Our hope for traveling down the west coast of Baja was to experience some of the more remote parts of Mexico, and Islas San Benito are about as remote as one can find on (or near) the Baja peninsula.
The three small islands that make up Islas San Benito are uninhabited except for a temporary fishing village, and it didn’t take long for friendly local fishermen to stop by in their panga (fishing skiff) and offer us a few lobsters. When we tried to pay, they insisted, “no dinero!” We had a creamy lobster pasta for dinner.
Almost as friendly as the fishermen were the hundreds of juvenile sea lions congregated around the islands. They swam around the anchorage in large groups and the most curious came right up to Flyer to check us out.
We beached our dinghy at the small fishing camp — which was completely empty when we arrived aside from a couple of elephant seals — and walked up the hill to the one functioning lighthouse, then further to the abandoned lighthouse on the west end of the island. The landscape is dry, rocky and dramatic with beautiful views over the islands and out to the open ocean. We marveled at being in a place that relatively few people get to visit. We also looked down at our feet a lot to avoid the lethal little cactus pups that seemed to jump off larger plants.
When we got back to the dinghy, one of the generous fisherman we’d met the day before was waiting on the beach for a panga ride home to Isla de Cedros. In Spanish and with gestures, he asked where we’d been and where we were headed, told us that 50 people live in the camp during abalone season, and explained that elephant seals come to San Benito to breed in the winter before migrating to Alaska. He was patient and kind with my halting questions and answers (“How many live in this place?” “We walk to the house of light.”) and obviously enjoyed seeing kids on the island. It was such a pleasure for us to make this small connection, and at the same time, frustrating to feel so limited in our ability to communicate.
Hours later, we were joined in the anchorage by a much less friendly-looking military vessel. We started to feel a little on edge when a skiff with eight men in uniforms carrying uzis approached our boat taking photos, then pulled up alongside us and asked to come aboard. I understood about 20 percent of what they said, but tried to translate the gist for the rest of the family: the San Benito islands are part of a protected area and illegal fishing is enforced by the Navy.
It’s unsettling to be boarded by people carrying machine guns, and especially so when they’re speaking another language. Even after they checked our papers, looked around the boat, and headed back to their ship, I was still unnerved enough to Google: “Is it normal to be boarded by the Navy at San Benito?” (Yes, it is.) Afterwards, we talked a lot about how strange even a normal experience can feel when you don’t understand what’s being said, but also how much you can tell from a person’s demeanor. These men were all professional, but I’ve thought a lot about the one who offered a quiet “¿Con permiso?” before stepping up onto our boat.
After two nights, we left San Benito before sunrise and motored six hours to Isla de Cedros, an island known for salt production and commercial fishing. Despite a permanent population of only 1,000-2,000 people, Cedros sees a lot of marine traffic and has its own Port Captain, so we were required to go ashore to check in.
Walking through town, every person we passed on foot or in a car greeted us. At the Port Captain’s office, a thoughtful employee found chairs for the kids to sit in while we went through paperwork. Another cruising family was invited to dinner at a local’s house when they arrived at a restaurant just after closing. It felt like a small town that happens to have an international sport fishing business. But we also heard that the island has suffered since 2023 when salt sales dropped sharply after the Mexican government bought out Mitsubishi’s shares in the salt export company, ESSA. We noticed empty, run-down buildings in addition to the big, waterfront houses.
Back at the boat, we got hot in the sun, swam to cool off, and monitored Marine Traffic to make sure that the Baja Ha-Ha fleet had cleared out of Bahía Tortugas, our next anchorage.
Bahía Tortugas is a small fishing town on a big bay that is overrun for a couple of days every November when over 150 sailboats arrive on the first stop of the Baja Ha-Ha rally. We’d been warned over and over to stay away from the overpriced fuel at Tortugas, but we couldn’t wait to get there to reunite with our friends on Dark Star. We were also excited to catch some of the boats we’d been playing leap frog with since the Channel Islands: Wasatch, a couple who built their own unconventional sailboat in Twisp, WA; Savory, a French and Canadian family on a steel boat reminiscent of Moitessier’s Joshua; and Hepatica, a young couple from Nanaimo, BC on a Roberts 29 whose friendly calls over the radio in the preceding weeks made us eager to meet them in person.
After six hours of motoring, we turned towards Tortugas at noon, just in time for the kids to log on for school. But their Zoom hosts were nowhere to be found and their Chromebook clocks read 11am. Somehow, we were an hour early. Or wait, had we completely missed class? We checked and double checked. Our phone clocks said noon, but our Google calendar now showed school starting at 1pm. Earlier, I had noticed that the analog clock seemed to be losing time and changed its battery. It took an embarrassingly long time for us to work out that we had crossed the border from Baja California to Baja California Sur and were now in Mountain Time.
It was nearing dusk by the time school ended, so we rushed into shore for tacos. Almost immediately, we had the impression that we were seeing a place in the wake of an invasion — and not just because the ruins of the old abalone cannery are the first thing you see when arriving by dinghy. The restaurant was out of everything except sad beef tacos and the only produce left in the grocery store was bruised or moldy. Walking through town in near dark, we practically jumped out of our skin each time a dog lunged from behind a fence, barking wildly.
Heading back to the boat, we had to launch the dinghy through surf in the dark. It was chaotic and wet. We argued about which of the many anchor lights in the bay was Flyer’s. Even after we were on board, panic continued to rise when Steve went to open the companionway door and the key broke off in the lock. The kids managed to wiggle through a hatch and eventually opened the door from the inside, but nerves were high and spirits were low. The most optimistic among us were starting to worry: Is this what the rest of Baja is going to be like?
In the morning, we watched Dark Star and Hepatica haul up anchor and move east in the bay, and we decided to follow. It turns out that a one mile move was all it took to swing our mixed feelings hard toward the positive.
Looking back toward town, we couldn’t help but laugh at the pangas absolutely swarmed by pelicans.
And then the dolphins arrived! Hundreds of dolphins — including babies — swam around us at our new anchorage. When we took the dinghy into the beach, the dolphins joined us. One morning, James woke up to the sound of dolphin chatter, looked out his window, and saw a dolphin swimming past only a few feet away. Now we asked ourselves: Is this what the rest of Baja is going to be like?!
The beach at Bahía Tortugas made for good long walks and there was just enough double over-ankle swell for the kids to surf before and after school. Even town looked better with a little perspective, and just three days after arriving we found that the grocery store had been restocked with fresh apples and — be still my heart — romaine lettuce!
The night before we left, heading further south to some of Baja’s famous surf spots, Alex and Laura of Hepatica joined the Dark Star crew for drinks on Flyer. We didn’t know it then, but this group would become the heart of the cruising community that made our holiday season in Baja so memorable. Of all the pleasures ahead — surreally beautiful sunsets, perfect downwind sailing, epic wingfoiling sessions, beach-side shrimp tacos — these friendships were the real gift.
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