By Nicole
Friends of ours on Hello World and Bint al Khamseen cruised the Sea of Cortez a couple of years ago and told us stories about “the black hole of La Paz.” They explained just how hard it was for people to leave this favorite cruiser hang out in Baja. We figured we’d like La Paz but that we wouldn’t have any trouble escaping its gravitational pull. We were wrong!
As I opened up our logbook to record our departure from La Paz on Sunday, I calculated just how long we’d spent in the area this last time around. Aaron guessed 3 or 4 days. We were there for 12 days! In total, we hung out in the area for almost a month. Not only is it a black hole; it’s apparently a time warp, too.
But with temps only in the 60s and 70s (I know, I know) and the water chilling off rapidly (too cold to swim without our wetsuits), it was time to reach escape velocity. We made the hop to Bahia de los Muertos, one of the prime jumping-off points for mainland Mexico (and hopefully warmer water!).
We buddy-boated with Dawn and Patrick on Deep Playa, who were even awesome enough to catch that night’s dinner on the sail down. Sweet!
The boys enjoying a little post-dinner Scotch on Deep Playa
The anchorage that night proved to be super rolly and uncomfortable, but Dawn and I were still up for rowing the dinghy to shore the next morning to do some exploring and hiking.
The bay is actually the site of a planned resort community with marked lots for more than 100 luxury homes (which I’m sure was started during the real estate boom, and you know what that means). The developers, hiring a savvy marketing team no doubt, decided that Bahia de los Muertos (Bay of the Dead) wasn’t exactly going to bring in droves of buyers looking to invest in Baja California desert property. So what did they do? They simply renamed it Bahia de los Sueños (Bay of Dreams) instead.
Someone certainly had mighty big dreams for developing this area, but from the looks of it, those dreams are dying -- the place is a total ghost town. Maybe they should’ve left the name alone…
We hiked up the hill from the beach only to stumble across a giant paved road. Dawn thought the (only) house there might be owned by the cartel. I mean, who actually has a mission bell?
Another prime lot for sale… They’re pretty much all open, so take your pick.
Dawn and Nicole explore the hillsides of Bahia de los Muertos
Goodbye to the deserts of Baja. We’re on our way to the tropical mainland!
who would name a bay "bay of the dead"? clearly the early settlers didn't have marketing backgrounds.
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