Kids. Don't believe everything you read on the Internet. LA Bay to Santa Rosalia I knew was going to be one of the longest legs. Turns out it is hands down the longest. My Internet research found a site with pretty exact milages listed for this leg that said it was 139 miles. Boy was that wrong. The guy must have been smoking crack when he was looking at his GPS. I ended up paddling almost 190 miles to complete it. Took me a couple of days to realize how off it was and that I needed to refigure on the charts. Made it to Santa Rosalia with one day of water left. Cut it kind of close. Psychologically it was a rough week at times. The realization of the added distance got added to the fact that I was in a grind out the miles part of the trip. The first two weeks you have excitement of the adventure and something new to get you going. Week three into four you have "wow, I have gone 200 miles which is an achievement but there are still 500 to go!" That and a rough day on the water (high wind and rough water in a bad spot of coastline) coming around Punta las Animas put me in a bit of a funk. However by the end if the leg I was better. Had some beautiful camping spots, the weather has been very cooperative, and I have passed the halfway mark which means it is all downhill from here. 3 days gets me to Mulege which is the gateway to Conception Bay, one of the premier kayaking spots in Baja. So far I have only seen local fishing pangas. I have seen no other kayakers, no sailboats, no fishing trawlers, or a cargo ship until I got to Santa Rosalia. There I finally saw a cargo ship loading gypsum and a pair of sailboats. The next section has Highway 1 (the main road up and down Baja) along it so I may see more people along here then anywhere else. If I don't see kayaks in Conception Bay then I may never see any. I was surprised I didn't see any in LA Bay.
The wildlife highlight of this section (there are many to choose from) was a 2+ mile long line of whales (50 to 100 to I have no idea how many) that were leaping out of the water and making loud smacks when they hit the water. It sounded like thunder. It went on for about 5 minutes before the settled down and just went back to being a whale parade headed north. Amazing to watch but too far away to film.
More when I can report again.
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