Spending the days walking and eating around town and seeing some crazy sites! Tuesday, we will probably go to the island closest to La Paz for a few days with our friends Dana and Micah on Audacious and will most likely not have internet. We have been having a good time chiecking out La Paz.

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Had a good time in Muertos with cruising friends Daniel on Trilogy and Micah and Dana on Audacious. For 3 days in a row we went to have lunch together at a restruant and hotel on the beach and had nice long walks on the the wide white beach. When we first went to the hotel to check it out, we accidently walked into a " house " at the hotel with the family sitting outside under a large palapa....we thought it was the hotel bar and were ready to order fish tacos and margaritas! the people were from Nebraska and were used to cruisers making the mistake. We had a lot of wind , 20kts, daily and so waited for it to ease up and then took off at 3am for La Paz. Had a very relaxing ride up the Ceralvo channel up to La Paz. We got a slip at Marina Palmira for the week and yesterday went into town and met up with friends Pete and Kathy from San Diego for lunch. Dana and Micah joined us for carne asada tacos and margaritas, it was great. Today, Linda and I will go into town to find some fish tacos and beers, ummmmm.

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Went to Los Frailes for a couple days and aborted two attempts at crossing over to Mazatlan because of too much wind and waves. Decided to go north to Muertos 55mi then onto La Paz another 55mi or so after that. Made it to Muertos in 8hr at night to avoid too much wind and waves. Very tired when we got here at 7am and it was a rocky ride all the way and cold. Looks like we may stay in the Sea of Cortez for the season instead of going down the coast of the mainland as we started late and took a long time to come down the Baja coast. Took a nap when we pulled in and then had lunch a a very nice palapa resturant on shore with some cruisers we met at Los Frailes. It was great to meet and talk with them. We will wait for good weather to make the 9hr trip to La Paz. Lot's of small Manta rays jump out of the water all the time.

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We go to Los Frailes tomorrow apx 40mi equals about 6hr which puts us on the east side of Baja. Then we will make the 165mi trip to Mazatlan on the mainland. At least the full moon is happening which makes it a lot less scary so we will update in a couple days about 3 actually. Does anyone know of any Winnabago sales jobs out there? Had a lobster dinner tonight. 25usd each. It was OK. Cabo has become noisy with disco music at 1am and now at 8:45 a pontoon party boat that came back but still has a noisy generator running, ugh. Time to go back to the void.

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Well , we finally were able to leave Abreojos after our aborted attempt in the 30knt winds and big waves with water spraying all over the place, ugh! It had still been real windy in the morning and then one morning, I noticed the hatch above the bed was wet, signaling that the Santa Ana was over, so we were able to leave after being in this area for 6 nights! We headed for our next stop, Bahia San Juanico, 60mi south which took about 10hrs. Just before we arrived, I caught my first Yellowtail about 10lbs. We had some nice meals from it and the best ceviche ever! It was a nice place with some Americans living there but we had no internet service which seemed odd since we had it at some remote spots. Went into town a couple times and walked down the beach to look at a crazy beached whale boat. Had good surf there which attracts some of the Americans. Finally time to head to Mag Bay and the anchorage just 20mi north of it , Bahia Santa Maria about 95mi south. Since this was going to be a long one, we left about 2am so we would get there before dark. Well, we were disoriented trying to leave the bay in the dark, going in circles for a while, then got out on the ocean and were uncomfortable in the pitch blackness but finally got under way. Finally the sun came up making everything feel better, but a thick fog came in which lasted till noon, quite errie. I saw a blip on the radar and sure enough, a panga was out fishing in pea soup fog 10mi out from shore, crazy! I think we sailed for awhile but not long as the wind changed. We pretty much have motored all the way down. Since we left a little late and the distance was long to enter the bay and clear a nearby point/island, the sun set and it was completely dark as we were entering this large 10mi across bay. We were worried about running over a lobster pot float and getting it tangled in the prop as almost every bay we had been to had them when you got close and some are hard to see. So for the next 6mi ( 2hr at reduced speed ) we had spotlights in hand and using radar and chartplotter to see land and anything that may be in the way, very nerveracking! Oh, and at some places in Mexico, the charts in the chartplotter are not correct and you have to rely on the radar more so. Luckily the radar and the chartplotter were in agreement. Finally we heard surf and anchored 1/4mi from shore in 35ft to play it safe. When we woke up in the morning it was socked in fog, couldn't even see shore. We didn't go ashore here but it was another pretty, but desolate place. Nice sand dunes on shore though. Had to stay another day to avoid the fog. Next stop a short hop to the inside of Mag Bay to a spot called Belcher's Point which used to be a whaling center. Now there are pangas and tent's on shore for the fishermen to stay in. Also some old building remnants from a phosphorus plant which looked like stonehenge from the boat. We went ashore for a good long walk and got some shells and saw a dead dolphin on the beach. Caught a bunch of puffers which are posionous, luckily we didn't eat them! Had some foggy days here also and had to wait another day to make the long non-stop overnight trip to Cabo. We were running out of food also. Finally took off for Cabo at 6am which would get us there around 10am the following day. Had mild conditions motoring in the day and then night came. We were planning on having the moonlight help out but there were clouds blocking it most of the time and then it set around 2am. Now it was total blackness so I brought the tv/dvd player up to the cockpit and we watched Seinfeld episodes almost the whole 12hr while checking the radar every 15min. Neither of us slept so we were up apx 28hr. Getting close to Cabo, the sun rose which changes everything and we were so excited to be close to Cabo and people and food and drink and a boatyard. There were three cruise ships in the bay and it was so crowded coming into the harbor it really was a joke, insane. The engine had been running a bit hot lately and using more oil. I added about 16oz on the trip down to Cabo but as I found out when I checked it today, it was very low on oil. There is a boatyard here and I had a mechanic take off the exaust elbow, clean it out as it was fairly plugged up and he ran a rod in the heat exchanger to clean it out which should really help out with the overheating and also the oil usage. We were lucky to get it fixed so soon. I sat in on bongos with a really good Mexican band last night and it was really fun. Now we are trying to decide where to go next. Either up the inside baja coast to La Paz, or head across the sea of Cortez another over nighter, and get to the mainland and start heading south. I am really not looking forward to another overnighter but the moon is getting full so it will be brighter and will stay up longer, all night, so there is that to figure in. Cabo sure is a fun crazy place, party city. All the colorful buildings around the marina look cool. Kinda like Monaco, although I don't know what Manaco looks like. Doing laundry today, changed engine oil and coolant. Still haven't had a lobster yet but may here but prices are high, apx 40us a piece. See pic gallery and leave comments

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Well, we didn't leave our beach anchorage at Areojos yet as it was too windy again this morning so we didn't want to chance getting beaten up again. High clouds are moving in so I think the Santa Ana is weakening and I'm pretty sure we will leave tomorrow 6am. This is a nice spot though, deserted beach with the sound of the surf and not much rolling so we have actually slept well the last 2 nights! Felt tropical today also which was nice. On with the Journey to the Center of the Earth.

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