After a couple weeks of cleanup from the hurricane (not to mention some pool poaching, a bit of late night carousing with Australians, and more than our fair share of roasted chicken), Autumn, The Rascal, and I were all ready to get back out into the Sea Of Cortez.  

We wanted to get as far away from the possibility of hurricanes as possible and there was plenty of unexplored territory to the north.  With this in mind, we put together a plan to head north to Loreto over the course of a week, resupply there, and then continue to San Carlos (on the other side of the Sea) where I hoped to haul the boat out to inspect the paint "removal" that had occurred during the hurricane and throw on an extra coat of bottom paint in the process.  

While I have a great love for my inflatable dinghy, "The Little Rascal", but the truth is that she doesn't quite get the job done.  Especially with more than one other person aboard, shes just too small and outboard lacking to go any distance.  Thus I'd been looking for an upgrade and a few days before we were set to leave La Paz, I finally found one.  Its a 9 ft long inflatable Achilles with a 4 hp 4 stroke Tohatsu to power it.  The whole kit and caboodle was hardly used and came at a very reasonable price.  In honor of a nightclub in Seattle that Autumn used to frequent, I decided to name her "Superhighway".  The Little Rascal shall forever hold a special place in my heart, but it sure is nice to be able to explore around in Superhighway without breaking a sweat. 

Autumn’s birthday was at the end of September and we made plans with our friends in La Paz (Brett & Aimee on Catalpa and Gary on Sea Turtle) to meet up in the majestic Isla San Francisco for a birthday celebration that would please esteemed Interim Hurricane Captain Autumn as well as the venerable Poseidon upon whom we would depend upon for safe passage to San Carlos.  But first, we needed to get tattoos.  

All of the folks that rode out the hurricane decided to get tattoos of the anchors that held them during the storm.  Thus, we asked around and found that Manuel the tattoo artist was the man for the job.  In we went and about three hours later, everyone (except me) was all tatted up with matching CQRs and Bruces on their feet / ankles.  Lovely!

The next day, we made a big provisioning run, making sure to get plenty of pina (pineapple) juice, which happens to be one of the cheapest and most refreshing things you can drink in the Mexican summer heat.  We finally got out of La Paz around noon and picked up Gary on our sail across to Gallo Bay on Espiritu Santo.  Autumn caught a delicious dorado on the way over, and we fried him up for dinner and served him up on some pasta with a nice creamy goat cheese sauce.  Scrumptious.  

The next day (Autumn’s bday!) we got up early and went for a morning snorkeling mission and then headed over to the Sea Turtle for some breakfast.  

The wind was blowing good and strong, so we decided to make use of it and pointed our bow northward, only to have the wind fail after about a half hour.  Typical for La Paz, and it allowed Catalpa to catch up with us.  The Sea Turtle and Catalpa are each about 36 feet long, so they go a bit faster, and by the time we got halfway there, they were each just specs on the horizon.  Autumn and I continued to trundle along in the Rascal and our turtle's pace was rewarded.  A hungry dorado nailed the handline and off it zinged.  I grabbed it and he leaped high in the air.  When he hit the water again, he took off on a run that was so blisteringly fast, that it started to burn my hand.  The shock of this was enough to surprise me into dropping the handline and plunk it went right into the sea.  I hate littering, but even more so, I hate losing big fish.  I found myself disgusted and resolved that this travesty could not stand.

I looked over at Autumn, whose mouth was agape with surprise.  "Cut the engine!!!" I yelled.  She immediately knew what was up, and said "Yep!".  With that I dove into the Sea of Cortez and started swimming furiously for the slowly sinking handline and the glory that would hopefully be attached to the other end.  I finally grabbed it and looped it over an arm, and started swimming back towards the Rascal, who had enough forward momentum to be a fair distance away at this point.  After a few minutes of swimming, I couldn't feel the tug of the dorado any more and I figured he had shaken himself free when the line went slack.  Still breathing heavily, I dragged myself up into the Superhighway.  I started to bring the line in, and low and behold, something was still attached to the far end.  "Hooray!" I yelled in triumph, and the fight continued.

To everyone's astonishment, including my own, I managed to land him from the superhighway and we decided that after such a valiant fight, he ought to be able to return to the deep blue ocean.  

Given that it was her birthday and the sun was shining, Autumn elected to do some sunbathing in her birthday suit on the back deck.  All of a sudden, the handline started zinging out again.  She quickly grabbed the spool and the fight was on.  Dorado, for whatever reason, seem to like to zing from one side of the boat to the other, which necessitates quick moves from the angler to get the spool around the windvane and the solar arch (and frequently the Superhighway as well) so that the line doesn't get all tangled.  This fish was of a similar mindset, and its lucky that Autumn wasn't encumbered by clothing, because she had to do a lot of jockeying around in order to land him.  He was a beauty and we decided he might make a scrumptious birthday dinner as well.

We eventually pulled into Isla San Francisco and found the rest of the crew already drinking beer in the water.  We dropped anchor and cruised on over to find that they were up to their necks in water to avoid the assault of a sizable cloud of jejenes (pronounced Hay-Hay-Nays) that had congregated around them.  Jejenes are a tiny biting insect that is so small that they're effectively invisible, yet they deliver a fearsome bite for their size.  I had flashbacks to my last trip to Isla San Francisco, and we all agreed that despite how picturesque it was, we probably ought to find a better spot to anchor.  As we motored back out of the bay, the wind picked up and shifted around to the northwest, and we thought that this might be enough to banish the insects from the cove, so we decided to head back and take our chances as there weren't many any other anchorages nearby that would be protected.  Autumn and I decided to close up the entire boat, just to be safe, as we knew the jejenes would be worse than the heat.

The wind helped and we enjoyed a delightful dinner of bulgogi dorado, mixed veggies, and gin drinks.  It was even capped off with a birthday cupcake from our good friend Captain Doug in La Paz.  As it got later, however, the wind slowly died and the jejenes came out in force.  We retired to the Rascal and slept just fine for the first half of the night.  I got up late to use the restroom, and the second I got outside the cabin, I was immediately totally overwhelmed in a cloud of angry jejenes.  I quickly brushed them off and got back inside, but the damage was done.  The rest of the night was spent swatting at them and cursing despite being wrapped up in a protective sheet burrito.  As sun began to rise, we got on the radio and said it was time to peel out.  Everyone immediately agreed and we steamed out of the bay at mach schnell to try and force the fearsome creatures out of all the nooks and crannies.  They seemed to have gotten in everywhere and we started shaking everything out to try and get rid of them.

We met back up in Cabeza de Mechudo for breakfast, and everyone immediately jumped in the water to nurse their wounds.  It was clear that everyone else fared even worse than we had and we were glad to be away from the dreaded, yet beautiful Isla San Francisco.  After a big, hearty breakfast, we all split up, with the Rascal heading north, and the rest of the crowd heading back to La Paz.  We lazily sailed along towards Nopolo all day, and found a delightful little anchorage (that Wade and I had used a few months before) just as the sun was setting.  

A few straggler jejenes were still buzzing around, so we decided to smoke them out with a smoldering palm frond, which happened to be quite effective.  

We awoke to a west wind and quickly got under way, but it shifted into a norther, and picked up speed quickly.  We sailed close hauled and tacked back and forth into 15 or 20 knots all day, with tall waves close together, which wasn't particularly fun.  

We managed to pull into Casa Grande, which was a great north wind anchorage, at sunset, and heard from Porter on the satphone that a strong norther was expected to continue for the next day.  A lone panguero by the name of Manuel pulled up that evening and exchanged pleasantries and inquired about matches, which we happened to have extras of.  He said he would bring us lobsters the next day in exchange for the matches, and we invited him to dinner the following night.

We elected to rise early the following morning and grab some pictures of sunrise from the hillside above our anchorage.  It was a gorgeous vantage point across the Sea of Cortez, the Sierra La Giganata mountains, and the fishing village of Casa Grande.  It certainly made us feel better about spending the rest of the day doing boat chores while the north wind blew.  

We were able to accomplish a lot during the day and went to explore the village of Casa Grande that afternoon.  Legend has it that, around the turn of the century, a poor fisherman found an enormous pearl and earned a fortune from the pearl traders in La Paz.  He went back to his village, built an enormous house, and retired to live out the rest of this days in luxury.  The house has since fallen into disrepair, but its walls still stand.

The town is mostly deserted now, and the few ranchers and fishers that remain are outnumbered by vultures, stray cattle, lizards, and cacti.

We had been cooking a pork udon soup all day amidst our boat chores and by the time Manuel showed up for dinner, our mouths were really watering.  We chatted for an hour or so over wine and dinner and he told us about himself and his family.  It sounded like he has a hard time making ends meet as a fisherman, as costs go up, and fish populations decline.  

We woke up to the sound of banging and went out into the cockpit to find that part of the windvane had fallen apart for no apparent reason.  A cotter pin or something must've worked itself loose.  Needless to say, this was really fun to fix early in the morning, with a little bit of swell and the boat jumping up and down.  

We had a healthy breeze all day and made good progress to the north, with lots of thunderstorms threatening and just enough rain to clean off the decks and give us a good shower.  The temperature reached a record low 76 degrees - a temperature not felt since I had been in California months before.

Porter relayed during the day that the potential existed for another hurricane to cross the Baja peninsula in a few days.  We started making plans for where we would weather it if, and when, the time came.  

We anchored in Los Candeleros at sunset and made an early night of it so that we could wake up and do some exploring the following morning.  The weather obliged and we had a killer sunrise to start off the day.

We were quite close to Puerto Escondido and eager for a cold drink and some supplies, so we motored a few miles north through the calm morning seas, and dropped anchor.  Puerto Escondido is one of the most protected anchorages I've ever seen, with lots of mooring balls and a small marina all surrounded by steep hillsides with an entrance channel that is only about 100 ft wide.  Despite this, you could still see some of the havock that had been wreaked by Hurricane Odile around the bay.

When we got into shore, however, we found that everything was closed on Sunday, except this one market that was 10km down the road.  We started walking in that direction and before long, an American in a minivan stopped to pick us up.  He was a friendly guy and even gave us some cold gatorades from his cooler.  We figured we would be able to hitch back, and before long, a gentleman named Martin stopped to pick us up, if we would be willing to chip in 50 pesos for gas.  "Sure!" we said, and climbed in.

Martin was playing some superb Mexican pop music and he drove exceptionally slowly.  I casually looked around in the car and noticed a few empty beer and tequila bottles.  He chatted with Autumn while we were driving along, but the music made it tough for me to hear what was transpiring.  We both had reached the conclusion when we were back in Puerto Escondido that Martin might've had a few drinks before he picked us up.  We got back to the boat and relaxed for the rest of the day, savoring the cool breezes and drinking a few evening cocktails.  

With news of the potential hurricane fizzling out, we decided to spend the next day out on Isla Danzante which is just a short sail from Puerto Escondido.  We spent the day hiking, fly fishing, spear fishing, and watching the clouds and weather blow over.  It was a beautiful view place and we felt lucky to have taken it all in.  

The next morning, we went on another sunrise hike and got just enough cell service to check the weather forecast.  It looked like we would have a south wind for a little while, and the hurricane potential had totally fizzled out.  Thus, we decided to head straight north to Loreto for a resupply without stopping back into Puerto Escondido.  On our way back down to the boat, we noticed that we weren't the only ones going out for a morning hike.  

The sail to Loreto was uneventful and we anchored a little ways offshore and parked superhighway beside a huge fleet of fishing pangas.  It was a quaint, picturesque town and we were able to eat our first meal out in more than a week.  

After a little more exploring around, we hit a grocery store, and staggered back to the Superhighway with enough groceries, pina juice, and ice for another week of exploring.

After one glorious week of sailing around in paradise, it was time to resupply, take a much-needed shower and dive into the second half of the trip.  After exploring to the south, we decided it was time to go north, and that's exactly where the wind blew us.  

We woke up to another warm, sunshiney day and moved the boat into the marina.  After a half hour standing under cool, fresh-water showers, we were both feeling rejuvenated and ready to get down to business.  We got a quick breakfast and went to an internet cafe to reconnect with the world and edit some pictures.  That accomplished, we realized that we ought to start resupplying before it got too hot to move around.  

We both agreed that we had made a glaring omission in stocking up for the first half of the adventure.  We had forgotten gin entirely.  I think most folks that've spent any time in the tropics would agree that there are few things more refreshing than a gin and tonic.  The gin is has a nice subtle bite to it, and the quinine in the tonic is, of course, great for treating malaria.  However, Mexico is a country of tequila and gin is hard to come by.  With this goal in mind, we set out on the town to find a well stocked liquor store that might have it.

Before such an industrious trip, we had to fill our bellies so we trundled off to the best fast food joint in town - Super Pollo.  Super Pollo is unlike anything we have in the states.  They have a big row of grills and rotisseries in the back and we immediately decided that we should have a whole grilled chicken.  Contrary to the American fast food model, there are beers readily available and we washed our chicken and salsa down with some ice cold Pacificos.  Scrumptious.  

During the first week, while we were lamenting our lack of gin, there was a memory that flashed across my cranium.  It was of a large liquor store, somewhere on a back street.  Surely they'd have gin, I thought.  But was it on Jalisco street or Revolucion?  Maybe it was over by the upholstery store?  Perhaps its near Ferre Mar?  I couldn't quite remember - but we set out across the town anyways, searching in each nook and crannie for the liquor store that came to me in my dream.  Eventually (after at least an hour of hoofing it around La Paz) we found it and got enough gin to sate our thirst for a full week.  Walking around town in the midday heat is quite exhausting and some mean looking thunderstorms were looming, so we stopped on the way back to boat at an enormous covered palapa style restaurant.   

As tradition would dictate, we ordered a few beers and sat down to look at the menu.  We were both in a bit of a daze from the heat and running to beat the rain, so we were having a really hard time deciding what we wanted.  The waiter came back multiple times asking if we were ready.  Eventually, in some jumbled spanish, I said, "Necesitamos veinte minutos para beber" (we need twenty minutes to drink).  That was the only thing I could spew out of my jumbled mind at the time, and we both immediately broke into laughter, realizing how completely absurd it was.  The waiter agreed, and let out a pretty hearty laugh himself.  Eventually we decided on a mixed seafood ceviche that was absolutely delicious.

That night, we went out on the town and drank in a couple of good dive bars and ate our fair share of street meat.  There is a woman (named Gina, pronounced gee-nah) a couple blocks from the marina that cooks on a little flat top cart in front of her house.  She offers up burritos, hot dogs, and hamburgers and typically opens at 7 or 8pm and cooks until 2 or 3 in the morning.  She has been my savior on many occasions and we've developed a bit of a bond over the course of the last few weeks.  In Spanish, hot dog would translate as "perrito caliente" and most people selling hot dogs on the streets advertise them as "perritos".  Gina, however, calls them "weenies" and wraps hers in bacon.  That night, we decided a traditional burrito wouldn't be enough to satiate us, and we both decided to get our burritos "con weenie".  Gina agreed that this was a great idea.  

Such a meal obviously swept us into a food coma and we awoke the next morning very well rested, if a big hungover.  We rallied and accomplished all the grocery and perishable shopping we needed to do and decided to have a little brunch.  We sashayed down to the beach and found the seafood vendor woman there in her little stand like always.  She sells anything the fisherman are catching that day, and she always has a big tub full of clams.  There is a special sort of clam down there called an "almeja chocolate" that has a very faint chocolately flavor if you close your eyes and taste real hard.  We got a dozen of them and ate them alive with a squeeze of lime and a dash of hot sauce.  Scrumptious, and just the way to overcome the lingering effects of our hangover.  

With that completed, all we needed to do was stock up on beer, and with a little mistranslation, we accidentally ended up buying twice as many as we were attempting to.  Whoops.  As luck would have it, we drank almost all of them on the sail out to Isla Espiritu Santo.  As we sailed deeper in the sea our conversation slowly got deeper over time, as well.  We covered a lot of ground, ranging from the existance of a higher power and afterlife to the ethics of the natural world.  

It was a Sunday, so none of the gas stations were open upon our departure, and I figured with the 10 gallons in the jerrycans and wind in the forecast, we ought to have plenty of gas to make it through the next week without a fill up.  The wind was very light when we started, so we fired up the engine to make Espiritu Santo before dark.  To ensure that we wouldn't run out of gas while motoring, we filled the tank from the jerrycans and motored north.  Ten minutes passed and I thought I heard a weird noise from the engine.  Another twenty minutes passed and the engines coughed.  Ten minutes later, the engine died.

Luckily for us, a fair wind had sprung up and we had a good anchorage within sight.  I kept my cool and we sailed up to a good spot, dropped the anchor, and backwinded the sails to set it.  We had caught a tuna on the sail in, so we promptly turned it into ceviche and decided to deal with the engine in the morning.  

Its obviously tough to tackle engine problems on an empty stomach, so the first order of business in the morning was bacon, egg, and cheese sandwiches.  With a fully belly - I dove into the engine compartment and started checking off the possibilities.  I figured our engine difficulties were just from air introduced while refueling underway and I put some time into bleeding the fuel lines.  They seemed to have a fair amount of air bubbles, so I felt confident that I had found the culprit.  We fired up the engine and, low and behold, it roared to life.  I was feeling pretty damn good about my mechanic skills and we motored out of the shelter of the anchorage, and into the prevailing winds.  We cut the engine due to these fair winds and sailed for a couple of hours.  As we were getting closer to our anchorage, the wind started to die, and we fired it back up.  Five minutes later, we heard a cough, cough, sputter, sputter and we both looked at each other.  Maybe I hadn't solved our engine problems after all.  

I spent a bunch more time bleeding the fuel line and it wasn't seeming to help.  The engine would start and then die 10 or 15 seconds later.  Wind was light, so we were feeling a bit sketchy about being able to find a suitable anchorage under sail.  I dove down to check that the cooling water intake and the exhaust outlets weren't clogged our fouled and everything looked good.  Finally, I decided to bite the bullet and change the secondary fuel fliter.  This can be an arduous process, because one needs to refill the new filter with fuel and then do a lot of bleeding.  There wasn't much sediment in the primary filter, so I was skeptical that this was the problem, but lo and behold, the engine fired over on the first turn and ran like a champ for the rest of the afternoon.  

Such a stunning victory required a stout celebratory meal, so I went to work in the cast iron and started whipping up a really hearty pork green chile dish.  While it was simmering away down below, we both grabbed a book and started reading while we were cruising along.  We were both in the cockpit when all of a sudden one of the handlines we had been trailing started spinning out of control.  This is always an exciting time and we were both filled with adrenaline when we looked back and saw a monstrous Dorado take to the air.  "Dolphin!" we both yelled and the fight was on, with me wielding the weakest handline we had and Wade wielding the camera and the gaff.

We cut the engine to slow the boat and started the long process of fighting the mighty creature.  The one we had hooked never jumped again, but one of his fellows was feeling acrobatic and continued to jump around in the wake of the boat.  He took off on several long runs, and we payed out lots of line before we finally got him close to the boat.  He was swimming in all sorts of directions and we had to pass the boat around rigging lines and the Little Rascal several times before we finally got him aboard.

Finally, we hoisted him aboard and oohed and ahhed at his spectacular gold, green, and blue coloring.  He looked like a creature out of Jurassic Park and we couldn't believe how big and beautiful he was.  We complimented him for his valor, dispatched him, and then disassembled him into strips and steaks.  It was clear that we would have to table the chile for the time being and make this beautiful mahi mahi our main course for the night.  

But just as we resumed our course for San Francisco Island, we found that we were in for another surprise.  Like a rocket, the second handline took off and this time Wade was the first to get to it.  It sped off on a couple of blistering runs that had us wondering if he would break the line, but eventually he tired and we got him in to the boat.

It was a hell of a fish, but in light of all of the dorado we had in the ice box, we decided to send him back to the depths from whence he came.  We had seen thunderheads building to the southeast all day, and they were continuing towards us when we pulled into a glorious, pristine horseshoe shaped bay on the south side of Isla San Francisco.  We anchored alongside three ginormous megayachts in this idyllic cove and did some swimming around amongst the sea turtles that frequent the cove.  The big thunderboomers never made it to us, but they did make an excellent foreground for the sunset. The sushi rolls and fish tacos we made out of the dorado made for a perfect dinner to cap off an exciting day.  

But sadly, neither of us would get much sleep that night.  Just as night was falling, a mostrous swarm of tiny biting no-seeums descended upon us and ate us alive all night.  I don't think Wade slept a wink and as the next day dawned, we were both drenched in sweat, wrapped up in sheets to try and protect ourselves from the devilish creatures.  We rowed into shore with camera and fly rods in hand and set out to explore the island.  We immediately came upon a big, wet salt flat that was clearly the breeding ground for the hoard that dined upon us the night before.

We crossed over to a bay on the other side of the island and started throwing flies.  For whatever reason, nothing much was biting and we decided a tour of the geologic diversity of the island might be a more effective use of our morning.  

We climbed up atop the ridge and the views in all directions were absolutely breathtaking.  We couldn't believe how gorgeous our surroundings were and as we continued along the ridge, Wade decided to reenact some scenes from the li

As we got closer to the cove we anchored in, we looked down and to our surprise, a few new boats showed up while we were out rooting around.  One of the newcomers was so big that he had a garage in his stern that fit two jetskis and a full sized ski boat.  It was outfitted with treadmills and a hot tub on the roof, and even his dinghy was bigger than the entire Rascal.  We couldn't help but look down on the scene in awe.  

At the end of the last ridgeline, I told Wade to jog ahead and do some fishing while I acted as spotter from above.  Most of the beach fishing is sight fishing, so its pretty important to be able to see your prey.   I saw a bunch of baitfish break the water and a flash of greenish gold told me that it was a dorado for sure.  Wade fired a cast out to him and the big, golden beast followed it in right up to his feet, but never struck.  He kept working his way around the beach and all of a sudden I spotted six football-sided shadows working their way across the shallows.  I knew this type of schooling was typical of roosters and Wade sprinted across the beach to intercept them.  He landed his fly right out in front of them, and once again one chased the fly into the shallows, right up to his feet with his comb slicing through the water, but alas, he didn't want to bite either.  At least we were getting a better feeling for technique and timing.  

I picked up some sort of stomach bug in La Paz, and I was feeling a bit under the weather, so I headed back to the Rascal while Wade continued to work the bay for roosters.  Around noon, as we were walking along the beach, getting ready to depart, we ran into the architect from Mexico City who had been chartering the megayacht that was anchored in the harbor.  He was very down-to-earth and they were all there to celebrate his mothers 96th birthday.  

We knew we couldn't spend another night among the bugs of Isla San Francisco, so we set sail to the north with a fair wind at our stern.  We were both a bit sleepy and dazed, but the arrival of a dozen dolphins helped to jolt us out of our stupor.  They rode alongside us and dipped and whirled as the Rascal parted waves.  We decided to bust out the go-pros and managed to get a few shots of them from under water as they splashed and twirled in front of the bow.

About a half hour later, just as the excitement from the dolphins was subsiding, we spotted two whales swimming in the opposite direction down the channel, blowing as they passed.  It was definitely an action-packed day and we were both pretty exhausted by the time we reach the tiny fishing village of San Evaristo which was to be our anchorage for the night.  It was well protected from the south wind and we read our books and watched manta rays leaping out of the water as the sun set.  They do this, apparently, to remove barnacles growing on their undersides, but we both conjectured that they rather enjoy it as well.  We made an early night of it and decided to explore around the huts of the fishing village in the morning.  

My fever broke during the night and I felt pretty damn good when I woke up.  We put together a quick breakfast and rowed in to shore to walk the beach and see what all the pangas were up to.  Most of the houses were made of wood scraps with thatched roofs and each had a fishing panga out in front of it, beached with the tide.  There was one store in town, but it had nothing but dried food, canned goods, and warm juice.

A couple of weeks previously, I had heard in La Paz of a cruising boat that had wrecked during a daytime storm and the whole thing had been relayed back and forth on the radio for all to hear.  Everyone was ok, but it was pretty tragic to hear this guy's boat being battered to pieces, and the responses to his cries for help on the radio from La Paz.  The full account of the story is here, and we saw the remains of the boat sitting on the beach in San Evaristo.  

We pulled out of San Evaristo when we got back to the boat, and sailed across the channel to a long sandy beach we had been eyeing the day before.  Along the way, we saw a shark that was swimming along in our wake with its fin sticking menacingly out of the water as well as a few whales off in the distance.  The beach must've been three or four miles long and we saw several turtles and caught a handful of smaller fish, including a couple of trigger fish and an odd creature that looked like an oversized needlefish.   We even happened upon a small scorpion that scuttled across our path.  

In the afternoon we took fishing and snorkeling gear to shore and hung out in a shady cave reading and sorting flies. We snorkeled through a school of baitfish and managed to hook into two fish that were big enough to break off our flies.  It was tremendously hot out, so we spent much of the afternoon just relaxing in the calm water and looking across as big thunderstorms tumbled across the Sierra La Giganta Mountains.  We decided we better bail to our anchoraged and crossed back across the channel to a little nook we had noticed on the charts.  We were delighted to find another glorious sunset and a picturesque gravel beach with a black sandy bottom.  Above the beach was a mountainous scene that could've been out of Wyoming or Utah with big craggy rocks and thick growth up the drainage.  That night, we were also treated to a spectacular show of phosphorescence all around the boat and we jumped in to watch the creatures light up all around us. 

That morning we rowed the Little Rascal in to shore and explored the wreckage of some fishing huts that had once been built there.  A flood had clearly swept down from the mountains and destroyed them.  We hadn't made much distance in the previous few days, so our plan for the day was ambitious - we would sail out around the north side of Isla San Jose and try to make it to an island offshore from there that looked like it might've been good fishing.  On our way out, we crossed into a school of 50 or 60 dolphins with tiny baby dolphins learning to jump and play in the waves.  They seemed wary of us, and tailed away to resume hunting other fish by the time we got close.  

When we rounded the north side of the island, we found that the southern swell was much bigger and our anchoring options were slim until we got quite a ways to the south.  With this in mind, we abandoned the possibility of anchoring on the tiny island offshore and we started to make time to the south.   As we zipped along the shore of the island, we eventually got to a really odd looking stretch and noticed a few small coves on the north side of a small point.  They were all geologically different from the rest of the island and we pulled in to take a look.  What we found was absolutely beautiful.  One was white sandstone, the next was bright orange, and a third one was bright red.  There was also a limestone area with some big caves carved out and a glorious sandy beach sitting at the base of each of these fingers.  Each cove was just big enough for a boat to anchor in and we immediately dropped anchor and rowed to shore.  

We did a bunch of rock hopping and saw some neat tide pools, some crazy rock formations, and all the while we were surrounded by crystal clear turquoise water.  

It was getting quite hot again, so we decided to spend some time floating around in the surf and eventually we made our way back out to the Rascal to enjoy a few cocktails.  When we got back to the boat, we found a dozen bees buzzing around it.  "This is odd," we thought and there was no food out so we figured they'd eventually vacate.  Over time, another dozen showed up, and we decided it was time we put up a fight.  Out came the fly swatters and flip flops and we launched an offensive against these nosy bees.  We found that we were actually pretty good bee hunters and after five minutes of swatting there were perhaps only a half dozen left.  

We sat back to enjoy our drinks again, but all of a sudden, a bunch more arrived.  The bloodbath recommenced and we killed dozens and dozens and dozens of bees.  About a half hour into this bee slaughtering nightmare, we realized that we didn't stand a chance - there numbers were too great and they were clearly trying to relocate their nest to the Rascal.  Our only chance of survival would be to sail out beyond the point into the prevailing wind and waves and hope that the wind would help to displace them.  We started to do this when we each saw a sight that chilled us to the bone - the queen bee.  By this time, we had queued up some inspirational music, and with AC/DC as our soundtrack, we each struck out after the queen with reckless abandon.  Wade had been stung four or five times at this point, so the battle had clearly grown personal for him.  She managed to dodge a few well aimed swipes but was finally smote beneath his size 12 flip flop just as we rounded the point.  We both breathed a sigh of relief and we sailed in circles, doing our best to dispatch whatever bees remained.  In the end, the death toll was staggering.  Six stings for Wade, one sting for me, and an estimated two hundred dead bees littered around the decks of the Rascal.  It was a sad day, but we're happy to report that the Rascal came out victorious.

While we were out sailing in circles, we noticed a dark, ominous opening in the cliff wall a short distance down the shore.  We pulled back into a cove a quarter mile down from the scene of the attack, and brought a rope and some cocktails with us to do some more exploring.  The cave ended up being quite large, and luckily, we didn't need the rope.  

As the sun began to set, we went back out to the boat and started whipping up a dinner of refried bean and cheese tostadas.  It was growing dark when all of a sudden, I heard the whine of an outboard.  "That's odd," I thought and we both came up into the cockpit to see what might be coming our way.  It was a fishing panga with no lights pulling up to us and we both looked at each other in surprise.  "Hola!" we called out to them, but they continued motoring towards us with no response.  It seemed very suspicious that they would be coming right at nightfall and they certainly weren't acting friendly.  We both prepared and expected the worst.  Another couple hails of "Hola!" and "Como estas?" eventually elicited a response from them just as they reached the boat.  They grabbed onto the rascal to steady their boat and one of them said simply "Agua" (which means water).  They still seemed emotionless and with a hint of suspicion, I asked them in Spanish, "Do you need water?"  Wade had grabbed his knife as they were pulling up and he was clearly ready for some sort of fight.  They were silent for a bit, and eventually said "Si," but made no move to grab a container.  I asked him if he had anything to hold some water and eventually they slowly produced an old jerrycan, all the while offering no smiles or expressions of thanks.  We filled it up for them and a few more moments of silence ensued.  Eventually I started asking them questions about fishing and they grew more talkative.  They were from San Evaristo, they said, and they were fishing for a bunch of different species.  They showed us a portion of their catch and we talked back and forth about fishing techniques in Spanish for five or ten minutes.  They asked us a few questions about the sailboat and we asked them a few questions about their gear.  They mentioned a beach that should be good for roosterfish and eventually they coasted back into the night with their water.  We were a little rattled after the suspicious way in which they approached, but in the end we were reasonably satisfied that they were just run-of-the-mill pangeros that had run out of water.

We tucked all of the electronics away for the night just to be safe and did some stargazing before we called it a night.  We saw no more of these mystery fisherman the next day.

We decided we ought to try and round the south end of the island the next day, so we threw out trolling lines and started beating into the south wind.  We managed to catch a couple of tuna, but they were all pretty small.  At the beginning of this trip, I had bought a heavy-duty trolling rod that we rigged up with a huge lure and some monster hooks.  It hadn't caught a single thing the entire time, so we decided to switch it out for the small squid that were so productive on the handlines.  I set the drag and let it pay out.  After a couple of hours we heard a loud ZING, and line started paying out at a crazy pace.  We immediately grabbed the rod and went to set the hook, but when we gave it a tug, the resistance immediately dropped off.  We figured we had pulled it out of his mouth, but when we reeled it in, the truth immediately became clear.  A young tuna had hit the lure a while back and hadn't been heavy enough to pull line out with the drag setting.  We must've towed him for a while and something bigger and meaner (a marlin by the looks of the bite marks) had come in and tried to bite him in half.  The larger fish didn't end up getting hooked, so we were just left with the mangled body of the tuna to our credit.

FInally, we arrived at the cove the fisherman had mentioned and we did some walking and scouting for roosters.  We didn't manage to nab any, but the water was clear and the swimming was great!

The next morning we got up early and tried our luck again to no avail.  We did, however, end up with a glorious sunrise and a beautiful beach to walk around on.  

We soaked in the cool water for a while that morning and a puffer fish decided to swim up and nibble on my toe.  It was a weird sensation that freaked me out a bit and we decided to swing back to the boat and sail back towards Epiritu Santo.  

The wind was with us and we had a great sail to a nice secluded cove.  The visibility was great when we got there and we spent hours snorkling around and exploring the bay.  We did some reading, and drank a few cocktails that evening and we began to lament the approaching end of the trip.  Some summer sausage and onion pasta rounded out the evening and a rising west wind rocked the Rascal to sleep.  

We trailed a line after we were out of range of the island and we must've hit a school, because both handlines took off at once.  One of us was in the hammock and we only had a chance to grab one of the hand lines, the other jumped off the boat and into the sea.  We both swore and were disappointed as we retrieved the one line.  To our surprise, however, the second handline must've gotten tangled on the first after it jumped ship, and Wade managed to retrieve both lines at once!  Two fish with one stone!

The wind was quite calm that morning, so we were forced to motor and when we were about 15 miles from La Paz, the engine cut out.  It dawned on us both immediately that we were out of gas.  We had done more motoring than we had expected that week and we must've gone through all ten gallons.  Shucks.  We texted my brother via sat phone and he mentioned that we would have wind through the morning with a lull around midday.  We set a course for Balandra and the sailing was going well when all of a sudden things really started to blow.  It was turning into a little chubasco and it got up to 20-25 knots before we decided to heave-to.  We cursed my brother for giving us a nasty headwind instead of a lull and eventually set sail again after it died down.  We made it to Balandra late that afternoon, anchored under sail, and rowed to shore with a jerrycan in search of some diesel.  A kind family that was beaching there offered to give me a ride back towards town and I got a few gallons and hitch hiked back.  We threw them in the tank and decided to try and make for La Paz that night.

As we got close, the wind picked up again and we decided to dodge into Pichiligue cove and wait to enter till the morning.  There just happened to be a little restaurant there and we got our first cold beers in a week.  Delightful!  The following morning we motored back into a familiar slip at the marina and promptly showered off a week's accumulation of salt and grime.  It felt good to be back in civilization and we decided some breakfast at Super Burro was just the thing to celebrate with.  

We spent the afternoon uploading pictures and shopping for gifts to bring back for Wade's family.  We happened into a sign spray painted on the streets that afternoon that seemed to sum up the trip nicely.  It was a Joseph Conrad quote, and it read: "I thought it was an adventure and in reality it was life" 

"I thought it was an adventure and in reality it was life"

On the first day of my freshman orientation, my dad noticed a kid from Bozeman, Montana and decided we needed to be friends.  He walked up and introduced himself and said, "This is my son, Dwyer.  You ought to be friends with him!"

Just like that, a beautiful bond was formed and we've been buddies ever since.  From the depths of the Grand Canyon to the top of the Wasatch Mountains, we've explored, adventured, partied, and pillaged across the west ever since that fateful day in 2006 when we first met.

Like the studious fella he is, Wade has been studying to become a lawyer and his bar exam was set for late July.  While we were floating down the Grand Canyon together, we made plans to end his law-school stint with a bang.  The agreement was: the day after the bar exam, he would get on a plane and come to wherever I was sailing for 3 weeks of fishing, partying, and unwinding.  We knew such a game plan could only end in infamy and we were correct.  Below is the description of the first half of his trip, a much needed reward from the rigors of academia and hard work.  

Wade flew into Cabo and I scooted down to pick him up in a rental car.  I found him exactly where I expected - sitting and waiting in the airport bar with an ice cold Modelo, a big smile on his face, and the meanest mustache he could muster.  With laughter and an excited growl, we wrapped each other up in a bear hug that was fierce enough to break a pair of glasses that got caught in the middle.  That set the tone for the trip and we spent the ride back to La Paz catching up from the months since we had seen each other.  

With a stop or two for street tacos and cold beers, we made it back to La Paz and stocked up on essentials for the week of adventuring to come.  The Rascal's ice box was soon piled high with delicious Oaxaca cheese, mountains of limes (key ingredients for both margaritas and ceviche), and of course dozens of fresh tortillas.  Wade tackled it like a champion and embraced Mexico with all the vigor and excitement of a young mariachi guitarist.  We were pretty worn out after the days travel and such a vigorous shopping expedition, but it was clear that we couldn't possibly skip out on a Friday night in the booming metropolis of La Paz.

We each drank a Ballenon of Pacifico (which translates as "Male Whale" and is roughly the size of a 40), and that was just enough to cool our jets as we watched the sunset from the cockpit of the Rascal.  We spent the evening bar hopping down the malecon (the main street along the ocean in La Paz) and managed to gobble down a huge plate of carne asada fries as the night wound down.  The combination proved enough to put us each into a deep coma and we awoke to day two slightly hungover, but well rested.  

For the week before Wade's arrival, I had been working in a local metal fabrication shop to build a stainless steel arch for the back of the Rascal.  Its the perfect platform to mount solar panels from and it also serves a bunch of different purposes: it includes a swim ladder, fishing rod resting points, a dangling hammock to sit in while sailing, mounts for navigational lighting, and attachment points for safety lines.  I'm really proud of how it came out.  

They were kind enough to let me use their shop and tools to build it, so I was working side-by-side with the Mexican machinists and welders as they worked on projects for other customers.  We built a fun rapport during my week there and they all had nick names for each other (with Bucky being the most prominent and comical of them all).  Without my prompting them at all, they decided to start calling me Dwayne.  Sometimes a good nickname is just meant to be.

The arch hadn't yet been installed, so we fortified ourselves with some of the finest grub that La Paz had to offer: Fish tacos from La Gaviota.  La Gaviota translates as "the gull" and its a little roadside stand close to where all the Mexican panga fishermen come in.  The proprietress buys a bunch of fish every morning right off of the boats and cooks incredible fish and shrimp tacos all morning until she runs out.  Its always packed, but we elbowed our way in and filled ourselves to the brim.  After that was completed, we drove the arch down to the boat and bolted it to the toe rail in the blistering heat.  When we finally got everything dialed in, it was mid-afternoon and our appetite had built back up.  I knew we couldn't depart from La Paz on an empty stomach, so we decided to tackle "El Monte" - the legendary name of the nachos at a restaurant by the marina.  The waiter warned us that normally only large parties or whole families order El Monte, but we assured him that we were equal to the task.  We didn't let him down and as we left, he shook his head in astonishment.  

We sailed out of the bay with a stiffening wind and ended up making it to Balandra Bay just before the sunset started to kick into gear.  I was quite satisfied with my new solar arch and Wade decided he ought to get a better view of the bay!

We were sharing the cove with a couple of huge motor-yachts (who saw fit to blare Miley Cyrus tunes for much of the night), but we managed to chip away at our limited stock of cold beer and soak up the sunset after a day of hard work in the blazing baja heat.  

On day three, we set our sights on Cerralvo Island, which is south of Balandra and the San Lorenzo Channel.  We decided to bust out the heavy tackle for the sail across, and had a couple of lines trolling when we made our first catch of the trip - a young, delicious tuna.  

It promptly became a sushi lunch and we devoured it in no-time.  Wade was finally getting into the swing of this "cruising" stuff, and a little ride in the little rascal as she trailed along really helped to melt that post-bar-exam stress away.  We sailed across a few areas that were at least a half mile deep and decided to try our hand at swimming in such deep water.  It was cool and refreshing, but I don't think Wade appreciated my "shark" jokes.  

As we wrapped around the north tip of Cerralvo Island, the lush eastern coast came into view and the wind died away.  We were truly in paradise and as we motored our way south, we started to see small schools of bait fish breaking the water as they ran from the predators that haunt these waters.  Wade jumped to attention immediately and started casting flies right into the middle of the melee.  We were rewarded with a couple more little tuna.

We anchored in a little indentation mid way down the coast and made a fairly early night of it.  The following morning, we hit the beach early and started casting flies at whatever structure we could see in the morning light.  We each went in an opposite direction down the beach and we were rewarded with great fishing.  We each caught a bunch of different species that morning, from jacks and pargo to snapper and chinese trumpetfish.  It felt great to finally be fly fishing in Baja and it was interesting to see the large diversity of fish that were lurking right along the shorline.  

During our perambulations along the beach, we found a new cove that was even more picturesque than the first area we stopped in the night before.  We moved a mile or two down the beach and decided to dive in for some snorkling.  The water was pretty calm, so visibility was good, and we saw some neat fish swimming around.  There was a beautifully cliff overlooking the anchorage, and we hiked up and around the back side of it for a view down into the anchorage.  There were a bunch of bushes and vines blooming and the view across the Sea of Cortez as breathtaking.   

Our new cove was filled with a bunch of driftwood, and we decided it might be pretty fun to start a bonfire and enjoy a huge bowl of guacamole and a few margaritas to toast a successful day of fishing.  The sunset that accompanied our fire was magical, and we decided to play around with some long exposures in such a picturesque little anchorage.

After such a placid, beautiful day, we expected more of the same, but got rocked awake in the night as a storm tore in from the south.  The wind started twisting around to the southeast and our anchorage was entirely unprotected.  As lightning struck Cerralvo mercilessly and illuminated the night, we could see how precarious our position was so close to the rocky shoreline.  As the wind and waves continued to mount, we decided that we had to move farther out.  The engine fired right up and we moved a couple hundred yards away from the beach.  We let out a lot of chain and, thanks to the heavy ground tackle, we didn't drag towards the coast at all.  That said, the boat was rocking up and down like crazy and I think Wade spent a sleepless night riding the roller coaster up in the vee berth.  The storm finally broke later in the night and we woke to a lovely sunrise, with the Rascal looking squeaky clean after such a vigorous shower.

We decided a more sheltered anchorage would be a good idea for the following night, so we pulled up the hook and sailed around the southern end of the island.  We found a perfect reef right next to a beach that allowed for great fishing and exceptional snorkling.  The water was crystal clear and we each went off in search of whatever creatures lived in such a rich environment.  

We spent most of the afternoon fishing along the beach and caught a handful of small fish, but nothing like the diversity we had seen on the other side of the island.  Having split up again, Wade decided he would try and catch a good tan at the same time and decided to go for a little bit of nude fishing.  I looked up at one point and way off in the distance it looked like he had changed into some white swim trunks.  Ironically, it also happened to be a full moon that night.

We had noticed a few lobsters hiding under the rocks during our snorkeling foray and decided they might just make a pretty tasty dinner so we headed out in search of a few suitable crustaceans to provide that nights' sustenance.  After some wriggling around, reaching into dark crevices, and a few carefully timed spear jabs, we had a meal fit for kings!

Some garlic butter and a few rum drinks rounded out the meal, and we slept free and easy after such a taxing day.  

The next morning, we made the quick hop over to Ventana Beach and we finally found ourselves in true roosterfish habitat.  Ventana is an enormous bay that is protected from the south wind and is fringed with 10-15 miles of perfect white sand beach.  It is shallow for a couple hundred yards before it drops off and there are countless schools of baitfish that live in the area.  The beach is just steep enough that you can walk along and look down into the water, searching for dark shadows that might indicate a larger predatory fish.  Wade and I made our way carefully along and started firing casts out into balls of swirling baitfish.  As we neared the point where the bay merges into Cerralvo Channel, a current started forming and there was a group of six dark shadows working in and out from the beach.  I saw the tell-tale comb of one break the surface of the water yelled "Roosters!" and just as I did, Wade ran into position for a cast.  One followed his fly in towards the beach, but didn't end up striking.  We worked that area of the beach for a couple of hours, but didn't manage to hook any of the elusive roosters.  

As we worked our way back towards the boat, we saw lots of signs of sea turtles that had pulled themselves up onto the beach to lay eggs during the full moon the night before.  There were also dozens of puffer fish criss-crossing through the surf and we even ran across the head of a hammerhead shark that some local fisherman had left behind on the beach. We spent the afternoon lounging in the shade of the cockpit, reading our books and relaxing.  Pineapple juice happens to sell for about a dollar a liter in Mexico, and we made great use of this delicious elixir as a mixer with some Kraken that happened to be on board.  As the daylight waned, we dove into some pretty deep conversations, with both of us agreeing that we were pretty lucky to be where we are in life.

We woke up early again the next day and after a couple of big sausagey, oniony, cheesy breakfast tacos we headed back out to fish the sandy point again.  We casted to a few promising shadows but weren't able to catch anything of note.  We got back to the boat around mid-morning and, as our ice supply had run out a few days previously, we crossed the bay to the town of El Sargento.  

It didn't exactly end up being the small mexican pueblo that we expected based on its twinkling lights, but it did have all the key ingredients we were running short on - namely ice, beer, rum, juice, and a bar. We spent a good part of the afternoon sitting on the upper deck of a little bar called "Las Palmas" and, amid a Pacifico or two, had our first encounter with a uniquely mexican dish called "Papas Rellenas" or "stuffed potatoes".  We selected the carne asada vareity and before it was delivered to the table, the waitress came and plopped down a condiment spread that immediately piqued our curiosity.  It included a couple bottles of assorted salad dressing, a wide array of hot sauce, as well as mayonaise and ketchup.  When the dish itself finally arrived, we were perplexed to find a foil packet filled with baked potato, canned mushrooms, canned corn, chopped up craft singles, little bits of ham, and some big chunks of carne asada.  It was a completely outrageous meal, and Wade was even brave enough to try a little bit of the Italian dressing with his. 

We sailed back across to the West side of Cerralvo that night and celebrated our successful resupply by drinking nearly all of the beers we had purchased.  Apparently our chosen anchorage was a good spot to catch baitfish, because we awoke surrounded by fishing pangas casting nets in the water right next to the Rascal.  Some refried beans, eggs, and micheladas helped to allay the horrendous hangovers we were experiencing (no doubt due to the papa rellena, as opposed to the beers) and we started the sail back towards La Paz with a light wind working against us.

It was a long day of sailing, and we made it back to La Paz just as the sun was setting.  With the first week in the bag, we set our concentration towards another resupply.  

Little did we know what the second week would hold - a monster tuna, a huge dorado, a couple of tense engine break-downs, an attempted hi-jacking, and a re-enactment of several scenes from The Lion King.  Stay tuned.

I've been in La Paz for quite a long time now, and I've spent much of my time in town running errands and eating street food like my life depended on it.  That said, I've also gotten out into the surrounding islands and gone on a few first class adventures.  It has all been sailing, fishing, hiking and beaching and I think the pictures speak for themselves!

My friend Wade is visiting for the next three weeks and I can't wait to get out and explore the Sea of Cortez with him.  We'll be fly fishing the beaches and trolling the deeps for as many SOC monsters as we can reel in!  More to come later!