Punta Pulpito and Bahia Concepcion - Mar. 21 & 22

INTREPID II left Caleta San Juanico mid-day on Monday, March 22nd for a 2 hour run up to Punta Pulpito to break up the trip to Bahia Concepcion the following day.  We passed a few boats and then a fishing vessel trolling up and down the waters.  It was difficult to see what it was doing until it passed diagonally in front of us later on and the outstretched arms became visible.

Fishing boat kept us guessing

Cloudy but impressive skies

At one point, off our port side, we spotted a long, narrow back fluke as a humpback  (Megaptera novaeangliae) flipped over to dive and later saw its high, powerful blows further south as it surfaced behind us.  This image, courtesy of earthwatch.org, provides a sense of the power and energy of this baleen whale.


Nearing Punta Pulpita we followed a sailboat in, sharing the anchorage with another Canadian boat, SV Relax.  Our visit was a chat via the vhf radio as neither of us were going to put dinghies in the water for the overnight stay.  It would be an early start tomorrow.  We had heard on the Sonrisa net to watch for the International Space Station passing overhead that night.  There it was right on schedule, arcing overhead in the black night sky.  A further treat was a huge ring around the almost full moon.

This is a stark anchorage, whose sandy beach had been washed away in a hurricane, so very difficult to land and go ashore.  The massive headland or "pulpit' has an obvious vein of obsidian  running through the rock.

Stark Punta Pulpito

March 22 at 6:45 am INTREPID II headed out, following aft of our overnight neighbours with a second boat in the distance that had come out of San Juanico very early.  Two hours later we were passed by the MV The Dark Side, who make much better time than us sail boaters. We had a good chat on the radio as they went by.  The wind was on the nose for all of us, with 11- 12 knots true. The day was hot, the seas quite rolly for a time, with the odd spray finding its way back to the dodger.  By 13:30 we were starting to make the turn to port around Point Concepcion and Kelly had the radar on to assist in picking out the rocky bits.  Now as we headed westward, the seas were on our starboard beam and we rolled some more.  But now we could roll out the jib and quickly were making some progress.  As we turned south into Bahia Concepcion we were suddenly enjoying a 7 knot run under the jib, with 18 knots true from the north - making up for lost time!

Checking with our friends on Keetya I who were already anchored nearby, we decided to anchor in Playa Santispac, which appeared to have the best north wind protection and the least fetch.  We anchored in 30 feet at:  26 degrees 45.l729 N and 111 degrees 53.122 W after almost 9 hours at sea and prepared to relax for a few days.