About the guidebook

Sea of Cortez - A Cruiser’s Guidebook by Shawn Breeding and Heather Bansmer is an outstanding cruising guide detailing the many anchorages found within the popular cruising waters of the Sea of Cortez, Mexico. This colorful, well-designed guide is full of over 100 GPS accurate, up-to-date chartlets as well as stunning photography, allowing the boater and dreamer alike to navigate through the blue, beautiful waters of the Sea of Cortez.

Sea of Cortez - A Cruiser’s Guidebook, harnesses today’s technology by utilizing satellite images, SRTM (Shuttle Radar Topography Mission) data, marine navigational software and GPS waypoints to construct the most accurate chartlets available for each anchorage. As many boaters find out first hand when cruising throughout the Sea of Cortez, that the large scale government charts currently available are outdated, several based on surveys originally taken in the late 1800’s. These government charts are also inaccurate, occasionally off by more than 1.0 nautical mile. This results in boats traveling over land on navigational software programs or GPS chart plotters, or plotting inaccuracy on your charts. For this reason, Sea of Cortez - A Cruiser’s Guidebook, is an invaluable aid to mariners, providing detailed, GPS accurate chartlets of anchorages, depth information, and GPS waypoints personally researched by the authors.

This cruising guide also features many helpful details such as hiking trails, dive and snorkel sites, beaches for shell collectors, along with city maps, restaurant guides, grocery stores, and marine chandleries and services. This handy information allows boaters to navigate both on the water and on land with ease.

The authors, Shawn Breeding and Heather Bansmer, have spent four seasons cruising and documenting the Sea of Cortez on board their sailboat, Om Shanti. Originally from Bellingham, Washington and the beautiful cruising grounds in the Pacific Northwest, Shawn and Heather set sail in June 2003, to pursue their cruising dream, which ultimately took them to the warm waters of Mexico and the Sea of Cortez. Shawn, whom is a professional graphic designer, and Heather, whom has long pursued writing as a hobby, have combined their talents and their love for boating to create this one-of-a-kind, accurate and up-to-date cruising guide.