Good Bye Mexico

The winds have been averaging about 5 knots since last night. This has led to calm seas with easy motoring over gentle ocean swells. We have traveled 930 miles since leaving Puerto Vallarta last Sunday. We are pushing it a bit and motoring at 7+ knots, but fighting an adverse current of up to a knot, so we are making 6+ knots over the ground. San Diego is 135 miles away and we expect to arrive Sunday afternoon. Our first stop will be the police dock where we will complete customs and immigration formalities. We think we can probably stay there overnight, but if not we will need to find a slip somewhere.

Temperatures were in the high 50′s last night. The skies have been overcast all day and the temperature barely got into the low 60′s. The water temp is also in the low 60′s.

Charley made coffee and Bart made cranberry and bananna nut muffins for breakfast. Stu made steak sandwiches for lunch and has a beef stew bubbling away on the stove for dinner. The boys spent the day shooting the breeze in the cockpit and covered a wide range of topics.

The highlight of the day was a visit by a tiny yellow bird, no more than 2 inches long. This guy was definitely not sea adapted and looked pretty pooped. We were 20 miles offshore at the time so we are not sure how he made it out this far. He was flapping like crazy to catch up with Snug Harbor and landed in our cockpit. He hopped around for a couple of hours and was not intimidated by us. He spent some time sitting on Bart’s head and made three separate visits to Stu. Stu was wearing his foul weather gear, which had a nice protected spot under his chin where our little friend settled in out of the wind. He even dozed off a couple times in there. Eventually our yellow buddy took off. At one point we were also surrounded by lots of cavorting dolphins.

Birdie #1 visits with Bart

Birdie #1 Visits with Stu

Birdie #1 Settles in for a Nap

Birdie #1 eventually flew off and was replaced by birdie #2.  Birdie #2 was more intimidated by the crew and flew off after a short visit.

Birdie #2 Takes a Breather on Snug Harbor

Once we get to San Diego we will check out the forecast and decide whether to make a bee line for San Francisco, or do some more leisurely harbor hopping up the coast.

Commander’s Weather says GO!

We motored into 20 knot breezes and steep seas until midnight last night. The wind and seas then gradually calmed down and was replaced by a blanket of fog. The crew unanimously agreed that dripping wet was a lot better than bashing into head seas.

You may be wondering how the crew sleeps when the boat is crashing and hobby horsing into head seas. Actually we have all been sleeping quite well, although with the interruptions required by our rolling three hour watch schedule. The captain is sleeping in the forward cabin, which has the most extreme up and down motion. His technique is to put in ear plugs and close the door to the main cabin. This renders him deaf to all sounds except for a faint muted bang whenever the boat is doing a particularly violent crash of the top of a wave into a trough. The captain lies down in the berth, closes his eyes and then all he feels is a sensation of getting tossed up and down. Once the sound is gone, the tossing is actually pretty gentle. It reminds me of a kid with a baseball in his hand that is playing one handed catch – tossing the ball up a few inches then catching the ball – except I am the ball and the kid is the boat. I drop off in no time. I even had a dream that I was driving a car that had bad shocks and was lurching all around on the edge of control. Fortunately I woke up before I crashed and realized the lurching was the boat.

The fog cleared after the sun came up and we pulled into Turtle Bay at 8 am. As We entered the bay we were met by a Panga named “Gordo, Jr” with three young lads who wanted to be sure we came to the fuel dock run by their boss, Enrico. We queried “quanto cuesta” for diesel and they told us 11.7 pesos per liter. We asked if a dollar a liter was OK and they said they didn’t know, they would have to talk to the boss. The left for a while, held a conference call via VHF radio with Enrico on the dock and after a while waved us in. We took on 285 liters, or 75 gallons, which worked out to 5 1/3 miles per gallon from Cabo San Lucas. Not so good until you consider that Snug Harbor is 47 ft long and weighs close to 30,000 pounds. The cost worked out to $3.80 a gallon – a dollar or two less than I expect to pay in the US. Thank you PEMEX!

Turtle Bay Fuel Dock with Thumbs Up From Enrico

After fueling up we dropped the anchor, caught up on showers, called home and Commander’s Weather, checked the diesel and cooked breakfast. Commander’s predicted light winds and calm seas the rest of the way to San Diego. Bart baked a cinnamon coffee cake and Stu made ham, cheese and veggie omelets. We upped anchor at 10:30 am and devoured the omeletes and the entire coffee cake as we motored out of Turtle Bay. At 2:00 pm we got a 10 knot westerly and we had a nice close reach at 7 knots for 2 hours. It was one of those memorable sails where the sun was out, the boat was chugging along with a head of steam and repeatedly climbing up, and over, long period ocean swells.

We made 3 whale sightings and repeatedly saw sea lions surrounded by birds feeding off the scraps of fish left over from the sea lion’s just finished meal.

Given the big breakfast we had sandwiches and ramen noodle soup for dinner.

We have now traveled 780 miles from Puerto Vallarta and have 266 miles to go to San Diego. We are hoping to get there by late Sunday afternoon. We have a light breeze and are motor sailing through a gentle ocean swell.

Bashing at Last

We had calm conditions until 2 pm today when a westerly breeze came up that let us turn off the diesel and have a great sail for two hours. However, the breeze backed to the northwest and built to 20 knots. By 6 pm the seas responded to the breeze and we are now bashing into a steep chop – lots of pounding, spray and burying the bow in waves which has slowed us down quite a bit. We have 80 miles to go to get to Turtle Bay and still expect to be there tomorrow morning.

Sandwiches for dinner tonight.

That’s all for now – working on the computer below decks in these conditions is too much of a temptation for Mr. Mal de Mer.

Bahia Santa Maria in Rear View Mirror

We have now made 490 miles since departing Puerto Vallarta on Sunday. Commander’s Weather has been spot on with their forecast of light conditions. Since last night’s post the winds have been 3-10 knots resulting in calm seas – perfect upwind motoring conditions. After sneaking past Cabo Falso yesterday we decided to hug the concave shoreline rather than take the direct rum line route to Bahia Santa Maria. This involved motoring some extra miles, but the payoff was that we caught a half knot counter current that pushed us north. The rum line course that would have had us bucking a the prevailing 1/2 to 1 knot southern current. This allowed us to cover 160 miles in 24 hours, which were all pleased with. We passed Bahia Santa Maria this afternoon, and are now heading for Turtle Bay which is 210 miles further north. Our course will take us about 50 miles off shore, so we will be out of sight of land for a day or so. If conditions hold we expect to get there Friday, fill up the diesel tanks, anchor just long enough to check the engine, and then head for San Diego.

The weather is now significantly cooler. The water temperature is 63 degrees, down from 80 degrees in Puerto Vallarta. The air temperature feels like mid to upper 60′s during the warmest part of the day, but maybe my blood has thinned and it is not really that cold. We spent the wee hours of this morning in pea soup fog which had the night watch bundled up in fleece and full foulies.

We saw lots of dolphins and some seals swimming together today. There was commotion going on all around us. Eventually a number of dolphins came over and played in our bow wake, giving us a show of which I never tire.

We have had three salt water leaks thru hatches. The first one was caused by the small hatch over the kitchen sink. It got opened one night when we were cooking and we forgot about it. The boat had been sailing fine on autopilot when Charley decided to try hand steering. In less than a minute Charley bore off too much and buried the bow in a wave. White water came rolling down the deck and poured into the open hatch. The best part was that Stu was sleeping on the salon couch and got a direct hit in the face from the torrent. A couple inches of salt water also found its way into the dry locker to the left of the galley sink. We also left the hatch over the forward head open by mistake and got everything in there pretty drenched. Charley also found a slow drip in the hatch over his berth, which explained why the berth has been feeling a little damp.

The crew is doing a lot of reading – Charley just finished Stu’s gift of an 800 page tome on Mexican history, which was a real eye opener. Bart finished “Currency Wars” by James Rickards and Charley is now reading it. Bart is now reading “The Intelligent Investor” by Benjamin Graham on Charley’s Kindle and “Empire of the Summer Moon” by S.C. Gwynne on the rise and fall of the Commanche Indians. Stu just finished a book on the Franco Prussian war and is now reading “The Affair” by Jean-Denis Bredin which is about the treason trial of Alfred Dreyfus.

The Long Passage Allowed the Crew to Do a Lot of Reading

Dinner was a blend of pasta, sausage and Dave’s Organic Pasta Sauce.

Today’s biggest problem is that we ate the last of the Mexican wedding cookies.

Cabo San Lucas Pit Stop

We arrived at Cabo San Lucas at 8 am Tues morning. We went straight to fuel dock and topped off the tanks. Charley tracked down the “paper man”, Victor, who came by the fuel dock and picked up our passports and boat papers for clearing out of Mexico. We then anchored of the beach and took well deserved showers. Bart even swam into the beach for for a while. Charley called for an update from Commander’s Weather and got the great news that it was expected to be light winds for the next week all the way to San Diego. We want light winds because we have to motor into the wind and the waves the wind creates. It generally blows really hard (20-30 knots) down the Baja coast in the spring so we are really lucking out. We hopped a water taxi back to the harbor and visited the supermercado to stock up on provisions for the leg to San Diego before having lunch at the Baja Cantina where Victor met us at 1:15 with our completed paperwork. We hopped a water taxi back to the boat and departed by 2 pm.

The first challenge was to get around Cabo Falso,which has a long history of preventing passage due to the acceleration of winds and waves at this prominent cape at the tip of Baja. Our cruising guide warned that winds typically are 10 -15 knots higher at the Cabo Falso, than they are just 4 miles way in the harbor at Cabo San Lucas. The cruising guide also gave Rule # 5 for the Baja Bash, which is “Don’t transit a prominent cape in the afternoon.” as this is when winds are highest. The captain however made a bold decision and ignored rule #5. His comfort came from Rule #6 “Be prepared to leave as soon as you have a favorable weather window.” The wind got up to 19 knots and the seas got pretty bouncy as we passed Cabo Falso, but then calmed down quickly. We are now motoring north into light winds and a gentle ocean swell.

Rounding Cabo Falso on an Unusually Calm Day

We hope to make Turtle Bay, which is half way up Baja, by Friday morning.

Our only significant problem is that we have eaten all the chocolate chip cookies that Elin sent with Bart.

75 Miles from Cabo San Lucas

Midnight Sunday we turned off the diesel and started sailing on a close reach in 10-18 knots of wind. We kept the sails up until 2 pm on Monday when the wind direction changed to our disadvantage and we turned Mr Diesel back on. The waves have been building from an average of 3 ft to 5 feet + and are getting closer together. We are heeling quite a bit and as we sail and motor up and down the waves are periodically getting launched and landing with a bang. There is constant noise and commotion and we are all working on getting our 60+ year old sealegs back. Moving around below decks and finding a comfortable way to wedge yourself into a berth in a steeply tilted upwind world is more challenging than our downwind run down the coast where the boat was generally upright.

Stargazing was excellent last night. With the nearest land over a hundred miles away there is no ambient light and there are more stars and planets visible than you can imagine. Bart and Charley used Charley’s “Night Sky” phone app to ID stars and constellations. Bart was thrilled to see the Southern Cross.

Other than one cruise liner we have seen no boats or wildlife since my last report.

The crew are all doing well – no mal de mer despite the bumpy ride – and getting plenty of naps between watches. Spouses will be pleased to know that lifejackets and safety lines are being used 24/7.

We still expect to arrive Cabo San Lucas early Tuesday morning. The chores will be to top off the diesel tanks, get our departure paperwork completed, buy some more provisions, and update the weather forecast. If the forecast holds then we hope to depart Cabo early Wednesday morning.

We just finished a dinner of broccoli salad and fresh baked corn muffins. Can you believe the three old guys are eating vegetarian?

Departed Puerto Vallarta for Cabo San Lucas

My crew for the trip north are Stu Conway and Bart English. Both are old sailing buddies from high school, with lots of offshore experience who are delightful company to boot. We have reasonably similar views on economics and politics so the risk of fist fights and premature crew desertion seems low.

Bart English and Stu Conway, Crewmates Extraordinaire

We left Paradise Village for good at 9 am this morning, made a stop in La Cruz to top off the diesel tanks, and then headed WNW for Cabo San Lucas. All is well as we are motoring with clear skies at 6 knots into a 10 knot breeze and 3 – 5 foot swells. We expect the 287 mile trip to take two days which should get us to Cabo San Lucas early Tuesday morning.

The sights so far have included lots of boobies dive bombing for fish around the boat, a few frigate birds and pelicans, one sounding of a humpback whale and hundreds of rays swimming by the boat just below the surface. The rays are brown on top and white on the bottom and in the shape of a two foot wide square diamond.

We have just had dinner. Charley cooked up some spanish rice, which is a favorite recipe that his mom used to make for him, the the crew all enjoyed. We finished it off with snickers bars for dessert. We are starting to pound a bit more on the waves, but hopefully that will stop as the winds die off after sunset. the sun is setting and we are now about 50 miles off shore and passing some large islands which are used to house Mexican convicts. We are giving them a wide berth as the authorities get pretty upset if you pass too close.