Cruise Log #11, Punta de Mita, La Cruz and Nuevo Vallarta
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Updated on February 16th, 2005
SolMate foils both the port captain and the Mexican Navy, escapes Chacala and sails around the corner (or was it through the point?) into lovely Banderas Bay, where we fall prey to the siren song of the marina.
SolMate's route from Chacala to Punta de Mita, La Cruz
and Paradise Village Marina in
Nuevo Vallarta.
Charts of this part of the Mexican coast are not necessarily spot-on. SolMate carries paper
charts and electronic charts. Unfortunately, they're both based on the same unreliable survey.
As we shook off the spectre of the Mexican Navy hauling us off to
jail, another unsettling vision presented itself, SolMate impaled on a rocky reef.
Each of our cruising
guides warned of submerged rocks and reefs off Punta de Mita - both recommended standing off
a comfortable mile while rounding the point.
We did, but the rounding was still disconcerting as our charts indicated that we were
ploughing right through the rocky point past the lighthouse.
Navigating southward from Chacala to Punta de Mita.
A few days later, we hiked across the point from our anchorage at Punta de Mita to take a look at the surf breaking on one of the reefs we successfully avoided. We skirted the golf course and tromped through a construction site, beyond - then wandered back to town and explored the cobblestone streets. The story goes that Four Seasons Resorts bought up all of the land under the town of Punta de Mita, which had been located on the north side of the penninsula, and the town picked up and relocated to the south side. I'm a bit skeptical because the town's cobblestones and junk piles looked too well-established to be new.
Four Seasons' golf course swallows took their lives in their
hands (feet) by landing on
Gale's boat....
They needn't have worried.
Further into Banderas Bay, nestled in between Nuevo Vallarta's high-rise hotels, we found a little turtle conservation building. The conservation program is run by university volunteers who patrol the beach on ATVs and guard turtles as they come ashore.
Turtle factory on the Nuevo Vallarta beach.
When mama turtles waddle onto the beach, the volunteers monitor their egg laying, and then when mama heads back to sea, they sneaky up behind her back and dig up the nest. The eggs are then protected in a fenced incubation pen, and reburied. They hatch in forty-five to seventy days. As the hatchlings dig their way out of their man-made nest, the volunteers again swoop down to gather them up and transfer them to a plastic box. Each and every night that day's hatchlings are sent out to the open ocean to fend for themselves. Only one out of a hundred will survive to maturity.
Turtle nursery with little circles of chicken wire surrounding each nest.
Boxed turtles waiting for nightfall and their release.
Turtle release was 8:15 every night - Stan and I gathered in the dark with
fifty other eager participants, toddlers to grandparents. First we heard a little lecture about the Olive Ridley turtles
that we would be sending off, then we received our instructions: no camera flashes or
flashlights - the little guys home in on light, and extraneous sources would confuse them;
no crossing the line - the little dark bodies can't be seen and might be trampled upon; no
lotion or sunscreen on hands - lotion is caustic to fragile little turtles, so rub hands with moist
beach sand to ensure turtle compatability.
Volunteers led us to the beach and drew a fifty-yard-long line in the sand about ten feet from
the water. Researchers believe that the turtles imprint on the sand and use their homing
instincts
to return to the same beach to nest. That's why they weren't released directly into
the water. It was a little painful watching the little guys make their way across that
short expanse of sand.
We all lined up above the line, where a volunteer placed a little turtle into each of our
cupped hands. Initially, mine was ready to go, scrambling to get away, but on the command to
release, that energy evaporated and she just sat, and sat, and sat. Stan's turtle was eager,
he took off down the
beach, homing in on the lights of the volunteers, who were standing knee-deep in the surf,
luring them towards the ocean with
flashlights. As the surf
rolled in, it picked up the turtles and they either swam out to sea or were swept back
up onshore to restart their trek back down to the water.
From its first contact with the sand, my little one took about twenty minutes to finally swim
away. Little wavelets kept sweeping her back up the beach, then picking her up and floating her
out a little ways, then picking her up, again, and bringing her back. Finally, she found a wave to her
liking and paddled herself into deeper water; off, off and away. Stan's turtle was long gone
by then, already making its way out towards the Las Marietas islands dodging hungry fish and birds.
Our little bit of conservation had at least provided the little guys a head start on
life (available stats list 290,000 hatchlings released in 2003).
Shea La Vie hosted a sail out to the Las Marietas, little islands off Punta de Mita, where many
of the Olive Ridley's hang out, offshore. On the way we spotted one of the lucky turtles
that survived the years and grew to full size, a foot wide and a couple of feet long - perhaps it
was making it's way to shore to dig a nest and lay some eggs?
We anchored in the lee of the middle island and proceeded to work at play.
Las Marietas, looking back toward the north shore of Bahia de Banderas.
Ron and Stan with excellent timing for tricky beach landings.
Las Marietas landing party, Kelsey, Marina, Jane and Kathy, exploring the caves (lava tubes?).
Jane and Kathy exploring another one of the Las Marietas caves.
Ron entertaining Marina and Kelsey on the wind surfer.
