SV Panta Rhei Retirement Trip

Picture this: We've left Guaymas and been underway all day and all night and part of the next day. We've been out of sight of land basically the whole time. I'm on watch when a little bird lands on the forward structure of our bimini. This bird makes a sparrow look large. It is one fourth the size of a sparrow, and it is having trouble keeping its perch on the stainless steel tube it has landed on. It works at it and eventually seems to reach an equilibrium. The sea state is moderate so its balance task never really ends. Eventually it decides it is time to explore. It looks under the turning block for the main sheet. You can see that it thinks it might be a home. Then it finds a pocket in the sub structure of the bimini. Another home? Eventually it tries to enter the main cabin. Karen puts down the screen to stop that. We went about our business sailing the boat and living aboard and the bird joined us for several hours. It had no fear of humans. It walked on my feet, and when my feet moved, it moved....basically it is lots more maneuverable and quicker to react than me. So the unanswered questions arose, "How does a bird whose wings move FAST and who is so small that it can't carry much food fly so far at sea (out of sight of land and too far to travel during the day alone) that it can even find our boat, let alone return to shore from the boat? Where was it headed when it found our boat? Why was it there?"

The jury rigged watermaker worked great and that is a cause for joy. We filled our water tanks. We will complete the repair in Mazatlan.

As we were leaving Guaymas, the house bank voltage regulator failed. It went to a high voltage condition and alarms started ringing all over the boat. We shut off the engine and sailed slowly for a while (there wasn't much wind), letting the engine cool down before I went to work in that compartment. I really didn't want to fix anything, especially not in the engine compartment while at sea. The house bank alternator was HOT from topping off the batteries and the voltage regulator is on the other side of the alternator in the engine compartment. (Think of reaching over a fire on the stove to reach a kettle behind it except the kettle won't move!). We have a spare aboard so I replaced the voltage regulator. I either had to repair it or disable it in order to recover the use of the engine. After replacing it, it had to be adjusted for the operating voltage. All done now and it was a good thing. Later on the seas got a little gnarly and we got very tired. We were glad the engine was working.

Topolobampo is a small town, described in the boating guide as being like a town in Greece. The path in to this town is a tortuous maze of buoys and ranges (3 of them!). It was like Alaska...only lots warmer. (87F water temp). The maze includes breaking waves on both sides, so no mistakes are forgiven. We had to pay CLOSE attention for a couple of hours. This is a problem for tired senior citizens. Finally we arrived and found the marina. Its a tiny marina tucked in close to the main road into town. It turns out that this is apparently a heavy trucking center and Jake brakes are heavily utilized. There is a nice looking restaurant next to the marina, but it was closed and it may never be open (doesn't look like it is). We found a taco stand and chose to go back to bed before exploring more. We'll do that today. We already found a boat we know at the dock (SV Magda Jean), so maybe they will have some local knowledge to share.