Guadelupe Island

by Bob

We fueled up at Cabo San Lucas, and took off a little bit later. We motored into the wind for a couple of days and pulled into
Turtle Bay (Bahia de Tortugas). A small outboard met us on the way into the bay and asked if we needed diesel. We did!

There is a pier with fuel available at turtle bay, but it's hard to tie to in a bigger boat. Instead, the guy we met took us to an
old stripped fishing boat with a 2500 gallon diesel tank in back. We tied to the boat with a single rope and they passed a hose to
us. We filled up at a very reasonable price and got on our way in just a few minutes. That's my kind of fuel stop!

Around 1000 people live in the town at Turtle Bay (I forgot its name). There is a 135-mile dirt road from there to the nearest
highway. The land there is barren. No trees, and almost no green whatsoever.

From Turtle Bay we came to Guadalupe Island, where we are now. It's about 140 miles off the west coast of Mexico. There are some
HUGE rocks and cliffs here, with really interesting formations. Isla Afuera is a giant rock on the south end of Guadelupe, with a
600+ vertical cliff on its south end. It's very impressive. The highest mountain on Guadelupe is 4000-5000' high (I think so,
anyway -- one map we have says 13,900' but that seems a little high).

We headed into a sheltered cove at the south end of the island, where a meteorogical station is. We didn't have any details charts,
so we weren't too sure where to go to avoid the rocks sticking up here and there.

We headed into this gap between a giant rock and a bunch of small ones. Mike was on front of the boat looking and I was driving.
Since he's blind and I can't drive worth a dime, we were in fine shape. He pointed out an underwater right next to the boat. I
reversed out of there straightaway, and we anchored in a more open cove about a mile or so away.

There are seals or sea elephants or some sort of sea monsters along the shore here. They do some loud trumpeting. They play in the
water, chase fish, and generally have a grand time.

Mike and I went kayaking. Sometimes the big sea elephants acted a little threatening when we got close. We kayaked around this cove,
and then up to the cove with the meteorological station. It was really windy on the way up there. On the way back to the boat we
held the paddles up and "sailed" almost the entire distance (a mile?) back to the boat.

This place has over 100 species of sharks. We haven't seen any yet. I'm trying to talk Mike into diving tomorrow.