Bahia Santa Maria

This was our first anchorage tucked close into the mountains in beautiful clear water.  This shows the arroyo which we walked across (the lowest area to the right of the mountain range)
This view from the beach of the same anchorage and demonstrating nicely how careful you had to be with your dinghy landings in the surf!
The afternoon sun on these mountains cast a warm red glow and gave the impression of silk folds.  We got so much pleasure simply watching the sun casting different lights.
This pristine beach went on for miles and miles, it was all pure white and covered in sand dollars up to 8" across in diameter!  It then erupted into 20ft sand dunes and stretched for a further 5 miles to the estuary of Magdalena Bay and further 10 miles to the other side of the Bay.  Now that is what I call a beach!
Walking through the arroyo was really fascinating with so many different rocks and wild flowers and cactus to discover.  This was one of our favorite walks along the West Coast of the Baja.
This is the view you are rewarded with at the end of the walk, the same one you saw from the sea as you sailed by, enroute to the Bay.  You could see all the way along to the lighthouse and a spectacular view of the Pacific Ocean.
This is the view we were rewarded after our long 5 mile hike across the sand dunes to the other side of the Bay.  From the top of the sand dunes you can see the mangroves growing into the dunes and the estuary of Magdalena Bay.
We saw so many different varieties of wild flowers growing in the sand and it was incredible how healthy they all looked!  This one grew into quite large bushes around 10ft in diameter.
This pretty crawler grew in the sand dunes everywhere and provided interesting splashes of colour to the sand.
This delicate pom pom flower had a wonderful smell, really pungent and sweet.  The contrast between the bare spiky branches and the pretty delicate flower was amazing.
This ground cover flower grew in the dunes and was so delicate on its long stem.
We saw many of these cactus flowers but these one's seemed particularly bright and had an interesting trumpet shape.

 

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