Travalog
One
San Pedro, California
to Cabo los Frailes, BCS
It's
hard to believe a month has passed since our departure from San Pedro.
For those of you that don't know, Pam and I are off on another voyage;
this time for a couple of years. We'll be heading down the coast of
Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama Canal, and onto the Caribbean. Things got
pretty chaotic those last few days, what with trying to move from
the house onto the boat. We were still loading VIVA at 11:00 PM the
night before our departure!
Our first stop was a 24-hour run to Ensenada for a haul out and bottom
job. After 4 days in the yard, mucho margaritas and a couple of great
dinners out, we were definitely ready for the adventure to begin!
Our 700-mile trip to Cabo San Lucas took 12 days with stops at 7 different
anchorages. The weather was quite varied, starting out cold with lots
of fog (usually upon arrival or departure from anchorages), no wind,
too much wind, and yes finally some sun! After about 10 days, we were
finally able to put away the jackets and cold weather gear.
Most of our anchorages were just overnight rest stops aboard VIVA
with the exception of Turtle Bay for a fuel stop, a little shopping,
E-mail, a great breakfast at the Vera Cruz Hotel overlooking the bay,
and of course the usual cervezas! By Turtle Bay, one finally begins
to realize the "manana syndrome"!
At Bahia St Maria, a very large anchorage about 250 miles south, we
were able to take the dinghy ashore for a nice hike along the cliffs
above the bay. This was our inaugural "wet" dinghy landing,
with I'm sure, many to follow! This is a very beautiful, remote spot
with a fish camp on a lagoon feeding into the bay...a great place
to start our trading for fish and lobsters with the local fishermen.
Our next overnight stop was Man-o-War cove, a quaint little village
about 8 miles back into Magdalena Bay. The town has its' own lighthouse,
Port Captain, about 50 houses, a couple of small stores, and a great
little open air cantina for the usual cervezas! A great spot to watch
the fishermen unloading and cleaning the daily catch. After a walking
tour of the town, we took the dinghy further up the bay to a very
remote and unspoiled spot known as Howland's Lagoon. After crossing
the sand bar, you are able to travel upstream surrounded by mangroves
on one side, and beautifully sculptured sand dunes on the other. Lots
of fish, white herons and egrets….a true wilderness area.
Speaking of fish, our luck hasn't been that great. We have a rod and
reel, and a "food line" (75' of 3/16 nylon, with wire leader)
out most of the time; but unfortunately we keep catching bonita every
time we run through a school. What we really want is dorado, yellowtail,
tuna or wahoo. Our day will come!
We have been buddy boating with two other boats, and it has been nice
getting together for happy hour, some great dinners and sharing the
ongoing maintenance and fish stories.
On our last leg to Cabo San Lucas, we knew we were running short of
fuel and tried to sail as much as possible. The final afternoon we
had a beautiful spinnaker reach with flat seas, sunny and warm, but
at sundown, we had to fire up the engine for the final 75 miles. Well,
at 5:00 AM the tanks ran dry, and there we sat with 3 - 5 kts of wind!
Needless to say, Pam was not a happy camper! The wind did fill in
a little, and 12 hours later we sailed our way into the fuel dock
at Cabo San Lucas! On the plus side, we did catch our first dorado!
Talk about déjà vu…it was only a little over a
year ago that we sailed north from Cabo with the broken transmission!
Well, Cabo was in its usual rare form with two cruise ships and a
U.S. Navy frigate at anchor. The marina fees are over $1.65 per foot
per day with every slip filled with large sport fishing boats. I don't
think there were more than 10 sailboats in the entire harbor! The
town was packed, and after ½ a day of clearing Immigration,
Port Captain, API and back to Port Captain, we were definitely ready
for "shore leave" and our usual ration of margaritas! It
doesn't take long in Cabo to put a dent in the old cruising budget!
On Monday, 11/22, we departed Cabo for the 43 mile trip to Los Frailes,
the usual jumping off spot for the 170 mile trip to Mazatlan. We left
at 7:00 AM under sunny skies, flat seas and no wind; however, within
an hour or so the wind blew up from the North at 20-24 kts and that
leg took 10 hours of slugging to weather! Three days later, the "Norther"
was still blowing, but fortunately, Cabo Los Frailes is a beautiful
protected harbor from such winds. The three days here have given us
a chance to catch up on maintenance projects and we are still trying
to stow all the "stuff" we loaded on in San Pedro. The bay
here is gorgeous with a long sand beach, a few fishermen's pangas,
a small hotel and a couple of houses. The water temperature is 82,
the air 85! You can't get much better than that! Last night we had
Thanksgiving dinner for six aboard VIVA, which consisted of two BBQ'd
tri-tip roasts, a kilo of fresh shrimp (traded from a shrimp boat
at anchor in the harbor for 2 hats and 2 t-shirts), scalloped potatoes
and home baked rum cake…..who needs turkey!!
Well
, the winds are finally dying down, so we will leave tomorrow morning
early for the passage to Mazatlan. As you can probably tell, we are
definitely getting into the "cruising mode". It appears
that all systems installed and retrofitted on VIVA are working great.
Many thanks to our suppliers: Doug Grant for the mast and rig, Mike
Taylor for the beautiful new Main, Jib and Drifter, Harbor Canvas
for new dodger and bimini (a must-have item down here), S & W
Diesel for engine rebuild and Dean Hackbarth for all the help with
engine, watermaker, batteries, etc, etc. So far, when everyone else
has his head in the bilge, we are feeling quite smug!
Best wishes to you all. Drop us a note by E-mail when you have a minute
(please no photos or attachments) and stay tuned for the next chapter
of our "saga". Life is good!
As
ever,
Steve & Pam
s/v VIVA
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