It's easy, when picking your way down the coast toward Mexico, to live life, if not in vacation mode, then at least with a sense of urgency. You are somewhere for only a short while, and it seems only right and natural to make the most of every port you pass through. You look for their landmarks, soak up their history, search out the museums and parks and festivals that are the pride of the surrounding areas. You explore like it was your job. It is your job. You experience the newness of each place with the unabandoned excitement of a child.

Until you get There, wherever There may be. For us, it was Ensenada. Within the scope of our entire, round-the-world journey, a six month stop is nothing more than a long layover, really, and it was a welcome break from the previous year's relentless cycle of work-and-move-on. It's not long enough for There to feel like home, but it is more than long enough for all the little Practicalities of Life to come creeping stealthily back in to your day-to-day existence, rooting you firmly once more, in the dull, pragmatic confines of Responsible Adulthood.

Which is why, when Ken, Steve's Dad, came to visit, we found ourselves walking into CEARTE, Ensenada's Center for the Arts, for the first time. It's only a handful of blocks from the marina and we've probably walked past its doors 50 times without going inside. Which is a shame, because there's always something amazing going on at CEARTE. So thanks Ken, for reminding us that we are only here for a short while and it's really important to take the time to explore the wondrous unknown.

I can't believe how close we came to missing out on this Baja treasure. All the times we walked straight past, looking for tacos, or getting groceries, or tracking down water filters...none of those things were so important that we couldn't carve an hour or two out of the day to meander through some of the best that Baja's artists have to offer. The state funded CEARTE opened its doors in 2007 and is an important part of Baja California's Institute of Culture (ICBC), which you can find out more about on Facebook, here. Nearly every night, you can go watch an incredible spectrum of musical artists perform and if your thirst for art isn't satisfied after exploring exhibitions of work from local, national, and international artists, you can always take a class or attend a seminar. This month, they're offering courses for painting, drawing, sculpture, and photography, alongside less traditional classes that cover creating computer-based art, like how to compose music on your laptop, or becoming proficient with Scratch.

The first exhibit we walked through was a series of paintings by Liz Durand Goytia, called Profundo Mar. You can check out more of what she's doing on her blog, or on Facebook, or follow her on Twitter.













The next room contained a sea of strange fabric sculptures by Miriam Medrez. It was a little creepifying, those first moments, with your eyes not quite knowing what to look at first. And once they settled on something, not quite knowing what it was you were looking at. But that passed quickly, each new sculpture a hauntingly beautiful exploration of the bizarre. Until the end, finally, when they actually started to feel like other people. It was amazing and strange.

I don't know when it happened. Some time in the last couple of months I've become...sunset jaded. I didn't even realize it had happened until Steve yelled down for us to come and check out the sunset and a little part of my mind went, "Nah...I'd rather continue hunting down this stupid rss feed problem, instead." Of course, I went up anyway and it was insane. It was like a Hand of God touching the earth kind of moment and a Princess cruise ship happened to be right in the middle of it. Does God take cruises? Anyway, Steve snapped these amazing shots and also snapped me out of my sunset funk.

A couple of days after the bulk of his crew jumped ship, Captain Dog managed to hire on some new deckhands. I'm wondering how he finds these people, because most of this new crew look just as green as the last. Some kind of temp service that specializes in matching workers to jobs that they have few qualifications for? You could make a hit reality show off of something like that. Or maybe he's called for reinforcements from among his family and friends and if that's the case, you have to take what you can get. Either way, it's high comedy watching one of the new recruits try to figure out how to let loose a dockline. +5 points for effort and +3 for no tears.

The following day, there's a storm of activity next door. The crew bustles around, doing engine checks and getting the boat ready to go. We're treated to a lively parade of excited new passengers, followed by crewmen pushing dock carts piled dangerously high with duffle bags and expensive dive gear, and beer. The Captain has laid in ice chest upon huge ice chest of beer. So much beer that one of the female passengers keeps walking over to the ice chests, peering inside and saying things like, "Wow! That's a lot of beer." or "I can't believe you have that much beer!" and my all-time favorite, "Are we gonna drink all this?"

In a bit, the activity dies down and everybody just sort of stands around waiting, while the boat idles at the dock. After a couple of hours, someone breaks open the beer rations and things become much more cheerful on board the shark boat. As the hours creep by, we learn that all they're waiting for is the Captain to come back from the Port Office with their papers and then they can take off on another grand adventure. They drink some more beer to make the waiting go by faster.

When the captain finally does return, his mouth says there's been a little hiccup with the paperwork but the rest of his face says that things went really bad down at the Captain of the Port's office. It sounds like they don't have their papers and they're not cleared to leave. Turns out the Port wanted a couple thousand dollars from him before they were willing to let the boat take off. I wonder if Captain Dog has partied away that money or used it to replace the bait, because he tells the crew to shut down the engines and the passengers start making plans to get dinner and do a little sightseeing in town. Fingers crossed that they aren't planning to take the scenic route along the strip bar street. Yes, there is a street for that in Ensenada.

We hear them talking about how this delay will mess up their dive schedule and then, this little snippet of conversation wafts on over to our boat..."Well if we get there and it's late, can't we do a night dive? Can we do a night dive?" This, I think, from the woman who was so impressed with the beer supply. Captain Dog busts out a huge, hearty laugh that sounds like it's bearhugging the passenger from behind and booms, "What a great attitude. Awesome! That's like saying, oh well, we ran out of tequila, but we can still do coke!" Do. Coke. Not drink Coke. WTF??? I really hope he's talking about Coke the beverage and not Coke the recreational uh-oh.

Two minutes later, he fires up the engines and the crew starts yelling for everybody to, "Get back on board the boat, get on the boat! Hurry up! C'mon, let's go, let's go!!!" and then they take off from the dock like all the hounds of hell are chasing them down. In all the high-spirited confusion, they left the milk crate they use as a step, sitting on the dock. +95 points for style and execution to the crewman who snagged that sucker with a boat hook only nanoseconds from the point where it would have been unsnaggable. I heard they may have missed a couple of people and I'm positive that they're not supposed to be screaming full throttle out of the bay and into the night like that. One of the guys on another shark boat said he saw them later on, out by the islands. Running dark, with no navigation lights or anything.

Maybe they were just excited they finally got cleared to go. If they didn't get clearance, I have a hard time understanding Captain Dog's decision making process. I mean, it's not like the Mexican government doesn't know he's out here. And you can't miss the guards walking the docks every hour or so, clipboard in hand, making sure all the boats that are supposed to be here are here and that no unaccounted boats are hanging around. He'd have to know he'd get caught. I wonder what's going to happen when the Navy finds out Captain Dog did a runner...

Which brings us to now. They're baaack! Cue Jaws music. I can tell it's Blue Cammo by the way the captian is completely failing to take advantage of his twin engine setup. If he'd just split the screws, and put one engine in forward while the other's in reverse, he'd be able to walk the boat neatly sideways to the dock. Instead he's going for maximum power, gunning both engines to the limit--first forward, then reverse, with hardly any time spent in neutral to let the poor engines breathe. During this awesome display of seamanship, he's doing a pretty good impression of an overly dramatic teenage girl, texting a FB status update that lets all her frenemies know that she's srsly guys imma fail this driving test cause i cnt prelllell park n this testr guys so mean.

About a hundred years later, he manages to get the tail end close enough so that an anxious looking crewman can hop off the stern rail with a mooring line in hand and try to tie the boat off. Apparently, nobody ever bothered to show him how you make up a proper cleat hitch and this is srsly guys just painful to watch. He gets one and a half turns into the thing and then totally loses his nerve. I watch his head swing from the boat, to the cleat, to the rope in his hands, and then back down to the cleat. He finally decides to leave the cleat hitch halfway done, and then takes the tail end of the line down to the next cleat and ties another partial cleat hitch and calls that good. Srsly.

Then the captain resumes his full throttle forward-backward torture of the engines, while the rest of the crew scurries up and down the boat, holding fenders over the side. Not tying them off or anything. Just holding them. Like they were playing charades and the answer is those little plastic spacers that keep everything lined up when you're grouting up new tile on the kitchen floor. Finally, they manage to get both the bow and the stern tied off, without anybody losing any body parts. Which is a certifiable miracle. One of those guys definitely has rope burns on the tips of his fingers. They've hooked up their shore power cord without too much trouble, but entirely left out any spring lines, so the boat is kind of surging back and forth along the limits of the bow and stern lines. Looks hella comfy.

At first, it seems like they've come back carrying fewer people than they started out with. Like the passengers are missing? Capt. Dog hops off the boat and heads for the Cruiseport Village marina office, his shoulders all hunched forward and a look on his face like he just got sent to the principal's office. One of the crewmembers starts to follow, but gets shut down, "Remember...we're not supposed to set foot off the boat." They settle themselves down on deck, making awkward small talk and look generally glum all the way around. They wait. A passenger comes out on deck to exchange contact info with a crew member. I take this as a good sign that a wonderful time was had by all and nobody got eaten by sharks or lost at sea or left behind. After a minute, the passenger goes back down below and the crewmen resume milling about the decks in mostly anxious silence. They wait some more.

I'm washing a sink full of dishes when a desert cammo helmet catches the corner of my eye. One of Mexico's finest Marines marches grimly past our forward port hole and on down the dock toward the shark boat. Trailing behind him like a string of baby ducks, are a couple of the local Port security guards, a Cruiseport Village marina representative, maybe three or four people from the Port Office, the shark boat's captain, 5 more Marines, armed to the teeth, and bringing up the rear--a German Shepard drug sniffing dog. Once they're on board, they swarm over the boat like Army ants. Two of the Marines stay out on deck, fingers casually resting on the triggers of their guns, keeping watch over the seated crewmembers. Passports and paperwork are collected and scrutinized. The rest of the group make a deliberate ciruit of the decks before disappearing into the belowdecks region or climbing up into the wheelhouse. They're out of sight for what seems like an eon. The crewmembers wait silently on deck and watch the Marines watching them back.

In ones and twos, various government officials begin leaving the boat and with each departure, the crew's morale improves visably. Little bursts of chit-chat start popping up but they fade away quick.The Cruiseport Village rep materializes again and before she leaves, distributes all the passports back to their respective owners. This is a fine development as far as the crew is concerned and they now audibly relax into a torrent of conversation, wondering aloud in vauge terms about things they can't actually talk about while the Marines are still standing there watching them. I'm thinking those Marines know more English than they let on.

More officials leave the boat until finally, it's only the Marines who are left. Two soldiers disembark with the drug sniffing dog and walk to the end of the dock. Heads close together, they have a hurried, whispery conversation and then the guy on the right whips out a cell phone and starts talking to one of his superiors. The dog wags its tail contentedly, sniffs the air a couple of times and then drops its nose down for a more thorough examination of the dock piling. The call ends and all three return to the sharkboat for another walkabout.

And then, it's over. Five minutes after the Marines take off, everybody still on the boat jumps into action. The crew are practically racing the overloaded dock carts up to two pickup trucks waiting in the parking lot and probably manage to set a land speed record in the time it takes them to clear an entire mountain of air tanks, gear, duffle bags, and ice chests off the boat. Meanwhile, one of the crew goes around getting contact info from some of the passengers because, "You never know how these things go. We might need to get in touch." Capt. Dog coordinates the controlled chaos and does an impressive job of getting passengers, gear, and what looks like some of the crew, off the boat and safely on their way. Again, in record time. Dude may have missed his calling.

"Hurry up!" the captain's voice goes rolling down the dock. "We're supposed to be gone by now!" With that, the last crewmember still on land hops back aboard and they're off. The dock is empty and silent in their wake. I wonder if they got in trouble. I wonder if they're in danger of losing the boat or getting kicked out of the country. I hope not. Crazy as their whole scene is, I haven't yet met a one of them who's an asshole. They creep back all quiet like after dark, and now I'm thinking they were just trying to take on fuel before the fuel dock shuts down.

They slip away again, in the wee hours of the morning, and so far, they haven't come back. Somebody heard they might have gone back up to San Diego. Whether that means they got booted out of the country is up for debate. Shark season's winding down around here. I think they do fishing charters, as well. Maybe they just moved on. At any rate, we wish them well. It might be quieter here, with them gone from the marina, but it's also a lot less colorful.

He kind of deserved it.

There are a couple of shark-diving boats that operate out of Cruiseport Village marina, here in Ensenada. For three months of the year, they are paid extraordinarily good money to haul insane vacationers out to popular shark haunts where they can frolic in the water amongst cute and cuddly maneaters. At more than 100' long, they're so big that when they pull into port you don't so much see them coming (although the way they take up the whole horizon, they're hard to miss), or hear them (again, couldn't miss it if you were comatose), as much as you feel their approach coming. The aggressively throaty growl of huge twin diesel engines is transformed underwater, into an onslaught of miniature soundquakes that assault everything below the waterline.

It sucks to have them be your neighbors. Maybe it's a cultural thing. The age old rivalry between power boats and sailboats. Or commercial vs. pleasure craft, I don't know. They're obnoxiously loud, running their engines and generators pretty much the whole time they're tied up. Even in the middle of the night. And their lights, oh my freaking god, the lights. I'm all for having well lit decks but their lighting scheme is also designed to illuminate all of the ocean around them in roughly a 10 mile radius. I'm surprised they haven't laser-beamed a hole through the side of my pilothouse, yet.

The only good thing about them is that they're usually only tied up for 12 hours at a time. Just long enough to offload the old passengers, reprovision for the next trip, and take on a brand new set of divers with death wishes. We make a habit of being nice to them and they do their best not to suck, which is greatly appreciated. In retrospect, I should have been more appreciative.

One morning, we got woken up way too early by the unmistakable rumble of an incoming shark boat. Whoever was driving the damn thing was doing a piss-poor job of it. He'd come in too hot, panic at the last minute, and then (still full-throttle) throw it in reverse. It took them a good half-hour to park. Steve was not a happy camper.

"Hey fuckers, do you think you're gonna like parking, once you get the hang of it?" he shouted, as the captain walked by. Despite this less than auspicious start to our relationship, everyone stayed pretty mellow. Which is good, as it turns out, because we got to be neighbors for weeks. This new shark boat was different from the others, smaller and a little rough around the edges. They hardly ever went out. The other shark boats were sleek and shiny with burly shark cages stacked up on deck and everything looking really squared away. Their crew wore uniforms. This new boat's superstructure was painted in a blue camouflage pattern and their shark cages...I think a hungry shark would view those cages as inconsequential packaging surrounding a tasty treat. Steve says they're built like lawn chairs. He is being too kind.

Eli decided that the captain looks kind of like a hippy, stoner version of Dog the Bounty Hunter. Actually, more like the love child of Captain Ron and Dog the Bounty Hunter, On our boat, we call him Captain Dog. His crew was more of the same. A pretty ragtag bunch and I'd bet good money that this was the first time most of them ever crewed on a boat. Or did anything on a boat. Nonetheless, they were a less of a pain in the backside than we feared, so things were good.

Until a couple of days after I got out of the hospital. It must've been all of 3:30 AM when the shouting started on the boat next door. Ugh. I tried to go back to sleep. And then the explosions started. At least, that's what it sounded like. POW! POW! POW! POW! POW! By this time I was sitting on the companionway steps trying to see what was going on without making myself an obvious target. I heard a bunch of splashing, then more yelling and now stuff was raining down on our boat. On my bleepity-bleeping boat! I'd had enough and stepped off the boat to go have a little chat with the neighbors about WAKING THE DAMN DEAD IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FREAKING NIGHT. Before I got very far, two port security guards glided by, like ninjas. Ninjas who speak Spanish. "Calmate, Señora, calmate," one said, motioning for me to stay put. I went back to my post near the companionway.

"Hola! ¿Hola, qué pasa?" The first guard called loudly, knocking on the side of the shark boat. Dead silence from inside. Then, one of the crewmembers shuffled out on deck and said, "Ahhhh....yeah.....it's all cool now. Sorry about the...uhhh noise and stuff." The guards weren't letting him off that easy. "¿Qué pasa?" they insisted. "I don't exactly know," he said. "I was actually sleeping when all the shouting and stuff started. I don't know why, but one of the crewmen has aaahhh...had too much to drink and started yelling and throwing stuff in the galley and now he's kinda curled up in the fetal position under the table. Crying." "So is everything ok? Does anybody need help?" asked the second guard. "No, I think...I think it's all good now." After the guards left, there was a little more shouting, but not much. One of the crew got out a camcorder and began walking around the boat saying, "Oh my God, this is crazy. I'm trying to document this. I don't know where the captain is now...hopefully he's just partying in town with some hookers or something...,"His voice trailed off as he moved into the wheelhouse and then everything was quiet for a while.

We all tried to get back to sleep and I must have been successful because an hour later I woke up to more shouting, this time from Captain Dog. Apparently, he'd returned safely from whoring around. "WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO TO MY GALLEY, YOU STUPID FUCKING WASTE? WHERE IS THE BAIT? THE BAIT. WHERE IS MY MOTHERFUCKING BAIT? DID YOU THROW MY FUCKING BAIT IN THE FUCKING WATER? FUUUUUUUUUUCK" There was a pause, while a quieter voice made noises that I assume translated into some kind of an explanation. "Jesus. Fuck. Jesus....," It sounded like the captain was running out of steam. I closed my eyes. Maybe he'd shot his wad and we could salvage a little more sleep before the sun came up. "I DON'T CARE. I'M GOING TO BED. THIS BETTER...YOU'D FUCKING BETTER HAVE MY GALLEY CLEAN BY THE TIME I WAKE UP IN THE MORNING. I DON'T CARE. I DON'T GIVE A FUCK, IT BETTER FUCKING BE SPOTLESS. DO YOU HEAR ME? FUCKING SPOTLESS. GOD, I CAN'T BELIEVE WHAT YOU DID TO MY BOAT. FUCK." I crawled out of bed and went up on deck just in time to see a skinny, barefoot, shirtless guy slither off the boat. He stood on the dock, facing the boat and tried to spit on it. From where I stood, it looked like most of the spit ended up on his chin. He turned around and began walking slowly down the dock. Thinking the show was finally over, I started back down the companionway steps.

I hear a thud, as Captain Dog jumps off his boat and onto the dock. Then the sound of someone sprinting furiously past our boat. "YEAH YOU'D BETTER RUN, PUNK. FUCKING PUNK. YOU PIECE OF SHIT. I'M GONNA FUCK YOU UP," he screams. The skinny guy takes off, running down the finger pier right after ours. I'm back out on deck, but can't see anything because there's another boat between me and the commotion. I hear a huge splash and then the skinny guy starts screaming, "Help! Help me! Somebody help! He's trying to kill me!" He sees me and starts swimming frantically towards my boat. His face is all terror and panic and then...relief, as I step down onto the dock, ready to help him out of the water when he reaches my dock. By this time, Captain Dog has walked back into view, two crewmembers in tow. Then they start walking down my finger pier. I turn and look at the guy in the water and then back at the ugly look on the captain's face. I cross my arms and block the captain's path. "WHAT. THE. FUCK. MAN?" I shout, right in his face.

Some of his bluster drains away. "My boat!" he yells, stabbing the air next to my face with his finger, for emphasis, "Did you see what that asshole did to my fucking boat?" I step a little closer and match him decibel for decibel, "Look, I am sorry he fucked up your boat," I say, "And I don't know what's the deal between you two, but you guys need to take a break. Jesus Christ, I just got out of the hospital. How am I supposed to get better with this crap going on?" "I'm sorry," he says, "I didn't mean...it's just...he smashed up the galley and there's shit everywhere and he threw the bait in the water and...how can I trust him on the boat after he pulls this kind of shit?" Now he's pissed off again and starts forward, like he's going to push past me and finish what he started, but he can't, because one of the other crewmembers has grabbed him from behind. "Look," I say, "You're the captain, not me, and you're the one who has to make the call, but maybe he shouldn't be on your boat right now. Just, you know, give yourselves a little time to cool off." "You're right," he says, "You're right. I'm sorry. I just....fuck." he looks over my shoulder and points his stabby finger at the skinny guy, who's managed to crawl onto the dock by himself, "You're off the boat. Got it?" Then he stomps himself back onto his own boat, leaving the crewmembers to make more apologies in his wake.

I turn around to see a shivering, dripping, scrawny kid of a man trembling next to my boat. It looks like the enormous dive knife he's clutching is the only thing holding him up. "It's gonna be ok," I say in what I hope is a soothing voice. He nods his head a little and I'm surprised his eyes haven't jumped right out of his head by now. I put one hand on his shoulder and the other over his hands, which are clutched tight to his chest. "It's ok. You're safe now...just...give me the knife, alright?" He shakes his head and I feel his knuckles shift as he grips the huge knife even closer. I give a gentle tug. "Please," he whispers. "Please don't take my knife. Please. He's gonna kill me. He tried to kill me. I'm so scared. Please don't take my knife." Tears are dripping off the tip of his nose and in this moment, he looks all of five years old.

"Ok," I say, "Ok. I won't take your knife, but you've got to tell me what's going on. Ok?" He looks at me and says softly, "What am I going to do? I was asleep and then he was..he was choking me and I couldn't breathe and I thought he was going to kill me right then and worst of all he's my Daaaaaad!" And now he's crying big wracking heartbroken sobs. "What if he comes back?" he asks. I think about bringing him onto my boat, where Steve and Eli and Nala are hopefully still sleeping. I think about what could happen in close quarters if Captain Dog comes back for another round. Sigh.

"Tell me your name," I say. He wipes his eyes with the back of the hand that's holding on to his dive knife and blows his nose into the water. "I'm sorry. I know that's gross," he says, "I'm Corey. "Good," I say, "and the captain is your dad?" He nods, wrapping both hands around the knife, again. "Do you guys do this kind of thing often?" I ask, "I mean, do you have a history of fighting like this?" He shakes his head. "I think...I think he's on something. I mean, he's been acting weird. On our last trip out to Guadalupe, he stayed up for like 30 hours straight and wouldn't let anyone else take the wheel and then he slept for like two days straight. I think he's taking some drugs. I don't know what." "So what are you going to do now?" I ask. "I don't know," he says, "go home, I guess. Yeah, go back home."

"There's a bunch of paperwork that needs to happen if you're leaving the boat," I say. "Do you speak any Spanish? Do you know what to do?" He shakes his head. "And my stuff," he says quietly, "Shit, all my stuff and my passport and..." He's looking down at his feet, using the dive knife as a security blanket again and I'm pretty sure that's going to end well for no one. "Corey, look at me," I say. His head comes up slowly and I can see how he must have looked as a child. "Do you trust me?" I ask. He nods a tiny nod. "Here's what we're going to do," I say. "We're going to walk on up to the guards and tell them what's going on. They can help you and they will keep you safe. OK?" He nods again. I start down the dock but Corey stays where he is. I go back, "Corey, we have to go up there." "I know," he whispers, "but what if he comes after me again when we're going up there?" "Give me your hand, Kiddo," I say. His eyes are full of questions. "You already saw, " I say, "he won't hurt me and he's gonna have to go through me to get to you." Long, cold fingers slowly release their deathgrip on the knife and fold themselves into my hand.

We walk, hand in hand, up the dock and find a guard. "This man," I say, "this man is not safe on his boat. He and the captain had a big fight. The captain choked him and it's dangerous for him to go back. He needs to get his stuff and his papers. He needs your help." "OK, is ok," says the guard. "Ven aqui," he says leading us over to the patio. "Wait here." He walks back over to the dock ramp and stations himself in the middle of the walkway, making sure he can see both us and the shark boat at the same time. We spend the next five minutes listening to him rattle off the fastest machinegun Spanish I've ever heard. Understanding exactly none of it.

By this time, Corey is shivering pretty bad from the cold and adrenaline. He looks so cold and miserable and I've got nothing to put around him to keep him warm. Marina, the stray kitten who adopted herself to Cruiseport, meows for attention and twines around my feet. I swoop her up and deposit her in Corey's arms. He looks at me like, WTF? "Hold her. Pet her. You'll feel better," I say, and since I used my MomVoice on him, he does. "Thanks," he says, "I'm sorry you got dragged into this, but....ummmm....I'm really glad you were here." We talk about trivial things for a while, willfully ignoring the elephant in the room, until Corey calms down a bit and stops shaking so much. The cat becomes bored with us and takes her leave with an annoyed meow.

He tells me about his friends and stuff he likes to do and about his mom, which makes me feel old, because as it turns out, she's exactly the same age as me. And he's like 23. He tells me that things have been tough on their boat and no one's gotten paid in a while. He tells me how he and his dad and another guy went cruising the strip bars last night and about how he got in a hassle with security at one of them and got kicked out and kind of beat up. And then they ditched him. He said the reason he smashed up the galley was because he was mad at his dad for not sticking up for him. And for ditching him. "Oh, crap," he says, "I guess I can pretty much kiss my PS3 goodby. He's probably thrown it in the water by now."

After a while, the Navy shows up, because this is a Federal Port, after all, and they like to discourage the kind of shenanigans that we've been partaking of this night. They ask many questions of the guards, then start in on Corey. What is your name? Tell me what happened tonight. Do you have your papers? That kind of thing. Then they start on me and when I give them my last name it literally stops the whole thing cold. The guy turns to one of the guards and asks in Spanish if I'm the mother of this boy or not.

Awesome. I assume at some point, there comes a time when you're so used to being old that stuff like this never even registers a blip on your radar and maybe I should just be happy I'm not there yet. Still...sucky. "No," I say, "I am not his mother." "So you are the girlfriend?" he asks, looking doubtful. "No. I am just the person whose boat was closest to him. He needed help, so I helped him." He's looking at me like I just said something weird. "So...this man here," he says, pointing at Corey, "he is in a deadly fight with the captain of another boat and you are the one who is rescuing him?" I suppose the fact that I was wearing a skirt and no shoes did nothing for my credibility. "In the past," I say, "I was in the Coast Guard. We have a lot of training for things like this. But now, I am a mother. My son is 15. I see this young man needing help and so I help him." He nods his head, "Ahh, I understand."

The sun was up by the time I was able to make my way back down to the boat. Most of the crew jumped ship that morning and well, who could blame them? The Navy had a serious talk with Captain Dog and told him that if anything else goes wrong, they're impounding the boat. Later that day, one of the remaining crewmen bumped into Steve on the dock. "You might've heard some crazy stories going around the dock..." he began, "but nothing like that really happened. Everything is cool." Steve stopped him right there, "I'm not listening to any crazy stories going around the docks. I'm going by what I heard and what I saw and what happened right in my wife's face. That's what I'm going by." Which pretty much shut that guy down. Later, when the Captain tried to smooth things over, Steve said, "Look, as long as you keep your shit off of my boat, we're good, got it?"

And he did. But that isn't quite the end of the story. Tomorrow, I'll tell you what happened after Captain Dog managed to hire on some new crew...

I had a lot of keys. House, deadbolt, garage, camper, racecar, shop door, shop deadbolt, shop other door, shop other deadbolt, shop 3rd door, suitcases, shop storage, shop bathroom, big tool box, side tool box, roll around tool box, race tool box, truck, Subaru, Porsche, Porsche, Porsche, wheel locks, boatyard bathroom, boatyard shower, and the boat.

When you get down to just the boat key, you’re ready to go!

While Hurricane Paul peters out along the coast of Baja, doing nothing much except pouting big grey clouds across the sky, folks in the marina are bustling about--some of us are heading south in a few weeks, others are hunkering down for what passes as winter in Ensenada, and a few just plain bustle all the time. We call those people freaks of nature.

Here on Landfall, we've got a list of stuff that needs doing before we head south and now that we're knocking hard on a deadline, it's getting done. You know what your garage looks like when you're in the middle of a project? Now imagine that your house is the garage, only 75% smaller. With all your stuff in it. And the family. And the dog. All of the hatches and cupboards and secret hidey holes on board have spewed out a deadly array of tool bags, watermaker parts, bulk supplies, the electrical bag, cans of paint, rolls of tape, and other miscellaneous instruments of leisure killing doom. The entire boat is a tripping hazard right now, with projects going on both abovedecks and below.

At nearly five in the afternoon, I'm trying to decide if I should fight with the computer some more or head outside to scrub on a hatch we're putting in the aft cabin. It's heavy and old and beautiful bronze and I'd like to throttle the idiot who decided to cover its magnificence in like, 532 layers of ugly paint. If that's not a cardinal sin, it ought to be. Anyway, as I'm glaring at the computer screen, waffling back and forth between, should I stay or should I go, Steve calls down the companionway, "So...the Navy is here and we need to show them our passports."

That was unexpected. I grab our Blue Binder of Important Stuff off the nav station and head topsides. It's moderately waterproof and zips up to keep safe all the documents that keep you out of jail and prevent your boat from getting impounded. We've got the passports in a little mesh zippery flap and everything else stashed in plastic sleeves, which is convenient and looks impressively squared away.

Three Mexican Navy guys with M-16's were strategically positioned on the dock, alongside our boat. Their eyes were serious, but not unfriendly. A fourth man, armed with only a pistol and a Port of Ensenada representative, asked for our papers and permission to come aboard. As if we'd say no. I fished the passports out and Steve handed them over with our boat documentation papers. He looked them over. "¿Hay uno mas persona...?" he said, turning to the rep. "Do you have another person on your boat?", the rep asked. Steve said yes, while I yelled downstairs, "Eli, come up and meet the Mexican Navy-- they need to make sure you're you." He popped up for a minute, said hello to the nice guys with the big guns and then, in typical teenage fashion, evaporated back down below. Steve stayed out on deck to entertain the troops and keep everybody relaxed and thinking happy thoughts, and I tried to get out of the way by going back inside.

The man with the pistol examined our papers for a few minutes and then gestured, almost apologetically, that he'd like to look around below. Wander about our labyrinth of partially finished projects. I wondered what would happen if he tripped on the water filter box under the table and landed temple first on the screwdriver sticking out of the toolbag next to the nav station. Would the Mexican courts consider death by boat a punishable offense and are Mexican prisons really as bad as everyone says?

I shouldn't have worried. He was a pro, after all, and threaded his way around the obstacle course like it wasn't even there. Until he noticed the dog curled up on the pilothouse settee. "¿No morder? ¿Morder el perro?" he asked, visibly leaning away from Nala. "No," I said, "Ella es muy tranquila. Ama a todo el mundo." He gave me a look that said, "Do you know how many times I've heard that particular line of bullshit?" Nala raised her head and sniffed the air a couple of times. He actually stepped back into the midberth before asking again if she was going to bite him. "Me llamo Tamiko," I said, "Ella se llama Nala." I gave him a couple of pats on the shoulder, "She is very nice. She will not bite you. she loves everybody." He stuck out his hand, "Me llamo Juan," he said. "Mucho gusto"

Juan glanced into Eli's cabin, took a minute to peruse the chaos in the midberth, let his eyes roam about the pilot house, giving only the briefest of attention to the aft cabin. "Gracias," he said, and then headed back outside, making sure we got all our papers back before he left the boat. We weren't the only boat that got boarded today, it looked like they inspected all the boats in slips 12 or 13 on every dock in the marina. We'd heard enough positive stories about getting boarded by the Mexican Navy that we weren't expecting anything bad to happen, but all the same, it's nice to know for our own selves.

As you may know, I enjoy frequenting cafes. I've grown acquainted with a retired man who also visits the cafe who lives across the street from the one that I go to most often. He has three topics of conversation. Ten percent is current news. Another ten percent is bad jokes. The other eighty percent is his sexual prowess, past conquests, and skills. The eighty percent bores me but you can't chose who else shows up at a cafe.

As you probably also know there are, every Wednesday and Saturday when the cruise ships arrive, many Indians, mostly Oaxacan, who crowd the streets selling handcrafted goods, Chicklets, cornrow braids, and begging. They specialize in looking unfortunate.

After a few weeks one becomes weary of their approaches. While I have some sympathy for their condition I doubt that starting out as the 1001st person selling wooden slingshots and hand weaved bracelets with your name on them is a very promising business plan. Most of us that have here in Ensenada for awhile have become jaded. Last week Gina, an Ensenada native that I've become friends with was approached by a lady selling the same old stuff as we were talking. She said to the lady in Spanish "Three hundred years and you're still selling the same old shit. Have you no imagination?" While I don't approve, I understand.

Back to Mr Self Styled Cassanova. Today we had quite a few of the little ladies try to sell us things that we don't want or need.



After several, Cassanova started asking them, in English, "What time do you get off?" or, "Do you wanna come up to my place tonight?" They would just smile slightly and nod their heads the way we all do when we have absolutely no idea what somebody is saying.

It was funny. Cruel, yes, but funny. Some Texans walking by heard one of these exchanges and got quite a big (Texas sized) laugh out of it. The last time he did it Cassanova bit off more than he could chew.

Another un-sexy little Indian lady stopped to show off her wares. Cassanova started up again, "Hey, you & me tonight, baby, for some hot nakedness!"

Her jaw dropped and she said "You son of a bitch! You theen I doan speak any English? You wrong! You should be ashame of you self, asshole!".

Then his jaw dropped.

We just had a great visit from my dad, Ken. We walked and pedaled his ass all around Ensenada and he enjoyed it so much that he's considering moving down here so his money will go farther.

Now it's time to get the old boat ready for her biggest sail so far this century.

Finish procuring watermaker parts. Still need a valve, some hose, and some high pressure lines.

Fix the cabin top leaks and paint the poor thing so it doesn't rain inside anymore.

Wire up a 110v outlet in the aft cabin so we won't have electrical cords laying on the floor anymore.

Wire up the spreader lights so we have light on deck at night when we need it.

Cut the damned wind speed meter off of the top of the mast and float test it. I think it'll sink. Then I'll never have to look at it again!

Install and wire up the headlights for anchoring at night.

Install the new old port in the aft cabin.

Fix the existing outlets so they all work.

Cut the cords on the wifi router, the Island Time PC wifi antenna, and the external hard drive and wire them all through switches.

Put away about 8 tons of shit.

Stock up on food, we have about 800 miles of sailing to do in the next 3-4 weeks.

Get the bottom cleaned on the big boat and the dinghy, it looks like a seaweed salad right now.

Clean the white paint off of the waterline that the dumbasses on the blue shark boat got on it when they rinsed the oil based paint out of their brushes with my water hose right next to my boat.

Modify the boarding ladder so that it fits our boat and install it.

Install the LED light for the cockpit.

Replace the compass light switch.

Plus a whole mess of other things that I can't remember right now.

There's this cafe in Ensenada that has the best apple pie in the world. I mean that. The World. Ironic isn't it? I don't go there often because it's as expensive as Starbucks but every once in a while it's OK. Their pie is over four inches thick and it's layered with cheese and when it's warmed up it's one of the best things that you will ever eat.

Today I decided to walk there because it's the closest cafe to the boat and my friend Sabine had borrowed my bicycle. Since I was walking I decided to take the dog. Sounds good, right? Walk the dog to a cafe. No big deal.

Walking up the dock, Nala decided to take a huge pee right in front of our neighbor's steps that lead onto his boat. After the top of the ramp she dumped a huge shit right in front of Cruiseport Village's doors. The doggie dump bag dispensers were all empty. In the office they told me that they were all out so I had to go scrounge through a trashcan to find something to pick up the shit.

OK, now we're walking. Me & the dog. Walking, happy.



We covered a few blocks and turned on to Calle Primera, Ensenada's nicest street. It's so nice that they even paint the sidewalks to make them easy to clean. A few doors up Calle Primera there's a lovely jewelery store and a tea shop. The pretty ladies that work there were standing out front chatting. Nala thought that would be the perfect time for shit number two in ten minutes. AWESOME! Then I got to watch the two pretty ladies watch me watch the dog take a shit RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF THE BEAUTIFUL SIDEWALK! Of course I didn't have a doggie dump bag in my pocket because I've been depending on the marina to supply my habit. I walked away in shame as they talked bad about me in Spanish for leaving it there proud and steaming, perfectly centered on the shiny sidewalk.

I raced to the cafe, tied the dog to a post, placed my order, stole a wad of napkins and hustled back to the fuming pile of shit that I was now the proud owner of and I did my best to not smear it all over my fingers or the sidewalk with those tiny napkins.





OK, Dog #2 #2 handled. After I dumped the dump and returned to the cafe I grabbed a newspaper and a magazine and after a minute the owner brought out my mocha and apple pie, sat it down on the table in front of me, I smelled the mocha and smiled. As I was picking up the fork to bite into the succulent apple pie the owner asked "Esta tu perro"? (Is that your dog?) I answered yes even though I should have disowned her by now. The owner pointed to a sign on the window that I had never noticed before.

NO PETS

There's my apple pie and mocha, both looking at me and wanting me to eat them right then. And the owner looking at me like he'd just caught me stealing. I catch a whiff of the apple pie. Apples, cinnamon, and butter.

I asked the owner what I should do, I was unaware of his no pets policy and told him I was sorry. As I was considering how to ask in Spanish if he could wrap it up to go, he picked up the pie and mocha and said "You no pay, you go." I left.

I didn't kick the dog even once on the walk back home.

Yesterday I went out for coffee again, obviously, and had to do a couple of errands.

After the first two, a stop at a pharmacia and something else that I can't remember right now, I had to repeat the paint stripper journey.

I went to the same paint store and to the same taco stand as I had a few weeks ago. After both were done and I was riding my bicycle home, (BTW, riding a bicycle around Ensenada is like being a cat who lives in a neighborhood full of puddles and loose dogs) between dodging busses and potholes I had time to reflect on the difference between a few weeks ago and today.

I went to the Comex Pinturas store first. Last time it was really awkward and they had to go find the guy who spoke English. This time I was able to greet the girl in front well enough that she smiled rather than just looking confused, I asked for the paint stripper and she led me right to it without any difficulty, I made the purchase and then looked around for a few minutes just so that I would know what they had. A different clerk came over and asked if I needed any help and I was able to tell him thanks, but I'm just looking around, all in decent Spanish, without any problems.

At the taco stand, I ordered dos tacos de adobada con todo y una fresca. That's two marinated pork tacos with everything and a grapefruit soda, all for under $2.00. The owner was there and he's a really nice guy who was a commercial fisherman and has traveled the whole Pacific in search of tuna. He speaks great English (and Tagalog and Norwegian) but he won't speak English with me. He likes me, you see, and he wants me to practice my Spanish.

First we talked about the weather and pretty girls walking by. Then we moved on to sailing and my upcoming trip south. We covered a lot of geography of the North Eastern Pacific, all the ports down the outside of Baja and inside the Gulf of California, and the various attributes and expenses of most of the harbors. All in Spanish.

I left feeling proud of how much Spanish I've picked up since we've been here. I still have a LONG way to go, but progress, my friends, progress.