Baja is dry! In fact in 7 months we've only seen a few drops of rain! We ponder how the austere looking big horn sheep copes and have marvelled at the myriad of cactii that thrive here. But what about us? As we don't have a water maker, we liken the boat to a camel, some friends term it "camping", we call it home. On the longer 2- 3 week jumps away from the supply of liquid gold, we have to be careful. Especially when there is more than two of us aboard, but we can live quite happily on 50L/person/week. So what do you get for that? ...... you get: a daily fresh water rinse under the solar shower; to do dishes in a bucket of salt water (mexican dish soap handles this well) and rinse with some fresh; exercise from using the hand pump as we don't have a pressurized system (that can be vulnerable to leaks and requires electricity); as much drinking and cooking water as you need and finally to wash clothes in salt water with a little rinse in fresh, but then, we aren't wearing to many layers these days and most washing waits till we are closer to a supply. For sea passages we cut the showers to a sponge down and cook with a little more seawater. This then lasts about 5 weeks for the two of us at 5L/person/day. Keep in mind the head (toilet) uses salt water and we get to swim at least once a day when anchoring.
Where do we get water? In La Paz the highly chlorinated water available at the marina must have cleaned us and our tanks nicely, in San Everisto there was a desalination plant for the village where we had our jerry cans fillled, in Puerto Escondido they had sweet spring water from the mountain range that rises abruptly behind it, and then on three occasions we have been genourously given a jerry can or two from cruisers with watermakers that enabled us to stay out a few extra days. All small towns will have a purifacador, "the local government subsidised watering hole" who will fill your jerry cans with reverse osmosis treated water and whose facilities are always spotless. 10 – 15 pesos gets you 20L. (about $1CAD). Or as in Guaymas and San Felipe, you call a water truck and lug the 20L containers up and down the dock to fill 300 odd L if we are empty.
So thats how water works here, we do enjoy the odd day at a marina to rinse the layers of salt that accumulates after spray dries and sticks over the weeks of sailing. Recently we arrived in Santa Rosalia on the day the water came back after a 3 day drought for the entire city.... apparantly due to internal politics, the city had not paid the water bill.....where did the money go is the question...??
So next time you turn on that tap..... be thankful :).
