The crossing between Isla San Lorenzo and San Esteban is only about 15km and was expected to be a THREE HOUR CUISE. The underwater topology between these two islands is the shallowest part of the midriff area and is supposed to have the worst tides. Everyone agrees on this but nobody could give us any details before we left. Sid Taylor reports that the ebb tide is very bad and has overfalls at the south end of Esteban. If you get caught in an ebb tide you get carried south where the land turns away from you in all directions and there are no more islands to land on for hundreds of kilometers. (In the distance we could see Isla San Pedro Matir, a "desolate rock covered with bird guano"). I planned this trip to always launch before the slack before a flood so that we never had to contend with an ebb tide.
The first hour and a half of the crossing was pleasant with calm water and no wind. This was starting to look easy. But after another hour the island did not look like we were going to get there in another half hour. A wind came up to blow in our faces and slow us down. We paddled south and then east again to avoid a field of noisy water, a tide rip over a shallow spot? But this would mean that the flood tide had started a lot earlier than we expected. Expecting the tide to push us north we turned farther south. Roger turned directly southeast and sprinted out of site in his racing boat on a course perpendicular to a path to the island. He claimed later that he got above the flooding water and could have paddled around to the east side of the island if he had not returned to follow us. With no points of reference we could not tell if there was any current. I started measuring the size of the island with an outstretched hand and discovered that we were being pushed backwards by the tide and getting farther away from Isla San Esteban! We decided that Isla Tiburon was making the north flooding tide turn west to oppose us. Thinking that this tide eventually had to turn north again, I turned us north to cut across the west flowing water with a plan to turn east again when the tide turned north. I compromised by turning us 45 degrees north so that we would not loose ground while going north.
Fred Cooper didn't hear or didn't like this plan. He found a range on Isla Esteban, two peaks that allowed him to stay on a straight course to the island. He convinced John Somers to join him and took off away from the group. At first they went almost out of sight to our right. Later they crossed right to left just in front of us. Then they disappeared outof sight to our left. Eventually Fred landed about 300 meters north of us and only a few minutes before we did. Presumably since Fred was on a range and moving in a straight line, this passing back and forth was actually caused by the curving path that the rest of us took.
As the rest of us worked our way north it became apparent that the west tide wrapped around the top of the island and came at us from there as well. We modified our course once again to head for the center of the island and slog it out until we got into the calm backwater. This eventually worked but not until over nine hours after we had launched. We probably only made it because the tide ended and there was another slack.
Just before we landed we talked Fred and John on the VHS radio. There was a lot of miss-communication and I was told that "they" had landed on the north side of the island, which made sense to me after seeing them apparently disappear into the distance north of the island. We paddled north and found Fred on the east, not the north, side of the island. But John was not with him. John had become tired and dropped behind. He had packed his lunch inside his boat, planning on getting it out when we reached the island, which was only supposed to take three hours. The rest of us had stuffed parts of our lunch in our PFD pockets and had been able to snack throughout the day. John had paddled hard for nine hours without any food.
Fred was in radio contact with John but I could not believe what he was reporting to us. Fred pointed to a course south along the island that he claims he followed, when I had last seen them north of the island. I was told that John was still out at sea and would probably need a tow. Then I heard John's voice on the radio saying that he was next to the island in calm water paddling north. I wondered if John and Fred both had their compasses screwed on 90 degrees off and John was actually on the north side of the island. We all paddled out and to my great surprise I found John south of us next to the island. Apparently John had dropped so far behind Fred that when he turned towards the island the rest of us had paddled between the two of them. John was close enough to a beach that he was able to paddle over and land on his own power. It was a pretty nice beach so we decided to spend the night there.