Nautical Ladder

The Nautical Ladder or Escalera Nautica (or literally, Nautical Staircase) is a $2billion initiative which involves building a “ladder” or nautical route of marinas and tourist sites along the east coast of the Sea of Cortez and the Baja peninsula so that boaters will never have to travel more than 120 nautical miles to the next stop (one day’s travel by boat) - thus, a "nautical stairway." This massive plan is being designed to promote nautical tourism to Baja's 2,000 miles of coastline, as well as another 1,000 miles of coastline on Mexico's northwest mainland coast.

The plan calls for 22 full-service marinas: 5 of these already exist, 7 exist but will be rebuilt, 10 will be new. The 10 new marinas will be located on sites with natural shelter, or bays, a common feature on the peninsula. It also call for construction of an 70-mile land bridge (or dry canal, a superhighway for cars and trains) across the middle of the Baja peninsula, from Santa Rosalia (on the Pacific side) to Bahia de los Angeles (on the Sea of Cortez side). This land bridge will facilitate the transportation and delivery of yachts up to 55 feet in length into the calm waters of the Sea of Cortez.
Fonatur anticipates that 52,000 American boat owners will sail to these destinations and a good number will permanently move there. Fonatur estimates that 76,400 boats will be cruising the Baja coastlines by 2010 and that there will be 5.4 million nautical tourists by 2014.   

For more information visit, www.thenauticalladder.com.