October 29, 2008 - Wed.

Every morning at 7:30 there is a roll call to make sure everyone is
still afloat and to get everyone's location. It seems like we are about
the middle of the pack, but people are spread all over the place. This
is a result of people's decision to either sail close to shore or to go
further off shore - we were obviously in the later group. In any event, we are making tremendous time and it looks like we will get to Turtle Bay (Bahia Tortuga) sometime today - this will be a day sooner than yesterday. Again, not much to report, still motoring. In the
afternoon, we hit pay dirt! After two years of trying, we finally
landed a Dorado (mahi mahi). It was beautifully colored and must have weighed about 22-25 pounds. It was too heavy to lift onto the boat so we had to gaff him. I want to hone my fileting skills, so I have filleted both fish and this one went a little smoother - of course there was a lot more fish to work with.

During my early a.m. shift I saw what appeared to be a significant storm brewing due south (we are sort of on a south easterly course) and there was quite a lightening show, but it was too distant to hear the thunder. Of course the motor was running and that sort of drowned out any sound. Toward the end of my shift the fog came back in and greatly reduced visibility and things got cold again.


After day break there was still virtually no wind and we motored along. Later in the afternoon, the storm I had seen at a great distance finally go to us and there was pretty heavy thunder and lightening. We had passed behind one front, but were caught by the second one and got about 15 minutes of rain. Again, however, it is much, much warmer than last year. Even in the rain it was bare feet and shorts. Alison and I were playing a marble game (Awale - pronounced A-Wall-EE), and just played right through the cloud burst.

As was the case at the Coronado islands, there is a large Island (Isles Cedros) near Turtle Bay and you have to make a decision to go inside (between the island and the mainland) or outside (the ocean side of the island), because we were so far offshore (but steadily heading back as we approached Turtle Bay), we again opted for the outside route.

At the southern end of the island we took a hard left (east) and headed toward Turtle Bay. It was about then that we got the rain. During the rain there was a magnificent double rainbow that you could follow from one horizon to the next. The inner one of the two had the most brilliant colors and brightness I have ever seen!

We continued on in a more or less easterly direction, still under motor. After dark, we were able to track a new storm approaching on radar and, sure enough, we got hit with another brief, but significant rain storm.


There has been no sign of the moon so the stars have either been
brilliant, or absent due to the fog. Tonight there was no fog so the
stars were out again in masse, other than when the storm hit. I finally saw my first falling star of the trip - and then saw a second just for good measure.

Because there was no moon, things were very dark and we relied on radar and the flashing entrance beacon lights to find the entrance to the harbor. Even though we had charted all of this prior to leaving, it is still pretty scary when you are sailing in, know there are rocks in the water that will sink you in a heartbeat, and you just have to trust the route you have planned. As we were searching for any sign of danger as we got between the two beacons, dolphins joined us and were playing around the boat. On the one hand, you didn't want to relax the vigilant watch for rocks, but on the other, the route was charted, it was too dark to see anything anyway, and the dolphins were pretty cool. There was finally some significant phosphorescents in the water, so you could see them approaching from some distance. Try to imagine the old war movies you have seen where the guy on the battle ship can see the approaching torpedo; that is what it was like, there were glow in the dark streaks approaching. When they would jump and hit the water, there was an explosion of phosphorescent water. Very, very cool.

We got in and set anchor, had a couple of beers (it was about midnight, by the way), and called it a day.

I'll get back to you in a couple of days.

Paul.