Re-entry

We're back in the real world and finally heading home without any requirement to quarantine on entry into the US. That was a relief. Kay and I rented a car and are driving back to Seattle now. It is the end of a grand adventure, one that didn't go as planned, but went much better than it might have. I can honestly say the last several months have been a good experience. We can't ask for much more than that. I think I'll close this blog at this point and open another when I figure out what comes next. I honestly don't know. I'll edit this page with a link to the next blog when I start one, so stay tuned. In the mean time I'll leave you with a photo Kay took of me as we prepped the rental car for the trip north...

Five weeks

Last night was way more enjoyable than the night before. The first was grim: cold, wet and foggy all night and through most of the following day. Last night was clear and warm with a sliver of a moon, a starry sky, and dolphins shooting through phosphorescent seas. It was quite a contrast and a rather spectacular finale.

We're on the home stretch into San Diego. The predicted light wind (no wind) arrived on schedule and we've been motoring through the last couple of nights. It's all very soothing, droning away, hour after hour, while contemplating the pandemic chaos that awaits us. We're looking forward to being done with this trip and yet simultaneously apprehensive about making contact with a changed world.

The night before leaving La Paz five weeks ago, we enjoyed dinner on the veranda of a restaurant overlooking the marina. The setting sun complemented piña coladas and seafood tacos. What a difference a month makes.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Among the negatives

There might be a positive impact of the virus on our intended trip: the downturn in the world economy will put a damper on the number of boats that have been crowding into the South Pacific anchorages. This was going to be an especially busy year with the World Arc under way. All those boats were forced to reroute through Hawaii. They won't be back next year. And, all the PPJ boats that would have been preparing to go next spring and can still afford to go might be forced to wait another year by their inability to prepare. It's all speculation, but probably reasonable. Then again, what if this blasted thing hangs on and some of the countries don't open their boarders by next spring? I'll have to decide if it's worth it to leave my boat where it is for two years - two years of not being able to use my boat. Ack! So much uncertainty. I guess I don't have to make any decisions now.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

The light at the end of the tunnel

I assembled the crew's breakfast this morning: oatmeal, fortified with some leftover from the last time we had it, and chopped dried apples. No one knew where the raisins made off to, or even if we had any left, so I chopped up some dates and threw them in instead. I served it with a bowl of chopped walnuts, chopped canned peaches, and a large jar of home grown yogurt. Sprinkled with brown sugar, it was delicious.

Our to-do list is light today. The sun is out, so the solar panels are making electricity while the watermaker fills the fresh water tanks. We're starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel on this trip. We're waiting for heavy weather to die down before departing tomorrow morning on what might turn out to be our last day of sailing. Sometime tomorrow night the wind is forecasted to die down for several days so we'll do a motorboat ride the rest of the way into San Diego.

Eric got word from the Mexican embassy yesterday that they couldn't advise us on whether to stop at Ensenada for clearance, since each port was adhering to is own policies. Given that the Port Captain for Turtle Bay wouldn't allow us off the boat, we're resolved not to try stopping at Ensenada to clear customs. We might just find our way clear of Mexico in four or five days!

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Not so Pacific

Our overnight passage to the next in a succession of anchorages was a rough one, but it was made in relatively good form. I refrain from naming most of these stops because nine tenths of them are named after saints or other religious contrivances and honestly, who cares what they're called?

The wind and waves were predicted to be moderate last night, but the wind was in the low to mid twenties for much of the night. The 2m waves made for a lumpy, wild ride.

I was lying in bed off watch at one point, trying to get some sleep on a bunk that was pitching and rolling under me. I heard a lot of lines running and winches rattling as Eric and Linda worked to keep pace with the rising wind speed by putting a third reef in the main. Suddenly I heard Eric shout an expletive and it wasn't hard to predict what was coming next: all hands on deck. Kay and I joined them to find reefing lines fouled in a 25 knot wind. It was a dark and stormy night... Eric led the effort as he worked to resolve the foul from the top of the coachroof while holding on to the boom for dear life. Linda and Kay worked the lines and held his light, while I managed the helm, somehow keeping the boat oriented so the wind came from forward and to one side of the boat. That kept pressure off the sail and prevented the boom from swinging around while Eric worked. It was a good bit of teamwork and everything worked out in the end, but you never know how things will turn out when you're in the thick of it.

I was on watch again later in the morning as the wind died down and we coasted into the anchorage under a lovely sunny day. The forecast is threatening to hold us here for several days, but it was nice to arrive in friendlier weather.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Fueled up!

A lot of boats had planned on joining the Pacific Puddle Jump (PPJ) rally this year from all up and down the west coast of North and South America to places all over the South Pacific. With SP countries now closed, scores of boats that had already left the Americas were forced to leave their boats and fly home. Many choose to reroute toward Hawaii instead, with the result that Hawaii is now overrun with yachts returning from foreign countries and seeking entry and safe harbor. We've heard from some of those boats via the PPJ network that Hawaii has closed at least one port to arriving yachts and is enforcing a two week quarantine on arrivals without regard to time spent on the yacht enroute. As I understand it, this is a directive from the governor of Hawaii. A similar policy may be in effect in California. We won't know until we get to San Diego whether we'll be stuck there for a couple of weeks before we can head home. So far we've been on the boat for over three weeks, so it's pretty unlikely that we're carrying, but I guess they don't know that.

We're in Turtle Bay now. It's the first anchorage in Mexico that we stopped at on our way south. It took us four days non-stop going south. This time it'll probably take us a couple of weeks of bashing up wind and anchoring along the way. So: two weeks to get to San Diego, two weeks quarantine, and a few days to drive home puts us there toward the end of May.

When we arrived here, we were met by a local in a Panga who sold us diesel and told we are not welcome to go ashore. Apparently there are police and military personnel who are posted to intercept us if we try. We assured him we were happy to remain on the boat. Refueling without having to go ashore was exactly what we were hoping for. Now we can proceed to San Diego without having to stop and without worrying about running out of fuel. Yay!

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Progress

And they're off. It's been a lovely day for sailing today. We waited until 11am to get going this morning because there was no wind. We figured there was no point in motoring out of the gate. Now that we're out, winds are moderate and progress is reasonable, if unimpressive. As the boat sails, we've traveled about 30 miles in seven hours, but that only translates to about seventeen miles as the crow flies. At this rate we'll get to the next anchorage around this time tomorrow. Our only goal is to arrive tomorrow with some daylight remaining. Notwithstanding our current rate of progress I think we'll make it. Even if the wind dies at some point we can motor some of the way. Time will tell.

I just got off watch and will be on again in four hours. We double up at night which gives us more watch time, but keeps us awake. Staying awake on watch is good.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Yogurt

It amuses me to observe where my mind goes when I write. I usually sit down without a clue of what I'm going to write about. I suppose it's like conversation in that regard. Sometimes we have something we want to talk about and sometimes we're content to let the conversation take us where it will. Face to face conversation between two or more people adds more opportunity for conversation creativity. My output tends to diminish with more people because it feels like having to force my way into the conversation. Not so here though. The cursor just waits patiently for me to say something.

It is looking like our departure will be tomorrow morning. It should be perfect sailing to the next anchorage. Had we left today, as I might have done, it would probably have been a rougher ride.

Kay and I just cleaned the bilge. It seems to need it once every few days; that's more than Quijote does, but this boat has a couple of sources of ingress that Quijote does not. The chain locker on this boat drains into the bilge. Every time we pull anchor on Rover a little drainage from the wet chain goes into the bilge. And at the other end of the boat the prop shaft penetrates the hull through a seal that's designed to leak a little to lubricate the shaft. That leakage goes into the bilge too. Quijote has a chain locker that drains overboard and uses a saildrive, a design that obviates the shaft penetration of the hull, so we have no leakage there either. No leakage, dry bilge.

Kay and Linda did some baking at this anchorage. Kay made yummy cookie bars and a spice cake yesterday morning. Linda bakes bread and rolls once or twice a week and she makes yogurt in a jar every couple days. The home-made yogurt is quite good. It's a little less creamy, and more tart than the commercial products, but it's definitely nice to have and easy to get used to. I really like the tartness. I might try making some when I get home.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Ugh...

I feel like I usually do when I take a nap in the middle of the day: just this side of cruddy. We made good time getting to the new anchorage overnight, but only because we motored five out of eight hours. We sailed for three and then the wind died.

After our arrival we ate breakfast and crashed. Now it's noon and I'm dying for a hot shower. Maybe later. Three other points of detail over the last twelve hours are noteworthy.

2pm yesterday: Kay and I settle in for a game of cribbage; she with a beer and I with my usual coconut rum and pineapple juice. Eric comes by and dumps our drinks in the sink, explaining that we can't drink on days we sail. I'm tempted to point out that our intended departure is ten hours away and midnight is technically the following day, but I hold my tongue. The incident marks the sole note of discord on an otherwise harmonious cruise. I have a great deal of respect for Eric and the job he does managing this boat. He knows his boat well, knows how to sail it well, and is a good leader. In my eyes, he's anal in all the right ways. But... we can't expect to agree about everything.

7 am this morning: approaching the anchorage at sunrise with an escort of dolphins riding the bow wave - magical.

9 am this morning: sitting down to breakfast on Easter morning with home made cinnamon rolls - heart warming.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Cribbage

Kay just beat me at a game of cribbage. We play most days when we're at anchorage around 3 or 4 pm with a tumbler of coconut rum and fruit juice to fortify us. Cribbage, like tennis, or any game between opponents of equal skill is very streaky.

It's been mostly a day of reading. We did a little deck work this morning and I bloodied one toe. I drove my Croc into the narrow end of a deck cleat and it aligned perfectly with a hole in the croc to do its damage.

I have only Crocs and Keens to choose from for footwear, since I didn't feel like being burdened with too much stuff and I didn't anticipate any hiking for this part of the trip. I usually wear the Keens on deck and the Crocs in the cabin, but one Keen got wet yesterday with a wave rolling down the deck. They're out in the cockpit now drying off in the sun and wind.

Things have been going well. The current pattern is for the wind to peak in the late afternoons. It got up over 30 knots today, so we're trying to pick our timing carefully. It's supposed to gradually decline as the week rolls on so hopefully we'll arrive at our next anchorage early before it picks up, then make our multi-day run for Turtle Bay after it eases. That's the plan!

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

"Home" cooking

We rolled out of bed this morning, enjoyed a breakfast of oatmeal, and weighed anchor around 8 am. The morning was sunny and breezy, a perfect day with just the right amount of wind for a day of sailing. The plan was to take a 24 hour passage to the next anchorage, but on closer inspection, Eric discovered an intermediate destination that will allow us to anchor before nightfall. That'll give us two daytime passages in place of one overnight passage. It was a popular decision with the crew, as it gives us better sleep. And we're in no hurry.

I'm on the hook to make dinner tonight; black bean soup and home-made bread I'm told. As ambitious as that sounds, it's really not. At least not for me. Both soup and bread have already been made. It's up to me to heat and serve.

Before embarking on this trip, Linda rented a hotel room with a kitchen in La Paz and sequestered herself for long enough to fill their boat's freezer with ready-made vacuum sealed meals. I've done the same on Quijote before leaving on trips from home. The primary difference is that Quijote, as a smaller boat, has no freezer. That substantially limits the range of pre-prepared home-made meals. I have no idea how deep their freezer is, but so far the meals keep coming. Presumably we'll resort to canned meals at some point.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Two weeks and counting

We're staying two nights at this anchorage - Abreojos. The day between has been spent doing boat chores. Linda serviced the main halyard winch, cleaned the cockpit, and is now making yogurt. Kay made brownies and bran muffins. Eric tried and failed to fix his AIS and his battery monitor. I did makework. The ladies have been much more productive than the gents today.

We have a single overnight to the next anchorage. We'll depart tomorrow morning.

There aren't many boats out here. We see an occasional cruiser heading up or down the coast and every village has a few pangas out fishing. When the AIS was working we saw a few larger commercial targets - fishing boats and cargo ships. But there isn't much out here otherwise. There's probably a reason for that. Aside from being so remote, I'm wondering about the impact of the pandemic. Just as it has emptied city streets and made road travel unwise or unnecessary, it appears to have had the same impact on commercial and recreational boating.

The only reason we've been able to carry on is that we provisioned for a long trip across the Pacific shortly before things blew up. Both Rover and Quijote were preparing to depart Mexico around April 1st. Now Quijote is on land full of food and we're making good use of Rover's stores. With sails to limit fuel consumption, ample stores and the ability to desalinate water, we can remain out here for a very long time.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Progress

We're anchored! It's not a quiet little cove, but it is home for the next few days. There's a shoal area off the point where the incoming swell breaks with a roar, dissipating most of its energy. That's a good thing for our comfort.

Eric just reported stats for our latest leg. We were under way for 77 hours during the leg. All but six hours was spent sailing. That leaves us with enough fuel to motor from here to Turtle Bay, where we can buy fuel again. We're close to the half way point of the trip. Good progress!

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Layering up

The weather has been much cooler than I anticipated. At the time I was packing to join Rover, I was inclined to pack light rather than bring a lot of stuff I'd end up not using. I eyed the sweatshirt, jacket and foul weather gear I had laid out and thought to myself that half that pile would turn out to be unecessary. If Mexico was as warm as it I imagined it would be, it might all turn out to be unecessary. The trouble was I couldn't decide which to leave behind. In the end I brought it all, and a wool hat as well, and have been very glad to have them.

Last night during the cold, clear, moonlit night at three in the morning I had on a shirt, sweatshirt, jacket and foul weather gear with wool hat and hood pulled up tight, and still I felt myself slowly freezing, wondering: why can't I see my breath in these temperatures? It probably wasn't as cold as it felt, but hours of inactivity in a cool breeze will make anyone thankful for all the layers they can muster.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Wildlife under way

The wildlife around us is displaying some curiosity. It started with humpback whales pacing along side the boat at a distance of twenty yards, blowing their fishy breath and matching our speed. We've never seen them do that before.

Then last night a cormorant circled the boat for quite a while, landing first on the pulpit at the bow, then on the BBQ at the stern and back again. Our relative wind accounting for true wind and boat speed was high enough that he had a difficult time maintaining his perch on either, but he tried for quite a while. Perhaps he was looking for a rest.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Zagging

We've enjoyed a good couple of days tacking our way north toward an anchorage at Abreojos (open eyes) Bay. The wind has been blowing between ten and fifteen knots the whole way, which is perfect for this boat for the sail plan we have up. We've been doing a consistent 4.5 knots of boat speed all night long, which will get us there without burning fuel except to raise and lower the anchor. Nice!

We've been tacking every four hours when the watch changes and we have an overlap of crew. More hands makes the job easier, especially if we want to put in or take out a reef at the same time. The inReach tracker should be showing long, four hour zags.

The seas have been fairly modest the last couple of nights too. That makes life easier: easier to work, eat, and sleep. I'd complain about the lack of exercise, but I'm afraid it wouldn't endear much sympathy from a world in lockdown. Part of me is eager to get home and part of me is revelling in what I have, careful of what I wish for.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Pescado

We're spending a second night at this anchorage in Bahia Santa Maria. The wind was up this evening, so we're waiting it out and will make an early escape in the morning for our next segment, which should take us about three days, depending on conditions.

A fisherman came by the boat this morning asking if we could spare some batteries for his handheld GPS. We gave him some and asked him to drop by again in the afternoon if he had fish to sell. It turns out he did, so we paid him a few bucks in pesos for a couple of fish. Linda cleaned them, Eric cooked them on the barbie, and we all enjoyed them for dinner. They were fresh, tender and delish.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

An hour in the bank

We have limited fuel for the eight hundred or so miles we need to travel between Cabo and Ensenada (fuel stop to fuel stop). If we tried to motor the whole distance, we'd probably run out of diesel three quarters of the way there. That means we'll have to sail about a quarter of the distance, which translates to sailing half the time when you consider the additional distance and inefficiency of sailing upwind.

Going south was easy: we set our sails and fly downwind in a straight line. Going upwind involves considerably more work and discomfort. However tempted we may be though to make quick miles with the motor when the going gets tough or the wind goes flat, we have to keep in mind that half of our time must be spent sailing. We have to make miles under sail whenever we can. That obviously assumes the sailing is productive.

Today was a successful day in that we were forced by the conditions to motor for three hours and we were able to sail productively for four hours. That's an hour in the bank for later withdrawal.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Rest Day

It was a rest day today, so that means boat projects. Kay and I were tasked with cleaning the bilge. Rover has a lot more bilge than Quijote does. Apparently a (hawse pipe) cap was left off that seals the port where the anchor chain comes in and out near the bow and it let sea water into the boat when waves crashed over the bow. That water found its way into the (bilge) bottom of the boat. So first we had to hand pump and wipe the bilge dry, then fill it with fresh water, then pump and wipe it dry again. It was a fair amount of work.

Kay and I also made tacos for dinner tonight. They turned out well considering we don't have cheddar. Mexicans use a cheese like cheddar called wahaka, probably spelled something like Juahaca. It doesn't have a lot of flavor, but does better in the heat than cheddar does. It's kind of ironic considering how much cheddar a Mexican restaurant in the States must go through.

While we were doing all that, Eric and Linda were busy beavers knocking items off their check list: cleaning the cockpit, making yogurt, weather forecasting etc, etc.

It was a busy rest day.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Tour of Rover

Kay and I alternate use of the quarter berth on Rover. It's alongside the companionway on the port quarter (left rear corner). The head occupies the starboard quarter. The door into the quarter berth opens into a small space with a seat from where one can side into the berth. Extricating oneself feels a bit like, well... birth. As many English words have their origins in nautical use and visa-versa, it wouldn't surprise me if the word berth owes its origin to such sentiments. I write while seated on the small seat inside the quarter berth just described. It feels a bit like sitting in a phone booth.

Climbing up the stairs of the companionway to my right takes us into the cockpit and the outside world. Below deck, proceeding forward down the center of the boat we pass the nav station on our right and the galley on our left.

The nav station is essentially a desk surrounded by the electronic components used to navigate and assess weather. It wasn't long ago that the desk saw greater use. Nautical charts can be large, so the size of the desk was important. Lately, with more focus on electronic navigation, the work space has moved from the nav station to the iPad. Even so, like the size of a man's garage, a certain sense of verility can be displayed by the size of the nav station.

No so the galley. The galley is probably not much different than it was a thousand years ago. Unless you're feeding slaves gruel from a bucket, the essential components remain the same: storage, cooking, cleanup. That said, propane stoves have improved over the years. They're safer and easier to operate than they used to be, even twenty years ago. The galley is never big enough.

Proceeding forward we find the main saloon, pronounced like salon when it's on a boat. It's the communal space used for indoor meals, card games, storage and sleeping. The main saloon is the other place that Kay and I alternate with the quarter berth. It's more exposed to the clatter of people moving about the boat than the quarter berth, which can be closed off; hence our decision to alternate. Navigating through large seas, the boat can roll and pitch about, sometimes severely. To keep sleeping persons from turning into projectiles, we tie up canvas restraining walls called lee-cloths. It's marginally easier to sleep in such conditions when you're restrained from being thrown on the floor.

Forward of the main saloon on this boat is the forward berth and storage for sails, water maker equipment, and anchor chain.

That, my friends, is a quick tour of the sailing vessel Rover.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Ocean comfort

We're getting a mixture of what we expected and not. As expected we're mostly sailing, but we're making much slower progress than we imagined we would.

https://share.garmin.com/svquijote
This site shows our track. There might be a link on the page that shows all data instead of the most recent data. With all data displayed we can compare the track going south against our more recent track going north against the wind. Aside from more circuitous routing, our speed through the water is much slower going against the wind. Wind and waves are working against us. We've also set smaller sails for the sake of comfort, preservation of equipment, and safety.

When things go wrong out here it gets very chaotic very quickly. Last night the wind was building uncomfortably so we decided to take in some sail and settle the boat down. In the process of trying to do that, the flogging sail tangled the lines. A flogging sail makes a lot of noise. It sounds like boat and sail are tearing themselves apart. In the midst of all that racket, confusion and a sense of doom, it's necessary to think clearly, act with deliberation, and get the problem sorted out. But sort it we did and the experience has left us reluctant to push the performance envelope. We're flying with smaller sails and slowing down. Comfortably.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Rest day

Today was a rest day of sorts. We did some minor odd jobs, confirmed the weather window for tomorrow's departure, and reviewed our watch schedule for the next few days. We expect light winds in the morning that should build in the afternoon. We'll get going around 6am and will probably arrive at Man 'o War Cove two days later. There may or may not be fuel when we get there and the trip will be almost entirely up wind, so we'll have to sail whenever we can and conserve our fuel. We're expecting it to be a good couple of days of sailing.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Getting to know our sails

It was a light air day today. That meant a lot of motoring. We also got to fly the drifter for a while after the wind picked up to about six knots. The drifter is a sail made out of a lightweight nylon designed for a day like today. It's like a spinnaker in terms of the material used, but it's not designed exclusively for downwind use like the spinnaker is. It does work well downwind though, which is how we used it today. Except for the color, it's a carbon copy of one I have on Quijote. Both were made by Carol Hasse at Port Townsend Sails. It's a great sail to have on a light wind kind of day.

After rounding the corner at Cabo San Lucas and sailing up the coast toward San Diego, we expect to be sailing against the wind most of the time. It will be interesting to see how well the drifter does in those conditions. My experience on Quijote has been that it does best reaching at larger angles to the wind, but doesn't do as well as the genoa at tacking into the wind. That's why some people call it a reacher. In any case, at some point when the wind is light enough, the drifter might out perform the genoa, even upwind. Maybe we'll find out.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Boat Projects

Today was a good day for boat projects and Eric had a list of them. We each had something productive to do, which was great. Linda, Kay and I made soft shackles that were used to reconnect the main sail cover that had become separated from the boom. I repaired a ventilation fan in the head and helped Eric untangle the fishing line rats nest that we created yesterday.

Linda had set out two trolling lines in the middle of the day and by one o'clock we had a fish on. Because the wind was blowing and we were busy sailing the boat, there wasn't time to do anything with it. We drug the fish behind us until shortly before we arrived at the anchorage. By then the fish, which turned out to be a yellow fin tuna had twisted itself around the other line, making a mess of both lines.

It was a mess we left for today, but last night we enjoyed fresh caught tuna barbequed on the grill. Thanks to Linda's willingness to catch and clean the fish, it was a learning experience and quite a treat.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Rover

Day three on Rover and we're heading south toward Cabo. From there we'll poke our nose out into the Pacific Ocean, round the corner, and head north. Rover is a 42 foot Valiant, a beautiful ocean capable yacht owned by Eric and Linda who did the Hoho and Haha rallies south with us from Seattle. Kay and I joined them in La Paz for the ride back to San Diego. They were looking for crew and we were looking for a ride.

Yesterday the weather forecast was calling for a sunny day and 10 knots of wind. Instead we got closer to thirty knots by the day's end. We started with a light breeze and all the sails up. Rover has a cutter rig so her working sails include a Genoa, stay sail and main. We were considering adding a light air drifter to the mix when the wind started to build. Soon we were taking reefs, shortening sails as the wind continued to build. By the time we reached our anchorage, the main was triple reefed and the genoa was furled. Rover got more time under sail yesterday than we've had on Quijote in weeks.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Farewell Quijote

Today was a busy day, but we got a lot done and finished the job of prepping the boat for storage. We had a minor panic when we arrived at the yard to find it locked up for the weekend. A security guy let us in (past the guard dogs) and called the owner who came down and administered our paperwork on his day off so we can leave tomorrow. We were thankful not to have to wait until Monday morning to get checked out.

After two days of hard work, Kay and I bid a sad farewell to Quijote then celebrated with drinks and dinner complements of Quijote. What a gal.

Tomorrow morning we set off with SV Rover on a three to six week passage to San Diego via Cabo San Lucas. I have to admit I didn't think I would find myself back in either place so soon. It'll be nice to settle into Rover's routines and see how Linda and Eric do things. I expect it to be an enjoyable learning experience.

Quijote headed for shore

Ready for weather

I feel so fortunate to have found the place that I did to take Quijote out of the water. We were shoehorned into the last available spot in a crowded lot. They didn't use a travel lift like most haul outs that I'm familiar with do; they winched it up onto a huge trailer and backed it into their dirt lot. It's crazy and the guy driving that truck is nothing short of amazing. We're placed within a couple inches of boats surrounding us in all directions.

With Quijote up on jacks, we spent the rest of the day preparing the boat for a hurricane. They haven't had one since 2014, and we probably wouldn't fare very well if they do get one, but we have to be ready for heavy weather and a lot of uv.

I pickled the watermaker with chemical to preserve the membrane, pulled halyards, removed the roller furling genoa, removed the wind generator turbine, dismounted the life raft, dismounted the anchor, serviced the anodes, etc. It was a busy day. But it's done and I feel relatively good about leaving her for a while. It's disappointing sure , but we're doing well with the hand that was dealt.

Shoe horned

On the hard

Yesterday at this time we were still full speed ahead for the Marquesas. Kay and I (more K than I) were spending our time loading the boat with non-perishable foods. Then in quick succession it was announced that Tonga, then French Polynesia and finally New Zealand were all closing their boarders. If we cross the Pacific as planned we would find ourselves with nowhere to go.

Another consideration was having options if we did get sick, picking it up in PV while provisioning, but not showing symptoms until under way. The whole crew would soon be sick with no one to operate the boat and no medical services available.  The decision quickly became easy. 

After years of planning it has all been snatched away. But... So far we are in good health, so we can be thankful for that. Still, as ever there remains the question: what to do. For a short period of time I entertained the idea put forward by Eric and Linda on Rover: bash our way back up the coast to San Diego, then leave from there next year. There were several things about that option that were unattractive: losing ground, the upwind slog north, the uncertainty of fuel availability. 

The idea that gained traction in my mind was pulling the boat out of the water in La Paz and leaving it in dry storage for the coming year. Afterward we'd have to travel home somehow. Then Rover offered to let us crew for the ride back to San Diego. That sounded even better: leave the boat in La Paz and ride to San Diego with Rover.

I set to work this morning and after some frustrating Spanish exchanges, finally located a boat yard with a lift that would give us space "on the hard."

The next challenge, after we arrive in San Diego, will be figuring out how to get to Seattle without subjecting ourselves to a flying petri dish. That's a decision that can wait a couple weeks. 

Business as Usual

Wandering around this town, you'd never know there was a global contagion under way in other parts of the world. Restaurants are bristling with customers, people are shopping, tourists are touring. Life hasn't changed since we were last here. Kay and I walked along the Malecón to dinner last night. We split a huge calzone and enjoyed our first salads in a long time.

While salad in Mexico might sound like a risky proposition, La Paz's water supply is served by desalination plants and is then chlorinated. That makes it fairly safe to order salads and drinks with ice. Their emphasis on clean water has made their tourism industry thrive. 

Lying in bed last night I began to think: just because there's no fear of contagion among the populous doesn't mean the city isn't infected with the virus. We should be a little smarter. I think each of us has had the same thought as we've all stuck to the boat today for most of the day.  Kay did some provisioning and I worked with the laborers, but we'll be limiting our explosure from now on. I hope for two things 

beyond good health: that French Polynesia will let us in. And that provisions will remain available. Fingers crossed. 

Back on the grid

After contacting Marina de La Paz on Monday morning we were finally assigned a slip. Turns out we're in the same slip we vacated two months ago. Quijote is back in her old familiar spot. She spent the holidays here turning into a barnicle garden while the crew flew home.

As luck would have it, a diver was cleaning the hull on the boat next to us when we arrived. I asked him to do our hull when he finished with theirs, so that was a chore quickly dispatched. Even better it was half the price I was led to expect. 

Another gentleman approached me to see if he could do some work for us. The hull below the toe rail and above the water line desperately needed waxing, so I asked him for a price to do that. Eighty dollars. Long pause. Each side. Pause. Your materials. We each had just enough of each other's language to muddle through a negotiation. In the end I paid him his eighty bucks, and a twenty four a tip, but for both sides with his materials, which is probably what we was angling for. Still, after sharing the effort of washing the boat with him beforehand, it took him and his son more than a couple hours to do the job and they did good work. Hence the tip. It was work I was glad not to have to do. 

Quijote

Kay has had just about enough of us.

Naturalistic Artistry

Sunset dining

We're back!

Arriving in La Paz, we called each marina in turn and were duely ignored. That was no surprise as this country is largely Catholic and it is Sunday. Thankfully we were able to shoehorn our way into the anchorage. After settling in, a gentleman in a ketch called over that we might have crossed our anchor rode over his. He was very friendly about it - hails from Prince Rupert. He'll be here "a while" though, so if we find a marina that will take us in the next day or two, we should be out of his way by the time he needs to pull his anchor up.

Another concern is that the current through this anchorage gets up to three knots back and forth as the tide ebbs and flows. Boats at anchor here do what they call the "La Paz Waltz." That's not a problem if they all Waltz together. So far they have, but we haven't been here long. As the wind and current have shifted over the last several hours, the ketch has moved from fifty yards abeam to a position thirty yards astern of us. That's closer than I'd like, but not so close as to make me move the anchor. Yet. Besides, if I give myself more room from him, I take away room from someone else. And that person might not be so friendly. The gentleman in the ketch might not be very friendly either if we remove paint from his hull. I just hope we don't find ourselves moving the anchor in the middle of the night. High tide comes at midnight, so it might be worth setting my alarm and poking my head up for a quick look around that time. Or maybe... it's a good time to delegate!

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Limbo

The reservations I made for the Marina in La Paz have been retracted. As of now they have no room for us. This is apparently because boats that were scheduled to leave have not done so. An alternate marina that I contacted also has no room.

Tomorrow is Sunday, so it's beginning to look like we're stuck in this anchorage, fifteen miles outside of La Paz for the weekend. That, or we'll have a go at anchoring off the marinas in La Paz. We haven't made a decision yet. The La Paz anchorage has a fair amount of current and boat traffic that will push us around. This anchorage is pretty buggy. Anchoring there would put us in position to take advantage of anything that opens up, but it will certainty be more noisy and less scenic. What to do.

We're hoping something will open up on Monday morning. Thankfully we have some wiggle room in our timing. We need to have the hull cleaned by a diver and we had hoped to get started on provisioning for the Pacific crossing that will commence in two weeks. We don't need to depart for Puerto Vallarta until the 22nd. If all goes according to plan, we'll arrive in PV on the 26th, meet Cody on the 30th, and start the passage to the Marquesas on April 1st.

Unfortunately for vessels crossing the Pacific via the Panama Canal, Panama has closed their marinas to foreign vessels. It isn't clear how those boats will get fresh water or provisions. The word is all ports of entry into Ecuador are also closed. I guess our challenges are mild by comparison. We hope.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Back to La Paz, Friendly farewells

We'll be back to life in the big city on Sunday. The wildlife appears to be sad to see us go. We've had some visitors drop by to wish us fond farewells. It started yesterday evening with a couple of cormorants perched on the upper spreaders. The boat was rocking in the wind, so it demanded as much flying as standing to perch themselves up there. I started by assuming they wouldn't stay long, but there they remained. Then I worried they'd outlive their welcome and poop all over the boat, giving new meaning (or not) to the term poopdeck. So I rattled the halyards and banged on the shrouds to raise their sense of discomfort, but it didn't faze them. I eventually gave up and was rewarded a few minutes later with a milky splat that ricocheted off the canvas dodger and onto the side of my face. The cheeky bastard couldn't have aimed it more perfectly. It was Kay who finally settled the matter by freeing the end of the spinnaker halyard and flipping it at their back sides.

This morning we were visited by a gull perched on the dinghy. He appeared to be as insistent on staying as the cormorants had been and quite intent on staring at us. He was a beautiful bird. When we saw bands on each of his legs, we postulated that maybe he has learned that being counted comes with being fed. Not wanting the dinghy to share the same fate as the dodger, or my face, we had an easier time chasing this visitor off.

A couple hours later we were visited by a young sea lion. I'd have pegged him for a seal, but Kay is certain there are no seals in the area. She's a lot more well read on the subject than I am, so a young sea lion it is. He was inquisitive and friendly, swimming circles around the boat, rubbing his back on the hull, showing us his belly, and posing with flipper touching his nose as though auditioning for Sea World.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Short Hopping

We've been short hopping our way down an island coast for a few days. Last night we tucked into a small one boat cove that was supposed to house blue footed boobies. We found the place where the chart indicated the rookery should be and even located the exact spot in the book where photos of the birds were taken, but sadly there were no boobies. There was good protection in that cove though, so even though the wind kicked up after dinner, we didn't get tossed around too much.

This morning we nosed our way around the corner into a larger cove, actually a slot between two Islands. Caleta Partida (Split Cove) has shoal water areas that the pelican love to fish in. I can hear them crashing into the water behind me as I write. There are fish camps around the perimeter of the cove, semi-permanent dwellings for local fishermen to use when they're out here doing their thing.

We'll have a lot more company tonight. There was a steady stream of boats heading out as we entered. There are only four boats in here at the moment, but the day is still young, so there is plenty of time for more boats to join in the fun latter this afternoon.

We're only a few hours out of La Paz with four days on our itinerary to get there, so for the next three days we'll continue our short hopping until it's time to go in and trade the scenery for showers and internet.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

The tale of the breached breaches

The tale is truthfully about stained breaches, but what kind of a title would that be? An unseemly one for sure. 'Tis better to be unseamly.

We arrived at our new anchorage this morning and headed for shore, then split off in different directions to blow off our ya-yas. I hiked to the top of a ridge and got back to the dinghy shortly before the other two. While I waited the wind started to build, blowing across the bay. We were one of the first boats to arrive today, so that gave us pole position in the upwind corner of the bay. While changing out of our hiking shoes and into our beach shoes (the shoes we don't mind getting wet), we strategized about how best to get back to Quijote without being blown out into the San Jose channel. We decided to drag the dinghy along the shore to where we were upwind of the boat and let the breeze blow us back to the boat. We just didn't want to miss it. Kay speculated that we might not need to worry: if the wind blew the dinghy past the boat, maybe it would blow us to the other side of the bay. Then it would just be a matter of of hiking the dingy along the shore to the other side, where we could try again. I couldn't decide if that would be considered optimistic or not.

So we pulled the dinghy along the shore to the upwind corner. Of course the shore wasn't a white sandy beach along that stretch. That would be way too easy. No, it had to have super slick, round rocks covered in algae and barnicles. The dinghy faired better than I did, since I was holding on to the bow line while I hopped from rock to rock and the wind was blowing it off the rocks. For my part, all it took was one stumble and I found myself nursing a bloody gouge on my ankle. Ah well; it goes with the territory. As it turns out, we needn't have worried. Unnoticed in all the dinghy futzing, the wind died, so we were able to row back to the boat in relative calm.

Back on the boat I went to work cleaning my battle wound and ended up with half a bottle of iodine on my shorts. I guess yellow isn't the worst color stain, but it's unseemly enough.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Feasting on fish

We're back in San Evaristo for a couple of nights. The village seems to serve as a hub for the local fishermen to offload their catch for shipment to market, presumably in La Paz. Pangas (we would call them skiffs) power into the bay at the end of the day from who knows where and add themselves to the crowd of people on shore and then speed away again.

It doesn't seem to matter to them if they come and go after dark with no lights on their boats. It doesn't even slow them down. It's not like they would be able to hear another boat coming in the opposite direction over the sound of their own motor. Why wouldn't they be more concerned about the possibility of running into someone? Maybe they can see better than I can. I know they can see better than I can. It must be good enough.

Petar has proven himself to be proficient at negotiating on our behalf for fresh fish in that melee. And Kay has done an awesome job preparing the results of his efforts. I help with the eating and I do a fine job of it if I do say so myself.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Raining somewhere

We're in an anchorage that's somewhat exposed tonight; here because it's one we didn't visit on our way north and because the wind will be somewhere else tonight. Or so they say.

It's a spot they call Mangle Solo (Mangrove Alone). I'm not sure what that means, but maybe there was a Mangrove here at one time that has since died of a broken heart. There is a lagoon across the spit and where there's a lagoon there is usually a Mangrove.

We got sprinkled on today for the second time in six weeks. They don't get a lot of rain around here - at least not at this time of year. We saw lightning in the distance, so it's raining somewhere.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Questions

We didn't travel far today - a whopping two miles south around the corner to Puerta Los Gatos. There is only one other boat in here so far. They're a Canadian couple from Victoria who visit their boat in Baja every year. There seems to be a lot of that. Folks pull their boat out of the water when it gets too hot or hurricanes become more likely, and fly home. The Canadians motored their dinghy over for a chat.

The virus that's been in the news was front and center in their minds, especially when they heard we're from Seattle. They filled us in on the impact on nursing homes in the Seattle area, but couldn't tell us much otherwise. There must be a lot going on in the world that we've been oblivious to. Maybe that's just as well. Maybe not.

On Quijote we talked about the virus and our special case of self imposed quarantine, a quarantine that will be broken periodically as we go ashore and as we are joined by new crew. We wondered what precautions we should take. We wondered if many countries will require airlines to turn away passengers that don't meet requirements for medical checks. Our agent tells us French Polynesia is requiring such a check within five days of crew flying in to meet us. We wondered what good it would do if the virus were contracted within that five days, or if the virus has already made its way throughout the global transport network, including French Polynesia. We agreed we had a lot of questions we wouldn't be able to answer for a while, perhaps mirroring discussions in homes around the world.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

A sunny, windy day

If I was out on Puget Sound, sunny and windy would sound exhilarating. Maybe it should sound that way here too, but instead it felt challenging. We woke to 32 knot gusts, with the wind generator having a conniption, screaming away hour after hour in the predawn hours before the sun came up. The boat was rocking about and various lines, buckets, and paddle boards were banging away to raise the dead. I checked the anchor alarm on my phone periodically to make sure we weren't going anywhere and then snuggled into my bag to defy the chaos and get a few more minutes of sleep. As if.

At 8 am there was no wind at all. The anchorage was like glass, so we ate some breakfast and pulled anchor. Part way toward the next stop, the wind picked up again and started blowing with its previous fury. First it blew from the bow, then from behind. One minute it was thirty knots, the next three. I've experienced abrupt wind changes, but none so continually abrupt. As I said to Kay: I wouldn't want to have to race in these conditions.

It was only a couple hours to the next anchorage, so I never did feel comfortable enough to break out the sails. Patar accused me of being a caravan sailor. Caravan is the European word for camper or RV. I had to agree: I'm more cruiser than racer, especially in those conditions.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

For the birds

We're in a new anchorage tonight - new in that we didn't stop here on our way north. That's as opposed to last night, where we repeated ourselves and spent two nights in Bahia Agua Verde again because, well... it's a pleasant place to stay for a couple of nights. Truthfully all the anchorages are nice, but some give better protection from the prevailing northerlies, some offer more in the way of recreational opportunities, and some have more wildlife to spy on. Bahia San Marte, where we are tonight, is one of the latter. It's loaded with birds.

When we arrived we noticed a small fishing vessel pulled up onto the beach. We couldn't see what he was up to, but we guessed he was cleaning his catch and heard latter that he was butchering a large mantaray (a species off limits for fishing). By the time Kay and I had mounted our paddle boards, the fishermen we're on their way out and the birds were on their way in. There were hundreds of them: gulls, vultures, pelicans, cormorants and others. They were having a feast on the fish detritus and making quite a racket. We left them to it.

While we're on the subject of bird watching, let's list our conquests so far. I'm no bird watcher, but Kay has a memory for such things that's matched only by her eyesight. Petar has good eyes too. Those two can identify with naked eyes, birds that I need binoculars just to find.

We've seen: yellow footed gull, Anna's humming bird, osprey, great blue heron, raven, crow, brown boobie, crested caracara, snowy egret, great egret, brown pelican, cormorant, belted kingfisher, greater roadrunner, magnificent frigate, turkey vulture, black crowned night heron, yellow crowned night heron, great blue heron, American oyster catcher, common tern, heermann's gull.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Fair weather risks

We made our escape from the marina yesterday with fuel tanks topped off. Getting in and out of marinas and fuel docks is always the most stressful part, but we time it well and didn't have much wind or other boats to contend with.

With calm winds we're taking time to stop at a couple of fair weather anchorages that we couldn't visit on our way north. We stopped at the SE end of Carmen Island last night. It was reported to offer whale sightings and nice views. Whales have been spotted, but they're a long way off. Tonight we'll see if there is anyone in a small cove called Caleta Candeleros Chico or Little Candlestick Cove. It's only got room for one boat so we'll head for an alternate if it's already occupied.

Kay is baking today. We're not entirely sure we have enough propane for such an extravagance, but brownies and banana muffins are worth the risk.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

It blows

We wait.

Mission Abort!

We've been docked in a marina at Puerto Escondido for several days now. We refilled our tanks, recharged the batteries, reprovisioned and enjoyed showers and Wi-Fi.  But, as nice as it is to take care of necessities, the crew was anxious to be under way again. There is only so much civilization we're inclined to tolerate.

The plan was to depart this morning, stop at the fuel dock and be on our way. The wind had other ideas. It was forecasted to blow fifteen knots today, gusting to 25, but we figured that traveling down wind as we were, it shouldn't be a problem.  The trouble came trying to get out of the slip.  

It's easy to turn the boat into the wind when there is forward motion and water is flowing over the rudder. We can even push water over the rudder with the propeller when the boat is standing still, but the turning force is much smaller and can't counter much wind. It is one thing to know all that and another to know how the present wind and the condition of the hull will impact our ability to turn. 

Had we been able to back the boat into the slip, it might have been easier to exit with a running start and turn the boat, but we were bow in and had to back the boat out of the slip and then start forward again. We were doomed. The wind just kept blowing the bow around, preventing me from turning into the wind. We were being pushed sideways down the marina. I was luckily able to duck into an empty slip several spaces downwind from where we started. We are so lucky we didn't crash into another boat - like one that might have been occupying the slip I was forced into.

The wind isn't supposed to let up for several days, so we'll be here for a while, trapped in an expensive marina with no way to get out until it calms a little. And how much is a little?

Oh well, at least the boat and crew are in one piece. The expense of the marina is much less than repairing someone else's boat. Thank goodness for inexpensive lessons. 

Kay's Blog address

For a more complete picture of this trip, I highly recommend Kay's Blog:

https://adventureswithkay.com/

I don't have the luxury (to say nothing of the inclination) for posting photos of myself, so Kay's Blog also offers evidence that I am actually participating! 😃

Sent from my rgPhone

Inquiring minds want to know!

Every now and then we find ourselves wishing we had better access to online information. Watching pelicans diving for fish for example, I wondered out loud: what is the life span of a pelican? The reason I was wondering that is because I stood in same spot twenty-five years ago, watching pelicans dive and it made me wonder how many generations of pelicans have come and gone in that time. Then Kay had a great idea: we should ask our loyal followers to post the answers to interesting questions as blog comments. We'll try that and see what kind of response is generated. For now, we're in port and can answer that question: Pelicans are reported to live 15 to 25 years in the wild, which means we could be seeing some of the same pelicans I saw 25 years ago.

Sent from my rgPhone

Vultures await

Quijote has wheels!

We usually wake to find Kay in this position with a hot cup of coffee

Porpoise Play

We appear to be in a porpoise play pen for the night, a veritable octopus' garden in the sea. The porpoises have been frolicking around the boat all afternoon, leaping completely out of the water at times as though they were trained at the San Diego aquarium. They splash about and slap their tails on the water like little kids let free for summer vacation. How interesting it would be to exchange places with them for a few moments. It's an idea without meaning, but fun to contemplate. They might find the experience more alarming than interesting.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Phosphorescence

We've seen phosphorescence in the water wherever we've gone, from Glacier Bay to Cabo, but it appears especially lively at times in the Sea of Cortez. We were enjoying a quiet dark evening after dinner a couple of nights ago, when fish started splashing. Each splash was accompanied by an explosion of light. After that light show settled down, we started to see twinkling under the water, brought about by random currents, then thin lines of light as fish jetted around. It was a scene reminiscent of the movie: "Life of Pi."

There is a lot less life in our current anchorage: Punta Pulpito. Fewer cacti, fewer birds, fewer fish; it feels more like a rock quarry than anything else we've seen. That didn't keep us from getting off the boat after breakfast this morning. With three crew, a dinghy and two paddle boards, we each chose a mode of transport and scattered. Petar walked, Kay paddled, and Rod scrambled up a hill. It was a hot day, but the exercise was awesome.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Not Speaking Spanish

The hike today was a good workout. It took us forty minutes or so to hump our way up to a local summit following an endless procession of cairns. The final fifty feet or so of elevation gain felt a bit like the rock on the North Twin Sister. We never did find the petroglyphs. As I told Kay: there are those who can find petroglyphs even when they're not looking for them, those who can find them when they are, and those who can't find them even when they look. We count ourselves in the last group.

While we were rowing the dinghy to shore, we aimed for a spot on the beach in front of a restaurant: Bertha's. Kay said we should ask the gentleman standing on the beach if it would be okay to leave our dinghy there while we hiked. There was some discussion about how to word the question in Spanish. We finally settled on "Podemos dejar nuestro dinghy aqui?"

While we pulled the dinghy up the beach I was walking backward assuming the beach was empty, but what I didn't know was that the guy had a puppy who was curious, or excited or whatever, so I accidentally walked backward over the poor puppy. It yelped and the guy scooped it up and stormed off while I tried to apologize in Spanish. I remember wondering why would he let his puppy get in our way? And: is the puppy okay? And: now who are we going to ask for permission to leave our dinghy? As it turned out, the restaurant was closed, abandoned, partially burned out, so there was no one around to care where we left our dinghy. And: later we met the guy and his puppy (who was fine) and he turned out to be an Aussi who didn't speak Spanish (at least to us).

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Eating well

It was the captain's turn to cook dinner tonight. I started early and did the Quijote shuffle around Kay as we both vied for galley space. While Kay whipped up four loaves of fresh french bread (OMG was that bread good, warm out of the oven and slathered in butter!), I fried onions, green peppers and ground sausage, then stirred in a jar of marinera sauce and served it over penne pasta.

We erected the cockpit table and enjoyed the meal under clear skies and the setting sun, then shared brownies still warm out of the oven when it was too dark to see. The brownies were rich and chewy. Kay likes to make the most out of a warm oven given our limited propane resource. You won't hear any complaints from the rest of us.

We talked a bit about propane while we gorged on brownies. Ideally it would be nice to enjoy fresh baked bread or brownies occasionally while crossing the Pacific, but we wonder if its too extravagant, given that opportunities to refill our propane tanks will be scarce.

It is certain that we won't eat as well while crossing the ocean as we do where fresh produce and propane are plentiful. But there is value in eating well and we should do what we can. We decided that if we have the comfort of knowing we will not go hungry, even if we run out of propane, we should be able to give priority to eating well. To that end, we'll stock canned foods that can be eaten cold if necessary: stew, beans, chili, veggies, meats, soups, fruit, etc. Then we'll eat hot meals while we can, fresh food while it lasts, mix in baked foods once in a while, and eat cold canned food if we have to.

That's the strategies anyway. Meals from canned food have the added benefit of being simple to to prepare when conditions get rough. And while it may not be what we would normally choose to eat, it won't last forever. Soon enough we'll find ourselves sitting in a restaurant in Papeete eating fresh fish and vegetables.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Lazy Afternoon

We enjoyed an active morning and a lazy afternoon today. For the last couple of days (and forecasts for the next three) we saw afternoon wind with night and morning calm. Anticipating that, we dinghied to shore early today, and did a short hike. It gave us a rather spectacular view of two anchorages: the one we're in and a more crowded cove to our west. It was so picturesque looking down on the blue-green water and the cluster of sailboats floating peacefully at their anchors. I especially love looking down into a cove where Quijote is anchored. It kind of makes a guy feel like a proud papa.

Back in the dinghy we found one of two hot springs marked on the map. It was a small tide pool at the waters edge, alternately mixed with hot water and cool seawater. Neither Kay nor I were dressed to to enjoy it, but Peter dived right in (killing his cell phone). We left him there to soak for half an hour while we rowed about, exploring the coastline.

The afternoon was filled with domestic pursuits as the wind picked up right on cue. Kay boiled eggs for tomorrow's lunch and washed windows while I serviced the filters in the watermaker and Peter tried to salvage his phone.

A dinghy in an anchorage on a windy day is worthy of caution. People have often been swept to sea, unable to counter the force of the wind with their oars if they have no outboard or it won't start. It's something we are careful to avoid, never stepping into the dinghy without being confident we know what to expect from the weather.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Electronic Charting

The electronic charts are all over the place.

We enjoyed a long day in the sunshine today slogging along the Baja coastline. We plodded our way upwind for more than ten hours. It was good to charge the batteries and fill the fresh water tanks while making significant progress north. After we rounded the point into Bahia Conception it took us another two hours in a cold north wind to sail south again to our anchorage.

Getting into the anchorage was somewhat confusing. We knew where we were going, but were navigating with four different electronic chart sources. The boat's plotter has one source called CMAX, the laptop has navigation software called TimeZero, and my phone and iPad have Navionics and iNavX. And are all contradictory. The plotter is very coarse and wildly inacurate, so we have't bothered with it since arriving in Mexico. Time zero has better detail, but carries a large offset which makes it impossible to use under way while in Mexico. Navionics is more accurate, but shows the current anchorage as drying and generally can't be trusted for anchoring. The iNavX data that I downloaded from the guide book's website is a life saver. I don't know what we would do without it. Or what people did twenty years ago. Actually I do know: the same thing we did in Puget Sound twenty years ago: paper charts and dead reckoning. It's nice to have an alternative to reliving those days.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

All's swell

We were five and a half hours under way today in mostly calm, placid water. The winds kicked up from the south as we arrived, so we were left with the decision to anchor for the winds as they were or for the winds as they were forecasted to be. I opted for the latter, figuring that wind from an unforecasted direction would probably not remain long. That was the case, as it turns out.

It's usually preferable to anchor on the side of the bay from which the wind is blowing because the land dampens its velocity and because there is less distance for the waves to build. Swell from the open water outside the bay will also be bigger on the downwind side as it refracts around the point where it enters the bay.

We can tell the wind is blowing outside the anchorage because there is substantial swell rolling us about, but it must have backed from the north because the hills are offering protection and we're not feeling it. We have no wind, but a lot of swell rocking us about.

We might have a few days in this anchorage, partly because it's lovely and there is recreating to be done, and partly because the next good anchorage to the north is a good ten hours away. We'll want to do it on a calm day or a day when the wind is from the south.

Mmmm... It smells like dinner is nearly ready.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Feels like home

Showers and internet today - first time in over two weeks. The shower was bliss; the Internet, not so much. At least it's free and reasonably functional as long as you confine your work to the "Mariner's Lounge".

When we were ready to return to the boat the wind was up and the seas were pitching. We had to get back though, so we headed out into it against our better judgment. I managed to get us back without capsizing the dinghy, but we were all soaked to the bone in sea water. So much for the fresh water shower.

The watermaker failed again. Same symptoms, different cause. This time the feed pump wasn't running. I traced the problem to a loose wire. I can wiggle the connector to make it work. Sigh. At lest I know what the problem is. That or I'm like the chipmunk that lifts his tail and an acorn drops in front of him, so he keeps lifting his tail expecting the same result.

We made a provisioning run into Loredo today, fourteen miles. $25 each way for a taxi, $35 to rent a car for the day. No busses. We opted for the car rental. Afternoon winds were similar to yesterday so rather than being treated to another seawater shower we paid a water taxi to ferry us back to the boat. It was $5 well spent. We were carrying too much cargo for the dinghy anyway. We are well stocked with fresh produce.

Kay talked to someone that has been getting out here every year for ages and she said they have never before seen it so cold and windy. I've been wondering about that. This just doesn't feel like Mexico.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Hiking Isla San Francisco

Ensenada Grande

Los Gatos

The Watermaker is working!

Yahoo! I woke this morning with the watermaker on my mind, running through strategies. With no way to flush it weekly, I needed to sacrifice three gallons of fresh water to preserve the membrane if I ever hoped to be able to make use of it again. So I returned to the manual to review the pickling procedure.

While my nose was in the manual, I re-read the section on bypassing the sensors. It was, I think, a misunderstanding that led me to believe that the section didn't apply to me or was not something that I could execute. When I re-read it, it clicked into place with a new clarity. It was exactly what I needed and thanks to some hardware I installed for sampling the product output, I would be able to follow the procedure easily. Best of all, I wouldn't need to spend any water to try it out. It would either make water or it wouldn't and I'd know right away whether the sensor or the pump was bad.

After disconnecting some tubes and reconfiguring the system, I flipped a switch on the control box and the pumps fired up: no water and the Clark pump wasn't cycling. That suggested to me that either the Clark pump wasn't working properly or it wasn't getting the water it needed. If the latter was the case... then I looked at the service valve. The yellow handle was in the middle position covering the label that said OFF. I turned that handle down, fired up the pumps and immediately began generating water!

It was all a procedural error on my part after pickling the system several months ago, I didn't put the handle back in the right position. Dang! But Yahoo!

I celebrated by running the watermaker for an hour, making six gallons of water and spending three to flush the membrane - just what it needed. I ran the engine for that hour so we'd be charging, rather than discharging the batteries. Tomorrow I'll run it again while we're motoring to the next anchorage.

The desalinator is back in business!

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Noon Sights

We're on day three at the Puerto Los Gatos (The Cats) anchorage waiting for the winds to die down before we proceed northward. Tucked in behind a prominent point of land and protected from the north winds, we can peer out into the open water and be thankful we have a place to hide. The whitecaps look intimidating out there.

While we wait I thought I'd practice some celestial navigation and take a few noon sights with my sextant. The sun lifts itself from the horizon every morning and settles back down again every night. Somewhere in between those events, it passes the meridian, a point where it's at its maximum point above the horizon. It's the actual time of noon for that point on the planet. The time of the meridian tells you your longitude and the height at the meridian can tell you your latitude.

I used tables in the Nautical Almanac to predict the time of the meridian passage (12:38), then used my sextant to observe that the height of the sun above the horizon slowly increased before 12:38 and then decreased thereafter. I used the height measured at exactly 12:38 to calculate (with more tables and some arithmetic) our latitude: 25 deg 13' N. The GPS says our actual latitude is 25 deg 18' N, a difference of 5 minutes or about 5 miles. I'm happy with that, especially considering my horizon is actually a distant shoreline. Five miles is close enough to find an island in the Pacific if we lose our GPS. Next up: sighting stars and planets.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Resources

One of the more challenging aspects of cruising in a small boat is making limited resources last until they can be replenished. Food, fuel, water, propane, and battery storage are primary resources that have to be carefully monitored on a trip like this. You can turn fuel into battery storage with the alternator, or battery storage into water if you have a desalinator. And you can move the boat without fuel if you have wind and sails, but regardless of how you trade resources off, they are constantly dwindling. Entropy always wins.

I've put some effort into improving our hand in the resource game over the last few years. I installed a couple of removable solar panels with charge controllers. I retrofitted the nonfunctional wind generator and installed a charge controller for it. I replaced the engine alternator with one that produces a higher output. I improved the fuel filtration, installed water filtration, made multiple repairs to the desalinator, and installed a salt water foot pump in the galley for washing dishes.

In spite of all that investment of time and money, we find ourselves losing the resource game when it comes to fresh water. Regrettably, this is a familiar story. In Alaska several years ago, we had to curtail one leg when the fresh water tanks didn't get filled properly or we used more than we thought we were using. The cause wasn't clear, but regardless, we've learned how to be more frugal, learned how to use less water.

We started out this leg with 110 gallons in the boat's fresh water tanks and then, with about a third of that remaining, I reluctantly decided to try to make more water with the desalinator. I say reluctantly because the desalinator on this boat has a sorted history. Every time I try to use it, something fails. Pressure sensors, then the salinity sensor, then a cracked membrane vessel end cap. Each time I got it working, I tested it in Puget Sound and it worked great, then when I wanted to actually make fresh water, it failed anew.

And the thing about reverse osmosis desalinators is that they have to be flushed with fresh water to keep them functional, so it doesn't just fail to make water, it costs water. You have to run it for twenty minutes to make up the water you lose before you begin to make ground. If I'd been able to run the desalinator for six hours as intended, I'd have made 45 gallons and paid five gallons. Instead we just paid five gallons. And then, not wanting to have nothing to show for that five gallons, I worked on the problem hoping to resolve it and paid another five gallons. It's enough to make a guy pull out his hair by the roots.

Thankfully SV Rover has a fully functional watermaker and donated ten gallons to the cause, so we are back where we started, but without a working water maker.

I contacted the service representative for the manufacturer by email and learned that the most likely cause this time is the stroke sensor. If that doesn't mean anything to you, you're not alone. I didn't have a clue what a stroke sensor is either, but it apparently senses water flow and gives a thumbs up to the onboard computer. Lacking that, the desalinator shuts down.

So now the big question is: is the sensor bad or something else? If I was home I would just replace the sensor and see what happens, but working in the middle of Mexico with all its concomitant difficulties, I'm thinking maybe we'll go to plan B: additional water storage. I brought eight five gallon collapsible water jugs for just such a purpose. That won't be enough to wash our hair, but it'll help us ward off thirst.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Something for Everyone

We're in a quiet little double cove tonight called San Evaristo after the name of the village that occupies it, mostly people who fish for a living. A gentleman on a boat called Second Wind has been here for a week and is the only other occupant of the lobe of the cove that we're in. He rowed his dinghy over to say hi before we even had our anchor out. We were anxiously attempting to sort out a kink in the chain without the anchor being properly set, while hearing all about a whale and her calf that had wandered through the cove recently.

We didn't come far today: four miles or so across the channel. The spot was chosen for its protection from the northern winds that have been forecasted to move in tonight. They're expected to rip all day tomorrow, so we'll be here for a couple of nights.

Kay and I took advantage of a nice day today though, paddling around the perimeter of the cove in our standup boards while Petar motored the dinghy into town in search of internet. There's something for everyone.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

An Evening to Herself

With three of us on board we've been rotating cooking duties for the two regular meals we eat each day. Lunch is usually a light snack. That means we're each responsible for cooking breakfast one day, dinner the next day, and we're free from cooking the day after.

Yesterday was my day to make dinner. I boiled a chicken, shredded it, and flavored the stock with bullion. Then I fried chopped onion, crushed garlic and poblano chilis in olive oil. I added the chicken and stock, chopped tomatoes, and substituted left over pasta for the cooked rice the recipe called for. I have to say the flavor of the sauce was exceptional.

Regrettably Kay wasn't on board to share the meal with us, so Petar and I enjoyed it in the cockpit while we watched the sun go down. Where was Kay, you might wonder? She was eating cold left-over spaghetti in her tent on the beach. What a girl won't do to get away from the boys for a night. Word has it she enjoyed a lovely evening to herself.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Staying Put

Alert Quijote followers who have been keeping an eye on our In-Reach tracking will no doubt have observed disappointing progress. So what gives? Have they really been sitting in one place for four days? Pretty much. The first two days were deliberate because we like the anchorage we're in. But then the winds picked up for a couple of days and gave us the choice of bashing our way up wind for six hours to the next anchorage, or staying put and enjoying more of a good thing. So here we are. We'll be on our way tomorrow though as winds are predicted to be more moderate for the next several days. The nice thing about windy winter weather in Mexico is that it makes temperatures pleasant and keeps the bugs away. Our anchorages so far have been relatively bug free.

We anticipate good hiking and snorkeling tomorrow afternoon, which might tempt us to linger for two nights. Granted hiking and snorkeling is exactly what we've been doing at this anchorage, but such is life on a boat in the Sea of Cortez.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com

Scrub a dub-dub

I have little doubt that this trip will be a huge learning experience. There will be all sorts of times that I will look back on and say: If I had it all to do over again, this is what I would do differently...

Leaving La Paz yesterday I could tell right away that we were under powered. What was going on? Were we really underpowered or dragging a dead horse behind the boat? The 2000 rpm of engine speed that usually generates 6 knots of boat speed was giving us around 4 knots on our way out of La Paz. I had two choices: throttle up and double our fuel consumption or put up with the slower speed. We weren't in a big hurry, so I chose the latter, but it was a problem that needed solving.

I've heard about other boats making this kind of trip describing the marine growth they experience in tropical waters, but I'd hoped that a fresh coat of hull paint would give me a period of grace. When Kevin dove under the hull at the first Mexican anchorage during the Haha, I was pleased to see in his videos that the hull looked great. It was clear though that two months in La Paz had taken a toll on the condition of the hull

So it was that I found myself spending the better part of an afternoon with mask, snorkel, and kitchen spatula scraping muscles and barnacles off the hull and propeller. The tenacity of those mollusks is impressive. Later on the beach while chatting with Eric from Rover he told me he paid a guy $90 in La Paz to scrape his hull for him. Why didn't I know to do that? Yet another item in a long list of things I would do differently. Preparation is all about keeping that list as short as possible.

----------
Sent via SailMail, http://www.sailmail.com