickup trucks.

One by one the trucks would take off, including one small

refrigerator truck.  Another truck carrying gasoline tanks would

arrive and run a hose to fill the gas tanks on the fishing boats.

Then the beach would clear out for a few hours and return to the

possession of the gulls and pelicans.  As the sun was setting the

whole process would repeat, with the wives and kids waving off

the fishermen as they left for the night's catch.  Long after dark

we would hear the pangas return.

I was reminded of my great-grandfather who was a lobsterman on Massachusetts' north shore in the

early 1900's.  He rowed his dory from lobster pot to lobster pot faithfully every day, hauling them by

hand.  His village was small and tight-knit too, made up mostly of Scandinavian immigrants and

situated at the end of a long journey from Boston.  Agua Verde lives in the early 21st century,

however, and the Honda outboards were big and powerful and the pickup trucks were late models

from Dodge and Chevy.  One fisherman was putting in his iPod earbuds as he zipped past our boat,

and they all had VHF radios and antennas.  The trade is the same, but it is a different era.

This part of the Sea is traveled by kayakers

as well as fishermen and cruisers, and we

met several who were kayaking and camping

en route to La Paz from Loreto.

One day we hiked over the hill past an old

cemetery.  The tombstones were from the

1930's to the 1960's, and some still bore

adornments lovingly placed there by living family members.

The hiking trail

follows a wash

out to the

beach, and

the free-ranging cattle were

in abundance.

Laid out on the ground in

one spot we saw the

skeleton of what we thought

was a horse, complete with

skull, vertebrae and leg

bones.  All the bones were

bleached white in the sun, and a jawbone laid off to one

side showing a full row of molars.

One afternoon a Mexican Navy boat entered the bay

and anchored.  All the cruisers kept an eye on the boat,

waiting for the inevitable moment when we

would all get a visit.  To our surprise the Navy

boarded several fishing pangas as the

fishermen headed out for the evening's catch.

This business of being boarded by the Mexican

Navy is an equal opportunity affair.  A few

lagging pangas snuck out of the bay on the far

side to avoid being detained, but another went

straight to his buddy who had been waylaid and

waited for him to finish with the Navy so they

could go out to fish together.

The cruisers' turns came the next

morning, and as before it was an

easy process.  This time it was

more like a US Coast Guard

boarding: along with the usual paperwork they wanted to see that our flares were up

to date, our fire extinguishers hadn't expired and that we had life preservers for

everyone on board.  We have now been boarded three times in two months (the

second was so trivial I didn't mention it on these pages).  Seasoned cruisers say it

was never this way in the past.  It's just a sign of the times.

Agua Verde was a classic Sea of Cortez stop.  Clear turquoise water, calm nights and

a dusty but vibrant fishing village, all set against the soaring jagged peaks of Baja

California's Sierra de la Giganta mountain range.  By the time we left our sprits were

completely restored after the wild ride we'd been given during the late season

Norther, and we were ready for more Baja adventures in the Loreto area.

Find San Evaristo, Puerto Los Gatos and Agua Verde on Mexico Maps.