We Made It

Saturday, August 1. Bahia de Las Animas to Ensenada el Pescador.
We were awakened by rollers coming into the bay. It started at 6:00am which is early but not like before when they came in at 2:00-3:00am. We are leaving sometime this morning for Ensenada el Pescador. It is only a 3 nautical mile trip so we will be going slowly. Peter and Marni have to make water so they will be taking their time as well.

About 8:45am Peter and Marni start their engine and Peter is at the bow getting ready to hand crack the anchor up. We start our engine and get everything ready, don our headsets and Dave goes forward to raise the anchor. Everything went well and then all of a sudden the electric up button on the windless didn’t work. We turned the switch off and then back on again, reset the switch and still nothing. Dave is going to get his exercise this morning. I offered to help but he said he would do it, so I put the helm in neutral and the wheel in midship position and went forward to tell him where he was on the anchor chain and when I could see the anchor. I called Peter and told him what happened and he said to tell Dave to relax and just do what he needed to do and they would wait. It was about 9:00am when Dave got the anchor up and we were on our way. The down button worked but not the up. Dave will check things out when we get to our new anchorage.

As we got to deep water I dumped the contents of my compost container overboard and then we broke up the bottles and tossed them overboard. They don’t burn so you have to do that. Eventually it becomes sea glass which ends up in craft items. Then we raised the headsail since we had a little wind and did some motor sailing. Our baby pelican, George, caught up to us and wanted to hitch a ride but we shooed him away. Peter and Marni put both their sails up, but they have a light boat and they use to race it. It takes more wind for us since we are heavier. We ended up tacking back and forth until we got close to the entrance of the anchorage, then we rolled in the sail. Marni and Peter went further out from shore to try and catch a dorado. All they caught was skipjack tuna. They don’t want any more of those. They aren’t the greatest tasting fish and it is red meat.

We put in a waypoint to the place recommended to anchor and when we got close we dropped the anchor. It was pretty rolly and we were being tossed about and in the troughs. Peter and Marni were right behind us coming in and they called us to say they were going in further behind the island for more protection from the swells. Dave wanted to be closer to the mark but we decided we would be in the troughs and that would be too rolly if we stayed there so we followed Peter and Marni. This meant we had to crank up the anchor by hand again. This time I told Dave I would do it. So I did for most of it then Dave did the rest. We went over by Peter and Marni and anchored about 100 or so feet away from them. To the north side of us there is an island called Isla el Pescador that is a bird haven. We didn’t want to get too close to that as when the wind blows just right it isn’t a pleasant smell. So we kept our distance. We still had rollers but not as bad as when we anchored the first time.
LOG: 6815.5NM TRIP: 6.21NM
LOCATION: 28̊ 55:459N/113̊ 23:325W
ARRIVAL: 12:00PM
ENG. HRS: 1294
On the south side of where we are there is a long sandy beach with 10 palapa cabins and one large building used for meals and such. It used to be a resort but now is abandoned. I hope to explore that tomorrow and look for shells. We are staying here tonight and tomorrow and leave on Monday. There are some clouds in the sky to the south but nothing threatening. There has been a nice breeze all day which is slacking off a little. I hope it doesn’t stop completely.

We managed to see a sperm whale about a boat length off our starboard side. It was huge. It never surfaced again and we didn’t see any others.

Sitting at anchor I can hear the birds call to one another, the waves wash over the rocks at the shallow end of Isla el Pescador and the boat is just heading into the wind and rolling along on the waves coming into the bay. It is relaxing.

When we got anchored, Dave investigated the up button on the anchor. Then he had to take the bookshelf out at the head of our bed. He found a loose connection and tightened it but still the button didn’t have any power so he made the down button work as an up, while the up button is dead right now. Dave says the solenoid is good but he thinks the switch for the up button is dead. So he will look at that later. Meantime we don’t have to manually raise the anchor. Also if we had to leave here in a hurry we can do that.
I siphoned the water out of the back tray for the air conditioner, wiped up the residue left over from the raw water pump, washed clothes and hung them outside. No bees!!! Dave took a nap and I caught upon the journal. Oh yeah! I forgot to tell you. When we had our headsail out, I looked up to the top of the mast to see what direction the wind was coming from and saw that our windex was bent!!! Some big bird sat on it. I bet it was a boobie. They are notorious for landing on masts. On second thought, it could have been an osprey. Now either Peter or I will have to go to the top of the mast to fix that and we also need to have the anchor light looked at as it wasn’t working when we were anchored in Trinidad. That was when we got hit by a chubasco and a panga came at us looking for the fish camp on shore to wait the storm out. Luckily we did have our solar lights on and we were on deck so they were able to maneuver between s/v 2 Pieces of Eight and us. I went below and turned on the anchor light so they could see us better but it didn’t work. But with us being on deck they were able to make their way to shore without running into us. Anyway, Peter volunteered to go up the mast and since he knows what to look for I figure he is the best choice.
There has been a breeze but it is hot. I fixed dinner and after we ate we watched a couple of pangas come in from around the corner and go ashore. Then a big power boat followed and anchored behind us. The first thought we had was oh no!!! Loud music and party time to all hours of the morning. It is Saturday! We moved our dinghy on the starboard side of the boat and hoisted it out of the water for the night. Then Dave and I got our cushions out and took them forward and set them on the foredeck to spy on the people on shore and on the boat. Now if you talk to Dave he will tell you he doesn’t spy. Well he is right. HE doesn’t, however, you bet he wants to know what is going on so I do the spying and then he asks me what is going on. HA!!! The sunset was just phenomenal. That is a sight you don’t see very often if at all. The rest of the evening was interesting. The guys that arrived in the pangas had brought an ATV with them and they were raking up the seaweed and then smoothing the sand with something attached to the ATV. There were people preparing for dinner or something inside the big building. In the meantime on the big power boat, there were deck hands running the dinghy from the boat to shore and back again. There were 3 older gentlemen standing around waiting, it seemed impatiently, looking like they were getting ready to go ashore. They sprayed themselves with bug spray and when the skiff (dinghy) came back to the boat the gentlemen got in and were taken ashore and dropped off. When the skiff returned to the big boat, a net filled with something, could have been clams or lobster, was loaded and a large container and some other things and then a gal got in and was taken ashore. We figured she was the chef. On shore a fire was burning as if they were going to cook outside. There was no music or whooping or hollering. We did, however, have to put up with a couple of the guys riding the ATV around the beach. After I had finished my spying I went to bed. Dave stayed up for a while. It was strange that so much effort in cleaning the beach and getting stuff ready was for 3 guys. We thought there was going to be a reception, or anniversary dinner or a guy trying to impress his lady! NOPE!!!! It was for 3 guys!!! Something is wrong with this picture!!!
Sunday, August 2.
When I got up the power boat and pangas were gone. Dave said they all left around midnight. Very interesting!

We had watched clouds move in last night so we weren’t surprised to have clouds this morning. It was partly sunny and it felt good to have the clouds cover the sun for a while. Since we are leaving tomorrow and it is pretty choppy, we aren’t putting the motor on the dinghy.

Dave ran the generator so we could make water, charge batteries and defrost the refrigerator and freezer.

Marni called and said they were going to shore to give the dog some exercise and look for shells and we told her we’d be there soon, but had to finish making water and let the freezer cool down before we left. About 30 minutes later we got in the dinghy and paddled ashore. The water was calm. It would take some real effort though when we come back to the boat as the tide will be against us. We figured it would be alright. We got to shore and Peter and Marni’s dinghy was anchored to shore but the dinghy was sideways to the waves coming in to shore and water was splashing in it. We couldn’t see Peter and Marni anywhere. We brought our dinghy on shore and walked over to Peter and Marni’s dinghy and the aft end of the boat was swamped. We had a hard time moving it with the water in the back and the waves were crashing over the transom. Dave went to look for Peter and Marni while I stayed with the dinghy. I tried to use the container they had for a bailer to bail the water out but it just disintegrated in my hand. Apparently the sun did its job on it and made it brittle. We had a container in our dinghy but it wasn’t cut out yet, but I thought at this time, anything would work. So I got it and tried my darndest but it just wasn’t working. So then I started to twist and turn the boat and pull when a good wave came to shore and little by little I was making a little progress moving it further on shore. Dave came back and said he couldn’t find Peter and Marni and I asked him to move the anchor up further on the beach since we had moved the boat up. We had to get the water out of the boat so I went on a search for a container. As we went along the beach we looked into each cabin that was there and was surprised they were fairly decent shape. Each one had a bathroom with a toilet and shower stall, and curtains on the windows, and some even had screens in those windows. Even though it is an abandoned resort the Mexicans have been using them to sleep in and keep some of their nets in a few, but other than that they were empty. We got to the big building and saw that the group that was on shore last night didn’t clean up after themselves. There was food still in plates and flies and bees were flying around. I went into the kitchen area and found an empty pitcher so I brought that out and started heading to the dinghy when here comes Peter and Marni strolling along the beach. They had walked to the south end of the beach and back looking for shells. I walked up to them and handed them the pitcher and said there was a lot of water in their dinghy. Peter said they had a bailer and I told him, “not anymore”. So they walked back to their dinghy and I continued on to finish looking at the cabins. The last one I came too was like a honeymoon suite. It was larger and the building was up off the beach and had a deck on it. It was kind of cool. Then I walked back toward everyone looking on the beach for shells but didn’t see much of anything. When I got back to where everyone was, with Peter and Marni’s dinghy further on shore, we took off toward the north end of the beach looking for more shells. I did manage to pick up a couple but there wasn’t much on that beach. About half way down the beach Marni said she was tired and wanted to go back so we figured that was a good idea. I looked off shore and saw that the waves were bigger and they were coming in pretty strong. Hmmmm!!! I think it is going to be an interesting paddle back---maybe! The clouds had come in a little more and the wind picked up and it was getting a little nasty on the water. So Peter and Marni said they would tow us to our boat but wanted us to get a head start. So we got in the dinghy, and got wet, and we started paddling with all our might and the wind was blowing us sideways. I bet anyone watching us thought to be a wee bit loco!! As we would paddle out a wave would come in and push us back and sideways. We were struggling and knew that if Peter and Marni weren’t there, we would not have made it back to the boat for a long time. So as we are struggling to keep the boat in position, Peter and Marni were trying to get off the shore. They finally did and didn’t bother with pulling up their dinghy wheels because of the wave conditions. So they came over to us and we gave Marni the lines and we got situated and off we went. We went slowly because of their wheels being down and also due to the tide and waves still coming in. As we were being towed, the big power boat and pangas came back. They looked at us a little funny, but we just waved and smiled. They waved back and dropped their anchor and we proceeded to our boat. Once there Marni handed us back our lines and we scrambled aboard and said thanks. They went to their boat. Boy!!! What a ride!! Next time I will rethink the paddle option!! The wind was really hooting on the outside and we were getting white caps in the bay. It was so rocky rolly that I couldn’t read or write due to the boat tossing, so I took a nap! Before I took a nap I watched the guys that came in the pangas go ashore and started raking up the seaweed off the beach and cleaning things up. The gentlemen went ashore and had lunch. Dave and I are thinking they have bought that land because they put a Mexican flag out by the building. They probably wanted to know why we were on the beach there. Another power boat arrived shortly after they did and dropped their anchor and went ashore. I think they were probably wheeling and dealing as to what to do with the property. They were there all afternoon and finally left at sunset.

The waves and wind have finally subsided and the wind has switched from south to the north. We had wind all day but now that we want it for sleeping what happens? It dies. Oh well. I was below washing dishes and putting them away sweating up a storm. It was 8:00pm and I thought Dave was going to run the generator and was surprised he hadn’t yet. So I asked him if he was going to do that and he said he hadn’t planned on it. Oh!! I kind of wanted to cool off and also cool the boat down so I could sleep. Dave asked me if I wanted it to run and I told him yes. So he started it up and we ran the air conditioner and charged batteries. When I was finished in the galley, I booted up my computer and started catching up on the blog. It was hot and muggy outside so it really felt good to be where there was cool air. After an hour of running the generator we shut it down. I played a couple games on my computer until the coolness went away, and then I shut my computer off and went outside. I sat there for a little while then decided it was time to go to bed. I left Dave snoring in the cockpit. A pleasant breeze came up so I didn’t turn the fan on until later when the breeze died.

Monday, August 3. Ensenada el Pescador to Quemado.
It is a beautiful morning. I helped Dave lower the dinghy and move it to the stern of the boat. Then he helped me crisscross the lines of the dinghy for towing. We’ll have to adjust them after we get going. We listened to the net and kept an eye on s/v 2 Pieces of Eight for when Peter goes forward to pull his anchor up. They had their engine going already because they were making water. Around 8:15am or so, Peter started cranking his anchor up. He doesn’t have a windlass. We started our engine to warm it up and Dave went forward to pull the anchor up. He used the down button because the up is broken and that is how he fixed it so we wouldn’t have to crank it up by hand. He will go back sometime later and take care of that so it will be back to normal. The funny thing is --- we don’t use the down button, or very rarely. Dave pays out the chain a little at a time by hand. Oh well.

Peter and Marni wanted to go a ways off the island to see if they could catch a yellow fin tuna. They are suppose to be in season right not. We didn’t want to go out too far as we were only going 2 nautical miles to our next anchorage, however, Dave did put his pole out and all he was able to catch was seaweed. We came into the anchorage and there were two boats already there anchored. We found a spot and dropped anchor. It looks like a nice spot. It has a long sandy beach and hills all around us.
LOG: 6834.6 TRIP: 15.6
LOCATION: 28̊ 55:674N/113̊ 24:412W
ARRIVAL: 9:30AM
ENG. HRS: 1295
Once the anchor was set I put the awning up, the side curtain down, and helped Dave with the windshield cover on the dodger. Now we are set. Dave put the engine on the dinghy as we will be here until Saturday. This is one of Marni’s favorite spots. The wind has come up and it is refreshing. I washed some clothes and hung them on the lifelines to dry. I went down below to get some peroxide to put on my right big toe as I stepped on a small shard of glass on deck last night and I wanted to keep it clean. Lesson – never break a bottle held out over the side of the boat as small pieces of glass fly everywhere. I was the fortunate one who stepped on the glass. Dave had walked up and down that side of the boat and never stepped on it. That was good. Now when we break bottles we put them in a bag first and then dump the remains into the sea. Anyway - back to my story. I was still in the head getting the peroxide and a cotton ball and Dave was in the main saloon and we heard this rumble. I came out of the head and looked up through the hatches above our bed to see if the wind was blowing because I thought the awning was going crazy. It wasn’t moving. I looked at Dave and then I said it was an earthquake. We went outside and looked around and Dave went forward to check the anchor and another rumble came. This time it was longer and louder than the first one. Dave felt that one come up the chain. It was like someone was starting the engine. We called Marni on the VHF and asked Marni if she felt the 2 earthquakes. She said she hadn’t felt the first one but surely did the second. Peter was diving under their boat at the time cleaning the bottom and he said it sounded like a big boat was coming in the bay. We saw plume come from one of the hill tops behind us and a strange cloud over the mountain in the distance that looks like a volcano. It made us think of when Mt. Saint Helens blew. We thought it was that mountain that erupted. As we were watching the clouds above a mountain, that looks like a volcano, a military helicopter was flying really low and flew right between Peter and Marni’s boat and ours. We could see into the cockpit of the helicopter that is how close they were. That was a little unnerving!!! I thought they might be going to Bahia de Los Angeles because of the earthquake. Peter said he was probably checking us out because anyone who comes to the Bahia de Los Angeles area gets checked out and boarded. Well---after that little excitement we listened to the Manaña net and they were talking about the earthquakes and where they were. They were south of us and the big one was a 6.9. So how about that!!! We not only have to worry about Chubascos, Elepantes, but now earthquakes!! Woohoo!! The wind picked up and the bay got a little lumpy but because we were headed into the wind we didn’t bounce much.

It is about 3:00pm and the wind is dying down. I’ve taken the dry clothes off the lines and brought them in, folded them and put them away and then started writing in the journal.

The earthquake was the talk of the evening net. The epa center was near Isla Angel de la Guarda which is located NE of where we are. What we thought was a plume of smoke ended up to be dust from the rock slides. Our friends, Larry and Lena off m/v Hobo were anchored in the “Pond” of Isla Estanque which is at the south end of Isla de la Guarda when the quake hit. They were snorkeling at the time. They went back to their boat and could see the rock slides. They were lucky they didn’t get trapped in there as there is only one way in and out of the “Pond”. So there ya go. Another exciting day in Paradise. It was pretty quiet after all that. I served us cheese and crackers and red wine for dinner, sitting on the foredeck on our cushions. The breeze was refreshing as we watched the sun set. Later on we brought our cushions back to the cockpit where Dave sat there a while and I went below to get ready for bed. It was only 8:45pm but it seemed a lot later than that. It was cooling down a little, so I thought I would play a game or two on my computer before going to bed. I went to bed and Dave stayed in the cockpit. Needless to say I had a hard time getting to sleep even with the fan going. I tossed and turned even after Dave came to bed. I could have gotten up and read but I didn’t want to so I fought it until I finally did get to sleep.

Tuesday, August 4.
While I was tossing and turning trying to get to sleep last night, the wind came up and I jumped out of bed to see what was going on. Dave was already up and was securing the lines on the dinghy and I took the side curtain up and put it away and eventually we took the windshield cover off the dodger too. This is around 1200am. Luckily the wind never got over 20 knots. We were on the north end of a Chubasco so it wasn’t full strength. It came and went quickly with no thunder or lightning. I decided to go back to bed and with the wind blowing a little it was pleasant down below. No sooner had I settled in and was relaxing the wind came up strong this time. Dave closed the hatches and I laid there for a few minutes until it started to get stuffy so I got up and joined Dave in the cockpit. All we could do now was wait until it was all over. The wind would come up a little strong then die down, then come up again. So we lay down in the cockpit and ended up falling asleep. I woke up feeling uncomfortable with my “bed” and the wind had died down so I opened the hatches again and then went below to my more comfortable bed. Luckily there was enough of a breeze I didn’t have to turn the fan on.

So far this morning has been uneventful with blue skies and some breeze. Water temperature is about 87̊ and Dave and Pete took off in our dinghy to hopefully catch fish. We are hoping for a grouper. Hopefully, when they are done and rested, we all can go ashore and explore and look for shells and other interesting things.

I rinsed out clothes and they are now drying. I took the hose off the elbow under the sink in our stateroom head to clean it out. It was full of nasty stuff!! Dave had been brushing his teeth and ran some water and it wasn’t draining. So I told him I would clean it. I did and then hooked the hose back up and ran water and it drained nicely. I then had to check the sump pump to make sure the filter wasn’t clogged up by the gunk that flowed down there. I cleaned the sump pump and all was well. Now I can relax and do some crocheting. But wait!!!! I have to make coleslaw for dinner and precook the brauts before I can do anything else. So off to the galley I go.

What is with our boat!!! Pelicans love to land on it. I know---it’s not the boat it is just a place for them to rest. Well forget THAT!! They can rest someplace else. I shooed him away and he left and visited Peter and Marni’s boat. No sooner had he landed she was out there shooing him away. The salad and brauts are done so NOW I can relax.

Dave and Peter were fishing for about 2 to 3 hours. Peter didn’t catch anything but a pelican and Dave caught a little sea bass. It wasn’t much, but at least it is something other than trigger fish and dorado. Poor Peter just isn’t having any luck with catching fish.

We ate our brauts, salad and the little bit of sea bass. It was good. It has been a good day. The moon is going to be full in a day or two. It sure does light up the night sky. The only problem is we can’t see the shooting stars. Oh well. It’s all beautiful. It was too warm to sleep down below so Dave and I slept in the cockpit. When it gets cooler I will go to my comfortable bed.

Wednesday, August 5.
We haven’t had too many bees but we sure have had a few of those tiny pesky black flies flying around. They are very annoying. We ran the generator to charge batteries. Our number 2 battery bank is putting out less charge as we go along. I sure hope they can last until we get to La Paz.

We took it easy this morning. We did the usual stuff like the awning and clothes washing, and then decided to take a dinghy ride to shore to look for shells. Peter and Marni said they would follow us in a few minutes. The shore got shallow a ways from shore so we had to jump in the water pull us into shore. We had noticed several sting rays in the sand and moving around so I told Dave to remember to shuffle his feet when we get out. So we did and all was fine. We got the boat secured on shore and then saw Peter and Marni coming. I told them about the rays so they would know to shuffle their feet too. We walked along the shore and I wanted to go on the rocks, which were smooth, to see if there were any interesting shells that way. I couldn’t walk all the way to the point but I got far enough to find out there weren’t a lot of shells to be gotten. Most were broken up and old. But I had fun looking. Peter walked up the hill and looked over into el Pescador where we had anchored the night before. He said there weren’t any boat in there. We all walked back to our dinghies, got in and headed for the opposite shore to check that out. It was all rocks, no sand so we didn’t go ashore. Plus the beach had a steep slope. So we just drove around and then headed back to our boats.

When we got aboard our boat I fixed Dave and I lunch and then afterward I crocheted then read a little. Dave has been playing different games of solitaire and other stuff to pass the time. He doesn’t have a book to read.

As the sun was setting, Dave got a bucket of fresh water and a rag and got in the dinghy and washed down both sides of the hull with me on deck guiding the dinghy and holding it in place so he could reach the hull. It had all kinds of salt encrusted on it and it had to come off. It will ruin the paint. At least he was doing it in a little bit cooler temperature. The wind has died and it’s going to be a hot night. After Dave finished washing off the hull, we moved the dinghy to the side of the boat and pulled it out of the water. We heard the coyotes on shore which was really neat. It sounded like there were a few of them on the rocky beach.

I think I have found a way to be comfortable sleeping in the cockpit. My youngest son gave us a body pillow so I am going to sleep on that and it should be more comfortable. We’ll see how it goes.

After dinner we sat in the cockpit drinking rum and coke and listening to the sounds of the birds dive bomb for fish. It was time for bed so I made my special bed and it actually was pretty comfortable. I had a hard time getting to sleep though because all I could hear were the birds dive bombing and the boat that is anchored in front of us had some kind of alarm or something that kept going off every few minutes. It was a little irritating. Eventually I did go to sleep after star gazing. There was just a hint of a breeze. Darn!!

Thursday, August 6. Quemado to Puerto Don Juan.
We have blue skies and rolly seas. The wind is blowing out of the north so it is causing us to get wind waves. The wind should switch to NW in a while. The boat anchored in front of us left this morning and a familiar boat anchored in the very spot the other boat left out of. Michelle and Tim on s/v Bamboo just arrived. We are getting together tonight on s/v 2 Pieces of Eight tonight around 5:30pm along with Michelle and Tim so it will be fun to find out where they have been and all that stuff.

I woke up this morning because it was cooler and so I decided to down below to bed. Dave was still sleeping. I actually got a little chilly in the cockpit and that is probably what woke me. I covered Dave with a long towel before going below. 2:00am seems to be the time it cools down I guess as that is when I woke up the last time I slept in the cockpit. My cockpit bed was comfortable but the only thing is I can’t stretch out. If I do I will end up falling off the seat. I haven’t been using the fan because I only have 4 D size batteries left and the flashlight takes D’s. So I am trying to conserve battery juice.

Dave started the generator to charge batteries and I defrosted the refrigerator and freezer. I finished proofing the June blog and when I get internet service, hopefully I can get the pictures in and then post it.

We got a call from Marni asking me to come over so she can measure my wrist. She is making a bracelet for me. That is really neat. When I finished proofing the blog and were done with the generator, Dave drove me over there in the dinghy. She measured my wrist with what she had already made to see how much more she would have to add. It looks really neat. Then we sat and visited a little bit then came back to the boat. We met Michelle and Tim in their dinghy and talked for a few minutes before they headed off to their boat. I washed out a few items and now will do whatever.

We ate lunch and I caught up the journal then went outside in the cockpit to read. The waves were still rolling in from the sea and we were getting bounced around a little. We wondered when we would hear from Marni asking us if we should move. She doesn’t like the boat moving around a lot when anchored. No sooner did we think and say it, she called. She wanted to know how we were doing. We told her we were doing alright and we figured it would start to settle down later in the afternoon. She said they have been here before when the wind picks up like this it doesn’t lie down it just gets worse. They wanted to move over to Puerto Don Juan. We said that would be alright and they spoke to s/v Bamboo and told them of our plans and they said they would join us. So we started preparing to leave. We took the awning down and pulled up our side curtain and secured the dinghy with the motor on it. We were a little nervous about doing that because of the waves, but we were going a short distance and Peter was going to pull his dinghy with the motor on it too. We took the windshield cover off and fired up the engine and Dave went forward to raise the anchor. It was about 2:00pm. We were heading out first but didn’t know where we were going so we slowed down to let Peter and Marni go ahead of us since they had been in there before. We got into the bay and found a spot to anchor where we were getting the north breeze. We could look out through the mouth of the entrance from where we were anchored. It took us an hour to get to Puerto Don Juan from Quemado so now it was 3:00pm. After we got settled we got in the dinghy and went toward shore where Peter and Marni were looking for clams. The tide was coming in so it wasn’t the best time to be doing that—but that didn’t stop us. While they were at the head of the bay, Dave and I went around the corner to where a fishing boat had gone aground, and was abandoned and secured to the side of the hill so it wouldn’t float away, and looked for clams. We got in the water and I held the dinghy while Dave took the dinghy paddle and moved the sand back and forth to see if he could uncover some. No luck. Maybe tomorrow. Before we left our boat to get in the dinghy we decided we would move as we were right in the middle of the channel and we were getting the swells from the mouth of the entrance. So after we looked for clams we came back to the boat and pulled up the anchor and moved forward a bit more. Then it wasn’t as rolly and we still had the breeze. I took some pictures as we were coming into the bay and then of the “window” that looks out toward Bahia de Los Angeles. I also got a picture of the boat we were by in our dinghy and also got a picture of another fishing boat that had gone aground and was left. This isn’t a bad place to come to get away for a little while but also for a hurricane. It is pretty well tucked in with hills all around.
TRIP: 5NM
LOCATION: 28̊ 56:598N/113̊ 27:007W
ENG. HRS: 1296
We were invited to s/v 2 Pieces of Eight along with s/v Bamboo for happy hour. When we all got there Marni opened a bottle of champagne and said we were celebrating getting to Puerto Don Juan, the hurricane hole. We visited for a while and then each of us went back to our boats. There was still a nice breeze so I think we will sleep well.

Friday, August 7. Puerto Don Juan.
We woke to bees outside on the deck, everywhere. They were looking for water. We had dew overnight so they were trying to get at it. They would get into the net I have across the open space on the windshield and get caught in it and get mad because they couldn’t get out. We were killing them left and right as they entered the cockpit. We put salt water on the port side of the boat as there was still shade and fresh water so they were congregating there. It must have been about 2 hours before the majority of them went away. As for the ones caught in the netting, I finally opened that up and turned it wrong side out so they would fly away. There were so many bees on the deck I couldn’t put the awning up until they went away. I eventually got it up. The wind blew all day which was really nice. We had heard stories of how it is soooo hot in Puerto Don Juan. Well yes it is hot there when the wind doesn’t blow, but it is hot no matter where you are in the Sea of Cortez if the wind doesn’t blow. So that didn’t matter. You just don’t want to stay in there a long time.

Dave and Peter went in our dinghy and got clams for dinner. By this time s/v Distant Shores and s/v Alma Inqueita came in and anchored behind us. Party Night!!!! Marni made reservations for 8 on our boat for around 6:30pm and she was bringing the clams, the others were bringing something to share, what they want to drink, and their own dishes. I won’t have a lot to clean up. Cool. There is a method to her madness because we are the only boat that has air conditioning and everyone wanted to be cool. No worries, we were just as happy to have them come to our boat because then we could secure our dinghy and have things ready for leaving in the morning. It all works out just fine. We want to go to Bahia de Los Angeles so we can get a few vegetables. When Dave got back to the boat from clamming, and Tim off s/v Bamboo dropped off a diver hose for Dave to use with his air tank so he could check out the bottom of our boat and maybe clean it a little. Peter offered to let Dave borrow his lycra suit which was really nice. So Dave put the lycra suit on and connected the hose to the dive tank and got everything ready. Then I was to sit in the dinghy and pay out the hose as he went the length of the boat. So I did. The air regulator gauge was laying flat on the floor of the dinghy and I couldn’t see it, as I was paying out the hose. The only problem was the hose was getting kinks in it and I was trying to work them out when all of a sudden Dave shoots up alongside the dinghy and said he didn’t have any air. What happened? Oops!!! He lifted the air pressure gauge and it read zero. Yep he was right!!! He had no air. So I told him about the kinky hose and while he hung on the side of the dinghy, we both worked to untangle the hose so he could have enough to do the rest of the boat. So he got the gauge to read the air pressure and he went down under the boat. This time all went well and the gauge was where I could keep an eye on it this time. He said there were a few barnacles but only babies and for the most part the hull looked good and was clean. When he came up, he promised Peter he would dive on his boat, so we took our dinghy over to his boat and Dave went under the boat and checked out his keel and cleaned it. Peter couldn’t stay down long enough to clean it without a dive tank, which he didn’t have. After that, we came back to our boat and Dave took the lycra suit off and rinsed it out along with his fins, dive mask, gloves, shoes, and belt with weights. I put them on the deck to dry and then we had the wonderful task of untangling the hose. Now this hose is not some filmsy hose, this is a ¼ inch diameter sturdy hose that doesn’t like to be coiled. So we had to stretch out this hose which meant Dave stayed in the dinghy and I took the other end and curled it around and around until it untangled enough to where I could stretch it out. This was a long drawn out process but we did it. Now it is coiled nicely and the strap is around it so it doesn’t come uncoiled. Dave took it back to Tim and thanked him for the use of it. When he returned I boiled some eggs so I could make devil eggs for my contribution to the dinner. Then I took a nap. When I got up I started to crack the shells and peel the eggs. Dave came over and helped me so the job went much quicker. Then I made the filling and put it in a Tupperware bowl and put that and whites in the refrigerator to cool. I straightened up the cabin and prepared for company. At 6:30pm everyone started arriving and bringing their goodies on board. We had a wonderful dinner and it was good to visit with everyone. S/v Distant Shores is leaving tomorrow for Bahia de Los Angeles to get some supplies and s/v Alma Queita are headed for San Carlos to get boat work done. So it was good to get together with them again before everyone went their separate ways. When everyone stepped outside after being in air conditioning, it was so hot and humid. It was like a sauna. No joke!!! No breeze just dead damp air. Yuck!! When we said our goodbyes, I went below and washed the dishes we had and put them away so I don’t have them to deal with in the morning. Then we called it a night and went to bed, turning the fan on to move some air. Since the air conditioning had been on it wasn’t bad for sleeping.

Saturday, August 8. Puerto Don Juan to Bahia de Los Angeles.
We got up at 7:30am, put the water on to boil for coffee and Dave got the last 2 jerry cans ready and the funnel for pouring the diesel into the fuel tank. We want to take all four diesel jerry cans and the one gas can into town after we arrive. After the cans were empty and our fuel tank is full, we cleaned up then we lowered the dinghy into the water and moved it to the stern of the boat and got it secured for towing. Then Dave secured the empty jerry cans on the stern of the boat and under the seat and we were ready to go. Marni called on the VHF saying they would be leaving around 9:30am. It was 8:00am so we had plenty of time to take down the side curtain and put it away and get the net off the windshield and the windshield cover and stow them. We relaxed and enjoyed our coffee and waited. We only had a handful of bees this morning. The salt water is sure the trick. They do not like it. Also before Dave went to bed last night he shammied the deck to get most of the dew off so I’m sure that helped tremendously.

S/v Alma Inqueita and s/v Distant Shores were leaving so they said goodbye and thanked us for the wonderful air conditioning time they had aboard our boat. Then at 9:30am we pulled anchor and followed Peter and Marni out of the bay. S/v Bamboo was staying behind until they got water made. It is only 7 nautical miles to Bahia de Los Angeles so we didn’t have to go far. We got in and the wind was blowing 19-21 knots out of the north and the water was choppy. We saw s/v Bamboo coming behind us so Peter and Marni went in around the lighthouse and dropped their hook there. It was so far from shore we didn’t want to be that far out so we circled Bamboo. We asked Marni why they chose to anchor there and she said they don’t like to be close to shore on the weekends as it is noisy with music and jet skies and the fishing panagas go tearing out from shore at a fast clip. So we said o.k.!! Works for us. Because we were tucked inside the bay behind the spit, we were pretty protected from a lot of the swells from the wind waves. We didn’t put the awning up due to the wind. Our poor little bungee cords wouldn’t last.
ARRIVAL: 11:00AM
LOG: 6824.7NM TRIP: 5.71NM
LOCATION: 28̊ 57:327N/113̊ 32:773W
ENG. HRS: 1299
About 12:30pm everyone had their boat squared away so we got in our dinghies and took off for shore. The wind had built up nice wind waves so our dinghy was surfing the waves and the little engine was struggling a little but we made it. We were hoping it would calm down before we had to head back otherwise we would be getting wet a lot. Once our dinghies were secured on shore we walked a short distance from the beach to the restaurant named Guillermo’s to have a beer and lunch. When we were pulling our dinghies up on shore, an old man came running to the wall at Guillermo’s yelling something about charging us a fee to park there. We laughed as we knew from Peter and Marni that this guy did this all the time to people. They had met him each time they came here so they knew what he was about. His name is Herman Hill and he is an 87 year old character. He wrote a book titled Baja’s Hidden Gold. He is an old time prospector of gold and has a claim in the mountains of Bahia de Los Angeles. He doesn’t prospect anymore and lives in a modest home on the beach across from Guillermo’s, and loves to talk to anyone so he can tell his stories and jokes to. He returns home every year to Las Vegas to gamble and visit family and friends. Herman only had one copy of his book to sell and Marni bought it promising to share it with us. When our bellies were full we walked to one of the grocery stores up the street. Across the street was an internet café so while I shopped for food, Dave went there to check emails and to see if we got our documentation form yet. It was pretty pricey for the groceries. But about 400 pesos were for booze. 4 tetra carton wines, a bottle of rum and some veggies came to 694.73 pesos. Owe!!! I didn’t get everything I needed like eggs because I want to wait and get those before we leave.

Marni was able to find someone who could give the guys a ride to the Pemex station so they can fill jerry cans. That will save a lot of time and effort as it is a little bit of a walk. I’m sure it won’t be really expensive. So we have an appointment on shore at 11:00am tomorrow.

After everyone was finished shopping we walked back to the dinghies and came back to our boats. The wind and waves had subsided which was a very good thing. Once on our boat I put groceries away then went to the cockpit to catch the journal up. I got tired and I was still full from lunch so I went below and lay down. I didn’t feel all that well and I don’t know why. I finally fell asleep and when I got up I still didn’t feel great but I did feel better. Dave and I were in the cockpit and saw Michelle, Tim, and their dog Bently, in their dinghy going to shore by the lighthouse. They were joining Marni, Peter, and their dog Kela on shore so the dogs could run and the adults could look for shells. We got in our dinghy and took off to walk our dog. Oops!!! We don’t have one. Well we wanted to walk on the beach and look for shells! There were all kinds of tiny shells closer to the point and there were a whole lot of small conch shells strewn all over the beach. I picked up about 3 and a couple other nice shells. Michelle got the find of the night as Tim found her a full small Murek shell. How cool!!! The beach stunk because the tide was out so when I got back to the boat I boiled the shells so they wouldn’t smell anymore. I had a hard time getting that smell off my hands. Yuck!!! I eventually did but it took a while. We weren’t very hungry so for dinner we had cheese, crackers and wine and enjoyed the lights of Bahia de Los Angeles. After that I still wasn’t feeling that great so I went to bed. Maybe it was the heat. It couldn’t have been anything I ate as everyone else had the same stuff. Just one of those things. I ran the fan all night but I had a very hard time getting to sleep, even after Dave came to bed. I finally did get to sleep but man!!!! That was so frustrating.

Sunday, August 9.
We had a light breeze blowing this morning that lasted through the day. Dave started reading a book he got from Marni and I swept the floor. I couldn’t take it anymore. There was hair, sand and food particles on the floor and I used up the last of my swiffer floor duster rags but at least I was able to get most of that up. I shook the two rugs we have and just by doing that made me feel like the boat was a little cleaner down below. Around 10:10am we got the jerry cans in the dinghy and got ready to go ashore to fill them. Peter and Marni were behind us and then Tim and Michelle came a little later. When we secured our dinghies we carried the cans to the road by Gillermo’s Restaurant and waited for the guy to show up that was going to give the guys a ride. We waited and waited then Marni and Michelle started walking to the store where the guy works to see if he was there and I wasn’t far behind them. It turns out the guy had been there and we weren’t so he came back to the store. So we told him our spouses were at Guillermo’s waiting. So he left to get them and Marni, Michelle and I walked across the street to the internet café to check emails and hopefully post the blog. I found out, with having to pay for internet service there is no way I can post pictures in the blog this time or for August either. So I will have to post it without pictures and later on add them.

I read email and sent some and got the blog in as a draft, but as I went to save it, it would say that the blog was having a hard time saving it. So I knew then I wouldn’t be able to do pictures and I wasn’t even sure I was going to be able to post the blog. So I shrunk down the blog sight and went ahead and answered emails to give it a chance to save. When I came back to the blog it still was saying the same thing, but with us being on the internet for an hour it was time to go. So I shut down the blog sight and hoped everything got saved so next time I can post it. We paid the guy and left and walked back to Guillermo’s and found the guys waiting there drinking beer. We had lunch and then loaded each of our jerry cans in our own dinghies and pushed off shore into the surf and went back to our boats. When we got back on the boat and tied up the dinghy, I got out and Dave handed me the jerry cans and the computers then he got out of the dinghy. I put my backpack and computer away and Dave brought his computer down below, then we prepared to pour the diesel into the fuel tank. Because the diesel was road side diesel, Dave had to add oil to it for viscosity. When he was ready to pour, I handed him the first jerry can and when he was finished with that and the cap was secured on the can, I handed him another, and we did this for 4 jerry cans. But on the 4th one we only used a tiny bit as we were afraid we would over flow the tank. So we had a full tank now. When we were all done and everything was put away, we relaxed reading our books. It was a pleasant day, but a working day for the guys.

We just finished dinner. The awning is down and I’m catching up the journal. We have the generator running and we are making water, charging batteries and cooling us down. Hopefully we won’t get any west winds tonight as those come from the land and it is hot and blows hard. Sometimes up to 50 knots. No thank you. If it starts to do that we will pull the anchor and go just across the bay to Gecko Bay where the winds don’t come that far. These winds are called elephantes as the clouds sometimes associated with it are shaped like an elephant trunk. They don’t always appear but you know what it is when the wind comes over the mountains from the west and the air is hot. We haven’t experienced those yet and don’t want to. They can happen anytime after 5:00pm and last for quite a while. Once we finished with making water and charging batteries, we sat outside and enjoyed looking at Bahia de Los Angeles with the lights on. It is a pretty view. Dave and I sat out in the cockpit watching for the meteor showers. I took my cushion to the foredeck after awhile so I could see better. I was only able to see a couple little ones so I started watching the lights of the homes in the village go out slowly. I was getting tired so I brought my cushion back to the cockpit where I found Dave snoring. I chuckled. We have the breeze blowing but it isn’t enough to keep air flow down below in our stateroom so I’ll have to turn on the fan.

Monday, August 10.
We had a good night for sleeping. I slept well. It got a little chilly this morning so I pulled the sheet over me. The sun is shining and it’s starting to get warm. No breeze right now.

Dave is outside on the deck trying to catch fish. He tried to catch bait fish but they weren’t biting. They aren’t sardines because they are running away from his lure where sardines love that lure. Now he is just dinking around passing time and seeing if he can catch anything. Tim from s/v Bamboo and Dave are going back into town for another diesel run. I’m staying on the boat so I can clean the heads and do laundry. When Dave gets back we’ll both go in and take our computers to the internet café and check emails and post my blog.

I’m going to finish my coffee then put the awning up and get to work.

My chores are done and Dave has returned from the Pemex station so now we are all fueled up.

We took our computers with us to shore and walked to the internet café. They had arranged the desks so you couldn’t get to the electrical plugs to plug your computer into AC. We asked and they said no just the internet. Well that didn’t set well with Dave because we had to use our batteries. So we weren’t going to be there long. I posted the July blog without pictures and was happy to find it did save everything the last time. When we finished at the café we walked back to the dinghy and came back to the boat. I fixed us lunch then we relaxed. I did some crocheting and reading and Dave did some reading.

Around 5:00pm we took the awning down and got cleaned up for dinner as we were joining Marni, Peter, Tim, and Michelle at a restaurant up the street from Guillermo’s. When we were ready we got in the dinghy and went to shore and met everyone there. We walked to the restaurant which wasn’t too far away; remember this is a village so nothing is too far. The name of it is Costa Del Sol and we all had wonderful food and we got 2 x 1 margaritas. We always like that!! There was a man sitting with his friends at another table when we came in and he said the food was excellent. As we sat down he started asking us where we were from and all that kind of stuff and the subject got on fish, of course. He asked if we had had yellow tail tuna sashimi style and we said no. So he asked the waitress to get us some to try. It was really good. We ordered our dinners and ate them and then were sitting around talking when the man that recommended the sashimi came back into the restaurant and said he wanted to show us something. He was staying at the motel right next to the restaurant and he brought in a cooler on wheels and set it down by Dave and opened it up. Inside was filleted tuna and dorado. He was on a fishing vacation and had been going out everyday catching fish. His name is Alfredo. Very nice man and loved to hear us share stories of our time in the Sea of Cortez and he told us he was a lawyer living in San Diego and loves to fish. After talking for awhile we said we had to go, Alfredo gave Dave his last business card and said if we needed anything let him know. We had a wonderful visit with him and the dinner was gourmet quality and inexpensive. We walked back to our dinghies and went back to our boats. It was humid and in the distance we could see lightning on the mainland. As long as it stays there I don’t care. A little breeze did pick up but not enough to be cool enough for sleeping so I will have to run the fan again. Dave and I sat out in the cockpit for awhile watching the lightning on the mainland side making sure it wasn’t coming our way. When we felt comfortable enough that it was moving south, we went to bed.

Tuesday, August 11.
We really like BLA (Bahia de Los Angeles). The view from the anchorage is beautiful and at night it is neat to see the village lit up. We will probably be here a couple more days as tomorrow, being Wednesday, is fresh vegetable delivery day for the stores. The plan is to go to town tomorrow and get veggies and see the museum.

Dave went into shore to visit a different internet place. The guy at the internet café that wouldn’t let us plug into AC pissed him off so he wasn’t going back there. I wanted to stay on the boat so I could sweep the sand out of the cockpit and have some time to myself. So Dave went ashore and I did my thing. When my chores were completed I finished writing in the journal. Dave called me on the VHF and said he was able to plug into AC and use Skype to talk to Ron back home. He was a happy camper. I down loaded the pictures from my camera onto the computer to free up disk space on the camera for more pictures. When Dave returns we’ll have to run the generator so I can defrost the refrigerator and freezer and we can make water. I’m hoping I will be able to catch my blog up for posting at the end of this month. I write everything in my journal then transfer that to the computer for the blog.

The refrigerator and freezer are defrosted and water is being made. With all that finished Dave and I will just hang out. I will probably read and then crochet, adding more rows to the baby afghan.

After dinner about 7:30pm we went to shore to meet up with Peter, Marni, Kela, their dog, Tim, Michelle, and Bently, their dog. It was time for them to let the dogs run. This is the opposite beach from where we go to shore for the village. This beach has a lighthouse on it and it actually is a sand spit. We enjoyed visiting, looking for shells, and enjoying the coolness of the evening breeze. When we came back to the boat Dave and I watched for meteors. We saw maybe 2 at the most. We finally gave up and went to bed.

Wednesday, August 12.
We had an exciting morning. First we were able to see a whale shark mom, her calf and we think the dad too, swimming next to our boat. They went all around the bay so s/v Bamboo and s/v 2 Pieces of Eight were able to see them too. What an awesome sight. They are dark and speckled and their head and mouths are huge. They are plankton feeders so they swim with their mouths open. They are known as the gentle giants. A lot of people have swum with them, but the thing to remember is that they are wild and the water is THEIR home. So one must still respect them as wild and keep a distance. They get very big and I think the one we saw was about 15 feet long. It was quite a sight and we are hoping to see more of them as we move up the bay. They like it here because there is a lot of food for them. Even though they have the shark name attached to them, they are not aggressive but docile. After we watched them swim around us for a while, Dave and I put up the awning then went about doing other things. No sooner had we put the awning up, the wind came up fast at about 25 knots. The wind doesn’t always come up a little at a time; it is more like it is on you in a heartbeat. We waited for a few minutes to see what it was going to do, then decide there was too much wind pushing on the awning so we ended up taking it down. We also had to take the side curtain up as it was flopping against the hull. We were experiencing a day time chubasco. We saw the convection clouds and knew that is what it was. We are getting good at figuring this stuff out. In about 20-30 minutes it was all over with so we put the side curtain down and the awning back up. The seas were subsiding and calm enough for us to go to shore. We got our computers ready for transport and got in the dinghy and left. We secured our dinghy on the beach and then started to walk to the internet place. Herman was sitting at a table with a bunch of young men and he recognized us and was giving us a hard time, fun wise. We talked to him for a few minutes and then we were on our way to the internet place. Once there we hooked our computers to the AC and internet and checked and sent email and Dave filled out his application for Social Security so he can start receiving the money in December. That will be nice to have a little more income coming in. I won’t be able to apply myself for 5 more years. Unfortunately as he was filling out the application he found he didn’t have all the information he needed. So he did what he could and then he would have to come back again tomorrow to finish the process. We packed up our computers, paid and walked back to Guillermo’s, stopped in their mini market and purchased ice then walked to the beach and got in our dinghy and came back to the boat. We didn’t do much for the rest of the afternoon. I crocheted and read a little and Dave cap napped in the cockpit.

After dinner we sat on the foredeck with a glass of wine and watched a great meteor show. Then it was getting late so we went to bed. There was a nice breeze blowing which is so nice at night.

Thursday, August 13.
We woke to sunshine again and it was rather pleasant outside. Not too hot yet. Dave listened to the net and I got up about 8:00am, poured my coffee and sat and woke up. We are going into the village around 10:00am so Dave can finish applying for his Social Security and I can get vegetables.

I put the port side of the awning up and then helped Dave lower the dinghy to the water on the starboard side and move it to the stern of the boat. Then I finished hooking up the starboard side of the awning. Once we were ready, we told Peter and Marni we would meet them at the internet place. Shortly after we took off for shore, we turned around and there was Peter and Marni in their dinghy bringing up the rear. Tim and Michelle had already gone to shore so they could borrow a truck and get fuel. They would meet us at the internet place.

When we arrived at the internet place Michelle and Tim were already there. They had gotten fuel but they wanted to get propane and couldn’t. The people at the station told them they don’t fill them anymore. That was a bummer. There isn’t any other place to get it around here unless you buy a big bottle and do it yourself. Marni, Michelle and I checked our email, and then left Dave to do his thing while we went to get fresh vegetables. Tim and Peter rode in the truck while we ladies walked to the community co-op they have up the street. I was really surprised and pleased I could get most of what I needed there. The only thing I didn’t get was lettuce. The heads were small and the leaves looked tuff. It was a lot cheaper shopping there than at the macado. When we were done, we all piled in the truck. The gals in the back (our choice) and the guys in the front seat with Tim driving. We went past the internet place and I asked Tim if he was going to stop and see if Dave was ready to come with us and he said no. I was surprised, but he wanted to get the truck back to the owner at Guillermo’s. So I figured I would just see Dave back at Guillermo’s. When we arrived we got our stuff out of the truck and mentioned we wanted to visit the museum which was just about a block and a half from where we were. We asked the waitress, that let us borrow the truck, if she could keep an eye on our groceries while we go to the museum. She said yes. Then we were told that the museum is only open until 12:00pm and it was 11:40am. Not enough time, so we decided we would go tomorrow. So we told the waitress of our changed plan and we sat down and ordered drinks. I ordered water as I was so thirsty and surprisingly everyone else ordered non alcoholic drinks too. I waited and still no Dave so I decided I was going to walk up to the internet place and get him. Tim said I could use the truck assuming I knew how to drive a stick. Yep!! I can!! So I got in the truck and looked around to get a little familiar with it and tried starting the motor. It jerked and I decided I didn’t want to drive it. For some reason I got overwhelmed with it and envisioned stopping and starting on down the road and I would be very embarrassed. So I walked up the road to the internet place. I got there and didn’t see Dave working on his computer so I stuck my head in and he was paying the bill. He got ice cream in a bowl since the rest of us already got some before we left to go get vegetables, so it was his turn. We walked back to Guillermo’s and he told me about filling out the application and having to call Ron back home so he could get a copy of his DD214 from storage and then take it to the Social Security office so they could see it. As we were walking we saw a yellow truck coming toward us and slowing down. It was Michelle to the rescue. Dave got in the front seat and I climbed in the back and off we went. Dave told Michelle the process he had to go through in filling out the application. She was employed at the Social Security Office in Washington, for a while, so she was familiar with the forms and what to do. She said she doesn’t know why they have to see the DD214, but they do. It never made sense to her that they ask for it. It really doesn’t do anything. So if you were in the military prior to 1968 and you eventually apply for your Social Security, they ask you for it and want to see it. We finally arrived back at Guillermo’s and Dave ordered his drink and then we all ordered lunch. After lunch we sat around and played Mexican Train. Tim and Michelle brought their game because it makes the train sound when you start a train. It goes on for quite a while so we didn’t push it too often. After about 3 games we called it quits and packed up our stuff and got in our dinghies and went back to our boats.

Once onboard our boat, I put groceries away and then typed to catch up for the August blog. Dave played solitaire on his computer for a while then went on deck to try and catch a fish off the boat. He cast off the line and it went into the water and a few minutes later I hear Dave calling for me. He got a bite but the fish took off under the boat and ended up wrapping the line around the propeller, strut, and shaft. Some smart fish!!! And he still had the lure in his mouth so he wasn’t getting away. So Dave had to get his swim suit on and get in the water and see if he could untangle the line that way. Nope!!! He would have to dive under the boat. So he asked for his snorkel mask and down he went under the boat. As he loosened the line I reeled it in. Soon we had it all untangled and got the small yellow fin off the lure and let him go. He was too small to keep. BUT!!! Where there are small yellow fins, there are big ones. Now Dave is encouraged to fish for the bigger ones, but not off the stern of the boat. After rinsing off the salt water, he changed out of his suit and back into his shorts and tried again and this time he got a couple of larger ones to follow the lure, but not bite. I think he will have to put bait on it to catch these guys.

We are currently running the generator to charge batteries and cool the boat down. When that is done we will go outside and see if we can see anymore meteors. That’s all Folks!!!

Friday, August 14.
A little before 9:00am, Tim from s/v Bamboo came over in his dinghy and then Peter from s/v 2 Pieces of Eight arrived to help with going up the mast to check out our anchor light and wind vane. Peter had volunteered to do that a while back and since it was calm waters and no wind, now was the time to do it. Tim had a pulley system in a bag that with the halyard attached to it would be hoisted up as far as the halyard would go. One line was to be attached to Peter’s bosons chair and the other line was designed for Peter to be able to pull himself up the mast and then be able to release the line to come down. Well that was all fine and dandy except they found out as Peter was going up that the mechanism in the pulley system didn’t catch and so there was no way to allow Peter to do it himself. So my job was to hoist the pulley system up the mast and then the guys took over in hauling Peter up in his chair. Tim and Dave had to take turns hoisting him up because there was so much resistance on the line and they didn’t have a winch on the foredeck to use. Peter checked out the anchor light and found that it hadn’t been seated properly so it was disconnecting from time to time. Especially when we really wanted it to work. So he secured it in there and it worked just fine. Then he went as far as he could go to the top of the mast and tried to fix the wind vane. The only problem is it is plastic and he was afraid if he put too much pressure on it it would break. What we think happened was it got really hot and a bird sat on it and bent it. We’ll have to replace it when we get back to Mazatlan. It still works and that is o.k. Then it was time for Peter to come down so Dave took over the halyard and let him down. That was really good to have the light and wind vane checked out. I would not have known what to look for as far as the light bulb was concerned. Once Peter was down and the stuff was put away, I served coffee and beer at their request. Tim was very upset he couldn’t find the instructions on the pulley so he could figure out why it wasn’t engaging. He must have it somewhere else on the boat. The guys sat a few minutes and talked and then Tim and Peter left and went back to their boats.

Shortly after that we all were headed to shore to visit the museum, use the internet and get a few items from the mercado. We walked to the museum and it was open. It was packed with all kinds of interesting things. They had a huge shell collection, bones of whales, a dolphin, dried turtles and more. There was a section on how the Indians lived and then the lifestyle of the Ranchers and then the gold mining display which Herman donated a lot of his equipment to. I enjoyed it thoroughly. I forgot my camera so I don’t have any pictures right now, but when I go back to the Village, I will go back to the museum again and take pictures. The museum is open every day from 9:00am until 12:00pm and is free. You can donate money which most people do. After that, we walked across the street to a place that just opened that sells ice cream. We all got a scoop and enjoyed it very much. Then we walked to the internet place. Dave, Tim, Peter, and I went across the street from the internet place to a mercado/ferreteria. They had a lot of stuff and Dave was able to get a small gas can to carry gasoline in the dinghy as extra fuel. Then Tim went across to the internet place, Dave and Peter walked to the Pemex station and because I didn’t get a chance to finish my snooping, I stayed behind to do that and then went across to the internet place. Michelle and Marni finished with emails and the three of us walked to the yellow mercado and left Tim behind checking his emails and waiting for the guys. When we got to the mercado we got what we needed, if it was in stock, and then walked back to Guillermo’s where we found the guys sitting there drinking beer. We ordered something to drink and sat and talked for a while. We weren’t going to have lunch there as we decided we were all going back to Costa Del Sol restaurant for dinner. When we paid our bills, we went upstairs to the art gallery where there were a lot of oil and water color paintings, beautiful wood furniture and some painted pottery. They also had a beautiful long dark wood bar that we thought should be used because there was a deck outside and it would be really cool to have that area to sit and order drinks. It may have been used at one point, but now is in the gallery. Oh well. There was some really neat stuff in there. No one bought anything but it was fun to look. We saw very few prices so we figured it was probably expensive. There was one wood table Dave and I would have liked to have. It was round and had pieces inlaid to make the Mexican/Aztec pictures we see on t-shirts and other things. It was 950 pesos. When we left there we gathered out stuff and went to our dinghies. The wind had picked up enough it was blowing white caps. Dave had turned the dinghy around so it would go bow out and I walked to the side of it helping to push it out away from shore. The waves were rolling in pretty good and were almost waist high to me. How do I know that? Well as I was standing alongside the dinghy and he was back by the motor. I had trouble getting into the dinghy because the water was getting deeper and I couldn’t get my legs up high enough to climb in, so I got hit by a couple of good sized waves. He finally had to pull the dinghy back toward shore a little so I could get in. Then he pushed it out again, started the motor and jumped in and away we went. When we came back to the boat I rinsed off with fresh water and changed my shorts. Then I hung the shorts out to dry on the lifeline. The wind was blowing 21 knots so I ended up taking the awning down. There were no clouds in the sky but we were experiencing a slight elephante. It wasn’t a full blown elephante but the wind was hot and blew for quite a while. We were beginning to wonder if it was going to calm down enough for us to go into shore for dinner. Marni called and suggested we wait until after the weather at 6:00pm and then if it hadn’t calmed down by then we would go tomorrow night. But it did calm down so we all went in and walked to the restaurant. Everyone except Peter had the Combination Mexicana plate. I don’t know what Peter had but it involved beef. We all had our 2 x 1 margaritas and had a great visit. Earlier when we were at Guillermo’s we met these two Italian ladies, in their mid to late 20’s, that were on holiday and they asked what there was to see and do around here. So of course, being that Peter and Marni have been visiting for 2 years, told the girls what things there were to do and see. Then who do we see at the restaurant? Right!! Those same ladies. They were staying at the motel there and came in for dinner. We talked to them for a little bit and they went and found a table and we got our bills, paid and left. We walked back to Guillermo’s and saw two young guys and two young ladies talking and they were also from Italy. The two ladies we just left had hired a boat and captain to take them to see the whale sharks and these two couples were doing the same thing. We figured they will all be on the same boat. So they will be seeing each other tomorrow. I guess it is quite common for the Italian people, when on holiday, to come to Mexico. These gals flew to San Diego and drove to Cabo San Lucas, then back up the Baja stopping in each place, working their way back to San Diego to fly home. That is really cool. We said good night to the young couples and walked to our dinghies and left. Once back on the boat, we started the generator to turn on the air conditioner and charge batteries. I sat and played my games on the computer and Dave played a little on his then he went outside to watch for Meteors. Eventually I joined him but I didn’t see any and I was tired so I went to bed. Dave came in a few minutes later. He woke up at 4:00am because it was kind of stuffy and warm in our stateroom and ended up sleeping the rest of the time outside. I will be doing that too when we use up our D batteries on the fan.

Saturday, August 15.
Today is a stay on the boat day. Dave took the aft head pump apart thinking there might be a hole in the baffle, but there wasn’t and the other thing that might be causing it to lose air is maybe the flapper valve on the part that cracked, which he can’t take out now, has a problem. Well he cleaned what he could and we found that toilet paper is really bad to put in these heads. It sticks to everything and causes more problems. So anyway, after he got the head pump put back together, he turned it on and it primed and pumped and then stopped. Wow!!! That was a good sign. So Dave flushed the toilet and put it through another test. It pumped and then stopped. We left the switch on to see what would happen and it pumped again on its own, because of an air leak somewhere, but it took it 20 minutes to do where before it was maybe 5-10 minutes. So progress has been made. So we have a head to use in an emergency, but aren’t relying on it much. We will get a rebuild kit when we go home for a visit then and fix it when we get back. While Dave fiddled with the head, I caught up my August blog, and my journal is caught up too. I defrosted the refrigerator and freezer, washed clothes, helped Dave when he needed it and then shook out our bedding and changed the pillow cases. I am putting the Steinbeck book aside for now so I can read Herman Hill’s book. Marni let me borrow it and then after I read it Dave wants to then we will give it back. I’m really enjoying his book. I also enjoy talking and listening to his stories. How neat it is to be able to talk to someone who has spent all of his life in a desert setting, and prospecting, but living the simple life and giving a lot of the money from the gold to his family and those in need and of course spending it on his love for gambling. He has a fun time and why not. He can do that and he enjoys it.

The wind has picked up this afternoon. It is coming from the East and we hear it is suppose to blow hard tomorrow up the middle of the Sea of Cortez. We won’t be going anywhere until Monday I think. Now I think I will get some of that wind in my face and read some more of Herman’s book.

What a relaxing afternoon. Dave was playing solitaire on his computer and then checked for emails on sailmail and there was none. I was out in the cockpit for awhile reading and I got sleepy, so I thought I would lie down for a while. I came down below and found Dave playing a form of solitaire on the table. So I left him doing what he was enjoying and I lay down. I didn’t go to sleep right away but eventually drifted off. I had slept an hour or at least 45 minutes then I got up. I went out into the cockpit where Dave was trying to catch a fish. I sat out there watching him for a while and also looking around enjoying the sights. Then I went below and fixed Dave and I a rum and coke. At 5:55pm we listened to the net and Don’s weather. Nothing is happening in the Sea of Cortez anywhere tonight. That is a very good thing. I fixed dinner after the net and we ate then I washed dishes and went outside to the cockpit. Dave had his fishing pole in hand fishing again. I got Herman’s book and was reading that until I couldn’t see anymore as the sun went down. Dave did catch a fish which we figured was a sea bass or grouper but it wasn’t big enough so he had to let it go.

The wind has died and it will be a little warm tonight, but probably around 2:00am or 3:00am it will get cool. I think I am going to sleep outside tonight as I don’t want to use the fan so much we run out of battery power and when it really is hot and we need it it won’t work. I will try to get more batteries when we go into the village again. The co-op sold them separately so I will see what the price is. It probably will be cheaper than the ones I bought at the Mercado. We are thinking of going into shore tomorrow to check email one more time before we take off, and the co-op is just up the street.

We were talking to Peter today and he mentioned how it was suppose to blow tomorrow up the middle of the Sea of Cortez, and it may or may not affect us, however, we will leave for the islands on Monday to see if we can’t do some fishing, stay overnight and come back to Bahia de Los Angeles and visit La Mona. Hopefully we will see more whale sharks as they like it there.

Dave was hoping he didn’t have to run the generator tonight, but unfortunately we do because the freezer wouldn’t shut off. I think as the afternoon wears on the water temperature gets warmer and then that is when the freezer runs and runs. That is just the way it is. I am going to take advantage of the air conditioning and play some games on my computer then when the batteries are charged I’ll move outside.

Sunday, August 16.
Last night Dave discovered a pelican pooped all over our roller furling and vicinity. We couldn’t do anything about it last night so when I siphoned the water out of the tray for the aft air conditioner; I used that water to wash off the roller furling. Then I came and got more fresh water to finish the job. What a mess!!! After that I put the awning up.

We got a call from Marni inviting us, Tim and Michelle for dinner tonight on their boat. I am bringing a salad and Michelle is making a dessert.

We gathered our computers and my camera and took off for shore. The last shore visit for internet for a while.

We secured the dinghy on the beach and walked to the internet place and took care of our emails and Dave made a couple of calls. When we finished we walked back toward Guillermo’s, but I wanted to stop at the museum to take a couple pictures of the outside. I didn’t think it would be open this morning due to it is Sunday, but I was surprised to find it was. The man was getting ready to close the doors when we walked up, but he let me go in and take my pictures and then we left. As we walked back to Guillermo’s I took a picture of the plaza and kept on going. We got to the dinghy and loaded our stuff in it and rolled the dinghy into the surf. The wind had picked up a little and the waves were crashing on the beach. We faced the bow into the surf and walked the dinghy out then climbed in. We got a little wet on the ride back but it was so hot we didn’t care. Back on the boat I made lunch and then washed out some clothes and hung them outside then I made Oatmeal chocolate chip cookies for Peter and Tim for their help in checking the anchor light and the wind vane. Since Dave doesn’t like Oatmeal in his cookies I made him a batch of chocolate cookies. In between the cooking cycle I read my book while Dave took a nap. The cookies are done and I have to take the awning down as the wind is blowing pretty strong with some strong gusts. I went back to reading and Dave got up from his nap and is waking up. While reading in the cockpit, I was keeping an eye on where we were in relation to the lighthouse to see if we were dragging anchor. The wind was still hooting and we were tugging pretty well on it. When I looked up toward s/v 2 Pieces of Eight, I noticed they were fairly close to us and about even with the lighthouse, where before they were north of us and the lighthouse. I told Dave it looked like they had drug and wanted him to take a look to confirm it. Just by looking he could see they drug a lot but we turned on the radar and checked the distance between them and us and sure enough they were dragging big time. So Dave called them on the VHF and told them what we thought, and they didn’t agree with us at first, but then when Peter went on the bow to check the anchor and looked around, he confirmed they had. So they pulled up their anchor and moved up to where they were originally and set the anchor again. All was well again.

While listening to the net, I made the salad to take with us to dinner and when it was over we gathered our stuff and got in the dinghy and went over to s/v 2 Pieces of Eight and had a delicious dinner. Before dessert we played Mexican Train and then had dessert. It was a key lime cheesecake. That was really good!!! We played a couple more games and then called it a night. We had a really fun time and Dave stole the show with winnings. We thanked Peter and Marni for their hospitality and said good night to Michelle and Tim then went back to our boat and ran the generator to charge the batteries and cool down the freezer compressor. Once that was done we shut down everything and I read for a little while then went to bed. It actually was pleasant enough to sleep down below.

Monday, August 17. Bahia de Los Angeles to Este Ton on Angel De La Guarda.
Dave was up early starting to prepare for our trip to Este Ton on the island of Angel De La Guarda. Yes! That was the island the earthquake was centered. The main reason we are going there is so we can fish along the way. Marni and Peter have not caught a dorado yet and they figure if they are in deep water they have a chance. We were hoping to just catch something. When I got up I helped in preparing the boat and Dave had to go over to Pete and Marni’s boat to get his sunglasses he left on there last night. When he returned we tied the dinghy to the stern, secured the jerry cans and hoisted the anchor. We were on our way by 9:00am. It only takes a couple hours to get to the island so we are going to just have a leisurely trip trying to catch some big fish.

Needless to say no one caught any big fish. We were the only ones that catch a fish but it was too small to keep. We think it was a skipjack and we really don’t like those.

We anchored around 12:00pm in a nice bay. Very quiet and I thought it was beautiful. A lot of cactus on shore and good protection from the north wind which we were suppose to get today. It is definitely warm here. We ended up re-anchoring a couple of times because we were too close to the shore and rocks. It wasn’t a large anchorage and we had been told that maybe 2 boats could anchor there. Well we pushed the envelope and we were able to get all three of us in there. The anchor is down and we are between s/v Bamboo and s/v 2 Pieces of Eight.
LOG: 6836.2NM TRIP: 16NM
LOCATION: 29̊ 009:720N/113̊ 19:905W
ENG. HRS: 1303
It will get shallow but we should have at least 4 feet under our keel in the morning. The only thing that we didn’t like about this anchorage were the bees. No sooner were we anchored, they arrived. We were killing bees left and right. It makes it so unpleasant when you have to do that and also be careful where you sit and step. We put the screens down and took the dinghy for a paddle around the bay. Dave was looking to see if there were any fish among the rocks. There wasn’t. When we returned to the boat I changed into my swimsuit and got my noodle and went into the water. It was a little chilly at first but then it felt really good. Ahhh! I floated around the stern of the boat enjoying the cool water. Then I floated by the side of the boat inspecting the water line and noticed there was a bunch of grass (algae) stuck at the waterline. So I went back to the stern of the boat and asked Dave to hand me the scrub brush so I could clean it off. I cleaned the starboard side and moved around to the port side and half way I was starting to feel little pricks now and then. I wondered if they were jelly fish. I ignored them and just kept moving and scrubbing. Finally it got to the point I was uncomfortable and it felt like little needles, and was becoming more frequent. So I decided I needed to get out of the water. I got the algae off the boat but I still had some slim I wanted to scrub from the beam of the boat to the stern, but it wasn’t happening today. I swam to the stern and Dave was standing on the ladder looking under the stern at the tiny barnacles that were starting to form. He would have to take a plastic scrubber of some sort and scrape them off. I told him I needed to get out of the water as I was being attached by tiny creatures. So he got out and I was behind him. We rinsed off with fresh water and then I poured salt water over everything after I got done so the bees wouldn’t come in hoards. Mission accomplished. We still had bees but just the usual. We changed out of our wet swimsuits and got dressed. I had to hang the suits in the head for fear I would draw more bees. One good thing about nightfall is they go away. I hope we don’t get visited by no see ums or other critters tonight. For precaution I will put out a mosquito coil in the cockpit. I hope we will be able to sit out tonight and enjoy this beautiful spot. We would have stayed another day to explore but didn’t want to contend with the bees. When you look at the hills with the cactus it reminds me of the pictures I saw on Sunset Magazine of Mexico. This really is a beautiful place. Can’t see the sunseting but as it set the sun shone on the hills around us and gave it a beautiful red hue. Really nice.

After the sun went down it was safe to go forward and take the awning down so you wouldn’t worry about stepping on a bee and getting stung. We had dinner and then Dave turned the generator on to cool the boat down and of course charge batteries. That is becoming our daily routine.

The generator is off and all is quiet again. We have our cushions on the foredeck enjoying the night sky. You can hear the water lapping the shore behind us. Earlier there were a couple of fin whales at the mouth of the anchorage feeding. They sound closer than they are. This afternoon we had one come up at the stern of the boat as we were crossing the Sea. Dave had to reel in his line so as not to get the whale tangled in it.

I finished Herman Hill’s book Bahia’s Hidden Gold. It was a really a neat book and quite a good history of this area. He led an amazing life. It is time for bed now and I think it is cool enough down below for me to sleep.

We are leaving tomorrow morning to go back across the Sea to an anchorage called Laguna Rada on Isla Coronados (Smith). It is north of Bahia de Los Angeles about 5 miles.

Tuesday, August 18. Este Ton to Laguna Rada.
Dave was up early and on bee patrol. It didn’t take long to start hunting. Dave was swatting them left and right. We listened to the net and checked in then we pulled anchor around 9:00am.

We made it out of bee city. They were everywhere. On the deck in the cockpit and even down below. Man!!!! I’m glad we are leaving. It is a beautiful sunny warm morning and we have the fishing line out ready to catch something. We would prefer a dorado or yellow fin tuna, but if it is big enough and edible we take it. Again it will take us a couple hours before we drop the hook again, so we are just relaxing and fishing. We saw some whales to the north of us by s/v 2 Pieces of Eight. One even broached. I told her I was jealous!

I am having a sentimental moment so bare with me. Right now I feel so blessed to be here and see what I’ve seen and done. It is wonderful and if I were to die today I would die happy. O.K. I’m done now.

We saw some fin whales feeding and we didn’t catch anything. I think the whales are scaring them away. No one was lucky in the fishing department today.

As we were going toward our anchorage, I looked up on a hill and saw this square thing. It was huge. I got the binoculars out and it looked like some kind of nest. There were sticks strewn all around and dry grass and stuff. I couldn’t take a picture because I was manning the helm. I had Dave look at it and he thought it was a nest too. We didn’t know what kind though. We arrived at the anchorage and Peter and Marni went in first and dropped their anchor and let out 100 feet of chain. Well that put them right in the middle of the anchorage so the rest of us had to maneuver around them. We went toward shore then Dave dropped the anchor and told me to go in reverse. I was having trouble at the time trying to keep the boat from being blown all over the place and when I looked behind me to see how far we were from Peter, I realized I hadn’t pulled the dinghy lines in and they were long enough to get caught in the prop if we continued to stay in reverse. I told Dave I had to pull the lines in or they will get caught in the prop. He was not really happy with me or the situation because then when the wind gust came up it blew the bow off so much we lost control and therefore couldn’t drop the anchor. So we would have to try it again. So once I got the lines safely up out of the water, we headed out of the area, passing s/v Bamboo on the way. We told them to go ahead and find a spot and drop their anchor then we would find a place to go. Big mistake! S/v Bamboo ended up where we wanted to anchor and all that was left to anchor in was just at the mouth of the bay which didn’t allow much protection for us from the south wind. Everywhere we went there were rocks. We tried to anchor at least 3 times and ended up bouncing the anchor over rocks. Dave was getting very frustrated. I told him that if we couldn’t anchor safely we should leave and find another anchorage. We knew of one just north of us. But he said he would try again and see what happens. We finally got it to hold but we were hooked on a rock and not in sand. We said we would keep an eye on things and see how it went.

LOG: 6845.7NM TRIP: 9.51NM
LOCATION: 29̊ 02:730N/113̊ 30:388W
ENG. HRS: 1307
There was another one of those nests up on a hill from where we were anchored so I took a picture. There was also a big rock with a window in it that I had to take a picture of. Really neat geography here. We were close to the rocky shore and we knew the tide was going out and that worried us. We were concerned about being close to shore and also about how much depth we would have under us in the morning. It didn’t sound like we were going to have a restful night. We would just wait and see what happened. In the meantime Dave was thinking of putting the engine on the dinghy to go explore. The plan was for us to stay tonight and tomorrow and explore the lagoon tomorrow at high tide. As the tide went out and the boat was swinging in the wind, we were getting too close to the rocks for comfort. Plus we were in the tide current which was twisting us around. We changed our mind about getting the motor on the dinghy and exploring. We needed to stay on board and keep an eye on things. Dave finally was concerned enough to call Tim and asked how much depth was under him because we were thinking of coming up where he was. But he was getting shallow. Dave did some figuring and told Tim we couldn’t move up there where they were because of rocks on both sides and it would get pretty shallow. Tim mentioned we may want to put a stern anchor out. Then Marni came on the VHF and said we could move to the starboard side of them. They thought there was enough room. So we thought about our options and knew we had to do something pretty soon or we would be on the rocks. So we pulled anchor and went on the starboard side of s/v 2 Pieces of Eight and found a sandy spot and dropped the anchor. It dug in good but the test would come later as to whether we would hold. We felt so much better plus we were in deeper water. We were close to s/v 2 Pieces of Eight, but as long as we didn’t get strong winds and drag anchor we would be o.k. Dave put out 90 feet of chain. S/v Bamboo had 75 feet of chain out. We felt much better now and could relax a little. We sat in the cockpit and drank a margarita. That was our reward for our successful anchor job. Then I went below and fixed dinner. After dinner we were able to hear Peter and Marni’s music and talk to them as they were not far from us. It is a beautiful evening. Around 9:00pm we fired up the generator and turned on the air conditioner to cool it down below. When it was cool enough we shut both the air conditioner and generator off and shortly after that went to bed. There was a little breeze blowing which was nice.

Wednesday, August 19. Laguna Rada.
That little breeze turned into a raging wind. About 3:30am we were woken by the sound of gusty wind. It was blowing around 20 knots with gusts to 25 knots. Another Chubasco!! We had seen lightning before going to bed and we should have guessed we would get wind. It seems to happen that way when we see lightning happening on the mainland side. Luckily we were north of the system so we didn’t get the full blast of wind. We were concerned about the anchor holding as Dave only had 90 feet of chain out and he couldn’t put out anymore or we would be rafting up to Peter and Marni!! We sat outside in the cockpit and Dave checked on the anchor a couple of times and I lifted the side panel from over the side hull as it was flapping vigorously. I rested it on deck as the bottom of it has sand in it so it wasn’t going to go anywhere. When the wind picked up enough to be concerned about the cover on the dodger, Dave was out on the deck so he started to secure the cover over the windshield and in doing so pushed on the port side of the windshield and it cracked. He was so mad. Well it didn’t beat the time when we were still in Bremerton and it snowed and there was lots of snow collecting on the windshield and I took my fist and tapped on the windshield to get the snow off and ended up putting my fist through it. There wasn’t anything we could do about it so we just continued to secure the cover over the windshield. All we could do now was wait and see how long the wind would last and how much wind we would get. We watched Tim and Michelle on s/v Bamboo get up and check their anchor and be on watch, and then Peter and Marni were up. Are we having fun now? We turned our radar on and kept an eye on the distance between s/v 2 Pieces of Eight and us and also s/v Bamboo. I prayed our anchor would hold. As Dave and I were watching everything around us, I looked away to shut off the alarm on the radar and looked back over to where s/v Bamboo was and they had drug big time. I got Dave’s attention and he called them to see if they were aware of the situation and they were. They were concerned about the rocks and stayed there until the wind died down. Luckily it was a short lived system. As the wind was calming down, they pulled anchor and decided they were not going to try and re-anchor in the dark so they would go out in the deeper water just outside the anchorage and wait until sunlight and come back in and anchor. Our anchor had passed the test as it didn’t budge. Thank you God! The excitement was over and everything was back to normal so I went below and went back to bed. Dave stayed up and called s/v Bamboo to tell them we would have our radio on in case they needed anything. Just give us a call. A few minutes after that they called us and said they were going back to B.L.A. (Bahia de Los Angeles). We wished them a safe trip and said we would see them sometime tomorrow probably. Peter and Marni had already gone back to bed so they weren’t aware that S/v Bamboo had drug anchor and were leaving. So we promised we would tell them.

We woke around 8:00am but we had missed the net and weather. So we asked Marni and also mentioned about s/v Bamboo and she said they had checked in. So now Marni could relax knowing they were safely anchored. We were told that the boats anchored south of us got hammered. Their wind gusts were 35-40 knots. No one escaped the wind last night. Not even Bahia de Los Angeles, however, they didn’t get as much as we did. Marni said since she had to do the net again tonight, they thought it would be good to go back to B.L.A. We had planned on exploring the lagoon today, but given the circumstances of the mornings events, we thought it best to get somewhere we know we would be safe. So after everyone had their morning coffee, we all prepared to leave. Then we raised the hook and away we went. We were going to go across to the Baja side and fish off the shore of La Gringa and down toward the anchorage. So off we went. Did we catch fish? Nope. We didn’t, but Peter and Marni caught a little sierra. So they were happy. We continued to fish up to the point where we were coming in to anchor then Dave reeled in his line. We found a spot pretty close to where we had anchored the last time and s/v Bamboo were on our port side again. Peter and Marni decided to anchor on s/v Bamboo’s port side so they would be in sand and not grass like the last time they were here. So all is well. We dropped the hook around 10:30am and there was very little breeze and we were hot.
LOG: 6851.5NM TRIP: 5.61NM
LOCATION: 28̊ 57:303N/113̊ 32:823W
ENG. HRS: 1309
Once we were settled I washed some clothes and hung them to dry outside. We really like B. L.A. because there aren’t any bees or flies. It is just great!!! Then I washed dishes and then I will fixed lunch. After lunch I think I am going to take a nap.

Dave and I both had a nap but it took me awhile to get to sleep as the wind would come up and the awning would flap around and I was concerned it would stretch the bungee cords too much. Also with a lot of wind under the awning it pulls the boat further back on the anchor which is not good. So I go up to check the wind and it was about 18 knots. We have had it up for that much wind so I figured as long as it didn’t get any higher it would be alright. So I went back and lay down. Then the wind picked up again with a little stronger gust, or so I thought, but it wasn’t any more than the last time so I decided to quit worrying about it and lay down. This time I was able to fall asleep. We had a long nap. Dave got up first and got his fishing pole out and was fishing off the side of the boat hoping to catch a yellow fin. Well he did but it flopped so much on deck as Dave was trying to take the hook out of his mouth, it tumbled over the side. Oh well. I got up and was still tired. It took me a while to fully wake up so I sat in the cockpit for a little while. Then I took the clothes down and brought them inside and put them away. It was humid and there were clouds to the south of us. We were a little nervous about that and kept our eye on them. They eventually dissipated. We saw some clouds building on the east side over by the mainland. The wind was out of the north so that was a good thing for us. If it comes from the West we could get an elephante, and if it is from the east we get Chubascos.

We had dinner and then when dishes were done we went outside to get some breeze. We saw lightning on the mainland side and were keeping a watchful eye on it to see where it was headed. I took my cushion to the foredeck and watched the light show. The last time we were here Dave watched lightning go all around us and we had no ill effects from it. Hopefully it will be the same tonight. We ran the generator for about a half an hour just enough to cool the boat and compressors. Then I went to bed. Dave followed shortly thereafter. Hope we have an uneventful night.

Thursday, August 20. Bahia de Los Angeles.
We did indeed have an uneventful night thank goodness. Dave and I slept really well. We woke to blue skies and not much of a breeze. Matter of fact it was pretty darn hot. We put up the awning and Dave put the engine on the dinghy. We were sweating up a storm. It was humid and the sweat was just rolling off us. Eyuck!!! Well things have to get done so you carry a sweat towel around with you and do what you have to do while wiping the sweat off. I washed out some clothes, washed the few dishes I had in the sink and then Dave fired up the generator to make water and then I could defrost the refrigerator and freezer. The freezer is still sucking amps from the batteries by not shutting off all afternoon and into the evening, but as soon as we run the generator and turn on the air conditioner, the area where the compressors are cools down enough the freezer shuts off then behaves itself after that. It is just the cycle we go through every day. So far the generator hasn’t leaked any more oil than just a few drops. We really need to get an oil seal and are thinking we might have to take a trip into San Diego. We’ll have to see how it goes. She be holding together for now.

After the refrigerator and freezer were defrosted, we were still making water so I took this time to catch up for the blog. I finally did and I think I will be able to post the August blog without pictures on the first of September since we will still be here in Bahia de Los Angeles.

There is a boat that pulled in yesterday named s/v Aquarius with Jerry and Sally aboard. We have heard them check in every day and now we will have a chance to meet them. They are friends of Tim and Michelle off s/v Bamboo. So the plan is to meet on shore at 6:00pm and walk to Costa Del Sol for dinner.

We need to use the internet so we are thinking we might go in a little bit earlier so we could check emails and all and then meet everyone at the restaurant. We talked to Marni and told her we were going to go in early and that was their plan too, as they needed to use the internet. So they said they would meet up with us at the restaurant, but when we went past the restaurant to make reservations for eight people. So we packed our computers up, changed clothes and got in the dinghy and headed for shore. The tide had been out really far this morning so by waiting it allowed the water to be up high enough on the beach we wouldn’t have to drag the dinghy too far.

Once ashore we secured the dinghy and stopped and talked to Herman Hill for a few minutes and the guys that were with him, then we started our trek to the restaurant to make reservations. As we came out of Guillermo’s driveway and turned right to go up the street, we saw Kitt and Deb off s/v Alma Inquieta walking back to Guillermo’s from the store. We stopped and talked for a few minutes and the conversation came up about dinner so we invited them to join us. Deb was ready for a dinner cooked by someone else beside her. So they accepted the invitation and we said we would see them later and parted ways. When we got to the restaurant we told them we would like to reserve 10 places together for dinner at 6:00pm. They said no problem and we thanked them and walked out and across the street to the internet place. Once our computers were hooked up it was really slow getting into everything, but we were able to get our stuff done. Dave was able to find a source in Cabo San Lucas that deals with Northern Lights generators. He took down the phone number and he will try to get a hold of them tomorrow to see if they have an oil seal. That would be way cool if they did. Marni and Peter came in shortly after we got there and she had trouble getting onto the internet. For some reason it was really slow. She was finally able to get on and get emails send. As we were getting ready to pack up Sally and Jerry from s/v Aquarius showed up. They too needed to use the internet. Well they had so much trouble getting on they decided to come back tomorrow. We packed up our computers and walked to the restaurant stopping at the little mini market to buy water. The place where we hook up to the internet is connected to a mini store but they don’t have bottled water and most of their drinks aren’t really cold even coming out of the cooler. We were all so hot and dying of thirst and I wanted to have water before drinking margaritas. We drank our water on the way to the restaurant and when we got there, Marni and Peter were already sitting down starting on their first margarita. We had a nice visit with Jerry and Sally and just before we were going to order dinner, Kitt and Deb walked in and joined us. We ordered dinner and it was delicious. After we had completed dinner, we paid the bill and walked back to Guillermo’s to get into our dinghies. The tide had gone way out and it seemed like forever trying to get the dinghy in deep enough water to run the engine. Of course Dave had to get in the dinghy to start the motor, with me pushing the dinghy out to deeper water. Needless to say Dave had to move from the stern of the boat toward the bow as the dinghy wasn’t budging. I needed a little weight shift there. I pushed and pushed and the water was getting deeper but we still didn’t have enough water under the engine to start it. I was laughing because everyone was having the same problem and Marni and Peter’s dinghy and ours wanted to mate and trying to keep them apart was a little funny. Let’s just say you had to be there. We finally got to where Dave could start the engine but by now I was deep enough in the water that I got my shorts wet. Oh well. Such is life. I jumped into the dinghy and off we went. When we were far enough away from shore, Dave pulled up the dinghy wheels and we came back to the boat.

It was still pretty humid and we could see lightning again on the mainland side. This time it looked as though it was moving west. That is not a good thing. As we sat and watched this beautiful but worrisome sight, I decided it was going to come and visit us and we needed to prepare the boat for wind. I took up the side curtain and put it away, then we closed the middle section of the dodger windshield and snapped the cover down over it. We closed all the hatches preparing for rain, and we lifted the dinghy with the motor on it out of the water and it hung off the railing on the starboard side of the boat. When we were satisfied everything was secured and ready for whatever happened, we just sat back and watched. What a show!!! The lightning lit up the clouds and we saw several bolts come down. It was all around us from the north to the south. We knew sooner or later we would get wind and maybe rain. We were hoping no lightning though. We put the computers and all electronics in the oven for safe keeping. It was just too hot to sleep down below, so I got my body pillow, pillow, and Dave’s pillows and brought them up to the cockpit. We were set. We had cleared the cockpit of shoes and anything that could go flying and we put the cockpit cushions up under the dodger in case of rain. I was getting tired so I lay down but I couldn’t sleep. I kept an eye on the clouds and where they were going and the lightning. Dave did the same thing. We did manage to fall asleep but I kept waking up and checking things out. Between 1:30am and 2:00am we heard the wind pick up. Dave said “Here it comes”. We waited for the blast of wind but it didn’t come right away. Then it did and it blew for a while. Dave thought it would blow a long time but thankfully it didn’t. We must have gotten about 35-40 knots of wind. Another Chubasco. We had lightning and thunder, wind and it finally sprinkled a little then stopped. I was hoping for a down pour to wash the boat. Didn’t happen. We only have another month then the Chubascos go away. When the wind first picked up Dave was lying down on the starboard side of the cockpit and he sat up and looked out toward the dinghy and said “oh crap”!! Of course I asked what was wrong and he said we had to do something with the dinghy. He went outside on deck and was holding the halyard out away from the boat to keep the dinghy off the side of the boat. However the wind was blowing so hard that it was picking up the bow of the dinghy and with the motor at the stern was dangerously lifting the bow up. We had a line attached to the forward cleat from the bow of the dinghy, but all that was holding the rest of the dinghy was the halyard and that was not a good thing. We had visions of the dinghy turning over, landing upside down on the boat with the motor on the deck or life line. That would have been a real disaster!! We had to act quick as the wind was building in velocity. As Dave was holding on to the halyard I went to the cockpit to release the halyard very slowly to get it past the rub rail of the boat. Then I had to hurry on deck and go to the forward cleat and let out some of the line so the bow would come down a bit. Then it was back to the cockpit and I let the halyard down a little more. Then I came back and let out the line a lot more so the boat could go down to the water. Then I went back to the cockpit and slowly let the halyard out to get the dinghy in the water. Once that was done I had to hurry out on deck again and grab the line that is connected to the dinghy strap that the halyard is attached too so Dave could unhook the halyard. He had the strength to be able to hold the dinghy away from the boat so it wouldn’t bang against it on its way down. He did that and attached the halyard to the lifeline for the time being as I went back into the cockpit and pulled the halyard snug. Then I came back on deck and took the line that was attached to the strap on the dinghy and Dave went and got the bow line for the dinghy off the cleat and we walked the dinghy back to the stern of the boat. We had to move quickly before the wind caught it and flipped it. We did it and crisscrossed the lines and attached them to the stantions off the stern and pulled the dinghy in snug to the boat. The waves had built up and that was a fear it would capsize the dinghy. Well after we knew the dinghy was safe and secured, Dave went back to the foredeck and took the halyard off the lifeline and secured alongside the mast as I pulled it tight and secured it. Then we both were in the cockpit watching and listening and keeping a close eye on the dinghy. We saw the lights go on onboard s/v Bamboo and saw Tim go to the bow to check the anchor. We called him on the VHF to see if they were alright and they said they were. Just watching like we were. Then we wondered if anyone else was awake and s/v Aquarius came on and said he was and they were keeping an eye on things. So we wished everyone well and said we would keep our radio on just in case someone needed something. After that we tried to sleep, but when the wind would pick up and the waves would toss the dinghy around I was up in a heartbeat checking on it. Needless to say we didn’t get much sleep. When things finally calmed down, I went to bed down below. It had cooled off enough so I could sleep. Dave stayed out in the cockpit. We survived another Chubasco. It was kind of scary there for a while with the dinghy. Had Dave and I not acted as quickly as we did, we would have had some major damage to both the motor of the dinghy and the boat. I’m glad everything worked out fine. I told Dave we made a great team. I always knew we did, but in situations like this, we kept our heads clear, didn’t panic and moved swiftly. Didn’t I tell you I would have a lot of adventures to write about? Well there ya go.

Friday, August 21. The day after the storm.
We woke to cloudy skies. Remnants of earlier this morning. We figured at some point they would burn off. We didn’t put the awning up because the cloud cover cooled things down a bit. It was muggy still but at least we didn’t have the sun beating down on us. There was a little breeze all day which was nice. There were clouds building to the north and south of us and we saw where there were rain showers. To the south of us there were some thunder bumpers but they didn’t come our way. I was tired after last night even though I slept in until almost 9:00am.

I washed dishes and washed out clothes and hung them to dry. I put the side curtain down to keep the heat off the hull for the refrigerator and freezer. We talked to the other boats around us and they too had little sleep. I made coleslaw for dinner and put it in the refrigerator to chill. We will have dorado and coleslaw for dinner tonight.

Dave was thinking about going into the village to see if he could contact someone at the Northern Lights place in Cabo. He had a phone number but not the email address so he wanted to get that. I really didn’t want to go into shore today. So Dave thought we could just do it tomorrow and I could get my vegetables and a few other things at the market as well. He heard a conversation between s/v Bamboo and s/v Aquarius and they were going into shore to use the internet. Dave called Tim aboard s/v Bamboo and asked if they were going in and when and if he could get a ride from them. I told Dave he could go ahead and go in I just didn’t want to go. He didn’t want to take the dinghy in by himself as it is a little harder when you are alone trying to get the dinghy on the beach and then launch it again. Luckily Tim said it was o.k. for him Dave to ride with them so that was settled. I fixed Dave and me a sandwich and he got his computer ready to go and got a shirt on. Tim and Michelle came over around 1:30pm and picked Dave up and off they went. I sat in the cockpit reading my book, The Log from the Sea of Cortez. I was thirsty but didn’t want water right then so I got myself a cold beer and came back out into the cockpit to read some more. I took a drink of the beer and a few minutes later I didn’t feel so good. I felt really weird. My head was fuzzy and my back tightened up and my arms went a little limp and tingly. I didn’t know what was going on but I knew it wasn’t good. I stood up and talked to myself out loud telling myself it was going to be alright and I moved my arms and then I went and sat back down again and was wondering what was going on. I was uncomfortable and my upper back was tight. It felt as though my back was going into a spasm. I have had those before but with the hot weather and all I haven’t had any problems with my back. So I just relaxed and I actually wondered if it was the beer. It’s funny how things go through your mind. I did think that if I was seriously ill, Dave wouldn’t have been able to reach me in time. I would probably call Peter and Marni because they were the closest boat to us. But it all subsided and went away. I did wondered if I was having a heart attack as the symptoms for women are different than a man and a woman gets back pain. But whatever it was it went away and I am fine. It was scary though. After that I figured it wasn’t the beer so I continued to drink it and I read my book. Then I took a nap. I didn’t get a restful nap as a fly was buzzing around me and annoying me to death and it was hot and I was sweating. But I was tired so whatever sleep I did get was good. Then I heard Dave call on the VHF. He took the handheld with him. He said he was on his way back.

Once he was back on the boat, he started the generator and was finishing making water from yesterday. We turned the fans on down below to get air flowing. Then we listened to the net for weather, but it was hard to hear Don so Dave turned off the water maker and we could hear a little better but we needed to ask about a weather fill when we checked in. There isn’t supposed to be any action for us tonight. The convection is moving north to New Mexico and Arizona. This is a good thing. We still had clouds to the south of us and some lightning, but it is all going away now.

Dave tried to catch fish off the side of the boat but had no luck. He enjoys trying. He had a couple of nibbles but nothing that will grab on. He did catch a puffer fish earlier, but that is not a good fish to even touch, let alone eat so he let it go.

We ate dinner and then sat and relaxed. Dave tried his luck again at trying to catch a fish as they were jumping, just not biting. Maybe tomorrow. We have about 3 packages left of dorado from when he caught it at Sweet Pea Cove and then he really will have to get serious about fishing.

After dinner I washed the dishes and Dave started up the generator again so he could back flush the filters on the water maker and run the air conditioner to cool down the cabin. I am catching up the journal/blog and I played a couple of games and now it is time to call it quits. I will get cleaned up and refreshed then go outside in the cockpit and join Dave and watch the sky and stars then go to bed.

Saturday, August 22.
Why is it that all the weather and stuff happens in the wee hours of the morning? Well 4:00am Dave woke up and saw a flash and wondered if it was the light from the lighthouse or lightning. It was the latter and it was getting closer to us. So we gathered all the electronics and stuffed them in the oven and went outside to keep watch. We were lucky we didn’t get any wind and no lightning strikes to the boat as the system was moving east and north. There was a system on the east that we watched very carefully to see which direction it was moving and thankfully it was going north. So about an hour and a half later the lightning subsided and things were back to normal. I went back to bed and Dave stayed out in the cockpit for a while. Dave was up at 7:00am and listened and checked in to the net, made coffee and then I don’t know what else until he told me at 8:30am he was going to troll the bay to try and catch something. He said he probably would catch a pelican and if so would I eat it. I said no! He left in the dinghy and I had a couple more snoozes before getting up. I poured my coffee and then Marni called me and said Dave caught a huge dorado and he was going to clean it on the beach after he came to our boat to get his knife and a couple other things. He had stopped at there boat on his way to our boat. But at the time I wasn’t all that excited because I had just gotten up and I was not awake yet and hadn’t had my coffee. Dave was getting closer to the boat and he held up the dorado. It was a big one. He said he would need his knife and a board and some garbage bags. So I started to get those items. He went over to s/v Bamboo to show Tim and Michelle, and then s/v Aquarius wanted to see it so he went over there. I was able to take a couple of sips of my coffee before he got back to our boat but I wasn’t able to sit and enjoy it like I normally do and slowly wake up. So needless to say I was a little on the grumpy side. He finally got back to the boat and I took a picture of him holding the dorado in the dinghy before we did anything else. I gave him all the stuff he needed and then he asked if I was going to come with him. I hadn’t planned on it but he said he needed someone to hold the fish while he skinned it and because it was so big he just needed some help. So I said o.k. but begrudgingly. Jerry off s/v Aquarius, who has been in Mexico for 5 years, said that has been the biggest dorado caught so far that he knows of. That made Dave more proud. We got into the dinghy and started for shore. We went by s/v 2 Pieces of Eight and Marni was saying something to us but we couldn’t hear her over the engine so we pulled alongside the boat and she asked if we needed a cutting board. We had one but another would probably help so we said yes. Once we got the board we went to shore and pulled the dinghy up on dry land and we thought we might be able to clean the fish on the ledge of the lighthouse. Unfortunately it was too tall. So we ended up putting the two cutting board on the side of the dinghy and cleaned the fish. It was a little tricky but it worked. It made a mess though and there was fish blood on the canvas cover and alongside the dinghy. When Dave got one side of the skin off and threw it in the water, one seagull got that whole thing and didn’t share it at all and it was so far down his throat that no other gull could take it away from him. I thought that was pretty clever. He gulped that thing down so fast I thought he would explode. When Dave threw out the other skin, there was one seagull that claimed it by putting out a call to the others and was standing guard over it. By this time the word was out there was food and the seagulls came in flocks. Every time this one seagull bent his head down to get a hold of the skin the other seagulls started to move in and then it looked like a feeding frenzy. After Dave finished filleting the dorado, we bagged the meat and threw out the carcass for the other birds to fight over. We forgot our bucket so we couldn’t really clean the canvas off so we rolled the dinghy back into the water and Dave tried to clean some of it but we needed to use a brush. So we came back to the boat, got tied up, and Dave handed me all the stuff out of the dinghy. Then he said he would take the dorado down below and clean it further and cut it up while I cleaned the dinghy. Well I didn’t like that at all and it was hot and I was already in a pissy mood and this didn’t make me any happier. I made a face and Dave said o.k. you can clean the fish while I clean the dinghy. I thought about that for a few minutes and decided I would clean the dinghy. So Dave went below and did his magic with the fish and I got the scrub brush out, which I had to move the jerry cans so I could open the stern locker to get the brush. It was hot, sweat was pouring off me and I was just miserable. But I scrubbed the dinghy as best I could and thought about how I was being such a brat and I should be happier that he was able to feed us and I should stop being such a brat and snap out of it and share his joy. When I was done with the cleaning and thinking, I put everything away again. I came down below and helped Dave with the fish. I rinsed off the pieces already cut and put them in zip lock bags. We thought it would be great to share the fish with our friends and neighbors, so I called s/v 2 Pieces of Eight, Bamboo, and Aquarius and invited them over at 6:30pm for a fish fry. I asked them to bring a side dish and whatever they wanted to drink. Then I went back to packing up the rest of the dorado. We have a full bag of fillets for just us even after the fish fry. So we were going to celebrate the big catch. Wahoo!!! That dorado was 4 feet 8 inches long and weighed about 35 pounds. There was a lot of meat on him. Once the fish was in the freezer, we cleaned everything up and I fixed us lunch. After lunch Dave got his computer ready for transport and I grabbed the backpack, as Dave was going to go to the internet place and I was going to the community co-op to get some vegetables. Dave also wanted to see if he could buy another fishing pole as the dorado broke his in half. We were heading to shore and where I was sitting on the side of the dinghy was soft. I told Dave we needed to put air in it. He felt it and he was really concerned because of how soft it was. We had to go back to the boat to getthe bow bag which had the pump and repair kit in it. So once we had that we were off for the shore again. When we arrived on shore and secured the dinghy Dave pumped it up then we saw Herman at Guillermo’s having a brew so we asked him where we might get a fishing pole in town and he suggested Diaz just up the road. So we walked first up the street toward the internet place and stopped in a fishing tackle place the guys had seen on their way to the Pemex station. But unfortunately they didn’t have any. We asked there and they mentioned Guillermo’s or Diaz. So we left and Dave went to the internet place and I walked further up the street to the co-op. They didn’t have much, but I was able to get cilantro which we needed for Dave’s special fish sauce, and a couple other things. I thought it was so neat to find little chicks running around the store. I imagine the owner was the one who shooed them out the back door. Only in Mexico!! I think that is so neat. They had the chickens in the back and I’m sure that is where the eggs come from. Then on my way back to meet Dave I stopped at a mini market and bought 2 huge waters and walked to the internet place. Dave was doing his thing and made a couple of phone calls on Skype. It is always hit or miss trying to make a phone call. When he was done, I checked my email and then we packed up, paid and walked past Guillermo’s to Diaz to see if they had fishing poles. I was able to look at the chapel that Diaz built when the government wouldn’t allow him to build a church off his property. There is history on all of this in Herman’s book. Anyway Diaz didn’t have any fishing poles but they did have some fish hooks Dave is interested in. The gal at Diaz suggested Guillermo’s so we walked back there. We thought maybe she meant the little store next to the restaurant, but they said to ask at the restaurant. They didn’t have any. So we tried. All this time we noticed there were white caps out in the bay and there was thunder and rain at the south end of the bay. We were concerned it would rain before we got back to the boat so we called Marni and asked that if it did rain if they would go over to the boat and close the hatches. They weren’t far from us. She said they would do that. So we watched that cloud real carefully. The surf had really picked up and was roaring in with some pretty high waves. Dave pumped up the dinghy side again and we put Dave’s computer case in a garbage bag, as we don’t have a waterproof bag for it, and laid it in the bow then I put the bow bag on top of it so if we did get some water over the bow the bow bag would get it and not the computer. We pointed the bow to the waves and tried to push the dinghy out. It was hard pushing it against the waves and my side was turning right in the surf as Dave was trying to keep the dinghy straight. He got exasperated with me and told me to just get in the dinghy and he will push it out himself. By this time I was waist deep in water and gladly jumped in the boat, but before that a big wave came over the bow of the dinghy and put a lot of water in it. Everything got wet. Dave moved a little quicker and was able to get the engine started and jump in before we got another big wave. We must have gotten about 2 inches of water in the dinghy from that wave. We went out far enough to where the waves weren’t as big and Dave was able to pick the wheels up and then we headed for the boat. It wasn’t too bad after we got away from shore and there wasn’t much wind as we got closer to the boat. We were concerned about the awning still being up and pushing the bow around but we were fine. Once we got to the boat and tied up we off loaded everything and everything was wet. Shoes, towels, my backpack, and the garbage bag that was covering Dave’s computer case, and the bow bag. Once I got all of that on the boat, Dave took the wheels off and I got into the aft locker to get the siphon pump out so Dave could pump out the water that was in the dinghy. When that was done, he tried to find out where the leak was but had a hard time finding it. He asked me for a sharpie to mark the spot as he finally saw some bubbles coming from the port side of the dinghy. So he took the engine off and then we moved the dinghy to the starboard side of the boat and hoisted it onto the deck so we could dry the bottom and then Dave would try to find the leak. He used soapy water and finally found where the leak was and circled the area with the sharpie so he would know where to patch it tomorrow. We secured the dinghy on the deck in case the wind came up and left it over night. We will look at it again tomorrow morning. After all that I ended up rinsing out everything that got wet, my shorts and top, backpack, Dave’s computer case and a bunch more. In the process he discovered that the computer did get some moisture but not a lot which was very fortunate. He booted up the computer and everything worked except the screen. It flickered and then went dead. Uh Oh!! I suggested we put it in sun to see if it would dry the moisture. When we brought it in it booted up and the screen worked. Then Dave tried it a few minutes later and it didn’t come up. He wasn’t a happy camper. I suggested he just let it sit and try it later. He was looking at options just in case the screen didn’t come back to life. Our TV screen can be used as a screen for a computer. It was getting close to 6:30pm and company was arriving. Peter and Marni were the first to arrive and then Tim and Michelle. Dave was telling Tim about the screen and booted it up and it came up so he was glad. He turned it off and thought nothing more about it. Sally and Jerry from s/v Aquarius hadn’t arrived yet and it was going on 7:00pm so I gave them a call. They were running late. No worries. When they arrived we started the BBQ and put the fish on. We had coleslaw and potato salad and basmati rice to go with the fish. We sat around and had our drinks and talked and then it was time to eat. Everything was just delicious. After dinner we talked some more and then everyone said goodnight and went back to their boats. I decided I would do the dishes tomorrow morning. For a day that seemed from hell, it turned out to be alright and everything got fixed and is running fine.

Sunday, August 23.
This morning Marni and Peter went out to see if they could catch a dorado, but caught nothing. Jerry and Tim went out and caught 2 Sierras but no dorado. When Jerry and Tim got back from fishing, Dave called Tim and asked if he could try the liquid patch stuff Michelle was telling him about. He said he would bring it over in a few minutes. Once Dave got the liquid patch he went to work patching the pin hole in the dinghy. He had to wait 5 minutes in between each coat and he put 6 coats on. We let it set pretty much all day. I did some laundry and washed dishes then cleaned the heads.

We had lunch and I was down below reading because there was no wind and Dave was in the cockpit fixing his fishing pole. He thought since we didn’t find one in town, he would call this lady named Ruth that lives in town. Her call sign is Snow Rabbit on the VHF so he gave her a call. We had met her at Guillermo’s one afternoon. He called her and asked her if she knew of anyone who had a used or new fishing pole for sale as his was broken. She said she couldn’t think of anyone at the moment, but if something came up she would let us know. So Dave thanked her and went back to fixing his pole. He did a really nice job on it. Shortly after talking to Snow Rabbit, Dave noticed a couple of guys swimming in the water and it looked as though they were heading toward our boat. I came up to look and figured it was just some kids swimming. As they got closer we heard someone calling and it seemed they were trying to get Dave’s attention. They came up to the boat and asked if we were the boat that had the broken fishing pole. He told them he was. One of the guys could speak English and the other one couldn’t. They came to the back of the boat per Dave’s invitation, and got out of the water and sat on the stern step. So Dave talked to the guy and he said he had a fishing pole that he would sell us. His truck was on shore and they swam out to talk to us. I thought that was pretty neat. Dave called Ruth, Snow Rabbit, and told her and she knew the man as he has been working for her for 15 years. He had heard her talking about the pole to someone and he rushed out to see if he could sell his to us. She did say to take a good look at it. Well with our dinghy out of the water being repaired, we had no way to get to shore so Dave called Peter to see if he could get a ride. He called him and explained what was going on and Peter came over after he had a bite to eat. He had just gotten up from a siesta. Meanwhile the guys were thirsty so I got them both some water. Dave had a very nice conversation with the guys and Dave mentioned he may have to go to San Diego but didn’t know how they would get to the bus. The one guy named Ramon offered to take us to the bus station if we needed a ride. So there ya go. Everyone is so willing to help you out, the locals and cruisers. I think that is awesome. Peter came over after he finished his lunch and picked Dave and the guys up and took them to shore. When Dave returned he had a fishing pole. It had been used a lot, but it was a strong one and a little shorter than the one he has now. It needed a little cleaning up so that was his afternoon project. It cost him $50.00 (650 pesos) for it and new they are usually around $150.00. He got a good deal. So everyone was happy.

Dave poured some soapy water over the patch work on the dinghy and there were no bubbles so we decided to give it the big test and put it in the water. Before we could do that he had to pump up the floor. Then we lifted it up and swung it over the side of the boat and let it down then brought it around to the stern of the boat. Dave got in and noticed the same side that had a hole was soft again. He leaned over the boat and looked for bubbles but didn’t see any. Then he checked the valve and that was leaking air. So he took the valve off and pumped some air in it and put the valve back on and then he pumped up the other side. He could still hear a little air coming out of the valve, but he said it would be alright and he would keep an eye on it. So all the projects were done for the day and we just relaxed. It was hot and usually we get a nice breeze in the afternoon but we had nothing.

After dinner we had some wine and a cigar and sat outside to catch whatever breeze there was. It had picked up a little. Then when our cigars were out, we went below and ran the generator so as to run the air conditioner to cool it down below. I did typing for the blog and Dave sat outside. When we were done with running the generator, we shut it down and I went to bed shortly thereafter. It was pleasant enough to at least get to sleep.

Monday, August 24.
It is a beautiful morning and there isn’t much of a breeze but Marni was saying that one weather prediction was for southeast winds to 20 knots, and Don’s weather said there wouldn’t be much at all. So who to believe? Don is right most of the time so I believe his forecast. Marni was all worried because if it was going to be rolly she would move the boat down to La Mona at the south end of the bay. She hates the boat to rock. Plus Peter went in with Tim, and Michelle, to get propane and get some welding down for Tim. Marni said that when Peter comes back and it is blowing they will move and she said that s/v Bamboo would have to move too if Peter was going to work on their boat. He doesn’t like it rolly. We figured we would just stay put. 20 knots of wind isn’t much and the wind waves aren’t really that bad in here. Marni had scheduled lunch at Costa Del Sol, but cancelled it. It turned out that the wind came up but as a nice breeze out of the ENE.

Dave went into shore to use the internet to call and talk to his son. Michael should be coming home in another day or two. He is in Wisconsin right now. When Dave called me on the VHF to ask how the wind was doing, I told him the wind was fine but we need to defrost the freezer. I told him I was going to start the generator and do that. He said he was heading back to the boat now so he would be here soon. So I fired up the generator, loaded it up and defrosted the refrigerator and started on the freezer by the time Dave made it back to the boat. The dinghy behaved just fine and all went well. I fed Dave lunch and I finished up with the freezer and I’m making ice right now. While Dave was in town he bought a couple of hooks for 2 of his fishing lures and he put those on. We are making water since I used up some when I did laundry this morning. I washed sheets, towels and other items needing to be cleaned. Not much else going on. I am going to go outside and enjoy the breeze and read my book. Dave is checking sailmail email and the screen is back up and running like normal again which has made him very happy.

I spoke too soon about the dinghy doing just fine. It was still leaking air and he looked over the side and did see bubbles from one and could hear another source of bubbles, but the only problem with being able to see them was difficult because we had rollers coming into the bay and when the waves splashed against the dinghy it created bubbles so he couldn’t tell what was dinghy air bubbles and what was wave bubbles. But he knew we had at least one if not two holes left to repair. So Dave had to take the engine of the dinghy which was not a lot of fun as the dinghy was bouncing up and down from the wave action, but he managed to get it back on the pedestal. Then we had to pulled the dinghy to the side of the boat and attach the halyard to it and hoist it out of the water and get it on deck. Dave did the directing of the dingy as I cranked up the halyard and we got the dinghy on the deck. We secured it and were able to lift the bow enough to open the forward hatched over our bed to get air. Then we took some soapy water and poured on where we knew there was another hole and found it and marked it but couldn’t find the other one. Dave seems to think it is further under the dinghy. We will have to turn the dinghy over tomorrow and check it out good. For now there isn’t any more we can do. We ate dinner and then relaxed with some wine. Tomorrow we hunt for holes.

Dave slept in the cockpit as it was too warm for him down below and I turned on the fan and was able to sleep in my bed.

Tuesday, August 25.
There is no breeze, wind, nada this morning. I sure hope we get something pretty soon as it is hot!!

Dave got the solution for fixing air leaks from Michelle and Tim so he was ready to plug those holes. First we had to find them. He had put a circle around one we knew was a hole but he knew there was another one and figured it was way under the dinghy so he wouldn’t be able to see anything. So we got the dingy turned over and got some soapy water and poured it all over the middle section of the port underside. Sure enough we found the other hole. The fish had grabbed the hook and dove down under the boat and must have poked the holes as he dove with the hook in his mouth. They were in a row. So Dave got some paint thinner and cleared the antifouling paint from around those two holes and waited for that to dry, then he tested it one more time with the soapy water to make sure that was where they were and then wiped all that off and let it dry. Then he started to apply the solution to the holes. It took about 30 minutes for the whole process, then we waited to let it dry well then we turned the dinghy back over and put air in the tube and hoisted her up and Dave guided her over the side of the boat and down to the water. Then we moved the dinghy to the stern of the boat and let it set for a little bit. Dave put the engine on and strapped the gas can in again and she was ready to go.

It looks like all the holes in the dinghy have been patched and we are good again. Dave did have to scrape off some small barnacles that were collected on the bottom but nothing major. Dave couldn’t stand it anymore. He had to try out the fishing pole he bought and see how the dinghy would do, so he went trolling. He is going to have to get use to the new pole as it is so stiff compared to his other fishing rod. He came back empty handed.

I was going to fix us some alfredo sauce and put that on top of spaghetti pasta and Dave was going to fry a couple of dorado fillets in olive oil and garlic and put that on top of the pasta. Well that didn’t happen as there was no wind, not even a breath of air and I wasn’t going to heat the cabin to make it even hotter than it already was. So we decided we would have cheese and crackers and wine for dinner. We weren’t really hungry anyway.

Marni called us and said that if we wanted to walk our dog (joke), they were going ashore to walk Kela around 6:15pm and we were welcome to join them. Tim and Michelle from s/v Bamboo were walking Bently as well. So we said thanks. We were having a margarita and relaxing in the cockpit. At 6:00pm we listened to the weather on the net but couldn’t hear Don at all. We checked in and then we got in the dinghy and went to the shore where the lighthouse is. We all walked the beach looking for shells and talking. The dogs were running around having a great time. There was a nice cool breeze coming from the north which felt really good since it had been so warm today. The guys were trying to get some clams, but the tide was coming in so it was a futile effort. They will have to come when the tide is further out. The sun had set so we walked to our dinghies and went back to our boats. Once onboard, I fixed us a plate of cheese, sliced beef sausage and crackers, and Dave went to his computer to boot it up. When it was booted up he noticed it wasn’t charging like it normally does so he was looking at the possibilities that would cause that to happen. Anyway he was concerned. He ended up taking the spare battery out and then it would charge. Strange! Anyway it worked.

We fired up the generator and charged batteries and turned on the air conditioner. It was hot outside and the wind was hot and blowing from the west which means we were having an elephante. The hot blast of wind didn’t last long but it took a while to cool down after the wind switched to the north. I left the hatches closed to keep the cool air in and I went to bed. My little battery operated fan worked for a while and then died. So I tried to sleep. I had a hard time and then it had been long enough with the boat facing the north that the breeze was coming up cool, so I got up and went out and opened all the hatches. Dave was sound asleep in the cockpit. When I came back into the cockpit Dave had awoke and wondered what was going on. He saw me and said “Oh it’s you”. “Yep” I said. I just told him I had to open the hatches to get air down there. So I went down below and went back to bed. Dave came in a little while longer and stood at the foot of the bed to see how cool it was and determined it wasn’t cool enough for him to sleep down below. He wondered how I could. I like my soft bed but once I got to sleep I was fine. So Dave slept in the cockpit. He took the body pillow and laid on it for a more comfortable sleep.

Wednesday, August 26.
I was asleep and all of a sudden I heard this breathing and then a sound like a horn. It was loud enough it woke me. Every night when we are down below after the generator has been shut off; we’ve been hearing this noise. I at first thought it was a dog barking but a dog barks usually continuously and this noise would come and then it would be quiet for a few minutes then it would come back. We just couldn’t figure it out. It has to be something either in the water or someone is running something in or near the water so it is transmitting through the water. But last night it was the loudest I had ever heard. I swear it is some kind of mammal making that noise. Dave said there was a fin back whale lurking around all the boats last night for the longest time. After I heard the noise I got out of bed and went to the cockpit to see if Dave heard it but he was asleep. This was about 4:30am. I stood in the companion way listening and I could only faintly hear the noise. So I decided he wouldn’t be able to hear it so I didn’t wake him and I went back to bed. The noise finally faded and I fell back to sleep.

Dave was up after the sun came up and he came down to the stateroom and put his pillows back on the bed and standing, he leaned over and lay down from his waist up. I woke up for a few minutes and talked to him and then I went back to sleep. I heard the net go on and then I heard, “I’m going fishing”. So I said “so long”. I stayed in bed until about 8:00am or so then got up. He hadn’t even made coffee. So I turned the stove on and started heating water. I was going to go out and put the awning up but decided I would wait until the water was hot and my coffee was made before doing that. So I washed dishes and washed out clothes and hung them to dry. I made coffee and poured me a cup then went out and put up the awning. I like to have my coffee sit for a while before I drink it. I can’t drink it right after it is poured like Dave can. I like it hot just not steaming hot. Once the awning was up, I got my book, which I have started a new one, Plague Ship by Clive Cussler with Jack Du Brul. So while I am sitting out in the cockpit enjoying my coffee and book, I hear splashing going on. I thought at first the pelicans were dive bombing for breakfast and then I looked up and saw these good size fish jumping out of the water. Wowee!! I got on the VHF and called Dave and told him. He was on the outside of the sand spit and he said fish were jumping out there too but not biting. So I went back to my book and he worked his way back to the boat.

I did a couple more rows of crocheting on the baby afghan then went back to reading my book. Tim and Jerry had gone out fishing early and came back with a couple of sierras. They went further out than Dave did. Anyway, Dave wanted to know what lures they used to catch the sierra, so he went over to Peter and Marni’s boat since the guys were over there. I went down below to figure out what I was going to serve for lunch. Michelle told me she made roast beef sandwiches from the canned roast beef and it was good. So I went to the seat where I store my canned goods and opened it up and took out a can of the roast beef. I was standing there trying to figure out what I was going to do when I saw a bug on the can. I killed it and then I started seeing more of them all over inside the seat. GREAT!!! I started taking things out and inspecting them and the second thing I took out was an unopened container of cracker crumbs. There were those mealy or weevil type bugs all over it. I rushed it to the sink and poured water all over it then got my dish rag and went back to the seat and proceeded to take everything out of it wiping off the cans as I did so. There were a bunch of those bugs. As I got down to the bottom where I have two plastic containers, one of the containers had soups, tomato sauce, paste, bread crumbs and the like. The other container had tuna, salmon, pickled little corn on the cobs and things like that in it. So I concentrated more on the one that I took the bread crumbs from first. I discovered that the bread crumb container had holes in it and when I got to the bottom of that container there was larvae and some had hatched and were crawling around. Another GREAT!!! When I got to where I could lift the plastic containers out, I took them and some of the canned goods outside and took the hose at the stern of the boat and washed the cans and the containers. I left them outside to air dry and came back down below and sprayed the inside of the cabinet with awesome. They didn’t like that much and I was able to get a few of the bugs up but they were in all the cracks and crevices so I decided to get a tooth brush and some Clorox and brush it on everything. They liked that even less than the awesome and it was killing them. It was also making them run too which I didn’t want as we took the screws out of the bottom of the cabinet/seat to move it so I would have easier access and they would be able to get out and onto the floor. So I moved fast and between the Clorox and me picking them up with a paper towel, I got a handle on it. Once I was comfortable with the Clorox rinse, Dave and I tilted the cabinet/seat to check underneath it. I saw a couple and got those and then we inspected the floor and even took the deck plates up that were under the cabinet/seat to make sure none were hiding under them. When we were satisfied we had them taken care of we put the deck plates back down in place and then I fixed us a peanut butter and jam sandwich. I was all out of energy as far as making something fancy for lunch. Dave kept an eye on the container/seat and found a couple more bugs which he killed. Then he didn’t see any more. After lunch and after the container/seat had a chance to dry, I put the plastic containers back in the container/seat and inspected each can and wiped them off before putting them inside. Once that was done, I cleaned up my mess and then put everything back together again. I kept an eye on it through the afternoon and did find a couple more bugs that had found their way out of a crack. There is a handle that goes behind the seat and that handle is stainless steel, which holds a wood back rest that goes down inside the seat where the food is. I think they were crawling out around the holes where the stainless steel rod goes down so I went and got a bunch of bay leaves and put several inside the seat and stuck a couple each in the area around the stainless steel handle to get any that were coming out. So I think I have all bases covered. Wow!!! I sure didn’t want to do that kind of work today! I am glad we found the source of those bugs because we had been killing them and wondering where they were coming from. Little did we know what we would find? I will vacuum every nook and cranny of the boat when we get to a marina so as to rid our boat of such things. I will be going from room to room cleaning extensively. Kind of like spring cleaning when you go through cupboards and such. Sound like fun? NOT!!! But at least I will know the boat is clean.

So!! What else happened today? Well Dave’s computer wasn’t charging when we were running AC. He thought it might be the charger that was going bad. He did some testing and did a few other things and he thinks it might be the mother board that is going out and things are dying a little at a time. So that is a worry as we have all the electronic charts and sailmail and more on his computer. No we don’t have paper charts of Mexico because they are not correct. We get the updates to the charting program on a regular basis. My computer doesn’t have all the capabilities for him to load all that to mine, so if the mother board dies we are A.S.O.L. We won’t know anything for sure until we hook up to the internet in town tomorrow. We don’t know what we will do if his computer dies. There is always something.

It is hot tonight. Hardly a breeze is blowing and we ran the generator before we went into shore to have dinner. Tim and Michelle invited us to join them and Sally and Jerry off s/v Aquarius for dinner. So we accepted. We knew we would be back late, so Dave ran the generator for an hour before we left. Then he figured we would run it when we got back to the boat. We met everyone on shore at 6:30pm and walked to Costa Del Sol restaurant to have our favorite 2 x 1 margaritas and an excellent dinner. We did have an excellent dinner and conversation. We were the only ones in the restaurant. As you can imagine, this restaurant is not very big. Anyway, we left there and came back to the dinghies and then to our own boats. Once we got onboard our boat, Dave looked at the batteries and they were doing alright so we decided we wouldn’t run the generator tonight. I had already decided it was too hot to sleep down below so I was sleeping in the cockpit. It was warm and hardly a breeze to speak of. We sat outside in the cockpit for a while then I moved my cushion to the foredeck to try and catch any breeze I could. I was getting tired so I brought the cushion back in and went below to get ready for bed. Then I got our pillows, the body pillow and the large towels as a blanket in case we get cold. I got my bed ready and so did Dave and then retired for the evening. Well Dave doesn’t have any problems sleeping anywhere but me on the other hand it takes me a while which is really frustrating sometimes. Well most of the time!!! So he is over on the other side of the cockpit making his little sounds that he makes when he is asleep and I am looking at the stars and trying to find a comfortable position. Like I said before, I like to stretch out and there isn’t the room in the cockpit for that. So I felt cramped and it was hot with no breeze. I can hear the dogs, birds, and other stuff that I usually don’t hear when I am down below so that doesn’t help. Well I tossed and turned a few times and I suspect finally dozed off. But then I would wake up and change position and try to get back to sleep again with difficulty. I was even getting upset because I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t go below yet as it was still hot down there. So I had no choice. I did fall asleep eventually and when I woke I had had enough and my body was hurting. So I got my pillow and went to my comfortable bed. By then it was cool enough I could sleep. Dave was sound asleep. How he can sleep there I don’t know, but he does sleep so good on him!!!

Thursday, August 27.
Dave was up early as usual and he tried to listen to the net but couldn’t hear Don again, so he told me he was going to go fishing. So I said goodbye, wished him luck and off he went and off I went back to sleep for a while. I finally got up between 8:00 and 8:30am. I made coffee and then went out and put up the awning. As I was putting up the awning Dave came back and said he tried everything he had and the fish were not biting it. He did get a nibble, but nothing strong. There were some other guys fishing and one of them was catching them right and left. Even Tim and Jerry caught Sierra. Poor Dave! He was really down about that. He usually can catch something. He was also down in the dumps about his computer and worried about it going TU. I got my coffee and went out into the cockpit. Dave got his coffee and came out to join me and was thinking of things to try to figure out if it was the mother board or the charger. After we finished our coffee we got ready to go into town while there was hardly any wind and no waves. Once we were ready we got into the dinghy and went over to where Tim and Jerry were talking to Ken on m/v Genesis. They were talking fish as Ken was the one who was raking in all the fish. Well after the guys were talked out about fishing, Dave mentioned to Ken about his computer and found out that Ken had the same computer and charger. So he let Dave borrow it to see if our charger was bad or what. So we thanked him and went off to shore. We walked to the internet place and Dave tired Ken’s charger and the same thing happened with it as it did with his own. So it is the connection within the computer. Darn. Well so much for that. He can’t charge his battery. He did some looking on the internet for a Dell computer like what he has and they don’t make it anymore. Go figure!!! So now what? Well to make a long story short, we found out that Jerry on s/v Aquarius had the same thing happen to his computer and he ran it just on AC for 2 years until he could get another computer. So there is hope!! Dave checked emails and found one from the people in Cabo San Lucas for Northern Lights and they don’t do parts. Darn. Oh well we tried. Well when we were finished at the internet place, we looked out on the bay and white caps were forming. The wind had picked up early today. We had a late wind yesterday and I was hoping it would be the same today, but no. So we walked back to Guillermo’s and met Ken and his wife Faye off m/v Genesis and they had just finished lunch. We sat down and started talking hoping we would pass enough time that the wind would die down enough the waves wouldn’t be so high in trying to get dinghy off the beach. Well we visited and then more couples we knew came and had lunch and so by the time we were all ready to leave the wind had died down and so did the waves so it was safe to leave. The last time we left when the waves were crashing on the beach Dave’s computer got wet. I’m sure that didn’t help the computer problems any. Matter of fact it probably sped them up. We all left at once and got in our dinghies. However, we didn’t keep from getting wet leaving and certainly didn’t stay dry on our run back to the boat. The computers stayed dry but Dave and I got wet. Oh well. At least the water is warm. I just rinsed out my clothes when we got on board.

We had a nice dinner. Dave fried up some dorado and I made alfredo sauce and mixed it with the spaghetti noodles and the fish and we had a great meal.

We are running the generator right now cooling the boat down and charging batteries. Dave’s computer is hooked to AC and he is saving his documents to a thumb drive just in case. So there ya go. We got a chance to talk to John Eltrich on s/v Masquerade and found out they are not too far from us now. In two weeks they have traveled from Mazatlan to Animas Slot. We should be seeing them in a week. It will be good to see them and see how Sandy is doing since her cataract surgery. They also have a package for us with parts in it.

So as you can see we are hanging in there. If it isn’t cool enough down below tonight for me to sleep, I will make my bed on the deck where I can spread out!!!! There has been a fin back whale visiting the area around the boats and m/v Genesis had the whale so close to his boat that he bumped the anchor chain. Don’t need that hummer to mess with anchor chains. He has been swimming around here every night feeding. It is amazing to hear them and not see them. Well I am going to play some games on my computer and relax with another glass of wine. Chow!!

Friday, August 28.
Well Dave’s luck is turning for the better as he caught his first sierra!! We will have fish for dinner tonight. We haven’t had sierra yet but everyone that has caught one said they are really good eating. So we shall enjoy!

While Dave was fishing, I got up and put the awning up, washed out clothes and towels, siphoned out the back tray for the air conditioner, and then enjoyed my coffee in the cockpit. I got the stuff ready so when Dave gets back he can pour diesel from the jerry cans into the fuel tank and then we are going ashore to get them filled. There is a gal that works at Guillermo’s that let us borrow her truck last time, so Dave thought she might be willing to do that for us again. He asked her yesterday if we could borrow it again and she said yes. So she will meet us at Guillermo’s at 11:00am this morning.

I got my coffee and went out into the cockpit and enjoyed sitting in the shade sipping my coffee. At 9:00am I called Dave on the VHF to let him know what time it was since we had that appointment for a fuel run at 11:00am. Tim, Jerry, Peter, Dave, Marni, and I are all going to shore. The guys were going to get the fuel and we ladies were going to walk to the yellow Mercado and get some food items. Marni had to get a few things and all I needed to get were some carrots, avocados, bread, and tomatoes.

Dave came back to the boat with 2 sierras he had caught. He took them below and cleaned and filleted them as they were not huge fish, then I put them in zip lock bags and put them in the freezer. We emptied 3 jerry cans of diesel in the fuel tank and got those and the gas can ready to go to shore. Dave packed his computer so he could check his emails and we changed clothes and were ready to go by 10:30am. We said we would meet everyone on the beach at 10:45am. We had a nice slow ride in and the rest were behind us and on the shore shortly after we pulled the dinghy up on the beach and secured it. The truck wasn’t there yet so some of the people had a soda, or mineral water. Then we were told that the truck was parked in the back so after a while when everyone had visited and drank their drinks, the guys took off to load up the truck with their jerry cans, and Marni and I walked up to the yellow Mercado. Marni needed to check her emails so instead of shopping first, we went across the street to the internet café. After she was done we went to the Mercado and got what we needed then as Marni was loading her groceries into her portable cart, there were some men getting ready to leave in their car and asked us if we wanted a ride and where were we going. We said that would be nice and told them we were going to Guillermo’s. So we visited on the way which wasn’t far and they dropped us off. It was nice not to have to walk back in the heat. The guys hadn’t gotten back from the fuel run yet, but there were some other cruisers sitting at a table so we joined them. Soon after the guys came back and joined us. Dave and I had lemonade and then we needed to get back to the boat as I had to defrost the refrigerator and freezer. So we finished our drink and said goodbye to the rest of the cruisers and carried our jerry cans to the dinghy. We got the dinghy in the water and I held on to it while Dave got the jerry cans and loaded them into the dinghy. Then we pushed the dinghy out and I got in then Dave started the motor and climbed in and off we went. Dave went out a way from shore and put the engine in neutral as he pulled up the dinghy wheels and then we were off. When we got back to the boat we off loaded all the jerry cans, computer, etc from the dinghy and then put all the stuff away. I went below and put the groceries away and Dave started the generator and I defrosted the refrigerator first then the freezer. I fixed Dave and me lunch and then I proofed the blog for August and caught up for today. Tomorrow is my birthday so Dave got our cruiser friends to join us for dinner at Costa Del Sol. That will be fun. A PARTY!!!

We have some clouds rolling in and they look like rain clouds, however, the wind is blowing from the NW and the clouds were moving in from the E so I don’t think we will see any rain. I’m still waiting to get that down pour cruisers talk about that you can grab a bar of soap and take a shower.

We had the sierra for dinner and it was delicious. I made minute rice and put canned mushroom soup in it and it turned out soupy. I don’t cook with minute rice so I forgot that it doesn’t suck up the moisture like regular rice does. So that was a flop, but we ate it anyway. I’ll have to add some spices to it next time because it was a little on the bland side. After dinner Dave said I had to redeem myself because of the rice and fix him a rum and orange juice. I laughed. So I fixed us both one and we sat in the cockpit until it got dark. Then I had dishes to do. I am going to have to dock the maid’s pay since she/he skipped out on us tonight. Just kidding guys!!! I really don’t have a maid but sometimes it would be nice. Anyway Dave and I joke like that when I don’t want to do something like the dishes. Oh I can hear you!!! You are saying--- why doesn’t Dave do the dishes. Well Dave doesn’t do dishes and he made that quite clear before we got married. So forget that one!!! I would have let them set until morning but I really didn’t want to be faced with a sink full of dishes tomorrow, so I sucked it up and did them.

There is lightning in the distance to the east but it is far away. I think we will have a quiet uneventful night. I hope!! We are running the generator again to run the air conditioner and the ice maker. I was making ice earlier but we had to shut down everything so we could hear Don the weather man and it still was hard to hear him.

So I will finish up making ice and we should have a full bag when I am finished. Not much going on. We are just relaxing.

Saturday, August 29.
Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday, Happy Birthday, Happy Birthday to me! Yep! I’m another year older but I am having a Baja Birthday!! I haven’t had one of those ever!!

Dave went out fishing this morning and didn’t catch anything. Nothing was biting. I guess they all went south. I got up a little before 8:00am and made coffee. I was woken up at 3:30am when I heard the wind pick up. Dave was already up since he was sleeping outside, and he was watching the dinghy and looking around. I waited and it calmed down. I don’t know what all that was about because there were no clouds in the sky. The sky was just beautiful and the stars were bright. I went back to bed

Tonight the people off s/v Bamboo, 2 Pieces of Eight, Aquarius, and m/v Genesis are meeting us at the restaurant tonight to help me celebrate my birthday. I thought that was nice. Dave was the ring leader on that one. We had originally been invited by Marni and Peter to go to dinner with them then Dave told them it was my birthday so they agreed with Dave to invite our other cruising friends. We are going back to our favorite inexpensive place, Costa Del Sol.

This morning Peter dropped off a bag for me and inside was some of Marni’s homemade Kahlua and a card. That was so sweet. Michelle off s/v Bamboo and Sally off s/v Aquarius called and wished me a happy birthday so that was nice.

I put my clean dishes away from last night and then washed clothes, put the awning up, cleaned out the ice maker, siphoned out the water in the tray for the aft air conditioner, and wiped off the solar panels. I think I am done with chores for today. I will probably read and crochet the rest of the day. Dave and I will probably go to shore around 3:30pm so we could check emails and Dave could make a couple of phone calls. We’ll just have everyone meet us at the restaurant. We just didn’t want to make 2 trips into town.

We are running the generator right now to finish filling our water tanks and then that job will be done.

Our plans changed about going into shore this afternoon. We decided to go this morning as the wind was doing strange things and Dave was afraid we were going to get a real blast of wind this afternoon so he wanted to go ashore now so as to get back if it did blow up. So he packed up the computer and we took off. As soon as we got ashore and the dingy secured, we started walking to the internet place. Dave asked if I had his wallet. I told him I left it in the boat in the bow bag so I went back and got it. As I was walking back to where I left Dave, here he comes and I asked him what was going on and he said he forgot the headset. Needless to say he wasn’t a happy camper. The wind was picking up and the surf had some large rollers. It wasn’t going to be a great ride back to the boat. I told him I didn’t need to go back with him so I kept the computer with me and helped push him into the water. Well that was sure a lot of fun as the surf came splashing in and we got some water over the bow of the dinghy but I got soaked up to my waist trying to get the boat in deeper water. So he is finally on his way and I am soaked to the skin from the waist down. I walked back up the beach to Guillermo’s and sat down in a chair and waited for Dave and tried to dry. It was about 20 or so minutes by the time Dave was back and I walked down to help him bring the boat ashore. I managed not to get any wetter than I already was. So we walked to the internet place and checked emails and Dave made a call back home. When we left we walked across the street to a mini market run by a mom and pop. We went in and got some water and were checking out what they had. We were looking for Jumex orange juice in the tetra containers but they didn’t have any. Dave saw a container and was trying to get it out to see what it was and ended up hitting a bottle off the shelf. It broke and juice was all over the floor. The man came in from out front and Dave told him he would pay for it. I offered to clean up the mess and he said no he would do it. Well I felt bad so I insisted on cleaning it and asked where his mop was. He pointed to outside. So I went out there and around the corner was a mop. So I came in and soaked up the juice and Dave was cleaning up the glass. I needed to rinse the mop so I asked for water and he pointed outside. Dave and I went out to look and we saw a barrel with water in it and we asked the man if that was it and he said yes. We got a bucket full of water and I rinsed the mop and then went back over the floor again. It would have to be cleaned again, but at least we were able to get most of it up. I brought out small chards of glass and explained to him there were still some on the floor. So he said he would take care of it. So we did our good deed for the day. We left there and walked back to the dinghy and by this time the surf had subsided so getting the dinghy out into the water was a much better experience. We got back to the boat and we didn’t have a lot of wind just a breeze which was really nice. We never did get a big blow so that was good. We met the other cruisers on shore at 6:30pm and walked to the restaurant and had a great dinner and good company. Our Kiwi friends just happened to come in for dinner so we invited them to join us. It was a great time.

Sunday, August 30. Bahia de Los Angeles to Puerto Don Juan
Dave slept in the cockpit last night and this morning around 6:00am or so he came down and lay on the bed. He said it was really damp out there. It got humid last night and everything was wet. He went to sleep and when he awoke it was almost 7:30am and he was afraid he missed the weather report from Don, but as it so happens because of the hurricane that is brewing south that was the topic of conversation this morning so he was able to get the weather. It is suppose to get really windy south with rain. When people hear hurricane they start to panic and want to run right away to Don Juan. I understand that since Don Juan is not a large place, people want to get in before the mad rush.

Peter and Marni picked Dave up in their dinghy and went to shore to use the internet so Dave can get a real weather forecast. Don does a good job but he isn’t an expert and he has been known to be wrong. So Dave is checking out everything before we take action. I guess this hurricane is a bad one and if it does hook a right there could be some ramifications from it no doubt. So we will see. Starting now until the end of October is the critical time to be wary of any hurricanes forming south of us.

Dave wants to snorkel the bottom of our boat today to see what the through hauls look like. A few people here have found their through hauls almost totally clogged due to the small particles in the water. So when he returns from shore he will probably do that before it starts to get windy.

The birthday party at Costa Del Sol was so fun. When we returned to the boat we couldn’t believe it was 11:00pm. We got to the restaurant at 6:30pm. I guess we DID have fun!!

Today I washed left over dishes that were in the sink, washed clothes and hung them out to dry, put the awning up, siphoned the water out of the aft air conditioner tray and am now catching up the blog. I will be posting it when we get back to the village.

Dave returned from shore and it looks like we are pulling anchor to go to Puerto Don Juan to wait out the reports of the hurricane. No one knows at this point what it will do so we want to get in there so we can get our anchor set before the mad rush. Dave doesn’t think it will come this far, but we won’t know anything for a couple of days. So s/v 2 Pieces of Eight, Bamboo, and m/v Genesis are going there too.

We took the engine off the dinghy, secured it on the pedestal, took the awning down and the windshield cover off and the side curtain up and we were on our way. We left at 11:30am and it will take an hour to get to Don Juan. The wind is on our nose out of the East and it is blowing about 24-25 knots.

We have arrived in Puerto Don Juan where there are several boats in here already. John and Sandy on Masquerade are here. They have a package for us that have parts in it from the states.
ARRIVAL: 12:30PM
LOCATION: 28̊ 56:501N/113̊ 27:094W
ENG. HRS: 1311
Once into Puerto Don Juan we motored around looking for a good spot. We found one not too far from John and Sandy so we dropped the hook. After we got set we noticed the boat behind us had a float to mark their anchor and it wasn’t too far from our stern. We couldn’t see it when we came in because the wind was making white caps on the water and their float is white. When we got anchored and was looking around to make sure we were far enough away from everyone and not dragging, we saw the float. We talked to the boat behind us that the float belonged too and they said they have 200 feet of chain out now and will be letting out another 50 feet. We had 150 feet of chain out so if we wanted to let out more we would be right over their anchor. So we decided to pull up our anchor and move forward far enough to where we could let out 200 feet of chain and still miss their anchor mark. So that is what we did and we are fine now. The wind is blowing about 19-20 knots which we find is kind of weird as this is supposed to be the hurricane hole for protection. It just seemed strange. We spent the rest of the day listening to weather reports and watching more boats come in and get settled. Marni and Peter deployed 2 anchors simultaneously as they were backing down to set them when they came in. If we need to use our second anchor, we will deploy it if need be. We aren’t in any hurry to strip the boat yet until we hear more of what the hurricane is doing. So we will wait.

John and Sandy invited us over for a drink and to get our package so we got in the dinghy and paddled over there. The wind was dying and so it was manageable to paddle. Sandy had fixed Sushi and we had margaritas. We visited for a while and then it started to get dark so we said goodbye. I picked up the bag with our goodies in it and was first to climb into the dinghy. I set the bag on the deck of Masquerade and proceeded to climb down into our dinghy. As I was reaching for the bag, the dinghy was moving away from the boat so I grabbed the bag and in a flash I was in the water head first. I came up and grabbed onto the dinghy and Dave was hollering for me to get the bag into the dinghy which I did, and then I was trying to figure out how I was going to get into the dingy. Finally Dave got into the dinghy and helped pull me into it. Talk about a drown rat!!!! At least the water was warm. So all was well and Dave and I paddled back to our boat. Once on our boat, Dave immediately took all the things out of the bag and rinsed them off and put them on paper towels to air dry. We had spark plugs, my cholesterol pills, a plastic filter and some latches for the freezer, so there wasn’t anything that would get ruined thank goodness. While he was washing off and laying the stuff out to dry I was rinsing the salt water off me. I came down below and changed clothes. Dave asked what happened and I told him the dinghy moved away from the boat and there was too much space between the dinghy and the boat to get enough pull to get them back together again and over I went. It’s that gravity thing ya know!! All is well now.

We had a quiet night with a little bit of a breeze. We ran the air conditioner for about 30 minutes to cool things and then I think we are good.

Tuesday, August 31. Puerto Don Juan.
Well word travels like a rocket even at anchorages. Several people were informed this morning that I fell out of the dinghy into the water at John and Sandy’s boat. I’m glad I was able to supply some entertainment for everyone especially my husband. He thought it was quite comical. I just was able to get refreshed!! So there ya go. No one got hurt or anything bad, however I am a little sore today from the combination of paddling the dinghy and being pulled in the dinghy. I will survive!!

We have been listening to weather reports all day and the last we heard on hurricane Jimana, is it will come ashore at Magdalena Bay on the Pacific side and cross land and end up in the southern Sea of Cortez. They are predicting by Friday we will have anywhere from 35 to 60 knots of wind and rain. We don’t know if it will rain a lot or just sprinkle. Everything is very unsettled right now but everyone here at the anchorage is preparing their anchors, sails and the like just in case. We are planning to deflate the dinghy, clear the decks of everything that could get blown away, take the dodger screens and dodger windows off for less wind resistance, take the headsail down, and tomorrow there will be 5 divers checking anchors to make every boat is securely anchored. I will start tomorrow stowing things below and then when Thursday comes we will have a better idea of what the winds will. So it is just a waiting game.

Dave went snorkeling under the boat and checked all the through hauls and they were fine. We paddled over to John and Sandy’s boat to borrow their hooka so Dave can dive and clean the bottom again. While we were on our way back to the boat the wind started to pick up. Once on board Dave was looking at the hooka and then the wind started to come up more so Dave isn’t going to be able to dive under the boat today because the wind swings the boat around and makes it hard for him to clean it. Tomorrow he is one of the divers helping to dive the boats to make sure anchors are set and if the wind doesn’t come up as strong maybe he will be able to clean the bottom after that. It will get done before we leave here though so no worries.

The wind blew from about 15 to 21 knots today. The breeze was nice because this morning it was hot. I ended up having to take the awning down after having it up for about an hour or so.

Dave and I put chafe guards on the snubber lines that are lead back to the forward cleats.

Both Dave and I took naps and didn’t do much else. We are planning our strategy for our storm preparation. It is really neat to hear and see people come together willing to help one another for all of us to be safe. There have been helpful hints from those who have done this preparation stuff before and it really does help keep the nerves in tack. Dave doesn’t think we will get the high winds, but right now the reports we are getting don’t seem to jive to really know what is going to happen. Like I said before, it is a matter of time and by Thursday we WILL know what is going to happen. We are concerned but not worried. We will do our part to be safe and keep other boats around us safe.

All the guys that will be diving the boats tomorrow morning are meeting at 9:00am to go over stuff. We are thinking of taking down our headsail tomorrow. Well there is nothing like a hurricane to get people moving and excited!!! HA!!
It is a beautiful night. The sunset was beautiful and it is almost a full moon. There were people catching a lot of sierra fish this morning. Dave didn’t go out as we had other things to do.

Tonight will be a comfortable one and we should get a good rest. The boat is being cooled down for sleeping as I type.