Another week in paradise! La Cruz is such a lovely anchorage and the surrounding areas of the Banderas Bay are great! Although, we have yet to venture out too much yet. This week the town of Bucerias was hosting a festival in which the fishermen get their pangas blessed for the season (similar to our Opening Day on the Bay). Dick got some pics of their decorated pangas as they sped past us on their way to Bucerias.
We spent most of this week continuing to sample the restaurants around town. The German restaurant in town, “The Black Forest”, had a “Beerfest” night with special items on the menu, so we went there that night. The food was terrific. We are going to have to go back for dessert though, as we didn’t have enough room to fit it in. (We also went back t6 the “Brittania”for Sheppard’s Pie and checked out the “Octopuss’s Garden , owned bt a Brirish couple who sailed in twenty years ago and never left – D).We also spent a few evenings checking out the local music scene. (Tami’s starting to make some connections into the local music scene – D)
Dick took a trip to the big chandlery in the area, Zaragosa Marine, in Nuevo Vallarta, which is on the way to PV, but didn’t find anything he needed at this time. (Once again we’re getting to the point of at least partially mastering the local bus system, a must if you want to avoid the expensive taxi’s – D)
We took a short trip over to Bucerias yesterday, which is next door to La Cruz (after a cruiser’s swap meet at which I did find a few useful items – D). It is a small bayside town on the beach. It is far more commercially tourist than La Cruz. They had restaurants on the beach with a lot of the roving vendors bothering you. We walked the streets which were lined with touristy shops and vendors trying to get you to walk in. In that respect it was kind of like being in Cabo, but smaller. We were told to go to the town square and get tacos from the street taco stands, especially the ones who make their own tortillas. So, we did!!! Very good advice!! They were super yummy! We also each got an ice cream cone at the corner shop. Nice trip and a nice way to end the week. (Last night was beautiful night in the anchorage, calm, flat and mild temperatures – lazy night to end a relaxing week – D)
Last but not least, we got some laundry and provisioning done.
This week we are planning to visit more surrounding towns. (And maybe sail over to Yelapa for a day or so – D)
Monday, January 30, 2012
Monday, January 23, 2012
01-17 to 01-23 Banderas Bay
01-17, Tues. through 01-23, Sun. -- We are here in La Cruz de Huanacaxtle, Banderas Bay, enjoying the nice warmer weather in this region. It is in the low 80’s every day with a nice breeze that comes up in the afternoon. Below is a list of things we’ve done this week:
- We explored the darling town of La Cruz, which we absolutely LOVE! It is a small town with several streets, cobblestone, brick or dirt roads, very friendly people, lots and lots of good restaurants and LOTS of music. They play music in at least one of the restaurants every night and usually more than one! There is everything from rock and roll, jazz to country music being played. The more popular places in town are Philo’s, Café Huanacaxtle, Ana Bananas, The Britannia, The Octopusses Garden and The Black Forest. There are MANY more though. You could spend a year just trying to eat your way through this tiny town. (This does not count the small nighttime taco places that sprout up on the streets at night – D)
- We spent most of this week just walking the streets of town, eating our way around town, listening to music and visiting with a lot of fellow cruisers we haven’t seen in a while.
- We also took a side trip on a bus on Saturday for the day to Old PV. It is about an hour ride on the bus to Old PV as it is the southern-most part of PV (the ride was in a unair-conditioned bus with a suspension that died years ago, but it was cheap – 15 pesos for a one hour bus trip – D) . We were dropped off in a non-tourist part of the old town but with a map and some help from very friendly locals we soon found our way to the beach. We had lunch at a beach-side restaurant. They were launching people on a parasail from the beach right in front of us. I much prefer the kind that launch you from the back of the boat on a platform, than a beach take-off. It was fun to watch though. We were surprised that the prices in the restaurant were not any more expensive than in La Cruz, which are cheap. We then walked further south on the beach and walked the Malecon to the heart of old tourist PV, checking out the shops, clubs and restaurants. It was a lovely day and will be fun to spend more time in that portion of town.
- When we returned from Old PV, we were rapidly informed that “Journey” had pulled anchor while we were gone and a bunch of people had boarded her and reset our anchor!! WOW! Scary! Thank goodness we leave the key in the ignition, and someone was able to locate our windlass motor switch in the V berth. We had not locked the boat, or they would have had to break the door to get in. It seems to be a very safe area. No one locks their dinghy to the boat or the dinghy dock either. However, we now know that we need to pull and reset the anchor every few days, as we turn around and around on the anchor the chain gets wrapped around the anchor and will pull it. In this instance it had actually gotten wrapped around one of the flukes of the claw. Thank goodness we are surrounded by folks who knew just what to do and took care of it. One man started the engine, the other found the windlass switch and a few dinghy’s were in the water trying to keep her from drifting down on anyone while they were doing all this. Whew!!!!! We owe some folks big time. Thank goodness no one and nothing was injured or damaged.
- We watched the 49er game at Philo’s in town on Sunday. Sad we didn’t win the Championship, but a good game was played. We are very proud of their performance this year.
This coming week we are going to check into a land trip to Guadalajara with a group of people. We will be going to a meeting this evening regarding this possible trip and will keep y’all posted. We will also be doing more exploring of the Banderas Bay area. Our friends on “Nirvana” arrived in Nuevo Vallarta and we will be visiting them. They are in the Paradise Village Marina, for which we won a free week stay. So, we want to check it out. It has a five-star resort associated to it and you can avail yourselves of all the amenities when you stay in the marina. Woo Hoo!
- We explored the darling town of La Cruz, which we absolutely LOVE! It is a small town with several streets, cobblestone, brick or dirt roads, very friendly people, lots and lots of good restaurants and LOTS of music. They play music in at least one of the restaurants every night and usually more than one! There is everything from rock and roll, jazz to country music being played. The more popular places in town are Philo’s, Café Huanacaxtle, Ana Bananas, The Britannia, The Octopusses Garden and The Black Forest. There are MANY more though. You could spend a year just trying to eat your way through this tiny town. (This does not count the small nighttime taco places that sprout up on the streets at night – D)
- We spent most of this week just walking the streets of town, eating our way around town, listening to music and visiting with a lot of fellow cruisers we haven’t seen in a while.
- We also took a side trip on a bus on Saturday for the day to Old PV. It is about an hour ride on the bus to Old PV as it is the southern-most part of PV (the ride was in a unair-conditioned bus with a suspension that died years ago, but it was cheap – 15 pesos for a one hour bus trip – D) . We were dropped off in a non-tourist part of the old town but with a map and some help from very friendly locals we soon found our way to the beach. We had lunch at a beach-side restaurant. They were launching people on a parasail from the beach right in front of us. I much prefer the kind that launch you from the back of the boat on a platform, than a beach take-off. It was fun to watch though. We were surprised that the prices in the restaurant were not any more expensive than in La Cruz, which are cheap. We then walked further south on the beach and walked the Malecon to the heart of old tourist PV, checking out the shops, clubs and restaurants. It was a lovely day and will be fun to spend more time in that portion of town.
- When we returned from Old PV, we were rapidly informed that “Journey” had pulled anchor while we were gone and a bunch of people had boarded her and reset our anchor!! WOW! Scary! Thank goodness we leave the key in the ignition, and someone was able to locate our windlass motor switch in the V berth. We had not locked the boat, or they would have had to break the door to get in. It seems to be a very safe area. No one locks their dinghy to the boat or the dinghy dock either. However, we now know that we need to pull and reset the anchor every few days, as we turn around and around on the anchor the chain gets wrapped around the anchor and will pull it. In this instance it had actually gotten wrapped around one of the flukes of the claw. Thank goodness we are surrounded by folks who knew just what to do and took care of it. One man started the engine, the other found the windlass switch and a few dinghy’s were in the water trying to keep her from drifting down on anyone while they were doing all this. Whew!!!!! We owe some folks big time. Thank goodness no one and nothing was injured or damaged.
- We watched the 49er game at Philo’s in town on Sunday. Sad we didn’t win the Championship, but a good game was played. We are very proud of their performance this year.
This coming week we are going to check into a land trip to Guadalajara with a group of people. We will be going to a meeting this evening regarding this possible trip and will keep y’all posted. We will also be doing more exploring of the Banderas Bay area. Our friends on “Nirvana” arrived in Nuevo Vallarta and we will be visiting them. They are in the Paradise Village Marina, for which we won a free week stay. So, we want to check it out. It has a five-star resort associated to it and you can avail yourselves of all the amenities when you stay in the marina. Woo Hoo!
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
01-11, Chacala to 01-16 trip to PV
01-11, Wed. to 01-13, Fri. – These next few days were a nice relaxing few days in this beautiful anchorage. We met some interesting people to chat with, heard some interesting stories, laid about and read, relaxed in the hammock, tried the local cuisine, walked the town, walked the beach, did some cleaning on the boat, etc. etc. (At the far end of the beach, there was an exclusive high end yoga retreat http://www.mardejade.com Quite chi-chi – D)
01-14, Saturday – 49er game is today!! One of the owners ( a charming English lady named Amelia – D) of a palapa restaurant on the beach, Chac Mool, (http://chacala-cafe.blogspot.com/) and (http://chacmoolcafe.webs.com/) promised that they would bring their own personal TV down so we could watch the game and sure enough, when we got there it was there. It was a beautiful big-screen TV and they had set it up on a rickety fold up card table. One of the legs looked like it was about to collapse. It was funny! ( But it worked – D). At any rate we got to watch the best game we have seen in years!!! Of course we won. That pretty much covered it for the day.
01-15, Sunday – We decided to stay one more day we’ve been enjoying here so much. (Plus I had a day’s worth of boat maintenance projects to address that I hadn’t gotten to what with all the enjoying going on – D) Made one more trip to the beach, picked up some bread at the store and readied ourselves for tomorrow’s trip to La Cruz, in Banderas Bay.
01-16, Monday – We headed out at nearly 9:00 am for this approx. 7 hour trip. Just as we got out of the anchorage we saw about 5 whales playing in the bay. We have seen more whales in the last couple weeks than we’ve seen in our entire lives. The trip was uneventful, no wind, humid and motor sailing the entire way. The wind came up as we got into Banderas Bay, but we were almost there, so it wasn’t worth the trouble of raising and lowering sail.
We saw more whales along the way and then again in Banderas Bay! Must have seen 10 or 12 whales in all. Saw another big turtle too! I couldn’t figure out what this round black thing floating in the water was. I was worrying it might be a fishing line and then all of a sudden, he stuck his head up and looked around. It was funny!
We arrived and were anchored at 4:00 that afternoon. There are MANY boats (about 50-60 in the anchorage not counting the ones in the marina –D) and people we haven’t seen since the “Ha-Ha” or La Paz, so we scooted around in the dinghy to see who all was here. We will go exploring tomorrow and saying hellos. (Can’t wait to explore, this is supposed to be a very cool town with great food, music and art. The full name is La Cruz de Huanacaxtle for those that may want to look it up – D)
01-15, Sunday – We decided to stay one more day we’ve been enjoying here so much. (Plus I had a day’s worth of boat maintenance projects to address that I hadn’t gotten to what with all the enjoying going on – D) Made one more trip to the beach, picked up some bread at the store and readied ourselves for tomorrow’s trip to La Cruz, in Banderas Bay.
01-16, Monday – We headed out at nearly 9:00 am for this approx. 7 hour trip. Just as we got out of the anchorage we saw about 5 whales playing in the bay. We have seen more whales in the last couple weeks than we’ve seen in our entire lives. The trip was uneventful, no wind, humid and motor sailing the entire way. The wind came up as we got into Banderas Bay, but we were almost there, so it wasn’t worth the trouble of raising and lowering sail.
We saw more whales along the way and then again in Banderas Bay! Must have seen 10 or 12 whales in all. Saw another big turtle too! I couldn’t figure out what this round black thing floating in the water was. I was worrying it might be a fishing line and then all of a sudden, he stuck his head up and looked around. It was funny!
We arrived and were anchored at 4:00 that afternoon. There are MANY boats (about 50-60 in the anchorage not counting the ones in the marina –D) and people we haven’t seen since the “Ha-Ha” or La Paz, so we scooted around in the dinghy to see who all was here. We will go exploring tomorrow and saying hellos. (Can’t wait to explore, this is supposed to be a very cool town with great food, music and art. The full name is La Cruz de Huanacaxtle for those that may want to look it up – D)
Friday, January 13, 2012
01-05 to 01-10, Trips to Isla Isabel & Chacala
01-05, Thurs – We finished our preparations for the next adventure today and went for pizza dinner in the Marina. Yummy!
01-06, Friday – Passage to Isla Isabel. It was the most exciting passage yet for marine life!! It was a beautiful sunset on Mazatlan as we left the harbor. The lights were beautiful, the seas were nice and calm and the moon was full and bright. There were lots of fishing boats out but easily managed and it was a nice overnight passage.
01-07, Saturday –We were just approaching Isla Isabel in the dawn hours and it was a beautiful. I just came on watch at 6:00 a.m. and was looking out in the distance, I saw a huge water disturbance and then a huge fin come out of the water. As I continued looking in that direction I saw A LOT of water disturbances. There were hundreds of dolphins swimming around a pod of humpback whales!! They were breaching, slapping their tails and waving with their fins. It was beautiful! I wasn’t able to catch any of them on camera, but about an hour later there was another whale Dick spotted out in the distance, that was slapping his tail on the water and blowing water out his blow hole, jumping out of the water and splashing down. (It looked like he(?) was standing on his head in the water, slapping his tail over and over- D). I got some great pictures of it!! I also saw a huge sting ray jump about 8 feet out of the water twice. He was beautiful! Then as if that wasn’t enough, about a half hour later a whale came right up in front of the boat and blew water, slapped his tail down and submerged. I had to throttle back and turn to port so I wouldn’t run over his tail!! WOW!! Excellent!! Very exciting!
Isla Isabel had come into view at the last whale sighting and it is beautiful. We had to watch carefully for fishermen’s drift nets. This is very rich fishing grounds and there are many panga fishermen and big shrimp fishing boats. We pulled into the anchorage and found five boats anchored. We didn’t really like it because the bottom here is rocky and there are reefs around the shore. So, we tried the southern anchorage, but that was too small for us and even more dangerous reefs there. So, we went back to the other anchorage and found ourselves a spot we could live with. What a fantastic place this is!!
Isla Isabel is an isolated volcanic island, a protected national park and a World Heritage Site. As a matter of fact, Isabel is nicknamed “The Galapagos of Mexico”. The only thing on it is a fishermen’s camp in the southern anchorage. There are so many birds it is amazing! They have Blue-footed Boobies, Green, Red, Yellow and Brown-footed Boobies, which are only found here on this island and on the Galapagos islands. Also, I have never seen so many Frigates it is like being in the movie “The Birds”. We are going to the Island tomorrow to take pictures and explore. There is a big crater lake in the middle of the island where the volcano used to blow from, now filled with water, that we want to go see as well.
We napped of course after an overnight passage and enjoyed the beautiful sights in this anchorage.
01-08, Sunday – Another beautiful day in paradise! Very calm, sunny and lovely. We launched the dinghy and attempted to row ashore in this anchorage, but the surf was pretty big and there are a lot of volcanic rocks and reef along the shore. We decided not to go at that time as it was kind of precarious. We stopped at a boat by the name of “Cricket”, with Pat & Lynn aboard, and chatted with them for a while. They were out of Santa Cruz. So, we had lots to chat about with them. They have been coming down here for years, so had lots of interesting and educational experiences to share. They had been down as far as El Salvador & Ecuador.
The surf didn’t calm down, so we went back to the boat for a while. The tide went down after a bit and we could see the reef exposed now all along the shore. We tried again, thinking we could find an opening somewhere, but were not comfortable with it. Pat & Lynn had told us that most people go around the point to the southern anchorage and beach land there at the fishermen’s camp. So, we put the motor on the dinghy and did just that. Much easier landing area there and a shorter walk to the places we want to visit.
We started walking to the trail that would take us up a bluff and were immediately engulfed in birds!! Birds in the trees, birds on the trail, birds in the air!! (And you could walk right up to them, absolutely no fear of people – D) It is nesting time too. It was mostly Frigates in the lower areas sitting in trees, in the air, on nests or watching over their darling white fluffy chicks. It is truly a sight to see. As we climbed the bluff (REALLY STEEP), we started running into the Boobies. They were not too happy to see us walking by their nests, but we got great pictures of them as we went by. The Blue-Footed Boobies are my favorites and the prettiest. Their feet are soooooo blue!! They nest on the ground . (You had to watch where you were stepping and could walk right up to a nesting Mama. Mama would squawk at you and stand proudly over her eggs, but as soon as you passed she settle right back on her eggs – D) We got to the top which had stunning 360 degree views! We worked our way over to where a trail was supposed to be to get down. We managed to figure out how to get down from there. It was not marked and we had to kind of push our way through some of the overgrowth. There are so many birds, nests, babies and the majestic male Frigates with their bright red necks that blow up like a balloon, that you almost miss the Iguanas! We did see a few though.
We also found our way to the crater lake named “Lago Crater” tee hee. It is very pretty and serene. There were birds and iguanas everywhere.
We went back to the boat and prepared for tomorrow and our day-long passage to Chacala, had dinner and watched a movie.
01-09, Monday – We got up at dawn, raised anchor and set sail for Chacala. It started off as kind of overcast today and we had some wind, so we were able to motor sail. About 2 hours into the trip a whale stuck his big fin out of the water very close to the boat. I had just looked up to do a scan of the water and there he was! He did some more waving, slapped his tail and humped under the surface. He didn’t come back up though, so it was a short bit of excitement.
The fishermen’s nets were a problem the entire way across, so we had to keep a vigilant watch for the little black flags attached to floating poles. They are very difficult to see and you don’t know which way the line extends from the pole other than that it probably goes windward. Some of them had a little plastic bottle at the other end of the net, but again very hard to see. Also, we watched for the pangas because where there was a panga there were nets.
Since this is such a rich fishing ground and we were cooking along about 6.5 knots, I decided to FINALLY fish! YAAAAAAAY! Rudy…. Charlie….. I caught my first fish!!!! Looks to be a blue or blackfin tuna, about 18 inches long and around 8 lbs. We had to slow down and bring it on the boat, drain the blood, clean it, filet it and then clean up the mess. Very exciting! We got a couple of 2-pound filets out of it. Will have that for dinner tomorrow.
That pushed our arrival time out to about 5 o’clock in Chacala, but also the time is now one hour later. We are now on Central Time. What a lovely anchorage! We got settled in and will explore it tomorrow. Our friends, Bill & Brenda, on “Tahnoo” are here also, so will have lunch with them tomorrow as well.
01-10, Tues – We rowed ashore, checked in with the Port Captain, very nice fellow, and then walked the trail to the beach area. It is very lovely! (It is known as an eco-tourism spot, with a rich gringo gated community on the north end and a ritzy, exclusive Yoga spa on the south end – D) The Port Captain recommended the first restaurant for breakfast, so we had our breakfast there. They had really good coffee and the food was very tasty! After enjoying our meal, we walked down the beach past all the palapa restaurants (a half dozen or so and a small local hotel– D) and then back on the street side behind the beach . (Main street was all of about 4-5 blocks long, a couple of small tiendas and a few more small local hotels – I think you could walk every street in town in an hour - D) When I say street I mean cobblestones, sort of. There are round stones pushed into the dusty dirt. (Only two of the streets warranted the cobblestone treatment the rest were dirt – D) There are a handful of souvenir/artsy crafty/trinket kinds of stores.
Bill and Brenda met us at one of the palapa restaurants for lunch. The fish tacos were terrific! We met some folks who were traveling through the area and had interesting conversations. The margaritas were very good there too. Too good! ( and strong – D) We hung out there all afternoon and headed back to the boat for a quiet evening. (It was somewhat of a rolly evening but uneventful – D)
01-06, Friday – Passage to Isla Isabel. It was the most exciting passage yet for marine life!! It was a beautiful sunset on Mazatlan as we left the harbor. The lights were beautiful, the seas were nice and calm and the moon was full and bright. There were lots of fishing boats out but easily managed and it was a nice overnight passage.
01-07, Saturday –We were just approaching Isla Isabel in the dawn hours and it was a beautiful. I just came on watch at 6:00 a.m. and was looking out in the distance, I saw a huge water disturbance and then a huge fin come out of the water. As I continued looking in that direction I saw A LOT of water disturbances. There were hundreds of dolphins swimming around a pod of humpback whales!! They were breaching, slapping their tails and waving with their fins. It was beautiful! I wasn’t able to catch any of them on camera, but about an hour later there was another whale Dick spotted out in the distance, that was slapping his tail on the water and blowing water out his blow hole, jumping out of the water and splashing down. (It looked like he(?) was standing on his head in the water, slapping his tail over and over- D). I got some great pictures of it!! I also saw a huge sting ray jump about 8 feet out of the water twice. He was beautiful! Then as if that wasn’t enough, about a half hour later a whale came right up in front of the boat and blew water, slapped his tail down and submerged. I had to throttle back and turn to port so I wouldn’t run over his tail!! WOW!! Excellent!! Very exciting!
Isla Isabel had come into view at the last whale sighting and it is beautiful. We had to watch carefully for fishermen’s drift nets. This is very rich fishing grounds and there are many panga fishermen and big shrimp fishing boats. We pulled into the anchorage and found five boats anchored. We didn’t really like it because the bottom here is rocky and there are reefs around the shore. So, we tried the southern anchorage, but that was too small for us and even more dangerous reefs there. So, we went back to the other anchorage and found ourselves a spot we could live with. What a fantastic place this is!!
Isla Isabel is an isolated volcanic island, a protected national park and a World Heritage Site. As a matter of fact, Isabel is nicknamed “The Galapagos of Mexico”. The only thing on it is a fishermen’s camp in the southern anchorage. There are so many birds it is amazing! They have Blue-footed Boobies, Green, Red, Yellow and Brown-footed Boobies, which are only found here on this island and on the Galapagos islands. Also, I have never seen so many Frigates it is like being in the movie “The Birds”. We are going to the Island tomorrow to take pictures and explore. There is a big crater lake in the middle of the island where the volcano used to blow from, now filled with water, that we want to go see as well.
We napped of course after an overnight passage and enjoyed the beautiful sights in this anchorage.
01-08, Sunday – Another beautiful day in paradise! Very calm, sunny and lovely. We launched the dinghy and attempted to row ashore in this anchorage, but the surf was pretty big and there are a lot of volcanic rocks and reef along the shore. We decided not to go at that time as it was kind of precarious. We stopped at a boat by the name of “Cricket”, with Pat & Lynn aboard, and chatted with them for a while. They were out of Santa Cruz. So, we had lots to chat about with them. They have been coming down here for years, so had lots of interesting and educational experiences to share. They had been down as far as El Salvador & Ecuador.
The surf didn’t calm down, so we went back to the boat for a while. The tide went down after a bit and we could see the reef exposed now all along the shore. We tried again, thinking we could find an opening somewhere, but were not comfortable with it. Pat & Lynn had told us that most people go around the point to the southern anchorage and beach land there at the fishermen’s camp. So, we put the motor on the dinghy and did just that. Much easier landing area there and a shorter walk to the places we want to visit.
We started walking to the trail that would take us up a bluff and were immediately engulfed in birds!! Birds in the trees, birds on the trail, birds in the air!! (And you could walk right up to them, absolutely no fear of people – D) It is nesting time too. It was mostly Frigates in the lower areas sitting in trees, in the air, on nests or watching over their darling white fluffy chicks. It is truly a sight to see. As we climbed the bluff (REALLY STEEP), we started running into the Boobies. They were not too happy to see us walking by their nests, but we got great pictures of them as we went by. The Blue-Footed Boobies are my favorites and the prettiest. Their feet are soooooo blue!! They nest on the ground . (You had to watch where you were stepping and could walk right up to a nesting Mama. Mama would squawk at you and stand proudly over her eggs, but as soon as you passed she settle right back on her eggs – D) We got to the top which had stunning 360 degree views! We worked our way over to where a trail was supposed to be to get down. We managed to figure out how to get down from there. It was not marked and we had to kind of push our way through some of the overgrowth. There are so many birds, nests, babies and the majestic male Frigates with their bright red necks that blow up like a balloon, that you almost miss the Iguanas! We did see a few though.
We also found our way to the crater lake named “Lago Crater” tee hee. It is very pretty and serene. There were birds and iguanas everywhere.
We went back to the boat and prepared for tomorrow and our day-long passage to Chacala, had dinner and watched a movie.
01-09, Monday – We got up at dawn, raised anchor and set sail for Chacala. It started off as kind of overcast today and we had some wind, so we were able to motor sail. About 2 hours into the trip a whale stuck his big fin out of the water very close to the boat. I had just looked up to do a scan of the water and there he was! He did some more waving, slapped his tail and humped under the surface. He didn’t come back up though, so it was a short bit of excitement.
The fishermen’s nets were a problem the entire way across, so we had to keep a vigilant watch for the little black flags attached to floating poles. They are very difficult to see and you don’t know which way the line extends from the pole other than that it probably goes windward. Some of them had a little plastic bottle at the other end of the net, but again very hard to see. Also, we watched for the pangas because where there was a panga there were nets.
Since this is such a rich fishing ground and we were cooking along about 6.5 knots, I decided to FINALLY fish! YAAAAAAAY! Rudy…. Charlie….. I caught my first fish!!!! Looks to be a blue or blackfin tuna, about 18 inches long and around 8 lbs. We had to slow down and bring it on the boat, drain the blood, clean it, filet it and then clean up the mess. Very exciting! We got a couple of 2-pound filets out of it. Will have that for dinner tomorrow.
That pushed our arrival time out to about 5 o’clock in Chacala, but also the time is now one hour later. We are now on Central Time. What a lovely anchorage! We got settled in and will explore it tomorrow. Our friends, Bill & Brenda, on “Tahnoo” are here also, so will have lunch with them tomorrow as well.
01-10, Tues – We rowed ashore, checked in with the Port Captain, very nice fellow, and then walked the trail to the beach area. It is very lovely! (It is known as an eco-tourism spot, with a rich gringo gated community on the north end and a ritzy, exclusive Yoga spa on the south end – D) The Port Captain recommended the first restaurant for breakfast, so we had our breakfast there. They had really good coffee and the food was very tasty! After enjoying our meal, we walked down the beach past all the palapa restaurants (a half dozen or so and a small local hotel– D) and then back on the street side behind the beach . (Main street was all of about 4-5 blocks long, a couple of small tiendas and a few more small local hotels – I think you could walk every street in town in an hour - D) When I say street I mean cobblestones, sort of. There are round stones pushed into the dusty dirt. (Only two of the streets warranted the cobblestone treatment the rest were dirt – D) There are a handful of souvenir/artsy crafty/trinket kinds of stores.
Bill and Brenda met us at one of the palapa restaurants for lunch. The fish tacos were terrific! We met some folks who were traveling through the area and had interesting conversations. The margaritas were very good there too. Too good! ( and strong – D) We hung out there all afternoon and headed back to the boat for a quiet evening. (It was somewhat of a rolly evening but uneventful – D)
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
12-26-2011 to 01-04-2012, Stone Island to Mazatlan Marina
Dave & Leianne are going to go up north as well, so we met them on the Old Mazatlan side to catch a bus up that way. It turned out that one of the small golf cart-type taxis (pulmonias) would drive us up to old town square for 30 pesos, so we did that instead. The drivers name is Jorge Gonzales, aka “Speedy Gonzales”. A really nice fellow that speaks super good English and gave us his cell phone number for future use.
We ate at a Panaderia (Bakery) called “Panama Bakery” that Dave & Leianne had found on their previous exploration of old town. (Delicious and cheap – D) We walked over to the Olas Altas (High Waves) part of town, which is situated on the coast, to catch a bus up to the Dorado Zone. We ended up taking another little taxi. The views were spectacular and the promenade (Malacon) was fantastic. We are looking forward to exploring it when we move up to the marinas.
We parted ways with Dave & Leianne at the Mega Mercado. They were getting provisioned to leave tomorrow for Isla Isabel. We walked up to the Telcel store where we spent the next 2 and a half hours getting our Banda Ancha. Yay! What I forgot to mention is that we had to haul the computer with us to the store so they could activate it and we could make sure it worked properly and knew how to use it. We were fortunate and got a lovely English speaking gal who was wonderfully helpful.
Next we got ourselves another little taxi up to the Marina Mazatlan so we could make a reservation for Wed. and see the facilities. It looks great and we are looking forward to spending a week there exploring new Mazatlan.
We caught a bus outside the Marina that took us all the way back down to the water taxi, down the Malacon and through old town. This will come in handy when we are in the Marina.
We got in our dinghy, back at Beji’s, to head to the boat. It was already dark and we got stuck in the fishermen’s gill net, for the 3rd time. They are not marked very well and drop them in odd places. It took a while before Dick was able to cut us free. Yikes! We won’t miss that part of being at this anchorage.
12-27, Tues – We are just going to relax and enjoy the anchorage today. Hang out at the palapa’s, have pancakes at Carmelita’s and say good bye to our friends at Benji’s.
I am finally going to cook that Christmas dinner I had planned tonight . We are leaving tomorrow for the Marina.
12-28, Wed – We pulled anchor and headed to the Marinas. The trip was uneventful. It only took about 2 ½ hours. It was a little dicey getting in the entrance though, as it was very narrow and shallow with the waves pushing us in, but we made it. The channel was very narrow and there was a dredge parked on the side of the channel. Fortunately it was not operating or it would have been in the middle and we would have had to try to get around it. As it was, we registered 7’ depth at one point. Our draft is 6 ½ feet, so that was close!
We were met by the security folks at the dock we had reserved, who helped us with lines, dock 5 slip 7. It was well marked and there was plenty of room for us to get into the slip. We got settled in and explored around the many restaurants and facilities available to us.
12-29-2011 to 1-1-2012 – We spent this time getting the boat ready in anticipation of some buggy anchorages in our future travels to the south of us. Edress had made screens for the hatches years ago and Dick started the process of affixing them with Velcro to the frames of the hatches. We need to get netting to cover the cockpit areas around the dodger. There is a fabric store in the old town we can go to for bridal veil material that will work perfectly.
We met more folks that we had done the “Ha Ha” with and some new folks too. We got to spend time at the resort pool and hot tub in the adjacent marina (really nice).
Dick is getting more comfortable with the SSB radio and all the different “cruiser nets” we can check in with. (I now have four – five different nets to pay attention to – D) We are getting back in contact with folks we haven’t seen in a while and staying in contact with those we have recently met.
Lots of good food here too!! We had a super inexpensive meal at a place called “The Fat Fish”. No…. we didn’t have fish….. we had ribs, of all things. 2 plates for 1. The ribs didn’t fit on the plate, the slab was so big!! How much did it cost???? $160 pesos ($12.00 American) good grief! With baked potato, salad and bread. (Lots of good beef here – D)
NEW YEARS EVE! We got together with Nick & Nancy from “Jessie Marie” and went to a Cuban-Mexican restaurant on the Malacon. Had another fabulous meal for not much $, then walked up the Malacon to a party on the beach at a restaurant called “Chili Peppers” not far from where we had dinner. They had a band, bon fire and you could see the fireworks that all the resort hotels put on. There weren’t a lot, but it was pretty. We saw our Canadian friends from “Tanoo”, Bill & Brenda, and from “August Moon”, Russ & Doreen there. They are staying at the El Cid Marina. We took a taxi home from there at about 1:00 am, 2012.
We spent the 1st relaxing (recovering – D) on the boat, playing WOW and then went to the sports bar near the marina to watch the 49ers win yet again! Yay!
01-02 to 01-04 – We continued the screen project, did some provisioning, visiting with friends, hanging by the pool/hot tub, enjoying local restaurants/music, riding the local buses around, getting the boat ready to leave. We will be leaving day after tomorrow (Friday 1/6).
This will be the last blog until we get to cell phone coverage area again. Stay tuned to see the Blue Boobies, and many one-of-a-kind birds and other fabulous adventures in the anchorages on the way to Puerto Villarta! Miss you all! Kisses & Hugs Happy New Year!
Tuesday, December 27, 2011
12-19 to 12-25, Mazatlan
12-19, Monday – It is still blowing pretty good today, a little less, but still blowing. The forecast is for it to settle down tomorrow until Thurs night. We decided to take our dinghy to Benji’s and leave it there while we took a water taxi over to old Mazatlan. Nick will watch it for us, which will be better than leaving it unattended on the resort beaches.
So, we walked a quarter mile to the water taxi and took it over to old Mazatlan and checked on the Club Nautico anchorage first (but they were closed today) with the idea that we might anchor out there soon. It is closer and easier to get to the town from there as opposed to having to take a water taxi over. They have a dinghy dock and don’t charge too much to anchor there. However, we found that their facilities were pretty rustic (read dilapidated, long past their heyday– D) and there is a new water treatment plant going in across the street so there is an unpleasant smell in the area. Hmmmmm…..
Anyway, we started walking back towards the town and looking to walk towards old town. We were hungry though and decided to get a bite to eat. We climbed up these very steep stairs up to a restaurant that is perched on the edge of a rock. It looked like it would have great views and it did. However, it was closed today! Bummer, but we got some good pictures from there. After climbing down, we started walking again and checked another restaurant, but it was closed too. Hmmmm….. Not sure why things are closed. It is not a holiday. Anyway, we found a small local hotel (and we do mean small, I’d be surprised if it had more than a half dozen rooms . To have a beer with lunch I had to walk across the street to little neighborhood tienda and buy my own and bring it back – D) which had a little restaurant and had lunch there. Nothing fancy, but yummy, authentic burritos.
We walked the rest of the way to the old town center and checked out both town squares. One of the oldest buildings in Mazatlan was in Plazuela Machado, the first square we visited, and had a museum regarding the history of Mazatlan on the second story. It was very interesting! We visited a beautiful cathedral which was in the second square we visited (Plaza de la Republica). There are several restaurants we saw which we will have to try on future visits.
It is time to get back to the water taxi and our dinghy. We had invited the couple from “Deep Playa” over to our boat for a visit so we needed to get back. The water taxi service stops after 6:00pm anyway.
We had a lovely visit with Patrick and Dawn. It was a very nice end to the day.
12-20, Tues – The winds have died as forecasted…. Yay!! We are going to go to ashore and check out the local resort row and some of the restaurants. Maybe hang out in a palapa or two and enjoy the reprieve from the wind.
We took the dinghy to Benji’s again and walked around to the beach strip. Our new favorite friend, Marley the dog, was showing us how to get there. Everyone seems to know him too. Very cute and a sweet dog. He’s a black lab mix of some sort and very smart. We got a recommendation from young Daniel, at Benji’s, to eat at either Victor’s or Carmelita’s. Both were way down the beach, almost directly in front of “Journey” when looking out from the shore. We decided to try Victor’s. Our friends from “Deep Playa” found us there and we all ate lunch together. It was a pleasant afternoon watching all the locals play in the water and chatting with some x-pats who have been here a while.
The food was absolutely superb here at Victor’s. We will have to come back for more . We were so stuffed, that we really didn’t want dinner, so we went back to Benji’s for a cold drink and headed back to the boat for a quiet evening.
12-21, Wed. – The folks on “Deep Playa” left the anchorage for the marinas to spend Christmas with visiting relatives. We listened to the morning net on the radio and were contacted by another boat, “Chrysalis II” (a 29’ boat!!) with Dave & Leiann aboard, letting us know they were coming out from the anchorage by Club Nautico to here today and wanted to get together later to swap stories. We set a date for that evening aboard “Journey”.
We had lunch at Benji’s and took the water taxi over to Old Mazatlan and took a bus to the town center (Centro). We walked the local market (Mercado Central), which is really fantastic, and looked at all the meats, fish and chicken for sale (fresh, chop-it-up for you now) . They had all kinds of produce available and almost anything else you might need. We strolled through the town and went to visit a local artist, Glen Rogers, who is a very good friend of our friends Larry & Patricia and Larry’s parents , Fawn & Roger. She has a beautiful home and studio in what looks to us like the up and coming art district of town. It turns out she had been aboard “Journey” once in the past at Angel Island on an Opening Day weekend event. We had a nice visit and will look to get together with her after the holidays before we leave Mazatlan. (We also met a fascinating, and somewhat mysterious world travelling Jewish artist, Daniel, from Israel sitting on the sidewalk working on a watercolor of the colorful old buildings lining the narrow streets and had a wonderful chat with him – D)
The time was getting away from us, so we walked out to where we could catch another bus back to the waterfront and a water taxi back to Stone Island.
Dave & Leiann came by “Journey” on their way back from the beach, where they had dinner at Carmelita’s and extolled how we should eat there as well. We had a lovely evening swapping stories with them and having hors d’oeuvres. They had some pretty interesting tales of their trip down from Seattle, Washington area and many other sailing adventures that Dave had been on over his lifetime. A lovely evening was had by all.
12-22, Thurs – Today we are going to have another Benji’s pizza for lunch with Dave , Leiann and another couple , Rob and Kai, who just pulled into the anchorage this morning and then go to the town here on the island. I want to find a mercado to get a few things for our Christmas dinner before the wind picks up as forecasted and we might not be able to leave the boat.
Dave, Leiann, Dick & I walked to the town of Isla Piedras on the dirt road that goes along the harbor side of the island. We wanted to find the 2nd water taxi to the Mazatlan side, because it runs all night long. As we were walking along the road this gringo fellow hollered from a home up on a hill overlooking the road and harbor for us to come up and see the view. He is a Vietnam vet who has lived down here for 20 years and is in the process of building a lovely home there on that hill. He was definitely a character, we think a lonely character though, and very interesting to talk with. The people down here are very VERY friendly. As you walk along, everyone says hello, smiles and asks how you are. You never know who you are going to end up meeting and sharing experiences with. The locals are only too happy to talk and laugh with you when trying to communicate. It is quite a fun atmosphere.
We found the water taxi station and there are a few concrete roads in this part of the town, but not many. We also found the small mercado and got a few things there. We followed the roads through town to the beach side of the Island, admiring the local architecture of the old homes painted so colorfully. We bought some roasted peanuts and candied peanuts from a local family who makes them right there in their yard. You should see the roaster they use, which was powered by a Rube Goldberg type contraption of an electric motor and pulleys (in the middle of it all a car transmission, for gear reduction I guess - D) that turned the 55 gal drum on a spit over a fire. There was a back-up hand crank for the spit. You could see a man further back in the yard pouring finished peanuts out of a basket from above a fan. The fan was blowing the empty shells out of the mix as they fell past it on their way to the basket on the ground. This way empty shells didn’t fall into the basket with the good peanuts and subsequently into your bag of peanuts (mostly). And…………….they were excellent!!
The road brought us back to the playa at Carmelita’s, so we stopped for a beverage, then made our way back to Benji’s and on to the boat for a nice quiet evening. The sunsets over the point have been spectacular!!
12-23, Fri. – The day before Christmas Eve?? Really?? Doesn’t really feel like it. We are going ashore to the beach palapas to find an internet connection. We had Leianne & Dave over this morning so they could take a shower while we used their Banda Ancha device to get internet here on the boat. We want to get one of these, so we can do this. We will have to find a Telcel store to do this though, so we won’t get to it until after Christmas.
I need to upload pictures and update the blog at least through our arrival here, so we went ashore with the computer. Carmelita’s has Wi-fi, but it doesn’t reach the restaurant. The owner is going to bring the router out to the restaurant tomorrow, so we will have to put it off till tomorrow. We had a late lunch there anyway.
We had so much to eat at Carmelita’s that we didn’t really need a big dinner, so we had a beverage at Benji’s and went back to the boat.
12-24, Sat – We got ourselves over to Carmelita’s early so we could do all of our interneting. Yay I got the blog updated to our arrival in Mazatlan, we both got our Facebook and e-mails dealt with too. We had a fabulous breakfast while we were there and the 49er football game was on that afternoon! Yaaaaay! Go Niners! We will come here tomorrow so we can Skype with our kids and grandkids in Redding (per the grandkids request).
12-25, Sun, Christmas – Can’t believe it is Christmas. It was supposed to be a no present year, but Dick surprised me with a lovely silver sailboat necklace with opal insets which he got in La Paz before we left. Very lovely!!
We had some breakfast munchies, made phone calls to loved ones that we could get ahold of and headed to Carmelita’s to Skype. Before we left though, one of the boats “Vallela Vallela” (say that 3 times fast, ha) in our anchorage (a nice young couple, Kai & Rob, from Port Townsend, WA (and they know Chelcie and Kathy too! – D)) organized a get-together at Benji’s Pizza at one o’clock for about six of us boats in the area.
It turned out to be a fun get-together. There is always the exchanging of stories, the food and the locals. Kai & Rob had bought a Santa pinata in the Market Central yesterday, so everybody had a chance to whack at it after dinner. It was fun watching the local children swing away at this thing.
So, we had Garlic Shrimp & Ham Pizza for Christmas dinner. Will do the meal I had planned for tomorrow.
Merry Christmas Everyone & A Happy New Year to you!
So, we walked a quarter mile to the water taxi and took it over to old Mazatlan and checked on the Club Nautico anchorage first (but they were closed today) with the idea that we might anchor out there soon. It is closer and easier to get to the town from there as opposed to having to take a water taxi over. They have a dinghy dock and don’t charge too much to anchor there. However, we found that their facilities were pretty rustic (read dilapidated, long past their heyday– D) and there is a new water treatment plant going in across the street so there is an unpleasant smell in the area. Hmmmmm…..
Anyway, we started walking back towards the town and looking to walk towards old town. We were hungry though and decided to get a bite to eat. We climbed up these very steep stairs up to a restaurant that is perched on the edge of a rock. It looked like it would have great views and it did. However, it was closed today! Bummer, but we got some good pictures from there. After climbing down, we started walking again and checked another restaurant, but it was closed too. Hmmmm….. Not sure why things are closed. It is not a holiday. Anyway, we found a small local hotel (and we do mean small, I’d be surprised if it had more than a half dozen rooms . To have a beer with lunch I had to walk across the street to little neighborhood tienda and buy my own and bring it back – D) which had a little restaurant and had lunch there. Nothing fancy, but yummy, authentic burritos.
We walked the rest of the way to the old town center and checked out both town squares. One of the oldest buildings in Mazatlan was in Plazuela Machado, the first square we visited, and had a museum regarding the history of Mazatlan on the second story. It was very interesting! We visited a beautiful cathedral which was in the second square we visited (Plaza de la Republica). There are several restaurants we saw which we will have to try on future visits.
It is time to get back to the water taxi and our dinghy. We had invited the couple from “Deep Playa” over to our boat for a visit so we needed to get back. The water taxi service stops after 6:00pm anyway.
We had a lovely visit with Patrick and Dawn. It was a very nice end to the day.
12-20, Tues – The winds have died as forecasted…. Yay!! We are going to go to ashore and check out the local resort row and some of the restaurants. Maybe hang out in a palapa or two and enjoy the reprieve from the wind.
We took the dinghy to Benji’s again and walked around to the beach strip. Our new favorite friend, Marley the dog, was showing us how to get there. Everyone seems to know him too. Very cute and a sweet dog. He’s a black lab mix of some sort and very smart. We got a recommendation from young Daniel, at Benji’s, to eat at either Victor’s or Carmelita’s. Both were way down the beach, almost directly in front of “Journey” when looking out from the shore. We decided to try Victor’s. Our friends from “Deep Playa” found us there and we all ate lunch together. It was a pleasant afternoon watching all the locals play in the water and chatting with some x-pats who have been here a while.
The food was absolutely superb here at Victor’s. We will have to come back for more . We were so stuffed, that we really didn’t want dinner, so we went back to Benji’s for a cold drink and headed back to the boat for a quiet evening.
12-21, Wed. – The folks on “Deep Playa” left the anchorage for the marinas to spend Christmas with visiting relatives. We listened to the morning net on the radio and were contacted by another boat, “Chrysalis II” (a 29’ boat!!) with Dave & Leiann aboard, letting us know they were coming out from the anchorage by Club Nautico to here today and wanted to get together later to swap stories. We set a date for that evening aboard “Journey”.
We had lunch at Benji’s and took the water taxi over to Old Mazatlan and took a bus to the town center (Centro). We walked the local market (Mercado Central), which is really fantastic, and looked at all the meats, fish and chicken for sale (fresh, chop-it-up for you now) . They had all kinds of produce available and almost anything else you might need. We strolled through the town and went to visit a local artist, Glen Rogers, who is a very good friend of our friends Larry & Patricia and Larry’s parents , Fawn & Roger. She has a beautiful home and studio in what looks to us like the up and coming art district of town. It turns out she had been aboard “Journey” once in the past at Angel Island on an Opening Day weekend event. We had a nice visit and will look to get together with her after the holidays before we leave Mazatlan. (We also met a fascinating, and somewhat mysterious world travelling Jewish artist, Daniel, from Israel sitting on the sidewalk working on a watercolor of the colorful old buildings lining the narrow streets and had a wonderful chat with him – D)
The time was getting away from us, so we walked out to where we could catch another bus back to the waterfront and a water taxi back to Stone Island.
Dave & Leiann came by “Journey” on their way back from the beach, where they had dinner at Carmelita’s and extolled how we should eat there as well. We had a lovely evening swapping stories with them and having hors d’oeuvres. They had some pretty interesting tales of their trip down from Seattle, Washington area and many other sailing adventures that Dave had been on over his lifetime. A lovely evening was had by all.
12-22, Thurs – Today we are going to have another Benji’s pizza for lunch with Dave , Leiann and another couple , Rob and Kai, who just pulled into the anchorage this morning and then go to the town here on the island. I want to find a mercado to get a few things for our Christmas dinner before the wind picks up as forecasted and we might not be able to leave the boat.
Dave, Leiann, Dick & I walked to the town of Isla Piedras on the dirt road that goes along the harbor side of the island. We wanted to find the 2nd water taxi to the Mazatlan side, because it runs all night long. As we were walking along the road this gringo fellow hollered from a home up on a hill overlooking the road and harbor for us to come up and see the view. He is a Vietnam vet who has lived down here for 20 years and is in the process of building a lovely home there on that hill. He was definitely a character, we think a lonely character though, and very interesting to talk with. The people down here are very VERY friendly. As you walk along, everyone says hello, smiles and asks how you are. You never know who you are going to end up meeting and sharing experiences with. The locals are only too happy to talk and laugh with you when trying to communicate. It is quite a fun atmosphere.
We found the water taxi station and there are a few concrete roads in this part of the town, but not many. We also found the small mercado and got a few things there. We followed the roads through town to the beach side of the Island, admiring the local architecture of the old homes painted so colorfully. We bought some roasted peanuts and candied peanuts from a local family who makes them right there in their yard. You should see the roaster they use, which was powered by a Rube Goldberg type contraption of an electric motor and pulleys (in the middle of it all a car transmission, for gear reduction I guess - D) that turned the 55 gal drum on a spit over a fire. There was a back-up hand crank for the spit. You could see a man further back in the yard pouring finished peanuts out of a basket from above a fan. The fan was blowing the empty shells out of the mix as they fell past it on their way to the basket on the ground. This way empty shells didn’t fall into the basket with the good peanuts and subsequently into your bag of peanuts (mostly). And…………….they were excellent!!
The road brought us back to the playa at Carmelita’s, so we stopped for a beverage, then made our way back to Benji’s and on to the boat for a nice quiet evening. The sunsets over the point have been spectacular!!
12-23, Fri. – The day before Christmas Eve?? Really?? Doesn’t really feel like it. We are going ashore to the beach palapas to find an internet connection. We had Leianne & Dave over this morning so they could take a shower while we used their Banda Ancha device to get internet here on the boat. We want to get one of these, so we can do this. We will have to find a Telcel store to do this though, so we won’t get to it until after Christmas.
I need to upload pictures and update the blog at least through our arrival here, so we went ashore with the computer. Carmelita’s has Wi-fi, but it doesn’t reach the restaurant. The owner is going to bring the router out to the restaurant tomorrow, so we will have to put it off till tomorrow. We had a late lunch there anyway.
We had so much to eat at Carmelita’s that we didn’t really need a big dinner, so we had a beverage at Benji’s and went back to the boat.
12-25, Sun, Christmas – Can’t believe it is Christmas. It was supposed to be a no present year, but Dick surprised me with a lovely silver sailboat necklace with opal insets which he got in La Paz before we left. Very lovely!!
We had some breakfast munchies, made phone calls to loved ones that we could get ahold of and headed to Carmelita’s to Skype. Before we left though, one of the boats “Vallela Vallela” (say that 3 times fast, ha) in our anchorage (a nice young couple, Kai & Rob, from Port Townsend, WA (and they know Chelcie and Kathy too! – D)) organized a get-together at Benji’s Pizza at one o’clock for about six of us boats in the area.
It turned out to be a fun get-together. There is always the exchanging of stories, the food and the locals. Kai & Rob had bought a Santa pinata in the Market Central yesterday, so everybody had a chance to whack at it after dinner. It was fun watching the local children swing away at this thing.
So, we had Garlic Shrimp & Ham Pizza for Christmas dinner. Will do the meal I had planned for tomorrow.
Merry Christmas Everyone & A Happy New Year to you!
Saturday, December 24, 2011
12-05 La Paz to 12-18 Arrive Mazatlan
This week is going to be about getting ready for the impending trip, whatever and whenever it will be. Doing some cleaning, reorganizing and provisioning.
12-06 Tues – 12-12 Monday
- Went to our favorite restaurants, did laundry, cleaned, provisioned, varnished and prepared to leave for Mazatlan
- On Thursday we got together with Bob & Sherry of “Nirvana” and Terry & Patricia of “Sunnyside” for sundowners. (Bob and Terry ganged up on me to take the ham exam that was to be given that Saturday morning – 36 hour later. So I spent all day Friday studying from 7 AM to 9 PM. Took the test at 9 AM the next day and passed. Now I have aTechnician’s class license but need to study for the General class exam befor I can consider myself a “ham”. – D)
- We have been continually unhappy with the way our 65 lb. CQR anchor has been performing. We have had to try 2 or more times to get the anchor to set, it wouldn’t feel like a secure set and have had the anchor drag more than once. We have been unable to sleep well at anchor because of this. We went and looked at Lopez Marine in La Paz at some of the anchors there and took measurements back to the boat. Dick thinks the 110 lb. claw-type anchor will work well on our bow sprit. So, after the exam on Saturday Dick went and bought it. He had to make a few adjustments to the size of the hole (minor wood surgery – D) that the anchor comes up through the bow sprit, but it worked and we are anxious to try it. We are excited about this new addition to our ground tackle tools.
- Bob & Sherry decided to stay until their FM3 visas are completed (3-4 more weeks), so we decided to leave for Mazatlan (based upon weather conditions) on Tues 12-13. The weather has been very windy, the seas choppy and forecasted to stay that way until Monday. The seas should be calmed down by Tues.
- On Monday the weather had calmed and we went to pay our electric bill that night at the Marina office ($35 for the month) and inform them we were leaving early in the morning. They told us that the port was closed!! We couldn’t figure out why since the weather was just fine, and they said we’d have to wait until the morning till after they opened to see if the port would be opened. This will only delay us an hour or so from our desired 6:00 am departure.
12-13, Tues. – We checked with the office at 7:00 am and were told the port is open. We think maybe it was due to a holiday on Monday that it was closed. Anyway…….
Bye bye La Paz ………. Hello Mexican Navy? Yep! We got boarded just as we left the LaPaz Harbor channel. A boat full of young, handsome and very nice Mexican Navy boys flagged us down and boarded us. Yes, they had machine guns (M-16’s - D). They were very friendly, let me take pictures and took a picture of me with one of them . They seemed to be mostly interested in making sure we didn’t have any stow-aways and had our proper papers.
After that we were on our way again and headed to Los Muertos. We really enjoyed that anchorage last time (except for when we dragged anchor) and are looking forward to visiting there again with our new anchor.
We arrived there just before dark and were not disappointed! It only took one try and we were “stuck” with the new anchor, able to rev the engine up to 1200 RPMs in reverse without moving an inch! Excellent!! We are VERY happy and relieved. It was just as beautiful as remembered. There were only four other boats there and we knew one of them, “Deep Playa”. A nice young couple we met on the “Ha-Ha”, Patrick & Dawn. We slept VERY good, for at-anchor sleeping.
12-14, Wed. – We are now back on the long range Amigo Net in the mornings. This is a channel on the Single Side Band radio that cruisers use to check-in when they are under way, get in contact with each other and get weather reports. We checked back in with this group to report we were under way again and what our plans are. We found out that the “Northers” (those nasty winds) will be “blowing like snot” through Thursday night. We were planning on leaving on Thursday afternoon. So, once again, weather has postponed our travels, but only by a day.
Not such a bad deal. It is really very lovely here. We were unable to leave the boat though as it was too windy to launch the dingy. We read, played cards and had good meals.
12-15, Thurs – We were hoping we could launch the dingy and go ashore, but it was still too windy to launch the dingy. So, we read some more, watched a movie and had some more good meals .
12-16, Friday – The weather “laid down” as forecasted, so we readied ourselves for the trip. We will leave this afternoon at 4:00, sail all night, all day Saturday, all night and arrive Sunday morning in Mazatlan.
Since we had the entire day before leaving, we wanted to go to the restaurant ashore, so we launched the dingy and went for a super hamburger for lunch. We chatted with two men from one of the boats at anchor, “Music”, who had stopped by our boat on their dingy to say hi to us earlier that day. They had sailed down from Canada and were on their way back to Cabo San Lucas from La Paz. The owner’s wife was coming to meet him and his buddy (who helped him crew down from Canada) was going to fly home.
We stopped by “Deep Playa” on the way back to our boat from lunch to see what their plans were. We found out they were looking to go to Mazatlan too, so we decided to “buddy boat” with them for the trip across. It’s always nice to have another boat around to keep an eye on each other under way on a long passage. So we agreed on the 4:00 departure time and both left the anchorage then. (They ended up turning back for a brief repair so were a half hour behind us for the first day – D)
The weather was beautiful, sunset was beautiful and the overnight passage was really nice and comfortable.
12-17, Saturday – A beautiful sunrise, more flying fish and more dolphins! A really lovely morning. We had only been able to motor sail to this point due to lack of wind, but the winds started picking up at noon and we were able to turn off the motor, pull out the Genoa head sail and move right along at a nice pace. (5.5 to 6+ knots – D)
It was at about 4:00 though and the winds really started picking up and the seas got steep and short-period swells. We could see it was going to be a nasty night.
By the time it was dark, we were really rolling around out there. Still sailing though! The thing about the Sea of Cortez is the condition of the seas compared to the North Pacific, or the SF Bay. We didn’t mind winds up into the 30’s, no big deal, right? Well in the Sea of Cortez when the “Northers” are blowing, they have the entire Sea to blow down causing very steep waves with no break between them. (period of about 3 seconds – D) The longer the wind blows the taller the waves get. So, here we are in the dark, no moon (until midnight) and we could see and hear the white-capped waves coming at us from the side. Since we were traveling south-east, the waves and wind were coming at us on the beam (from the side). This is very uncomfortable! So, about the time we were considering turning up into the seas for a while, our traveling companions on “Deep Playa” radioed us with the same idea. So, at about 8:00, we turned north-east for some relief from the beating we were taking. We had plenty of time to spare as we had made good time so far and it was looking like we were going to get to Mazatlan too early and in the dark. We were only doing about 1.5 to 2.5 knots during this time, which was fine by us. (Got down to heaved-to on my watch – drifting at about 1 knot sideways with no headway which was nice as we were starting to close on the coast, turned out “Deep Playa” was doing the same – D)
12-18, Sunday – The winds were forecasted to lie down around midnight and just about that time they did, although it was still blowing 15-20 knots. Deep Playa radioed us at about midnight and said they were just crossing in front of us heading south-east again. We were just talking about turning ourselves, so we followed right behind them. Now we were on a down-wind run with the seas behind us at about 12:30. Very comfortable and a lovely sail down to Mazatlan. We ended up sailing all the way beginning Saturday at noon until the last two hours before we arrived in Mazatlan. Always a nice savings on diesel
Dawn broke as we were approaching Mazatlan and we were at anchored by 9:05 am alongside “Deep Playa”. Lovely!! Once again, it only took one attempt and we were “stuck” with our wonderful new anchor in a lovely anchorage called “Stone Island” (Isla Piedras). It is just outside the Mazatlan Harbor and old Mazatlan. We are the only two boats here, with white sandy beaches, palapas, restaurants and what appear to be local resorts (not the fancy ones like in new Mazatlan).
Time to rest up! We are looking forward to exploring Mazatlan and spending Christmas and New Year holidays here.
After napping, we had enough energy to go visit Benji’s Pizza! Yumm Yumm…. Garlic Shrimp & Ham pizza with a white sauce. We were the only patrons there and had a great time speaking Spanglish with the fellow, Nick, that was serving us. He really enjoys chatting. It is a very nice family that owns and operates this funky restaurant. We are looking forward to having a few more meals there.
Time for a good nights sleep!
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