Cabo San Lucas

We arrived in Cabo San Lucas Thursday noon to a hub of activity in the bay, including 3 large cruise ships anchored out. We had opted for a slip in the marina (for $120 per night!) to be able to wash the boat down and more easily do check-in, laundry, provisioning, and partying. The owner had come back to the slip we were originally assigned, and we could not contact Profligate to get our new assignment. So we spent some time going on in to the fuel dock and filling up on diesel – until we got our assignment on the end tie of “J” dock, right at the end of a dock full of well-supplied sportfishing boats:


It turned out to be an ok slip, even though it was on the main fairway and the fishing boats started going out a little before 6am every morning, some throwing their wake up and making us bob a little. At least being on the fairway, there was a bit of breeze going through, and the large fishing boat next to us shadowed us some from the hot afternoon sun.

Thursday evening was laundry and a gathering of HaHa people at Squid Roe – a bar with dancing just a couple blocks from the marina:


Friday morning Doug and David walked around to check us into the country, while Cathy washed the boat. The check-in involved a walk to immigration (which wasn’t open yet despite being just after the 9am posted opening time), across to the bank to pay the money for our tourist cards, then back to immigration with the receipts to get the tourist cards and stamp on our crew list. Next stop was the Port Captain – about a 15 minute walk across town. There were a number of people waiting in the small office – and the officials there said their system was down so they couldn’t process anyone – should be back in a couple hours. Michael (from Laura) and I stayed while all the others left. Insisting that we needed to check in, since we were leaving Sunday and needed to check out as well, eventually the official started processing my papers, and then somehow produced the sheet I needed to take back to the bank across town to make their payment. A walk to the bank and back, and we got our stamp and signature on the arrival crew list, as well as a new crew list showing just the two of us staying on. It was shortly after noon. The afternoon was a relaxing beach party with all the HaHa folks – mostly just sitting under umbrellas on the beach drinking beer.

Saturday, Cathy did provisioning with Laura and Worrall Wind (Costco plus a local supermarket), while Doug worked on the blog. Since the wireless did not work at our dock – we sat in the marina office to work on the computer. Even though it was slow and often dropped the connection, at least it was air-conditioned in the office. Saturday evening was the awards party, with beer provided by the marina office. We were shocked to place 2nd in our division! In each division they give a 1st and 2nd place, and everyone else gets 3rd. They give priority to boats that sail more – you turn in your total time and engine time for each leg. It’s not clear what formula they use – if any – to penalize you for engine time. The boat that placed first in our division had sailed all the way. So with us using the engine about a third of the time, we were surprised to take 2nd.

Sunday morning David and Dick left for the airport to fly home. It was great having them on board for the trip down Baja! We cleaned the boat, finished uploading what we could to the blog, checked out of the marina, and headed out to the anchorage off the beach just a few miles outside the marina for the night.