We left Marina Ixtapa on Thursday the 13th, destination Barra de Navidad, a distance of about 207 NM . Our original plan was to sail out to a small island off the coast, anchor overnight and leave at around 4:00 in the morning for a 70 NM sail to an anchorage called Caleta de Campos. We would spend the night there before making the 133 NM overnight trip up to Barra. Although the first anchorage got pretty rolly during the night, we pretty much stuck to the plan leaving about 3:30 AM and making our way thru shipping lanes and around turtles mostly motoring due to lack of wind. Sometime during the afternoon I was able to get out the sails and in very light wind kept begging for just a little more wind....be careful what you ask for. About an hour out of Caleta de Campos the wind came up....with a fury, we pulled into the unprotected anchorage, looked at each other and said "let's go"...and we did. I've learned that in order to avoid the long lines put out by the Mexican fishermen it is best to travel 10-12 miles out, so we put out our sails and headed off shore into the proverbial sunset. The wind continued to build through the night, once off shore we turned north and had to motor sail through the night as the strong wind was right on our nose. The 15-20 knot winds created a large, steep swell/chop which was also on our nose. Si Bon smashed her way through the rough seas and as the sun rose the wind died off. I knew when we decided not to stop in Caleta de Campos that we were not going to be making Barra de Navidad before dark, so I decided to go for Manzanillo, knowing that even that was going to be tight...VERY tight. We entered the large bay of Manzanillo as the sun was setting, we were greeted by two or three whales who put on a spectacular show for us (pic). We wove our way through 8-9 large container/oil ships and as night fell dropped the hook in the Las Hadas anchorage. The total trip from Ixtapa was 39 hours and 186 NM. Although we were able to motor sail a fair amount, we were only able to fully sail for 3.5 hours...a disappointing number. We saw tons of marine life and dodged tons of commercial traffic, and we arrived safely...which is all that really matters.
It is often said that a cruisers plans are written in sand at low tide. You probably noticed that I am heading north away from Panama and towards San Diego, which is where I am planning on returning to this spring (unless the plan changes). On another note of change, Dawn and I have decided that we will be going our separate ways, and she has now left the boat, I wish her well.
Yes, plans do definitely change while cruising.