We dropped anchor in Cabo San Lucas at 2 o’clock in the morning on Sunday December 21st. Anchoring in the middle of the night is never the plan, especially since it meant missing out on seeing the iconic Arch at “land’s end”, but the alternative of bobbing around waiting until sunrise was not worth considering. We planned on catching a peak of the famous landmark on our way out.
Two days before, we left Bahia Santa Maria in the afternoon with the conservative estimate of a 48 hour sail south to Cabo. The wind was just too favorable though, and the trip actually took just 36 hours! There was one point that we were screaming along at over 6 knots with just a reefed mainsail up. Our friends on S/V Kialoa were making over 6 knots with no real sails up, just the dodger that was acting as a sail in the downwind breeze. Once we realized we were making great time and wouldn’t be arriving after sunrise like planned, we messaged our friend on S/V Coconuts, Eric and Jaime, who had sailed into Cabo just a month before. Eric assured us that Cabo never sleeps, so the anchorage is bright enough that we’d have no trouble dropping the hook sans daylight.
After half a night’s sleep, we awoke to the sound of music and pangas zooming by Astraea. We hadn’t even had our coffee yet and the bay was already alive with activity. We knew then that we had made it back to civalization after spending two weeks in the deserted Pacific Baja coast between Ensenada and Cabo. After our coffee, we got ready to check out the town where most cruisers plan to exit ASAP.
Before we had the dinghy off the bow and ready to go we overheard Cindy from S/V Namaste on the radio planning a rendezvous on Lover’s Beach with the rest of boats we’d been sailing south with. We decided the town could wait, so with swimsuits on and a picnic packed we headed to the beach, excited to get off the boat for the first time since leaving Turtle Bay five days earlier.
We landed the dinghy on Lover’s Beach with the help of guys hanging out on the beach for just that purpose…expecting tips of course. Thinking we were just going snorkeling and swimming, we didn’t bring any money. We should have known – it’s Cabo! A couple of our friends had cash with them so they tipped the guys for us all. Then we unloaded Sully’s toys and spent the afternoon chatting about the trip to Cabo and snorkeling (I saw Angelfish!) with our friends. It was a great relaxing way to unwind after the trip down the coast.
