1.9.2013 15:00pm 76F

Sea of Cortez is notorious for northerly winds in the winter. We just had our first taste in the last week. Four out of five days, strong wind blew out of the north, stirring up big swells, making northbound passage into Sea of Cortez very challenging. It is not comfortable but still doable in a trawler or powerboat, really a pain for those sailboats trying to sail up wind in deep swells.

We anchored at Bahia Los Frailes. Beautiful anchorage and very well sheltered from N wind and swell. We stayed there for 3 days to wait out these N winds.

White caps look intimidating outside of the anchorage.

Los Frailes is a popular spot. I was surprised to see the number of RV and camps on the beach. Many of them came from British Columbia, interestingly.

One of the most amazing scenes here is rays jumping. One calm morning, we heard loud noise outside, like water splashing — they were rays jumping out of water, two or three at a time. I paddled over to take a close look. As I got closer, I noticed I was surrounded by fins.  I looked down in the water, and saw some triangle-shaped objects reflecting sunlight. Oh my, hundreds of ray overlapping each other, gliding through the water. I just realized, the 2,3 rays we saw jumping out in the air were just 1% of what were actually there. Amazing!

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