When you live on a boat you get used to things breaking and coming apart. It's always frustrating but we can normally figure out how to fix things.

A couple of weeks ago, I noticed that I couldn't send/receive information using my SSB radio/Pactor modem. I was frustrated but not surprised as there are high hills around most of the anchorages here. I tried again at the next anchorage, same thing but we still had high hills surrounding us. I rely on my SSB to get weather information but when we got to La Paz, I kind of forgot about it because we had an internet connection and I could get what I needed through that and through the local morning VHF cruisers net.

When we left La Paz, I continued to try to send/receive using my SSB/Pactor moden but couldn't connect. I finally asked my friend Celeste on The Beguine if she was having problems. Nope, her system worked fine. Great, I thought, I've got a problem. Even though Ken and I installed the SSB/modem/tuner ourselves and I do have a ham license, I don't pretend to know a THING about this darn radio.

I started by checking all of the connections to/from the radio, computer and modem. All was fine. I tried listening to the ham nets. I could hear everything fine. I tried transmitting to a ham net and they heard me just fine. The only problem that I seemed to be having was in sending/receiving through the modem. As a test I brought my computer over to Celestes to see if t I could send/receive from there. I could, so that eliminated my computer. Ugh! Where is the problem? I took the tuner cover off this morning to check all the connections there. Everything looked shiny and new. The copper foil had a good connection at both ends and I could find no corrosion. I'm about ready to give up when Celeste called out hello from her boat and asked if I wanted to go kayaking. While looking at fish and crabs and while listening to the swallows roosting in the cliffs above, I told her all that I had done. We put our heads together and she said that it must be in the modem. Okay. I'll look at that. When I got back to the boat, Ken had pulled up the floor in the compartment where the auto tuner is located and sure enough... A LOOSE CONNECTION! Guess what these loose wires connected... yup, the modem to the tuner. DUH. Jeez, I think I looked at every OTHER connection. It's always the last place you look. It probably just rattled loose while were underway at some point.

So, what else have we been doing besides tracking down a simple loose connection? Well, lots actually. We have been anchored at Isla San Francisco for about 5 or 6 days. It's peaceful here. We've hiked up to the top of a small mountain, looked at the salt flats, the guys have fished (a lot) and yesterday we took the dinghies over to Isla Cayote. This tiny, tiny island has about 5 houses (shacks) on it. It's the only inhabited island in the Sea. The half dozen guys that live there make their living fishing. They sell to the mainland communities and also to cruisers who visit them. There have been a few dead whales wash up on their shore. They've brought the bones up the hill and have them on display, calling it a museum.

After leaving Isla Cayote, we heading for the southern point of Isla San Jose where we could take the dinghies through the mangroves and into a large lagoon.

We've also been snorkeling. The snorkeling has been pretty blah so far but there were some pretty purple colored Gorgonians, King Angels and a few colorful stars. It turned out to be good. I'm hoping that the snorkeling/diving gets better because so for it's almost not worth even getting wet for. The water is still a bit cool, too.