Sunrise at San Carlos

Sunrise at San Carlos seen from my hotel window with the Tetakawi mountain in the background. San Carlos is a winter resort for American and Canadian snowbirds. We were here off–season and it was rather empty except for all the boats at the marina. San Carlos is in the municipality of Guaymas, the city of Guaymas being about 1/2–hour drive away. San Carlos has an airport but flights to it are either from Hermosillo, Mexico, or from Mexico City or you can take a bus there from Tucson. San Carlos offers sports fishing, water sports, and hiking.

Sea of Cortez Cruise

This morning, we went on a cruise of the San Carlos harbor. The boat in the photo is not the boat that we took but a sister boat of it. Plenty of room for good views.

Sea of Cortez

The water of the Sea of Cortez was very blue.

Pelicans

We saw many pelicans on our cruise.

San Carlos

Looking at both the casas and the boats at San Carlos gives you an idea that there is a lot of money here.

Rock Formations

There were many dramatic rock formations on the sea.

Pelican

Some pelicans were posing. Many dolphins are often spotted on the cruises but we didn’t see any except for possibly one, though it was probably a sea lion.

Bird on a Rock

We saw a couple of birds on the rocks. This might be a frigate bird as it has a red gullet.

Rock Formation

Another of the rock formations in the sea.

The Beach

After our cruise, we took a drive along the sea and beach to Guaymas.

Guaymas

While San Carlos is basically American and Canadian, Guaymas is Mexican. It is the major port for the state of Sonora.

Guaymas

While most of the casas that we saw in Guaymas were not as big as the ones we saw in San Carlos, Guaymas did have some very big elegant ones.

Pearl Farm

We were in Guaymas to visit a pearl farm. A conservation center has been here since 1968 as part of a university but now it is owned by a group of Mexican investors and does research into the growing of cultured pearls.

Pearl Farm

This young man gave us a lecture on how cultured pearls are grown here in the Sea of Cortez.

Pearl Farm

In a nutshell, oyster spat (larvae) is collected, the spat is seeded in cages, the oysters are periodically cleaned, and then they are harvested. The whole process can take two to three years. The photo shows the cages that the spat and then grown oysters are placed in, starting from the cages on the left.

Pearls

The Guaymas pearl farm uses the rainbow lipped pearl oyster that is native to the Sea of Cortez and that produces pearls of light and dark gray colors. These pearls may be considered the world’s rarest cultured pearls since they come from a single farm and few are produced. They are on the expensive side. Different types of oysters grow differently colored pearls.

Souvenir Shopping

San Carlos didn’t seem to have much of a village, but in our free time, some of us took a taxi to this souvenir store. We asked at the reception desk if they could take us there as they had shuttle carts to do this but they didn’t have anyone to drive the shuttles. We asked them to call a taxi for us. The taxi ride cost us $1.00. However, all these arrangements were a bit difficult to make as no one at the desk could speak much English, surprisingly as San Carlos attracts Americans and Canadians. Maybe the off–season here is different.

Sunset

In the early evening, we were taken to an overlook to view a beautiful sunset.

Mariachi Singers–MOVIE

Dinner was next with mariachi singers. “Cielito Lindo.”

Youtube: https://youtu.be/Pr4u–qSwhHI

I have put my photos of San Carlos and Guaymas on a slideshow. Go to http://www.peggysphotos.com/san–carlos–guaymas/ (Slideshows, Central America, Mexico, Copper Canyon Tour, “San Carlos; Guaymas”).