The Voyages Of Galatea

Mazatlan

2010-03-19T23:11:00.000-07:00

[GPS: N 23° 16’ 12” W 106° 27’ 16”]
Doug’s flight home was set for Friday. Sunday was spent relaxing, and going out to dinner with Michael & Laura. So there were 4 days to put the boat away. It was a busy 4 days – and somewhat nerve-wracking trying to decide exactly how to leave it – and how much time there was to do some of the tasks. Should I take the main off, or leave it on and covered? Should I take the halyards out to prevent sun damage? Well, no to both of those.

It seemed like a reunion in the marina - familiar boats included Laura, Juniata, Avalon, Overheated, Maradon, Jabiroo, Ahea Kali, Slacker, ... It was great to see so many familiar faces/boats in the marina - and to get advice and help from many of them as well as from new friends.

Tasks included: top up the fuel (used jerry cans from the nearby Pemex), clean the boat inside and out, clean head, clean out the frig, shut off propane, power off except bilge pump/alarm and solar panels charging, deploy double dock lines with fire hose chafe guard (thank you BFD) and spring lines, remove bimini canvas and dodger windows, secure dodger frame, cover main and wrap/tie a line around the cover, remove jib and staysail, secure lines on deck (furling lines, traveler etc), secure boom, remove wind generator (thank you Michael) and store below, secure anchors on bow, tie down winch cover and binnacle cover, store cushions below, store dinghy motor below, store dinghy and kayak below (thank you Phil & Katie), close thru-hulls, etc…

Hopefully it is well put away for the summer. I hired Tony to help look after the boat – regular topside and bottom cleaning, running engine, airing out, no bugs, etc.

Nuevo Vallarta to Mazatlan

2010-03-14T23:11:00.000-07:00

[GPS: N 20° 45’ 49” W 105° 31’ 06”] - anchorage at Punta Mita
Michael came down on the overnight bus Thursday night, arriving Friday morning. We left at about 10am, motored over to La Cruz marina to the fuel dock to top up, and then out to Punta Mita where we anchored for the night. We figured ca. 30 hours from Punta Mita to Mazatlan – if we went on through we would arrive at night, and waiting until the next morning would give the seas and winds along our route a chance to lay down a little more. We weighed anchor at 5:25am Saturday morning and set off. The trip up to Mazatlan was an uneventful motorsail – arriving at our slip at 8:40 Sunday morning. It was great to have Michael come help me do this passage!

Paradise Village - Nuevo Vallarta

2010-03-05T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 20° 41’ 27” W 105° 17’ 36”]
Doug flew back down to PV (along with the repaired chartplotter and replaced wind transducer) on March 4. Galatea was fine. Juanito had just finished refinishing the teak toerails and coamings – and polishing the stanchions – the boat looked great!

There was a large power yacht berthed along the opposite side of the dock, blocking the view and the wind – but not the surge that still managed to get through.

Doug was originally expecting to spend a week getting the boat back together, a week from PV to Mazatlan (with a couple stops along the way), and a week in Mazatlan putting it away. Since none of the people in the Bay Area that Doug approached as possible crew to help move the boat were available, we tapped Michael (from s/v Laura). They had just gotten to Mazatlan and were spending time with her parents. Michael was going to take a bus from Mazatlan to PV and then help Doug bring Galatea up to Mazatlan. Since he couldn’t be away very long, we planned to do it more as a delivery – no stopping at Chacala or Isla Isabella…

Doug ended up with almost 2 weeks in PV before leaving. He was able to more leisurely put the boat back together – and was able to spend time enjoying the resort and town. There were lots of sailboat races going on – leading up to the Bandaras Bay regatta that would be the weekend after he left. And a movie was being filmed at the resort (grade B – they said the working title was “Blood Coast”):

And he did get to downtown to enjoy the Malecon, including the sand sculptures along the beach:

Berkeley (home)

2010-02-05T23:11:00.000-08:00

It was nice to be home – especially to see our kids and our grandson again. And to sleep in a real bed again! We had planned to be home for about 4 weeks and then go back down for 2-3 months in the Sea of Cortez. However – it turns out we had lost our health insurance, and were denied for the private insurance that we applied for. Rather than trying to find a different private insurance, or going onto COBRA, we decided that Cathy would go back to work. And Doug would plan to go back down to Mexico in March to bring the boat up to Mazatlan to put it away for the summer.

Nuevo Vallarta

2010-02-04T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 20° 41’ 27” W 105° 17’ 36”]
Friday we moved the few miles into the Paradise Village Marina at Nuevo Vallarta, where we would spend 4-5 days getting the boat ready to leave for our February trip home. We were assigned a slip on A dock – the first dock as you come into the marina, facing out towards the breakwater and the bay. We were told by our live-aboard neighbors, Ron & Valerie, that the surge could be severe there – and they suggested we double all of our dock lines.

We spent Saturday just relaxing around the 5-star resort hotel associated with the marina. Marina patrons can use the pools and beach at the resort. And they have a small zoo with 3 tigers and several exotic birds:

On Sunday, it started raining – putting a damper on our cleaning/stowing plans – and kept raining until Thursday morning. Our flight home was Thursday afternoon. It was mostly just light showers.

But Tuesday evening… It was about 11pm and we were just getting in bed. Cathy commented about how the pitter-patter of the rain on the cabin top reminded her of sleeping on our boat in our slip back home. All of sudden, the pitter-patter turned into a hammering, the wind generator started a very fast, high-pitched whine, the boat heeled about 10-15 degrees… tied up at the dock! And it sounded like a truck was running through the marina. We got up and looked out the companionway. The wind was bending the trees at a severe angle, and the rain was coming horizontal. We turned on our VHF. Other boats in the marina were reporting wind gusts as high as 75 knots (85 mph)… in the marina. It blew over 50 knots (60mph) for about 20-30 minutes. We were glad we had tied up so well! Even so, it felt like we could break loose at any moment and go into the million dollar fishing boats berthed on the dock behind us. We realized that our dinghy and kayak which we had left on the dock (without tying them down because we were still working on cleaning them) were no longer on the dock. It was blowing and raining too hard to venture out of the boat to investigate. Finally when the wind abated, we jumped down on the dock. The lid of our dock box was nowhere to be seen, the kayak and blown off and fortunately just nestled between Galatea and the dock. The dinghy we saw almost to the dock behind us – swamped, but still floating with about 2 inches of the gunnels above the water. We went around to the next dock and were able to retrieve it, empty the water, bring it back around, and tie it up. There was no significant damage to our boat or any others in the marina. The boats at anchor a few miles away in La Cruz did not fare as well. We heard reports of one boat dragging anchor and running into another, another dragging onto shore – but was fortunately able to power off on the crest of a wave that came in, unfurled/torn sails, and other damage. The next morning a couple on a Nordhavn 46 (power boat) came into the temporary dock right across from us. They said they had been 100 miles offshore when this storm came through and that they had seen 88 knots (100mph) gust out there! People who had been in the cruising community there for years said they had NEVER seen anything like this – particularly in the winter!

With a few breaks in the rain on Wednesday, and a sunny Thursday morning, we were able to make our flight home on Thursday afternoon – including taking our chartplotter and wind instruments out and packing them to take home with us – to send off to Raymarine for repairs.

La Cruz

2010-01-26T14:18:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 20° 44’ 53” W 105° 22’ 13”]
We left Tenacatita Monday morning. The winds that had been off the coast were supposed to stop and actually turn to a little southerly. So we figured if the seas had calmed down enough we would just run through the night and go all the way to La Cruz in Banderas Bay. It was comfortable enough that we did just that, anchoring off La Cruz just after sunrise on Tuesday.

John and Jan aboard Jabiroo had sailed up from Tenacatita just behind us, and anchored about a hundred yards away from us. We enjoyed spending three nights at La Cruz (except that it was a little rolly) in the anchorage:

There is a new marina at La Cruz, which we used for the dinghy dock when we went into town. It was fairly empty:

It was actually sad what the marina has done to the view from Ana Bananas, a local restaurant with live music several evenings a week. It’s a popular spot for cruisers which was right on the bay, but now overlooks construction of condos near the marina. One day there was a sign up that they were closed because the water was off. Water was on in the rest of town – probably due to construction – perhaps the marina was just trying to push them out?

We spent some time just poking around the town of La Cruz – very authentic Mexican feeling still:

And the nearby town of Bucerias – much more touristy – a short bus ride away or a couple mile walk up the beach.

We enjoyed dinner, music, and dancing Thursday evening at Philos with John & Jan. It was open mic night. One of the musicians was a one-man band with a washboard etc – well known and popular in the community. After a while this 90-year old man, who had been dancing up a storm with his upper-80’s wife got up in a similar gig – but somewhat mocking the musician. Turns out it was the musician’s father.

Tenacatita

2010-01-25T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 19° 17’ 56” W 104° 50’ 16”]
On Friday, we left for the 10 mile trip around the corner to Tenacatita Bay. As we entered the bay, we followed one rainstorm in, and just managed to miss the next one coming behind it. There were typically two dozen boats anchored in the main bay.

We stayed 10 nights in Tenacatita. It’s a beautiful spot. There’s a nice long beach with a relatively easy dinghy landing. The Blue Bay resort hotel is at the eastern end and a palapa restaurant at the western end where there is an entrance to a jungle river that goes to the backside of the next beach in Tenacatita Bay. There were a couple of overcast days, but mostly the sky was cloudless blue, and the temperatures typically ranged from lows in the upper 60’s to highs in the mid 80’s. The water was clear (we could see our anchor down through 25’ of water) and a perfect temperature – refreshing and not too cold. Snorkeling around the bay was good.

We ended up feeling like real cruising here - it’s hard to remember what happened one day vs. another. A typical day would start with breakfast while listening to the nets on the radio - Amigo net on SSB at 8am that essentially covers all of Pacific coast of Mexico and the local net for Tenacatita and Barra on VHF at 9am. Late morning we might take a trip up the jungle river and a walk around the beach there and a trip to the tienda for a few groceries – or we might stay on the boat for a few chores – or paddle our kayak over to the rocks near shore for some snorkeling. Most days at 1:30, Rita and Darrell on Overheated hosted a swim to shore. Swimmers would swim about ¼ mile to shore while Darrell would follow along in a dinghy to carry things for the beach and to fend off any pangas. After arriving at shore, we would take a walk along the beach up to the end where the resort hotel is, then walk back for a game of bocce ball on the beach or perhaps Mexican train (dominos). Then we would finish up with some drinks at the palapa restaurant, and get back out to the boats (sometimes swimming back) around 4 or 4:30. Then a couple hours of playing music or reading or internet (with cocktails), followed by dinner, and then a movie.

Robert on Harmony with his wife Virginia is the current “Mayor of Tenacatita”, and organizes/hosts a dinghy raft-up party every Friday afternoon. Each of the two Fridays there were 17 dinghies that came – everyone brought appetizers to share (enough for a meal!) and introduced themselves. The second Friday included a talent show, so Cathy and I played a tune on the button box and mandolin. We shared a couple delightful dinners with John & Jan on Jabiroo (another IP that we met on the Baja HaHa) and (re)learned how to play Rook.

The jungle river goes 2½ miles through some pretty dense mangroves overhanging the narrow river and comes out to a small lagoon, where you can leave your dinghy and take a short walk up to the road and the beach (Playa Tenacatita) which is around a point from our anchorage (still in Tenacatita Bay). There are several palapa restaurants on the beach, a couple hotels, and a small tienda where we stocked up on a few more essential groceries.

Just over a hill there is another beach on a small bay (still inside the main Tenacatita Bay) where there are a bunch of RVers who look like they’ve been there a while, and a short walk across to the Pacific side.

We kept our sunshades up most of the time – I promised a picture of them…

Barra de Navidad

2010-01-15T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS (lagoon) N 19° 11' 30" W 104° 40' 21"]
On Saturday, with light winds on our nose, we motored the four hours from Manzanillo Bay to Bahia Navidad, taking advantage of the time to make water. We stopped at the fuel dock on the way to the lagoon and filled up – this time the pump was working, but we had to wait for one of the two megayachts at the diesel dock to finish pumping his 2000 liters. We then made our way on back to the lagoon, with the aid of gps waypoints we had gotten that outlined the 8’ depth line. We anchored near the north edge.

The lagoon is a shallow area about 1 mile in diameter, with an area deep enough for anchoring (> 8’) about 1/4 mile in diameter. You enter through a channel on the east side of Bahia Navidad. As you enter the channel, the town of Barra de Navidad is on the left (photo to right), followed by a smaller, shallower lagoon with Pig Island in the middle. On the right is a resort hotel, the marina (2nd most expensive we’ve seen in Mexico – would be about $100 a night for us – we chose to anchor out), the fuel dock, and then a little village of Colimilla. (Note: the picture is from the north side of the channel on the malecon at Barra de Navidad looking back towards the lagoon.) The water in the lagoon is muddy and dirty, so no watermaking in the lagoon. There were some mosquitos, but the winds that came up every afternoon helped keep them at bay. There would be panga fisherman in the lagoon every morning and evening and sometimes through out the night. Our plan was to stay a couple of nights.
We ended up staying 6 nights. There was no internet available in the lagoon – neither 3G data card nor wireless, so we would go into one of the restaurants in Colimilla or to the Sands Hotel in Barra for internet.

One of the amenities of being the lagoon (or the expensive marina) is that there is a local French baker who comes around every morning with fresh baguettes, croissants, tarts, etc. It’s almost like having the Berkeley Cheese Board deliver to the boat.

We got a few groceries to tide us over at a small tienda in Colimilla, and had a lady in Colimilla do our laundry for 12 pesos ($1) per kilogram. We spent some time just exploring around Barra de Navidad, including finding the port captain to do our check-in/check-out paperwork.

The best day was just hanging out at the Sands Hotel. If you buy food or beverage, they allow cruisers to use their pool. So we spent one lovely afternoon having lunch, internet, playing Mexican train (dominos), and taking dips in their pool.

Las Hadas (Manzanillo Bay)

2010-01-09T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS (Las Hadas) N 19 06 04 W 104 20 42]
Las Hadas resort with its Moorish-influenced Spanish villas on the east slope of Punta Santiago, was inspired by a famous Moorish fairytale called “The Fairies” (Las Hadas). The resort is probably most famous for being the location of the film “10”. At the base of the hotel is the marina, the oldest pleasure marina on the Mexican Pacific coast, with all Med-mooring tie-ups (i.e. stern to the one long dock that goes around the perimeter of the marina basin). We were anchored just outside the marina and just off the Las Hadas beach. The cove is pretty well protected and very calm – except for the wakes from the jet skiers and ski-pangas that circle (and cut through) the anchorage.

Tuesday, we went into the marina to do laundry and scope it out. The marina looked a bit worn – and the bathrooms and showers were not inviting enough to use – but it was a nice place to be able to tie up the dinghy when we went ashore. We finished our laundry – each washer or dryer load was 60 pesos ($5)! Rather expensive – but it is a resort. We are running pretty low on fuel, and found that the fuel dock at the marina was out of diesel. So we decided to take our two jerry jugs to a Pemex station. Closest one was a ½ mile hike up the hill to the bus stop and then a bus ride over to the main highway. The sky looked a little threatening. As we were riding the bus back, the wind picked up. As the bus made its way out the west side of Punta Santiago (overlooking Bahia Santiago on the other side of the point), we could see whitecaps. We got our jugs off the bus, down the hill to the dinghy, and back out to the boat. Just as we finished getting onto the boat, it started pouring – and rained off and on the rest of the day and on through the night. People in the anchorage said they actually had gusts up to 30 knots just before the rain. And a boat that was underway coming around from Bahia Santiago, said they got hit with 35-40 knots. We were just glad that we weren’t there – and that our boat’s anchor held! (Have we said how pleased we are with the Manson Supreme anchor that we have as our primary?)

Thursday, Doug took a bus trip into Manzanillo – around the other side of the bay. It’s much larger than Zihuatanejo – and much more industrial – with numerous container cranes along the water just before getting to downtown.

There were generally about 10-12 boats in the anchorage at Las Hadas – and we met most of the other people there. Avalon (Phil & Katie) from the HaHa and LaPaz were there. And Gary & Cindy aboard Distant Shores taught us a new game – “Pegs and Jokers” – kind of like Sorry but with playing cards. One afternoon Cathy had 4 other women over to Galatea for a game of Mexican Train (dominos), while the men all gathered on Optical Illusion for beer and chatting. On Friday evening, a group of 11 of us went ashore to a restaurant for dinner together.

The water was very clear, so we would often take a swim off the boat – sometimes swimming over to another boat. One afternoon we cleaned our bottom by free-diving. One morning, we heard a bunch of splashing around the boat. When we went up to look, we saw some gulls around and a couple pelicans diving into the water – but not enough for all the splashing. Then we heard some thumping on the hull of the boat. We went to the deck and watched over the edge. There were probably 10-12 what looked like tuna – about 2 feet long on average, swimming around the boat. They would herd together a small school of these needle-nose fish and then go for them – splashing all around. The gulls were flying all around for the orts. The needle-nose fish would swim around the boat or under to the other side, and then the larger fish would find them and start herding them again. This went on for about an hour. We got some video – but Doug mistakenly erased them - sorry….

Ixtapa to Manzanillo (Las Hadas)

2010-01-04T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS (Maruata): N 18° 16' 05" W 103° 20' 41"]
[GPS (Cabeza Negra): N 18° 36' 15" W 103° 42' 07"]
[GPS (Las Hadas): N 19° 06' 04" W 104° 20' 42"]

We had a quiet New Year’s Eve at Marina Ixtapa – including dinner at the pizza place. Magda and her friend Ricardo had come back to Ixtapa as well, so they came by the boat on New Years Day. Ricardo had brought a case of avocados for us from his avocado ranch. After showing him the boat, we had lunch at Fisher’s – the fish restaurant on the walk by the marina. After a relaxing Friday evening, we spent Saturday morning getting the boat ready to depart. After two weeks in Marina Ixtapa, we cast off at 1pm on Saturday for our last overnight trip before Puerto Vallarta.

There are not many good anchorages along the coast from Ixtapa to Manzanillo (180 NM), but then quite a few good ones on from Manzanillo to Chamela (60 NM). So we planned to get on up to Manzanillo fairly quickly, and then spend our time along the “Gold Coast” from Manzanillo to Chamela.

We targeted Maruata for our first stop – 105 NM away, so we planned to run overnight. After mostly motoring (we’re heading back uphill now – wind was either too light and/or right on the nose), we pulled into Maruata at 8am. It’s a very pretty beach – and it looked like the large restaurants along the beach had closed – and there were camper tents set up under that shade of the former restaurant seating areas. But it was quite rolly! And a panga was anchored with a long line in the one spot that looked ideal. So we dropped the hook for a few hours – had a nice breakfast and a couple hour nap – and then headed on.

We pulled around Cabeza Negra into the anchorage on the north side of the point late Sunday afternoon. It too was a little rolly, but we set the anchor just outside a power boat that was there (which left just after dark). We got up early and got underway for Manzanillo – it was a short trip but we wanted to avoid beating into the afternoon chop.

We passed the huge smokestacks of the power plant just south of Manzanillo (pollution!), rounded Roca Vela (Sail Rock) into Manzanillo Bay, dodged a container ship as we cut across to the NW corner of the bay where we anchored just off the Las Hadas hotel.

Morelia

2009-12-31T23:11:00.000-08:00

Monday, Lizz left to fly back home. Jena and Hugo were going to Morelia (and then on to Mexico City for New Year’s Eve) – so Hugo’s mother invited us to join them in Morelia. We gladly accepted. So the remaining 10 of us made the 4 hour drive inland to Morelia in 2 cars.

Morelia is in a valley at 6400’ elevation. So we went from Ixtapa (highs ca. 88, lows ca. 72) to Morelia (highs ca. 72, lows ca. 45) – fortunately they had warned us to bring a sweater. Morelia is a colonial city, founded in 1541 as Valladolid. In 1581 (?) it was made the capital of the state of Michoacan (which in those days encompassed more than just today’s state of Michoacan). In 1828 the name was changed to Morelia in honor of its native son, Jose Maria Morelos, who rose from the his low birth status to become the architect and hero of the Mexican War of Independence. The historic center of the city was designated a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1991.

We had a lovely 3-night / 2-day visit in Morelia. Magda (Hugo’s mother) was a gracious host. We stayed (along with Jena and Hugo) in her lovely house – 3 bedrooms plus an extra bedroom/bath that she had added in the back. She made us fresh-squeezed juice, fresh fruit, and bread / pastries every morning for breakfast. We had three lovely dinners – first at a local buffet restaurant, second at J.Campos – a local place with great tacos al pastor (see picture to right), and then at Las Trojes - a traditional Mexican restaurant (named after the traditional housing of the indigenous people of Morelia).

Hugo and Magda showed us around some of Morelia’s downtown spots – including the University which was the hot-bed of revolutionary thinking leading up to Mexico’s war for independence, the Palacio Clavijero (former Jesuit college) with its museum including a special exhibit on the archeology and hieroglyphs of the Mayans, the downtown Mercado along one side of the Palacio, and a House of Crafts in an old church cloister. The latter was a combination museum and workshop with copper items, pottery, ceramics, woodcarvings, lacquerware, and other crafts from the local region. In the evening they drove us up into the hills for a beautiful view looking down on the lights of Morelia.

On Wednesday morning we (with Jena, Hugo, and Magda) took a 4-hour private tour with Miguel (whose English was great) in his air-conditioned van (though we did get out and walk much of the time – particularly around the downtown sites). We went to the main cathedral downtown, Templo de las Rosas (a Dominican convent and home of the oldest school for liturgical music in the Western Hemisphere) and adjoining Jardin de las Rosas, the birthplace (and museum) of Morelos (who was a half Indian/half black whose mother had walked into town to market and gave birth to him essentially in the stable area of one of the large downtown homes), along the arches of an aqueduct (from late 1700’s was primary means of bringing water to the city that was built in a high part of the valley), the fountain of three women, along Calzada Fray Antonio de San Miguel (a tree-shaded pedestrian street with the summer homes of the more aristocratic families of early Morelia), to the Santuario of Guadalupe (lavish baroque church with highly ornate handmade painted ceramics adorning the walls).

That afternoon Cathy went to a place (that Jena, Hugo and Magda had already “tested”) for a haircut – hers was about $7.50 – more expensive than Doug’s, but hers included a shampoo.

Thursday morning, we took a bus non-stop from Morelia to Ixtapa. More comfortable than a plane! Air-conditioned, with thick curtains that closed well, full-length leg/foot rests, chairs that reclined almost to a bed, and 2 movies (one was even in English with Spanish subtitles).

What a great trip!

Ixtapa / Zihuatanejo

2009-12-28T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 17° 39' 59" W 101° 36' 58"]
Saturday, December 19 we moved on from the island to Marina Ixtapa. We had intended to stay in the marina just a couple days to wash down the boat, laundry, etc, and then move on to anchor in Bahia Zihuatanejo just around the corner. But with the visitors we had, and all the coming and going, it was much easier to be at a dock. So we ended up in the marina for 2 weeks. And this is now the farthest south and east the boat will go. From Berkeley Yacht Club, we have now traveled 20° 12’ to the south and 20° 42’ to the east.

Saturday was spent cleaning the boat and putting our laundry in to be done. There are no Laundromats in Ixtapa, but the marina has someone who picks up your laundry and does it for 16 pesos per kilogram. The restrooms/showers behind the marina office apparently have their water heated by solar tanks on the roof – so early morning showers are not advisable unless you need to cool off. The building housing the marina office looked like it had a deserted restaurant and club area – and signs around that we think translated to “in foreclosure”. Along the walk by the marina there are 5 or 6 restaurants – mostly overpriced – but there was a pizza place and a fish restaurant that were somewhat reasonable. And several shops – little grocery, yacht broker, liquor store, jewelry store, etc. We walked on out the road past some condos to the local beach. On the way back into our dock, we noticed the sign warning of crocodiles – not to feed them and no fishing. We sat in the cockpit as the sun went down, and watched a 6’ crocodile slowly swim by our transom as he pushed his tail to one side then the other.

Sunday we took the local bus (8 pesos) into Zihuatanejo – about 5-6 km away, over a hill – essentially the next little bay. Unlike Ixtapa which was invented/created as a resort community about 25 years ago, Zihuatanejo was an old fishing village and is rather quaint. Doug got a 30 peso ($2.50) haircut that was one of the best he’s ever gotten. We walked through town (most of the shops were closed on Sunday) to the municipal pier and beach. After lunch (con cervezas) on the beach, we walked through the local Mercado (market) on the way back to get the return bus.

Monday morning we scoped the “town” of Ixtapa. There are hotels all along the beach, with the main road behind them. Across the road are boutique shops, restaurants, banks, etc. We understand the restaurants there are struggling since many of the hotels are now “all inclusive” – i.e. room, food, drinks, entertainment all included for one price. We went into about 5 hotels to scope them out – two of them mentioned that they have day passes to use their beach area and pools even though you’re not staying there. Monday afternoon Lizz (our daughter) arrived. We had dinner at the Z-pizza place overlooking the marina.

Tuesday we decided to take advantage of those day passes at an Ixtapa hotel. We first stopped at the one where yesterday at the front desk they had told us just put a refundable deposit down for towel, pay for your food and drinks and you can use the pools and beach. No go. The manager was at the desk this time – and he said no way – they are full and their guests need to use the pool and beach chairs etc. So we went to the second which was an all-inclusive day pass. They gave us a hard time too, but we did end up getting the day passes for 550 pesos (ca. $45) each. We spent a relaxing day laying under a palapa on the beach reading and drinking margaritas – with occasional breaks for playing in the surf and eating at the restaurant.

Wednesday, Magda (Hugo’s mother) came to the boat to meet us. She took us to her house (she lives in Morelia but has a vacation townhouse in Ixtapa in a new community a few kilometers inland. She took us to the grocery in Zihuatanejo for some provisioning, and then we went to the airport to pick up Jena (our older daughter) and Hugo (her boyfriend).

Thursday (Christmas Eve), the girls spent mid-day at the local beach. Late afternoon we went to Magda’s for Christmas Eve dinner. We had a wonderful meal featuring bacalao - a Mexican dish made from dried salted cod that has been rehydrated. Also there were Christian (Hugo’s brother), and Fabian and Alfredo (Hugo’s cousins) – all in their early 20’s. After dinner we enjoyed some karaoke of Mexican songs, and then some present opening.

Lizz had brought some things down for us – besides some things needed for the boat, the best Christmas present was a book of Zack (our first grandson) pictures that Lynda and Paul had put together. And of course the new World Almanac from Doug’s mother. And a CD from cousin David of his pictures (he used real film!) from the Baja Ha-Ha.

Christmas day we invited the whole group (9 of us total) to go out on the boat to Isla Grande (Isla Ixtapa). We anchored in the cove, had lunch in the cockpit, then various of us went snorkeling, swimming, kayaking, dinghying, or just rested on the boat. All the guys and Jena went to shore and went snorkeling in the cove on the other side of the island - just 50 yard walk through the restaurant that has palapas on both coves. Since there were 6 of us and only 3 sets of snorkel gear, we camped out under a palapa drinking beer while we took turns snorkeling. There are no boats on this side – they used to anchor in the cove, but were destroying the coral there. But it was much more crowded with swimmers. The snorkeling was actually better in the cove on the side where we anchored. We tried sailing for a bit on the way back, but there wasn’t much wind. What a different Christmas Day!

Saturday morning we did some housekeeping on the boat after having it out. Then we went in Zihuatanejo and met our friends Kathie and Rick. We had seen them on their boat in La Paz – they moved to Zihuatanejo some 2-3 years ago. They met us on the beach and we walked with them to their beautiful house that they had built. They walked us around town, showing us some of their favorite shops and restaurants. Zihuatanejo was even better with the aid of locals! We had dinner at a local Mexican restaurant, and then to a bar for drinks while listening to a gringo duo singing 50’s, 60’s and 70’s songs. Kathie and Rick offered that we stay at their house that night instead of heading back to Ixtapa – so we did. We were awakened by roosters crowing back and forth across the neighborhood - and then a cacophony of bird sounds from a nearby neighbor who raises parrots and other birds.

Sunday we spent the whole day on Playa Quieta with Hugo’s family. Playa Quieta is more on the north side of Ixtapa – there is a Club Med at the beach, and just off the beach is Isla Grande! Besides the 9 that we had for Christmas, Hugo’s uncle and aunt (Fer and Miriam) also joined us. The boys wanted to play with our kayak, so they tied it on top of one of the cars – with 6 in the car (one with feet sticking out) – it was quite a sight. We had a great day just relaxing on the beach.

[Alfredo not pictured since he took it...]

Life on the Boat – Water Management

2009-12-21T23:11:00.000-08:00

Water, water everywhere - nor any drop to drink. One of the best decisions we made while outfitting the boat was to add a watermaker. Our Spectra watermaker is programmed to run in 1 hour increments. If the battery bank is above 85% (thank you solar panels) or if we foresee an extended period of motoring, we run the little desalination plant and top off our water tank. This allows us to shower daily, do a little hand laundry, wash the cockpit down, keep up with the dishes, and flush the head with fresh water.

We discovered early on while sailing in San Francisco Bay that it wasn’t what you flush down that creates the off-smell in the boat, but what one flushed with – seawater. Seawater is full of organisms that once sucked into the hoses, quickly die and give off a sulfur-like smell. Flushing with fresh water eliminates this, and in our experience, the need for using chemicals in the head.

No one on this boat likes to do dishes. Cathy feels strongly about not using disposable plates or cups. So through the day, we seem to accumulate a sink full of dishes. If we’re underway and the seas are calm enough, we try to wash up after every meal, even if it’s just 2 bowls, 2 spoons, and 2 cups. But after dinner, if we play some cards or watch a movie, once you’re tired, the thought of doing dishes before going to bed is too much to bear. And we usually just leave them until the morning.

Living onboard a boat with our daily activities, in an environment with daytime temperatures usually well into the 80's, and between 40 and 90 percent humidity, it gets hot. We look forward to arriving at our destination, a quick dive to check the anchor, a cool shower, followed by drinks in the cockpit (if the sun is low enough). However, there are days when no matter how few clothes you have on, you simply cannot cool off. Doug has taken to just living in his “pajamas” (Hugo – you know what we mean), and Cathy wears quick-dry Capri pants and the largest t-shirt she can find. She also keeps a moist bandana around her neck for the evaporation value.

We drink lots of water – desalinated water. If we’ve anchored out, even on the hottest days, once the sun is down and the land starts to cool off, the breezes turn coolish, and with the help of our 12volt fans, we are able to sleep in the V-berth somewhat comfortably. In anchorages, we can jump overboard and take a cool swim – and then rinse off with fresh water using the spigot in our cockpit. But in a marina, for two reasons – both health related – that is not a possibility. First of all, no one seems to use the pumpout stations here. In fact, some marinas don’t even have operational pumpout stations. And secondly, many of the marinas are built in natural estuaries, and at these latitudes, that means crocodiles. The first sign we saw alerting us to this was in Puerto Vallarta. And we actually saw a crocodile swim by our transom in Ixtapa just after sunset.

Actually the hardest place for water management is in the marinas. At least we don’t use as much, since for example we shower on shore. But we cannot make water in the marina since the water is generally too dirty and would gum up the membranes quickly. Is the water at the dock potable? In Cabo the marina office told us “well I drink it, but you probably shouldn’t”. While in La Paz we were told “it’s drinkable – but I wouldn’t drink it.” So we don’t. We use it to flush the toilet, wash down the boat, rinse out salty clothes (salt attarcts water, so clothes will never dry if the salt water hasn't been rinsed away) – but use our watermaker water for dishes, showers, and drinking.

Our water tank holds 170 gallons. With the watermaker, we really don’t worry that much about how much we use. And we carry 10 gallons of emergency water in 2 liter jugs and are never very far from land. I can’t tell you how much per day we really need – but I guess I could go back and calculate it from our records of watermaker usage. Our Ventura model watermaker will make about 8 gallons per hour. When we run it, we generally like to run it for several hours. We feel like this is most efficient, because we don’t collect the first gallon or so that comes off (but we do catch it in containers to use for flushing), and there is a fresh water rinse that happens at the end of the operation cycle. But more importantly, we found it is best after every use to take the filters out, rinse them and soak them with fresh water, and let them dry. We were a bit surprised when we were heading from Cabo to La Paz, and the water being produced had a very sulfury smell. Don’t want to put that in our tanks! So what do we do… read the manual! There it is – in warmer water that promotes a lot of algae growth, leaving seawater in the filters, allows the algae to die and give off a sulfur odor. (We knew that .....) The manual suggests the rinse/soak/dry cycle after each use.

Isla Grande (Ixtapa)

2009-12-18T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 17° 40’ 44” W 101° 39’ 25”]
Thursday morning early we got underway towards Isla Grande (Ixtapa) as we expected a fairly long day. We made good time – again mixed motoring and sailing. Even flew the asymmetric for a couple hours. Late afternoon, we pulled into the small cove anchorage on the north side of Isla Grande (Ixtapa). We had essentially made it to our destination. We celebrated with margaritas in the cockpit:

There was a lot of activity during the day – a couple large powerboats anchored, a couple jetskis running around, pangas bringing people and taking them out, several restaurants on the beach. But people are not allowed on the island at night. So shortly after 5pm, everyone started leaving – and then the restaurant crews cleaned up a little and also left. We had the anchorage to ourselves.

Friday morning we did some snorkeling along the rocks on the west side of the cove and out to the point – where we saw a good variety of reef fish. Blackdragon, a Catalina 34 that was on the HaHa had come into the anchorage, so we swam over and talked with them for a while – Steve & Tracey and their 2 children and dog – plus another couple with 1 child who were visiting them. In the afternoon we rowed to shore in our dinghy (didn’t want to bother getting the motor down), had fajitas, tacos, y cervezas at one of the restaurants. There was a vendor selling shells on the beach – including conch shells that he pound a small hole into so you could use it as a horn… we bought one! – but still working on being able to blow it reliably. We walked to the other side of the island (about 50 yards – the restaurants had tables on beaches on both sides). The cove on the south side had a lot of people snorkeling. Boats used to anchor in the south cove – but there is coral there, and the anchors were destroying the coral, so it is no longer allowed. There were a lot of people snorkeling on that side. We will save that for a day when we come back out here with our girls who are coming down for Christmas.

Caleta de Campos

2009-12-16T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 18 ° 04’ 21” W 102 ° 45’ 03”]
Tuesday morning we got a leisurely start out. Our farthest possible target was about 24 hours away – if we kept good speed we would come in early in the dark, and if we were slow we would still get in during the day. We got another treat of dolphins tagging along with us – this time carrying a couple passengers - I think they are called remora fish:

We made pretty good time, mixed motoring and sailing – and came into Caleta de Campos at 8am. We anchored right around a breakwater in fairly shallow water (15' at low tide). There was a lot of activity in the water. Early in the morning pangas of fishermen went out, and older kids were fishing from the breakwater. There were families and kids on the beach. When some of the fishermen got back, there were about a dozen kids that took one of the pangas out into the cove, and were buzzing around pulling one kid on a wakeboard and another on a single ski. If someone fell, they would swim to shore – and other kids would swim out again to join the boat. They came close to us and yelled Chocolada? At first we waved them off and said no – but we did have some chocolate bars still in the freezer – so we pulled out 4 and called them over. As the panga approached, 4 or 5 of the kids dove into the water and swam towards the boat. We said – “solo cuatro” and indicated they needed to share. We signaled for the oldest kid who was driving the boat to come closer, and we gave them all to him to dole out.

Feeling rested from a morning nap, we decided to go to the beach to one of the restaurants – thinking if we stayed two nights, the next day we would walk on up into the town to go exploring. We rowed our dinghy to the corner farthest inside the breakwater to avoid any surf in our landing. The restaurants had large, fairly deserted covered areas overlooking the beach. We picked one, got our beers, and sat waiting for our food. As we looked out over our boat (picture to right), we could see how much the swell picked it up as it came to shore and broke as ca. 3 foot waves. We started feeling our boat was perhaps too close to shore. Then we saw 2 kids swim out towards our boat. They started playing with the float ball that we had attached to our anchor to indicate its location. We thought; "Please don’t fool around with that and trip the anchor.." . Then they swam over to the bow of the boat and started climbing on the chain – standing up where our snubber was attached to the anchor chain and diving off. Did we turn the breaker off for the windlass? If they climb up on the foredeck and accidentally step on those foot switches, they could screw up our anchor – what if the boat broke loose? Cathy went to the edge of the water and yelled, waving her arms. They eventually saw her, gave a friendly wave of their arms and swam away from the boat. Still sitting waiting for our food… and another couple kids swim out to the boat. They go to the stern, and start playing with our “tarzan” line that we have hanging from the arch to help us climb out of the dingy and onto the boat. Then one of them starting climbing into the cockpit. We both went to the edge of the water, yelling and waving. The people on the beach just looked at us blankly. The kids eventually started swimming away as well. We went to the kitchen and asked for our food to go!In Cathy's broken Spanish she said " Cena? No a qui....los ninos....(dinner? not here... the boys)" and then indicated with her fingers climbing. The owner and her maother had a heated discussion about los ninos, and the beautiful platters of lobster/shrimp/and fish we hjad ordered were quickly moved to styrofoam containers. It was ashame because they had taken so much time arranging the platters so creatively. After we got back to the boat, a teenage couple swam out. We invited them into the cockpit. They were just looking for a place to rest before swimming back. Curiosity?

Anyway, we decided we would not be leaving the boat there the next day to go more into town, so we may as well enjoy our dinner in the cockpit and plan to head on out in the morning.

Punta Mita to Barra de Navidad

2009-12-14T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS (Punta Ipala): N 20° 14' 13" W 105° 34' 21"]
[GPS (Chamela): N 19° 35' 00" W 105° 07' 42"]
[GPS (Tenacatita): N 19° 17' 47" W 104° 50' 10"]
[GPS (Melaque): N 19° 13' 08" W 104° 42' 41"]

Friday morning we started the long trek southeast towards Ixtapa/Zihuatanejo. There were mixed reports about how much the winds would have calmed down around Cabo Corrientes, so we thought we would leave early. When we got up at 6am, it was still dark. A boat had pulled in and anchored next to us, and during the night the wind had shifted and the boats had swung to where we were concerned that he was close to sitting on top of our anchor. So we decided to wait until light, so that we could see better in case we had to get too close to him as we pulled our anchor up. Turned out to be no problemo. As we passed the cape, the winds were only about 15 kts and only 3-4 foot seas, and we sailed by the cape making a little over 8 knots SOG (speed over ground) over a 2 hour period. Cabo Corrientes = Cape of Currents! – this time in our favor.

We went about 15 miles further down the coast to the first decent anchorage – Punta Ipala. It’s a narrow little cove with rocks on the left and right and a submerged one to avoid near the middle, a beach in front, with a little village on the left end of the beach with about 10 pangas scattered just out into the cove, and some moored net thing in the middle of the cove that we had to dodge. We were the only sailboat there, and plunked down in the middle of the clearest ? spot, to the amusement of some old people sitting on a breezy balcony on the shore. Then another boat came in about an hour after us.

Saturday we motored (no wind!) from Punta Ipala to Bahia de Chamela. We put a hand line out with a bright “Mexico” lure, and within an hour caught a little 19” Mexican bonito. And a little later we caught these dolphins on video:

It was a short day Sunday from Chamela to Tenacatita, so on the way we took detours to check out possible anchorages for the way back up.

The first, Paraiso, was instructive about the use of charts and cruising guides. First of all, the only paper charts are of such large scale (approx. 1:700,000) that they are not very useful for navigating close to shore into these small anchorages. And the electronic charts (except in city/harbor areas) are of such low resolution – and usually are about a mile off (we look to be further north or east than we really are) so it looks like we are anchoring on well inland. So we mostly rely on cruising guides. These are written by cruisers - we have Charlie’s Charts, Pat & John Rains’ Mexico Boating Guide, and Sean & Heather's book that just covers the Sea of Cortez. These books are great for the sketches of anchorages, including the approaches and rocks to watch out for, but are all “not for navigation”. Sometimes Charlie’s and Rains’ don’t really agree. Paraiso was a case in point, where Charlie’s makes it look like a nice, >1/4 mile across anchorage. There’s a plantation estate home there, that one of the books says has armed guards so don’t go ashore – wonder what they are growing :-). What Charlie’s doesn’t have is the huge rock that Rains’ has drawn in the middle of the anchorage. The rock IS there – and is huge! Like 100' tall and 100' in diameter. So the anchorage is MUCH more cozy than imagined. Rains had the rock, but the rocks in the entrance were much better represented by Charlie. When we’ve thought of it, we have captured images from Google Earth to help us – think we will try to be more diligent about doing that. It’s generally not a good idea to go into these unknown anchorages at night!

Next place we scoped out was Careyes, small 3-lobed anchorage in a gorgeous setting with cliffs around, luxurious private homes on the cliffs, and on the 3 beaches condos, club med, hotels, and restaurants. As we rounded Punta Farallon, there was an odd hemispherical building on the point (see right). And then it was on to Tenacatita, a large bay with several anchoring locations, a couple snorkeling spots, and a jungle river that you can do by dinghy. We’ll definitely spend time at these on the way back up.

For the next legs, we originally expected to do 3 or 4 day hops to Caleta de Campos, but instead decided to do a very short day on Monday to go into Barra de Navidad for fuel, and then do an overnight to Campos. We went through the channel on the eastern end of Bahia de Navidad, past the marina, and pulled into the fuel dock. There was another sailboat on the other side of the dock – and then we noticed the fuel pump was taken apart – at least there were a couple guys there working on it. The other boat (which was a delivery from Miami to Newport via the canal), said they had been waiting a couple hours, and it wasn’t clear when it would be fixed. We only needed about 30 gallons, so we decided to use our two 5-gallon jerry jugs and carted diesel in from the Pemex station up on the road near the fuel dock. Of course, just as we got back with the last jug, they got the pump working again! At least we saved the 13% mark-up for fuel dock services – since Pemex is nationalized, the government sets the price of gas, but marina fuel docks can add a service charge.

Most cruisers anchor in a large, shallow lagoon further on east from the fuel dock, but we decided to go out to the NW corner of Bahia de Navidad and anchored off Melaque. The beach had many fairly rundown looking restaurants and hotels, and a huge cell tower – so we figured we would get good internet connection there – but the 3G service kept dropping our connection…

Paradise Village (Nuevo Vallarta) and back to Punta Mita

2009-12-10T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 20° 41' 53" W 105° 17' 40"]
Monday morning we made the trip across Banderas Bay to Paradise Village at Nuevo Vallarta in intermittent drizzle and showers. As we passed La Cruz we notice a rainbow remarkable in that it was so low that you could see where both ends touched the ground. It was the first time either of us had seen that.

We had been to P.V. before - 5 years ago with Bruce & Bobbie when we crewed for them aboard Music (IP40) on the 2004 Baja HaHa. As this was not an originally scheduled stop over and we didn’t have a reservation, we called the marina and crossed our fingers. Dick Markie came through and assigned us a slip and then sent out a panga to lead us to it... ALL the way down the river, just before a bridge. We passed 3 Island Packets on the way – Lyon Around (a 38), Armagh (a 40), and Crème Brulee (a 380 – Bill & Cynthia that we know from the Bay Area – but they were not there), and then pulled in next to another – Gratitude, a 370 with Frank, Nancy and son Nick aboard.

Doug walked back to the office to check in. When he did, he asked Dick Markie, the harbormaster, if he had a recommendation for someone to work on Raymarine electronics. He said Jorge – his shop is right in Paradise Village. And what about windlass. Again, Jorge. And he speaks English well. So Doug walked right back to the boat. As he approached, he saw someone in the cockpit with Cathy, working on the chartplotter. Jorge! What service. Dick must have called him, gave him our slip number, and he came right over and jumped on it. Before the end of the afternoon, the chartplotter was working (but we will probably send it to factory in February for some overhaul) and the windlass serviced and working well. But with high winds and square seas predicted around Cabo Corrientes (the cape heading south out of Bandaras Bay), we decided to just stay put for a few days.

Walking back along the docks, Armagh (the IP40) looked strangely familiar… red canvas… two Bruce anchors?? It had to be Music! The owners were not around. But then it turned out they stopped by later to see our arch. Sure enough, Armagh is the former Music that we had crewed on from San Diego to Nuevo Vallarta. They are the second owners since Bruce & Bobbie – it was Fire Escape in between.

Tuesday was mostly a relaxing day. In the morning we put up our Shadetree shades – they help keep the sun off the boat, but let the breeze blow under them. We got them years ago (off Craigs list?), but had never really set them up – so we spent a good bit of time just futzing with how to best deploy them. (I forgot to take any pictures, so will try to do so for a future posting). The afternoon included a swim in the pool at the resort (marina guests have resort privileges!) and that evening we had an excellent shrimp dinner at the resort in the restaurant on the beach during another beautiful sunset.

Wednesday morning was laundry, Pilates class for Cathy, and visit to the Port Captain for Doug (to check in and out – managed both with one visit since you can check in up to 48 hours after arrival and check out up to 24 hours before departure). Wednesday afternoon we took a bus into Puerto Vallarta, where we walked around the old town, including going by the places where Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton stayed when filming Night of the Iguana in PV. Note bridge connecting the 2 houses... Then we walked down the Malecon, including going through a naval museum and admiring the sculptures on the beach. We ended up with an early dinner and 2-for-1 margaritas at a restaurant on the Malecon before catching the buses back to our boat.

Thursday we headed back to Punta Mita. It was a short trip, we had all day, it was a nice day, and there was 10 knots of wind. So even though the wind was on our nose, we sailed all the way out – tacking back and forth. The furling gear seemed to work smoother after the rain, maybe washing away some dirt and salt crystals from places we can’t reach with the hose. We put our anchor down very close to where we had been on Sunday night, watched some surfers riding the waves into the beach while we played another round of Mille Bornes in the cockpit, and then went to bed for another rolly night.

Mazatlan to Punta Mita

2009-12-06T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 20° 45' 50" W 105 ° 31' 16"]
We left Mazatlan at 11am Friday, just after the high tide – expecting about 28-30 hours to Punta Mita, just inside the NW corner of Banderas Bay. There was no wind for the first 11 hours, so we had to motor. We noticed our alternator was not charging the batteries! Belts turning… stop engine… belts tight enough… made sure connections to regulator were tight… restarted engine… thankfully working ok! Then just after dark (following a spectacular sunset!), the chartplotter shut down, and still had power, but would not restart with the charts. We would use the handheld GPS, and plot our position on paper chart every hour through the night. We had to pull out the GPS manual to figure out how to manage waypoints and routes. Finally at 10pm the wind came up enough to sail – and at 11pm it started it drizzle, so we put the transition up (between the dodger and bimini) to try to keep the cockpit dry. We decided to skip Isla Isabela (and expect to stop there on the way back north) – besides the trouble with the chartplotter, and the rain, we would be getting there about 2am. We alternated between sailing and motoring until 4am, and then were able to sail the rest of the way to Punta Mita. It continued to rain off and on, which was really rather nice, as our sails and rigging could use the cleaning.

As we turned east into Banderas Bay, we could see some large splashes in the water miles ahead. After watching for water breaking over exposed rocks coming around Punta Mita the first thing Cathy thought of was “give me the binoculars” and “are we going that far in tonight?” But wait a minute ...” I see a big black stick come up and then a huge splash... oh my gosh I think it’s WHALES!” We were too far away to really enjoy the show or get pictures, but the boats anchored out in La Cruz must have had a front row seat. The activity lasted about 30 mins.

We turned north and anchored in the lee of a resort and golf course. The largest islet off Punta Mita is part of the exclusive Four Season’s golf course and is the site of a 196 yard par 3 hole (#3) that is the only true island green in North America. When the tide is in #3A is played from its location on shore.

As we put the anchor down – another small problem – our windlass clutch was slipping a little. We checked various connections on the chartplotter hoping for another easy fix, but could not get it working again. So, we decided rather than going on south, we would take a detour into Paradise Village at Nuevo Vallarta and get someone to help us with these little issues. And enjoy the pool, local yacht club and food.

After a vodka and grapefruit juice, and a game of Mille Bornes, it was off to bed in the rolly anchorage.

Mazatlan

2009-12-04T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 23° 16' 16" W 106° 27' 15"]
We ended up spending 4 days and 4 nights in Marina Mazatlan. Not sure where all the time went – it seems like mostly chores! Let’s see, of course there was washing the boat down and vacuuming inside. And laundry! Cathy defrosted the frig (see picture to right) and we reprovisioned at the Mega (kind of like a super Walmart). That was a bus ride towards downtown. We got on the wrong bus coming back, and it turned around about a mile short of the marina so we just walked the rest of the way, dragging a cart and carrying 2 other bags full of groceries. Doug changed the engine oil/filter and fuel filter (for the first time completely on his own). We decided to fill our fuel tank by carting jerry jugs from the Pemex station across the road instead of stopping at a fuel dock. We needed about 40 gallons – which with our two 5-gallon jugs meant 4 trips. We can only manage 2 jugs on our handcart anyway. The overall process took about 4 hours. Doug went to Telcel to figure out how to pay for the next month of 3G data card service.

We also finished up some books. We both read Gringos in Paradise (which we had borrowed from Laurie – and she hadn’t even read it yet so we needed to return it before we left), a story about an American couple that moved to Sayulita (just north of Puerto Vallarta) and their adventures in building and furnishing a house there. Over the last couple weeks we also both read “The Collector” by Baldacci and “The Associate” by Grisham. After so many spy/detective novels, we wonder if the cruising folks we meet might really be in a witness protection program!

We did manage to have a little fun too.

Doug went to a baseball game. Patty on Pacific Voyager organized it. There was a group of 12 that went – there and back by pick-up truck “taxis” – the bed had seats along both sides and a cover over the top. The transportation safety board in the US would freak out, but it seemed natural here. The local team, the Mazatlan Vedanos (deer) was apparently champions last year, and won the first half of this season. It was a pretty good game, with the Vedanos losing to the Hermosillo “Orangemen “ 4 to 1. Level of play was about equivalent to US triple-A ball. Pacifico was the sponsor of Mazatlan, and Tecate the sponsor of Hermosillo – all the jerseys had big beer logos on the back. Doug had the requisite hot dog and beer (a Pacifico vendor was camped out right next to the section we were sitting in), as well as a fruit cup – freshly prepared at the seat with a sprinkling of pepper spices and fresh squeezed lime juice.

Patty took Marcia, Roz, Laurie and Cathy to old town Mazatlan including the Mercado downtown, for open art studios Friday. The old town Mercado reminded Cathy of the old French Market in New Orleans where she grew up. She has fond memories of shopping there with her parents when she was a young girl.

Please note: baby not for sale...

Even the central square with its Basilica de la Immaculada Concepcion looks like Jackson Square. To celebrate the Christmas season the locals erected a tree on one side of the square made from plastic bottles filled with different colored water.

And then of course there were meals and margaritas. We finally learned the secret of the best Margarita. Hugo and Jena, we use the lime squeezer a lot now. On Friday morning we said goodbye to Russ & Roz, whom we might see again in February in PV before they take off for the South Pacific, and to Michael & Laurie, whom we will probably see next along the “Gold Coast” between PV and Z-town after the new year, as we head north and they head south.

Southern Crossing to Mazatlan

2009-12-01T23:11:00.000-08:00

The weather for the next 2 days looked pretty good – mostly 15 kts – not too much and good for sailing. With 240 nm across the Sea of Cortez, we expected two overnights – 48 hours at 5 kts / 40 hours at 6 kts. So we got away about 9am Sunday. We came around Isla San Francisco to rendezvous with Laura on the east side to buddy-boat on the crossing. We had to motor until about noon before the wind picked up enough to sail – dead downwind of course. When going dead downwind, especially with lumpy seas, you have to be careful not to jibe the main – and the jib has a tendency to collapse. We have a boom brake to help control any accidental jibe of the main, and we poled out our jib on the opposite side for wing-and –wing. At other times we would just head off about 20-30 degrees to keep the sails full and stable, and then jibe back to the other tack when we were too far off the course. We motored for a few hours in the evening when the wind was light – but started sailing again at midnight and on through to the second evening. Then the second night was off and on motoring vs. sailing.

Besides keeping in contact with Laura, we saw another boat as we came out from Isla San Francisco apparently on the same heading – turned out to be Juniata with Dave & Marcia aboard. So the three of us kept in VHF radio contact as we headed across.
This was actually the first overnight sail that we have ever done with just the two of us aboard. It went pretty well. We decided to stick with 4 hours on / 4 hours off with the same shifts that we did on the Baja HaHa when we also had David and Dick as a second person on watch. We were a little loose with the handoff times – but it really went pretty smoothly. If we had any sail change or significant issue (like a large fishing boat looking like he was crossing our path) we would get each other up – so it was fairly rare to have an uninterrupted 4 hours of sleep. Meals were mostly easier things – bowl of cereal or bagel for breakfast, sandwich for lunch, soup or beef stew for dinner.

As we approached Mazatlan, we were running a little ahead of schedule. Rather than come in at dark, we held back – sailing with just a reefed main and making about 3 Kts. As dawn broke (see picture below) and we got close to shore, we hailed Marina Mazatlan on the VHF. It was only 7am, so the office wasn’t open – but Pacific Voyager (another cruising boat berthed in the marina) picked up our call, said it looked like there was plenty of room, went to get security and got slips assigned for us, Laura, and Juniata. Turns out we are all next to each other, and across from Worrall Wind – Russ & Roz – who had arrived on Sunday. Then it turns out Juniata is really good friends of Russ & Roz. More small world!

Isla San Francisco - Thanksgiving Day and more

2009-11-29T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 24° 49' 17" W 110° 34' 20"]
Thursday morning we moved on to Isla San Francisco. We sailed most of the 20 miles there alongside Laura, beating against the northern wind. About halfway there, Reel Summertime came motoring past us. We anchored in “the hook” at the SW end of island. There were at least a dozen boats in the anchorage – half of them powerboats, including a huge (170’?) “Time for Us” that we had seen in La Paz.

We had Thanksgiving dinner aboard Laura with Michael & Laurie. What a feast! Michael cooked a whole chicken, with fresh green beans, and potatoes au gratin. Cathy cooked dressing (with sausage, celery, onion, apple, etc) and a cranberry jello. Laurie baked an apple pie (and we found one last small container of ice cream deep in our freezer to put on it). Doug brought some Chardonnay and his appetite.

Friday we walked across a salt pond to the “agate beach” on the east side of the island, where we just walked along the beach looking for interesting stones, and Michael did some snorkeling.

Cathy went back to the boat and Michael, Laurie, and Doug did a hike up to and along the ridge on the SE corner of the island, overlooking our anchorage and the agate beach.

Saturday we took our dinghies for a ride for about 2 miles along the western edge of the island to a small island, Isla Coyote, just north of Isla San Francisco – between it and Isla San Jose. There is a small fishing village on the island. We pulled our Porta-Bote dinghy up onto the rocky shore next to the fishing pangas, while Michael and Laurie anchored their inflatable dinghy just off the beach. We watched some of the fisherman filet their catch on wooden tables on the rocky beach. The blood dripped off the tables onto the rocks, and when the fishermen had finished excising their filets, the carcasses where thrown into a pile by the edge of the water. They mostly had large sting rays and manta rays, but also some hammerhead sharks. They excise the barbs from the sting rays and take them way out to sea to dispose of them since they have children on the island and don’t want to take any chances on them getting hurt. They also had some beautiful chocolate-colored clams that we watched them shuck. We walked up the hill to the covered porch of their dwellings, where a lady was selling shell earrings, necklaces, etc. and made a few purchases. At the top of the hill was a small chapel building, but some of the ceiling had collapsed and there was debris all over the floor. We also bought some tortillas from the lady in the cook shed.

We got back to our dinghies and motored over to a beach on the north side of Isla San Francisco that was advertised as the shell beach. Our beachcombing turned up a few specimens, but nothing much more than what we had seen on the beach where we had anchored. Cathy found some interesting crabs.

We got back in our dinghies to head back around to the anchorage. As we passed the NW point of the island and turned south, we were hit with 12-15 kts of a SW wind in our faces and a building chop. As we pushed the dinghies through the chop, we realized this direction would be going right into our anchorage. We saw several boats fleeing out of the anchorage, and listening in on our handheld VHF found they were all going over to the mainland to seek shelter at San Evaristo about 9 miles away. We contacted them to make sure our boats were still securely anchored. We finally made it back to our boats. Michael & Laurie decided to move around to the east side of the island (anchor off the agate beach). We decided to just stay put – we felt better when we saw a yellow-hulled boat come in that we had seen in Caleta Partida and had been sailing the Sea of Cortez for over 25 years – local knowledge is a comforting thing.

We had been expecting to wait until Monday to leave for Mazatlan rather than Sunday because our grib files had been showing a weak low spinning across the south end of the sea. But now our gribs were showing that the low had weakened and pretty much dissipated – and that these westerlies that we were getting were not just coromuels – that they would continue through Sunday. So we decided to check the weather again Sunday morning – and probably leave for Mazatlan.

Ensenada Grande (Isla Partida)

2009-11-25T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 24° 33' 37" W 110° 23' 57"]
After a breakfast of scones and fresh fruit, we decided to move north to the southern lobe of the 3-lobed anchorage at Ensenada Grande on Isla Partida. It took us longer to secure the kayak and pull up the anchor than the journey to that anchorage. The winds were 15-18kts on the nose for the short motor north. They quickly dropped as we got further into the anchorage into shallow aqua water behind the high red sandstone cliffs. We anchored close to some carved sandstone cliffs on the northern side:

The winds broke our string for the burgees – between the Mexican flag (which ended up stuck by the spreader) and our BYC and HaHa burgees, which we saved just before they went into the water. Once we got anchored, Cathy stood up on the boom to try to get the flag down – and succeeded, but managed to strain her left shoulder in the effort. Get out the Motrin and ice! … and rum!

Tuesday afternoon, we dinghied over to the white sandy beach at the eastern end of the cove and set up our beach tent. We spent the afternoon just hanging out and reading. Our cruising guide indicated there was a trail up the arroyo from this beach, so Doug set off on a hike. After a hundred yards, there was no discernable trail – and was just scrambling over the rocks. When he came down over a ledge and saw a couple dried up snake skins, he decided this maybe wasn’t the greatest thing to do alone and headed back down to the beach. Here is our boat taken from under our beach tent, and a picture of the anchorage from Doug’s hike:

Wednesday morning Michael & Laurie came on up from Caleta Partida and anchored nearby. We went to the more pebbly beach on the southern side of the cove. Michael, Laurie, and Doug took a hike up this arroyo – this time with companions Doug made it farther. We went up to the top of a ridge between the two beaches. The only fauna we saw were lizards and small chipmunks – though we did see some fairly fresh scat from what must have been a larger mammal. The flora is fairly abundant this year – they had more rain than usual this summer with the tropical storms that came over this area.

While on this beach, we met two families – one from Journey (a HaHa boat) with Craig & Melanie and their 2 young sons; and another from Reel Summertime (powerboat) with Kip & Kit, their son, 4 daughters, and exchange student from Italy. Kip and Kit invited us over for drinks later, and Cathy suggested we all meet back on the beach for a bonfire and marshmallows that evening. We stopped by Reel Summertime for a glass of Merlot – it’s a beautiful 80’ powerboat – large living room, kitchen (not a galley) with side-by-side refrig/freezer, etc. Very nice family from Utah down for Thanksgiving week on vacation – they keep the boat in La Paz.

Once it was dark, we headed over to the beach to start a fire. Michael did the boy scout job, including propping his dinghy up with a paddle as a windbreak. We cooked sausages in the fire, and Cathy pulled out marshmallows and Hershey bars for everyone (we didn’t have any graham crackers to complete the smores). After the marshmallows, Cathy introduced the kids to a game of flashlight tag on the beach. This was one of our most enjoyable evenings so far in our journey.

Caleta Partida

2009-11-23T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 24° 31' 53" W 110° 22' 38"]
Caleta Partida is the best protected anchorage on the island. Lying between Isla Espiritu Santo and Isla Partida, its geologic history stems from being the crater of a large extinct volcano. It is still a bit open to the west, so we got some chop, but it was much better than Ensenada del Candelero. We stayed two nights – having dinner aboard Laura (with Michael & Laurie) on Sunday night, and aboard Jabiroo (with John & Jan) on Monday night. When we were ready to leave Laura, we shone our light down into the water, attracting a lot of fish. We threw a line down, and pretty quickly caught one – it looked like some kind of mackerel with an interesting frog-like pattern of green and gray pigmentations on its dorsal surface. We threw him back in. On Monday, we took a long (yes, Doug pushed us to go too far) kayak trip. We paddled through the channel separating the two islands, then turned right to go down the eastern side of Isla Espiritu Santo towards some sea caves. As we would reach one point, Doug would look beyond to the next point and say “oh, that looks good, let’s go on to the next point”. When we finally turned to go back, we had the wind and chop on our nose - at least it wasn’t blowing too hard yet. On the way back, we dawdled for a while in the channel, watching a group of a pelicans diving for fish. They were doing short quick dives compared to what we saw e.g. in Morro Bay – perhaps because the water was so shallow.

Ensenada del Candelero (Isla Espiritu Santo)

2009-11-21T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 24° 30' 23" W 110° 23' 21"]
We left La Paz for the islands just north. Isla Espiritu Santo lies 20 miles north of LaPaz, and on the north end is connected to Isla Partida with a small channel dividing the two islands. The islands lie near the fault lines, and expose colorful layers of various rocks – oh to be a geologist!

Most of the anchorages are along the western coast of the islands, with good protection from the northers that blow down the Sea of Cortez, but not so good protection from the nighttime coromuels that come from the southwest.

With light north winds, we only were able to sail for about ½ hour out of the 4 hour trip. We poked our heads into Bahia San Gabriel and Puerto Ballena before deciding to drop anchor in Ensenada del Candelero (Candlestick Cove). We put the kayak into the water for Cathy to take a trip to the beach, where some people from a Baja Expeditions group were camping. And the next morning we paddled around the Roca Monumento in the center of the cove and did a little snorkeling around the reef that leads from there back towards shore. We paddled over to Evergreen where we met Dennis, Carol, and their 11-year old son Josh (busy doing math “home”work).

When the coromuels blow against the tide it can create a square chop, so we spent a very uncomfortable night of pitching/hobbyhorsing. We slept in the sea berths with lee cloths deployed. In the morning, we decided to move on to the next anchorage.

La Paz

2009-11-20T17:16:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 24° 09' 18" W 110° 19' 33"]
Here it is Friday evening – we’ve been in La Paz for just over a week, and will be leaving tomorrow morning for the islands just north of La Paz, and then crossing to Mazatlan around December 1 with the full moon. We had only intended to stay here for 4 nights – doubling our time is not as extreme as some people. Our dock neighbors on one side (Dan and Leigh aboard Afroessa) came here for a month – 6 years ago. La Paz is a very cruiser-friendly community, and people talk about the "La Paz bungie" that keeps bringing you back.

Coming down the channel toward La Paz last Friday, we decided to try to get into the Marina de La Paz which is closest to downtown. We thought it would be nice to be able to clean the boat well, and there was a norther predicted to start Sunday evening - northers are the winds that blow down the Sea of Cortez from the north when there is high pressure in the Arizona/New Mexico area and low pressure at the southern end of the Sea. We weren’t too hopeful, since we had heard the marina was booked for November – and there were a LOT of HaHa boats heading to La Paz. However, when we called in, they said they thought they could move boats around a little and to call back in an hour. We anchored temporarily just beyond (south) of the marina. While we were waiting, several flotillas of brown chunks came floating by in the water ??? (maybe we were near the sewer outflow?) – so we were happy when we got in touch with the marina again and they said we could have a slip.

It’s hard to know where a whole week went, but here are some of the activities:
There were of course the chores. Laundry – but at the laundromat here at the marina, Polly would do a load for you and fold it for 50 pesos ($4) – or you could use the machine yourself for 40 pesos per load… no brainer! Grocery – a couple trips to CCC, the local big grocery, which was a hefty walk, or an 8 peso bus ride or a 50 peso cab ride. Doug went to the main Telcel store and got a 3G data card. So now we should have decent internet connection whenever there is decent cell phone service – works well from the marina – much better than the marina wifi! And then we redid about half of the teak on the boat. We (Doug) lightly sanded and put 4 coats on the forward half of the toerail, and we (Cathy) totally stripped one eyebrow and put teak oil on it. If the oil does well, maybe we’ll switch over to it totally. The oiled finish is flat and looks like a nice piece of Danish furniture. Peter from Delphis stopped by to help us with our broken wind instrument; we did find and fix a bad connection – hopefully that will fix the problem. We went to a shop we had heard about in town where a lady (Katty) makes one piece full-body lycra suits – they protect you from the small jellyfish and other creatures in the sea. We got two custom-made ones for 450 pesos each – completed in one day! Cathy picked a bright fabric because she doesn't want to be mistaken for a seal by any sharks down here. Doug looks delicious in his navy blue suit. Stay tuned for a picture of the 2 newest action heros....that's what we look like with the suits on!

And then there was socializing and dinners. We had Michael and Laurie, and Phil and Katie over for popcorn and a movie (“Captain Ron”). We ran into Kathy and Rick on ConsumMate – right across the fairway from us - We knew them from Berkeley/Danville (small world!). Knowing La Paz well, they introduced us to 2 wonderful dinner spots – Rancho Viejo (delicious Papas Asaderras – potatoes with marinated/grilled beef - the Mexican version of Shepherd's Pie) and Bandidos (great onion rings and hamburgers at an outdoor patio where the grill was installed under the hood of an old car). Alan and Christine from BYC, having lunch at the dock café at Marina de la Paz, noticed our boat as they looked over the marina. We saw them and walked up to have a beer and later a pescado dinner with them at La Fondas. They had just gotten back to their boat in Marina Costa Baja where they had left it for the summer. We had John and Jan from Jabiroo (another IP that did the HaHa) over for dinner – they were working on refinishing their toe rail as well and we walked back and forth to each other's boats to conpare the progress and outcomes. And another visit to Rancho Viejo for more Papas Asaderras – this time with Michael and Laurie.

We ended up staying long enough to go to the La Paz HaHa party Thursday evening – at the beach location of local business Papas & Beer. It was a great party sponsered by the National Tourism Board and many local busineses! We sat at a table with Michael & Laurie, and Russ & Roz (who had just gotten back in from the islands and were staying 4 miles north at Marina Costa Baja). Only $7 per person – and the first 50 HaHa’ers (including us of course) got in for free. From 4pm to 7pm there were free margaritas and beer, and a plate of 4 fish tacos for each attendee. And entertainment – two kid dancing groups, a mariachi band, and a young adult dancing group. And prizes raffled off. When we all sat down Cathy had warned everyone that she had very good luck with raffles, so everyone should expect to win something. Out of the 6 tickets at our table, 4 were winners! We won a hand carved wooden whale tail (the symbol for La Paz), and 1 hour free electrical/refrigeration consulting. Then starting at 7pm there was a rock band and dancing.

And then today, November 20, was the celebration of the Mexican Revolution – on this date in 1910 the war to overthrow dictator Porfirio Diaz began. There was a parade down the Malecon (the main street along the waterfront), with bands and groups of dancers, martial arts, baseball, etc. Afterwards, people stayed around the downtown area, continuing with a street fiesta. The town is not really as we had expected – it never really was a fishing town so the waterfront is not that developed. But they have now lined the shore with a nice sidewalk with public art statues all along it.

Puerto Balandra

2009-11-12T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 24° 19' 17" W 110° 19' 53"]
Wednesday morning we slept in a little – anchor up at 6:45 am. Well, when it’s dark at 6pm and when it’s 8pm it feels like midnight, so we go to bed early, it’s not too hard to get up early. But we slept in for 15 minutes this morning. The winds were light all day, so we motored north through the Cerralvo Channel, west through the San Lorenzo Channel, and then turned south towards La Paz. Just after the turn towards the south, and still 12 or so miles from La Paz, we pulled into an anchorage at Puerto Balandra.

This is a beautiful spot. Clear blue water (we could see our anchor down 20’), several smaller coves around the anchorage where the water shoals to a green color for as much as a hundred yards up to white sand beaches. The beaches are separated by rock formations –one has a rock on the point called “El Hongo” (the mushroom) – perhaps 12 feet high with a stem and then a large cap. Unfortunately, it actually fell a few years back, and some engineers raised it again and reinforced it with rebar.

In the evening a southwesterly coromuel blew up to about 12 Kts and blew all night until mid-morning. These coromuels result from low land southwest of La Paz which allows the cool air from the Pacific Ocean to flow across Baja peninsula towards the warmer sea of Cortez. We decided to stay another night in this anchorage. There were only a few other boats anchored here. Each day one or two large power boats would come in for the day, dinghy people to the beach or El Hongo. We took down our kayak and paddled around the bay, stopping for a while on the beach to sit under a palapa near El Hongo. On the way back to the boat we stopped by Avalon another boat in the anchorage and visited with Phil and Katie. Cathy cut Doug’s hair in the cockpit – a good first effort . But the hairs were not as easy to clean out of the cockpit as we thought, so we’ll have to do it on land in the future.

The second night was a bit less comfortable. The coromuel was blowing 16-18 Kts and there was a boat that had anchored next to us, that when the winds picked up and shifted was almost right in front of us. With only about 12 miles to La Paz, we got up really late (7am) Friday morning, had breakfast and put things away (including pulling the kayak back up on deck), before pulling anchor at 8am.

We have been so pleased with our new 60 pound Manson Supreme anchor. We're not sure if it's the sandy bottoms or the new anchor, but it sets each time and you better be holding on to the boat when it does. We usually drop the anchor to the bottom, then slowly pay out a 4 to 1 scope, and then back down at about 3kts to straighten out the chain and set the anchor. When the anchor grabs the boat suddenly stops, while the engine strains against the load. This is very different from our experiences in the SF bay with a Bruce anchor in mostly mud and eel grass bottoms.

Ensenade de los Muertos

2009-11-10T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 23° 59' 16" W 109° 49' 38"]
Tuesday morning was another early (6:30am anchor up) departure for the next 45 miles to Ensenade de los Muertos (“Cove of the Dead”). Again the winds were light – or in the afternoon on our nose – but we were able to sail about half the way. Again the wind instrument worked for about 6 hours and then stopped working again. We pulled into Ensenade de los Muertos near Laura. We put OUR dinghy in this time and went to shore with Michael and Laurie to a restaurant on the beach – the “Beach Club at the Bay of Dreams” – for margueritas, chili relleno, and tamales. We had heard that the name of the Bay had been changed - presumably “Bay of Dreams” is the new name.

It was dark as we headed back to the dinghy. As we were wading the dinghy out, the women got in, and Cathy shown the light into the water. Swimming right next to us in 2’ of water was a large moray eel (4’?) with its mouth open and teeth bared, trying to bite the beam of light! The women squealed. And when Michael and Doug understood why, they QUICKLY! jumped into the dinghy and we took off to find our boats, now nestled amongst 24 boats in the anchorage.

Los Frailes

2009-11-09T23:11:00.000-08:00

[GPS: N 23° 22' 49" W 109° 25' 16"]
We got up early Monday morning, raising the anchor at 6:30 so that we could make the 45 miles to the first anchorage and try to get in before the crowds – we had heard of a LOT of HaHa boats planning to go next to La Paz – and for those doing it in day-hops, Los Frailes and Los Muertos are the natural stopping places. Laura had the same idea – we had not seen them at anchorage off Cabo (they had also moved out to anchorage on Sunday), but as we pulled away from our anchor spot, we saw them right in front of us. The winds were fairly light – so we sailed some, but motored a good bit as well. We were shocked that our wind instrument seemed to be working (though the angle was off by ca 30-40 degrees) – but then it crapped out again after 6 hours. At one point we counted 21 large sportfishing boats along the horizon – they must know where the fish are running.

When we pulled into Los Frailes there were only about 8 other boats there – but by nightfall there were 28 boats in the anchorage – all but 2 were HaHa boats. We dinghyed to shore with Michael and Laurie and took a long walk along the beach. We spoke to a couple of Canadian guys, sitting on ATVs that looked like they used them to pull fishing boats down to the water. They spend 6 months in the winters living in a trailer on the beach at Los Frailes. As the sun set, we dinghyed back to Galatea for drinks, dinner, and movie.

Los Frailes is the easternmost point of the Baja peninsula. It is so named (“The Friars”) for the rock formation on the point at the entrance that looks like friars climbing up the hill:

Cabo San Lucas

2009-11-07T23:11:00.000-08:00

We arrived in Cabo San Lucas Thursday noon to a hub of activity in the bay, including 3 large cruise ships anchored out. We had opted for a slip in the marina (for $120 per night!) to be able to wash the boat down and more easily do check-in, laundry, provisioning, and partying. The owner had come back to the slip we were originally assigned, and we could not contact Profligate to get our new assignment. So we spent some time going on in to the fuel dock and filling up on diesel – until we got our assignment on the end tie of “J” dock, right at the end of a dock full of well-supplied sportfishing boats:

It turned out to be an ok slip, even though it was on the main fairway and the fishing boats started going out a little before 6am every morning, some throwing their wake up and making us bob a little. At least being on the fairway, there was a bit of breeze going through, and the large fishing boat next to us shadowed us some from the hot afternoon sun.

Thursday evening was laundry and a gathering of HaHa people at Squid Roe – a bar with dancing just a couple blocks from the marina:

Friday morning Doug and David walked around to check us into the country, while Cathy washed the boat. The check-in involved a walk to immigration (which wasn’t open yet despite being just after the 9am posted opening time), across to the bank to pay the money for our tourist cards, then back to immigration with the receipts to get the tourist cards and stamp on our crew list. Next stop was the Port Captain – about a 15 minute walk across town. There were a number of people waiting in the small office – and the officials there said their system was down so they couldn’t process anyone – should be back in a couple hours. Michael (from Laura) and I stayed while all the others left. Insisting that we needed to check in, since we were leaving Sunday and needed to check out as well, eventually the official started processing my papers, and then somehow produced the sheet I needed to take back to the bank across town to make their payment. A walk to the bank and back, and we got our stamp and signature on the arrival crew list, as well as a new crew list showing just the two of us staying on. It was shortly after noon. The afternoon was a relaxing beach party with all the HaHa folks – mostly just sitting under umbrellas on the beach drinking beer.

Saturday, Cathy did provisioning with Laura and Worrall Wind (Costco plus a local supermarket), while Doug worked on the blog. Since the wireless did not work at our dock – we sat in the marina office to work on the computer. Even though it was slow and often dropped the connection, at least it was air-conditioned in the office. Saturday evening was the awards party, with beer provided by the marina office. We were shocked to place 2nd in our division! In each division they give a 1st and 2nd place, and everyone else gets 3rd. They give priority to boats that sail more – you turn in your total time and engine time for each leg. It’s not clear what formula they use – if any – to penalize you for engine time. The boat that placed first in our division had sailed all the way. So with us using the engine about a third of the time, we were surprised to take 2nd.

Sunday morning David and Dick left for the airport to fly home. It was great having them on board for the trip down Baja! We cleaned the boat, finished uploading what we could to the blog, checked out of the marina, and headed out to the anchorage off the beach just a few miles outside the marina for the night.

Baja Haha Leg 3 – Bahia Santa Maria to Cabo San Lucas

2009-11-05T23:11:00.000-08:00

We headed out of the anchorage at about 6am. Through the morning there were times that we could fly the asymmetric, but also had to motor a lot. The biggest excitement was when Cathy looked at the fishing line we had been dragging behind us to see it dancing back and forth! Pulling in the line, she had snagged a yellow fin tuna. We pulled it up alongside the boat, gaffed it, poured rum down its gills trying to kill it, looped a line around it tail, hung it over the side, slit its gills to bleed it. It measured in at 27”. Cathy and Dick then pulled it up on the side deck to clean it. They filleted and cut out probably about 6 pounds of meat. Cathy prepared a little sashimi with wasabi/sesame oil/soy sauce which was enjoyed by all except Doug (who doesn’t do raw fish) – and particularly enjoyed by David.

By early afternoon, the wind had picked up to about 10 Kts with very calm seas. We poled out the jib and sailed wing-and-wing. We were cruising along at about 5.5 Kts – but it was so smooth, we pulled out the cockpit table and were playing cards on it – taught Dick and Dave to play Mille Bornes. After a while Cathy prepared an absolutely delicious dinner on seared tuna steaks with sesame seeds and risotto on the side, with a glass of Merlot. It doesn’t get better than this. A spectacular evening sailing along and watching this sunset:

Bahia Santa Maria

2009-11-03T23:11:00.000-08:00

We arrived at Bahia Santa Maria at 9am Monday morning and anchored just about in the middle of the fleet in the NE corner of the bay. The setting is gorgeous. The cliffs to the north were much greener than we had remembered from before – perhaps from all the rain that came with hurricane Jimena which had passed almost right through here a few months ago. In the northeast corner there is an estuary that comes into the bay, with a sandbar that extends towards the south. And along the southern end there is a narrow strip of land with sand dunes that separate Bahia Santa Maria (BSM) from the larger Magdalena Bay.

We put the dinghy together and pulled the kayak down, and spent some time cruising around the anchorage and stopping by other boats. We saved the shore landing for the next day when there would be a party hosted by the local fishermen. We spent the evening in the cockpit with cocktails and then dinner, and then watched the moon rise:

Tuesday morning, the wind was calm, so we cranked Cathy up the mast to have a look at the wind instrument connections. A little water to clean, lube to spray, and making sure connection was tight – still no luck – but here’s a picture from the top: We opened the junction box at the base of the mast (5-wire connection) and measured voltage and amperage across various terminals – but that didn’t shed anything obvious. Will probably have to wait until La Paz to deal with it.

Cathy headed off in a dinghy with Michael and Laurie from Laura to go up the estuary. Dick and Doug following shortly in our Porta-Bote. Beach landings in a dinghy can be rather tricky if there is any breaking surf at all – and leaving beaches even trickier since there is less time between waves. But heading up the estuary, we had small breaking waves at the mouth, where there was a sandbar that got very shallow (prop hit bottom a couple times), and a very strong flow coming out of the estuary causing some turbulence in the breaking surf. .. But we all made it in ok.

The estuary is lined with mangroves. The main fishing camp is on a bluff right where the estuary comes into the bay. The fishermen here would be hosting a party for us that afternoon. There was a smaller fishing camp with just a tent on the right as we entered the estuary. And then further up on the left there were two more fishing camps. Their buildings were fairly makeshift – and it looked like most of the buildings had lost their roofs – presumably from the hurricane this past summer. At the first, it was interesting that one of their buildings had a cross on the peak of the roof – presumably their little chapel. The point of interest of the second was that they had a TV satellite dish!

On the way back we beached the dinghy on the back side of the sandbar. The tide was going out fast. We walked along the sandbar, picking up various shells - including silver dollars and abalone. Cathy played with a couple crabs – catching them and letting them go.

It was then time for the party, so we motored across the estuary and beached the dinghy just inside the mouth. The local fishermen bring in their wives to help with the food they serve. And they had cold beer and margaritas. And a live rock band with generator to power their amps etc. Cathy was observant enough to get us a place near the front of the food line - a plate of shrimp, rice, beans, cabbage, and tortillas. It’s pretty impressive for these people to put on this party and meal and beer for hundreds of people! After dinner, Michael and Doug played beach volleyball while Laurie and Cathy cheered them on.

We left about 4pm (low tide!) to go back to the boat. To get out of the estuary, we had to walk the boat through shin deep water across the sand bar. Since we had an early (6am) departure the next morning, we worked on getting the boat ready – getting the kayak back up on deck and lashed, and pulling the Porta-Bote up on the davits and lashing it in place.

Baja HaHa Leg 2 – Bahia de Tortugas to Bahia Santa Maria

2009-11-01T23:11:00.000-08:00

The second leg is about 240 NM from Bahia de Tortugas (Turtle Bay) to Bahia Santa Maria – we expected it to take 40-48 hours (2 overnights). Soon after we headed out from Turtle Bay, we deployed the asymmetric. The sailing was terrific all afternoon, and evening – smooth sailing at about 6 kts. We carried the asymmetric past dark until midnight, when we jibed and just winged out the staysail. Sunday morning was fairly light so we were alternating between sailing with main and jib – and just motoring. In the afternoon it picked up so we ran with asymmetric until about 11pm, when the wind died and we started to motor again. On this leg a northbound freighter and a northbound cruise ship passed a couple miles outside of us. The freighter was just a dark hulk with the high white light on the stern and lower white light at the bow. The cruise ship cannot be missed – it looks like Las Vegas coming over the horizon.

Bahia de Tortugas

2009-10-30T23:11:00.000-07:00

Thursday evening, another problem started – the head (toilet for you landlubbers) was VERY slow to pump (flush for you landlubbers). Probably either one of the valves going bad (the joker or the flapper) or something stuck in the hoses. We tried putting vinegar down the head – no luck. Try hot water, letting it sit for a while first – no luck. A call out to the fleet on VHF and we got a suggestion for baking soda + vinegar. It fizzed and spewed a bit – a couple pumps on the handle – and POP! One Heimlich manuever later... a couple pieces of guess-what popped up, and it was then flushing as well as ever. We thought about doing DNA testing to identify the offender, but decided we were just pleased that it was clear.

We had anchored towards the NW end of the anchorage (farther from town, but closer to the beach where the party would be). After sunset, it looked light a small city with all of the anchor lights glimmering.

Friday morning, listening to the net at anchor, we learned that the HaHa had lost their first boat ever. J-World, a J/120, apparently sailed through a pod of whales during the rough weather on Wednesday morning. They "encountered" one of the whales, causing their rudder to break, and opening a large hole in the boat. Within minutes they had to abandon ship into their life raft and the ship sank. They spent about 4 hours in the liferaft before being picked up by a US Coast Guard helicopter which flew them back to San Diego. We heard the skipper will come down to Cabo for the final awards party – we are anxious to hear more about what really happened!

We decided not to put the dinghy together and instead hailed a panga to take us to town – they were charging $1 per person (plus $1 to dispose of our trash).
The pier at town had improvements since we had last been there. There was no a dinghy dock sticking out from the end of the pier with metal stairs to go up (the first step was a doozy at low tide), instead of having to tie the dinghys to the pilings and climb up a straight metal ladder. We walked up through town.
The HaHa must be the big event of the year for the town. It is well off the beaten track, all dirt roads, and perhaps a thousand residents. There are probably 160 HaHa boats in the anchorage, with some 600 sailors on board.

We stopped into an internet café for a bit, where one of the locals seemed to latch onto us. He showed us to the local grocery where we bought some tortillas and limes, and then to the local bakery where we bought some fresh bread. There were two restaurants in town – one up on the hill and one by the water. We decided to have lunch at the one by the water. They were clearly not used to having so many patrons – it took us 2 hours for a simple lunch, with each of us getting their meal at a different time.

Since the beach party had already started, we went to the pier to get a panga to take us from town at the NW corner of the bay out to the beach party at the NE corner – stopping by our boat on the way to drop off our groceries and pick up our potluck contribution. The panga driver was a very pleasant older gentleman who had his 11-year old grandson (one of 14 grandchildren) helping him. The beach party was fun, talking with the other sailors, sampling the potluck dishes, drinking cold beer that the locals were selling, a stroll up the beach – we avoided the more strenuous activities such as the tug of war and volleyball.

Saturday morning start was delayed until 12:30pm due to the late arrival of many of boats that had stopped over San Quintin or other places on the way down. We spent some time in the morning on our wind instrument – first circling to try to recalibrate – thinking that perhaps in the wind and seas we had experienced, the mast had been circling and might have just whipped the anemometer around so quickly that it screwed up the calibration. No luck. We checked the wiring connections at the back of the instrument and at the base of the mast – looked good. And it was already too windy to try going up the mast to check the connections up there.

Baja HaHa Leg 1-B – Bahia de San Quintin to Bahia de Tortugas

2009-10-28T23:11:00.000-07:00

Although the wind at sea was supposed to be picking up to a sustained 25 kts, it was rather calm in the anchorage. Even so, our gps (which we had left on all night as an anchor watch – we set it to sound an alarm if we moved more than 150 feet from our original location) showed that we had traveled 4.82 miles overnight, as we rode back and forth at anchor. On the morning net Wednesday at 0730, Profligate reported from their weather service and from reports from boats that had continued on, that the wind was there but that the seas didn’t seem quite as large as predicted. Even though it was still expected to blow 25 kts all day Wednesday, Profligate planned to head on towards Turtle Bay. Most of the boats, including us, decided to leave as well. So we pulled up anchor at 0900 and headed out. We were motoring out of the bay, with the main already raised for the light winds we were currently feeling. About 10am, with the course set, Doug went below for a little rest. Within 10 minutes, Cathy yelled down to come up and help us reef. “Reef?” Doug said. “We’re not even sailing yet”. But when he went up, the winds had already built to 20 kts and as he came up the companionway a huge wave was towering over the stern. We got the boat into the wind, put in a double reef, then turned downwind and also deployed the staysail. Around noon it was blowing mid 20’s and continued to blow all day. We figured the waves were 10-12 feet with occasional 15-18 footers. No one was happy with these conditions, but the boat was built to handle it. As it got dark, thankfully there was a waxing moon, approaching full – so we had a fairly bright moon from sunset until about 4 am. While there were some periods of lighter wind around midnight and 2am, we also saw sustained winds in the upper 20’s with gusts to 35 from our port quarter. Then all of a sudden our wind instrument showed about 7 kts at 30 degrees. That couldn’t be right. Cathy cycled the instruments off and on, and it seemed to correct itself. But over the next several hours it continued to screw up until it finally started reading 0.0 apparent wind from directly in front of us. So now it’s feeling the wind on the back of the neck or in the face, looking at the wind generator, craning to look up at the windex, and looking at the sea state.

Here is the crew of Galatea, and sunset at sea:

By 6 am the wind had pretty much died down, and we had to motor the rest of the way into Turtle Bay, arriving at about 2pm Thursday – feast or famine!

Baja HaHa Leg 1-A – San Diego to Bahia de San Quintin

2009-10-26T23:11:00.000-07:00

The start was set for 11am Monday morning just off Point Loma outside San Diego harbor. We felt a little nervous heading off with the approaching weather – but we did feel a little more informed about weather in general. Besides getting regular reports from Profligate (the Baja HaHa committee catamaran), Doug learned a lot at the Sailmail class about various grib files that we could get. We had set up some regular feeds of weather forecasts to get via our SSB radio. Grib files (short for grid-binary?) are binary data files that can show data such as the wind speed/direction, wave height/period, barometric pressure on a lat/long grid (e.g. every 1 degree or every ½ degree), forecast by a couple of different computer models for every 24 or 12 or 6 hours out for the next several days. The main model is the GFS (Global Forecasting System) model – but there is also a COAMPS model that seemed useful since that model pays a little more attention to effects close to shore. And with the weather that was predicted for Tuesday night and all through Wednesday night, we had scoped out a couple of possible anchorages for refuge along the coast on the way down. The first leg from San Diego to Bahia de Tortugas (Turtle Bay) is about 360 nautical miles (NM), which we expected to take about 72 hours. The prospects of 3 consecutive overnights, with heavy weather on 2 of them was not exactly what we were looking forward to.

All the boats were to parade past Shelter Island at about 10am on the way out to the start. The harbor police had arranged for a fire boat to be spraying his hoses as we went by, and there was media coverage set up. There were perhaps 160 boats at the start. Of the 193 signed up, several had already dropped out (e.g. due to boat problems like the water tank problem that Dick’s original boat had), were planning to start from Ensenada, or had decided to wait until Thursday when the weather had passed.

We approached the starting line at 1100 with very little wind, but just 10 minutes after the start the wind freshened to 8-9 knots from the starboard quarter. We deployed our asymmetric – and most of the boats deployed their asymmetric or spinnaker. Our asymmetric is the big blue/white/black with red horizontal stripe sail billowing out front – it’s a ¾ oz. sail, best for doing a broad reach in relatively light wind. An asymmetric has the tack attached down to the bow of the boat, as opposed to a spinnaker which has a pole to hold the tack out to the side opposite of the main boom. By early afternoon the wind had picked up to 13-15 knots, and we were pushing along at 7 to 7.5 kts as we headed through the Coronados islands.

As it turned to late afternoon, the wind died. We started motoring and started getting into our routine. We had set a watch schedule with everyone having 4 hours on and 4 hours off around the clock. We staggered the watches so that a fresh person came up every 2 hours. So Cathy had midnight-4am, 8am-noon, 4pm-8pm - opposite Doug with 4am-8am, noon-4pm, and 8pm-midnight. Dick had 2am-6am, 10am-2pm, 6pm-10pm – opposite David with 6am-10am, 2pm-6pm, 10pm-2am. Nominally Dick and David would “hot bunk” in the aft berth and Doug and Cathy would “hot bunk” in the forward berth (if not too rough). We also had the lee cloth up for the port side salon settee – Doug, Cathy, or Dick often used that berth. And at the beginning, David wasn’t feeling well and so often just slept in the cockpit.

The wind picked up enough in the evening to sail for several hours, but then died again at midnight and we had to motor all night. By 6am the fog had closed in to ¼ mile visibility. Every morning at 0730 there was an SSB net (on channel 4A = 4146 MHz), run by the Poobah (Richard Spindler of Latitude 38) aboard Profligate. It started with emergencies (medical or boat problems), followed by weather, followed by a roll call check-in where we would give our 0600 positions. Tuesday morning, Richard said that the forecast was still showing some pretty heavy weather coming in Tuesday night through Wednesday night, and strongly suggested that people might want to pull into Bahia San Quintin (or perhaps Punta Baja) – and said that Profligate would plan to pull into San Quintin. San Quintin had been our primary potential refuge, and given that report, we reset our waypoint to head in.

Bahia San Quintin is a large bay, about 5 miles from north to south. It looked like there was a hotel towards the SE, and some villages along the E shore. When we entered the bay at 1300 there were already perhaps 20-30 boats in there. We chose to anchor in a spot tucked into the NW corner near where an estuary comes into the bay. By nightfall, there were about 70 boats in the anchorage. It was a beautiful site with all of the anchor lights. We wondered what the villagers on shore would have thought – they are probably not used to so many boats in their bay at once – and certainly were not expecting the Baja HaHa group to stop there.

A week in San Diego

2009-10-25T23:11:00.000-07:00

What a week in San Diego! Cabrillo Isle Marina is an Almar marina, which was a sponsor of the HaHa, so they gave discounts on slips to HaHa participants. There were 55 HaHa boats in this one marina out of the 193 signed up. There was a real interesting trimaran (not a HaHa boat!) at the end of our dock. The sail was a foil that looked like an airplane wing turned on its end. The owner said the foil was floating on a bed of ball bearings. Since the foil isn’t directly attached to the boat, the boat can point up to 20 degrees off the wind while the foil is at 45 degrees. He also said it should do better in storms than traditional rigs – since the foil is not attached to the boat, it doesn’t put the same strains on the boat. Next to that boat was another trimaran that was used to film Water World. The movie where the entire surface of the earth is covered by water, and all the inhabitants are trying to find enough dirt to grow something green.
We decided to rent a car together with Russ and Roz (from BYC) to make running around easier. But being around all of the other boats gathering for the HaHa, getting ideas of what else we just have to have, or have to do – and having the car to make it easier – it seemed like a non-stop week of running around. Let’s see – there was Downwind marine (3 trips), West Marine (3 trips), Dinghy Doctor (to drop of dinghy motor for service and pick up), another marine store for shear pins, Yanmar shop for spare filters, Island Packet dealer to try to pick up mail that was sent to us, Home Depot (2 trips), Vons grocery (2 trips), Costco, 2 sporting good stores to find some swim fins, Ace Hardware (2 trips), bank, Mexican fishing licenses. And then there was having a guy inspect our rigging (we won that at IP Rendezvous on Catalina), a bottom cleaning, having Russ help Doug change the oil (after a couple attempts at setting up different systems for sucking out the old oil), fueling up, laundry, SSB class for Doug, Sailmail class for Doug, skippers meeting at West Marine, party at Downwind Marine, dock party Thursday afternoon with other HaHa boats, and then the big costume HaHa party in West Marine parking lot on Sunday.

We went to the party as patient, nurse, and doctor. Cousin David, our crew member who arrived on Saturday, was the doctor complete with scrubs, lab coat, stethoscope. Cathy was the nurse, with a very tight short skirt, tight blouse with the twins bulging out (thanks to Victoria Secrets). Doug was the patient, with gown open in the back showing his huge buns (plastic ones tied on – not his real big buns) and a urinal for a beer mug. Russ and Roz, whose boat is a Nauticat, went as naughty cats. Here are some pictures of our costumes:

At the skippers meeting on Sunday morning, Poobah Richard Spindler discussed how the weather forecast was showing pretty heavy weather for Tuesday through Wednesday – 25 kts with gusts to 35kts and 15-18 foot seas. Sunday evening, Dick stopped by - he was crew on a boat that had just discovered a split in their water tank and were going to cancel out of the HaHa – so he was looking to latch on as crew on another boat. Given the weather forecast, the prospects of dealing with that with only 3 of us (and that first leg is usually three straight overnights), that Dick was an experienced sailor who has a Hunter on SF Bay, and that Dick seemed like a nice guy – we took him on.

Finally we turned in the car – the time for errands was over – and we were anxious to just get moving again.

Newport to San Diego via Oceanside

2009-10-17T23:11:00.000-07:00

Friday Oct 16 was a relatively uneventful trip down to Oceanside – mostly motorsailing. We did pass some military exercises (e.g. hover craft on right). Since we didn’t need power or water and didn’t want to hang out of the 34’ slips they had available, we stayed on the long “Dolphin dock”. We thought it should have been called the “Pelican Poop Dock”. We did manage an early evening walk to the shops and restaurants at the marina end of the harbor, and out to the beach.

Saturday morning we left for San Diego. As soon as we got out of the marina, we were enveloped by fog. Visibility was 1/8 to 1/4 mile ALL DAY. We kept thinking it should lift as afternoon wore on. We ran the radar the whole day and kept a careful watch, but sometimes small runabout fiberglass fishing boats that didn’t show up on radar would just pop into view as they passed our boat. As we approached the entrance to San Diego bay, the fog seemed to just get thicker. We thought we had gone far enough off Point Loma to avoid the kelp beds there, but ended up going even farther out, dodging crab pots and fishing boats that appeared through the fog. As we turned into the channel, the fog seemed to close in even more – 1/8 mile visibility at most. When we heard a loud HOOOOOOOONK directly behind us, we scurried over to get just OUTSIDE the channel buoys. Thankfully as entered the bay, we ran out of the fog to a glorious blue sky and view of the San Diego skyline, and easily found our way to our slip in Cabrillo Isle Marina. Looking back at the fog, it looked like the thick kind of fog that we are used to seeing streamjng thru the gate into Francisco Bay.

Newport

2009-10-15T23:11:00.000-07:00

We started feeling a little cabin fever in Cherry Cove with the overcast and rain, so even though the storm was not supposed to clear out until Thursday, we decided to go on over to Newport on Wednesday. While it was overcast and a bit foggy, we didn’t have any rain.

Just as we were pulling out of Cherry Cove, the autopilot would not engage – kept giving a message about “Autorelease”. After digging through the manual, it says “Auto Release provides emergency manual override… This option only applies to sterndrive actuators [which we don’t have] – for all other systems this option should be set to off”. Hmmm… maybe it accidentally got engaged. Poking through all the settings, it didn’t even show up where the manual said the setting should be. A quick call to Raymarine resulted in a diagnosis of likely some problem with the rudder bar. We didn’t feel like digging enough out of the lazarette while underway to see what we could find, so hand-steered on to Newport. Once in Newport, we found that a cotter pin holding the hydraulic drive had sheared, allowing a bolt to come loose which must have put torque on this bar that connects it to the rudder and popped it off. Realigning the drive, replacing the cotter pin, and popping the rudder bar back on and we were back in business!

Newport harbor is an incredible place. We spent the first night at the Balboa yacht club guest dock, and moved out to a city mooring for the second night since the yacht club gave only one free night for reciprocal clubs. Newport is a huge harbor with two large islands (Lido and Balboa) as well as a number of smaller islands. Besides a dinghy trip to Balboa Island to do laundry, Thursday afternoon we took a long dinghy ride around the harbor. Since so much of the shore is private residences with private docks (like the one to the right), there are many mooring fields rather than traditional marinas. There were scads of these small covered runabouts that people used to just cruise the harbor on nice evenings. But even with all the wealth and well-kept boats, there were a number of derelicts, such as the two below that the local sea lions had taken over.

We caught this picture of the sun setting over the moored boats with the outline of the new moon visible in the western sky.

Cherry Cove, Catalina

2009-10-12T11:55:00.000-07:00

Sunday we headed out from Catalina Harbor, thinking we would just go a short distance down the coast to Little Harbor to anchor. But when we got there, with 1 sailboat and 3 power boats already there, we decided to go on around the island to the East side. After checking a couple other anchorages that were still too crowded, we picked up a mooring in Cherry Cove, just north of Isthmus harbor. The video below shows panning from Isthmus Harbor around to Cherry Cove. We look farther from the rocks in the video than we do in this shot from our transom!

The tail end of storm is expected to coming through Monday night and Tuesday, so we decided to stay here for a few nights – spending time dinghying to shore, playing music, and watching movies.

Catalina Harbor – Island Packet Rendezvous

2009-10-10T23:11:00.000-07:00

Thursday Oct 8 we left Marina Del Rey for Catalina Harbor, on the back side of Catalina at Two Harbors, for the Southern California Island Packet Rendezvous. We had to motor most of the way to Catalina, but then sailed around the point at west end and on to Catalina Harbor. The picture to the right shows Ribbon Rock that we passed just before Catalina Harbor.

There were 13 boats that came to the IP Rendezvous – 11 stayed in Cat Harbor and 2 stayed on the other side of the Isthmus at Isthmus Harbor. The island is very narrow at this point – just about a 10 minute walk across – and the facilities (village of Two Harbors) are more on the Isthmus side. The pictures below show Cat Harbor and a buffalo grazing in the field we passed on the way walking over to Two Harbors.

Suncoast Yachts (Darrell Allen with help from Diane McGrogran and others back at the office) did a great job of hosting the rendezvous. Formal activities were confined to the afternoon, allowing for late sleep and/or morning activities on our own. Thursday evening we had a potluck dinner aboard Cutthroat, a 485 that Suncoast brought as the host boat (it’s in brokerage – if anyone is interested….). Friday afternoon there was a boat-to-boat treasure hunt. Each boat had a clue with a fill-in-the-blank word for an answer. Then the first letters of all the words had to be unscrambled to get the final 14-letter answer. As we all went boat-to-boat to get the clues, wine and hors d’oeuvres were served. Besides the game, it was a great opportunity to meet the other owners and see their boats. The boat equipment hit of the tour was a 64” screen with projection TV and surround sound that Mike and Mary had on an IP 40! The last clues weren’t available until that evening as we had a BBQ dinner on the beach at Two Harbors and were able to get the clues from the Isthmus side people. There was one boat that still hadn’t made it – and we needed the clue not just the final answer. It was pretty clear the final answer was “Island Treasure” (or “Treasure Island”), but we still needed the “T” clue. Darrell ended up letting us guess the “T”-word, and since we correctly guessed “tack”, we won the treasure prize! – for which we chose a rig tuning in San Diego. The BBQ dinner was delicious. Saturday afternoon was a group sail – we went out with Eric and Gisela on their 485, followed by the group picture, and dinner at a restaurant in Two Harbors. Dinner included door prizes – the grand prize was a bottom job. We ended up winning a CD of sailing songs, a $50 gift certificate with Garhauer, and an ICOM handheld VHF radio. Overall a great rendezvous!

Marina Del Rey

2009-10-05T23:11:00.000-07:00

We drove back to Marina Del Rey on Oct 3 to find Galatea covered in fine dust from a dust storm had passed thru the area a week earlier. Otherwise she looked great. Our neighbors Renee and Doug had watched over her diligently and we appreciated it. We quickly stowed the gear we had hauled down from Berkeley, put the boat back together and provisioned for a fun sail on Sunday with old friends from grad school - Dennis and Ellen with their daughter Meghan.

On Sunday it was blowing 15 knots in the marina, and although NOAA said it was only blowing 12 kts next door at LAX, we expected at least 20 kts when we were out of the harbor. WRONG. It was blowing 30 knots at the harbor entrance. We passed 2 over-turned sail boats in the main fairway and watched other sail boats scurrying back in with shredded sails. Out of curiosity we stuck Galatea's bow out from behind the sea wall. WOW what a sight. Waves breaking over the seawall at the entrance to the marina, and 50 feet out to sea. We would have had to sail/motor thru them just to get away from land. We quickly turned tail and motored back to our slip for cocktails and appetizers. Pulling up to our dock we thought we were safe, but wrong again. Just as we were tying up a huge gust blew the stern of the boat away from the dock causing the bow to "sweep the dock". It was a slow motion event. It's amazing what a 60 pound anchor hanging off the bow can do when it tangles with an electrical box.

Afterwards we strolled with Dennis, Ellen, and Meghan through the Abbot Kinney district of Venice, and enjoyed a wonderful Italian tapas dinner with them.

On Monday Oct 5 we drove back up to Berkeley to drop off the jeep that was loaded with the things we didn't need. We spent one night in Berkeley, got to see baby Zachary again, Cathy put in one more day of work, and then we flew back to LA Tue night. Wed we had dinner on Galatea with Renee and Doug, and as the night closed we all looked thru the windows of our hearts. An experience I will remember.

The hardest part of this cruising life style so far has been saying good bye to all the wonderful people we are meeting.

Back to Sea

2009-10-02T08:20:00.000-07:00

Dear Friends,

How quickly times passes. Here it is Oct 2 and our brief visit back home is at an end.

Our first grandchild was born Sep 10 and we hosted the new family (Lynda, Paul and Zachery) for 5 days while Lynda recovered (talk about a full house, the galley never closed).

While we were home Cathy went back to her job at CHORI while Doug dealt with/ repaired some unexpected gutter issues and dry rot that led to a large deck project (thank you Hugo, he really appreciated your guidance and patient assistance). We have gathered up a few items for the trip south, most notably a ride on top kayak and a supply of Bison Grass Vodka.

Our time back in the bay area was very limited because of family and work commitments. For those of you that we able to spend time with, it was good to see you again. For those of you whose schedules didn’t mesh with ours, we are sorry to have missed you. We think about you all frequently. Keep in touch and consider a trip to Mexico!

- Cathy and Doug

Grandparents home in Berkeley

2009-09-10T17:55:00.000-07:00

Our reason for coming back to Berkeley for the month of September happened today. Zachary, our first grandchild, was born Thursday 10-September at 9:02 am. He weighed in at 6 lbs 10 oz and is 20.5 inches long.

Expect next update in early October when we return to the boat...

Marina Del Rey

2009-08-30T23:11:00.000-07:00

Thursday we had planned to go to another anchorage on Santa Cruz Island, but with winds expected to pick up to 25 kts in the afternoon, we decided to just cruise by Anacapa (picture is east end of Anacapa) and go on into Marina Del Rey. Some dolphins helped escort us:

Since we came into MDR a day early, we stayed the first night at the California Yacht Club. Friday we stopped by the fuel dock on the way to our slip for the next month. We will be leaving the boat here in Marina Del Rey for the month of September, while we go home to Berkeley to welcome our first grandchild into the world. We’re spending a few days here just cleaning the boat well, putting things away, sorting through what to take home, laundry, hanging out by the pool, and walking over to Venice Beach. Saturday we could see the huge plume of smoke rising from the Crescenta Valley fire in the Angeles National Forest - the mushrooming cloud of smoke in the picture to the right looks like a dragon!

A huge seal just jumped up on the dock next to our boat – Cathy chased it away spraying the hose on it. Hope they don’t turn our boat into a condo while we’re gone! Here's our boat's home for the next month:

Santa Cruz Island

2009-08-25T23:11:00.000-07:00

We left Santa Barbara for Santa Cruz Island late Tuesday morning. It was a beautiful day of sailing – blue skies, wind on the beam. We were sailing with main, jib, and staysail – starting out doing 4 kts in 7 kts of wind, and as the wind picked up to 10-12 kts we were sailing along at 6.5. As we approached the island the winds picked up to 15 and we put the staysail away. We decided to go into Smugglers Cove on the SE side of the island – it’s on the National Park end of the island, with a road coming down to a grove of olive trees near the shore. We hoped we could go ashore for a hike.

A Coast Guard boat kind of shadowed us as we turned into the anchorage. We were expecting to be boarded, but it just pulled into the anchorage and tied up to a mooring ball that was there, spent the night, and seemed to spend some time the next day doing exercises. Also Michael and Laurie aboard Laura pulled into the anchorage a few hours after us. The anchorage was beautiful – but with very little wind to keep us oriented, and a slight south swell coming in, it was rolly! Put flopper stopper on the list for our September refit!

Wednesday morning we took the dinghy out for a spin. Having it on the davits already put together made it much easier! However the swell made getting the motor on a bit of a challenge. We scoped the shore for a landing, but with the surf breaking onto a rocky beach, decided it wasn’t worth the attempt, so we just drove along the cliffs near the anchorage and went visiting other boats in the anchorage.

Santa Barbara

2009-08-25T09:24:00.000-07:00

We ended up spending 4 nights here, on a long dock at the SE corner of the marina. It seemed like everyone sailing south that we had met so far had converged on Santa Barbara – Bruce and Dawn on Lady Jane, Michael and Laurie on Laura, Simon and Susan on Encore… We spent most of our time just relaxing, playing some music and liars' dice aboard Lady Jane, eating a nice curry dinner aboard Laura, and visiting. We did manage to do laundry, grocery shop, and the required visit(s) to West Marine (conveniently located right at the harbor).

So we were able to do a number of boat projects. We found that when we were anchored at Cuyler Harbor, the snubber had actually worn fairly deep grooves in corner of the teak toerail just below the rubstrake which was intended to prevent this. So we sanded out an area of the toerail, reapplied the finish, and put additional rubstrakes just below the existing ones. We also finished putting together a bridle system for the PortaBote so that we can hoist it up on our davits. The bridles were made of pieces of lifeline looped around carabiners on each end (and swaged to hold the loops), and then swaged to a metal ring in the middle where we would attach the lines to hoist it up. When we tried it, we realized the u-straps we had riveted into the side of the PortaBote (where the carabiners were attached) pulled inward too much and deformed the side of the boat a little more than we wished. So after some thought and comments from everyone on the dock who happened to walk by, we decided to put new u-straps just above the seats so that the seats could take the compression load – requiring borrowing Michael’s riveter, and making a new bridle strap as it needed to be longer now. Boat projects are never as simple as they seem… but hopefully this is now a workable system. For those of you who are not familiar with PortaBote, It’s a 10 foot dinghy that can fold down to the size of a surf board. In heavy weather we can fold it down and secure it to a side deck, or even stow it below if necessary.

Morro Bay to Santa Barbara (Avila Beach, Cuyler Harbor)

2009-08-21T23:11:00.000-07:00

We left Morro Bay Wednesday for a short, uneventful trip to Avila Beach. We passed just offshore Diablo Valley nuclear power plant. We wish we had much more nuclear (and solar and wind and hydro) and much less dependence on foreign oil – but we did wonder about the yellowish slick in the water just offshore the plant (see foreground of picture). We anchored just off Avila Beach near the pier for the night. We wanted to get a little closer start for the trip around Point Conception.

Thursday the winds were calm and seas flat as we motored down the coast past Point Arguello. The winds picked up a little, enough for us to sail, and we decided to just sail straight on out to San Miguel Island (westernmost of the channel islands). As we passed Prince Island (picture) into Cuyler Harbor, the winds had picked up to 15 kts, and soon after we anchored at about 6pm, they increased to 20-25 knots. We had hoped for a quiet anchorage with hardly anyone else around, but there were 5 other boats anchored within a quarter mile and soon two fishing boats also came into the area. The wind was blowing so hard we were concerned about dragging our anchor, so Doug stayed up to watch a movie, and kept a watch on the radar screen, where he could easily see the location of shore and blips for the other 7 boats to make sure our position stayed relatively constant. Finally feeling somewhat reassured we would not drag, he went to bed as well , and Cathy got up to stand a watch– thinking the wind should subside soon after midnight. But it keep blowing 20-25 kts ALL night long. The rigging would pump and shake, and we heard some grinding as the anchor chain pulled the snubber from side to side. After a fairly sleepless night, we decided to just move on instead of going ashore and spending a second night as we had originally thought.

We sailed over to our next targeted stop – Becher Bay on the east end of Santa Rosa Island. As we approached the anchorage, the wind continued to blow close to 20 kts as we got closer to the shore. It looked like the pier was under construction, with a big crane moored at the approach to the anchorage. Doug suggested we might not want to spend another night of 20 kt winds at anchor and that we might just go into Santa Barbara, and Cathy whole heartedly agreed –we could still make the 5 hour trip. Cathy, at the helm, immediately did a 180 and off to Santa Barbara we sailed.

Morro Bay

2009-08-18T18:00:00.000-07:00

It was a quiet Sunday morning trip from San Simeon Bay down to Morro Bay. Without the main, we just motored with the staysail up. It never got above 5 kts of wind anyway.

We tied up to the guest dock at Morro Bay yacht club, after sitting on one of their moorings for a while until the daysailers that had participated in their regatta were cleared the dock. The port captain helped us arrange with a sailmaker to fix our main. We were a bit concerned when we learned the name of the business was "SLO-Sails" - until we realized the SLO was for San Luis Obispo where he is located. The port captain even delivered it for us Sunday evening and then returned it to us Tuesday morning. We reinstalled the main and now feel like a sailboat again.

We saw old friends and met new people here. Dave aboard Andante helped us with initial mooring and docking (we noticed his Island Packet on a mooring ball as soon as we approached the club!); he is heading north after having been down in Mexico. Simon and Susan aboard Encore and are headed down to the Channel Islands (from Brickyard Cove) had a rental car and were kind enough to take Doug to the grocery store with them. And we spent an evening chatting with two couples we met and introducing them to liars’ dice – Scott and Adela were aboard a Chris Craft which they are delivering up to SF, and Michael and Laurie aboard Laura are also doing the Baja HaHa and are spending their time making it down the California coast.

We took an afternoon walk around Morro Bay – lots of restaurants, galleries, and junk shops - and along the fishing docks with the seals laying in a heap up on the dock - then walked out to Morro Rock and the breakwater. Morro Rock is a volcanic plug that was formed 22M years ago when lava hardened in the vent of an active volcano, and then the volcano eroded away leaving the plug. It is really quite impressive standing guard over the entrance to the bay. The picture on the left shows Simon and Susan leaving for their next port (sailboat at the horizon on far left of the picture – tiny in comparison to the rock!).

San Simeon Bay

2009-08-14T23:11:00.001-07:00

Here in San Simeon we find a sailboat that we had been next to in Stillwater Cove and had noticed across the slip from us in Monterey. Her name is Lady Jane. A couple is on it with their little terrier. He paddled over to say hello (they had noticed us in the last 2 stops as well). He had customized their kayak so the dog could just sit on the bow like a living hood ornament.

We just spent a quiet day on the hook in the bay with Hearst Castle high up on a hill overlooking us. We took a short trip to shore just to walk on the beach, out to the pier, and to a small state park educational station. The beach here is very nice and the water temperate is 61 degrees so families are here with children in the water, dads standing by their BBQ grills, young girls lying in the sun and older women sitting in the shade.

Dawn and Bruce our anchor neighbors from Lady Jane came over for dinner. We had hoped they would bring their little dog so we could get a "Jill" fix (our Jack Russell "Jill" is home being cared for by our kids). But no - they did bring some great garlic bread to go with our fettucine carbonara. We had a good time teaching them liar's dice.

Big Sur coast – Stillwater Cove to San Simeon Bay

2009-08-14T23:11:00.000-07:00

We left Stillwater Cove shortly after 6am since we wanted to make the 75 NM to San Simeon and still come in during daylight. We motored for the first hour or two until the wind had built enough behind us to sail. Going dead downwind, we decided to just use the main and the staysail prevented out for wing-and-wing. As we passed Point Sur the winds were a comfortable 15 Kts, but soon started building to more. We had a few hours of 27-30 Kts with gusts to 36. At one point we pulled around into the wind enough to reef to main (glad we weren’t going north!). It was pretty intense. We ended up jibing a couple of times since the direction we wanted to go was dead downwind, but we wanted to leave an angle of 10-20 degrees to prevent accidental jibes. The seas were fairly sloppy and we were yawing up to a 40 degree swing, rolling up to a 40 degree swing, and probably pitching about as much too. Coming down one of the waves, we hit a highest speed (SOG) of 12.5 knots – pretty good with just a reefed main and staysail on a boat with a maximum theoretical hull speed of 7.6 Kts! From Cape San Martin to Point Piedras Blancas it calmed down to the lower 20’s. We thought as we rounded Piedras Blancas it should calm more. Wrong! It started blowing 30-33 Kts with gusts to 40, even as we rounded the green buoy marking the entrance to San Simeon Bay. We were happy to get the anchor down as the winds calmed to 10-20 inside the bay, and after dark finally became calm.

Flaking the mainsail, we found a rip around one of the grommets where it attaches to a slide between battcars on the mast. And of course the rip is just above the second reef, so we probably can’t even use the main reefed until we patch it or fix it. Bummer! We’ll try to deal with it in Morro Bay.

Stillwater Cove

2009-08-13T23:11:00.000-07:00

We left Wednesday morning to make the trip around Monterey peninsula to Stillwater Cove (14.1 NM). The trip was rather foggy, with about a half to one mile visibility until it cleared to a gorgeous blue sky as we entered Stillwater Cove in the shadow of Pebble Beach golf course. The cove is aptly named as the extensive kelp beds keep the water pretty flat and tricky for anchoring. Fortunately we were able to call the local harbormaster and were able to get onto a mooring ball. But there is a bit of a southerly swell that makes it into the cove, so we are swaying to and fro at our mooring ball. Besides the beautiful golf course and homes, a striking thing about the cove is the lack of otters or seals.

View from stern:

View from bow:

We woke up Thursday morning to a thin layer of ash on the boat – we understand due to a forest fire in the Bonnie Doon area near Santa Cruz.

We spent the afternoon ashore. The Pebble Beach Club is getting ready for their part of the car show – both vintage cars and new ones – with a focus on luxury car$. We felt sorry for a nice Ferrari we saw with a thin layer of ash on it… After walking through the Lodge at the 18th green and the Beach Club, we spent some time just playing cards on the beach.

There’s a large power yacht anchored just outside of us. Looks like about 90' – Far Niente. There are people being ferried out this evening for what looks like a big party aboard – our invitation must have gotten lost in the mail…

Monterey

2009-08-11T23:11:00.000-07:00

We made the short trip (14.8 NM) from Moss Landing to Monterey on Monday morning. We got a slip in Monterey harbor to make cleaning the boat, power, and access to Monterey easier. Monday afternoon we took a walk to downtown Monterey and a stop at Trader Joe’s. Jennifer was kind enough to drive down and bring our camera (plus our old one as a backup!).

Tuesday morning was filled with laundry and showers, and then we walked down to Monterey Aquarium. We had the camera, but Doug had forgotten that he set up the battery for charging – so no battery – so no pictures! We liked the jellyfish displays the best, with the seahorses placing a close second, and third the otter show. Tuesday evening is farmer’s market on Alvarado St. in Monterey. We got some fresh produce – all certified organic. We think Monterey is even more politically correct than Berkeley – could that be? The big deal for the coming week in Monterey is a car show and auction. We watched many vintage cars driving past us to the holding corral:

Moss Landing / Elkhorn Slough

2009-08-09T17:52:00.000-07:00

It was a short Saturday morning sail (15 miles in 3 hours) from Santa Cruz over to Moss Landing, where we pulled into the guest dock of the Elkhorn Yacht Club. The club has a great facility (the original building was made from an old barge) and very hospitable people.

Here at dock we feel like we have a front-row seat for a National Geographic program. There’s a colony of about 8 otters that live just opposite our dock. One in particular floats back and forth with a baby on her chest – just a little ball of fur. Our dock neighbor told us how she (“Jill”) had lost a baby last season, and then started caring for a dead sea bird – he was pleased when she had a new baby this year, and thinks this baby will survive. He lets them sleep on the swim platform of his boat because they feel safer there. A hundred feet away on the shore is where all the harbor seals haul out, sunning themselves all day long on the beach – slowly moving up the beach as the tide comes in.

Kayakers leave from here to paddle up into Elkhorn Slough to view the wildlife including otters, seals, terns, grebes, pelicans, jellyfish. We took the dinghy to the commercial harbor (on the south end of the harbor here, while the yacht club is on the north end), and then east under the highway 1 bridge into Elkhorn Slough. Surrounded by kayakers and nature, we felt guilty with the outboard, so we rowed most of the time. There are a couple of kayak rental facilities here, with naturalist guides to go with groups if desired – would be a great outing to come down here from the Bay Area for the day.

Santa Cruz

2009-08-07T23:11:00.000-07:00

We spent three nights / two days in Santa Cruz. We enjoyed dinner with Colin (from Mamabird) at Johnny’s, dinner with some old friends the Wipkes at Shadowbrook in Capitola, and our son Paul and his wife Lynda came down for a day at the beach. Their dog Thorin celebrated his first birthday being introduced to the sand and surf. Unfortunately, after they left we realized we had left our camera in the trunk of their car, so no more pictures for now.

Santa Cruz harbor was interesting. Our slip was right behind Johnny’s fish restaurant and right next to a loading dock for receiving fish. One morning some local bait sellers cast their net in the marina right across from us. We watched them haul the net in and then go over to the fish dock. We walked over to see what they had hauled in – they had two tubs full of beautiful 8” sardines. Now we know why there were so many seals cavorting in the fairway of the harbor. We also watched a group of guys offload 6000 pounds of kelp that they had harvested (in an hour and a half!). Although there was a bit of a language barrier (we really need to start listening to those Spanish tapes), we think they said they were taking the kelp to an abalone farm, and that they do this three times a week. It’s fascinating how some people make their livelihood.

Half Moon Bay to Santa Cruz

2009-08-05T23:11:00.000-07:00

We set out at 7 am towards our next destination. With overcast skies and little wind, we motored for the first few hours until we passed Pigeon Point lighthouse, where the skies cleared and a light wind came up. Since we were sailing dead downwind, we poled out our jib and sailed wing-and-wing towards Santa Cruz at about 4.8 kts in 7-8 kts of wind.

As we rounded Pt. Santa Cruz the winds piped up to 15kts and then quickly to 22 kts. We called the harbormaster to request a slip, and were asked to stand off for a half hour as they were clearing an overturned vessel from the entrance to the harbor. Do we really want to go in? We had heard of difficulties entering Santa Cruz due to shoaling, but thought that was in the winter and that they had fixed the problem with some pumping system. After the boat was cleared, we made our way into the harbor past the Santa Cruz lighthouse on the breakwater composed of computer-designed blocks of concrete.

Friends on a sistership (Mamabird) had suggested we request the slip next to them, since the fisherman who has that slip was up in Washington fishing. After we were safely tied up in the slip, Cathy ran off to a LONG, HOT shower to relieve her poison ivy itch.

Half Moon Bay

2009-08-04T23:11:00.000-07:00

When you’re hanging on the hook, you’re subject to all kinds of life forms floating by – including jelly fish and these creatures: This made us realize what a mistake it was not to get a kayak before we left. Now we’ll be looking for a tandem ride-on-top at stops along the way.

Instead we put our folding dinghy together (a real chore! this has to get easier with practice!) and went to shore for showers - much needed to relieve Cathy’s poison ivy itching. Tom and Sharon flew down for the day to see us, and we enjoyed a late lunch with them.

Out the Gate and Turn Left

2009-08-03T23:11:00.000-07:00

Our target was to leave August 1. After ten years of dreaming and planning, two days late isn’t too bad. But what does “late” really mean – we aren’t on any schedule any more! We told ourselves without a schedule, we would sail as much as we could. But as we cast off from the Berkeley Yacht Club guest dock at 10am under overcast skies against a flooding tide with ZERO wind, we left under motor. The cityscape was an artistic study in grey.
When we had reached the Golden Gate bridge at 11:30, the wind temporarily built to 18 knots, but as we approached Point Diablo, it died down again to about 10 knots, so we set our sails and turned left to start slowly sailing toward the south. The wind died again as we approached Point Montara, so we motored on in to Half Moon Bay, having covered our first 34 miles in six and a half hours. Our new Manson anchor performed flawlessly in its first use – luckily Cathy was holding on when it set!