Norbert, with winds of near 105 mph, was expected to hit land early Saturday along a relatively unpopulated stretch north of the resort of Cabo San Lucas.
Paula Lucero Aviles set out with six children and four other adults in a small fishing boat Friday when they got a cellphone call warning them to return to the port of San Carlos, where the skies had already turned dark with the hurricane's approach.
"We turned back because they warned us bad weather was coming," Aviles said. "We would have been risking our lives. It is coming on strong."
A hurricane warning was issued for the west coast of Baja California from Puerto San Andresito to Agua Blanca. Forecasters said Norbert would weaken somewhat before hitting land.
But the government issued hurricane warnings along the coast of the northwestern border state of Sonora and on the east coast of the Baja peninsula from near La Paz north to Loreto.
Norbert is expected to sweep across Baja on Saturday, cross the Gulf of California and then head toward the Mexican mainland.
The storm's remnants were expected to dump more rain on water-logged West Texas, where authorities were preparing for more flooding.
State and local officials plan to activate an emergency operations center Monday in Presidio, where an earthen levee is struggling to hold back the swollen Rio Grande.
The Governor of Baja California Sur state, Narciso Agundez, said officials here are "very worried."
"It is certain that it will hit land tomorrow in Baja California Sur," one of two states that make up the peninsula, Agundez said.
Under overcast skies, fishermen hauled their boats onto beaches in La Paz, a port town on the peninsula's eastern coast. Yellow flags on beaches warned people to stay out of the water.
Eli and Claudia Tubia, on vacation from Texarkana, Texas, took a cruise Wednesday night despite the coming storm, but their hotel in resort-dotted Cabo San Lucas was already storing outdoor furniture and paintings.
"They kind of cleared out the beach, and the restaurants that they have on the beach, they took all the furnishings away," Eli Tubia said.
Norbert was centered 210 miles west of Baja's southern tip late Friday and was moving north at 12 mph, said the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami.
Meanwhile in southern Mexico, Tropical Storm Odile was approaching the resort of Acapulco, but was expected to remain offshore.
The government extended a tropical storm warning from Lagunas de Chacahua westward past Acapulco and Zihuatanejo to Punta San Telmo, as Odile moved parallel to the Pacific coast with winds of about 60 mph.
Odile was located about 40 miles southeast of Acapulco, and was moving northwest at about 13 mph. Odile could become a hurricane, and a small deviation in its path could bring the storm inland, the hurricane center said.
Forecasters said Odile would sweep close to land on Saturday and could dump as much as 8 inches of rain, threatening dangerous mudslides.
Odile has already caused flooding in Acapulco and forced officials to cancel classes at local schools.
Civil defense officials in the southern state of Guerrero, where Acapulco is located, urged about 10,000 people living along river banks or other dangerous areas to evacuate.
But Adrian Jaimes Celso, who lives in a vulnerable mountainside settlement in Acapulco, said residents "don't know where any shelters are if we have to evacuate, or what provisions have been made."
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