Osprey
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 3694
Registered: 5-23-2004
Location: Baja Ca. Sur
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Cruise to Cabo
You "guys" seem to like my true life adventure tales more than my fiction stuff so here's another.
Sea Cruise
It wasn?t a mid-life change. Nothing like that. A chance to ride my big bike to the coast, hop on a fishing cruiser, take it from Newport Beach,
California to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, fly back to San Diego, ride the bike back to Vegas ? all expenses paid.
Well, that?s what it sounded like when I got a phone call from my daughter in California. It was 1989, about 6 weeks shy of my 54th birthday, I had
some vacation time coming ? why not? I said yes. Maybe I would have passed if I had a little more info about the people and the mission.
My daughter was running with a lanky, raw-boned marina bum who got a contract to take two fishing boats to Cabo. They needed an extra hand. That?s
all I knew. So I kissed my wife goodbye, climbed on my Yamaha 1100 XS and roared off for adventure. The other shoe, when it got dropped (about 200
miles out to sea) was that these two little boats (a 30 ft. Cal. and a 29 Bertram) were being smuggled by four of us to Cabo to become part of the
charter fishing fleet of a famous hotel there. The smuggling part was to avoid the huge import fees. The other three guys would split $5,000 dollars
when the boats were safe in the harbor at Cabo ? I was just along for the ride.
Some other things I might have wanted to know before my commitment was that we planned to run mostly at night with no nav lights, take only boat to
boat radios and run by Loran only. That we had to take extra fuel in 50 gallon drums to make the hop to Turtle Bay and San Carlos and that only one
of the three smugglers had ever been this way, north to south.
Regrets: Just a couple.
The seas were such that we wore out the steering on both boats. The wheel had to be turned stop to stop for countless hours to avoid rounding up.
One boat we fixed ourselves, with the other we had to have a part manufactured by a ?taller? in Turtle Bay.
Without radios we never learned that hurricane Octave would be meeting us with killer winds about 50 miles north of Todos Santos, that it would take
14 hours to go the last 41 miles to Cabo.
My three companions were street wise criminals ? in the end I had to pay my own air fare back to the U.S.
Surprises/pleasant memories: a few
We picked up a Mexican hooka diver at Isla Natividad. I got to know him, found out a little about his dangerous job, his life on the island.
Caught a boatload of tuna at incredible speed. We had to be doing at least 22 knots ? the lures were in the air more than in the water.
Captured and ate a couple dozen lobsters just inside the bar at San Carlos ? saw hundreds of octopus ? should have caught some for later trade now
that I know how much Mexicans treasure pulpo.
Would I do it again? Well, I?m 69 years old now, about half stove up, but if I could pull my weight I would sign on again this very minute.
P.S. My Mexican/Indian diver friend and I invented a new dance at the Roe. We called it the ?hooka?, used all his diving moves. It was a big hit
with the ladies ? we got all of em doin? it.
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vandenberg
Elite Nomad
Posts: 5118
Registered: 6-21-2005
Location: Nopolo
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Mood: mellow
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Osprey
Great story and definitely an adventure you'll never forget. And you stayed out of the slammer
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bajajudy
Elite Nomad
Posts: 6886
Registered: 10-4-2004
Location: San Jose del Cabo,BCS
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That trip can be a nightmare without a hurricane
I too am glad that you made it
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bajalera
Super Nomad
Posts: 1875
Registered: 10-15-2003
Location: Santa Maria CA
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Whether fiction or non, you really write great stuff, George. If there's anyone on this board who really needs to write a book about Baja, it's you.
\"Very few things happen at the right time, and the rest never happen at all. The conscientious historian will correct these defects.\" -
Mark Twain
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