We appreciate your interest in the Vagabundos del Mar Boat & Travel Club, the oldest and only non-profit travel organization specializing in Baja California. When you participate in our numerous RV-ing, boating and travel events you will be rewarded with new friendships, knowledge and experiences which are always unselfishly offered by fellow Members.
The Club had its real beginning in 1966 as a result of a group of trailer boaters who "buddied" up. 29 people in 13 small trailer boats cruising from Bahia Kino across the Sea of Cortez. This adventure attracted others with similar interests, more trips resulted and the sharing of experience and knowledge became an integral part of this group and the ultimate cornerstone of the Club.
After several years of this informal association, the Club evolved into a non-profit organization of more than 10,000 Members. One of the tangible benefits of getting organized has proven to be our ability to obtain or create good deals for Members on various travel services - low-cost insurance, Adventure Tours, discounts, books, clothing and more. No one does it better than the Vagabundos.
Our Club was incorporated in the State of California in 1971 as a non-profit corporation. We took our name, "Vagabundos del Mar", from the Mexican fishermen who used to roam the Sea of Cortez in log canoes, prominently portrayed in the book "Sea of Cortez" by the late Ray Cannon. Although they have become a vanishing breed on the Cortez, they truly were "Vagabonds" or "Gypsies of the Sea". As our numbers have grown, we certainly have become an extension of their belief of freedom on the water, as well as on land.
Through the years the Club has donated thousands of dollars to worthwhile conservation and other causes in the Western U.S. and Mexico; and organized many activities and trips by boat and RV that ventured all over Mainland Mexico, including the Yucatan and through the Copper Canyon, Baja California, Bahamas, Canada, Alaska and locations in between.
Our Members best realize the benefits by participating in the activities. No other Baja travel Club offers this sort of program. We believe in using our RV's and our boats, which come in all shapes and sizes, even though Membership does not require that you have either.
Our annual Crab Feed provides an opportunity to renew old friendships, make new ones, review past adventures and plan anew for the season ahead. Today, reports from far-flung Members document that the Club burgee is flying year-round on land and water adventures to Alaska, the San Juan Islands, the California Delta, and throughout the U.S., Canada and Mexico.
We are grateful to our Commodore Eternal Ray Cannon and President Emeritus, Chet Sherman, for introducing us to Baja and the Sea of Cortez and bringing us together. Chet used to say this was a hobby he started in his garage “that just got out of hand”. He had the special talent of “organizing the unorganizable” and was a Pied Piper. He started writing our publication, Chubasco, Spanish for big wind. The dedication and hard work of the Club’s previous and present Officers and Directors, the many volunteer Members as well as the ladies in the office, have made the Club what it is today.
Ray Cannon’s Sea of Cortez book lured many to the Vagabundo lifestyle. Ray left us in l977 and Chet Sherman, a Pied Piper and Adventurer in his own right, formulated the Club in ensuing years. Chet was the first President for 30 years until he left us in 1996. Chet expanded horizons and drew near to him those he chose to carry on his legacy who were of like mind. Many of us who have driven Baja 1 over numerous years and cruised the waters of the Sea of Cortez, know first-hand the advice back then to be prepared is still true. Chet preached about “shake-down” cruises and practice runs to “Baja bomb test” your boat, trailer and rig before hitting the road. Though there are many modern marinas today with fuel much more available, it still pays to be informed, watchful and well supplied. Baja l has been improved from the days when trailer boats were towed through innumerable big potholes and rough roads and launched over the sand on portable wire mesh tracks, but the road in some areas is still narrow with no shoulders. It’s stories of survival from broken trailer tongues or wheels rolling off into the desert, axles breaking, being stuck in the sand and the like when we used to say, ‘this is where we separate the men from the boys.’ That came to mind other times on launching the boat from the trailer into the surf and hoping the engine would start; or at anchor watch in a storm at night in the rollers when wind direction changed in a Chubasco, hoping one of two anchors out would hold and you wouldn’t wind up on the rocks. It takes a certain resourcefulness to work out of a situation or predicament that just seems to happen when you are in remote parts on an adventure. With buddies to help who carry spare parts or to crank a wrench or change a hose, and then at the end of the day to retell and share the experience, it makes all the difference. The Club’s Mission still is -- “To help Members travel safely, economically and enjoyably in all of North America, especially Baja California.”
Ray Cannon so eloquently expressed his love for small boat cruising in a previously unpublished essay that is included in Gene Kira’s book, The Unforgettable Sea of Cortez. As we reflect over the past Half Century, this expresses the founding Credo for the adventurous band of small boaters that formed the Club. This essay follows:
“To the young in spirit, no matter the years, to those with an inner ache to thrill once again with wild and true adventure, or who long to capture the storybook romance of cruising out in search of hidden treasure on an island, to explore painted caves for Indian artifacts, and like a primitive, live off the fat of the land and waters, for all this and more, I say ‘go down to the sea in little ships.”
“Go for a voyage searching among the baylets, coves and lagoons.”
“Go ashore, build a camp and spend a night in the wilds and hear the plaintive mating calls of creatures of the wilderness, the yowls and caterwauls of coyotes and cats challenging for your food, the thunderous gurgles of snoring whales making bedfellows of your boats, and the courting cries of the nocturnal birds and katydids, all accompanied with the background music of little waves breaking on the beach and the even more gentle winds.”
“Sleep, and breathe deeply of the primeval and tangy perfume wafted down on the balmy night breeze from blossoms of the wild hillside chaparral.”
“Wake up by the chuckles of sea fowls announcing the dawn, to swim in warm, clear water or dive into strange and beautiful marine gardens of flowering animals, succulent sea foods and rare sea shells.”
“There are thousands of things to do, never before done by modern man in these vast and uninhabited places that once supported tens of thousands of Indians. You can cast for fish where no angler has dropped a hook, or cruise out to troll for bottom fish, with complete assurance of success. You can sail on to new areas, each seeming more inspiring than the last.”
“Although this Sea is vast, its smooth surface, almost waveless beaches, bizarre islands, baroque shorelines and its wilderness character and abundant sea life make it ideal as a small craft wonder water world. Not only for those who still cherish that precious inner spark for adventure, but for all of all ages who wish to rekindle it.”
“After spending half a lifetime in search of adventure in many of the remote places of the earth, I can now say with all truth, that small boat cruising in the Cortez provides the most exciting, most pleasurable, and most satisfying method of fulfilling that craving to experience the strange and unique in nature in the raw”.
“But I learned the hard way that these voyages can be enjoyed to the fullest only when they are well planned and carefully executed and there are no shortcuts to thoroughness.”
“The Sea of Cortez is no place for the thoughtless. Beautiful, calm mornings may bewitch the careless outboarder to disaster; running down a favorable tide or breeze may speed him beyond the range of his fuel supply; a lack of knowledge of weather reports and seasonal storm conditions can prove hazardous.”
Probably what best describes why we continue to operate a truly non-profit organization comes from the many Members who have told us, "We use our equipment and have more fun since becoming a Vagabundo than ever before." Many Vagabundo RV and boat trip travel acquaintances have become life-long friends. Our Club continues today on the above concepts. That's what it's all about, amigo. You have the opportunity to "get on board" with the greatest bunch of fun-loving, adventurous tow-boaters and RV'ers to be found anywhere.
