Part 2. Bahia de Los Muertos.  What did I do to deserve your wrath?  Captain Chameleon and I motored into the beautiful resort cove of Bahia Los Muertos expecting a calm reprieve.  I had cast my vote to stay two days at Los Muertos since we needed to run the water maker.

Why not slow down?  Spend tomorrow making fresh water, catch up on sleep, and explore the sand dunes.  Over a candle light dinner of  meatloaf and mashed potatoes we weighed the options and came to the conclusion that the weather forecast would decide.  If the winds stayed out of the north we would stay and if they switched to the south we would leave.  Bahia Los Muertos is sheltered in north weather but wide open to south and east wind and seas.  From the weather sources we were reviewing, it showed the winds would be out of the north until Friday.  Great!  I could count on a relaxing day in paradise.  Just what I took a leave of absence from work for.

Just as I was taking my last bite of meatloaf, conditions changed.  All heck broke loose and the anchorage turned into a rocking-rolling- roller  coaster.  Glass was clanging, unsecured items were flying, and we could barely stand up.  South sea swells were upon us. Trying to make out as though this was the norm, and thinking it would be over in a half hour, Captain Chameleon and I proceeded to carry on in a normal conversation about the resilience of cruising.  He told about the time when he took his little tug boat (26 ft. Crosby Tug) up the intercostal waterway and ran into strong current and opposing wind.  At anchor, for 3 days, he laid on the floor on a sleeping bag and read, waiting out the rocking-rolling-roller coaster.

“What did you eat?”

“Whatever I could find and pop open.  It was too rough to cook.”

“What did you do for three days?”

“Read and tried to sleep.  I couldn’t stand up.  It was pretty rough.”

“Hmm.”

Trying to be encouraging, Captain Chameleon’s dug out a sleeping bag and said, “We should probably do the same now.  Lay on the floor since we can’t stand up.”

Right.  I guess this counts as “uncertain events’ in the definition of adventure.  I wish I could say that I handled the whole situation with grace.  But, after 8 hours of not being able to stand up without bruising, listening to the interior elements clash, and the boat creak as though it was going to break in half, I was over it.  OVER IT.  Enough uncertainty, unexpected hindrances and discomforts, all to see a beautiful sunrise and sunset.  Heck, I can do that from land.  But then guilt and self doubt set in.  Either I wasn’t the sea loving girl that I thought I was or Seamore Pacific wasn’t the boat I needed.  Captain Chameleon was snoring, stretched on the floor of the salon as I was devising a plan to sell Seamore Pacific once we reached La Paz.

Louder than a locomotive train, Seamore Pacific rolled and tumbled through the night as the swells teetered the boats in Los Muertos back and forth.  Mad and disgusted, the guilt of not being sea loving enough to endure it’s wrath and lay on the floor for 3 days as Captain Chameleon was prepared to do, gave way to enlightenment.  Wait a minute!  I am not going to endure rocking and rolling for 3 days and call it fun.  I came on this adventure to have some fun and this is definitely not fun.  Just because I think running 100 mile foot races is ‘fun’ doesn’t mean I would ask Captain Chameleon to do the same.  I rest my case.  We are selling Seamore Pacific once we reach La Paz and I’ll spend the rest of my leave from work having “real” fun….from a beach, or the desert, or the Midwest.

Good riddance Los Muertos! 

Part 3.  Tides, wind, and the deep blue sea.   We gladly pulled up anchor without staying one minute longer than we needed to in Los Muertos.  With the notion and satisfaction to put Seamore Pacific up for sale in La Paz, new things quickly appeared off her bow: Punta Arena de la Ventura lighthouse; Isla Cerralvo where sea gyspies (Vagabundos del Mar) are buried;  and Cerralvo Channel where the south end of the Sea of Cortez opens up.  Ok.  Maybe I was over reacting about selling the boat.

Punta Arena de la Ventana Lighthouse

Mesmerized by the water, the beauty, and the mystery of sea gypsies I was willing to give Seamore Pacific another chance.  Our third and final day into La Paz was smooth, uneventful, and mesmerizing.  Just after dropping anchor off the malecon, we met other cruisers who cursed and laughed about the same horrible night at Los Muertos.  Wow.  I needed that.  I needed to meet and relate to another cruiser who found the rocking and rolling at Los Muertos appalling.  It was in that moment I knew that I was finding my way in this lifestyle of cruising.  Perhaps I am a sea gypsy after all.

Where the winds and tides of the Sea of Cortez prevail over the Pacific