As the sun lights up the clouds behind the eastern mountains, a frigate bird glides gracefully overhead, in the company of smaller birds calling to each other, low over the water, circling the boat. A dolphin surfaces nearby, surprising me with a sharp breath as I write in the cockpit. A chilly breeze sends me back in for an extra layer of clothes, a luxury for now, as the day will be hot and humid within the hour. It's a quiet moment, admiring the beautiful angular wings of the frigate and feeling all tied-in with nature, when Allan and Chris emerge from the cabin. Chris looks up at the morning sky, and I think, ah, he's going to enjoy this sunrise too, and then he starts violently shaking the rigging while Allan joins him, jiggling the halyards and hollering Hey! into the air, and suddenly beautiful nature has become a minor threat - a large frigate has settled on top of our mast, perched on the tender little wind instrument, and threatening to lose a load of sticky, gluey bird poop on our white deck. He clings valiantly to the mast despite their efforts, but finally gets the hint and swoops off. I'm reminded of a funny moment 15 years ago here in La Cruz, pointlessly throwing walnuts into the air to thwart a bird on top of a neighboring boat in the marina, the walnuts barely making it to the spreaders before slowing, reversing their path and smacking onto the deck while we duck, the bird, undaunted, laughing from above. Ah, nature.

We're anchored just outside La Cruz de Huanacaxtle on the northern curve of expansive Banderas Bay. We arrived Saturday and have been enjoying the anchorage despite recent reports of attempted thefts on boats anchored here - a band of rogues has sullied the good reputation of this, the only realistically usable anchorage in the entire bay. But after discussing the options, we decided to brave danger, choosing to lock up all our valuables at night including the most common target of these hooligans, our dinghy. So far, we still have all our goodies. (Ps. A few nights later we spied an unlit panga with two guys in it, skulking slowly through the anchorage. Not usual behavior - fisherman are always in a hurry to get out to sea, or to get home, never skulking amongst anchored boats. We warned a nearby boat who had left his dinghy tied to the back of the boat - never a good idea at night anyhow - and made an announcement on Ch 16 to the fleet. Also mentioned it the next day on the morning Net. Advice from the local folks is to shine powerful lights on them, announce their presence to the fleet on the radio, ask everyone to turn all their lights on so they know we know they're there. I think this will be managed.)

Our guests, Chris and his wife Jean, the former owners of this boat, flew in from snowy Steamboat Springs and joined us on February 19th. Jean stayed for a week and Chris stayed aboard for the sail north from Barra to Banderas Bay.

Our time with them was great - we had only met Jean briefly 5 years ago when we first saw the boat, anchored in the Lagoon outside of Barra. She's delightful with her delicate Minnesota accent, spicy sense of humor and sharp mind. She and I enjoyed yoga classes on the beach a few times in Barra and had our own session under the palm trees in Tenacatita. We kayaked ashore with our yoga mats and water bottles, found a spot under the trees in the sandy dirt, laid out our mats and just slipped into our own practices, as easily as if we'd been doing yoga together for years. Off in the distance sat our kayaks, dragged high up the beach, and beyond Fly Aweigh rested among the other boats. Despite the tranquil image, I found myself largely consumed with the thought of falling coconuts, a big nest of them, green and heavy, directly overhead as I rested in savasana, and ended up dragging my mat multiple times to move outside the fall zone.

In all, we spent 3 days in Barra, dining with friends, stocking up on food at the weekly market, and splashing in the pool; 2 nights in a quiet anchorage south of Barra called Carrizal, and 2 nights in Tenacatita, where we ultimately said goodbye to Jean, who hitched a ride with friends on their boat, south to Barra to meet the driver waiting to take her to the airport in Manzanillo.

Chris, Allan and I set off north with a 2-day stop in Bahia Chamela, a wide bay with a few wild, cactus-strewn little islands. Allan and I took the dinghy over to one of the islands, Pajarero, dropped the dinghy anchor in the sand and had a delightful snorkel in the surgy water, surrounded by boobie birds sunning themselves on the rocks or perched precariously on the very pointy, spiny tops of the cactus. We went ashore one morning for breakfast at our favorite restaurant in the seaside town of Perula, Cafe Jazz, and took a nice walk back on the beach. Later, we had a chance to join friends from the boats s/v Single D and m/y Delta Swizzler for a fun cocktail hour, high above the world on Delta Swizzler's top deck, watching whales breach and telling sea stories, of course.

The next morning we moved Fly Aweigh around to Pajarero and anchored for the day, relaxing and doing more snorkeling, then left for an overnight passage in the afternoon. That last leg was around notorious Cabo Corrientes, which can be a washing-machine mess of a cape but our timing was good - no sailing, but a nice motor north, and smooth-as-glass seas as we rounded the cape into Banderas Bay. Chris stayed for a few more days and then flew back to Colorado, wearing shorts and a t-shirt but with his jeans and jacket standing by for his wintry return. It was great having him aboard - not only is he a pretty nice guy, and helpful, and funny, and smart, and knowledgeable about the boat (it was, after all, his boat for 6 years) but most importantly (to me), he took over cooking dinner for the last two weeks! What a treat to not have to eat my boring food. He's a flurry in the galley, aquainted himself quickly with where I keep all the stuff, adapted to our induction cooktop, and was thoughtful to consider our vegetarian leanings. So damn, now that he's gone I have to start cooking again. (Thank you, Chris!)

One of the reasons we're here in La Cruz, instead of, for example, way farther south in Zihuatanejo (which we had considered), is because we wanted to come and say farewell to our friends Jeff and his grandson Dylan on the beautiful Xquisite catamaran s/v Sea Larks, bound for the south Pacific with their crew, friends Lee Anne and Charlie (who recently ended their 5-year cruise in Mexico on their boat, s/v Juliet.) It was fun to be a small part of their busy life while they were in the final prep phase for their 3-ish-week crossing to the Marquesas. We had a few evenings with them and Jeff's wife Paula, who came to help with prep but will be happily at home while they brave the ocean. They pushed off yesterday to check out with the Port Captain in Nuevo Vallarta, an hour south-east. We had dinghied into the marina to see them off and ended up joining them across the Bay, a final hour together before they head to Punta de Mita on the far western edge of Banderas Bay. They'll launch for the open sea on Friday when the winds fill in. The timing of the departure for this voyage is tricky - you want the wind at the right angle and speed to get you to that magic place called, according to Allan "the place where you run out of wind." From there you turn south and hope crossing through the wind-less ITCZ isn't as ghastly as it's nickname, "the doldrums." There, in the middle of the doldrums, you cross the equator and transition from being a pollywog to a shellback, replete with ceremony, costumes, and offerings to Neptune, and finally you move south enough to meet the delightful trade winds which then move you west to the Marquesas. That's the Alison version, which is no doubt partly wrong but mostly right.

Was it bittersweet to see them go? Yes, for so many reasons! We want to go! We love that boat, and we love the South Pacific, and we'd love to melt off into 3 weeks of otherworldly open ocean passage making, but we're happy for all of them. Adventures await! So we hugged and took photos and waved goodbye, then wandered up the dock to get some breakfast at Eddie's.

We spent the rest of the day thusly: took the water taxi 3 minutes across the harbor to see if Jay on s/v Cadenza was around, visited with him a bit, bought Allan a pair of sandals, looked for soy milk (no luck), checked with Marina Paradise Village to see if they might have a slip for us (no luck) and then hopped on the "collectivo" bus, which took us all the way around the Bay to La Cruz for about a buck-and-a-half each. By the time we got out to our boat in the anchorage, we were hot and sticky and tired, but it was a good day. One reason I like being in the anchorage rather then the marina is it's more open and air-flowy. We unlocked the boat and opened all the hatches and within minutes the cabin had cooled and we flopped on the settee and took little naps.

Now we're plotting our next move. We've been threatening to visit our friends Jon and Erika in San Miguel de Allende, and we're finally doing it, leaving tomorrow on a big fancy bus with a 2-day stop in Guadalajara. So despite our preference for the anchorage, we're moving into a pricey slip so the boat is safe while we're gone. We went to the marina office and secured slip #14A on Dock 11, then dinghied into the slip to be sure we knew which one it was when we come in with the boat. Wandering around on the dock led to some confusion: our neighbor's slip was labeled 13, ours was 15. The one next to that was 6. I hailed a security guard nearby for answers. "Yes, that's #14," he confirmed, in excellent English, but when we showed him the 15 painted on the electrical box, he said, matter-of-factly, "Yes, we move them around." Peeking inside said electrical box, Allan found the connector was loose. "Will this work?" he asked, "Yes, it will work." "But, will it be safe?" "No, it won't be safe." We love Mexico! A few minutes later he offered to get the maintenance guy to come secure the fitting, so we'll see when we get in how that all went. (Ps. Polarity was reversed, we discovered that after dark, so plug unusable anyhow. Thankfully, we have lots of solar.)

So that's what our next week will be, an inland trip for a big change of scenery - not that our scenery doesn't change constantly already! I love this crazy life - it can be a bit dizzying at times, and exhausting, and even sometimes, surprisingly, a bit boring - but I love it.

(Ps: Still working on that darn photo gallery ...)

PredictWind Position

To start this thing off, here's a plug - since it's my blurb, after all - for our friend Deneb's marine research non-profit in the Islas Revillagigedos. A normal-ish blurb follows.

After spending 2 solid weeks together at the Revilla's, plus all the time before that trip in the planning stages, we learned a lot about Deneb and Derek, and about their passion for ocean conservation. The efforts by CONANP, the national park system in Mexico, to protect our oceans by creating sanctuary areas and national parks is beginning to pay off, as evidenced by increased numbers of species in areas where, in some cases, they had been endangered.

Just before we left for the islands, Deneb was asked to join a group of scientists in a presentation in Mexico City on the effects of the conservation efforts in the Revillagigedos, which became a national park in late 2018. It gave her a great sense of accomplishment to be part of something that is getting measurably better. And it buoyed her determination to continue her studies on the shark and manta cleaning stations in the Revilla's. As I mentioned in an earlier blog, these cleaning stations, established and run by the fish (an underwater mystery extraordinaire!) act as little urgent care centers as well as bathhouses, where the cleaner fish remove parasites, bacteria, and other unwanted things from the host fish, critical for their health, which is good, since they are critical to the overall balance of the sea.

So my plug is for her non-profit, CIENCIASBCS - Centro Interdisciplinario en Ciencias Aplicados de Baja California Sur (It practically translates itself, but means Central Interdisciplinary in Applied Sciences of Baja California South.) If you're at all interested in ocean conservation (and considering the realities of our oceans today and the direct effect their health has on ours, we all should be) and are at a place in your life where you want to help with something like this, she has a Donate button on her website and it's very easy, via PayPal, to make a one-time or recurring donation. Even 50 pesos ($2.43) per month (the lowest option on her website!) helps, because recurring donations are more reliable and begin to add up.

Her non-profit will also be expanding into other areas of study, including one that will evaluate the effects of exposure to nature on children. Taking city kids and giving them a chance to experience the beauty of nature not only enhances their mental and physical health, but it helps teach them, at a young age, to appreciate the world around them and learn the importance of protecting it.

Deneb is uniquely positioned as a marine biologist, the daughter of marine biologists, a former CONANP park ranger at the Revilla's, and an overall focused and brilliant person to be involved in these projects. Here is her website link, and we're proud to be listed as "Allies" (check it out!)

Link to CIENCIASbcs

Gracias, and I now return this blurb to it's regularly unscheduled programming.

Leaving the Revilla's after 2 amazing and rather unbelievable weeks was an adjustment. I could so happily just stay out there, diving, eating healthy, breathing incredibly fresh air (except when the wind stirs up the fine volcanic dust) and watching spectacular sunsets. But we were running out of food. Well, we had food, and could have stayed a lot longer, but rice and beans and pasta would have gotten quite dull, and I'd opened my last can of vegetables. Plus, we had places to go and people to meet.

The forecast for our 56-hour trip to the Mexican mainland promised following seas (the good kind, the kind the boat likes to surf down, smooth and quiet) and good wind from our port side. We were partly rewarded - we had a wonderfully energetic beam reach, with speeds over 8 knots at times, but the following seas did not happen. Instead we were tortured with a confused and choppy series of chunky waves that made moving around the boat downright dangerous, thumping and slamming into the hulls, making Allan a bit queasy and me just overall annoyed. But we were sailing, and that's always good.

We started our re-entry to civilization in Bahia Tenacatita, a beautiful large bay south of Puerto Vallarta. A long beach lines the protected bay, with a casual beach cafe where you can have a bite to eat, or sip cold coconut juice or beer or a tangy margarita and wiggle your toes in the sand. The sand! We hadn't had our toes on land for almost a month, so that was nice. We swam, and wiggled out toes, took our dinghy across the huge bay for some fresh produce at the local market in Melaque, celebrated a 6-year-old's birthday on the beach, and spent time with friends who were also anchored there, the Monson family on s/v Wippy, who we met in Oxnard last summer. Their 3 kids are home-schooled, so we got to be a part of their education with a presentation on our time in the Revillas. Deneb had equipped us with some CONANP promo videos of the Revillas and we had some of her fabulous underwater pictures of the cleaning stations, plus Allan's great stuff which he took with our new little underwater camera. We all marveled at the critters we got to swim with, talked about how long things live (sea turtles: thirty to fifty years!) and nibbled on oatmeal chocolate chip cookies.

3 days later, partially reacclimated, we headed 3 hours south to Barra de Navidad, a favorite destination for cruisers along this Costa Alegre, where we've been since last Sunday. We literally jumped into the fire upon our arrival, since it was timed with the start of a week-long fund raising event the cruisers put on every year to help support the local schools. This is one of the many give-backs that cruisers are doing world-wide - thanking the communities that host and support them in their travels. The event is called Cruise-In Week, and includes things like taking people in the community on sailing trips, music events, a Poker Taco Crawl (that helps introduce some of the cool taco restaurants to visitors), and the big event, a Flamingo Regatta, in which people bet on the winners. It's a very well-run week, lots of fun, lots of work, and raises lots of money for the schools. The school system here is interesting: primary is from Grades 1-6, then there are two levels of what we call "high school." Grades 7-9 cover the normal things, and Grades 10-12 are preparatory for college-bound students, or vocational training in specific trades. And, college is free if you go to one of the universities in a capital city.

Our week was a blur of activity, catching up with old friends who either live here full time or cycle back down for the season, many of them here specifically for Cruise-In Week. We joined a few friends on a jaunt to the local elementary school and had pizza with the 25 kids, who adorned us with paper necklaces and handed out hand-made valentines; we helped with our rubber-bumper dinghy to usher boats carrying passengers in and out of their slips in the windy conditions; and we crewed on s/v Cadenza for one of the two music cruises. And on the last day, we had the privilege of crewing on s/v Baja Fog for the Flamingo Regatta. We're not racers - we're cruisers, we do things more slowly, we don't make constant tacks and sail changes, we sort of chill. So the stress and energy of racing is a bit unfamiliar to us, but this was fun! Baja Fog is a Lagoon 45 with the helm located on the top deck for a spectacular view, and all the lines and winches and buttons and knobs right there in easy reach. She's a home, fully loaded with canned food and galley gear and all sorts of things a serious racer would never have on a boat, and she's a tank to begin with at over 30,000 pounds, so she was heavily, but fairly handicapped. I manned the port lines for the jib furler, the main sheet, and the traveler, while Allan manned the port lines for the jib sheets and the Code Zero, a sort of a spinnaker-like sail, beautiful and a bit tricky. We had 3 other very capable crew, 1 on the starboard side, and 2 running around on the bow giving feedback to the line handlers on sail shape and other intracacies, and working to untangle the Code Zero when it gnarled miserably. And last but most importantly, overseeing all the fun - we had Captain John at the helm. The communication was great between everyone aboard, and we tweaked and finessed the boat to a win across the finish line. We won the big boat prize while John's wife Monique and Captain Mike took the small boat win, and the overall win, on Foggy, the Hobie Cat. John was funny - as Foggy gained, ("Hi honey!" she called as they pulled alongside) he picked up the handheld radio and called Elinor, who was manning the betting on shore, and put more money on Foggy. Remember, the goal is to raise money - all the betting wins go to the schools, so the rules are loose.

Meanwhile, our friend Terri, accompanied by her husband Jay, emcee'd the race from the Sunset Bar on the beach over Ch 68 (a ship-to-ship radio channel) delivering witty remarks and "talking smack" about each boat and her crew, goading people to place their bets, upping the stakes and making the whole thing a lot of fun, although Terri and Jay had to endure the entire afternoon in a bar full of smokers. Even paradise has it's thorns.

Between Cruise-In events we took 5 loads of laundry to the laundry lady in town, bought food at the local Thursday market, joined the yoga class on the beach, hung out by the pool sipping mango margaritas and Topo Chico, ate our fair share of street tacos, and hired Pancho and his incredible crew to wash and wax the boat and shine up the stainless (a thankless job!) We've been enjoying the beautiful Grand Isle Resort that sits like a tiny Mediterranean town at the head of the marina, and reacquainting ourselves with the difficulty of being vegan in Mexico. Nearly impossible, so we've gained back some of the weight we lost when we were living on our 100% plant-based, high fiber, low fat, low sodium, nutrient dense diet in the Revilla's. C'es la vie, we blame the French Baker, who plies his bakery goodies every morning by panga, circling through the marina and the lagoon, ringing his bell, tempting us daily with cinnamon rolls, croissants, sourdough bread, and any number of other low fiber nutrient deficient delicacies.

Today we're excited to be joined by our friends Chris and Jean, former owners of this boat when it was known as Strikhedonia. Chris and Jean spent 6 years in Mexico exploring on the boat and we're happy to have them back aboard for a week or so. Ironically, a few days ago we were anchored in the lagoon at almost the exact spot where, 5 years ago on almost the exact day, we met Chris and Jean and saw the boat for the first time. We'll make plans tonight for the week and then decide what happens after that - Jean flies home on the 26th and Chris is staying with us for our northbound trip to Puerto Vallarta with some stops along the way. In PV we hope to meet up with Jeff on s/v Sea Larks, who is about to launch across the Pacific with his grandson and crew - our friends LeeAnne and Charlie from s/v Juliette.

And so life goes on as we live in this little bubble of happiness, trying to be oblivious to the events at home but of course failing miserably at that. But we're grateful beyond measure that we're here in this beautiful country, enjoying good friends and having adventures, feeling healthy and alive, and able to wiggle our toes in the sand.

I know I'm behind on putting photos in the Gallery, but that's on my list, such as it is.

And, you know by now that you can track us by clicking here:
PredictWind Position

And again, Deneb's Website:
CIENCIASbcs

Where to start? How to summarize the last week in this unique and amazing place, with two unique and amazing people? I just reread my daily journal entries, and I have no idea how to mash it down to something under 2000 words, which is about the most I can get away with. I'll give it my best.

Isla Socorro was quite different than moon-like and haunting San Benedicto. For one thing, it has green stuff growing on it. Trees and cactus and even some palms that were brought in at some point. It has land critters, which of course we didn't see because we can't go on land, but there are mice and cats, neither of which are indigenous. You'd think the cats would solve the mouse problem, but instead they're endangering the lizards, which are indigenous. So they're working on getting rid of the cats. They've successfully removed the imported pigs and sheep, which resulted in a huge regrowth of vegetation and an increase in the bird and lizard population. There are parrots, bright green, perfectly suited to hide amongst the bright green leaves of some of the trees on the island.

Socorro is also notable for it's Navy presence. The small Navy base sits in a protected cove with a residential area nearby. We were rather shocked when we arrived for the required check-in to find the gorgeous volcanic walls surrounding the cove littered with graffitti. I can only assume some bored Navy kids were out one night with a can of paint, but man, those cliffs are straight vertical! Ah well, kids.

In all, we spent 8 nights in 3 anchorages around Socorro. Our first stop was Cabo Pearce, where I got my first glimpse of those gorgeous volcanic walls. My inner geologist was agape the entire time, surrounded by streaks of color and texture, ancient volcanic formations that boggle the mind. The anchorage was a challenge, though, very deep and rocky. Rocky is bad for anchors. I won't waste too many words on this, just enough to say that we love sand. We couldn't find sand, even with our fancy mapping sonar bottom painting thing, so we headed for slightly shallower water and hoped for the best. We had a tough night - it was obvious the best is not what we got, and the chain, lots of it down there, was scraping and tangling on the rocky bottom, transferring awful sounds up through the hull into our not-sleeping ears, while the wind blasted and twisted the boat around and the the waves crashed into the volcanic walls, a little too close for comfort. We didn't drag, the boat stayed solid, but in the morning we, and Amphitrite as well, reanchored.

We went on two dives that day. Deneb and Derek came over at 9am for a very thorough dive brief - this spot can be challenging with strong current and a few other tricky things. Deneb's brief was terrific, using the very helpful 3-D maps of the dive site that she helped create when working for the national park service, CONANP. Our first dive was at noon. Deneb set her camera on a little hill underwater, this time she's looking at a manta cleaning station. The dives were not too exciting - the visibility was murky and there weren't a lot of critter encounters, but we did see a few mantas getting cleaned, which is a fabulous sight. One big manta had a remora on each shoulder, perfectly positioned to look like little jet engines, the remora being busily cleaned by little cleaner fish, pecking and poking. More fish swam around the manta's huge wings and a passel of others swam beneath and behind like an adoring fan club. The whole scene reminded me of the time I was in an elevator in New York and Luciano Pavarotti swooped in, wearing a fabulous suit with a white silk scarf wrapped about his neck, surrounded by his entourage. This manta had that air of importance.

Two dolphin swam by looking very late for an appointment, no time to say hi but they did at least come very close, close enough to see that they'd both been around long enough to have chunks and nibbles taken out of their dorsals and tails, with lots of tattoo-like scars all over their bodies. I hear it can be tough to be a dolphin, not all happy-Flipper as I'd like.

When we came up from the dive we had drifted a bit farther out that I'd realized, and Derek, our dinghy top cover guy, was thrashing about in steep swells and breaking waves as the wind whipped around the cape. He was all grins, though, a true salt that guy is, and we all clamored aboard for a raucous ride back to the boats. The second dive was much like the first, a bit underwhelming perhaps largely because of an overcast sky, which mutes the light. But, a dive underwater is always interesting in some way, if you look close. We saw tons of lobster and had a visit from the same two busy dolphins. The clouds and wind and wet splashy ride back left me chilled, though, and I couldn't wait for a hot shower.

Our second anchor job was good, we all had a restful night. I passed on the diving the next day, and Allan skipped the first dive, so he and I were top cover and had a blast up there in all the ocean chaos, riding the steep swells up and down in our faithful dinghy, circling around trying to stay in the general area against the current. The big stressor of being top cover is after about 30 minutes, when you know your divers are coming up soon, and not really knowing quite where. So there's a fierce search for the safety sausage, looking in all directions, trying to avoid a mindset of where you think they'll come up. And when you finally see that silly orange sausage bobbing on the waves, you give a big sigh of relief knowing all is well and your people will be back on board soon.

A quick dive in the morning to retrieve Deneb's camera and then after lunch we had a fabulous downwind sail to Navy Cove, a short jaunt south, reaching over 7 knots on the little jib sail alone. As we neared Navy Cove, we again said a silent thanks for Deneb, she's an ace on all the protocols and of course speaks the language. She got permission on Ch 16 for our boats to enter Navy Cove and anchor while we awaited the inspection. They went to Amphitrite first, and then Deneb boarded their boat to come to help out on Fly Aweigh. Formalities over, we thanked them, parted ways, and motored around the corner to El Aquario. Knowing that, again, this was a notoriously rocky anchorage, we searched hard to find a good chunk of sand, but our first attempt was an abysmal failure. It was apparent as soon as the anchor hit the 88' bottom and we tried to set it that we'd dropped into rock, and it was a trick getting it back up again, but after a few more attempts we found a sandy spot.

We had a few nice dives here, but again visibility was a bit murky and other than gobs of huge lobster and an occasional shark, not a lot to see. We took a fun two-dinghy trip to explore the coast and found a pretty spot to snorkel, I stayed the our dinghy with Amphitrite's dinghy side-tied while the other three splashed about, then we headed over to visit a neighboring boat that had a friend of Deneb's aboard.

Always amazing, the people you meet out in the wilds: the owner of the boat was from the Los Angeles area, was a pilot, had learned to fly out of a nearby airport to our home in Oxnard. So we had lots of fun talking flying stuff an hearing their stories. Always stories. People who come out to places like this are full of them. He had a total of 8 people aboard, including a dive guide from Cabo, a few dive instructors from La Ventana and a few more from Cozumel, a Captain and his partner from Cabo and a friend of the owners. So it was a very dive-intense boat, they had piles of dive gear and at least 13 tanks aboard, with a high-powered dive compressor.

Our third and last anchorage on Socorro was Punta Tosca, another rocky spot with a good sandy area in the middle and well-protected from swell, although we did have a pretty consistent wind whooshing down the canyon and blowing offshore. We had a few nice dives here, it seemed like the better stuff was at about 30-40', lots of color, beautiful fish, some coral, and a wonderful encounter with a few ancient sea turtles. We caught one huge, barnacle-covered turtle sleeping in a corner, and felt bad waking him up, but even though we crouched behind a rock and tried not to look threatening, he slowly gathered himself up and swam off. Hard to believe huge turtles can swim, but they are quite graceful. We were visited by probably the biggest manta we've seen so far, who glided past so close to me I could have touched the wingtip. And a little baby shark decided to try out his menacing skills, circling us over and over again, trying to look big and scary.

We had a super-fun outing one day on our dinghies, Derek and Deneb really wanted to show us the coastline farther up, so we loaded up with picnic lunches and water and headed off, covered from head to toe with sun and water-protective gear. We bashed our way into rather questionable conditions, but we were feeling bold and kept zooming north, following Derek & Deneb who looked back questioningly every now and then to be sure we were still game. It was a chore, but worth it. The coastline really was stunning, this volcanic stuff is, to steal my friend LeeAnne's words, truly eye-popping. We found caves, and arches, and little inlets with walls of nesting boobies and graceful white Paradise birds gliding overhead. We found a cute little beach in a safe nook and dropped our dinghy anchor in the sand, tied the boats together and had our picnic lunch. We shared spinach and garbanzo bean salad, hummus and chopped veggies, whole grain crackers and seedy banana bread while chatting amicably. It's such an amazing life out here - we've lost weight eating so incredibly well, we feel wonderful, we're smart about the sun, we're drinking a lot less alcohol (we're actually pretty much out of alcohol) and staying super-hydrated. We're exposed to the beauty of life on a daily basis and the air couldn't be fresher. We feel supremely grateful. And to top it off, we had a super-fun surfing ride, with following seas and wind all the way back to the boats, making the bash out totally worth the agony.

Deneb had gathered all the footage and data she needed for this trip, so we spent the last few days taking little snorkel trips in the anchorage. On one we found a delightful little aquarium, teeming with fish. Our last day was spent in energetic preparation for the 3-day passage to Tenacatita on the Pacific coast of Mexico. I was fierce in the galley, making a veggie curry, a pot of chili, papaya-strawberry bread, a cabbage slaw and some fragrant jamaica syrup to spice up our fizzy water. Allan fixed some of the hatch latches, put away all our freshly rinsed dive gear and got the boat all ready for the trip.

We wrapped up our time together with a last dinner on Fly Aweigh, sipping jamaica margaritas while the sun slid behind the craggy rock, and shared meal prep - Derek's recipe of ginger-soy marinated tofu, expertly grilled by Allan, and a pasta with roasted red peppers whirled into a creamy, zesty sauce. Deneb gave us hundreds of incredible photos and videos, including some drone footage which, since we never got ashore, really rounded out the whole picture of these islands. Derek stocked me up with lots of new music and some great recipes.

For the few of you reading this blurb who are considering a trip in their own boat to this unforgettable place, I have a few tips: 1- Bring a guide! I can't imagine doing this without Deneb and Derek, despite the thick folder of information I'd gathered from previous sailors here. It's a tricky place to be for a hundred reasons. CONANP has a list of certified dive guides that mostly base out of Cabo. And, if you have 3 or more divers, the rules require a guide. (So that means pretty much everyone.) 2 - Never try to dive without top cover in a dinghy! The current is wild at times, it's darn right dangerous to even leave the drop site, you have to stay close and make sure your divers come up safe and near enough to get to you. Stories of the dinghy moving off into calmer waters to wait out the 30-minute dive often end in sketchy events, divers come up too far off for the dinghy driver to see the sausage and too far to hear a whistle, while the current continues to sweep the divers out to sea. But having a qualified guide (See #1) would negate that. Oh, and by the way, you can always come here on one of the dive boats that make the trip regularly. They're staffed by incredibly capable people who know this area like the back of their hands.

For us, we are just amazed this all worked out so wonderfully. We made it! With the help of Derek and Deneb, we sailed to the Revilla's and dove with mantas, dolphins, turtles, and sharks! Hammerheads, silkies, white tips and silver tips. And lobsters, and crabs, and although we didn't swim with them, we saw, and heard many humbacks, including some mama's with their babies. We watched crisp, clear sunsets and saw a zillion stars. We still have our beloved Mantus anchor, despite efforts by the rocks to steal it away. And we still have fresh fruit! 2 oranges, an apple, a kiwi and 2 grapefruit, so no scurvy.

Now, back to civilization. Back to restaurants and streets and grocery stores. Back to noise and chaos. Back to laundromats! We'll see what the next adventure is, but it will be hard to top this.

(Oops, didn't make the 2000 word limit.)

Our tracker, and current weather:
https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/SV_FlyAweigh/

A week has passed since we left Cabo San Lucas. It feels like a month, or like time just changed into something completely different. Not because we don't have time to worry about - we're not living that iconic image of two retired people on a boat in the middle of nowhere with nothing to do but watch sunsets and sip umbrella drinks. We do have time on our minds, because we're on this research mission, with dive schedules and timing issues. So time is right there in our faces, and though we're busy, I could melt off into forever on this kind of time schedule. And anyhow, we don't have any tiny umbrellas.

Each day so far goes like this: Deneb calls the other dive boat(s) who are in the anchorage on any given day, which varies as they come and go, and coordinates who is diving when. The goal is to not overlap. The unspoken rule is the first boat in the anchorage gets first dibs on dive times. Once that's established, we figure out how the day looks as far as meals, dive prep, tank fills, water-making, and naps. Then, we load the dinghy with dive gear, pick up Deneb and Derek, dive, fill tanks and run engines to power the compressor, fix food, eat food, clean up after food, set up dive gear for the next dive, load the dinghy, pick up Deneb and Derek, dive ... and most days, do it all again a third time.

On the first dive Deneb sets up her GoPro camera on the shark cleaning station at 85'. She's careful and respectful, waiting until there's a gap in the flow of sharks circling the station. She slips in, attaches her camera which is anchored with dive weights, then backs off and observes for awhile, making notes on her underwater notepad, maybe counting sharks, assessing. Then we dive around, watch for mantas, hammerheads, dolphin, octopus, rays, sleeping sharks in the sand, and all the other colorful amazing critters that occupy this beautiful other-worldly place. Meanwhile, Derek is above in the dinghy, keeping track on the GPS of the drop site and also sometimes catching a glimpse of our bubbles. As we ascend at the end of the dive, Deneb releases the orange "safety sausage" around 30', it floats up to the surface where its' bright-orange-on-one side and yellow-on-the-other side obnoxiousness lets Derek know we're on our way up, with a 5-min safety stop at 15'.

We pop our heads up and start yapping excitedly about what we saw on the dive, removing gear and handing it up to Derek, floating happily around the dinghy until we haul ourselves in and head back to our boats. Derek has our friend Ricardo's gas-powered dive compressor on the bow of Amphitrite and gets busy filling Deneb's tank, while back on Fly Aweigh Allan spends the next hour and a half filling our two, which takes a bit longer because a) there are two, and b) our compressor is electric and is a bit lower in power. As I mentioned, we have to run an engine during this process because the solar power can't keep up with the demand. Sometimes we also make water, so between the compressor, the engine, and Little Debbie, our plucky water maker, it's a noisy interlude. We put our Bose headsets on and focus on our individual tasks, he in the cockpit being compressor-y and me below decks being the chief cook and bottle washer.

We usually have time for a quick 20-minute snooze in the salon before it's time to get the wet suits back down from the hangars in the cockpit and suit up again, off to get D & D for Dive #2. On this dive Deneb switches out the cameras. The whole process repeats on Dive #3 when she retrieves the second camera. I often skip Dives 2 & 3 or at least #3 and Derek goes down while I run top cover in the dinghy. I like my solitary time on the surface, watching their 3 turquoise shafts of bubbles rise to the surface and pop, assuring me that all 3 are still close together and breathing. The current is strong enough that it's a constant effort to return back to the dive site, and I often lose their bubbles, but the GPS gets me back or I have land references that get me close. I enjoy the view, sing at the top of my lungs, do some exercises, or just sit there feeling extraordinarily grateful.

A few times we've convened on Fly Aweigh for dinner, reviewing the video Deneb has gathered and looking at Allan's photos. The footage has been fantastic. And the food - we're all vegans, so we come up with some delicious and uber-healthy meals. Derek is a great cook and I appreciate someone else bringing their favorite vegan recipes into our lives. At this point, more than 10 days since our last organic produce provisioning from Martin, a supplier in La Paz, we're just about out of fresh greens and other delicate things, and down to carrots, celery, cabbage, a bit of kale, some green beans and of course potatoes. Derek gifted us with the last of a bag of salad greens and we just had that for lunch, the last "normal" salad for another 10 days.

Underwater, we were graced on one dive by a visit from two gorgeous mantas with 15' wingspans, which Deneb can spot from afar, coming out of the distant deep watery murkiness. They come first as soft shadows, then you see their huge wings moving gracefully as they approach, then some of the details of their unique markings become clear, then you see them fold their front cephalic fins together in a peaceful and polite Japanese bow sort-of way (it feels that way to me, a courtesy, a greeting, or something) and then fly right overhead. We hear they like the bubbles. They circle back a few times and we try not to squeal too much into our regulators, then slowly and silently they move off into shadow again. On another encounter yesterday at "El Boiler," a dive site around the corner, we had 3 mantas circle and circle around us, sometimes with their cephalic fins together, sometimes rolled up and pointing forward. Such amazing creatures.

We've seen hammerheads, many of them. They can be dangerous, and I'll admit to a bit of trepidation upon meeting them for the first time, and every time, but they've proven to be shy and uninterested in us. They come for the cleaning station services and aren't here to eat or be aggressive. They stay off in the distance, usually in groups of 3 or more, looking strange and weirdly graceful in their slow movements. On one dive we were in close range of at least 15.

We had a small family of dolphin say hello the other day! Swimming with dolphins - something I've wanted to do since the "Flipper" days on television in the mid-1960's. Man, my cup is full! The dolphin always have such a happy aura, so playful, and always seeming to smile. One large dolphin came up to us and hung vertically, just a few feet away, belly facing us, and swayed cutely left and right, or fore and aft, looking at us and seeming to almost laugh. Mesmerizing, sweet, and potentially dangerous, because as Deneb explained, they tend to keep sinking lower and lower in the water, and you can be so enthralled you don't realize you've gone down. Little mermaids, they are! They played with us for a bit and left. Later in the dive they returned for more hypnotizing fun, then off again, all 6 of them, in a close knot of happiness.

The island of San Benedicto is itself a wonder. Stark and moon-like, the last eruption from Volcano Bárcena, (which, by the way, is Volcano #341020) started August 1, 1952, lasted 10 months, and obliterated all flora and fauna. Since then, it has remained a stark landscape, white/gray/brown, with stunning formations cascading down from the cinder cone. The island is uninhabited, and the only people allowed to set foot on shore are researchers and park rangers. No roads, no footpaths, no telephone poles, no cell towers. We're going back millions of years, diving in a protected marine park with creatures that have lived here practically forever. Other than dive boats, which are permitted and tightly regulated so there's not an influx of them at once, we're alone. The VHF radio on Ch 16, the common hailing frequency for mariners, is mostly quiet - usually the only chatter is the brief discussions between boats to set the dive schedule. We're out of VHF range for almost any other boats unless they're coming or going to the island.

We went on a fun shore-side dinghy excursion the other day with Derek & Deneb in their dinghy, we in ours, tucking in and out of the stunning little coves formed by the lava flow in 1952-3. Around the corner there's an albatross rookery. When Deneb was working as a park ranger she went ashore to tag some of the birds - a challenging shore landing, and an even more challenging hike/climb over rough lava boulders. We didn't get a close-up view of the huge birds, but did see a few on the beach far off, too far to really see anything, but they were there! Amazing birds - if you don't know about the life cycle and lifestyle of the albatross, it's truly fascinating. Teaser facts: they can fly without flapping their wings for up to 620nm. That's from San Francisco to Seattle. Or New York to Chicago. Not a flap. And, they fly for years without setting foot on land.

It's all of this - sharks, mantas, dolphin, albatross - that makes me feel small and huge at the same time. And grateful to be on this awe-inspiring planet, appreciative of the lifeforms we share it with. And as long as I'm getting all grateful, I'll add that it's truly amazing to be in the company of Derek and Deneb. What an interesting and kind pair they are, and the work they're doing is so cool. They're capable and professional, and Deneb's connections and knowledge of things here in the Revillagigedos is impressive.

And here's a fun thing that happened the other day: as I've mentioned in an earlier blurb, the focus of Deneb's 2-year study here at the Revilla's is to learn more about the shark cleaning stations. Part of this is to see how human interaction affects the operation of these all-important places, which are in many ways little medical centers. The other day her camera caught a group of divers that descended down directly on TOP of the cleaning station in the middle of all the circling activity. Before they arrived, the camera recorded a very active station, with lots of sharks circling and being attended to. As soon as the divers barged in, the sharks dispersed. Gone. So, three things happen: the divers don't get to see what they came to see - sharks, activity, fish; the sharks don't get the attention they need, or it has to be delayed; and the cleaner fish miss a meal. It seems obvious - don't walk right into the middle of things uninvited! But apparently it's not. It seems best to be small, a bit far off, and not be all flappy and wild and intrusive, jamming huge cameras in the faces of critters that are just trying to make that 2pm doctors appointment.

Today we're on our way south to Isla Socorro for the next week. Socorro is a very different experience, according to Derek and Deneb. For one thing, there's a Mexican Navy presence there, a small base on the island. So we'll expect to be boarded and inspected, as they help enforce the rules laid down by CONANP, the governing body of the national parks. They check for the proper permits, gear and equipment, and confirm we aren't doing any illegal fishing. And probably some other stuff, I don't know yet but we'll know soon. For another, the terrain is different on Socorro, and the diving is different. If we're lucky, we might see some migrating north Pacific humpback whales. There are a few cleaning stations Deneb wants to study, so we'll continue to be under their guidance as far as where we go and which/how many dives we do. We are willing support, and couldn't be happier.

In this moment, as we sail south, we're trying to ignore the little gnat-like bugs that woke up in curious moods this morning and decided to explore our faces, hands, arms, legs - ugh, so annoying. We hope they have a short lifespan, like 3 hours, because they're too fast to swat. Meanwhile, I'm soaking a variety of beans for a soup I'll start in a few hours, and maybe make some quinoa-oat wraps. I ditched my fabulous sourdough starter, I just couldn't do it. It's like a marriage. It's like parenthood. It's like having a pet. It's a responsibility I couldn't manage right now, so, at least for now, no more hard-earned fragrant loaves of sourdough on Fly Aweigh.

More to come - and lots of photos in the Gallery!

Click here for:
Fly Aweigh Position

And click here for info on:
Albatross

And finally, from the Smithsonian, cool data on:
Volcanos

The other night we went to bed anchored in Bahia Los Frailes, one of only two boats in the anchorage, the full moon illuminating the high clouds in the east and making the long strip of beach glow white. A few hours later we were up and motoring toward Cabo San Lucas while 6 planets, with a 7th to join soon, lined up in that vast sky above. The celestial display was like a review of everything I learned about the planets and stars when I was a kid. Then, Cabo, the Big Party at the bottom of the Baja, a drastic contrast to the beauty and solitude of a remote anchorage or a night passage under full moon. The bars on the beach blast music - mostly bad, and the DJ from one particular bar rages on at full volume, spilling onto the beach, the restaurants on all sides, and into the anchorage, leading games, contests, goading everyone into a zipped up tequila-drinking frenzy. Worst of all, he sings "Happy birthday to you" and a lot of "Happy marriage to you" terribly off-key.

But it's okay. We're finally on the Grand Adventure, the Bucket List Box Checker that I've alluded to for the last few months. Because so many things conspired to thwart this endeavor, I was hesitant to speak too soon, plus, we're still learning about it. But here it is: we're on our way to the Revillagigedos Archipelago, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and national park 200 miles south of Cabo San Lucas, to do some serious and amazing diving. Comprising 4 volcanic islands - San Benedicto, Socorro, Roca Partida and Clarion, the archipelago is located at the confluence of the north and south equatorial currents, with something mixed in about the California current, making it a nutrient-rich place to hang out for migrating humpback and other whales, and a full-time home for hammerhead sharks, giant manta ray, tuna, tiger sharks, silky sharks, and oh so much more.

Spending time with these pelagic creatures is a goal we've had since 2010, when we pondered a quick stop after setting out on our Pacific crossing. At the time, it was upwind, would add at least 5 days to our already long passage ahead, and would consume more of our precious stores of food, water, and fuel. So, in concert with our crew, Greg and Tiffany, we made the decision to keep going toward French Polynesia. We can't say we regret it, because we know now that we were woefully underprepared for a diving stop in the Revillas, but since then it's been at the top of our long Bucket List. Finally, 15 years later, it's time.

I started investigating all I could about taking our boat to this special place, and here's what I've learned: the islands are a top destination for dive boats, bringing as many as 4000 divers per year from around the world to spend time in the pristine environment. The diving is challenging: strong currents, deep dive sites, rocky anchor-eating anchorages, and tough restrictions on diving make this a place you don't go alone. You don't go unprepared. You don't go without knowledge of exactly where to drop anchor, and other important things like, when the ash is spewing from the volcano on San Benedicto, don't be downwind! Most importantly, you need someone to run "top cover" (probably not a real diving term) in the dinghy while divers are in the water, since the divers may surface in a much different place than they went down due to the strong currents. Anchoring the dinghy and diving off is largely not possible in the deep water, and not allowed in most places, to protect the coral and not entangle the mantas. CONANP*, the national park system in Mexico, tightly regulates the visits, restricting the number of divers that can go in the water at a time, the required distance to maintain from critters, the tossing of garbage, food and other waste, and the soaps and cleaners that are washed into the sea from the boat. We're stocked with reef-safe sunscreen, dish soap, and shampoo, will not dump our holding tanks while at anchor (we never do that anyhow, eeewwww!) and will not be tossing food scraps out the window or, in the warning words of a fellow cruiser who spent many months in the Revillas, we'll have sharks circling our boat for days. In Frailes we scrubbed the slime and barnacles off the bottom of the boat, since we can't do that in the Revillas in order to avoid introducing invasive species.

All of this is why we're glad we didn't make that quick, unprepared diversion in 2010. And, also why we were in a bit of a quandary about our planned visit - it had become apparent that we needed a buddy boat for this adventure, and we had no idea how to find one. To begin with, the permit process to visit the park is daunting. There's a steep daily charge to be in the park - $100/day per person, and I heard that CONANP was doubling that this year. Luckily, as retirees, we're exempt, one of the few good things about growing old. Applying for the permit requires writing to CONANP (in Spanish) and supplying piles of documents to support the fact that you're on a sound, insured and legally owned boat, that you're divers who have advanced certifications or better and have dive insurance, that you have read and understood the 8,000,000 page document that lays out the rules, in Spanish, and lastly, for us, proof of our retirement status. So I did all that, with the help of others who had done it before, and after a few back-and-forth's with the park office we were awarded a month's visit in January with an official park stamp and everything. We paid our annual park fee and can now visit any of the national parks in Mexico. But still, finding another boat, with the permit, the time, and the soaps, how would we do that?

Well, leave it to my socially-inclined husband Allan, who fell into conversation one day in the boat yard in Ensenada with a newly-arrived couple, Derek and Deneb. Turns out, they were headed to the Revillas as well, in January, and moreover - best-ever - Daneb, a marine biologist, had been a park ranger on the islands for 4 years. (Giant exclamation marks!) She has recently formed a non-profit, the Centro Interdisciplinarion en Ciencias Aplicadas de Baja California Sur, commencing a 2-year study on shark cleaning stations, called, appropriately, "The Cleaning Stations Project." The'll live aboard their boat, s/v Amphitrite, and make multiple trips per year, basing out of La Paz, Baja California. Amphitrite is a beautiful boat, but currently not equipped with a dive compressor or a water maker. (This won't to stop Derek and Deneb, who are frugal with their water, and because of Deneb's connections in the islands and with the dive boats, tank fills are possible, although difficult.) But we have those things, and a great boat from which to stage. Deneb has intimate knowledge of the dive sites, the rules (she helped write them!) and the complex dance that makes up this whole adventure. You see where this is going? By the end of the conversation a mutually-supportive union had been formed, and we've been planning and fine-tuning ever since.

And trying to surmount the numerous inevitable events that conspired to thwart the endeavor. Things like the failure of the dive compressor a month ago, the multi-layered drama of getting a replacement compressor motor shipped to Mexico, Allan getting sick, Alison getting sick, Alison bruising a rib a few weeks ago, old dive gear finally giving up the ghost, and other things I've already conveniently forgotten. But the compressor got fixed in the 11th hour thanks to my smart husband and his creative and talented mechanical skills, and, icing on the already good cake, we were loaned a second compressor by my friend Ricardo. We got over the whatever illnesses beset us, bought new gear, tested it out, and my rib, although annoying, isn't going to stop me from diving with giant manta rays.

More about Deneb: raised in La Paz by marine biologist parents, she earned her master's degree in Marine Biology and in 2018 went to work for CONANP, helping to set up the newly-formed Revillagigedos National Park. She worked as a park ranger for 4 years, making months-long trips to the islands on Navy ships or dive boats, living ashore or on the boats, and was in charge of all marine monitoring. In that realm, she met her husband, Derek, a Canadian diver, sailor and ocean conservationist, and together, they have come to this point - the formation of the non-profit that would, under its umbrella, continue numerous projects in ocean conservation and education. They are both passionate about their work, and we, as kids who grew up watching The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau and harboring secret dreams to be marine biologists, are thrilled to assist, even if just for a short time.

After a 6am call each morning on the radio to coordinate the dive schedule with the dive boats in the area, Daneb will have a plan for our day. She'll dive down to around 95 feet to set up cameras on several of the known shark cleaning stations in the islands to record the behavior of the critters that come to visit. One of the hopes is to learn more about how the presence of divers affects the operation of the station. Do critters in need tend to stay away if divers are there? Do they leave and possibly miss out on critical care? The results of this study will inform CONANP and other scientists if further restrictions are necessary to protect the animals that come to the cleaning stations for this critical care. We'll join her on the dives, assist where we can, run top support when Derek wants to dive, fill dive tanks, fill water jugs, make vegetarian chili, and generally try to be very Jacques-Cousteau-esque, although Allan refuses to wear one of those tiny French bathing suits.

Let's talk about cleaning stations: these are not man-made places with drive-through service, but rather, locations in the ocean that the fish somehow establish - how they do it is a mystery. There are no signs and I'm not sure how they advertise, but apparently the word gets out. The cleaner fish - shrimp, gobi, wrasse, and angel fish to name just a few, are highly-trained and waiting for customers like sharks, mantas, mola-mola and many others to stop in for a nice de-bugging. The cleaner fish tend to the important business of cleaning wounds, removing parasites and bacteria from teeth, gums, skin. It's a win-win for all: although no money is exchanged, the big fish get a makeover, the little fish don't get eaten. It's a beautiful thing, an underwater miracle, and we get to learn more about it in one of the top dive spots on this amazing planet, with a marine biologist as our guide. You can learn more by checking out the link I put below, and/or by re-watching one of my favorite movies, Finding Nemo.

So, barring any other endeavor-thwarting events, we'll be in the water with giant mantas the size of living rooms in just a few days, keeping a sharp eye on the tiger sharks and hoping to spot a shy hammerhead in the distance. We plan to go through as many as 8 dive tanks per day, so we're grateful for the extra compressor, muchas gracias amigo Ricardo. We're stocked with food for a month, since the only thing in the islands is a small Navy base, and we're not allowed to go ashore anyhow. No groceries, fuel, trash cans or boat washes until we get to Barra de Navidad in mid-February. I'll be posting a few blurbs from the islands, since we'll have the Starlink in Priority Data mode (which means no Netflixing or Facebook scrolling, but email is good, phones work in Face Time or WhatsApp.)

In summary, we couldn't be more excited and proud to be part of the project. Speaking of which, it's a start-up, and looking for funding. I've put the link the website below, and if you're an ocean conservationist type looking for a fun place to donate a bit of extra cash, here it is.

More about giant mantas, lurking sharks, scrubby cleaner fish, rocky anchorages and trip-of-a-lifetime adventures in the weeks to come!

* CONANP - Comisión Nacional de Áreas Naturales Protegidas

Ps: I figured out how to make these links work, so click away!

Click here for Deneb's Website

Cleaning Stations:
https://ultimatedivetravel.com/cleaning-stations/

Our tracker, and current weather:
https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/SV_FlyAweigh/

Knockin' Around La Paz

We're here, in a lovely seaside town in the Sea of Cortez, with perfect weather, just doing things. Nothing Earthshatteringly important, nothing very interesting, just things - laundry, servicing the winches, cleaning spots off the deck, catching up on stuff you catch up on, hanging with friends, getting some exercise, eating too much. Back home, Earthshattering things are happening - friends are losing their homes in the fiercest fires we've ever witnessed in Southern California. Entire neighborhoods have been rendered to ash, barely anything left. You've all seen the footage. Some of you reading this lost your home. Almost everyone knows someone touched by these tragedies. It's hard to write my lighthearted blurb while my heart is simmering in deep shock and sadness, wishing I were home, helping friends sift through what's left, offering some morsel of comfort.

"We need your stories of adventures, Aliwhoosh. They'll uplift us during a tough time." said my friend Craig, who I've known since first grade, who just lost his longtime home in Alta Dena. I can't be home helping Craig & Kathi sift through the ashes of their lives, but I can keep writing and hope the distraction, even for just a few minutes, might help. So, lacking a more suitable segue, a recap of the last month, dedicated, with love, to Craig and Kathi:

Last time I sail-blurbed, we were in Bahia Los Frailes, sailing in the company of Louise and Andy and their pups on s/v Eos. Los Frailes provided a nice respite from a very lumpy 10+ hour passage from Cabo San Lucas, and we all rested and put things back on the shelves and relished the quiet, although it wasn't that quiet because the wind was blasting down the canyon, offshore, stretching our boats to the limit of their anchor chains. But we were safe and Louise made banana bread and we enjoyed the break. We did get ashore the next day for a walk, giving the rambunctious dogs more space to jump and chase and swim, and giving the humans a bit of a walk. I mentioned in a recent blog that Louise and I had "princess feet." Walking barefoot on a rocky beach used to be fun, but this time, not so much! When I was a kid, our family invested in some land in the Fiji Islands. Our first year there I was 14. We were pretty tough kids, we ran around barefoot all the time, but the Fijians! They had these marvelous feet - wide, tough as leather, strong. They never wore shoes, and they walked miles and miles down the rocky roads to get to the next village, to buy food, to go fishing. "Fiji feet" we called them forever more - those feet that can go adventuring without complaint. Living in polite society, getting a pedicure every month and wearing shoes all the time has done nothing for my Fiji Feet!

Allan and I dug all the scuba stuff out for one more test of the gear and had a satisfying dive to about 30 feet over the sandy bottom. It was too rough to dinghy around the corner to Cabo Pulmo and dive on the protected coral reef, so we settled for sand and rocks, a few colorful fish, and the knowledge that the gear was in good shape.

After two days we left Frailes in the dark of night, hoping to dodge the worst of the wind and waves coming down from the north. The forecast for the next week was just grim enough for a northbound passage that we decided to grab this chance rather than stay in Frailes for another week. Not that that would have been bad! But we all had eyes on getting to La Paz for various, not-very-important reasons. The passage was fine, we motored along in mostly good conditions and dropped anchor in one of my favorite places along this part of the coast, Bahia de los Muertos, or Ensenada Muertos.

We were here almost 3 years prior with a few other boats after a particularly energetic crossing from Isla Isabela, and the restaurant on the beach was where we all gathered after naps, to tell our particular sea tales over cold margaritas. I have good memories of that bonding time, and looked forward to a few more meals in this sweet beachside restaurant, called 1535.

We spent another 2 days in Muertos, enjoying food in 1535 while the sweet, floppy-bodied teenage kitties charmed us (I love a good, relaxed, floppy-bodied kitty - trusting, calm, easy.) We were entertained by a wing foil clinic that comes down from La Ventana to train people in the calmer, flatter bay. For hours in the afternoon, every day, the colorful wingers would circle our boat, tacking, jibing, falling, shakily getting the hang of the sport while the attentive instructor jet ski'd nearby to assist (and, protect our boat!)

So Muertos did not disappoint, but it was time to move on to the Big City, a short day trip around the corner, gliding between Isla Cerralvo, which is now Isla Jaques Cousteau, and the peninsula. We arrived in the afternoon and were able to get right into the slip we had reserved in Marina de la Paz, grateful they had a space for us after months of being told every marina was full.

We've been settled ever since, wedged between a huge luxury fishing boat and a massive luxury motor yacht. The latter, although it blocks our entire view of the beautiful bay, provides welcome shelter from the daily winds and choppy seas, so we're happy. She's a beautiful boat, anyhow, and we have a good sliver of view off our stern to the eastern hills and the sunrise.

We've spent our time, as I mentioned, doing mundane regular things, peppered with a wonderful Christmas meal with old and new friends here in La Paz, a quiet Zulu New Year celebrated at 5pm with a bunch of cruisers at Club Cruceros, and our 4-day sojourn to La Ventana. La Paz has matured even since our last visit 3 years ago, with great eateries and bike lanes (with lights!) and excellent shopping, even an organic produce guy who comes a few times a week to the local market. We've really enjoyed our time in this town.

What we haven't told you yet is that after Allan decided to put kite boarding on hold in La Ventana, we took a wing foiling lesson together, and loved it. Of course, we only had a few hours on the beach, with just the kite, and have yet to move to the next step of getting on the water with the scary foil board or whatever they call it - a small, lightweight board with a "mast" that sticks down into the water and some fins that jut out at the bottom, the thing the board rides up on when you get good enough to foil. We've been warned that the learning curve is steep, so we'll sign up for that 3-day clinic that sailed around our boats in Muertos, maybe in the spring when we pass back through. In the meantime, we bought a pretty lime-green used wing in La Ventana so we can practice our wing handling skills on the beach. Of course, there's some logic missing there, and we know it, because if it's windy enough to fly the wing on the beach, it's too windy to land the dinghy, so there's that ... catch 22's everywhere you turn, but we'll figure it out. We're determined to try, because this sport was made for us: first of all, there's a "wing." And when you're on the board moving slowly at the beginning, you're "taxiing." When the board starts to lift out of the water, you "take off." And, when you slow back down and settle, guess what? You "land"! See? As two pilots, we have to. And, despite other dangers and discomforts, there's no body dragging in this sport.

And finally, the Big Bucket List Adventure is nigh! We leave on Sunday morning, sailing with actual wind in our favor instead of against it, back to Ensenada Muertos, where we'll stay for a few days, pet the kitties, eat some good food, and jump in the water with our friends John and Lisa who offered to drive over from La Ventana and help us clean the bottom of the boat. Then we'll move on to Los Frailes for a night, and then back to Cabo San Lucas, where we'll get the final diesel top-off, gas top-off, and produce top-off before heading south with our friends on s/v Amphitrite. Where are we going? Stay tuned!

And don't forget:
Track us on PredictWind: https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/SV_FlyAweigh/

New photos in the Photo Gallery - Just click on "Gallery" on the webpage!