San Carlos to Bahia San Francisquito

This was a two leg trip with a stop 26 miles up the Sonoran coast at Las Cocinas. Then a long crossing just south of the Midriff Islands to Bahia San Francisquito on the Baja peninsula. The run up the coast was an easy one with light wind and several hours under spinnaker. We shared the anchorage with a trawler the first night then had the small bay to ourselves on the second night.

Our eighty nautical mile overnight crossing to Baja was a bit of a rough one. The forecast was for eighteen knots of wind in the afternoon then a calm evening. We got twelve in the afternoon and a peak wind of twenty three at two in the morning. Also, we were sailing over an underwater shelf that kicked up the wave height a bit. I'd say there were a few steep six footers out there that night. Fortunately we had the waves on the beam so the ride was kind of wild but we were still able to make good progress. We sailed under a double reefed main and stay'sl.  Solera was very well balanced and the autopilot handled the boat just fine.

There is a small isolated island called San Pedro Martir that was in our path about half way across. I wanted to sail south of the island in deeper and hopefully smoother water but the wind and waves just would not permit it. Solera skirted just north of the island in waves much bigger than normal for the wind we had. Approaching Baja the next morning had us in the remnants of an Elefante. This is another Baja localized wind phenomenon that's unique to this area. It's kind of like a Chinook along the front range of the Rockies. This down slope wind can get quite strong along the coast. It's name comes from the cloud formation that's associated with it. The lenticular clouds roll off the ridge tops in a formation that looks like an elephants trunk. The wind clocked around to our bow and the seas soon followed suit. We motored the last five miles.

We arrived at San Francisquito mid morning to a calm, quiet anchorage. I dropped the hook in fifteen feet of crystal clear water off a beautiful white sand beach. We stayed three days and enjoyed every minute!

One afternoon I took the dinghy across the bay to a small cobblestone beach. This was the site where eight years ago Dan Heidenreich and I had landed our sea kayaks marking the end of a four day, seventy five mile crossing of the sea. It was a clear day so I could see our entire route. Quite a feat... what were we thinking?!