Day 576 Getting closer to "Mag Bay".
29 November 2009 | Punta Abreojos
Bill Hudson
A strange way to start the day was with a wet boat. It sprinkled during the night! We haven't seen rain, or showers tor that matter in quite some time. I guess I should have expected it since I saw on the weather widget on my computer that it was raining in Ensenada. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough to clean the decks but what dirt there was became a layer of wet dirt. Not down to mud standards, but it just made the dirt worse on deck.
We dried off the windows and I stuck on my foul weather gear just to make sure the sprinkles stopped(it always works that way) and we upped anchor and took off about 0740. There was as always little wind so the engine stayed on for a short time but we raised the sails and tried it that way for a while. Eventually, the wind kicked up--sort of--and we turned off the engine and slowly coasted along. We rolled out the big genoa at the bow and between the two of us, maneuvered out the spinnaker pole to hold her out. The wind kept changing and the sail kept failing so with the pole, it kept it out to gather in what ever breeze it could find. Not a lot of that and eventually, the motor came back on as we still needed to be in the anchorage by 1746 before sundown. As always, as we rounded the point off the harbor(more like a bite along the coast), the winds picked up and started gusting into the mid-20 knot range. Perfect for a beam reach sail. That is when the wind is coming right at the side of your boat. It is supposed to be the fastest point of sail. We followed Passage II into the bay as they left Bahia Asuncion before us and are a much lighter boat so they make better time. There are 5 of us now in the bay waiting for tomorrow to see what the weather will bring. While the seas were large--10 to 12 foot swells, the wind wasn't that great till much later in the day. We had maybe 5 to 8 knots of wind at any one time. It's hard to move a boat like Zephyr in such light winds. Stronger winds had been forecasted but never got here.
Tomorrow, we are off for Bahia Santa Maria just outside of Mag Bay. About a 150 mile trip. We will be off early in the morning and be on the water for about 30 hours before we get there. With luck, the winds will be in our favor this time.