Birds and More

One of the great things about being someplace new is that you get to see new birds and animals.  Mazatlan means "Land of Deer" but so far all the deer we have seen are in a pen at our sister hotel's golf course.  I don't think there are any deer around the city anymore, but there is plenty of wildlife.  Yesterday we took a trip in our dinghy through a series of estuarial canals that wander off from the marina.  We brought cameras and got to see some great stuff.

This goat lives on Isla De Los Chivos (Goat Island) and they are wild but seem to be pretty tame.  I am sure I could get them to eat out of my hand.  If our windlass was working, I would leave the marina and anchor off this island and visit the goats every day.

A blue heron of some sort - the light was not great and does not do him justice. 

These are oyster catchers.  Again, the light was not so good.  They have brillant orange beaks and legs that contrast with their beautiful  black and white feathers.

Here is a better one of the oyster catcher.  They usually seem to be in small groups - this one had friends but they did not make it into the shot. 

This is a puffer fish.  I took it from the ramp leading down to the dock where the boat is.  They are very poisonous if you try to eat one and it is not prepared properly.  It is a delicacy in Japan, where the chefs need a special certificate to prepare them. Even then, people die each year from eating them.  I am not planning to try it, even if I end up in Japan some day. Too risky!

There are iguanas all over the place. This one is pissed because he thinks we might come to close.  (I guess he saw "Night of the Iguana" and decided not to take any chances.)

Here he is again.  They sort of change color depending on where they are.  I saw one on the lawn of the hotel here and he was as green as the grass.  I didn't have my camera that time.

These are mullets jumping out of the water.  Mike says they are not particularly good to eat, so we watched them rather than trying to catch them. This was taken in the estuarial canal.

Here are the mullet closer to the surface.  One of them jumped so close to the dinghy that it almost hit my arm.  I didn't see it first and it startled me so much I almost fell out of the dinghy. 

So - this is another reason why I am having so much fun.  We have some pictures that were taken with Mike's camera, which are much better.  We also have some of dolphins that we took on the way down here, and I will post those as soon as I can figure out how to deal with his camera.

I also discovered this hotel has an incredibly wonderful swimming pool.  Actually, there are two.  The one nearest the docks is shallow and warm.  The water aerobics and the volleyball games are held there.  Then, across the way, is the really fancy one.  It is actually a series of pools that are all different sizes and temperatures, ranging from a really hot hottub to a fairly cold deep one.  They are all connected by fake rocks that make it look like a series of tide pools.  There are waterfalls you can swim through that connect two of the deeper pools through a series of grotto-like fake rock formations.  Plus - there are two water slides.  I was (of course) the only grown up going down them.  It was all I could do not to call to Mike "Hey, watch me do this!"  I liked going from hot water to cold water and back again.  I can hardly wait to go swimming again.  I also want to try the water aerobics, since I need all the exercise I can get.  I think it might be a great addition to the yoga I go to twice a week, and being in the water I would not get all hot and sweaty, which I hate.  I will report as soon as I try it.

We are getting ready for our trip to the US (the cruisers refer to it as going over to the Dark Side) and I am looking forward to seeing all my family and hopefully some friends as well.  We will be in Wisconsin and Missouri and San Diego.  I hope to see as many people as I can.  While I really do not miss the US, I do miss my family and friends.  In an ideal world, you would all be down here with me.  
 

Bilge Woes

The bilge pump stopped working again.  Luckily, for no reason whatsoever, Mike decided to let it fill with water and see how things were.  The automatic pump did not kick in.  He tested the manual electric pump which uses the same motor and sucker thing (I have no idea what the thing that actually sucks the water up is called) as the automatic - both working fine. So it wasn't the motor or the sucker thing. He checked the electrical connections - working fine.  I hate it when he messes with the electrical system - only because I am sort of afraid of electricity.  (One time when I was a kid I took a bulb out of a lamp, turned the lamp on, and then stuck my finger where the bulb would go to see what it felt like.  It felt very bad.)  All of this took a couple of hours.  Then he dug the automatic switch out of the bilge and low and behold it did not work.  And miracle of miracles - thank you Nuestra Senora Del Carmen - there was a spare switch in our spare parts locker.  Mike changed the switch and it worked just fine - for a few minutes.  Then neither the automatic or the manual was working well - both were erratic.  So Mike then checked the electrical connections again, and discovered the connections were corroded, and the movement when he was fixing the switch caused them to work only off and on.  So he got out his soldering stuff and wire strippers and before long there were nice tidy new connections that worked perfectly.  I do not think there is anything Mike can't fix if he has the proper tools.  We were really glad to discover this while at the dock and not while underway.

Today we are just laying around doing nothing and it feels good.  Really good.  We don't have to be on the go every single day.  I had a yoga class this morning, which felt really good.  We have it outside on the grass.  Mike came walking by on his way back from the showers, and hollered at my to get straighter or some such nonsense.  We all laughed and I called him a Zen Whacker when I got back.  I was expecting him to do something like that and I knew he'd have to walk past the class coming back from the shower.  (Even though we have a shower on board, we use the marina showers a lot because they are bigger and have unlimited hot water.  Our hot water tank is small.)

In spite of my blood sugar issues, I have discovered I can have some fruit if I balance it properly by avoiding other sugars or carbs.  I gave up the milk in my coffee, added protein, and have been careful about alcohol consumption and it seems to be paying off.  My sugar level readings are getting better and I have lost weight.  Being more active can't be hurting either.  Of course, when I look at pictures of myself I still look too heavy, but I can wear things I wasn't able to get into when we left San Diego.  So there is proof positive this is a good way of life for me.  I really missed the fruit, and don't actually miss the milk in the coffee. 

Another good thing is how well my Spanish is progressing.  I get a lot of nice comments from the people here, and everyone is eager to help me when I get stuck.  Sometimes though, especially when under pressure, I can't think of a single word and just stand there with my mouth open.  But if I take a breath and start slow, it will come back.  I still have trouble with my tenses, and pretty much have to stay in the present tense.  So I say stuff like "En el pasado voy a lo tienda" which means "In the past I go to the store" instead of "I went to the store."  But everyone understands me and all are patient about it.  I have a new respect for people who come to the US and have to learn English!

Tomorrow we plan to take a little trip to Stone Island (Isla de Piedra). We can't take the dinghy because there is too much open ocean to go through because it is in the main harbor, which is a few miles south of where the boat is in the marina.  So we take the bus to the southern end of town and then get on a little ferry that takes us over there.  It has a nice beach, a couple palapa restaurants, and some hiking trails.  We will take some pictures with my camera, so I can download them and post them here.  The view is supposed to be really good.

So that is what is happening with us here in Mexico.  After we get back from the US, we plan to head a little further south before turning back north for the Sea of Cortez this summer.  Anyone who wants to visit is more than welcome!
       

A Wonderful Birthday . . .

is what I had yesterday.  I spent the day at the spa, and feel terrific. Facial, mani & pedi, massage - what could be better?  And Mike made it the best day ever just by being himself.  I don't think I am always properly appreciative.  And since he doesn't read this, I am not just currying favor.  It is really true.

I am still enjoying myself here, but we are also making plans where to go next after we get back from the states.  There is a town south of here - I can't remember how far - called San Blas that we have heard good things about and would like to visit.  Additionally, there is an island called Isla Isabella that is a nature preserve, but you can go on it and can anchor off it as well.  It has been called the Galapagos of Mexico  because of some of the unique species of birds that live there.  The island is just under 100 miles from here, and San Blas is a bit beyond that.  We miss being at sea as well.  I have gotten so spoiled that I want it all!

It is still strange to know the only thing that really controls what I do and where I go is the weather.  We have to go north by June to get away from the hurricane belt (June through Sept I think -it is an insurance rule) and plan to be in the Sea of Cortez for the summer.  It will be a great place to teach my nephew Walt how to sail, and for Walt and I to get our scuba certification so Mike can have diving partners and so we can take turns cleaning the bottom of the boat and rescuing the anchor if it gets stuck.  Plus - diving is just plain really, really fun.  I know I flunked my last class, but I did pass everything except the open water part.  I blame it on cold water and the fact that we had to walk 250 yards with all our stuff on and then swim through the surf another 250 yards before we even began our dives.  I did the first dive, but after that I was so beat I really didn't think it was safe to go again.  If we get the training here, the open water dives will be off a dive boat in nice warm clear water.  Plus I was too fat then and not in good shape.  I have lost weight and am a lot stronger now. 

This pirate thing makes me so mad - I hate the fact that sometimes thugs get to dictate where one can go.  I know that sounds naive, but it has always bothered me, even bad neighborhoods in US cities.  My son's father and I would sometimes purposely go to so-called bad areas just to prove we could do it.  We were usually mildly disappointed to see they were never that bad, just run down.  Like Watts in LA, or some of those places.  I guess I can't be so cavalier in other parts of the world.  So no east African cruising for us right now, that's for sure.  I feel so bad for those poor people who got killed. 

We are hoping to get our anchor windlass back soon, and also plan to add a large capacity watermaker to the boat, which would make it easier in so many ways - which includes regular fresh water showers while underway.  We have seen a model which would work off the generator we already have and would make 20 gallons of water per hour.  That would be using less than a gallon of gas for the generator.  Not bad.

Well, this is not the most exciting post I have ever written, but it will have to do.  I hope everyone has a great day!

The Need to Accept the Things I Cannot Change

Well, tomorrow is my birthday and I will be 55.  Like my friend Tom Kelly said, I will now be a speed limit. 

We are doing fine here and planning a trip back to the US to see family and friends and handle taxes.  This year will be more complicated than in the past, but I am hoping for the best and am well prepared should the worst happen.  This does NOT mean I won't break down and cry in the preparer's office if it goes south, but I have whatever I am going to need should that happen.  How is that for discusing taxes without naming any dollar amounts?  My father taught me it was rude to discuss money, and to this day it is easier for me to discuss sex than money.

I met a man yesterday in the swimming pool and while standing in nice warm water up to our necks we compared blood sugar levels.  I guess I am getting old.  

A couple days ago we took a walk up to Crespin Lighthouse - "faro" in Spanish - and it was an incredible view.  Mike took the pictures with his camera so I don't have them yet -but I will post them when I get them.  It was a fairly long walk all uphill with steps, and I did a very good job even though it was hot out and at high noon to boot.  Then we walked all the way back through town - I don't know how many miles, but the walk went from one end of town to the other.  Crocs are very comfortable walking shoes, by the way.  The next day we took our dinghy and rode out to these two islands.  One of them is Bird Island and you can't go on it because of nesting  birds.  Unfortunately, we did not know this until we landed the boat and THEN saw the sign saying "Do Not Disembark."  We left quickly, of course.  From the water, we could see literally thousands of pelicans sitting in trees.  I had no idea pelicans did that.  It was really amazing - pelicans, frigate birds gliding overhead, cormorants, and seabirds that even Mike did not know what they were.  We really need a bird book.  The other island is Deer Island and we could get out there.  It had a  beautiful beach.  Yesterday we spent the day going to the store (I love grocery shopping here) and mailing stuff off.  The mail my sister sent via Fed Ex arrived in only two days!  The staff at the harbormaster's office even brought it right to the boat for us. 

I haven't written in a couple days because sometimes there isn't always something interesting to say.  I still have really mixed feelings about the TV.  It is fun to watch movies and some shows, but we do get the news, which is almost always these days a total downer.  I know there are a lot of problems here in Mexico, but the atmosphere is that of hope and optimism.  Everyone works hard and wants their kids to be educated.  Teachers are respected here, not treated like parasites.  People are actually kind to each other.  I see less beggers here than I did in San Diego.  They advertise their social services and encourage people to apply if they are in need.  I am not ignoring the drug crime issue, but they aren't using it as an excuse to limit the rights of everyday people and to call each other names and be mean and hateful to those with differing opinions and faiths. 

I read today that the four people taken by Somali pirates are now dead.  A sobering note, for sure.  I guess I will have to pass on that part of the world - or stay with a flotilla.  Apparently this boat was with a group and then split off on their own.  Safety in numbers?  I have no idea what happened - how the boat was boarded or what happened to the people or anything else.  Why does everything have to be so horrible these days?  It seems like everything is falling apart.

But I can't spend all my time feeling bad about things I can't fix - got to keep that serenity prayer in mind, and just do what I can and stand up for what I believe needs my support.  At this point, I think it is all I can do. 

Socked In

 It is completely socked in with fog this morning.  I figured that when I was awakened by drops of water on my face.  My side of the bed is directly under a hatch, which is both good and bad, this morning being a demonstration of the bad.   So I am up early. 

Right now we are eagerly awaiting the arrival of about three months worth of mail my sister Buffy graciously forwarded to me.  She is allowing us to use her address while we figure out how to handle the mail issue.  And it is an issue. When we lived on the boat in San Diego, we had a PO box and could also use the marina address.  We arranged to take care of financial obligations electronically.  However, it seems one cannot get away completely with the need for a physical address.  That is where Buffy stepped in.  We recently discovered that for a fee (affordable, thank goodness) there is a firm that will recieve your mail, scan it, email it to you, and then you can determine what if anything needs to be sent on. As soon as we have all our tax stuff, we plan to enroll and take the burden off my kind sister.  That means we will have an address in Florida.  My "address" will now be in a state in which I have never actually stepped foot.

Here are some pictures I took while we were walking around the city the other day.

      And here we are tucked away nicely in the marina.

And we DID go out and get the TV. Mike mounted and hooked it up yesterday.  Now we can watch CNN and see all the awful we crap had been lucky enough NOT to see previously.  I do have mixed feelings about this.  However, the up side was watching movies on Showtime and HBO, both of which are provided with the free cable here at the marina.  A word about Mexican television.  I do not understand most of the Spanish on TV because they talk too fast, but from what I have seen, it is a combination of telenovelas (soap operas) and Benny Hill-type variety shows, involving fat old men dressed in silly clothes and acting manic, combined with beautiful young girls in tight clothing.  There is one show that appears to be like Montel Williams with a blond woman as the host.  She is sort of scary - in part because she looks like she might have started out life as a man.  (Not that there is anything wrong with that!)

I think I mentioned previously that our anchor windlass (the mechanism that pulls up the anchor electronically) broke while we were in Cabo San Lucas, requiring Mike to pull it up hand over hand.  That is simply too difficult considering the weight of the anchor and the chain (well over 200 feet of heavy chain) combined with the water on top of it.  But we got what might be good news - it may be repairable for a fraction (literally) of the cost.  I hope I am not jinxing it by writing in this optimistic tone, but here's hoping.  I have a small shrine here on the boat to Nuestra Senora Del Carmen, who is, among other things, the patron saint of mariners here in Mexico.  Perhaps she can intervene on our  behalf!  I may not be religious, but I do believe in covering all the bases.  I think my sprituality is more of the primative superstition ilk than true faith, but so far it is working for me.  I just do the best I can with that. 

Well, I can tell I am starting to babble.  Til next time . . .              

What we have seen

Here is a sample of some of the things we have seen while on our way here.

Ensenada has hundreds of drug stores (at least it seems like hundreds) that cater to Americans looking for better deals on pharmeceutical drugs.  They advertise and are not afraid to call a spade a spade.  This could never happen in the USA.

This is an example of the sunsets we get to see while underway.

And a sunrise as well!

Here we are at anchor.

Since I have now figured out how to add pictures and have an internet connection capable of handling it, I will hopefully be posting more pictures. Maybe even some video! 

Mazatlan is wonderful and I think I may have said that before.  I could easily live here.  We went grocery shopping yesterday at this huge store that had absolutely everything I could ever want and then some - and for very reasonable prices.  We are going to a potluck today on "A" dock (we are on "B" dock) and will meet our neighbors here at the marina.  We got the invitation from Captain George, who lives on a big stinkpot (powerboat as opposed to sailboat - they call us names, too) and who is the unofficial host of the marina.  The cruisers here in Mazatlan support an orphange, and have fundraisers amoung ourselves to help them out.  I am looking forward to meeting some new people.  There are some beautiful boats here,  but have no concerns - Magda Jean can hold her own with the best of them.  A Valiant 40 commands respect! 

Our plans from here are getting more convoluted by the day - we NEED a new electric anchor windlass, and WANT/need a watermaker.  This is more complicated than it sounds because the equipment needs to be imported from the US.  We could simply order it through the yacht repair and boatyard here - that would  be the easy way - but that means we have to pay a 30% tax, and the equipment we want is expensive enough as it is.  The other option would be to go to the US and bring it back ourselves, but that would have to be done by car or bus.  When you do it that way, it is not likely you will be caught and taxed.  I feel kind of  bad about trying to avoid the tax, because Mexico needs the money and I firmly believe in paying my fair share.  However, the tax on a four grand windlass would be about twelve hundred more, which is substantial. So we are mulling over our options. 

We almost bought a TV yesterday after we found out the marina has cable TV.  (It was Mike's idea, not mine.)   We can fit a nice flat screen in here.  I have very mixed feelings about it.  On the one hand, it would be nice to have the option of TV in the evenings, but it also means we have access to the news, which gets Mike to ranting about the state of the world and even though I usually agree with him, the ranting gets on my nerves.  I think we will end up getting one, though.  We have been really out of touch with the happenings of the world these days.  For example, we had no idea what was happening in Egypt until it was almost over and everyone was happy.  Our only TV watching has been confined to bars, which here means only ESPN or soccer matches.  Anyway, it is one of those blessing-curse combos.    Also, we could watch our movies on that instead of the computer, which would also be nice.  I am still pissed off at Netflicks who will not allow us to watch movies in Mexico.

There has only been one sad, sorry note to our adventures so far.  Mike's wallet is at the bottom of the ocean in Cabo San Lucas.  It worked its way out of his pocket while he was perched on the side of our inflatable dinghy racing around the harbor in very choppy seas. The worst part was we had just gone to the  bank and there were several hundred dollars worth of pesos in it.  I told him the lobsters were using it to bet on the seahorse races.  I am so grateful we could absorb this loss so easily - there was a time in my life (actually several times) when the loss of this much money would have set me back literally for months.  Now it is just a bummer and a hassle.    

I guess I should sign off this post and tidy up the cabin a bit - one of the good things about living on a boat is how quickly it can be straightened up and made to look nice.  For a crappy housekeeper like myself, that is the way to go.  At this point, I might want to live here after we finish cruising.  I wonder how many times I am going to say that before I am through? 

Safe and Sound in Mazatlan

No, we did not forget how to dock.  This is a great marina, and I discovered they have yoga outside every morning.  I am really excited about doing that again - and it will help keep me in shape, something I am always interested in as long as it involves something I like doing. 

Mazatlan is an interesting place on a lot of different levels.  Yesterday after we got here we took a bus into town for a grand total of 20 pesos (less than two dollars) for both of us.  Since the marina is north of the city proper, and a little too far for us to be interested in walking the whole way, that is a very good deal.  We then walked a long way back, after sharing cerveza and chips and guacamole with a couple we met who are vacationing from Portland, Ore.  We also stopped later for dinner, and then took a "cab" home, again for the whopping price of $7 American, which included a nice tip.  I put the word in quotation marks because these are not actual cars - rather, they are golf cart like things that are open air.  They call them Pulmonias.  It is a LOT less expensive to live here than it is in Cabo, although as I have said before, you can do Cabo on the cheap if you put out extra effort and avoid the tourist spots right on the waterfront.  Here, however, everything seems to be very reasonable.  I am in the process of locating a spa.  I am in dire need of a manicure, pedicure, facial, and wax. 

It is also really beautiful here, with a coastline that includes long sandy beaches as well as places where the water crashes on rocks.  There is a LONG malecon (waterfront walkway like a boardwalk) that goes all through the town, with palapa (thatched roof) restaurants all along the way right on the beach.  This place is famous for shrimp, and that is all right with me!  In fact, we discovered there is an employee here whose brother-in-law is a shrimper, and you can put in an order and have fresh shrimp delivered to the boat.  There is a laundromat here, but you don't have to wash your clothes yourself - you can just leave them and they will do them for you for a very nominal fee.  Who could ask for more?

Some of my friends back in the states have expressed some concern about my safety here - there have been recent articles in the papers up there about some incidents here that caused three cruise lines to stop coming here.  While I do not have all the details of exactly what happened, two of those liners are supposed to start up again real soon.  All I can say is that from what I have heard since I have been in Mexico, tourists and cruisers are in no danger from the drug wars unless they just happen to get caught in crossfire - which could just as easily happen in any town in the US with gang problems.  And the serious violence is confined to border towns and not in the tourist areas.  We have talked with Americans who have lived here for years, as well as to Mexican nationals, and everyone says the same thing.  I really feel safer here than in parts of the U.S.A.  And no public officials have demanded any bribes.  Even when we screwed up the check in/check out process (a requirement for boats entering and leaving ports in Mexico) in Cabo, we did not get in any trouble at all.  The port captain just told us how to handle it properly next time.  I suppose he could have asked us to pay a fine, and we would have done it without objection, since we were in the wrong.  In fact, the last time anyone was rude to me was a US customs officer when we went up to San Diego from Ensenada.

We plan to spend about a month here - but cruising plans are always subject to the vagaries of the lifestyle.  It is still taking some getting used to.  Last night I had a horrible dream that I was back at work, and everyone was giving me a hard time.  Even in the dream at one point I said to myself "Why am I bothering with all this, I don't have to work."  Getting a nice income for just having fun seems too good to be true.  I keep waiting for someone to contact me and tell me it was all a mistake and I need to get my sorry ass back to work.  (This is not unusual thinking for me - I am always faintly surprised when an ATM actually gives me the money I ask it for.)  This kind of life (once you pay for the boat and its outfitting) is actually pretty low cost.  We could not live in California for what we are paying here at this incredible marina, even in a tiny crappy apartment in a crappy neighborhood.  Here, I am living right on the water with everything I could want.  Amazing, really.

I plan to post some pictures in my next post - I forgot and used the computers that does not have my pictures on it.  We have what appears to be reliable internet here, so we will see what happens.  I am really eager to share the things I have seen with anyone who is interested.  Life is great!

Arriving in Mazatlan

Again, we made it to the next port safely.  This time we had a fabulous sail the 190 miles from Cabo.  We made it in just about 48 hours.  It did get a little pokey at times, because the winds were at times very light, but we made up for it when the wind came up beautifully.  Although we could have chosen to turn on the engine and motor when it was really slow, we decided to just drift along and see what happened.  We were not on a schedule or in any sort of hurry. And were we glad we did, because we saw some unbelievable sights.

First, we noticed some fish jumping out of the water.  They turned out to be a "school" made up of 14 bonito, each one about a foot long and proabably 3-4 pounds. (Bonito are small members of the tuna family.  In my opinion, they are not the best eating fish.)  They spent the entire day swimming around and around the boat. They are really pretty fish - silvery with blue blue and black racing stripes down their backs.  They swam in perfect formation and I decicded that synchronized swimmers must model their routines after these fish. After zigging and zagging in perfect formation, they would split off from each other in all directions and then began jumping out of the water. It looked like they were dancing.  I have never seen anything like it.  We saw a big sea turtle, several marlins, and the inevitable whale spouts.  The weather was warm and sunny, and I actually got to sail in a  bathing suit for more than 20 minutes. Both of us got plenty of sleep, and the watches went well.

Mike got to see something I cannot imagine. A little background is needed. There is a form of plankton and other forms of sea life that look phosphorescent at night.  The boat's wake glows, and if you flush the toilet, sparkles circle around the bowl.  Dolphins cutting through the water make glowing, sparkling streaks as they pass.  Anyway, Mike was on watch, and all of a sudden there was a huge glow under the boat that was as big as the entire boat.  It was a whale or very large fish swimming beneath the boat, and it scared the hell out of him.  He said it looked like either extra terrestrials or like when the lowriders put neon lights under their cars.  I want to see something like that.  There were also thousands, maybe millions of tiny little red crabs swimming about - they looked like tiny cooked lobsters and swam on their backs.  And to top things off, we saw a whole bunch of nautiluses - shellfish with cone shaped shells (sort of like a fancy snail shell) all clumped together floating along.  I had no idea what it even was - Mike told me.  It looked like something out of a science fiction movie. 

We are currently (as I am typing this) drifting along just outside the harbor waiting for the channel to open.  They are dredging and it is only open for going in and out between 2 and 3 p.m.  It is 12:30 now.  So we took showers, had breakfast, straightened up the boat, and now we wait.

I am excited to be here.  I went to Puerto Vallarta about 20 years ago, and about five years ago (I think) I went to Cancun. Other than that, this is my first time on the Mexican mainland.  I think we might stay here a month or so as there are somethings that need to be fixed on the boat (the anchor windlass) and this is a good place to get that sort of thing done.  Now that we will be at a marina with access to unlimited internet access, I will post some pictures on here.  I figured out how to do it, but without a good consistant internet connection it takes too long.

Well, I had  better get ready to take off into the harbor and our new marina slip.  I hope we have not forgotten how to dock!                    

Last Day In Cabo

Yes, today will be our last day here, if all goes as according to plan. We are heading for Mazatlan, about 180 miles across the Sea of Cortez to the Mexican mainland.  I have never crossed a sea before, even a skinny one like the Sea of Cortez.  So it will be another "first" for me.  It will likely seem no different than my coastal passages were because we always go so far offshore we can't always see land anyway.

We have had a lot of fun here but I would not want to live here.  It is too frenetic with all the hustling of toursits - you really have to run a gauntlet of timeshare sellers who will go to great lengths to get you in.  I have a high tolerance for stuff like that, because everyone has to make a living and there aren't that many ways to do it here.  But I still find it annoying. And the salespeople are more aggressive than in Ensenada.  But again, they need to make a living here in tourist land.  The place is pretty expensive, but if you look around, you can find reasonably priced restaurant food. It will not be on the main drag or right at waterfront, but only a few blocks away. 

Cabo is not a sailing mecca and I can see why.  The marinas are full of fancy fishing boats and megayachts, and the anchorage is narrow and does not hold real well.  Plus, it can get a lot more rolly than I thought possible.  Three nights ago it was so bad I hardly slept at all and a few times thought I was going to be thrown out of bed. The result of being on a rolly boat is that you are always doing a balancing act and as a result, my muscles ache as though I went to the gym or climbed a mountain.  The up side of that is I can now wear some clothes I could not get into when I left San Diego!

The only bummer is that we lost our electric anchor windlass and now have to pull the anchor up manually.  It is not the end of the world (easy for me to say since Mike does the actual pulling) but it is a hassle and will be an expense I for one did not want to have.  Here is what happened.  We decided to take up the anchor and move to a different spot in the anchorage.  (By the way, the anchor windlass is the mechanism that hauls the anchor up and down.)   Our windlass is probably circa 1982, like the boat.  Anyway, while we were taking the anchor up, a part of the windlass that keeps the chain going neatly around and down into the chain locker literally broke off (on further examination we discovered it had corroded) and caused the chain to tangle around, and then the engine in the windlass apparetnly could not take the strain of the tangled chain and simply stopped working.  And it will not be cheap to get a new one.  Damn, it is always something!

We have met some interesting people along the way.  There are two boats that were with us in Turtle Bay, and we met up with them again here.  One boat (a Cal 25 just like we used to have except teh boys stuck a homemade pilot house on top of it) has two boys in their twenties who are off on a sailiong adventure. They have little money, and have been picking up extra change playing their guitar and accordian on the street.  There is another young guy who is alone on his 30 foot boat, again with no money.  He got a job hustling tourists for glass bottom boat rides.  I like that they are doing this stuff and wish I had had the courage at that age to do something interesting.  We also found our friend Joel again, who we had to leave at Bahia Santa Maria  because the weather was too rough for him to single hand through to Cabo with no autopilot, no crew, and a boat in marginal condition.  I was worried about him, and was delighted to see him here today.

I am pretty excited to get underway myself.  I am of course hoping we don't get that crazy scary weather, but to be truthful, just sitting there waiting for the wind to come up and debating whether to cheat and motor for a while is not much fun either.  At least in the high winds and seas we made good time!  We have a reservation for a marina slip in Mazatlan - at a luxery hotel no less.  There were two marinas to choose from, with this one being about $250 per month more expensive.  However, this one has several advantages.  First, there is fresh drinking water at each slip.  Most marinas down here have fresh water at the slips, but it is not drinking quality and you have to buy bottled water to fill the tanks.  Another advantage is that marina guests get to use all the hotel stuff like the pools and the private beach.  Private beaches are nice because there are palapas to sit under, no vendors are allowed to hawk their stuff, and waiters bring drinks.  The city bus stops right out front of the hotel.  The water issue alone makes it worthwhile. I think we will stay there for about a month, and will do some exploring in the area.  I have never been to this part of Mexico.  That is one of the great things about cruising - we can just follow our own schedule, controlled only by the weather.     

Well, it is time for me to start getting things in order for us to leave tomorrow.  The next post will likely be from Mazatlan, and I am closer than ever to being able to post pictures.  However, none of them will really do justice to their subjects - the beauty here is overwhelming.

Cabo San Lucas

We made it to Cabo, but not without some drama.  It was interesting, hard, scary, and overall satisfying.  Cabo is wonderful, if touristy.  It is more expensive than most of the rest of Mexico, but I think the whole "oh my God it is so expensive" that we heard from the other cruisers was totally overstated.  We can stay here as long as we want to.  We are anchored just off the main beach in the center of town.  It is a little rolly, but nothing bothersome to us.  Right in front of us are these hotels that cost 3-4 hundred dollars a night.  We pay about $13.00 per day to anchor here, and another $3.00 per day to use the secure dinghy dock.  $16.00 per day to live in this paradise.  Even KOA campgrounds cost more than that.  Not bad.  We will definitely stay long enough to watch the Packers win the Super Bowl, but have not decided how long we will stay.  I was in a hurry to get to Mazatlan, but this is pretty nice.  And we are finally warm! 

We left Turtle Bay and sailed south 175 miles or so to a tiny little bay called Bahia Santa Maria.  It took about three days.  There is nothing there except a small fish camp, but we never saw anyone there.  We stayed for three days in Bahia Santa Maria, and would have only stayed overnight except that we met a friend there, Joel on the Esperanza.  He had a hard time getting there, so we stayed to help him out some.  Then we left for Cabo, and immediately found ourselves in near gale conditions.  Needless to say, our weatherfax information did NOT predict anything like that.  We literally flew down the coast.  The first day the seas were so steep and confused the autopilot could not hold the course and Mike had to man the helm for ten straight hours.  The seas then calmed enough for the autopilot, but we were absolutely flying with the sails reefed down to kerchief size.  We made it here in 33 hours.  It was nice to have a swift passage, but those seas knocked us around something fierce.  I have bruises all over my legs and a scratch on my nose.  We didn't get much sleep because the seas were knocking us about so hard I felt as though I would be thrown from my bed.  We were exausted by the time we got here, although things had calmed considerably after about 28 hours.  It got pretty scary for awhile, especially when we noticed water (not that again!) coming in.  The bilge pump was handling it, but when Mike tracked down the leak, he found it coming in like a little river.  But he managed to plug it - and things were then as good as new.  It turned out to be not a big deal.  But I am not kidding, it was really something.  We felt pretty good about our abilities when we were done.  I just hope our 190 mile trip to Mazatlan is a bit less eventful.

This is the first place we are finally warm.  Ensenada was as cold as San Diego has been this year.  (I realize there are people reading this who live in very cold places - but not even getting over 60 degrees is cold to me, especially when you consider I have no warm clothing as I did not expect to need any.)  There were a couple times in Turtle Bay when I was able to sit on the boat in a bathing suit - for about 20 minutes.  As we made our way down here, we found ourselves shedding layers - first went the long underwear, then the foul weather jackets, then the extra shirts, and so on.  Today we walked around town in shorts and T-shirts.  I almost forgot how it felt to be warm.  It does cool down at night, so we still have our extra warm blanket on our bed.  But I think it may not be too long before that goes as well.  It isn't warm enough to swim in the ocean in my opinion, but we are getting there. 

On a different topic, being out of touch has been weird.  First, once we left Ensenada, we had no idea what was going on anywhere.  For example, I forgot there even was such a thing as the Super Bowl, and Mike and I had even been watching the playoffs in Ensenada.  It was not until today that I discovered the Packers made it.  I have no idea what is happening politically in the US and I don't even care.  I can't take American politics anymore.  But being away from it all has some problems.  We have a number of bill payments set up to be automatically charged to our credit card (Steve's cell phone and car insurance, our own health insurance, things like that).  When we went to look at our account over the internet, we couldn't find it.  It was like it had disappeared.  So we went to an internet cafe in Turtle Bay, called the bank that issued it on the phone via Skype, and discovered some "major merchant" had "compromised" a number of credit cards, and ours was one of them.  Great.  And mail is an issue.  My sister Buffy is letting me use her address, but we haven't been anywhere long enough to have her send it to us.  I figure if we decide to stay here for awhile, we can rent a mailbox at Mailboxes Etc (I was surprised to see them here) and have her Fed Ex or UPS it down here to us.  Otherwise we will wait til we get to Mazatlan.  Mike is making noises about wanting to stay here for a bit - that is the beauty of this, we can make our own schedule.  I often forget what the date or day of the week it is.  Sometimes being cut off like this makes me feel sort of panicky, and I am not sure why.

I have now seen whales breaching, sea turtles, dolphins, and flying fish.  After hard sails with the seas coming up over the decks, I have found little squid on the deck.  Sunsets and sunrises at sea are unbelievable.  I think I made a good choice to live this way.   

It is getting late and I think I will go to bed.  I am hoping to learn to post pictures here, and I have taken some great ones.  Life is good.