Kayaking in Sea of Cortez: El Barril Day 22

This is the first day of the fourth week of kayaking in Sea of Cortez.  Here, about five miles south of San Francisquito, the tide didn’t come up anywhere near where I thought it would.  My San Felipe tide tables must be getting way off for this far south.

Thinking about my trip, my first thought on realizing that I had more than 100 miles to go was, “Oh no, more than eight days to go!”  But then I thought, “This is incredible, I still have eight more great days to go!”

I took a walk in the back country and there were lots of signs of burros and some primitive roads.  I was out on the water at about 7:00 and, after about an hour, I passed an unbelievable mansion perched on the cliff above the beach. This mansion, and there is no other way to describe it, was huge and complete with beach lights, tennis courts, arches, and palm trees.  There were two jet skis on the beach next to a long stairway.  I stopped just past this house for my “orange” break, and a “gringa” woman from the house came down the beach with two big dogs and asked me where I was coming from and where I was going.  I told her about my travels.  I had read about this mansion in some of the guidebooks and there was speculation that this was owned by a former president of Mexico, or perhaps a drug lord.  She was tall, blond, shapely, and had two dogs to protect her, so, naturally, I kind of leaned towards the drug lord theory.  Recently I have found this mansion called Rancho El Barril to be on Airbnb, here is the photo they have on Airbnb.

I continued on down past the fish camp at El Barril which has about 20 pangas and a three-story block building and a sort of harbor carved out of the tidal rocks.  It seems to be very well established.  I stopped about a half-hour later at a small but beautiful sandy cove where I had some soup in the shade of some rocks. I’ve come quite far south now and it’s getting very hot, I’m sure I’m getting burned through all the sunscreen and zinc oxide.  

I continued, alternating each hour of paddling with a short rest.  At the last point where could look back near Boca El Coloradito, I got my binoculars and I spotted the larger kayak group at the small beach where I had my soup, just two hours before.  I was surprised that they had caught up to me so quickly.  They had covered the distance that I had paddled yesterday evening plus the distance that I had gone today and now they were less than two hours behind me.  How had they come so fast?  I stopped for lunch and just as I was packing my kayak to leave, they passed me.  Of course, they were all in glass kayaks and they were younger than me, but still, I thought I was making good time and it would take at least a couple of days for them to catch me. 

I passed the group of kayaks as they were getting ready to stop for the day.  I spoke to one of them and I remarked by about how quickly they had caught up with me.  I ask him if they all had glass kayaks.  He replied, “Oh yes, there are no slugs in this group!”  From this I surmised that these elite kayakers regarded all plastic kayaks like mine to be slugs.  This group was all decked out with the latest high-tech stuff.  Well, me and my kayak took offense at this remark about slugs, and we put these guys behind us and never saw them again.  Although they may have been faster, I started earlier and probably went longer each day.  Also, in these groups you can only go as fast as the slowest person, because every decision is done by committee.  I could see that they were taking a long time to decide about staying at the last beach where I saw them.  One person went to shore and walked all over to see if it was suitable, while the others waited around and discussed the matter.  Later, I could see that my kayak was offended by the way it acted every time I mentioned the word “slug” on the rest of the trip.

Later I landed on a nice beach just south of Punta Jerga, also known as Cabo San Miguel.  My map indicated this was about 80 miles south of Bahia de Los Angeles.  It was sunny all day with very little wind.  The duct tape I put on my hand worked well and relieved the pain, but when I took it off my skin was all white and very wrinkled.

Here’s a new one I hadn’t seen before: It was just before sunset and a few feet in front of my tent, I saw sand being tossed up a couple of inches above the ground.  I looked around and I saw this was happening at several places on the beach.  Soon I saw crabs coming out of the holes in the sand, and they were carrying little loads of sand that they threw out, away from the hole.  The crabs came several inches out of their hole and made sure they threw the sand well away from the hole.  They threw it in a radial pattern around the hole.  They kind of sneak out of the hole carrying the sand, and then they throw it and rush back down into the hole.  It’s totally comical and I laughed every time one came up.  I guess they’re doing their house cleaning.  

Next: Day 23 – Stingrays & Jellyfish      

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