MEXICO REPORT
By CAPT. PAT RAINS
Map of Mexico showing fast & slow routes, holiday stops, airports.
HOT FOR THE HOLIDAY’S ITINERARY AS WE WEST COAST boaters prepare to depart our home ports along
the chilly northern Pacific, I suggest a robust Mexico cruising itinerary. Let’s call it “Hot for the Holidays.” For your southbound escape during November, December, and January, this itinerary is ideal for eight-knot powerboats with longer legs (ample fuel tankage). Pack away your foul-weather gear Santa, because quick as a wink this holiday itinerary gets you and your elves down south into those 85-degree tropics.
HOT for the Holidays We’re going to dash down Baja, zoom across to the mainland, and continue coasting south as quickly as possible until making 12 SEAMAGAZINE.COM OCTOBER/NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021
a big U-turn at Zihuatanejo and Ixtapa. There we begin slowly gunk-holing our way back northwest while working on our tans in bathing-suit weather. Why so far south, so fast? Because parts of the Sea of Cortez are colder in winter than most first-time cruisers (and their guests) expect. Screaming Blue Northers can keep all boats pegged down for days on end. We’ll initially bypass Los Cabos and La Paz, but we’ll stop there after water temperatures warm up. How fast? This hot-paced 8-knot itinerary gets you from Ensenada non-stop to Los Cabos in four days, then across and down to Ixtapa in three more days. If you plan to depart the U.S. about Nov. 10 –
