One of the sights of the day was paddling up to a shipwreck at Punta San Juacinto. Since running aground, it has collapsed, broken in two and is a favorite place for birds to nest on.
We had a discussion the night before over dinner about options. My original plan for the day had us doing a 22 mile day to questionable point with an offshore break. If we went there the following day would be a short one to Isla San Martin. Another option was to paddle to the last known safe landing at a fish camp, then do a full day to the island from there. When we rounded the fish camp point, Charles Harris decided that he could use a short day so we turned in for a landing.
Where we landed had a very steep gravel berm with waves breaking against it. Charles landed first and then me. We both fell out of our boats in our hurry to drag the boats high enough up the berm. I started huffing and puffing and slowly pulled my boat up the slope. If you let go of a kayak on this slippery wet gravel it would immediately take off down the frictionless surface and probably launch itself a hundred yards offshore. As I passed Charles I told him I’d be glad to help him haul his boat up, but I was a little busy at the moment. Charles abandoned his boat at the waterline with waves breaking over the coaming and helped me push my boat up over the edge. Then we slid back down and started pushing Charles’ boat up. Suddenly there was a third set of helping hands on the kayak! A Mexican man collecting stones (to sell as decorative stones in the USA) had run over to help us. Gregg Berman landed a little ways away and dragged his kayak up by himself before anyone could offer help. Charles gave the rest of his bag of candy to our assistant’s the two sons. The two boys then helped us carry our gear to a wider part of the berm where camping was better.
Gregg set up his tent, emptied his kayak, did a spectacular seal launch back down the berm and paddled back to the point to go surfing. If we were going to only paddle a half a day then he was going to try out the point break. He reported later having a great time! Charles and I walked up the beach to the nearest access to the top of the cliff. Then we walked back to the big restaurant-bar-hotel on the point. We had a drink at the bar, talked to the manager and brought Gregg back there later for dinner. We had a feast and ate more than we usually feed ourselves out of our camp stoves. Not to mention another margarita. It was well after dark before we returned to our tents for the night.