Agua Verde

You already know that means “Green Water”, right? And there’s a town in Arizona full of retirees by that name? And another on the flanks of Mt. Rainier, a couple hours from our home. This Agua Verde is different.

This morning we loaded our kayak on top of  the pickup truck, and Greg and Debbi (our sometimes travel buddies from British Columbia who we met through Doug and Jill) loaded their two kayaks on top of their Suzuki, and their dog Rosey in the back seat.  We headed south on Mex 1 for 21 miles, then turned east on a dirt road. We made this same trip two years ago in our Toyota Rav4 (see link HERE). 

The dirt road to the village of Agua Verde is 35 kilometers, often only one lane wide, and its’ condition varies from “not bad” (on which we drove about 25 mph) to “pretty rough” (which we drove about 10mph) to the last 100 meters down the hill to the beach, before which we got out of our truck, consulted with Greg who was following us to get his opinion on whether we’d REALLY be able to get back up the hill if we were brave enough to venture down; he said “Yes” so we went for it. Nonetheless, on the whole we found the road to be in somewhat better condition than two years ago.

The day was gorgeous.  Sunny, blue sky, a light breeze and eventually 84 degrees. There were tiny waves and a bit of a swell. Greg, Debbi and Rosey kayaked to a remote beach across the bay, while we circumnavigated a small, rocky island offshore, then poked along the water’s edge back to the beach where our truck, beach chairs, books and a beer awaited our return. 

Agua Verde is a tiny, very remote fishing village on the Sea of Cortez.  Perhaps 100 people live there, and only very rarely does a camper make its’ way down the rough road to stay longer than a day. We wouldn’t do it with our Arctic Fox.  It’s so beautiful that one of the few enlarged travel photos we have hanging on the wall of our family room at home is of the beach and hills of Agua Verde.

At 3:00, just as we were packing up to leave, a panga (Mexican fishing boat) pulled into shore and sold Cathryn a Cabrillo – delicious, white fish. She bought the whole fish after the panga owner agreed to clean and filet it for her.  Then two shrimp boats came into the bay, but since they were too big to come to shore, and we had already loaded up the kayaks, we missed the chance to buy just-caught shrimp.