Back to La Paz

We arrived back in La Paz yesterday about 4pm and anchored out. We had a great trip up the Sea of Cortez, and had a nice suprise waiting for us. Our mail finally arrived, our friend Peter had mailed it for us almost 2 months ago. Now we know why most of the cruisers are using boats or people flying north to take the mail to the states to have it mailed.
We spent 16 days in the Sea of Cortez. Many of the anchorages we visited were part of there park system. The whole Baha is a very dry desert like place with lots of cactus of every type and beatiful sand beaches. It almost never rains in the winter, we saw one day of rain since we left Monteray California. It is also very rugged with many sheer rock faces and steep mountains. There seems to be lots of sea life and fish around and many many birds. Pelicans, gulls, comorants, frigate birds, vulturs of some type some kind of huron and others I am not familiar with.
Our favorite anchorage up the sea was Isla San Fransisco just North of Espirito Santo. We spent 2 days there and got some good hikes in, and one long hike over the island to the North beach. We also had our first rain since getting to Mexico here, it spit off and on for a few hours and then poured hard for and hour or so during night. We also Enjoyed Punta San Evaristo where we spent 3 days and sat out a Norther here. There was a tiny village here with a small store where we get some drinks and one or 2 veggies but not much else.
At Puerto Escondido which is as far north as we got, we spent 3 days their before turning around. Since there is no safe anchorage or marina at Loreto, We got a ride from an American lady who lived nearby for the winters into Loreto to see the sites and buy some fresh food. It is a bit dusty in the city as not all roads are paved. Dorothy liked looking at all the mexican crafts that was sold along the main drag. The grocery stores there are small and a bit disapointing. We took the bus back to Escondido 14 miles away.
The trip back was nice with some great sailing and stopping at some of the anchorages we missed on the way up. The last day before coming back we did another trip to Los Islotes for snorkling with the sea lions. The crew of Jatimo joined us on our boat to go snorkling there as it was a calm morning. Dorothy got brave enough to touch one young sea lion this time that was stopped in front of her staring at her.
We will stay here in La Paz for 5 days to a week getting errands done and boat ready for a trip across the Sea of Cortez to Mazatlan. It will be our first over night sail for a couple of months.