Stargazing at Sea — A “Moving” Experience
Jack Edgerton sent us this fun little tale about stargazing on the Pacific from the decks of his 1967 Cal 34 Maybe Tuesday after last year’s cruise south with the 31st Baja Ha-Ha. It appears to have been quite the “moving” experience.
After reading Latitude 38 for years and dreaming about sailing south and doing the Ha-Ha, I finally got the encouragement I needed from my kids and my wife. I did the 2025 Baja Ha-Ha with my son and his friend. Of course it was fantastic, exciting, unnerving, with a dose of science nonfiction.
We had great sailing: moderate winds, wing on wing, the ASO was up a couple times, the symmetrical spinnaker was our go-to sail and just the main only with 30-knot tailwinds behind Cedros. We hit 10 knots in the old Cal 34 and towed the dinghy the whole way. The stops in Turtle Bay and Bahia Santa Maria were just as they’ve been described in all those letters I’ve read over the years. It was lots of fun: great people and an amazing adventure.
Once in Cabo, my son and his friend had to leave. I was on my own without a real plan other than I was going to La Paz. A one-day run to Frailes, another day to Muertos, and then another day and I was anchored off the Mogote in La Paz. I rowed my dinghy in at slack tide and then waited for slack tide to row back out. It wasn’t very convenient, so I thought I would go to Puerto Escondido, leave the boat there, and come back some other time and take her back to San Pedro.
Well, Thanksgiving rolled around and I made the decision to just go home. A day to Muertos and another to Frailes, then finally Cabo. I left Cabo November 30, about daybreak, and got only a few miles before I tucked in a double reef and rolled the headsail up to a sliver. I had this crazy idea I would sail all the way to San Pedro since I didn’t have enough fuel.
After sailing south of due west for 40 miles, I tacked back toward shore — at least now I was making northerly progress. The wind subsided, engine came on, I was being lifted toward Mag Bay [Magdalena Bay]. The timer was set; 30-minute sleep cycles were all I got, and after about 40 hours I was pretty delirious and slowing the boat down to time entering Mag Bay with the sunrise. So this is the science nonfiction part. First, I have to say on the way down in Turtle Bay, while shopping in a tienda, a fellow sailor asked if we had seen the stars that moved. I asked if he had been drinking. He said no … and that was that. I didn’t question him on it. I wasn’t going to ever bring this up, but with all the talk in the news about UFOs, why not?
It was about 4 a.m. December 2; the night sky was truly amazing. The stars were bright with only occasional wispy clouds, and as I looked up, I saw stars that moved. Several stars moved but I only noticed one at a time, perhaps because my focus was on just one at a time. They would move in random directions, up down, sideways. After each move they would stop and be motionless. Sometimes they would appear to fade away then come back, but they would stop and blend into the rest of the night sky. Did anybody else see these “stars?”
OK, that’s it. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. The rest of my trip? I had a perfect weather window, powered 98 percent of the way, wind above 15 on the nose for maybe six hours. Got to San Diego December 13. Stopped at Mag Bay, San Juanico, Hipolito, Asuncion, Turtle Bay, San Quintin, Colnett. The trip up was as good as the trip down.
After around 28 years sailing Maybe Tuesday, Jack says his experience of the Ha-Ha was “an incredible adventure thanks to the Poobah and all the folks behind the scenes who put it all together.”
Want to find out for yourself what it’s like to do the cruisers’ rally to Mexico? Sign up here for Baja Ha-Ha XXXII.