Anduril Sailing Blog: Birds of a Feather

After our Guadalajara trip, the presence of friends has leavened the travails of our slow trek northward back to the Sea of Cortez.

In Barra de Navidad our friends from Vancouver, Ron and Shirley, booked a room for two nights at the Grand Hotel, allowing us to party and partake of fine foods and pool-side service in swanky environs. Alice and Shirley enjoyed catch up gossip and Greg & Ron a little of the local herb. A few days later we dropped the hook in La Manzanilla and visited them again on the beach and at their equally swanky rental house.

Also at Barra we again crossed paths with the always fun to be around Ed & Linda, of One Fine Day. Watching a new boat pull into the marina, we were a little surprised to see Peter and Eileen from Appleseeds, flying a familiar RVYC burgee. It was nice talking over a beer and making connections to all our common friends at the home club.

In PV, we rendezvoused with our Calgary/Canmore pals Al & Kate, who joined us for a week on the boat travelling north to Mazatlán. The morning after their arrival in PV we sailed out to weather in pleasant “rail down” conditions, heading out to the Las Marietas islands located at the Northeastern point of Banderas Bay. Snorkeling there turned out to be a zero visibility experience and we overnighted at nearby Punta Mita. There, walking on the beach, we suddenly noticed our dear friend Leanne from Seattle who was dining on a beach-front restaurant (what are the chances?).

Arriving the next day at Chacala, swinging at anchor, happened to be Mo and Nick on Iolanthe. We had first ran into these two in December at Isla Isabel and have since repeatedly run into each other here and there, joining in various restaurant excursions and hoisting together a fair number of drinks (measured as sailors sometimes do). Mo, having recently parked her boat in Barra for the summer season, had now joined Nick on his boat with their pal Jeanette and they were now heading in the same direction as us.

The close environs of a small boat being what they are, we were darned pleased to find Al & Kate to be not only tolerant of boatside funkiness, but to also be adventuring souls with a simpatico disposition to ours. We ventured with them next to Matanchen Bay where Al & Kate panga’d with the crocs, and then onwards to Isla Isabel for a visit with the birds.

On our first visit to this island in December we formed the opinion that Isla Isabel is one of the earth’s grandest creations. Our second visit reinforced this impression. In December, future baby birds were mere proverbial gleams in each mating bird’s eyes. But by March they were a mix of eggs and fuzzy hatchlings. Walking among the birds on Isla Isabel (mostly frigates and brown and blue-footed boobies) it is wonderful to witness their naïve fearlessness of deadly humans. Taking care to avoid disturbing the nests as we walked the island trails we became naturalists impromptu, observing this awesomely cruel but nevertheless fecund display of birds in the wild.

The relationship between the frigates and the boobies is almost bizarre. Without apparent rancour they live together on the island and nest in the closest proximity. But boobies are the better fishers and when a booby makes a catch, the frigates pounce: swirling in an evil display of aerial dogfighting, 3 to 4 frigates dive and peck mercilessly at the fleeing booby. If the frigates are successful in their harassment the booby will regurgitate its catch into the water, to be immediately seized by one of the lucky frigates. On shore sitting under a tree we watched incredulously as a baby frigate stuck its long beak deep, deep down the throat of its parent, making said parent then puke up a fish into its darling child’s throat. We could not help but think of these goods as stolen property and of another hungry (and soon possibly dead) baby booby.

On board the boats, nearby humans were also behaving in the strange way of their own animal kind, willingly sharing amongst themselves fermented beverages and tasty morsels of food. Being all of a common liberal tribe, no cudgels, axes, bullets or bombs were required to make the peace.

Heading away to Mazatlán, Al ‘n Kate got to experience the pleasures of night watches, fighting the nodding forces of sleepiness as we motored forth on a boring flat sea. On arrival we next spent a highly pleasant week hanging about in the company of Al ‘n Kate and also Al’s sister Sharon and her husband Rod.

But as the earth curves along its slow passage around the sun, each day shows the fiery ball higher in the sky. Boaters in Mexico at this time of year begin planning to head home for summer. Young Mo had to head back to California to work and we joined her and Nick and Jeanette for a little send-off dinner.

Alice ‘n Greg then made their passage from Mazatlan across the sea to the Baja side. On the way across there was a sparkling, moonless sky and hundreds of turtles, whales, dolphins, flying fish and birds. And also huge hunting predator boats called purse seiners, armed with a helicopter flying overhead to spot the schooling fish and to direct rushing red speedboats as they corral said fish into a great round net of mass death.

Ocean passages, with the vastness of space glowing in the night sky above, always bring a sense of smallness to observing humans. On this passage we saw for the first time in our lives the “green flash” at sunset. This made us happy, because it is a rare event that we have unsuccessfully looked for during hundreds of previous sunsets.

We are now arrived on the Baja side of the sea in the lovely anchorage of Ensenada del Muertos. On gentle waves we rock slightly, with a cool northerly evening breeze blowing down our hatches. The stars above shine. At least for now, our hearts continue to beat. In the rough and tumble we are not yet the eaten…