January 11, 2011, La Cruz de Huanacaxtle, Nayarit Mexico
After over a month of neglecting the blog, we felt it was past time to update our readers. We are truly sorry to those of you who faithfully check our site.
We left off sailing towards Bahia de Los Muertos on the Baja Peninsula. Since then, we have covered a lot of ground, seen a lot of sights, and done some cool stuff.
We crossed the Sea of Cortez without incident and spent a little over a week anchored in Mazatlan's old harbor. The mainland side of Mexico is definitely different than the Baja.
From there we sailed down to Isla Isabela. This island is classified as the Galapagos of the North. It is inhabited by millions of frigate birds, blue footed boobies, and iguanas. We enjoyed a coupled days in the anchorage there and explored just about all there was to explore. We even got in a scuba dive with our friends from Serendipity, Zeppelin, and Lunautica.
From there, we sailed onto San Blas, where we spent a night in the anchorage at Ensanada de Matanchen. We took the jungle river panga tour and the kids loved it.
Our next stop was Chacala. This little town was great. We spent almost the entire day on the beach.
After Chacala, we continued south and rounded Punta de Mita into Banderas Bay. We arrived at the new marina in La Cruz de Huanacaxtle and stayed a full 2 weeks. Here we celebrated Christmas and New Years with about 60 other cruisers and close friends. We are now anchored out trying to save a few pennies. Later this week, we'll head over to Nuevo Vallarta and visit the marina at Paradise Village.
La Cruz is awesome. One of our most favorite stops so far.
The big news of the year is that Gene has a new job. Our goal was to sail to Mexico and spend Christmas and New Years there then we would consider employment again. Well, that's exactly what we did. Gene took a job flying for a company called Era Helicopters in the Gulf of Mexico. The work schedule is what we like best as it will allow us to continue living and sailing in Mexico and Gene can commute to and from work. More details to follow as he starts his training in a couple weeks.
So now, here we are, still in the Puerto Vallarta area with plans to be here for the near future. We were so busy in December and spotty internet service kept us from keeping a good blog. We hope to get back in the habit of updating it on a more regular basis.
More to follow...
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December 7, 2010, Bahia De Los Muertos
Well, not really a "man" overboard, more of a cooler to be exact. No kidding, there we were motoring nicely (cuz there was no wind!) along heading south towards Bahia Los Muertos. The sea was very lumpy and confused and the boat was rocking around pretty good. Just then, Tami announces "Cooler Overboard!" and I turn to see our blue and white drink cooler along with the lid and several bottles of water, coke, and beer floating away behind us. I won't go into too much detail regarding my train of thought, but we do admit that it was just too much plastic floating in the ocean to ignore. So, we turned the boat around and headed back to the scene of the crime. Since there was no wind, we were able to stop the boat next to the majority of the floatsom. Thankfully, we were towing the dinghy and I was able to hop in and row around to collect all the items that we could see. In the end, we recovered the cooler, the lid, most of the water bottles, a couple cans of cokes, and ALL the beer! We did our best to clean up our environmental disaster and continued on our way.
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Que Pasa
December 4, 2010, Cabo San Lucas, Baja California Sur
Our second trip to Cabo was much better than our first! Some good friends of ours from Washington own a timeshare in Cabo and came down to spend last week there. Since we were still La Paz, they invited us down to see them for a day. So, we rented a car and drove to Cabo and enjoyed a great time with them. We stayed at the beautiful Hotel Finesterra on the Pacific coast of Cabo. The kids loved the pools and Tami loved the bathtub.
It was a great visit. We enjoyed some great company and great food. We didn't want to leave, but were eager to get back to the boat even after just one night away.
On our way home, we made the required stop at Costco. Our short drive through southern Baja was an experience to remember as well. The landscape is beautiful.
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November 20, 2010, Sea of Cortez
As we sailed up from Bahia De Los Muertos towards Bahia Balandra the other day, we threw a line and lure in the water and trolled a bit as we always do. Just before lunch, we caught one small dorado and threw him back. It was nothing to write home about.
But, about an hour later....Wham! A beautiful Blue Marlin! It only took a few minutes to get the fish up to the boat. Since Blue Marlin are not good eating and we didn't have room for a trophy above the mantle, we decided to let him go. So w took a few pictures then cut him lose. It was a fun catch.
On another note, the internet has been very unreliable and slow. Therefore, our blog posts are way behind. We are currently in La Paz and making our Thanksgiving plans. Hope all is well with our friends and family back home.
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Chuck, Michelle and Morgan
November 5, 2010, Cabo San Lucas, Baja California Sur
Well, we did what we said we were gonna do. We sailed to Cabo! We got into Cabo San Lucas yesterday morning around 1000 after a 25 hour motor from Bahia Santa Maria. We have had a great trip down Baja sailing with the fleet of the Baja Ha Ha.
The weather is beautiful and we are all happy and safe. The boat did great and we can't wait to continue our journey. We tied to the dock last night but are headed out to the anchorage today. We have already visited the local grocery and Tami made a Costco run today. Cabo is very Americanized and most everyone speaks English. We are eager to get away from the hustle and bustle of this tourist town.
For the family and friends who have been following our trip, thanks for all the prayers and support. We miss you all and wish you were here. We will post more soon as we get settled.
We have posted a few pictures of our trip down Baja in a new album. Check them out if you get a chance.
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October 28, 2010, Bahia Tortugas, Baja, Mexico
It was a great start to Baja Ha Ha 17! We sailed out of San Diego Bay with about 160 other boats on Monday morning, crossing the starting line at 1100 am. The wind was great and we sailed most of the day towards Baja Mexico. We sailed across the US-Mexico border a couple hours later and were instantly transformed into grateful Ex-patriates (is it ex-patriot or ex-patriate, we're not sure?) It's not like we are former patriots, but just US citizens relocated into a different country. But I digress...
Anyway, after 3 great days at sea we made it into Turtle Bay yesterday evening at 6:30pm. It was a very lumpy ride down the coast. We stayed anywhere between 15 and 30 miles offshore and saw winds up to 25 knots on occasion and following seas up to 10-12 feet. We rocked and rolled the entire way. The first night the wind calmed down and we had to motor for about 12 hours. Perhaps it was lack of sailing skill or the fact that our old fat bottom'ed girl doesn't like sailing in light wind. The next day brought overcast skies and decent wind. The seas were still big and confused but we were able to make 6 knots or better under full genoa and main. The second night, the wind picked up quite a bit and we moved along at close to 8 knots all night long. Since the wind was directly astern, we had to gybe back and forth down our course line which took a little bit away from our progress, but not too bad. We stayed pretty dry, but the air was colder than expected. The wind died early in the morning and we had to motor most of the last day. Even though there was very light wind, the seas were still big and lumpy making for a slightly uncomfortable ride. The last day was sunny and beautiful. We watched a huge orange sun set on the Pacific just before entering Turtle Bay and anchored in the huge bay with many other boats who are apparently quite a bit faster than our Andiamo.
We are so excited to be here. We made it with no major problems and the weather is gorgeous! Andiamo did great and our SSB even worked! We were a little concerned about it since we hadn't had much luck with it previously. The kids are stoked. We are now sitting in a small cafe on the beach drinking Negra Modelo and using the free WiFi. Life is great. We'll post more later, but for those who are following us, we are safe, happy and doing great! Thanks for the prayers and encouragement.
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