12/27/2010 – La Cruz de Huanacaxtle, Mexico

Greetings from La Cruz. We finished getting the bottom painted in Mazatlan, did a quick provisioning then motor sailed down to La Cruz. If you recall, la Cruz is where we got “stuck” for about four months last year waiting on our new mainsail (nice place to be stuck though), and was as far south as we made it. We definitely have plans to get further but more on that towards the bottom of this entry. Here are a few of the things we’ve been doing in Mazatlan and La Cruz:

Part of the bottom job was fixing “blisters” in the paint. Blisters are points where the water gets into the paint and causes swelling of the paint. Bad ones can get into the fiberglass and might cause damage or delamination, also unless fixed the water seeping out can cause the new paint to not adhere well. When Sunny was first pulled, Bob the owner of Total yacht works didn’t think there were too many blisters but when they started sanding, many small ones kept popping out! They had to grind out each of these until they hit dry material. By the time they were done, Sunny looked like she had measles!

After 10 days of grinding, filling and painting, sunny’s bottom looked great. We even had the hull polished so she shines, at least from the toe rail down. We were very happy with the quality and speed that Total Yacht Works did the bottom and definitely would recommend them.

The topsides are another matter and this made it obvious to us we have to put in a little elbow grease polishing and waxing the rest of the boat, no rest :-)

We had bought 2 new 130 watt solar panels in La Paz and while we were in the yard, had stainless steel rails welded to the stern to mount the new panels on. Hopefully we will be a little less reliant on running our engine or generator when hanging out in anchorages without power.
It wasn’t all work and no play; one day we went to the Pacifico brewery tour with a bunch of other cruisers from the marina. It was a fun tour though the places within the brewery we could go were pretty limited and we couldn’t take any pictures. At the end of the tour we went up to the top of the brewery where there was a museum, a great view, and all the free Pacifico beer we wanted :-) Unfortunately the weather has been foggy so the views were not as good as they could be but it was still very nice:

Here’s Dan telling about the one that got away :-)

We also took a dingy ride up the estuary to annoy the iguanas:

We then did a quick provision and headed south to La Cruz. It was a quick two day, one overnight passage with a quick stop in Matenchen bay about half way down. We got into La Cruz a couple of days before Christmas and have just been catching up on a few friends we haven’t seen for a while. Had a fun Christmas eve party with couples we knew up in the Sea of Cortez. On Christmas we went to Philo’s; a local pub run by a musician. There was a big buffet dinner, lots of good music, and at the end of the dinner, gift bags were given out to over 500 local kids!

Check out Leon on the washboard, and the little kid playing the guitar in the back:

Santa handing out presents, some of the kids were pretty suspicious of the big guy in the red outfit:

That’s about all for now. We have friends from Tom’s old work visiting next week, then we’ll take a quick trip back to the states to visit family. By the end of January we hope to be moving further south. Long term we're hoping to be in El Salvador around mid March!

Cheers,
Carolynn & Tom

12/9/2010 - Mazatlan, Mexico

Greetings from Mazatlan. When I last updated our blog we were still in La Paz and it was just after Thanksgiving. A couple of days later Tom passed both the technician and the general ham radio tests, so now he too is officially a “hamster” (I took the same tests last year). For those interested, his new ham sign is KJ4ZLI, or phonetically “Kilo Juliet Four Zulu Lima India”. It doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue so he’ll practice a bit before getting on the radio, in the mean time we’ll continue to use mine (KI6RJU). Right after the ham tests we took off for a short jump out to the islands just outside of La Paz. We wanted to cross the Sea of Cortez from Muertos, like we’ve done before, so we figured we would get a head start. The forecast was calling for light north-west winds all night so we pulled into San Gabriel, which should be well protected. Unfortunately just as the sun was going down, the winds shifted to the south-west and started building, and building! By 2am the gusts were probably 25 knots (about 30 mph) and a large swell was rolling into the anchorage. We kept checking our position throughout the night but our anchor seemed to be holding. At 5am though a set of big rollers came through and our anchor must have popped out, because next thing we know; bang! crunch! lurch! We were hitting the bottom!!! Hard!!! We made record time getting the anchor up and powering out of there, with 6 foot swells, the boat flying up and down, and the keel crunching at the bottom of each swell. By the time we finally made it out we were both shaking and exhausted! We proceeded to Muertos, very shaken and subdued; we could have seriously hurt Sunny! All systems seemed to be ok, but we would know for sure when we got to Mazatlan and had the boat hauled.

We spent four nights in Muertos sitting out a strong north wind. The anchorage was well protected, which we were very thankful for after our near catastrophe! After the wind started dying down, we took off for Mazatlan. We had a fantastic crossing! Though the forecast was for no wind, we had a perfect 12 – 15 knots on our quarter. Sailed and/or fast motor sailed the whole way across :-) No issues and we made the crossing in about 27 hours (good time for this crossing).

We spent a few days in the marina then hauled the boat to get the bottom paint redone. It was pretty scary for us but everything went without a hitch.

First we have to back into a concrete channel then the travel lift drives down and raises big slings around the belly of the boat and slowly lifts her:

Once full raised, the lift backs out. The bottom will be washed to get most of the marine critters off:

At this point we thoroughly inspected for damage caused by our “touching bottom” in San Gabriel a week ago. Luckily, there were only superficial scratches. These will be cleaned up when the bottom is repainted.

I’m amazed at how little damage we have since it sure felt like we were slamming into the ground pretty hard. We’re so glad we have a tough boat.

The lift then drives the boat over to our “dry slip” where they put a few jack stands around the hull:

The lift then backs away. The flimsy jack stands do not seem enough to support our 50,000 pound boat! I will be moving very carefully around the boat while she’s propped up (the yard manager laughs at me and says that there’s no way I can tip her over but subconsciously I don’t buy it).

While we’re in the yard the only way on or off the boat is a flimsy ladder, hopefully we’ll not be here too long!

The weather here has been great, cool nights and warm days. Well that’s all for now, after the bottom paint is done, we’ll head back down to La Cruz for January.

Cheers,
Carolynn & Tom

11/26/2010 - La Paz, Mexico

Just a quick post to update everyone. We’ve been back in La Paz for the last few weeks catching up with our boat maintenance. When we got to La Paz we had a huge list of things to do on the boat. The entire summer we did almost no maintenance, major cleaning or boat projects; it was way too hot!! We've been working hard now though and have almost everything off the list. We've changed all the fluids and filters, replaced the transmission cooler, inspected all the critical systems, re-caulked a major portion of the teak decking, re-varnished the cap rails, made cockpit cushion covers, made dingy wheel covers, made a compressor box and did a thorough cleaning inside and out! Whew, I'm getting tired just reciting the list :-) Tom is also studying for his ham license test so any down time he's on the computer. We’ll be leaving La Paz, probably tomorrow, then we go over to Mazatlan and get the bottom of the boat painted, she'll be like a new boat!

Yesterday there was a big Thanksgiving feast here sponsored by the local cruisers club. They supplied all the roast turkey and gravy while everyone brings a side dish, it was wonderful. (Ahhh... traditional Gringo food)

A few weeks ago La Paz made the Guinness world record for the world’s largest burrito, 2.5 kilometers long! They started setting up at midnight and when we got there late morning they were working on extruding out the tortilla using an elaborate oven pulled in a trailer, then a team inspected the tortilla and laid waxed paper over it:

It stretched down the street for as far as we could see:

Later that afternoon teams from the local restaurants were cooking the filling:

By that evening they still hadn’t started the rolling of the burrito so we gave up and went back to the boat. We heard that they finished sometime in the wee hours of the night and by morning the street was being cleaned up. They supposedly gave out free meals, but with it taking 24 hours to make, I bet they didn't have too many takers.

One of the local pelicans here has a bad leg and almost every evening a fisherman sits on the quay, catching small fish and hand feeding his “pet pelican”.

One afternoon we took the small shuttle boat across the bay to a local golf course and spent a few hours on the driving range. It's been more than a year since we've seriously swung a club and our shots showed it, but the scenery was worth it:

That’s about all we’ve been doing, we’ll be in Mazatlan for December then back to La Cruz in Banderas bay for January.

Cheers,
Carolynn & Tom

10/15/2010 Underway to San Juanico

All is well, we're almost sailing :-) At least the sails provide good shade and a little help with propulsion. We left Santa Rosalia a few days ago and have had a pleasant and calm trip south. Another two weeks and we'll be in La Paz where we'll stay through Thanksgiving.
Cheers,
Carolynn & Tom

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10-10-2010 Santa Rosalia

We got back to Santa Rosalia about a week ago, ah, that first “real” shower felt so good! The general consensus from the weather gurus is that the sea water has cooled enough that any more hurricanes this far north are unlikely :-) This has been one of the mildest hurricane seasons in the eastern pacific in history (we’re very happy with that). We have a slip reserved in La Paz for November 1st so after a few days of clean-up and a few projects, we’ll proceed south down the Sea.

Here are a few of the things that occupied us for the last month up in Bahia de los Angeles (BLA):
We went on a big hike at the popular anchorage of La Gringa. This is also a popular RV and camping beach in the winter. This time of the year there were only a few hardy campers.

We went to a party and pot luck at the home/trailer of a cruiser couple that have settled in BLA. There were tons of great food and a very competitive game of darts. I tried my hand but went out the first round, Tom just sat and watched. A great time was had by all.

Another day, a Cruiser Living on Dirt (CLOD) brought his pick-up truck and trailer and gave all of us a ride around town to fetch diesel, water, provisions, whatever we needed. We called it the “cruiser hayride” and it was great fun. There were probably 25 cruisers and over 50 jugs for diesel and water all crammed into the bed of the truck and trailer (no seatbelt laws in Mexico). As we drove down the road, the locals would stop and stare in amazement at all of the gringos crammed into the trailer, we were laughing so hard trying to imagine what they were thinking. Here is the stop to fill the diesel jugs:

There is an excellent small museum in town that we spent over an hour in, It has many displays and artifacts from the early Indians, the days that BLA was a large mining area, as well as many displays of local and marine animals including a gigantic whale skeleton.


Here we are sailing our dingy around the anchorage. I think this is the most sailing we’ve done in months :-)

I was chased by a seal for a while but he lost interest when I didn’t give him a fish.

One last full moon party, floating into, then out of the La Mona estuary:

Some of the “floties” were pretty fancy:

Tom’s was simple:
Buster the dog was in the middle of the excitement:
One of the boats brought a very old, expired life raft that the kids deployed on the beach then had a ball playing in it:


A few days after the last party we decided to bid adieu to BLA. It was a nice area with many cozy little anchorages but we’ll be glad to get south where the land isn’t so harsh and rocky.
On the way south there were many pods of leaping dolphins:

The nights are getting cooler and it’s good to be moving south again.
Cheers,
Carolynn & Tom

9-22-2010 Bahia de los Angeles

We're still "roughing it" down in Bahia de los Angeles (BLA). We were planning on heading back to Santa Rosalia a week or so ago but didn't quite get around to it for a variety of reasons; mainly a corollary to Newton's law about an object "at rest staying at rest" but also because statistically we're still in the middle of hurricane season. We got reminded about that with tropical storm Georgette currently barreling up the Sea, but it looks like she'll miss us (fingers crossed). Several of our friends a bit to the south of us got smacked pretty hard but came out drenched but fine. The eye went right over the top of them but luckily the winds weren't too bad.

We haven't really been doing much, lots of reading and just lazing around the boat. We'll be very happy though when we finally feel it's safe enough to move out of here back to "civilization". It's been almost two months since we've had a real shower or have been able to wash clothes in a real machine. Even though we have a watermaker, we're in water conservation mode since we have to run the motor to make water and refilling our diesel fuel is a lot of hard work, the nearest gas station is a two mile walk hauling jerry jugs (after a mile dingy ride).

Enough complaining :-) All is well here and depending on the weather, we should be in Santa Rosalia in a couple of weeks. In the mean time we have another full moon party tomorrow so all of the cruisers in the area are gathering around. I'll take pictures which I'll be able to post sometime in the future.

Cheers,
Carolynn & Tom

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8/28/2010: Bahia de los Angeles

8/28/2010: Bahia de los Angeles

Note: I am initially updating this blog entry via the radio so I can't put the pictures in I want. There is an internet cafe in town but the connection is very slow and the building is very hot inside, I'll put the pictures in later (I have marked their location with parenthesis).

Update: Pictures added

We've been up in Bahia de los Angeles (BLA) for the last few weeks, and will probably be here for awhile. BLA is a large bay with many scattered islands and anchorages and is a popular area in the winter for camping. There is only one smallish village though and few provisions. From what we have been told it's pretty busy in the late fall to spring, but only the crazy yachtistas are here in the summer. It's very hot and muggy, I can't wait 'till fall when it starts to cool down and it's safe to go south.

The trip up from Santa Rosalia was pretty uneventful, though when we first left we couldn't get the boat speed up to normal; Tom was worried that we were losing our transmission! We debated going back but Santa Rosalia doesn't really have any repair facilities. It was a long overnight passage to San Fransisquito! It was good to see the sun come up, even though it would bring the heat with it. Sunsets and sunrises seem more spectacular out in the water:

Once we got safely anchored and had a good rest in San Fransisquito, we dove over the side. The problem with our speed was obvious, the bottom of the boat looked like a big shag carpet from the 70's and the prop was just a fuzzy round ball. It's a wonder that we could move through the water at all. A few hours of scrapping made our bottom look more like a boat's than a psychedelic flashback :-) We had just had our bottom cleaned three weeks ago in Santa Rosalia so in this warm water, the growth is incredible (like weeds growing in a spring garden). San Fransisquito was a nice anchorage but typical Baja dry:

We moved on to Las Animas bay, where unfortunately we got inundated with bees! There were dozens buzzing around the boat trying to get in. I was very glad I had sewn bug screens for the hatches and dodger so that kept most bees outside but we couldn't go out without feeling like we were under assault, we didn't stay too long in Las Animas.

On the way there we came across a huge pod of dolphins feeding, there were hundreds! They weren't interested in playing though so we sadly said good bye:

Our next stop was Ensenada el Quemado (burned bay). This was a very nice, secure and shallow bay, no bees and we ended up spending a week there just hanging out, continuing cleaning the bottom and exploring the bay. We had a few days of clouds which wasn't good for the solar power generation, but kept the temperature a little lower.

The clouds made for beautiful sunsets:


We started to run a little low on a few provisions so we motored around the corner to the village at Bahia de los Angeles. The few small stores are well stocked with staples, but nothing fancy. The exciting thing about the village anchorage was that there were whale sharks feeding in it! At one point I counted five in the anchorage and occasionally they would swim right by the boat: This one was only about 14 feet long :-)


It was then time for the full moon party! 27 boats descended on a small lagoon called La Gringa, in the north part of BLA where everyone floats into the lagoon on the rising tide then floats out when the tide reverses, do we know how to party or what?! While it sounds corny, it was a lot of fun and some of the floats were pretty impressive:

That's about it for now, just hanging out in BLA, listening to the weather and hoping no hurricane makes it up here.
Cheers,
Carolynn & Tom

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