Isla San Marcos is a short day trip from Punta Chivato and its northwestern side is a mere 11 miles SE of Santa Rosalia. Handy. Its eastern side is steep and deep, reputedly good for fishing for pelagic species like tuna but we will speak no more of such things.
There are anchorages on San Marcos's southern and SW sides, but they seem to be too close to the very active gypsum mining operation located on the SW side of the island. Here's what the fine gypsum dust looks like from a couple miles north on a calm morning:
That's not fog, people; that's drywall and we've spent far too many years cleaning it out of nooks & crannies in various houses & apartments we've rehabbed. So, we anchored on one of San Marcos's sandy shelves on the NW side, well away from the pier and mining operation and just a bit south* of the most popular San Marcos anchorage at Sweet Pea Cove. The day was calm, the evening delightful; overnight we heard a whale spouting close past our boat, and the next morning GB
caught a fortune jack right off the Fox. Flush with success GB dinghied out a few yards from The Fox into about the 75-foot depth and caught him some spotted and goldspotted bass. He snagged the arm of a passing octopus but the octopus pulled the hook out of his own arm and in a snit, spat water all over GB from his siphon. GB also managed to cheese-off a couple of large snake eels but they were nice enough not to bite him with their bacteria-laden fangs.
Awesome overnight.
* GPS of our anchorage = 27deg.13.495N, 112deg.05.784W. This may come in handy because neither the Rains nor the Charlie's Charts guides are very specific about waypoints of the potential anchorages they describe. And at least in calm weather the shelf we sat on was mighty nice.
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