07 | Sailing the Sea of Cortez on a Wooden Boat, La Paz and Espiritu Santo

We left the chaos of Cabo San Lucas behind, heading out around the East Cape and into the Sea of Cortez. The prevailing winter winds are from the north, and we needed to cover about 130 nautical miles straight into the wind to get to the cruising grounds around La Paz. Luckily, there are a few great anchorages along the way to help break up the northbound miles. Well, we're entering La Paz, traveling behind the sheltered bar in the channel. The Sea of Cortez had been our ultimate goal when we first set off from Seattle, and we always pictured La Paz when we dreamed about spending time in these waters. Pulling into this harbor, we felt like we had truly arrived, accomplishing this long-held dream. La Paz is a great town. When the federal tourism department arrived with a bunch of money to build a resort and marina complex, the town turned them down. As a result, La Paz developed more slowly and naturally, retaining the peace for which it is named. The harbor bottom here is famously sticky. Many lifelong cruisers have set their anchors here and ended up staying for years, some forever. There is a robust community of cruisers, and life is easy with a great dinghy dock and everything a sailor needs close at hand. The town is rich with culture and history, and we particularly enjoyed the many great murals. We stayed for much longer than we had planned, enjoying the easy life with new friends and finishing a few boat projects as well. Just a few miles from La Paz is the spectacular cruising grounds of Los Islas Espiritu Santo. These two islands are part of an island chain that stretches for more than 100 miles up the gulf. They are heavily indented with many bays and anchorages. There is no settlement on the islands, just protected wilderness with white sand beaches and rugged red cliffs. Ancient cactus groves dot the landscape, and the sea is rich with wildlife. This is where the cruising grounds of the Sea of Cortez really begin, and we tried to see as many of the anchorages as possible. Every day or two, we moved just a short distance to a new anchorage, dropping the hook into the white sand bottom and rowing ashore to climb the cliffs or to walk among the cacti. It is a landscape so different to the one we are used to at home, but we found it to be very beautiful in its ruggedness, especially at sunset, when the hills would burn red in a reflection of the sun before fading into darkness. Just north of Isla Espiritu Santo is Isla Partida. It is similarly indented with many interesting bays to explore. Here, the deep red cliffs sometimes give way to a lighter color. The rugged hills and tumbling arroyos make a beautiful backdrop to the clear blue waters. At Los Islotes, the sea lions will allow people to swim with them. While they have become somewhat accustomed to humans, they are still wild animals. We tried to be very careful around the big bull males, which can be quite territorial. It was an amazing experience to see these creatures up close in their natural environment. We continued north, sometimes pushing hard into the brisk north wind. Ahead of us lay spectacular island anchorages, an abandoned mining town, and the beauty of the Loreto National Marine Park.