We thought we'd share a video of one of many dolphin encounters.

Now that we're back home and we got a decent nights sleep, I thought I would elaborate a little about our experience. Would we make the same decision to do the trip knowing what we know now?
Answer is...Oh yes!

This trip was a great experience. We enjoyed the challenge of the trip, the people we met, and the Mexican culture.

In terms of challenge, it seemed like every day was a new adventure. As you probably noticed in our blog entries, we did a lot of problem solving along the way. Invariably things would go wrong at the worst times. Who would've thought we would've had to jump start our boat in an anchorage in the middle of nowhere? And, that was just the tip of the iceberg. In addition, on the trip we constantly learned more about the conditions that we could handle and the boat could handle.

We met a lot of wonderful people on our trip. It was not uncommon to meet new friends or "neighbors" in the anchorage one day and have dinner together the next. When you're on dry land, how long does it take to have dinner at a neighbors house after you move in? Too long! With cruisers, it's not the case. We met people who had sailed around the world...those who had lived / retired on their boats for years....or those who were just cruising Mexico for the season (like us)!

We enjoyed the Mexican culture. We found Mexicans to be very warm and friendly people with family at the center of their lives. In the small villages, many families barely had a roof over their heads yet they would bend over backwards to share their country and culture with us. We are humbled and honored for the experience. We would give toys, school supplies, or candy to the Mexican children but we wished we could've given more...

This experience is one we hope not to forget anytime soon. It will be nice to reflect on this experience well into the future. I think it's made me a better person...a better friend, daughter, sister, wife, etc.

And with that here is a little tally with some metrics about our trip.
On our Mexican adventure we..
-Traveled 4,314 miles

and we used...
- 325 gallons of diesel to run the engine
- 5 gallons of gasoline for our dingy outboard
- 25lbs of propane for cooking
- 680 gallons of fresh water for drinking, cooking, etc.
- 130 gallons of non potable water for cleaning (excluding our time at a marina)

So what's next? For us, we're going back to work and the "real world", but our lives will never be the same..

Today's trip from Ensenada was cake! The seas were calm although we had quite a bit of wind from 9am onward. The sea life didn't disappoint us today. We had dolphins swim on our bow today. Both of us went up the the bow (front) to see the dolphins playing in the water, and they stayed with us for a very long time...until we went back to the cockpit. We think they liked showing off, and our voices talking to them. As a special treat there was a baby and mom swimming with the others. The little baby, about 1/3 the size of mom, was keeping up with everyone else. It was the cutest thing!

We arrived at the police dock at about 3:30, and the check-in process was smooth and simple. Customs came out and checked out our paperwork and passports, and we were done! We're currently tied up at the police docks and will be here until we get our permanent slip back at Harbor Island West Marina. After an exciting and memorable adventure, we're HOME!!