11/27/2008, 24 31.92'N:110 22.802'W, Isla Partida
What would Thanksgiving be without Cheese Dip! We sailed back from Isla San Francisco after a rocky night, as the winds shifted to the South, leaving us exposed to the wind driven swell. We got back to the isthmus at Isla Partida to cook thanksgiving duck, make cheese dip and work on a generator that won't run. There's about 8 other haha boats here, but most are non-usa boats, so it's like "oh yea, thanksgiving".
It is very strange indeed... 88 degrees 65% humidity, blue skies and the smell of Thanksgiving cooking.
Happy Thanksgiving!
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11/26/2008, 23 03.752'N:109 40.492'W, Isla Partida
The last 3 days have been easy 3 hour sails between wonderful anchorages on Isla Espiritu Santo and Isla La Partida. Our favorite was the isthmus between the two islands, which reminded us of the canyons upriver in Lake New Melones in August. The waters are flat and warm, winds 10-15 and weather perfect. We will have some awesome sunset pics once we get a real internet connection again in another week or so.
Right now we are hanging out at the "hook" at Isla San Francisco with about 7 other boats. Carinthia is here, as well as 3 moorings cats, all of which who don't know how to anchor. Rina had to gently guide the incoming boats to anchor a) the hell away from us and b) for the prevailing north winds, as they didnt seem to understand the weather patterns here. Look at us, poo-pooing the poor charter cruisers.... It wasnt so long ago that Rina and I were forming our own cruising plans on a Moorings charter boat... now listen to us.
We've spent our time sleeping long nights, reading, kayaking, running on the beach, hyping with Ditmar about provisioning Carinthia for their upcoming blue water voyaging to the south pacific, and not much else. It's been humid so we have not been eating much, which is fine.
We've received emails from a couple people reading our blog who comment on all the positive's of the trip and wondering about the negatives.... Ok, so here it goes:
Cruising Negatives:
- Bugs - We were bug free until we got to Cabo, but since then, the mosquito's have been voracious at sunset and here in the islands the no-see-ums have come out. Rina and I had to scramble to finish refitting all our screens with special material that the no-see-um's can't get through.
- The fridge freezes things sometimes - While our fridge and freezer work well, at times the fridge works too well. It's a constant battle to keep it at around 37-42 degrees given the temperature swings we see here. We've been lucky so far, days have been 85-90 and nights 65-70. Sometimes we'll find frozen drinks or veggies in the bottom if we don't monitor it closely.
- Running the Generator - We've learned to ration our amps by turning off the inverter and all AC devices when not in use, but sometimes we splurge by leaving the TV or stereo on at night, which means that we wake up to batteries drained to 55-60%, requiring the generator to run for 2-3 hours and even though it is well insulated, it gets annoying. We've also learned to time our energy usage so that the batteries can be replenished by the engine and genset at the same time, reducing charge time and heating/generating water at the same time. As long as we are on the move every couple of days this works, otherwise we are in for a long droning generator session. That investment in solar panels we did NOT make is looking a little more appealing right now.
- Fermenting Poop - The 2 heads aboard each have a 25 gallon holding tank. When you flush the toilet, the odor is something like a smoldering porta potti at a summer rock concert. We have chemicals that help moderate the smell, but we didnt bring enough, leading us to go without sometimes. Our luggage will be full of odor-loss when we come back to the states in December.
- His and Hers cases of Tourista - Rina and I have both had minor cases, but luckily have passed (no pun intended) in 24 hours.
- An ear infection from too much swimming - I've made good use of the Cipro in our medical kit after 5 days of swimming resulted in a pounding right ear
- Marine growth on the hull - My retentive nature will NOT allow marine growth on my hull. Unfortunately the 80 degree water makes it a high growth environment, with little wormies growing every week. This results in a swimming session where clean the hull and come out exhausted from holding my breath and diving under the boat to clean the growth.
- Taking a dip while exiting the dinghy - Occupational hazard when coming back from a night of celebration on a neighboring boat, Rina exits the dinghy, slips on the bottom stair and goes for a swim!
- Veggies and fruit don't last long in the heat - Really need to learn how to buy only what will survive in the heat...
- No Tanqueray in La Paz - Both Follow You and Carinthia love our Tanqueray, and La Paz was dry... Hopefully Mazatlan is better stocked. Rum and Tequilla will suffice nicely until.
All in all, small price to pay for the many positives out here...
Happy Thanksgiving to everyone...
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Now, not having Tanqueray might be a serious problemo. :)
11/22/2008, La Paz
Rina and I have spent the last several days provisioning the boat for the next several weeks in the islands and rural shoreline above La Paz. We will be spending Thanksgiving in Aqua Verde, about 90 miles north with Carinthia and several other boat friends. We'll be out of cell and internet range, although we may be able to upload blog entries via satellite phone... we'll see.
We've been staying at Marina De La Paz, which has a wonderful set of services aimed at cruisers. The morning "net" on VHF 22 allows everybody to hear what's going on, announce new arrivals and departures, trade or barter boat parts for "coconuts". Many vendors come down to the docks to sell their services. The propane guy, who unfortunately lost his vocal chords to smoking, using one of those voice boxes that he presses to his throat, collects everyone's empty propane tanks, takes them off to the Pemex station and returns them in the afternoon. A parade of dayworkers, not unlike the Home Depot parking lot, come by the boats looking for work. I negotiated a full boat detail that would have cost a thousand bucks in the states for $200. Javier and his 3 guys worked on Follow You for a full day and a half, cleaning and waxing the hull and topsides, cleaning and waxing all the stainless and even cleaning the lifelines. I knew Javier was my kind of guy when he pulled out the toothbrush to get the rust off a few nuts and bolts on the bow pulpit.
There are 3 nearby chandleries that stock a pretty good selection of parts, although I have not been able to find fairleads used for my preventer that have broken over the past couple of weeks. A preventer is a line (rope) that "prevents" the boom from swinging back and forth uncontrollably when sailing downwind... very dangerous.... A fairlead is mounted to the lifeline stanchions to run the line back to the cockpit where we fasten them down.
[Corrected: Thanks to Gene for catching errors above]
The marina cafe had music last night, hosting boating guitar players with (AAARRRRGGGGHHHH!!!!) a drum machine! I would have pulled out my hand drum and joined them if not for that unfortunate event.
Rina and I cruised around the old town of La Paz on our bikes yesterday, visiting the grocery store, bank, having some very nice mexican Chinese food (picante egg drop soup anyone?) and hit the english book store, scoring "The History of Mexico" and "Do as the Mexican's Do - The Clued In Guide to Mexican Life, Language and Culture" Highly recommend by local cruisers as the gringo's bible to "Mingle in Mexico without Mortifying Mistakes"
After being pretty busy for the last couple of days, we're looking for some extended down time in the islands. Yea, I realize that won't get us much sympathy given the fact that this whole adventure is pretty much all downtime from the daily grind at home... this boating thing is a pretty active lifestyle, and Rina and I regularly drop into bed at the end of the day complaining about sore muscles we never knew we had.... a pretty fair trade actually.
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Topolobampo is a beautiful-ugly port town, or an ugly-beautiful town. It is a Cinderella without a Fairy Godmother. With its hills, port, (the deepest in Mexico, cruise ships can pull up dock side), offshore islands and nestled in the bay, it's as beautiful a setting as a Greek Isle or Mediterranean city.
11/19/2008, La Paz
After a 7 hour motorsail in flat seas and negligible winds, we arrived in La Paz, currently in a slip at Marina De La Paz while we provision tomorrow for the next couple of weeks of island hopping.
La Paz has a reputation as ground zero for cruisers because of the benign sailing conditions, great island anchorages and great weather in fall and spring. A large contingent of cruisers lives here year round and there is a clear community here, with daily cruisers nets on the SSB and VHF 22 where you can find any service, swap or sell parts and interact with your fellow sailors. Marina De La Paz is sort of the central location for this scene, with a restaurant catering to the live aboards, a chandlery and every shape and size sailboat you could every want to see. Of course it's also crowded and after the last weeks hanging out in uncrowded anchorages, were not sure how much of this we will put up with.
Current plan is to spend a couple of days and then make our way up into anchorages on Isla Partida and Isla Espiritu Santu where the turquoise waters are perfect for snorkeling.
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11/17/2008, Los Muertos
Rina and I have been passing time catching up on 20 years of BOOK reading.... Careers and kids will do that to you.... We both wanted to find time to really go deep. We went through our book collections at home and brought 40 books aboard and then did some serious Barnes and Noble shopping, and then added to that by trading with other cruisers. Included for me was stuff I was forced to read in college but really didn't appreciate at the time.... classics like Plutarch, Tocqueville, and a recently developed passion for World and American history. Also along for the ride is classic science fiction and for Rina, contemporary fiction.
I went for the feel good best sellers of the year:
What Went Wrong - written before 9/11, a scholarly look at the history of Islam and it's relationship with the West and how beginning in the 14th century, Islam moved from being a (relatively) progressive society into one that shunned all progress, especially if it came from Europe, which was just emerging from the middle ages. The result speaks volumes about the relationship between Islam and the West today. A dense read, but the insights enlightening.
Plagues and Peoples - Another cheery non-fiction, charting the course of human history from prehistoric times, through emerging societies BC and AD, all through the lens of disease and the role it had in shaping and destroying societies. The big aha in this read was the VERY recent role of modern medicine over the last 120 years and how while we may think we have conquered many of the diseases that shaped societies through millenia, disease always finds a way....
Currently reading "Collapse - How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed" gee, might be timely reading giving the BS our economy is going through right now.
Rina is reading slightly more uplifting fare...
Nights of Rodanthe, recently made a movie...., then Eat, Pray, Love...
As you might have figured out, we have different book tastes... I guess it's a Mars/Venus thing ;-)
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11/17/2008, Los Muertos
Los Muertos is about an hour from La Paz by road and 2 days by boat. It is a cove with a sandy beach that stretches for about a mile. On one end is a panga encampment, where the fishermen go out every morning at sunrise, come back by 2pm and sell their fish on the beach, to the two restaurants here or back to La Paz. The restaurant in this picture is formerly the Giggling Marlin, related to the club of the same name in Cabo, but now under new management as El Cardon, serving wonderful local mexican dishes and hosting a great tequila bar. On the other end of the beach is a 5 star B&B called Casa De Los Suenos. Formerly the private residence(s) of a San Diego real estate developer, now an exclusive resort with 5 individual houses, each with a private pool. The common buildings are magnificent, with a combination of enclosed dining and open air rooms. Walking through them feels like you are in somebodies personal residence.
There are about 7 boats in the anchorage and the resort does not open for guests until next week, but the staff needed some training. We were invited up to eat at the restaurant and swim in their pools, hosted by the manager. The margs were two for one, but he didnt really keep track... The restaurant was a converted great room, with the second floor holding a 3 level antique train set that filled the perimeter of the building, at least 50 x 100 feet. Downstairs held several tables, casual seating areas, big screen tv's etc and a 30 foot bar. The patio overlooked the endless pool, 2 stories, with a water slide connecting them.
This place normally goes for $6-900/night during the season and is booked solid. Next week we would not be able to even get our dinghys on their private beach. Check out the picture gallery for a couple of pictures of the property.
Yea, we can hang here for a couple more days, especially since we get to hang out on their free internet connection as well, which works great from the boat out in the anchorage.
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11/16/2008, Los Muertos
While visiting my auntie Pep in Newport Beach in October, she gave Rina a lesson in cutting my hair. As you can clearly see, she is a fast learner, doing a great job with this really picky client.
We also got a chance to try out our fledgling spanish today as a couple of fishermen were heading out and their engine died right in front of us and they started drifting down on Follow You. We tied them off on our port side and helped troubleshoot their engine problem. We have this great little book of "cruiser spanish" including names for all typical engine and sailboat parts... we fumbled through and found that the electrical connection to their fuel pump had come loose. Same thing happened on my SeaRay skiboat 15 years ago. Arsenio would be proud of our fumbling around in spanish trying to help these guys.
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11/15/2008, Los Frailes
We woke early to sail to Los Muertos with Carinthia, our friends on a Lagoon 440 Catamaran. We see the sun rise at 7am and are underway by 7:15. It is 45 miles to Los Muertos and the winds are at 10, increasing to 14. After 30 minutes Deitmar calls us on VHF 22 and declares a race on. I opine that the winner will be determined by who can point higher to the wind. Winds are from the North so it's a beat all the way there. Fortunately, if there is one type of boat that Follow You can point higher than, it's a catamaran. Sure enough, we are doing 6 knots, 40 degrees off the wind in 12 knots of wind, and Carinthia is doing 7 knots, 50-55 degrees off the wind. We head east for several hours and Carinthia is 3-4 miles ahead of us but their bearing continues to go down, indicating that we are sailing ahead of them. They finally tack back and their closest approach is .5 miles BEHIND us, when we started 1 mile behind them. We tack back after 30 minutes and never give up our lead. We both turn on the iron jenny around 1pm to make the anchorage by sunset, which was even nicer than last night. We may have the satisfaction of going to windward better than Carinthia, but downwind she will clean our clock.
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11/14/2008, Los Frailes
Rina caught my first dive into the warm waters of the Sea of Cortez. 80 degrees and clear as a bell. I spent the next 30 minutes inspecting the hull of Follow You... the marine growth was minimal and zinc anodes are in pretty good shape. Couple of divots on the bow where the preventer rubs back and forth but otherwise ok. I'll be a swimmin' fool as long as the water stays warm. 2 laps around today, 3 tomorrow, etc, replacing the jogging I used to do.
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11/14/2008, Los Frailes
Los Frailes is a small dent in the shore that provides a respite from the north winds and waves coming South. There is a rocky point about 500 feet tall and a sweep of beach, with pebbles turning to sand as it heads south.
Rina and I watched the sun set and the moon rise over the point and just marveled. We pulled out the camera and snapped the above shot, but it just does not do this moment justice. The water is 80 degrees, the wind almost as warm, the fish are jumping around the boat, and then out of nowhere a swarm of small jellyfish wash past our boat, each emitting a sharp black light, first concentrated in a single point, then dissipating into a blur outlining their pulsating bodies. The current swept the light show past our boat in about 10 minutes... if you were not paying attention, it was gone. We looked at each other and smiled.
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Love, Kathleen
