Here we are again: at anchor in San Carlos, ready to rumble but the weather is giving us no love. We splashed Galapagos bright and early, taking advantage of a two hour window of calm before the next blow came through.ast night, on the hard in the boatyard, we shivered under comforters and blankets, nothing but our noses open to the air, as the boat shuddered on its stands in the wind.

We’re in Mexico. We don’t have our diesel heater ‘ready to go’, as it were, but it sure would not have come amiss as the temperature on the boat plumeted to 51F. This being our third season in Mexico, we’re getting a little thin skinned when it comes to cold weather. Between the unnatural shimmying and shaking of the boat in the wnd and the cold weather, it was a restless night.

Painting the bottom of the house.

Just before first light we got up to prepare for launch. I wore a tshirt, a polar fleece pullover, and a light sweatshirt with a hood on top of that. It was my very first time wearing jeans in Mexico. I held my coffee with both hands, grateful for a bit of warmth as we watched Galapagos trundle down the road on the trailer.

The water was flat calm and there was no wind as we approached the boat launch. This is always good because they launch the boat stern first, which means you have to back out of the fairway and into the main channel. It’s not far, but let me tell you this: if you never seen a full keeled sailboat try to back up in a straight line, you haven’t lived. We’ve launched here 3 times and each time it’s been a no drama event because we always schedule first thing in the morning. And because we were lucky.

This was not the case today. The calm of the water belied the currents of an outgoing tide under the surface and as Mike gave Galapagos a little reverse, just enough to get her moving slowly, the current grabbed us and soon we were almost sideways in the channel, in shallow water. There is no room to turn around in the narrow channel so he brought her up to the dock and tried again. No bueno. Meanwhile I’m running back and forth with our biggest fender hanging over the side, making sure I can fend us off, giving Mike a calm and detailed running commentary about how far off he is from the boat or dock behind us. We’ve got that swim step on the stern of the boat, and at the helm it’s tricky to know just how much room you have when you need every bit of it. (We use those Sena bluetooth headsets ALL THE TIME and will never, ever boat without them by choice.)

It’s best to always be prepared for these scenarios, even when things look like they will literally be smooth as glass. My anxious brain had worried about just this very thing so before we cast off I had that fender out and ready. I used it three times to keep our boat and others safe, dropping it down between the boat and whatever it was we might have hit without it. Three. Who says an overly active amygdala isn’t useful sometimes?

Sporting his ‘naps’ tshirt and his ‘boatyard guy’ look.

After many attempts of forward into the middle, backward too close to the dock, then forward again, we worked our way to the main channel where somehow we had turned just enough for the current to push us in the right direction and off we went, cheers all around from the guys on the dock, no harm, no foul. And now we sit here at anchor listening to the wind howl again and blocking all the ways that cold wind finds to get into the boat. It’s great to be aboard again and we have BIG plans for this season.

Last season was a turning point for us. We had spent two seasons in the Sea of Cortez and Pacific Mexico and we needed to decide what was next. This turned out to be a pretty hard decision. In a nutshell we had three choices: stay in this area for another season, go further south and across the Pacific (which was our original plan), or return to the Pacific Northwest for awhile.

Boatyard horse. Mike shared his apple.

As much as we like the Sea of Cortez, and we do like it, we feel like we are ready to move on for now. So many people leave their boats here all year, returning to their home country during the heat of the summer and coming back in the winter to enjoy the (usually) beautiful weather and the sea. We’ve met lots of cruisers who have been in the Sea of Cortez for 10-20 years. But we aren’t ready to be those people. Maybe later.

After cruising for this long we both realize that the things we love about cruising are only marginally available here in the sea due to weather and water temperature. The cool temperature of the water and the generally marginal visibility (with lucky exceptions) make snorkeling a catch as catch can endeavor, and we both really love to be in the water. We love being able to swim off our boat and not have to don wetsuits. This luxury is available for only a brief time in the Sea of Cortez unless you stay through the very hot months. By the tme the sea is warm enough to enjoy just jumping in, the daytime temperatures are beginning to really heat up. Hiking is beautiful here when you can find a trail or scramble up an arroyo. But not when the weather starts getting hot. The summers are brutal, and we just cannot tolerate them without air conditioning. It’s a beautiful place, really absolutely stunning in so many ways, but for now, after this season we are done for awhile.

Just behind the boatyard, a trail through the desert.

Pacific Mexico, while interesting with all its cool animals, just didn’t make our hearts soar. We enjoyed La Cruz a great deal, but that was mostly due to the community of cruisers there and the excitement of everyone getting ready to do the Puddle Jump. This year we’ll probably be giving that area a miss, even though we have friends who are there and we’d love to see them again.

Our second choice was to go further south and cross the Pacific. This is what we really wanted to do and we began to make plans and get excited about it. Down in La Cruz we went to many of the seminars for people doing the ‘Puddle Jump’ and we had Jamie Gifford come aboard and do a thorough inspection of our rig. As we became more educated about what was required for that kind of extended voyaging, and as we took a long hard look at our boat, we decided this wasn’t our year to cross. There are too many things we feel like the boat needs before we set off for that part of the world.

The things we need to do, like pull the mast and completely refurbish it, replace all the rigging, put in a water maker, do some interior remodeling including replacing the salon cushions, install new radar and anemometer, possibly replace a toilet, get a different dinghy and bigger engine, and a few other bits and pieces, could certainly be done here in Mexico, but it’s harder and many times much more expensive. What’s cheaper in Mexico is labor, but we do our own labor almost all the time. Sourcing things is not easy here and we no longer have a car so we’re either relying on other people or taking local transport. In addition, these things cost money; money we don’t have at the ready without dipping into our retirement savings, and that doesn’t seem prudent at our ages. I know some people claim you can live this cruising life on a wish and a prayer, but we have found that to be completely not true if you want your boat to be safe. It’s just so much easier to work on the boat back home where we will have money coming in, get it really ready, then go.

So that’s what we are going to do. Go back and work for awhile, fill the cruising kitty, get Galapagos better prepared, and then get going again. That’s our plan for now.  If you are reading between the lines and sense a little conflicted heart on my end, you read that right.     This was not an easy decision. If our kids weren’t there, I’m not sure we would have decided on this path. But when it comes right down to it, we need to put money in the kitty.

Now that hard decision has been made there is some excitement about the choice, even as we do not look forward to living on board in the Pacific Northwest winter again. Both our kids are in the Puget Sound area now, and we’re looking at staging the boat in Olympia, WA, close to our Claire and Dan. Andrew and Jill live in Tacoma now and plan to buy their their own boat and live aboard at Foss Harbor marina, where our family has kept boats for well over 10 years.  It does our hearts good to think of being available for that process. I mean, what young couple DOESN’T want mom and dad looking over their shoulders as they dive into the trenches of boat ownership? I mean, we have LOADS of unsolicited advice just waiting to spring forth from our, parental bosom!

We had Christmas this year with all of our Washington family. Claire and Dan had just moved into their house in Olympia and we had no decorations. So Mike made this fireplace mantle and we put on a Youtube fire. It was terrific. Our tree I made from wire garbage cans Claire had. Zip tied together and lit up, it was just about perfect. Cheap Dollar Store stockings completed our decor.

We also have a lot of excitement about how we are getting home! Now the real adventure begins! We are currently applying for our permit to visit the Villagigados Islands, a few hunded miles offshore from Puerto Vallarta. These remote islands are completely protected  by the Mexican Government and offer the opportunity to see some really amazing wildlife, including giant manta rays. We are dead excited to go there and spend a week or two snorkeling.

After that we will begin our trip home. Rather than doing the bash up the coast, which to be honest, I was REALLY not looking forward to (as in “How much would it cost to truck this boat home? Answer: WAY too much.) , we’ve decided to do the ‘Clipper Route’ and sail across to Hawaii, then from Hawaii to the Pacific Northwest. That’s not as long a passage as the south pacific and we feel like the boat is ready for that journey. We’re both excited to get to do a passage of this length without pulling the trigger on the south pacific yet. Actually, we are very stoked about this!

We will be hiring a professional weather router for both legs with a focus on staying comfortable while continuing to have enough wind to sail. Depending, as usual, on weather, our tentative plan is to begin the journey to Hawaii in April, spend some time in Hawaii doing whatever the boat needs for the next leg of the trip and hanging out, and then begin the journey back home in late May.

Gratuitous photo of Claire’s cat.

Until then, we still have another season in the Sea of Cortez and we are ready! We’re going to hang close to San Carlos for a few more days then head across when it looks good.  Our first scheduled stop is Santa Rosalia where we will be putting Galapagos in the marina for a week while we go do some visits with grey whales over in Guererro Negro. I am dead excited! Send us all the good joo joo for a mama whale introducing us to her baby. I might swoon, even with the inevitable whale breath. Baby whales! Oh, my heart!

S/V Galapagos, Standing by on Channel 74

Ah, San Carlos. Could you make life any easier? Well, sure. I mean we could be in a condo. That would be way easier. But here we are at anchor in the bay in San Carlos getting things done while we are waiting to leave. The thing about cruising as a lifestyle is that while you are out enjoying the islands and sailing the wide blue sea, tasks are piling up. The ‘to do’ list is getting longer. So we are still in port working through that list. San Carlos isn’t a bad place to be stuck for awhile. So what’s on our list?

Our view from the anchorage

We’ve been taking care of medical appointments, catching up on that kind of thing. One of the blessings about Mexico is that we can pay for good medical care out of our pockets without breaking the bank. There is a reason why medical tourism is a growing industry and Mexico is a good place to experience that. We have access to a doctor here in San Carlos that makes things pretty easy. So easy that we’ve decided if we live in the states again, we’ll just come down here twice a year for medical stuff. We’ll get a vacation and save money at the same time.

Top of our Galapagos ‘to do’ list was fixing the little outboard Suzuki. It had suddenly developed a slipping prop. We don’t remember hitting anything with the prop, but for whatever reason, it was definitely slipping, which came home to us smartly during a low speed journey back to our boat in high wind. That was a wet ride. Fortunately, we carried a new replacement prop on board so Mike thought it would be the work of a couple of hours to take the old one off and replace the new one. But it wasn’t. He could not get the dratted thing off. Raw knuckles and bleeding hands later he decided he needed help.

We took the engine to Star Marine, the local Suzuki ‘service’ center. But there was no service. Because that’s how it is many times here. Sometimes the sign says ‘Taco Thursday Special’ and yet there are no tacos, although it’s Thursday. Sometimes there is a sign that says there is service for engines, but there isn’t and the young man behind the counter looks at you like you must be nuts to think otherwise. You learn to be flexible in Mexico. He did, however, point us in the direction of ‘a guy’ (mostly likely the ‘guy’ who actually services the engines through Star Marine, maybe. Who knows?).  Man, I tell you. There is nothing more valuable to a cruiser in Mexico than knowing ‘a guy’ when it comes to boats.  The guy is known as ‘Umberto’ and now that we’ve met and worked with him, we, too ‘have a guy’!

After a few false starts, we finally located Umberto and his magnificent garage and cadre of other guys. It’s always guys here.  Ironically, he is located within walking distance of Marina San Carlos. Funny, that. Umberto was great. He went to work immediately on that prop. First it was just him and Mike, tapping away with a screwdriver and hammer. You have to start slowly with these issues, you know, and apparently many things can be overcome with screwdrivers and hammers. When the thing didn’t budge and Umberto made frustration noises another guy came over, and soon there were 4 guys standing around working the problem from all directions, mostly hitting things with hammers and using screw drivers as wedges. I looked away, thinking how strong my arms would be from rowing if they broke our engine for good. After a concerted whack dark oil, the life blood of the beast, spurted out. I sighed heavily. Was that good, or was my engine now bleeding to death? Who knew? They didn’t seem alarmed. (Except for Umberto, who asked Mike how often he changed his oil. I guess not often enough? Damned embarrassing for a man who practically croons sweet nothings into our Beta Marine engine’s ear as he gives it the sweet nectar of a long and trouble-free life: fresh oil. All the time. )

The lifeblood of the engine, leaking onto the ground.

After some time, a long time, Umberto finally removed the entire lower part of the unit and took it to his inner sanctum. I busied myself examining this very attractive little Vespa scooter with a fishing rod on the back and swatting flies and mosquitos. Soon he was back, victory in hand. He installed the new prop, filled her up with fresh oil, and charged us 20$. Considering we had 4 guys on that prop at one time, I’d say that’s a really good deal.   One problem off the list.  The engine is back to its zippy self.

Really, the matching fishing rod makes this whole thing just too cute.

Next on the list is that dratted holding tank. Honestly, those “composting” toilets are looking better and better. Remember when our tank got a crack (which I still blame on that stupid whale who wasn’t looking where he was going)? Way back in La Paz we did a temporary fix and it had been working well until we put it to the test with 4 people aboard. By the time our kiddos had left for the greener pastures of home it was clear that we could not ignore the tank any longer.

Fortunately, we know a guy.

Mike had removed the tank, now a fairly straight forward task, while I was out shopping with a friend. Yes, the crack was worse. So I suggested maybe Umberto might know someone. And he did. Himself. He also does fiberglass work! Way to keep the income streams diversified, Umberto! So we brought him the tank and  he gave us a bid of about $330 to build us a new 30 gallon fiberglass tank exactly like the plastic one we took out. We are keeping fingers crossed that the tank will be done soon and that it will, in fact, be exactly like the one we took out.

Remember this fix with rubber roofing tape? That was quite awhile ago. This tape is almost as good as having ‘a guy’.

So while we are waiting for the tank and finishing up appointments, we get to visit with friends, including a trip out to a reef yesterday with Curt and Lynn Brownlow. What a treat to go snorkeling with our good snorkel buddies! The water is cooling down significantly and fast, so getting water time where we still don’t have to don wetsuits is much appreciated. We don’t miss that high heat and humidity, but we do miss the 85F water already.

We had snorkeled both sides of the reef and I had been kind of unimpressed, honestly. There was a lot of silt over the bottom. The fish population was pretty low and I wondered about the water quality here, considering it’s a good sized town with a lot of tourist activity. After almost two hours in the water we were all shivering and on the way back to the dinghy when I happened to interrupt this lovely pair of octopi in the middle of their octopus love. They stopped what they were doing and made a mad dash for a more private space under a rock. But this sighting was fantastic.  It’s rare for me to see even one octopus as Mike is the octopus whisperer on board. But to see two in all their glory and observe their mating ritual, well I was positively swooning with excitement. It was all I could do to hold my position in the water and my camera in focus. Here are a couple of octopus photos, and a few others.

Here they are before they realized someone was watching.

Now they separate but still maintaining contact, they scurry for cover. Is that a scowl on the face of the one in the foreground? I apologized profusely, but still kept clicking.

Little Sharp Nosed Puffer.

Photobombed by a tiny Cortez Triplefin

Nothing more cheerful than these  baby damselfish with their brilliant blues.

We are hoping to sail across the sea to the Baja again in the next week. I’m hoping the water is warmer there. Keeping fingers crossed.

S/V Galapagos, standing by on channel 74.