Crusing 20 years ago verses crusing now
10 January 2010 | San Blas Estuary
Jodee
Here in San Blas is a good reminder of cruising back in the 80's. Back then when we pulled into a small town you walked to all four corners of the town to get all the supplies you needed. It took all day and by the end your feet were more than tired and you got a lot of exercise not to mention the weight training of packing all the items on your back in a back pack.
In the larger cities like La Paz or Mazatlan you have a good bus system or taxi waiting to take you to or from the large shopping stores like walmart, sam's club, Home Depot, Mega Superstore, CCC, Ley's, Sorianna and the like.
You may get to the panaderia to find out that they are out of baked goods because they only baked once a day or once week and you got there late. In the restaurants now you actually get chips and salsa at the table. Back in the 80's you had to insist on them and when they arrived it was actually deep fried corn tortillas that snapped and could not be chewed.
In the little tienda's (stores) you have a larger selection to choose from. Back then if you needed milk there was only one to choose from now there is different kinds ie... whole, skim, lactose and also different brands.
Twenty years ago there was no purified water like there is today. We even had to chase horses away from their water trough in Costa Rica to collect water back then. In Mazatlan most all the houses have UV purification water filtration systems.
Cell phone technology was not available as it is now. Now they have pay phones and back then you had one small room with a phone and the attendant would place the call for you and when the call went through she would call your name.
We thought we were smart to take folding bicycles 20 years ago only to find out that the pot holes were larger and deeper than our 16 inch wheels and they were dirt street and now we find streets made from brick and rocks.
There are more marinas available than there use to be.
Now on the navigation side of things twenty years ago we used Loran in the U.S. and Sat Nav for the rest of the world and satellite fixes were every four to eight hours as we moved south. Now there is GPS-Global Position System and some are complete with chart plotting capability. With this system you know where you are at any given moment.
Back then we had a hard time finding kitty food and litter. Now you can find dog food made by Purina in almost every town and they sell it by the bulk.
Thirty-four foot sailboat twenty years ago was a large cruiser and now forty or forty-four feet does not stand out. Boats with water makers were rare and now it is hard to find one with out it.
If you do not have roller furling and full battens you are dating your self as old school.
I hope those of you reading this find this interesting and those that cruised back then and are not cruising at the moment enjoy this post.