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I couldn’t resist the temptation of using words from John Steinbeck’s work The Log from the Sea of Cortez. It seemed particularly apt because I have been reading it while we’ve been cruising around the places he and the crew of Western Flyer visited some 80 years ago. I referred to it briefly last time, how they documented their findings from tide pools and littorals with detailed descriptions of a plethora of creatures, flora and fauna, along with some deep and – it has to be said – complex, intellectual theories on the philosophy of life. I skipped over those parts, but it was interesting to read his perceptions of places we had been such as La Paz, Puerto Escondido and Loreto, and his observations of life on board a boat. It was slightly disconcerting to learn that many of the creatures they retrieved from the water were poisonous and that he came across lots of snakes, worms and urchins with lethal spikes. I tried not to think about those when Paul was encouraging me to give snorkelling another try! This entry covers our second venture into the Sea of Cortez, the main aim of which was Sister Midnight’s haul out in Marina Puerto Escondido on November 23rd.

It was only a couple of hours to our first anchorage at Ensenada Grande Cove, Isla Partida, which sounds more like a luxury resort than a tiny anchorage spot. It was pretty, calm and sheltered, however when we set the anchor just before sunset, which covered all our needs for a one night stay.

After a peaceful night, we weighed anchor just after 9 the following morning. The day had dawned with a few more clouds and a northerly wind blowing at 20 knots. The calm conditions we’d had in the cove disappeared as soon as we were out on the open sea. We were about to have an extremely rocky passage! The boat immediately took on what I like to term the ‘bucking bronco’ mode as it ploughed into the huge waves coming at us head on. The bow plunged downward into the chasm and was then pushed up high as the wave rose, creating a lurching, up and down pattern which felt like we weren’t moving very far forward at all. It had been a while since I’d experienced that sea state and I hadn’t expected the need to stow things securely. Soon I had to deal with water gushing through the windows and hatches which, although closed, weren’t securely tightened. Not long after, there was an alarming crash from below when the air conditioning unit shot off the starboard bunk onto the floor taking the printer with it. They were hurriedly secured on the port side with the table stabilising them; it appeared that the planned three hour trip would take a lot longer.

Aside from that, Paul was largely unconcerned with the conditions as we sat in the cockpit watching the stern go up and down, changing the appearance of the horizon behind it at an alarming rate.

A couple of hours later when I had retired below to lose myself in a novel, I asked Paul how high he thought the waves were and was shocked by his response of ‘about 15 foot or more’. By then, he had begun to feel a bit seasick as the boat continued to pitch and toss its way through the relentlessly high waves. He stood with his back to the mast for the final hour, a la J.W Turner until the nausea abated. The journey ended up taking us 5 and a half hours, and even as we approached the bay at San Francisco, I found it hard to believe that conditions would improve there. The wind was just as strong and the sea was still bouncing us around, but it was with much relief that we dropped anchor at 3pm in calm, shallow water with the sun shining, and it wasn’t long before the wind became refreshing instead of strong and blustery.

There were a few other boats anchored with the usual assortment of kayaks, jet skis and inflatables but later in the afternoon we were joined by one with an extremely loud generator. The noise it made sounded like roadworks were taking place nearby and it stayed on all night. I’m so pleased we don’t feel the need for one.  

It was truly the calm after the storm the next day. The water was flat and still as far as the eye could see and so clear in the bay we could see hundreds of fish below the surface. It looked as if it could get hot later so we went ashore mid-morning, having decided to stay another day after the previous day’s not so smooth sailing. A deserted crescent-shaped sandy beach, surrounded by hills covered in cacti and the distinctive rose-coloured rock greeted us as we drew closer in the dinghy. Once ashore, Paul led me across the beach to a flat plain which glistened with dried sea salt. We were about to see Isla San Francisco’s salt ponds. These are rectangular, shallow beds in the sandstone which collect the sea’s salt after the water has evaporated over time. The picture shows how the salt clumps around the edges once the sun has dried it. The water has a delicate pink hue, which made me think of the expensive pink Himalayan sea salt I’ve seen on sale, but the salt itself is pure white. It looked like a sunken bath with rose-coloured water, and I found it quite fascinating.

The eastern side of the island was rugged, more like Cornwall’s rocky coast. Waves crashed over the rocks and big red crabs crawled away from us to hide amongst the rocks. Eagles and frigatebirds soared over the hills and there was no one else around. We sat on the rocks for a while just appreciating it all, until the heat forced us to seek relief with a swim in the crystal clear water.

Paul needed to go up the mast later in the afternoon to fix a couple of things. It made me dizzy just looking up to take the picture.

We left Isla San Francisco early the following morning. At 8am I was in the cockpit with a freshly-brewed coffee enjoying the warm breeze on my face; it really is one of the many pleasurable situations when at sea, especially just after sunrise.  We were bound for Bahia El Gato (Bay of The Cat). The name, according to legend, comes from reports that a family of pumas had come down from the mountains and taken up residence in nearby cliff caves. Apparently, a lone male puma was often seen fishing from the cliff ledges. This was over a hundred years ago, but it was easy to picture him on the striking pink cliffs at El Gato. The geology is spectacularly pretty: its sandstone has shades of colour ranging from peach-pink, mango orange, deep red and brown. Over time, wind and waves have sculpted the cliffs into shelves and ledges with patterns and strata caused by erosion, along with swirly striped boulders and smooth gigantic ‘pebble’ formations that we thought resembled a giant’s toes.

We spent an enjoyable hour climbing the rocks and peering into tide pools wondering if Steinbeck and Ricketts had looked into the same ones all those years ago. Walking along the beach, a lone fisherman from a panga came ashore seemingly for the sole purpose of asking if we wanted to buy any fish because when Paul said no, he went back out to sea and we immediately wished he’d bought some. I obviously took lots of pictures on El Gato.

A predicted three hour passage meant we were in no rush to leave for Agua Verde on Wednesday the 18^th.  Both Paul and Arturo had told me to expect beauty there so my expectations were fairly high. As if to confirm it, the views grew ever more picturesque the closer we got. When we entered the bay it was hard to believe there was a village anywhere, let alone the sizeable one Paul described.  I could only make out what looked like a few beach shacks set back from the sand. It was too hot then to go ashore to explore so we waited until after 4 and rowed the short distance in the shallow water.

The village reminded me of some we had been to in Thailand. The houses were single storey basic buildings and it was clear people spent most of the time outside. The shop had basic provisions – we had to hail for service from the adjacent house, which happened to have a very cute puppy. It came bounding over to me, and commanded most of my attention while Paul was inside the shop.

We walked around the edge of town as the late afternoon sun began to go down. I spotted huge black birds perched on the tops of the trees which I thought might be buzzards but apparently they are turkey vultures. There’s a line of them on the hilltop in pic below.

It was nice to see a group of children playing an old fashioned game of hide and seek among the trees and further on we passed a pig tied to a tree, and goats, chickens and horses roaming free. There was more to see but as we planned to stay a few days we headed back to the boat to watch the sunset from the cockpit. With the sun gone and no moon, the night was beautifully dark. Only a few twinkling lights came from the shore and later to my delight, some glorious phosphorescence shining under the water’s surface all around the boat.

Over the next few days we made the most of everything Agua Verde had to offer. It was hot and sunny each of the five days we were there so this involved a fair bit of swimming and snorkelling. I was slowly building up to overcoming my aversion to snorkelling but initially I enjoyed cooling dips in the clear, still, warm and shallow water (ideal conditions for me). Looking from the dinghy I could see fish clearly but I knew I was missing out on seeing the ones that are deeper. I also enjoyed ambling along the shore while Paul snorkelled the area. A large white house situated on the isthmus (or puertito in Spanish) fascinated me because I couldn’t work out if it was a seasonal dwelling or someone’s permanent home. I waved to the man who was always sitting outside in a chair every time I walked there.

We had to move the boat after two nights anchored near the main beach because the infamous Agua Verde swell made it too uncomfortable to sleep. Our new position was nearer to the isthmus and was more picturesque as well as sheltered and calmer. One afternoon I had a long swim from one beach to another – the longest I had been in the water for years and felt my confidence in the water growing. Later that day however, wimp that I am I had to face another fear: the surf. Landing a dinghy when the waves are rough can be alarming. You have to time it exactly right in order to get ashore without landing on your back in the water flailing around in an undignified way. In some instances the dinghy can overturn, although Paul insists I’m overreacting. Nevertheless I have developed something of a phobia about it ever since a particularly rough landing in America. I could see and hear waves crashing on the shore, and wondered if it would be less traumatising to swim ashore! Paul took us to the calmest part, though and I managed to scramble out unsoaked.

One day we went in search of the farm that Paul had bought goats’ cheese from last time he was here. When he described the route we needed to take, it went something like ‘take the rocky path until you come to the first mountain, carry on to the bigger, second mountain and when you reach the dried river bed, turn left at the top, follow the dirt trail…’, I couldn’t resist asking him if there was a rickety rackety bridge to look out for. 

We arrived there after a thirty minute walk that did indeed match those directions. The farm was in one of the most remote places I have seen – a few ramshackle buildings on a sloping hill and a distinct lack of goats. People were seated at a table outside and I heard a little girl shout ‘Mama, gringos!’ I have learned since I’ve been here that gringos is a word used to describe Americans, so we don’t actually come under that term but it’s an easy mistake to make I guess. Paul used his Spanish to enquire if they had any goats’ cheese for sale. They didn’t, and we worked out they were suggesting we try the village shop, but they had none either. It was a nice walk anyway, and Paul got to practise his Spanish.

Agua Verde is ideal for snorkelling. Paul enthused about the things he’d seen so many times that I felt it was time to leave my hang-ups behind and literally plunge in. Late one morning, fully equipped with masks and a snorkel and mouthpiece I felt comfortable with, we took the dinghy to a shingly beach on the opposite side of the bay.  All went well, I held on to Paul all the way and he pointed out the colourful fish, starfish and coral. I didn’t even mind the spiky sea urchins on the sea bed which were much larger than any I had seen before. Then I spotted a sea snake, looking for all the world like a fat, brightly-patterned colourful stuffed caterpillar – and that freaked me out. I learned then that it’s actually possible to scream with your head underwater while wearing a mask and snorkel! Paul quickly pulled me away to another area and the rest of the session was marvellous enough for me to do it again the following day, our last day there. Walking the shores we visit in the dinghy and beach combing is an activity that I particularly love. There are so many beautiful shells of all colours, shapes and sizes, along with intricately formed coral and it’s always fun to watch the shy little sand crabs burrowing out of harm’s way at our approach. Again, it was great to note that the beaches were clear of plastic and rubbish.

The haul out was booked for 1 o’clock on Monday 23^rd November. We left Aqua Verde before 8 and wasted no time putting the sail up to make the most of the wind. That was great, but when we switched the engine back on a bit later, the autohelm wouldn’t work. All Paul’s usual fixes didn’t work so we had no choice but to hand steer for the rest of the way. This we did in 30 minute stints each, and it was easy enough because the route was straightforward and the weather was pleasant. By the time we got to the boatyard at Puerto Escondido it was very hot and Paul had to struggle a bit to reverse into the area where the lift was waiting, not having expected the need to reverse. A man in a dinghy kindly helped persuade it in and we had to climb a wall to get off while it was lifted out of the water.

Once Sister Midnight was transported over to ‘the hard’ we took ourselves off to look around the facilities and then up to the marina bar while they made it ready for us to get back on board. There we enjoyed a drink and some guacamole and nachos overlooking the bay. The pic below shows how we entered and exited the boat for the week she was on the hard. The toilets were just around the corner but I made a point of limiting my liquid intake during the evenings. That ladder was steep!   

The marina had everything we needed. We ate in the restaurant a couple of times, used the laundry, shopped in the well-stocked, though expensive, shop and sat at the tables outside the shop using the Wi-Fi or reading while the men were working on the hull with noisy sanders and grinders. John Steinbeck had come to Puerto Escondido in 1940 and I wondered what it had looked like then. His description obviously bore no relation to all the modern conveniences around me but his account of the very shallow narrow entrance rang a bell with me, and the bright green mangroves he referred to are still there. Pic below of my vegan ‘buffalo wings’ which were battered cauliflower florets in a delicious sauce.

We were reunited with a couple of guys we met in Agua Verde, and one day I met Gerry’s sailing companion; Boomer the Bengal cat. He’s been travelling with Gerry on his boat for the last three years, is perfectly at ease on board and obeys commands in the manner of a dog (he even gets taken for a walk on a lead). He was very friendly too.

We had a fabulous day out in nearby Loreto when Paul hired a car on Friday 27^th. The temperature had been gradually dropping since we’d arrived and when we arrived at the pretty seaside town, it was like a typical blustery bright autumn day on the UK coast. The sea was choppy and people were battling against the strong wind on the prom. We joined them and walked to the breakwater to see the sea lion construction and sat a while watching the birds diving into the breaking waves for fish.

After browsing the shops and the town square, we found a great place to have lunch in a shaded flowery area of the plaza and then visited a couple of supermarkets to make the most of having a car to transport heavy items back. I didn’t look forward to carrying them up the ladder to the boat though.

Loreto lost its status as Baja’s capital when a destructive hurricane in 1829 forced the government to move the state’s capital to La Paz. Its other claim to fame is that it was the first place in the Californias to establish a mission. There is a lovely old church (Mission of Our Lady of Loreto) to mark the occasion in the centre of town proudly bearing the date of that historic mission (1697). We were headed for the second oldest mission, however which proved to be the highlight of our time away from La Paz (for me anyway).

San Javier village is a small community about an hour and a half away from Loreto and to get there we had to drive up a mountain in the beautiful Sierra de la Giganta range for most of that time. It was simply stunning.  Every time we rounded a corner on the climb, the view was another awe-inspiring one. It was all the more exquisite for there being no other vehicles on the road for much of the way. The landscape was arid desert land, cactus-strewn and littered with rocks. In some parts, sections of the road had tumbled down the steep cliffs, narrowing it considerably. Paul, who had visited it in the summer told me that a car had been visible at the bottom of one of the valleys due to the crumbling roads. I was glad I wasn’t driving! The higher we got, the more remote it became. Dried river beds and spindly, small trees and bare bushes were a sign of long periods of drought and I was finding it hard to believe there would be any village at the end of the drive, never mind one with a population of 200. When we got there I was surprised to find it a lot larger than I expected. Even though only one primary street runs through the village we passed signs for the school, cathedral, police station, places of interest and a car park. Several cars were parked and I wondered how we hadn’t seen any traffic apart from one motor bike on our way up. The street was lined with a couple of small shops, a restaurant and cafes and a few houses.

Before visiting the cathedral, which looked beautiful in the fading light, we walked the small distance to see the spring that supplies water to the village and to look at what purports to be the oldest olive tree in the Americas.

Noticing the entrance to the cathedral was open (it was closed on Paul’s previous visit) we went inside to be confronted with a well-maintained and very compact interior. A man approached us to offer his services as a guide (whether we wanted him or not as it turned out). He told us a little about the paintings on the ceiling and the dates of various things in his best English and then held his hand out for a tip. We felt obliged to leave then, so it was a fairly quick visit and I forgot to take any pics. I found the exterior to be more gorgeous anyway.

Back in the street we had a look at the shop where there was a display of locally made honey and wines and other crafts. I couldn’t resist the offer of a taste of the red wine and as it was pricey but genuinely delicious, bought a bottle for a Christmas treat. We didn’t fancy driving back down the mountain in the dark, not least because it would be a shame to miss the views. We stopped a few times to take in the expansive views before us. The pictures probably don’t do them justice. I kept marvelling at the fact that Jesuit pilgrims had climbed this mountain to reach the cathedral in blistering heat on a makeshift dirt trail. Their journey must have seemed endless.

We had a few more days to wait until the work was completed on Sister Midnight and then we would be making our return journey to La Paz, taking in more of what the Sea of Cortez has to offer on the way.

Kathy

Tuesday 1st December

Rabbits
Up early, at least earlier than the bloody painters who haven’t finished the hull yet and we launch in a few hours. The plan is to lift the boat high in the slings so they can get under the keel, clean it properly then paint it. Eventually a whole gang arrive and start the work. The travel lift is busy preparing for a sailboat called Aventura which is being hauled out at ten. Everything goes to plan and we are launched just after 12. The whole thing is an ordeal for Kathy as she has a tooth hanging out which is giving her a lot of pain. As soon as we arrive back in La Paz it’s off to the dentist for her, or maybe some string tied to the door handle if things get too bad beforehand. 

Once launched we reverse into the fuel dock, and I’m very pleased to see the Bow Thruster works very well, the LED dims a little, so I’m wondering if it used to, or there might still be a problem. I will do some more tests at a later date. 
The boat is flying along with the new paint and shiny prop. We were doing 6.5 knots with a moderate amount of power, 2000RPM, so it’s much better. I’m very happy to be afloat again, and we have tidied everything up and are enjoying having running water again.We fuel up, get water, wash the boat down quickly and head out to sea.
It’s a bit bouncy out there, but I have spotted a small cove, called honeymoon cove, just 40 minutes from the marina, on Danzante Island. One review says “it can be a bit tight getting in,  but that’s appropriate for a honeymoon”. As it turns out, we are the only ones there. Our first attempt at dropping the anchor finds a stony/rocky bottom and it won’t grip. So we re-anchor in a different spot and the same problem. I let the boat drift back away from the shore, letting out more chain hoping at some point we will find sand, and in the end we dig in, but not very well. Then the boat turns and backs up to the beach, I’m not 100% happy with the situation, but as the wind is expected to drop a lot and there are no waves at all here I think we will survive. All the same I set a tight anchor alarm on the iPhone. 

Wednesday 2nd
One other boat joined the cove and anchored in a narrow section between two cliff faces. An older double ender boat like ours, but full of youthful exuberance. Loud Abba/rap for a while, then a lot of shouting at the cliffs, I’m not sure if they had ever heard an echo before, but we all have now.
We moved around a lot as the sun set, the wind swinging in every direction, eventually we ended up very close to the beach with the tide dropping, at one point we only had half a metre of water under the stern. With the very rocky bottom it was quite a worry. However the tide was soon rising and the wind pushed us a little further away, so I slept reasonably well, checking the depth and location every few hours.

Come dawn, the mountains were lit up spectacularly, and the waters were splashing like crazy with all the sea life. We left around 8am to make the most of the morning calm and headed north into the predicted strong winds for the deserted salt ponds town of Salinas. The boat performed really well, into a headwind of 15 knots and oncoming waves, we easily pushed along at over 6 knots without pushing the engine hard at all. We anchored in 4 metres of water off the beach, the anchor dug in first time and dug in deep, we gave it maximum revs in reverse and she didn’t budge. This means I get to sleep long and deep tonight. Later we went ashore to tour the ghost town and gather some salt from the old abandoned ponds. Kathy was quite amazed by it all. We joked about making Christmas cards with the scenery, it just looks like frozen lakes covered in snow.

Thursday 3rd
The wind built through the night, but I got a great sleep nonetheless, during the day the wind climbed to 25 knots but because we were anchored in a bay facing north, the waves were quite low, the boat seesawed around a fair bit and we stayed indoors doing odd jobs. I did some programming, without the internet you realise just how good books were, I mean programming books, I wanted to check the name of the tick box you see on web forms, I wanted to know the name of the element/attribute that is set when the tick appears, I guessed at Value, Selected, state, tick, etc etc, without the internet or books I was stuck, I ended up searching through some javascript code from a saved website and found it was called checked!  Kathy cleaned out all the cupboards in the galley and washed them with a mixture of water & Borax, hopefully this will strike a blow at the cockroaches that visit us each evening to see what dinner leftovers there might be. I lifted the stove out of its bay so we could clean around there and I checked the gas hose that supplies it, I couldn’t believe that it had been chafing on the steel plated bulkhead and had a groove in the sheath. I made a temporary repair and have made this the number one repair job to do when we get back to La Paz. I had meant to replace the pipe in Canada or the USA but couldn’t find anyone who could supply the pipe with fittings. I think this might be easy here.
I was up several times in the night, the wind was wild but eventually calmed a bit by morning.

Friday 4th
Up early to see if the weather has calmed enough to leave. We had seen 35 knots of wind yesterday, but we were now around 20, and although it looked and sounded bad out there, I felt it would be no problem, especially as we were heading downwind. The Raspberry PI computer had been logging the wind all night and a quick import to excel showed the wind was definitely on a downhill trajectory.

Kathy was keen to press on, so we took off, the first problem being the anchor chain was stretched taut by the force of the wind on the boat, so Kathy had to abandon her prone position in the V berth flaking chain, to drive the boat forward to where I was pointing from the bow. Every ten metres that came in had me running down to the anchor locker to knock the chain pyramid over. If I didn’t do this, the bigger pyramid would fall over on itself and trap the chain, making it impossible to anchor later on. As soon as the anchor broke free, the boat swung around in the wind and was away. I had the Genoa up and the engine off in minutes and we took off on one of the best sails I have had in a long time. It was a broad reach with waves and some surf pushing us along generally around 7 knots, at one point the GPS recorded 10 knots. We seemed to have the sea to ourselves and with bright blue skies, I lay back in the cockpit and let the autohelm do the work.

6 hours later the wind had dropped a lot, and I let out the last third of the sail as we glided into Agua Verde bay. Soon the hook was down in 9m of clear water and we broke out the drinks to celebrate a fast passage. 

Saturday 5th
We decided to enjoy having a lie in, then a lazy day in Agua Verde. After a leisurely breakfast we checked out the surf on the beach and decided it was a bit much for Kathy in the dinghy so we opted to go ashore in the protected little cove we were anchored in and take the dirt track to the village. It’s only about a mile, but up and down winding mountain trails. I’m glad we did, the trail took us inland behind a big hill overlooking the bay and we discovered amazing views both of the bay from high above and also of the mountains and plains inland.
At the village we stocked up on Bimbo bread and 5 hours of internet vouchers. Back at the boat we caught up with the news, downloaded the latest weather forecasts and generally continued to be lazy. 

Sunday,
I’m up at 7 and looking at the weather it seems like a good time to get off, I think Kathy might have preferred a lie in and a lazy breakfast, as we often do on Sundays, but today we have strong Northerlies forecast followed by several calm days and I figure we can do 50 miles to Evaristo in 8 hours in we average more than 6 knots, which should be doable in the predicted wind of 15-25 knots. So on with the kettle, and I start stowing while Kathy is still fast asleep. 
By half seven we are motoring out of the tranquil bay at Agua Verde into big seas and strong winds, The waves are high and for the first hour, on the side of the boat, making it rather Rolly. I quickly have the Genoa headsail up and the motor off. As we turn away from the wind and start our 7 hour downhill run we are hitting speeds of 9 knots as we rush off the big waves hitting us from behind. An hour later the wind shifts so that it is right behind us, I’m glad I didn’t put up the mainsail, we have enough sq ft up there and the main would just be more work. However the big waves has us corkscrewing a lot and the sail collapses frequently, then fills with a loud crack. It’s an old sail and I’m not looking forward to it ripping so I shove the engine on, furl the sail and get the spinnaker pole out. Soon we are flying along again and the Genoa stays filled for the next 7 hours. It’s brilliant sailing, I sit on the foredeck, as that’s the only place getting any sun. One of the problems of sailing south like this is that the sun is dead ahead and hidden by the sail, the solar panels aren’t happy at all.

After a few hours I check that all the lines are good, not chafing, the rig is under a lot of force, big waves lift all 19 tons of us up and throw us down, while the wind exerts a massive force on the Genoa sheets, which are very taut. I notice that somehow I have got the uphaul for the spinnaker pole wrapped around the radar unit on the mast, I’m amazed it hasn’t ripped it off yet. It’s also going through a shroud it shouldn’t, what a mess, I slacken it off and let the sail control how far down it can go, in the end it works out fine. Kathy sits in the cockpit for the last hour of the journey and is shocked when the spinnaker winch starts screaming as it spins quickly, I jump over and grab the fishing reel, I use the winch to tell me when the line is running out. It’s a big one, and after a bit of a struggle I get it on board, it’s a 4kg Dorado. Enough for 5 big meals. It’s the largest fish I have ever caught and I feel quite bad about killing it.  As I expect today is the last sailing day of the year, so will this be my last catch of the year.

We turn into San Evaristo around 2:30 pm, and I try to furl the Genoa, but unfortunately it’s blowing too strong and the sail furls too tightly and I can’t get it all furled. I need a better way to get this big sail in when it’s blowing hard. We drop anchor in a very protected cove on the north side of the bay and Kathy pours a drink, I have a beer before getting down to some serious filleting.

Monday
We leave Everisto and head for Isla Partida, but on the way we take a small detour to check out the Sea Lions at Isla Islota, a couple of big rocks north of Partida. They don’t disappoint, there’s plenty of them, making lots of noise, and quite a smell. Later we anchor in a lovely cove at Ensenada El Cardonal, there’s only one other sailboat there and we have a peaceful night, the wind now having dropped right down.

Tuesday
Leaving Partida, we glide down past Esperitu Santo, the wind picks up a little and I unfurl the Genoa again, The sails fills nicely and we are off at 3.5 knots in a very flat sea, we sail all the way to the anchorage at La Paz, negotiating the channel around the end of the sandbank that extends almost all the way to the oil terminal. We drop the hook just outside Marina De La Paz and I phone up and I’m lucky enough to get a berth in there from tomorrow.

Wednesday
A 5 minute motor into Marina La Paz and within a few hours the boat is hosed down, plugged in, hooked up to the internet and lots of $$$ handed over to the marina. We are back to being a static caravan for the next few months. I’m quite motivated to do lots of work on the boat, and also do some interesting Software dev.
We are here now until we work out what’s going on with the Vaccine, Brexit and other stuff. Kathy plans to fly home in Feb, I may join her, but only if I’m free to travel and visit family and friends, also we don’t know if we will be allowed to travel via European airports yet. It was announced today that Brits may only be allowed into other European countries for special reasons, because as a ‘third country’ with a High covid Level, we may be banned. Also we may be required to have vaccinations before we can board flights, and we may not be able to get them here before Feb. So many variables, we will have to wait and see.

Paul Collister.

Tuesday 24th November 2020
Our first day on the hard, and this is a very hard concrete yard we are in, and it’s not as bad as I was expecting. There’s not a lot going on here other than two men who are sanding the old antifoul off the hull in preparation for 2 coats of new interspeed 640 hard antifouling. I spent the day cleaning the prop, fitting a new anode to it and repairing the autopilot which failed just after we left Agua Verde. Once again the key that holds one of the cogs to the drive shaft fell out. Unlike the last time, I couldn’t find the key. I took this as an opportunity to give that area of the boat, behind the rudder shaft a good cleaning, with the hopeful bonus of finding the key. Thinking about it, I should have found it, and I’m wondering if the key might have slipped back into the motor housing. I ended up having to make a new key, and realising I don’t carry any material I could cut, 5mm by 5mm square, I chose a 10mm stainless steel screw and set about filing it down. It took a little while, but fit perfectly in the end. I made a dimple in it for the set screw that hadn’t done its job before and all was well, except I couldn’t test it as a lad was busy below sanding the rudder. I checked it before bed and it seems to be working fine. Later I heard Gerry and Chris, the two boats we met in Agua Verde calling for help with their lines as they approached the marina. I wandered down to the pontoon to help. A useful tip I picked up on my travels around is to have some ropes and fenders ready for when you dock, also it’s best to try to be parallel (ish) to the dock when approaching, it’s much harder when you are 90 deg to it 😉 . It was good to see them safely tied up. Later Kathy and I enjoyed a meal at the smart restaurant upstairs, Kathy was delighted to see a decent vegan menu on offer.
By the end of the day, 1/4 of the hull had been sanded, and several very small blisters had been decapitated. Back in Penang, Malaysia, nearly 5 years ago, there were several hundred blisters, many the size of saucers, the hull treatment seems to have worked well.

Costs:
As I was looking at the quotes for the haul out and paint job, which aren’t small, I thought I might pen a few notes on the cost of cruising for us. This seems to be a popular thing on other blogs, so without too much detail:

Monthly costs in the dock: £600 (Typical in the sea of cortez for a 45ft slip)
(Includes electricity, water, facilities, etc, just add food & drink)

Haulout & relaunch cost: £370
Labour to sand and paint hull, (2 guys 5 days ish) £1200
Paint: 3 gallons (11.5 litres) £600
Total haulout & paint job (£2170)

So I would do the haulout every two years normally, this time it’s over three since I painted. So that averages about £1000/year. And £600/month for the slip seems a lot, but because we are at sea/anchor a lot, it probably averages down to £500/month over a year. My costs of running the apartment back on Merseyside wasn’t that much less, when I consider Service charges (£120), Electric/Gas(£100), Council Tax (£110). Food and drink is cheaper here, I sold my home in West Kirby last year, so fortunately I don’t have those bills anymore. So all in all it’s not costing us much to be spending our time hanging out in exotic, tropical paradises as you might think.
Of course there are big ticket items that come up every now and then like new sails every 5-10 years (£5000), new standing rigging (Wires to hold up the mast) every 10 years, (£4000), failing electronics, probably a few hundred pounds every year. At some point I will need a new engine, that could be anywhere between £5000 and £15,000 depending on who does the work.
The other big cost we have is flying home from far flung places.

Wednesday.
The sanding continues, fortunately it’s not too loud inside the boat, but later a second guy joins and it’s getting a bit noisy. I book a hire car in the marina office so we can spend tomorrow being tourists, and get Kathy to a big supermarket before her shopping withdrawal symptoms kick in. I rub down the propellor, it has no grease in it at all, which is fair enough I suppose. I last serviced it in Sointula nearly two years ago. I spend the day doing some programming for work, it goes remarkably well, and I produce a flash user interface, well flash by my usual standards of 80×24 character, 128 levels of grey! Aren’t plugins great.
The sanding is taking forever.

Thursday
After a half hour of waiting for the car I go to the office to find out the lady there forgot to book it for me. Oh well, Manaña.
The sanding is continuing, It looks like they will complete today. They are doing a great job, but it’s going to be 6 man days work, I’m sure in Kudat, Malaysia it took one guy three days. I decide to have a serious go at bow thruster anodes, the props are badly fouled on the inside and impossible to clean without removal. I have tried several times to take the anodes off on past haulouts, but the bolt that holds them in place wont budge. The zinc has corroded around it, plus I think the wrong loctite may have been used on them, until I remove the anodes, I can’t get to the holding nut. Generally the anodes have not changed much in the 5 years they have been on, which in itself is an issue. I have a problem as all my 5mm allen keys needed for these bolts are missing, I think they broke on various jobs, I have one that I have filed down to be a 4.5mm ish key for some odd job in the past. I give up with the one key I find as it just isn’t budging and the key is two long to put across the prop. The shopping list for tomorrow grows. I also need to try and find anodes for the stern of the boat.

Friday.
Hurrah the rental car arrives at 9AM and we load up and head into town, I stop at an auto-service parts place and pick up an expensive allen key set, that comes with a snazzy ratchet wrench for about £15. The same or similar tool was available in Mr Tool, in Malaysia for no more than £5. Anything that is imported here, even value Chinese goods is pricey. I wonder if this is how the UK will be next year, A GoPro for £300 will cost £400 due to taxes & shipping fees. Next off to the Chandlers, where they have no suitable zinc anodes, I also can’t find any drill bits that I could use to fashion a block of zinc I have into the part I need for the stern.

I show Kathy around town, This is my third trip here and I’m almost a local. The wind blows very strong, but we find a lovely spot for lunch in the town square. I will let Kathy write about that, so far she has fared well for Vegan meals, largely thanks to the ingredients in Guacamole being quite veggie.

Off to the supermarkets (note the plural) and I am pleased to be able to stock up on cases of soda and cerveza sin alcohol. Kathy even finds some vegan products in the Ley Supermercado. From the town, we head up into the mountains to visit the mission at San Javier. This is a very old mission, in a valley right up high in the mountains, 30 km from Loreto and very remote. It shows what faith those missionaries must have had, it takes us an hour in a car on a tarmacked road to get there, goodness knows how long it must have taken back in the 17th Century with dirt tracks and donkeys. Kathy is surprised to see this little oasis of a village appear out of the mountains with the mission at the end. It is quite a lovely spot. I’m sure Kathy will elaborate.

Back at the boat I can see they have finished the sanding, but no painting has started yet.

Saturday
Painting begins, but not before I crawl under the boat and get my head under the keel, I can see there’s a large chunk of it missing. I’m guessing it’s from when we hit the mis-chartered rock in Canada, looking at it in detail, I’m thinking the hull material in the area looks messy, I’m wondering if in the past it has been patched up badly. I organise for it to be filled, glassed over and finished with epoxy resin.

Also the strip of damage near the rudder is filled ready for fairing.

I watch a YouTube video from Sidepower, the people who made my bow thruster, about removing the anodes then the prop, but the anode bit seems to have been edited out. It’s not a lot of use, a guy has a bow thruster on the table and he holds the propellor on one side as he undoes the nut on the other. I scroll down to the comments where some guy has written “Thanks for that, but unfortunately I have a boat wrapped around the bow thruster, so your technique doesn’t work.”. Thankfully the reply suggests showing a block of wood through the prop to hold it in place, something I had thought of doing but was worried it would damage the prop. As it turns out this works fine, and the allen keys I bought allows me to remove the anodes, and then the props.
Funnily enough, when I dig out the new anodes from my expensive/tiny boat bits locker, I find two 5mm allen keys in there, I obviously thought at some point in the past, this would be a good place to keep them. Forgetting that I always forget such great ideas. I clean and paint the props and will refit them tomorrow.

Next I try to drill holes in a large zinc block I have that could replace the wasted zinc on the stern. I always thought you had to drill slowly with metals for best effect, it seems with Zinc it’s better to go like a madman with the fastest drill you can, ignore the smoke and glowing drill bit, just go for it. I am making a big hole with lots of smaller holes, and the only way I can justify the result is that you have to dive under the boat to be able to see what a terrible mess I’ve made of it. In fact I may wait until just before launch to fit it so the boatyard staff don’t laugh at me. As the sun sets we head up to the restaurant here and have a lovely dinner.

Sunday
The boatyard is quiet today, so I clean the prop and then fill it with marine grease.

I finish off hacking a hole in the zinc anode for the stern and fit it. It’s a terrible bodge, but it will work. I expect as the zinc wears away, the nut will come loose and it will vibrate itself to bits. My plan is to replace it and the other one on the port side with the correct anodes when I get back to La Paz, they may be in stock there, if not I can order them. Hopefully I can dive and replace them myself with my new scuba skills. Tomorrow was meant to be launch day, but I think it will need to go back to Tuesday, also we have quite strong northerly winds at the moment, so my plan to go north won’t work right now.
I did a little more checking on the boat weight today, as the ton/tonnes thing always confuses me. The boat weighed 17.5 metric tons in the travel lift slings.
That’s the same as 38,581 lb. Looking in the sales brochure for the boat, the weight (displacement) is stated as 29,000 lb, making us 10,000 lb overweight.

Or 30% overweight. That seems a lot, the problem is that manufacturers always want to play down the weight for sales reasons, lighter boats go faster. So they often leave off things like anchors & chain, fuel and water, cookers, batteries, even the mast sometimes, anything that might be optional. Even so, I think we might be a touch too heavy. Kathy suggested we could lose some books, but I expect she means my books 😉

Monday
The boat bottom has been painted with two coats in most places, there’s more to do, but the final bits will be done in the morning when the boat is in the slings.

The rudder bit has been repaired, it’s not perfect, and the bash to the keel looks fine now, and at least it is solid and no water could work its way into the ballast.

The bow thruster props cleaned up well, I have painted them with the antifoul used on the hull, I’m not sure how well it will work, it was a bit thick going on, but I expect it will soon ablate off.

Tomorrow we launch, into the tail end of a strong northerly, typically we are heading north, against the wind which I expect will be gone by the time we turn for the south. We will explore the islands around Loreto. I’m looking forward to having a faster boat again. The bow thruster let us down on the way into the travel lift, I noticed the control panel LEDs went dim when it was engaged, this might have been because of the growth on the props, but I suspect it is more likely going to be an electrical problem. This could be one of two obvious things, a bad connection, which would be great as that’s an easy fix, but more likely, the batteries can’t supply the many hundreds of amps needed to turn the prop. Tomorrow if the prob is still there I will be running around the boat with my multimeter while Kathy energises the thruster!

Paul Collister.

Also known as The Gulf of California, the Sea of Cortez is the span of water that separates the Baja peninsula from the Mexican mainland. John Steinbeck and his friend, Ed Ricketts famously documented their 1940 exploration of its tide pools in a book called The Log from the Sea of Cortez. Their expedition was a 4,000-mile trip which combined marine biology, philosophy, ethics and art. Our trip would be less adventurous and although we have been known to engage in the odd philosophical discussion and converse about the arts, they won’t be documented here. Ours was a shorter, more leisurely trip but we did anchor in some of the bays that Steinbeck and his crew visited in their boat, Western Flyer. This is an account of my impressions of the islands and anchorages we stopped at on our journey north on the eastern side of the peninsula.

We weighed anchor from the bay in La Paz at the end of October and I experienced the delight of being back on the water after months of city life in the UK. The conditions were ideal: sunny, a fresh breeze, a gentle swell from the previous night’s storm and a cloudless blue sky. We were heading for the delightfully named Balandra Bay which sounded to me like a location straight out of a children’s story.  The swell increased as we drew near to it, however and we were unable to anchor there because it would have been far too rolly. It looked stunningly beautiful, and as Paul has been there several times he knows there is a sea lion colony there. We hoped to be able to stop there on our return journey.

The main event of this passage was Paul’s successful attempt to catch his dinner. It’s still a fairly rare occurrence but he does seem to be getting the hang of it now 😉 .

We anchored at 4pm in Partida Cove. The water was beautifully clean and clear. I was delighted to see turtles popping their leathery necks up, and it’s always entertaining to watch the diving antics of the pelicans. We had one fishing boat as a neighbour when we dropped anchor but a bit later a large catamaran and a few yachts arrived. Soon, the noise of family chatter, children’s shrieks and music broke the silence but not in too obtrusive a way. Just before sunset we dinghied near to the shore to check out the pelicans diving for their evening meal. Some of them came close enough for me to see the bottom of their feet as they soared down to their prey. One of the boats had released a drone to capture the scenes from above and I wondered what the pelicans made of the strange, noisy bird in their air space.

We stayed another day at Partida. The weather was perfect, and I had quickly got used to being without the internet. In fact, I found it emancipating to not have all the negative bulletins and news rolling in, both verbally and through social media. Such information saturation tends to predispose you to worry and anxiety I think. Out on the water, we were literally and emotionally removed from it all. Also, there was no need to wear masks as we were naturally socially distanced from people. We felt free to merely appreciate the beauty of the sights and sounds of the scenes around us.

One of those sights was the seasonal fishing village on the shore. The tide was so low that we were able to get out of the dinghy and pull it quite a distance to the beach. In the clear shallows we spotted more turtles, manta rays and the ubiquitous tiger (black and yellow-striped Nemo) fish. The village was deserted, either through Covid restrictions or being off season, so we were able to amble freely around the wooden structures which reminded me of allotment sheds. It’s odd how a few deserted, padlocked huts and shacks, with their outside chairs and fish gutting tables left in situ, convey something of an eerie atmosphere, especially as the ground was littered with skulls and bones and fish skeletons…or maybe I just had Halloween on my mind. I hadn’t taken my phone to capture the images unfortunately. At least there were no plastic bottles and empty cans littering the area, and we ended the afternoon with a cooling swim and snorkel.

Next morning, I was up early, sitting in the cockpit watching sea turtles. Their heads pop up periscope-like, revealing their striking green and yellow necks and coal black eyes for a brief moment before they sink out of sight below the surface. Our destination that day was just a short hop away to Isla Espiritu Santo and we were on our way there by 10 enjoying the mid-morning sun and sea breeze. Candeleros (Candlestick) Cove had been closed to visitors for a few weeks when Covid struck but Paul had been there with Jim just before the pandemic and latterly with Arturo as restrictions were relaxing. During their visit in August they had been the only two there and had seen goats all over the island. We joined several tourist boats as well as catamarans and yachts when we anchored early in the afternoon. Umbrellas on the beach were sheltering picnickers, and dinghies were frequently ferrying people back and forth. The goats, who had probably made the most of having the place to themselves when visitors were banned must have retreated back into the hinterland. The striking rose-pink rock formations and tall mountains surrounding the long sandy beach made an attractive vista from the boat, and didn’t disappoint once ashore.

We made straight for the trail behind the beach, passing this huge chair-shaped rock which has no doubt hosted hundreds of bottoms before ours.

It was blisteringly hot by then but luckily it wasn’t too arduous a walk, although there was a bit of climbing involved in some places – not the easiest thing to do in flip-flops. The landscape, with its stereotypical cactus plants, boulders and arid scrubland couldn’t have been more Mexican. I was thrilled by it. Hearing movement near a tree, I could just make out the distinctive horns of a goat. Sadly, it remained behind the tree despite our attempts to stay still and quiet, so we left it in peace and walked on. Ahead, we saw a group of people higher up the trail. The shrieks of delight we could hear turned out to be due to the fact that buckets of water were being poured over the heads of three young ladies. They were gathered round a square hole and an older man – an American tourist we learned – was drawing water from it to pour over the heads of the willing volunteers while his wife looked on with glee. They introduced themselves, telling us they were on vacation from Santa Rosa, north of San Francisco and invited us to join their ‘baptism’ fun. We politely declined, despite assurances that it was nice fresh, cold water. Later, I read in our pilot book that it’s an historic well but is usually disused and dry now, so perhaps they brought water ashore to pour in there. The girls were impressed anyway. We didn’t go much further because Paul couldn’t remember the way he had walked before, and the heat was beginning to get to me. We headed back to immerse ourselves in the welcoming cool of the sea.

We stayed another full day at anchor. Sunday 1st November brought a stronger breeze which blew through the cabin as effectively as any air conditioning system. A tourist boat heralded its arrival at midday with the sound of loud dance music. We could see the DJ at a mixing desk on the top deck of the super yacht and the music got louder according to the direction the boat was swinging. They didn’t hang around long enough to be too intrusive, though.

I was keen to do more of the walk we had cut short the day before so we dinghied over to the beach in the afternoon. It was a bit cooler, and I was better prepared for the rocky terrain in rubber soled shoes. The ubiquitous cactus plants are so like the images from the cartoons and comic strips I enjoyed in my 60s and 70s childhood. I haven’t got tired of marvelling at the size of them yet.

Huge birds soared over our heads as we ascended the hill, lizards of all sizes scurried away at our approach and we passed caves and caverns and dry, spindly trees and bushes. We hadn’t gone very much further than the previous day when we came to another sudden stop. It was beginning to look like we would require crampons and ropes if we wanted to get any further. Paul still couldn’t remember the way he had gone on a previous visit, and since it was beginning to get hot again, I was content to take a few more pictures and head back to the beach.

We were able to visit Balandra Bay on our return journey. The wind had allowed us to sail some of the way and we arrived there mid-afternoon, pleased to discover that it was calm enough to anchor without the swell that had been there the week before. Balandra Bay is famous for its mushroom-shaped rock. Tourist boats ferry people there so they can pose in front of it, especially at sunset. It does resemble a mushroom but we had noticed that the coastline has several of these geographical formations along the peninsula. This one must be profitable in terms of distance and provides an ‘Instagram-friendly’ photo opportunity due to there being a convenient signal for phones. So much so that it has been repaired from several ‘topples’ and now sports a vandal-proof rebar framework and tinted cement! It seemed appropriate to capture the image for our own album. Disappointingly, we didn’t see any sea lions this time either. Pics below of the rock and beach at Balandra.

We made it back to La Paz to catch all the excitement of the results coming in for the US election. It was both enjoyable and fascinating, and with the best of all results, so it was well worth returning to signal range to watch that, and to catch up with friends and family. We were at anchor in the bay for just over a week and discovered that like many places around the world, restrictions were being tightened up in response to rising infection rates. One of these is to separate young and old shoppers in Chedraui supermarket. As I approached the entrance, I understood enough Spanish to realise I was being asked for my age. It must have perplexed the guy when I answered him in Italian, which is similar enough for him to understand I was telling him 58. Yes, I took two years off my age because I had a feeling 60 might be the cut off year (also, I couldn’t remember how to say 60). I felt sorry for him actually, having the job of asking everyone’s age and then allowing or refusing them entry accordingly. I was permitted to enter but Paul wasn’t, so I once again found myself in that supermarket with no bags and a certain amount of frustration about what items to get because I couldn’t consult with Paul. We tended to favour Soriana Supermarket after that. Below are pics taken in the Soriana car park showing what happens when a bike lock key has been left on the boat! Paul had to walk off to find a shop that sold hacksaws while I stayed by our bag-laden bikes. I hoped our sign language and halting Spanish had been enough to convince the security guard that we were the bikes’ owners as he watched Paul cut the chains to free them.

We had a pleasant, chilled out week back in La Paz, provisioning and preparing for our next Sea of Cortez excursion. It was good to see Arturo again and to meet Dirk and Silvia, who were anchored near to us in the bay and called over to say Hi. We met for a coffee on the Malecon to swap journey and places experiences – one of the many joys of sailing, or of travelling in general for that matter.   

It became gradually cooler while we were there. So much so that we retrieved the duvet from its summer storage. It won’t get really cold here but the evenings now often require an extra layer or jacket. On Friday 13^th November, the evening before we left, we met up with Arturo to have a meal on the Malecon. It was good to see that the already-struggling bars and restaurants hadn’t been subjected to more restrictions. The promenade itself has been limited to only being accessible during the week; at weekends people are only allowed on the far side of the road. This does tend to force people to converge on just one street but at least most are still wearing masks.

We had a great meal in the Bismarkcito Restaurant on the far end of the Malecon. Arturo kindly explained to the waiter that I was vegan and they prepared a delicious salad for me. We bade farewell to Arturo, who will be joining us for the Christmas period when we return to La Paz after a further venture into The Sea of Cortez.

Kathy

Saturday 14th October 2020.
We leave La Paz around 11am, firstly we made a run to Chedraui to get some fresh bread, fruit & veg. Being there early ensured our admission with scores of other geriatrics. I’ve heard of Covid safe places, but this felt more like Covid assured.
The timing of our departure seemed good, the weather was acceptable, even if it meant a fair bit of motoring to get north in the prevailing winds. But not just the weather was right; we had returned to La Paz to hopefully see the demise of Orange Head, but as a bonus we got the announcement of a vaccine and the demise of Dominic Cummings. So all in all, things are looking up.
While we were in La Paz we enjoyed a few meals out, and did a bit of shopping, but mostly I was programming and Kathy reading. I still have a lot of work to do and I’m hoping to get a fair bit finished on this passage.
We met up with a lovely German couple, not from Germany, but from America where they have lived for many years. They have circumnavigated the globe once already and are on their second trip. We had a laugh about out respective father/motherlands, they wondered how their country could allow right wing groups to flourish, given their history, and I postulated my theory that the UK is suffering ‘empire demise’ syndrome and that Brexit might ultimately be good for us. That was a fun conversation!

Kathy might write about how to recover from losing your bike keys at the supermarket. While in La Paz the local government shutdown the Malecón in the evenings, Covid is on the up again, as it seems to be in many places. At least we are away from it for a few weeks now. The La Paz carnival has been cancelled along with the Christmas market. 

We motored up to the small uninhabited island of Partida, just above Isla Esperitu Santo. Anchoring was easy, it’s a safe place to stop for the night with lovely beaches, but we will leave early for Isla San Francisco. We have an appointment with the travel lift to haul the boat out a week on Monday, and I would rather spend time up near Agua Verde and beyond than down here.
I caught a massive fish on the way up, so far the cedar plug I bought, has been out twice, and each time brought me a lovely catch. I rather badly filleted this guy and ended up with 1.5kg of dinners. The cove here has quite a few big motor launches and massive Catamarans, some enjoying their loud party music. 

Sunday.
We leave at 9am for the three hour trip to Isla San Francisco. But as soon as we leave the sheltered bay it becomes obvious the waves from the North are quite big and instead of making 5-6 knots, we are soon down to 2-3 as we start pounding into the sea ahead and 20 knots of wind (apparent) on the bow. For half an hour I consider turning around and finding another cove on Partida for the day, but optimism, false as it turns out, makes me decide to push on anyway, by the time the waves are 15ft high and the bowsprit is hitting the sea on a regular basis, we have gone too far to make turning back worth it. So we push on. We hadn’t prepared for such a rollercoaster ride, the first this boat has seen in a year or more and we had become complacent. I had closed the main hatches but hadn’t screwed them down tightly, consequently the bed got soaked when the foredeck was covered by one wave. A little later the Aircon unit that had been sitting on the sofa with the new printer on top took flight. It landed on the cabin sole, I haven’t really inspected the damage yet, but I fear the teak & holly may have a few more marks on it. If the printer still works I will be very pleased, especially as my visa runs out this week and I plan to print out the new application when we get to Loreto. We are the only vessel heading north and after nearly 6 hours of bashing into the sea we turn into the protected cove of Isla San Francisco.

Previously I had worried that with the boat sitting idle for many months in the heat with a half empty tank of fuel that the dreaded diesel algae might have flourished, and that on the next rough passage it would stir from the depths of the tank and kill the engine, I’m confident now that’s not going to be a problem. In fact hats off to the engine, it’s doing a great job, but I must get it serviced soon, I think the cam belt is well past its set by date.
There’s quite a few luxury motor yachts and high end charter cats here. A jet ski is whizzing around and several marques are setup on the beach. We don’t mind, my main task now is to make the poached eggs for our breakfast, that we had delayed upon leaving with the idea of having it for Brunch, or Lunch if we were delayed. It turns out to be a lovely early dinner.
Tomorrow we will spend an extra day here, I have to climb the mast as there’s some white thing flying around at the top, as if a plastic bag has wrapped itself around the windex (Wind direction pointer thing). 

Monday
We walk over to the other side of the island and pass some salt pans on the way.The salt has a pink colour Kathy tells me, something like the expensive stuff you might see in Waitrose. I’m tempted to fill a bag with it, could easily pick up a few hundred pounds (£) worth of salt for free!
Later I snorkel around the boat, as usual the fish put on a spectacular show for me, there are several shoals of different species swimming around me. 

Most of the motor boats have left and there’s around ten sailboats here, three of us are Bob Perry designs. I climb the mast and find the white thing up there is the white insulation tape that was covering the unused Raymarine socket , I rip it off, check the other fittings and take a few pics.

Next a kayak over to another baba looking boat, it turns out to be a Union 36, the hull is very similar to a baba, and probably came from the same mould. We chat and I get some news from him as he left wifi land a little later than us. He tells me Oregon and California have gone into lockdown, he explains that it’s down to lefties and he worries about his home state of Oregon and how now they have legalised hallucinogenic mushrooms, it will all go to pot, actually that’s already legal there 😉 He quotes how Amsterdam has been ruined by prostitution and pot!

Tuesday
We have a pleasant overnight stay, a few more boats arrive but it’s mostly sailing yachts like ourselves and there’s little noise other than a generator running on a big beneteau., We depart early, around 7:30 AM, Kathy is able to flake the anchor chain into place without really leaving her v-berth slumber. She joins me on deck half an hour into the passage with a remark about how nice the mornings are and we must get up earlier more often!. We are on the way to El Gato, a lovely spot, but rather exposed to swell from the north. I tried twice to stop there with Arturo, but both times it was too rocky. I decided to leave early as if we can’t stop there, after this 6 hour passage, we will still have enough light to push onto Agua Verde which offers slightly better cover for a northerly swell. Also the winds tend to be less in the morning, and travelling up the strait between the Peninsula and the Isla Jose generally means going into a headwind and oncoming waves.

Halfway up the strait I remember there’s an island on the chart and our path takes us directly through it, It wasnt there back in January, but seemed to appear, at least on the chart during the summer. Yet I couldnt see it as Arturo and I steered around it. This time I decided to sail directly through the island, It looked so green on the chart I imagined it must be full of slippy grass that the keel would ride on, as you can see from the chart below we skidded right over the island and back into the sea on the north side, the depth sounder never dropped below 80m.

We have a very relaxing trip and at one point get the sails up and enjoy an hour on a close reach, later we motor sail the remainder of the way.

Arriving at El Gato we find a yacht and a motor boat, The yacht is called ‘True Love’ and has a younger couple on board (Finger down throat time), how do they call into the coastguard with that name, imagine, Mayday, Mayday, Mayday, it’s True Love here! Or what about if true love hits a rock?
We chat with them as they dinghy back from the beach where the motor boat has his dinghy a little way up on the sand. The tide went out, and it’s too heavy for two men to drag back to the water. It has a 35hp outboard and is about 12ft long with a sit down steering console. I silently congratulate myself on having gone for the lightest dinghy and outboard possible. We may go slower, but even Kathy could drag the boat and motor off the beach if needed.
Kathy is enthralled by the rock formations here and she will no doubt post some of the pictures. There’s not a lot at El Gato other than pink rocks that look alien.

Wednesday
A lazy start to the day, we depart for Agua Verde around 11:30 and arrive 3 hours later. We pass between a big rock/small Island off the coast. They were once joined and in fact still are below the surface, the pilots all agree it’s very dangerous to go through the gap, yet modern charts and google images show there to be no obstructions.

All the same I follow a carefully plotted line between the two. Agua Verde is empty of boats and very calm. We walk around the village and Kathy is amazed at the variety of wildlife and animals, goats, chickens, dogs, vultures, horses, all roaming free. We buy some internet tickets, 1 hour for £1, I assume it’s a satellite based system and later I reconfigure our boats wifi extender (Bullet M) to pick up the weak signal from the tienda and after a lot of head scratching, I turn the router into a bridge and the extender into a router with a dhcp server and we are all devices go. Sadly I waste our first hour of internet just trying to get it to work. We then feast on BBC/twitter/Facebook until our 2 hours are up. Kathy learns of ups and downs back home, but all is ok, I learn that not a lot has changed at the white house, but I’m very worried about the last minute rush to sell off drilling rights in the Arctic. I can’t get the lowdown on machinations at number 10, I expect I will have to wait for the memoirs to come out. It seems Brexit is turning into a complete shambles where a deal may be done, but it looks like a deal that nobody will want. So all in all, no change there. 

Thursday – Sunday
Still alone in the bay, Very calm and peaceful here. The village is very sleepy, some lads are crabbing on the rocks across from us. 

Kathy and I spend these 4 days dinghying around the little coves in the bay. Kathy dons her snorkel mask and gingerly gets back into a little underwater exploring. It’s difficult, she’s not a fan of salt water, or of a lot of things that are in it, like sea snakes and urchins, but she does really well and by Saturday we are able to make a long excursion around some headlands a long way from the beach. It’s such a lovely spot here.

We are joined by Chris and Gerry on two sailboats that we saw earlier in Isla San Francisco. Gerry sends over a plate of fish and taco ingredients for me, to make up for the fact he has to run his generator for an hour each night and morning, fortunately it’s quite quiet and worth it for the fish, which I think he recently caught and breaded, I would rather think that than imagine they have been in his fridge since Costco in Los Cabos. The Suzuki outboard is playing up again, but I think I’m on top of it, I think it’s as simple as the carb filling up with water, if I take the carb apart, swear at it , and then reassemble, it works great, so all I’m really doing is cleaning the water/fuel out. It started playing up just after I emptied the dregs of the fuel can into it. Sadly the drain at the bottom of the carb has broken, also when I reassembled it, I must have damaged the makeshift washer as it leaks fuel from the carb now. I count this as a success all in all.

Monday 23rd November.
We leave at 07:45 for the 22 mile trip to Puerto Escondido. Here we haul out. It’s a lovely passage and when we arrive, half an hour early, we try to get fuel, but the man on the dock who raced past us to get there first takes forever, and half an hour later the travel hoist has lowered its slings into the water and is calling us over. I give up on the fuel and slowly head for the lift, unfortunately as we approach they tell me I have to reverse into the slings. There’s a 10 knot crosswind pushing the bow down to port as I reverse, After many attempts I’m getting closer, but the lift sits above a very sharp and rough concrete set of piers, and once the stern is in, if the bow blows around, I’m going to be paying in teak and gelcoat. Fortunately a passing dinghy offers to help and I get him to push my bow back as I reverse, this works right up until the stern is in-between the piers, but then he is gone, I can’t see him, but the bow is swinging toward the concrete and I’m about to rush out again, which may not even be possible, when suddenly he is back on the job and the boat is lined up perfectly. Phew!
For the first time in 4 years, and 4 travel hoists, I find myself in one with a working weight sensor. I had always assumed our boat weighed 18 Metric Tons, but found out today the back end of the boat weighed 10 Tons and the front 7 in the slings, and we are light on 1/2 ton of fuel and water right now, so I’m very happy with that.Of course I would like the same boat in a ten ton version, for speed, but then I might not win so many battles with the rocks that jump in front of me. The hull looks ok, a small chunk is missing near the rudder, but only gelcoat, about 30 cm by 3 cm. I blame that on Canada, we probably hit a tree at some point, a USA tree would be too scared of litigation, and they don’t really do trees in Mexico.
Tomorrow at 8am a man will start sanding the surface down, I need to see how deep the barnacles have left their mark. I also have a very small number of blisters, maybe 5 mm across and just slightly raised, I’m not losing sleep over them. The starboard big anode had gone completely, the prop anode is about as far gone as you would like, but the port anode is still doing great service. I haven’t changed the hull anodes ever, so that’s good. The Max prop has no grease in it as usual, I will repack it, I’m not sure when the grease leaves, if it’s slowly over several months, or the first day I run up the prop?

We are here for a week, hopefully that’s long enough to get everything done. We shall hire a car and do a bit of sightseeing. 

Paul Collister

Saturday 14th November:
We have had a good rest in La Paz, but I have been working my socks off writing software for my UK customer. This was meant to be a small project I could mostly do on passage, but once I started, and looked at the data I had to work with, big problems emerged and I have been stuck in La Paz with its good internet connections trying to resolve this. I have done enough and now we can leave, the weather is good and I have a spot booked in Puerto Escondido to haul out in 9 days time, so it won’t be too leisurely a trip there.

I’m glad we popped back to watch the election, what with that, the vaccine and the departure of the eye test idiot, things are looking up.

So a breif blog to say we will be out of touch for a week or so.

It would be a very dull post to merely report the general day by day routine of our stay in Marina La Paz. A general daily summary would consist mainly of: get up (usually late in the morning), have toast and coffee; tidy up; laze in the cabin; Paul has a two-hour Spanish lesson while I read or write, and then we go shopping and have the odd evening walk or cycle along the Malecon. Such a general account, however, leaves out the finer details of our month here. When I left for the UK earlier this year, I had only spent a couple of weeks in this charming coastal city, so I’d had little time to explore it properly. A leisurely month allowed me to get to know it better.  Once my self-isolation ended, I was able to accompany Paul to the local supermarkets so that I could refamiliarise myself with the available products.  As a ‘veggan’, (which I have discovered is the recently made up word that describes someone who is mostly vegan but still eats eggs), I have a few favourite staples I like to use in the dishes I prepare. With fewer choices in the pre-prepared vegan range here, compared with the wide range in the UK, I knew I would be making more of my own meals on board. I had a list…I always have a list, and my list is written on actual paper with a pen, and it goes everywhere with me.

Over the course of the month I was able to cross items off my list through spotting them in the local markets and stores. I’m referring to things like nutritional yeast flakes, semolina, Worcester sauce (without anchovies), red lentils and vegan pesto. Sourcing and procuring these became something of an enjoyable mission when we were out – a bit like a culinary treasure hunt. We saw places we probably wouldn’t otherwise have seen and one day we met the North American owner of a natural food store who has been living here for 20 years. She runs a food cooperative, and had an intriguing array of products in her shop, including eggs from her vegetarian-fed chickens, organic fruit and veg from her ranch, and tubs of cooking oils and flours which she dispenses into recycled containers. She told us that a lot of her custom is from the American community in the marinas. Unfortunately for us, on this particular day they had cleared her out of eggs, so I came away with a small jar of sesame oil and a bag of semolina, which Paul has promised to make pasta with, so watch this space.

La Paz has great cycle lanes throughout the town, which makes for an easy and pleasant way to get around. I’m sure more people would get on their bikes in the UK if they felt safer and not in the way of road traffic. There are no steep hills to worry about here but the intense heat made it quite challenging to pedal to the supermarket for mad dogs like us, who get up too late to avoid the midday sun. Paul is more used to it, but the first few days I accompanied him I struggled to keep up. Our bikes are doing remarkably well, considering we bought them almost five years ago in Malaysia. We thought we’d make use of them there and ditch them when we moved on because they were relatively cheap, but I had got quite fond of mine and thought they might come in useful in other places. We’ve now used them in Malaysia, Japan, Canada, America and Mexico; through torrential rain, extreme humidity and searingly hot sunny days, and nights when we weren’t sure where we were on dark, unfamiliar streets. Folded up in the quarter berth, they crossed the North Pacific Ocean with us. Apart from a bit of rust, and a few punctures, they have proved excellent value for money. Wimp that I am, however, I only cycle when I can follow Paul. My cycling proficiency test was several decades ago and I’m not confident enough to cycle on the main roads on my own. It’s nerve wracking enough as a pedestrian until you get used to the crossing places and pedestrian rules here. I walked to Chedraui a couple of times and took a few pictures on the way.

The staff appear to have become familiar enough with Paul to allow him in with his shopping bag. When I entered alone, I had to hand my backpack in to the customer service desk, thereby losing access to my shopping list, water and bags to pack the shopping in. Hot and flustered after the 30 minute walk, I’d had to step on the rubber foot-cleansing mat, hold out my arm for temperature checking and then my hands for sanitiser, so obeying the instruction to hand my bag in was just part of the stress-inducing entrance permit. Next time, I scrunched a bag into my handbag to avoid the laborious task of putting the shopping into the basket, and then having to collect my bags and hurriedly pack the items in the small space next to the customer service desk.   

More pics taken during our cycle rides around La Paz.

Sundays after quarantine became Mogote excursions. The sandbar a short distance away from the marina has always been a popular leisure spot. As restrictions gradually lifted, Paul tells me he’s noticed more visitors than when he first began swimming there. People whizzing around on jet skis have returned, along with water-skiers and excursion boats. Groups of people gather for afternoon barbecues and picnics on the beach. All this activity made for a pleasant atmosphere, however – even with the engine noise and shrieks coming from the various skiers. Arturo joined us for dinner each Sunday and it has been a pleasure getting to know him better – especially as he is a fellow book and arts lover. One of the dishes I made was a veggie shepherd’s pie and Paul and I must have bemused poor Arturo by explaining that he was being served ‘guardian of the sheep’ pie. The various translation and language incidents have given all three of us much amusement.

As October went on, it very slowly began to get cooler. We noticed we were turning the air conditioning off more often. Nights required an extra cover on the bed, and mornings came with a refreshing breeze, albeit only for a brief period. We had arrived here just before Christmas last year and had been trying to remember what the temperature had been like then. Paul remembered having to wear a fleece and I know we had been using a quilt on the bed – which seemed hard to imagine when the afternoon sun beat down relentlessly and we were keeping cool under the fans in the cabin. The daily morning ‘net’ broadcasts from Club Cruceros informed us that the risk of a hurricane was decreasing rapidly and that it was a good time to visit the islands a few miles north of La Paz. This was indeed our intention. Our time in the marina was up on the 27^th so we left our berth on the afternoon of the 28th and anchored in the bay. We had stocked up with provisions in preparation for a trip up to Puerto Escondido where the boat is due to be hauled out later in November, but because we were keen to find out the result of the American election (so glad we did, to see Biden’s victory), we returned to La Paz for a few days after we visited some of the ‘must-see’ spots Paul had been to. It was the first time I was without access to the internet for 10 months. I followed the news avidly when Coronavirus first struck. I watched every government briefing, and was in daily touch with family and friends via social media. With so much still developing and alarming statistics being revealed in that area, along with the (seemingly) daily global political farcical events going on at present, it was a test of my addiction to be without instant access to information about ‘the outside world’. I wondered if might also prove to be a welcome relief from such information overload. The islands in the Sea of Cortez were as good a place as any to find out how I would cope….

Wednesday 28th October 2020.

The storm is peaking, although it’s not really a storm, 25 knot gusts in the bay and the harbour master has closed the port to everyone wanting to leave. You may still arrive in an emergency.

The marina office calls the harbour master for me and gets us permission to move out to the anchorage less than a mile from the marina as long as ‘we take all the necessary precautions’ whatever they might be.  First we must do a few jobs

In the morning Carlos the diver and his cousin arrive, scrape down the bottom and we are all good below, clean prop and bow thruster is a must when leaving the slip in strong winds. Arturo calls around and helps me take the canopy down. We have been very lucky with the weather as we will not roast with the aircon and canopy missing, the days are noticeably cooler, and with this wind it’s actually very pleasant.

We leave the dock without any drama, We have to turn the bow into the wind to leave which is always difficult, I get as much speed as I can going astern, as the bow is swinging the right way under the shadow of the big boat next to us, we get quite close to the boat on the opposite pontoon but hard to port and full ahead and we are on our way. Sadly we reach our destination in about 5 minutes, the anchor digs in first time and we sit about 1/4 mile off the Malecón which we have just heard is closing tomorrow, except for joggers in the morning, as too many people have been promenading without masks and not keeping the 1.5 metres apart.
This morning on the Ch22 VHF net, after the Malecón announcement was made, the village idiot, who occasionally pops up with his latest covid conspiracy theory announced that we would all be saved if we just take Vitamin D3 supplements. I think that this proves a worrying fact that if you keep shouting random nonsense, you might actually stumble on a truth. I had heard theories about this before, and although there is no firm evidence, there’s a growing body of research in this area that is interesting. I think we do well for Vitamin D by being on the boat, fair skinned, and mad as the proverbial Englishman in the midday sun. I do hope we learn of stack of useful stuff from this pandemic.
Kathy is reminded how nice it can be at anchor as we bob around in the diminishing swell as the storm drops away.

Thursday

No great rush to get the day started, we are only going as far as Esperito Santo, we don’t have a destination yet as I’m not sure how windy or how much swell there will be in the islands.

We motor up with a fast ebb tide to the most famous beach around here, Balandra. It has one of those mushroom stones, that appears on every postcard. We make over 7 knots with the ebb and the newly cleaned hull. Balandra, although very pretty, has too much swell to consider staying, so instead we take a few pics and push on to Esperituo Santo. We meander between the coves on the Island and my first and favourite choice of Canelero bay is full of luxury  motor yachts and plush Catamarans. I then decide to go to Ensenada Partida, right at the top of Santo, before Isla Partida, It’s very safe and calm there, and if we spend a night or two there, then we can work our way back down the island visiting the other coves and hopefully next Monday find ourselves in a much calmer Bandelra Bay before heading into La Paz to restock and watch the election.
Ensenada Partida has two big sports fishing boats here, but besides them we have it to ourselves, we have a great dinghy ride over to where a colony of Pelicans live and drift around watching them dive bomb. The fish have a worrisome life here, I caught one on the way into the bay, just as Kathy brought us head to wind so I could drop the main, the line went screaming out and I was sure something big was on the end. It turned out to be a tasty Skipjack Tuna I had for dinner later. 
By the time we had dinner, we had been joined by 8 other holiday boats, Cats and big motor yachts. Good old Mexican Banda music filled the air from all sides, mixed in with laughter, hysterical shrieking, jets skis and lots of shouting. A new joy entertained us in the form of a loud buzzing sound above, a drone no less, how nice! We retreated below and got on with our 2010 version of Scrabble which doesn’t need the internet.

Friday
We had to row back from the pelicanos last night as after four vigorous pulls on the outboard engine starter cord, it refused to start and the fourth pull would be the last as the rope snapped off. It was getting too dark to fix. I redid the cord this morning and it’s working fine again. A must for our trips ashore here. I was disappointed as four years ago in Langkawi I bought 100 metres of starter cord in Kua, I wanted some general purpose rope for tying things. This rope is thin and very strong and designed for the job, sadly it has no UV protection so wasn’t that good for outdoor use, I looked but I couldn’t find any. I think I have used 100 meters on tying up odd bits and bobs around the boat over the years.
After breakfast we dinghied ashore, the water shoals very slowly here, so it was very shallow for about 100 meters from the shore when we left, the tide was going to drop even more so we anchored the dinghy in knee deep water some way from the shore and waded the rest of the way. When we returned the dinghy was aground and we had to drag it for a few minutes into deeper water.
Later in the evening the bay filled with big lagoon charter cats, Many big charter cats are made by lagoon, I don’t like them, they’re like floating bungalows with lots of uPVC double glazing and patio doors. Saying that, they are very spacious and comfortable, but I’m of the school that it’s not meant to be that comfortable.

Saturday
We retrace our steps back two coves south to Ensenada Candeleros, my favourite spot on Isla Esperitu Santo. I have been here with Tim & Asta, Jim and Arturo, And now with Kathy. I’m pretty much on first name terms with the goats here now and could certainly get a job as a tour guide. I had been expecting the place to be full of boats, but we arrived at 11 AM when most are transiting to their lunch locations, and I was pleased to find we could get close in as there was really only one big cat in the bay. I anchored off the north wall, 100 metres away from some nasty looking rocks. My plan is to be far enough away to be safe, but close enough that no one would risk anchoring between us and the cliffs.
Just in case anyone thinks this lazy idyllic life we have to endure doesn’t have its problems, then think on.  We have a family of little creatures who have decided to come sailing with us, They look like small roaches, or maybe large Beetles, they move quickly and last night as we lay on the sofa watching ‘The Social Dilema’ they took to scurrying around us. They had confined themselves to the breadboard area up until now, but this was an expedition too far for my liking. This morning Kathy and I removed all the cushions from the cabin, then all the locker cover and doors and proceeded to treat all the surfaces with a mixture of boric acid and sugar, Inaccessible areas received a spraying from a product called ‘Poder Mortal’ Which I’m thinking won’t be to popular with the little creatures. The boric acid is a sneaky chemical, once ingested, by them eating the sugar, or just getting it on the skin, a slow death starts, they return to the nest and die, where upon the other roaches will consume their dead brethren and die themselves from the poison. This does rather test my Buddhist  leanings.
After lunch we head ashore, there’s quite a few tourist boats that have arrived and some have set up small marquees to dine under on the beach. We walk up to the old well and take some pictures of the bay. It’s extremely picturesque and most pleasant here. Later I swim around the rocky islands and see lots of tropical fish.
As the sun sets the feeding frenzy starts, Pelicans dive bombing all around and crazy activity in the water around the boat as big fish attack the tiniest of fish, which you can just see in the video below.

Sunday

We spend a second night at Ensenada Candelero and have a lazy Sunday morning. I start work on some website and backend code for my customer back in the UK, I have agreed to about two weeks work to be started asap. Fortunately I can do most of the work without an internet connection. I like working offline, it makes me focus on the task at hand better, however it does make you realise how dependent you are on on-tap knowledge. I often google stuff I know, but can’t remember. I have a good offline source of coding manuals which can be useful, but mostly I’m just regurgitating code I have used before, web interfaces, database routines etc.

At 2pm Kathy suggests a walk up the valley pass, it’s not too hot so we give it a try, we end up in a dead end canyon, and decide it is quite hot after all and head back. I snorkel around the big island and see many fish, but nothing like as many as when Arturo was here and the island was closed. Still not evidence to be conclusive, we saw one goat today, but when the island was closed we saw many. A large motor yacht arrived at lunchtime and up on the fly deck, there was a DJ with a desk and big PA speakers blasting out music to the four guests on board, the whole bay was subjected to this horrendous onslaught. Several boats close by upped anchor and left. By the time we returned from our island hike they had left, thank goodness.

I also made good progress on the boats systems, I have the PI reading in data from the GPS dongle, it will also provide an accurate clock for the PI, something the designers left off. I have it reliably recording the Wind data after a reboot now as well. I think I’m going to go for MySQL Replication to move the data from the boats system to this Blog site. I do need an internet connection to get this working. 

Monday
We leave Candelero to head back for a WiFi or 4g signal, we arrive back in Balandra Bay a very popular tourist beach, claimed to be one of the most beautiful spots in Mexico, it is nice, and the swell, although a little annoying should reduce through the night as the northerlies are long gone now. As the sun is getting ready to set, we dinghy ashore and I run up the white sand dunes in my bare feet wondering what Kathy is shrieking about below, I soon find out as I stand on several of those little cactus thorns that are everywhere. Now I’m up for a bit of shrieking. We wander along the beach and out to the mushroom rock as the last tourists are leaving. but just before we can get our photos lined up a new tourist boat arrive and dumps a load of passengers into the water to get their obligatory pic with the rock.

I hope I don’t get into trouble for saying this, but I’m rather dissapointed with the Mushroom. I do think the stone masons have done a great job of restoring it with rebar and concrete after it was recently toppled by tourists, but Kathy has much better pictures of massive potential mushrooms just around the corner.

Tuesday
We leave Balandra Bay around 9am to make the hour long journey back into La Paz bay, where we drop the hook and prepare to go ashore and get some fresh bits and bobs. We wonder if we need to buy pretzels in order to watch the election coverage later. Things don’t quite go to plan. The authorities are stepping up their enforcement of the covid rules here, and because people have been ignoring the masks and distancing the Malecon is closed in the afternoon/evenings now. I suspect the supermarket may enforce the ‘only one person from a family‘ rule and not let us both enter. So Kathy goes ahead into Chedraui while I cunningly cycle around the far end of the car park. Once kathy is safely in the store I approach only to be told that geriatrics can’t enter in the afternoon. Foiled! On top of that I have the money, the shopping bags and one of the shopping lists. Kathy is waiting inside for me to join her and I can’t contact her as she didn’t bring her phone. It all works out in the end, but Chedraui are now blacklisted by Kathy and Soriano is our new Supermarket of choice, where I’m allowed in an hour later. I’m just grateful that I didn’t get in and Kathy was refused on age, I would have been to scared to come out I think.

We are two hours behind USA EST (East coast time) and so the Florida results start coming in as we are settling down for sunset and dinner around 5pm. It doesn’t take long before we both realise that no one is going to be talking ‘Landslide’ in this election. I stay up until 4am watching the numbers come in and the tweets go out. Poor Poland 😉
Thoughts of sailing off into the blue on Wednesday or even Thursday with a result confirmed are dashed. However it’s so pleasant out here at anchor, and we both have a lot of things to do that require the Internet that we may well stay here until the weekend, when hopefully a preliminary result will be clear.

I really wanted to be in Mexico for the Day of The Dead festivities but they were cancelled this year. I first became interested after visiting an exhibition back in the 90s, I think, at the British Museum. Looks like it will have to be 2021.

Paul Collister.

We haven’t done a lot this week, but things are noticeably changing here. The temperature has been steadily dropping, days are now in the lower 30s as opposed to the higher 30s, nightimes are much cooler and we don’t need the aircon running to be able to sleep now. Also we are just getting our first northerly blow of the season. From hereon in we can expect increasingly strong blows coming down from the north. This means I have experienced the whole cycle of Northerlies, Southerlies and Westerlies plus my first, albeit benign, hurricane season.

We leave here in two days time, so today and tomorrow is all about stocking up on supplies, downloading books and videos we want to watch later as we will have no signal wifi or Cell Phone for a few weeks once we leave La Paz. On Wednesday we take down the covers, stow the aircon, haul the dinghy onto the foredeck, top up the freshwater and head out. We plan to head back in a week solely for the purpose of listening/watching the US election results. Because we are heading back out into the sea again for two – three weeks after this we could easily wait until we reach Loreto to hear the result, but we are quite invested in it now. Being in the Americas we have been in the right time zone to be able to watch the presidential debates live. I think I was with Kathy on board in Thailand 4 years ago when Trump got in. Previously my good friend Tim was sailing with me when the Brexit result came in, I forecast both results would go the other way. Third time lucky eh?

We are glad Kathy got out of the UK when she did, Liverpool is know under strict lockdown (Tier 3) and the rest of the country is facing increasing restrictions. Parts of Mexico are seeing increases in the virus, but our area, BCS, seems to be doing ok right now.

I’m pleased with my migration over to Amazon for this blog site. Now I have full control over the server (Virtual) that is hosting things, I can try to write some interesting code. I plan to add a live data feed from the boat to this server, this means that you should be able to see our location, speed, course, water depth, wind speed and direction and other stuff, in realtime on the blog. I’m working through a design for it now, but I’m thinking of storing all the information in a database on the boats PI computer (MariaDB) and syncing it with the same database on this server. That way I can sync the databases when I get a signal. If I can get both my brain cells to work together on this I may be able to recreate past journeys by re-running the database from a previous date/time.

I’m also thinking of buying myself a telescope for Christmas, I had dismissed this as a mad idea for a boat, but my last trip out to the islands was wonderful for stargazing, the binoculars revealed so much, so I’m thinking I could set up camp in the beach at night in these remote places and see what I can see. I last had a telescope when I was about six, my uncle dropped it on the stone floor of our kitchen, smashing the lens inside. He sneaked off without taking any responsibility and that was my last telescope. I may have picked up a couple of weeks coding work so that would allow me to treat myself. I haven’t looked, but I gather there’s a lot of options out there, I understand you can get computer controlled tracking mounts and all sorts of extras. Research is needed.

Paul Collister

La Paz, BCS, Mexico

It’s been another quiet week. Life continues slowly here, yet the days fly past. Kathy made Vegan tacos in the week, based on some rather dull shredded soy. This gave me the chance to try one of the sauce trays I had seen in the supermarkets. It seems, and I could be making a fool of myself here, that you tip the contents into a blender and a few minutes later you have a fresh sauce. I think if you want to punish yourself you can use a mortar and pestle. The pack costs about 60p and made the tacos taste great. I removed half the chilies first. We also had a guacamole sauce which was lovely. Shame they have to use plastic packaging.

Salsa Rojo

On Friday we went for a meal at Estrella Mar on the waterfront close to the marina. They made a vegan pizza especially for Kathy and I had an assortment of fish beautifully steamed with rice.

Anyway that’s about as much food talk as I want to have for about for a year.

For fun I have migrated this Sister Midnight blog over to the Amazon Web Service AWS. I’m not sure how well it’s known, but Amazon are huge in the computer cloud business. They power many of the big web sites, streaming services and a stack of Internet stuff like eMail, eCommerce, Bitcoin, I could go on..
It was mostly fun, but it took many days to get the email notifications to work as Amazon are crazy to make sure Spam and fraud can’t originate from their systems. I’m all for it, but I had to jump through a load of hoops and be evaluated by a human! The previous email system suffered from being blocked by different ISPs from time to time, but hopefully these emails should be trusted and less likely to be dumped or shoved into the junk box.
Im hoping also to be able to stream videos faster, I have attached a HD video at the bottom as a test.

Paul Collister.