For the record: we met an old guy in the Superior Cafe who told us that a good inexpensive hotel in central Guadalajara is the Occidental.
We closed the day by flying back to Puerto Vallarta on Mexicana Airline, a very pleasent experience even though they ran about an hour late. The Guadalajara airport terminal is very nice with a good restaurant and a mini public market on the upper floor. The flight to PV took only about thirty minutes. We were home on our boat by ten thirty after a very nice holiday in the big city.
We'd just gotten the clothes in the machines when Simon and Penny from Amobel showed up. Simon wanted to copy some pages from the new tide tables so we left the ladies and headed off in search of a copy machine. Simon is a distance runner and, in spite of his intention to be easy on this old man, he just about walked my legs off before we found a copy machine. By the time we got back to the boat I was ready for a rest.
I've been noticing that our house batteries haven't been staying up like they should so, after an hour's nap, I checked. Sure enough, the number 1 battery was showing 2.5 volts. Probably the cell that I noticed hadn't been taking any water is gone. So, I pulled that battery and put in the one that we had repaired in La Paz last spring. I hindsight I wish I had bought four new batteries in San Diego but it's too late to worry about that. I may end up replacing our golf cart batteries with 8D's. They don't have as much total capacity but you can buy them anywhere. The golf carts are hard to come by in Mexico.
That ain't much to have accomplished in a day, but who's in a hurry? There's always manana.
After that, we walked back out to the beach where we had a lunch of Margaritas and Quesadilla while we watched and took pictures of the tourists being towed off the beach in parachutes. On the way back I managed to record a bit of the drama of the PV buses as we bounced our way from the turn-around to our stop at Isla Iguana. There we jumped in the Metz, ran over to the cruise ship dock where the Stardancer stood waiting for her passengers to finish their shopping; and, after climbing over one of the huge tire fenders on the bulkhead (It was low tide), checked out with the Port Captain. Our fishing licences are about to expire and we had been asking the Yachtie community and others all day where to get new ones. All said that it was in the same building as the Port Captain. Well, that ain't true! The friendly officer with the big gun on his hip gave us the straight scoop; Pesca is in a third floor office in the Camia building on Calle Guadalupe Sanchez next to the Hotel Encino. They're open from 8:00 to 3:00 and it's 2:45 now. Oh well, there's always manana.
Another bus ride took us to the Comercial Mexicana for groceries and a taxi brought us home with our load. Jerry and Carol came for cocktails bringing their pictures of Guadalajara and we looked for the first time at the videos we took of there and here. All-in-all a very nice easy going day.
I'm not sure just what we're missing, but it was very obvious that we were probably the first yachties to buy fishing licensesat this office in quite a while. The girl looked at our old licenses for a long time, asked us if we really needed licenses for our chicito barkas (I have five licenses and Simon has four, one for each person and one for each boat no matter whether you fish from it or not), and then disappeared into an office for a long time. When she came out she assured us that we did indeed need all those licenses, and set about typing seven copies each of our Hacienda invoices. Fortunately, the Hacienda is only two blocks away, so we walked over there and paid our fees (Ours was 140,000 pesos, about the same as last year). On our return, our lady was furiously typing out licenses and, after about another thirty minutes we were all fixed up and good for another year. As we left we could only wonder that, in a city of this size, and with as many visiting boats, the Pesca office is so un-busy. Maybe others just ignore the rules. I imagine the fine if you got caught, and we've never been checked or heard of anyone being checked, wouldn't be much more than the license fees. Who knows?
I left Simon getting cash at the bank, took the first bus that came along, and soon found that Carol wasn't quite right when she said that any bus but the Pitillal would take you to the marina. This one was crowded, I was standing up so I couldn't see out, and the next thing I knew it was heading off in a completely different direction than all the other buses we've ridden. I relaxed and rode it to the end of the line which turned out to be not far from the main road to the marina. In the meantime I got a nice tour of parts of Puerto Vallarta not normally seen by tourists. Another bus took me home, I filled the jerry can with gas at Opequimar, and we were ready to haul anchor.
13:30 Hook up and we're on our way after twelve days in our little "puddle".
16:00 Yapala, a nice bay about a mile deep and a mile across on the south shore of Banderas which is a daily destination for the tour boats because of it's picturesque palpas, hotel, and village. And picturesque it is, even if it's not the best anchorage (We had to anchor fore and aft on a narrow shelf close to the rocks, but it's still better than some we've been in). On the east shore there is a big palapa hotel, then a series of palapas behind a nice looking beach on the south shore. There's a village on the southwest shore where most of the residents live, then a number of very well built thatched roof houses along the west shoreline.
We'd gotten our hooks down, the Metz up, and had settled down to enjoy our evening martini and the scenery when an inflatable with a young man and woman approached. I thought they were from one of the other boats anchored near, but it turned out that they lived in a house on the shore and were just coming home from the beach so I invited them on board for a drink. Their names are Marty and Joanne, they are from L.A., and own half of a house in this beautiful jungle community. Joanne has a tendency to sea sickness so, after about twenty minutes, they decided they'd better leave but invited us to see their place. We jumped at the chance.
Marty says that Yapala is actually an indian reservation which is governed by the tribe. There are no roads, no electricity, and all supplies are brought in by panga. He and other Americans and Canadians who own the beautiful thatched roof houses set in the jungle along the shore lease the land from the indians. He dropped us on a rock in the surf, hung his large dinghe on a bouy, and came in in a tiny inflatable which he could lift onto a rock. The "house" is a bit different. The living, kitchen, dining area consists of a large tiled floor surrounded by a four foot stone wall. There are no doors or windows. The roof is suspended high overhead by cables attached to trees. A combination of stone and wooden steps leads off into the jungle in one direction to a bedroom/bath area where a swinging bed, again suspended from cables, keeps sleepers safe from the one annoying pest, the scorpion. Instant hot water in the shower and in the kitchen is provided by propane RV demand heating units. Again, no doors or windows, privacy is provided by the jungle. The guest house is a round thatched roof building with an open front reached by another flight of stone steps from the main area. A large bar with comfortable stools divides the kitchen from the dining and sitting area and serves as the informal center, while a huge dining table could seat twelve or more for formal occasions.
It's hard to picture a house that protects from nothing but downpours, but Marty says the biggest problem is keeping the jungle back. For that he and his partner hire a full time man and keep the house open for the full year. They shut it down once for six months and had a disaster when they returned. Just before dark we climbed again barefoot over the rocks to Marty's ding and he took us home. Altogether a very interesting day.
11:00 Put the parafoils in the water. We've still got an hour to go before we round Cabo Corrientes and we're running right in the trough.
12:00 Lots of sport fishing boats out here as we round the point and we found out why as we picked up five Bonita in quick succession just south of the cape. I'm not too enthusiastic; my in'erds are starting to grumble about something.
13:30 Anchored in the cove at Punta Ipala and I'm about ready to cave. Feels like I'm coming down with the "Everisto Blues" of last spring - headache, fever, queezy stomach, and hurting all over. I went below and stayed there until morning. Along about 10:30 P.M. I started feeling better though, so maybe this is the 24 hour version, rather than the three day type. I hope so!
07:40 On our way. It's a quiet morning, no wind, just the big, slow Pacific swell rocking us along, much like the day just a year ago when we left San Diego headed for Mexico. It's fifty miles to Chamela, our destination for the day. That's about a seven hour run. We had the lines out most of the way but no action from the fish. Caught up with and passed the sailing fleet about noon. Let's see, there was Shadow, Wind Walker, Anna, Foily a'Duex, Voyager, and Free Spirit. These were joined by a boat named DX somewhere along the line.
The coastline along here is sure pretty, mile after mile of sand beaches backed by forested mountains and broken occasionally by rocky outcroppings. Every now and then there is a building or a coconut plantation. We couldn't have asked for a nicer day. The visibility was excellent, temperature about 75 with just enough breeze to keep things comfortable.
15:15 Anchored in the north cove of Bahia Chamela. This is a big bay so there was plenty of room for us to join the eleven boats already here. With us, and the seven others coming, we'll have at least nineteen here tonight. It sure isn't lonesome around here; a far cry from our almost solo run down the U.S. coast a little over a year ago. There are quite a few Canadian boats in the pack, they must come down the coast in the summer months. The great majority of the boats are sailboats between 25 and 40 feet long. Once in a while you see a larger sailboat, or a power boat, but they are few and far between. Some are very well equipped, some have almost nothing beyond the hull, sails, and rudder. From what I read, this is a relatively recent phenomena, promoted by the availability of inexpensive navigation equipment like radars and Satnav which make wandering around out here pretty safe, even for an amateur.
Chamela bay isn't a particularly picturesque place. The coastal highway runs just behind the shoreline and buidings ranging from Mexican shacks to hotels are scattered along the six or seven miles of beach. Charley says that one outstanding, multi-story building that looks like a hotel is not; it's the private residence of a U.S. "Tycoon". All-in-all, the beach doesn't look like a very inviting place to visit. There are a couple of large islands in the center of the bay. Maybe tomorrow we'll go take a look at them.
11:30 Got up enough energy to crank up the hook so we set off to see the little islands in the center of the bay. The two largest are Islas Passavera and Colorado, each about 3/4 of a mile long. The anchorages are on a large, sand, three fathom bank which lies between and around them. It would be a great base from which to dive the rocks around but, although it's pretty well protected from the direct effects of the sea, the swell and surge would keep things moving. Since I wasn't feeling quite up to diving yet we decided to move on down to see what Careytos is all about.
13:30 Well, we found out, or at least we saw enough to decide that Careytos is not our kind of place. It was kind of hard to find until we got very close, even with the help of the radar, because it's a rather small bay, about a mile long, with three big islands filling the center. The passages between the islands and reefs were filled with foam from the surf, even on this quiet day. Inside there is what I guess you'd have to call a great place to come for a week's vacation. Behind each of the little beaches in the three lobed bay there is a big hotel, Club Med on the north, then Club Playa Rosa, and on the most southerly beach the Hotel Playa Careyes. The only boats in the bay were two large power cruisers, one on the Club Med buoy and the other also buoyed in front of Playa Rosa. To anchor we'd have had to go bow and stern next to one of those. If it had been late, or if we had been craving the night life, we'd have stayed; but as it was, we took a quick look around and decided to keep heading south to the next anchorage, about two hours away.
This whole section of coast seems to be more developed than we saw farther north. Much of it is steep and rocky, broken by pretty beaches, and on many of the high bluffs over the ocean are big buildings. Some look like condos or hotels, some like private estates. The Mexican touch is evident in the architecture. We saw lots of round or domed buildings, high walls, and thatched roofs even on what would be a million dollar building up north. One highway bridge, visible from the sea, looked like an entire arroya had been filled with a white stucco wall with a perfectly round hole in the center.
16:00 Anchored at Tenacatita. There are hotels here too, and condos, but it looks to be a much better place for the likes of us. It's a beautiful big bay and the anchorage we're in, along with eleven other boats, is very well protected from the Pacific swell. We hardly roll at all. We're at the mouth of a stream up which, Charley says, we can take the ding and see lots of interesting jungle life.
Hooked up on two bonito this trip but lost one. When we got in and I started cleaning it I was surprized to find that this one had white meat. I wonder if it is a little different variety, or is it because we're getting in warmer, clearer waters. It was sure good eating, whatever the reason for its color.
There's much excitement in the fleet about the possiblility of taking a taxi from the Hotel American here on the beach to Barra Navidad about 30 miles south to see tommorrow's football game on big screen TV. It's hard for me to understand how people in this kind of an environment can still be concerned about a football game, but I guess a fan is a fan wherever he may be.
I also ran the Metz along the shoreline to the first big hotel. It appears that the only place to land a dinghe without danger of getting dumped is in the mouth of the river. From there it's probably three quarters of a mile to the hotel along either a dirt road or a sand beach. Of course, getting dumped in these waters isn't all that much of a problem if you're dressed for it. All day long a couple of lauches with "Tenacatita" painted on them pulled people around on long inflatable tubes which look like dragons, occasionaly dumping them shouting and laughing in the surf.
Spent most of the afternoon in the water working on our bottom. Things sure grow fast down here! Although I'm quite pleased with the job our bottom paint is doing - most of the hull was covered with a thin brown scum of an algea like growth but had almost no barnacles - in two months the prop had a pretty good crop of small barnacles and the shoe a solid cover about a quarter inch deep. I scrubbed the waterline and hull as deep as I easily could with just the snorkle, then used one tank of air to clean off the prop, shoe, keel, and throughhulls. I'm sure we can get the tank refilled in Manzanillo. The zincs are still in pretty good shape, with the one I put on the prop hub just starting to be eaten away. All the time I was cleaning little three inch long silvery fish with yellow tails kept close track of my actions, sometimes swarming to within inches of my tool or mask. They didn't seem to be feeding on the particles I scraped off; just seemed to be curious. Even though bottom cleaning is a bit of work, it's a work of pleasure in these waters. I'd rather do our 53 foot boat here than our 16 footer on Coeur d'Alene lake.
For dinner we had the rest of our Bonito which Lois prepared in a different, but just as delicious, way. Sure wish I had a good reference on Mexican fish! I got some more "expert" opinion from other boaters today, conflicting of course. I guess we'll just make a rule not to throw anything away until we've tested it.
We made our little tour up the river this morning. It's pretty much as I described yesterday for about two miles before the water gets sort of murky and the mangroves close in to where you have to fight your way though. The water never did get shallow. Most of the birds are near the entrance, probably because most of the fish are there too. The snowy egrets are sure pretty, with their lacy white feather crowns and yellow feet. There were dozens of them in the brush along the stream.
About half way up the river we met Doug & Annette from "Free Spirit" and Ernie & Sue from "DX" with their dinghes rafted together having a cervesa break. They offered us one so we tied along side and we all drifted with the current while we compared notes on our cruising. Both of them are from Vancouver, BC and which they left last August. We left our dinghes on the beach at the river mouth campground and walked to the hotel just to see what was going on there. As we wandered down the beach in our shorts and shirts with packs on our backs we were obviously out of dress as compared to the bikini clad people wading, swiming, or just walking along the shore. As we approached the hotel we were met by a young man in a white shirt and long pants carrying a computer printout of what was obviously a room list. He wanted to know if we were staying at the hotel. We told him no, but that we wanted to have lunch at the restaurant. He didn't speak any English and, when we insisted, he reluctantly let us pass, but followed us closely all the way to the hotel office.
There we found out the reason for his concern. The Fiesta Americana Los Angeles Locos Hotel de Tenacatitia is an "All Inclusive" resort. For 96,000 pesos a day you are entitled to anything and everything the hotel has to offer, and it's quite a lot. Starting from where we did, there is a long swimming and surfing beach with 85 degree water; boats to take you diving, fishing or sightseeing, or to tow you water skiing or on one of the bouncing inflatables; a good sized stable of riding horses; several big tennis courts; a huge swimming pool which sort of wanders around with several bridges and islands in it; hundreds of sunning lounges and tables with awnings for those who prefer the shade; a beer garden, coffee shop, at least two bars, and a gourmet restaurant; and beautiful landscaping and scenery. All of your meals are included as well as your drinks, unless you have to have imported stuff. They would have given us lunch for 54,700 pesos which would have included use of all the facilities for the afternoon. Not too bad, but we weren't prepared to take advantage of it.
They have a program to keep the most hyperactive busy and seem to cater particularly to the disco set. They also must have the biggest amplifiers made, because even where we are anchored, more than a mile across the bay, we have no trouble hearing their live and recorded entertainment in the evenings. I don't know how many of their "217 exotic luxurious rooms" are filled, but the sunning lounge chair occupancy rate was pretty high and there were lots of nice looking bikinis wandering around. Looks like a great place for a young couple to have a super vacation.
Back at the boat we went to work on the deck and spent the rest of the afternoon re-doing the section which I had done in Santa Rosalia. The synthetic "non-skid" material which mixed so nicely with the gel just wasn't non-skid! This time we used good old sand. That should make our feet stick to the deck. When we were through I suggested a swim and, wonder of wonders, Lois took me up on it, sliding from the Metz into our heated swimming pool and seeming to really enjoy herself. The 84 degree water sure is nice, just right to cool you off without a big shock getting in.
In the afternoon Lois went to work oiling the rail and woodwork while I worked some more on the deck - until I ran out of sand. I tried again using the synthetic material but it's just not rough enough. Tomorrow we'll make a project out of getting some clean beach sand. I think that would work pretty well.
After a swim and a shower we went over to the Flying Eagle to have a look at their boat. It's a very pretty little ketch with lots of shiny varnished brightwork which has obviously not been out of port very long. I get the impression that sailing to Hawaii has been a dream of Peter's for a long time and that, once they've done it, they won't be cruising for long. He talks about apple orchards in Wenatchee, a rare thought amongst yachties.
And another day in paradise is gone! It just don't seem right to have them disappear so fast, but they slip away without you even noticing. I meant to go fishing today but just never got around to it. Manana!
This morning there were numbers of large fish around our boat feeding on the little guys with which this harbor teems, so after breakfast I took a couple of salmon hoochies and my pole and trolled for a while. Didn't do bad. In about an hour I got two nice fish, one a nice bonito which turned out to have light meat like the one the other day, and the other was a very pretty, golden sided, round, perch like fish about twenty inches long.
John Gans from the Donde Va was also out trolling and later, after I'd cleaned and put mine away, I stopped by his boat to see how he'd done. He'd had similar luck, getting two nice ones. While there, I noticed that he had a small Johnson motor on his dinghe so I asked him if he had a manual. Stroke of luck, he did, a general repair manual for all Johnson and Evinrudes from 1971 to 1985. I borrowed it, studied it for a while, and decided it wouldn't be too much of a task to replace the impeller on our six horse. The instructions for removing the lower drive which had baffled me before sounded simple enough:
After the lower unit attaching bolts have been removed, the flywheel must be rotated (to rotate the drive shaft) until the pin in the drive shaft is aligned with two slots in the upper portion of the exhaust housing, Illustration A. The lower housing can then be separated from the exhaust housing.
Well, I fought with the damn thing all day and managed to do nothing but damage to myself and the motor. The thing the instructions failed to note is that there is no way to tell if the pin is aligned except by feel, and the shaft was so tight in the upper seals that it took a great force to move it at all, let alone feel for slots in the housing. I tugged and pulled while Lois, game lady, rotated the flywheel for what seemed like hours.
When the lower unit finally came loose we ran into another problem, one which the book had warned us about. The screws holding the water pump to the lower unit were corroded and frozen. With much grunting, and one damaged finger, we got three of four screws out, but had to drill out the forth before we could get the pump open. Guess what; the impeller was intact and seems in good shape! What's more, the one they sold me in Puerto Vallarta was the wrong one! All the passages in the lower unit are clear and, when I got out the air compressor and blew into the water lines, the upper unit doesn't seem to be plugged anywhere; nor does the manual give any hint of the source of my overheating problem. All our work for nothing!
Putting the unit back together was almost as hard as getting it apart. Rather than take a chance on damaging the water pump by more drilling, I put it back with only the three screws. Then we fought to push the lower unit back on, Lois again turning the flywheel while I pushed and twisted and cussed. It was five o'clock before we finally got the miserable thing all back together and the tools put away. It had been a hot day, and it was sure nice to fall in the water and cool the sunburn I'd gotten working up on the deck. After a martini and an excellent "perch" dinner (the unknown fish had nice white meat, just like a king sized perch or croppy), things looked a little better. I'll worry now about having damaged the shaft seals in our taking apart and putting together. Hope we can find a OMC repair man somewhere along the line who can do a good overhaul on our little tender power unit. We can row in a pinch, but that's like walking rather than driving a car; it's great exercise but your range is mightily restricted.
We had the folks from Donde Va over for drinks before dinner; John, Kathi, and their guest Len. John arrived with a present of one of the "Creek Chub" bass plugs which he says has been fishingso well for him. They are from San Clemente and are down here for the second time. The first time was for only six weeks in what they said was the wrong boat. This time they're in a Hans Christian 47, and plan on spending six months. Len is flying back to the States from Manzanillo this weekend, so we'll send some mail back with him.
08:45 All secure and hook up for the first time in days. The chain wasn't too bad, considering. A bit rusty (our galvanizing is long gone) but not much growth on it.
10:00 Barra Navidad. This next anchorage is only six miles south of Tenacatita and not as comfortable, but we have heard that it has more services and, in particular, that it is where you can find Phil (Philamina) and her Pelicanos Restaurant. She is a lady much famed in the boating community for her style and her hamburgers, kind of like Rose, of Rose's Bar in Pelican, Alaska. Today, however, we chose to skip meeting her and just made a pass through the anchorage to see what it looked like. It looks to be a pretty nice stopping spot. There's fair protection from the swell, although all the boats were using stern anchors, and it looks like you could land the ding in the corner of the beach without too much chance of going swimming. Most of the four mile long beach between the anchorage and the town is lined with what appear to be condos, small hotels or time share apartments with some RV parks interspersed. This is the junction of one of the main roads from Guadalajara, so is easily accessable from that city.
13:30 A 767 is landing as we pass the control tower for the new "Jetport" for Manzanillo at Playa de Oro, about 16 miles north of the city.
15:00 We anchor in the lee of the breakwater at the fairytale world of Las Hadas. It's a place that's hard to describe, a fantacy scene from the Arabian Nights. Hundreds of snow white buildings, many with round domes or spiral towers, cover the hillside around a pretty cove about a half mile across. The beach below is decorated with hundreds of little square tents topped with flags, again pure white, used as private rooms for the bathers. The whole is dominated by a grand central tower with a molded spiral (probably a staircase) around it which stands on top of the hill over the hotel. It's a sight you can hardly imagine, and one you'll never forget.
I spent a few minutes in the engine room draining Jimmy's oil for the first time since last May (we're on a 150 hour schedule) and came out dripping wet with sweat. While I was doing that we got a call on the radio saying that the ham "Chubasco Net" had been trying to get us with a non-emergency message to call Nan. I tried on High Seas but couldn't get through, so we got down the Metz and decided to go visiting. We talked with the folks on a Choylee 52 which is anchored next to us - that's one of the boats we had on our list when we were shopping five years ago, although we probably could never have afforded it. The owner, Jerry, says it's a maintenance nightmare.
We then went into the inner harbor which takes up maybe a third of the cove. There, tied "Med" style with their anchors set and their sterns to the shore, are refugies from Newport Beach, million dollar yachts by the dozen. We peons may tuck in between them for about $16.00 a night if there's room, and the Donde Va had found a spot and waved us in as we came around the breakwater. We had a drink with them then, since they had a date for dinner, we walked around the harbor the hotel side to a sidewalk restaurant called Giovani's. There Lois had a pizza and I had the best Frajitas I've ever tasted. Supurb!
We got back to the boat to find that we were being snuggled by a tiny sailboat which no one appeared to be aboard; so we upped anchor and moved. By the time we got that done and tried again to call Nan, she had left the shop for the day. Oh well, we'll try again tomorrow.
That done, our next project was to contact Nan. There was too much noise to get through on the single sideband, so we set off for the hotel in search of a telephone. Even finding the hotel was somewhat of a challenge. From the docks we headed in the general direction of the central tower. Winding steps, paths, and walks took us past the swimming pool which is really four or five pools connected by waterways, filled with pretty islands and several bars, and surrounded by lounge chairs, all with white towels of course, which rent for 38,000 pesos per day. Above this is a large wandering outdoor restaurant with tables set amongst the palms and flowering bushes. With some help from one of the guests, we found the entrance to the hotel next to the restaurant and climbed a flight of stairs to the lobby. By chance, we met Ed and Elizabeth from the Nua Nua on the staircase and they explained the telephone procedure here. Lois went shopping while I:
(1) Went to the cashier and paid a phone fee of 3,500 pesos.
(2) Found one of the two booths in the lobby empty and called the operator.
(3) Gave her the number and my credit card number. She said she'd call back.
(4) Waited for a half hour while talking to a nice guy from New York who has just purchased a condo here.
(5) Called the operator to see if she'd forgotten me. She said the international operator was busy.
(6) After another half hour got a call from the opera tor saying she now had reached the international operator.
(7) Made contact with Nan!
After all that I found that the Ham message had been a little garbled, that Nan had tried to save us the cost of a call by sending a message through the ham net that she had mailed a package on the 5th. All we got was that we should call. Oh well, the one thing about the ham net is that the price is right.
With our projects out of the way, we spent the rest of the day just exploring Las Hadas. We had a Margarita at the Hermosa next to the docks, then walked past all the shops and the swimming pool to the swimming beach which is pretty unique. I mentioned the little white tents which look so neat from the water. Each is about ten feet square and supported by a tubular frame. The roof rises to a point with a small flag on top, while the sides are hung like drapes so that they can be spread or gathered and tied depending on how much sun you want. There are from two to four lounges in each, and a small table for drinks or whatever. Turbined waiters rush around taking orders and bringing drinks to the loungers. Paths made of some sort of plasic material wind between the tents to make walking in the sand easier, and behind the beach are several rinsing areas where you can wash off the salt.
Beyond the swimming beach are another restaurant, more shops sort of tucked in the palms, and a path which leads along the shore of the outer harbor to the golf course. We walked over the hill and along a couple of fairways to the clubhouse. It is a nice looking course with very well kept greens and lots of neat hazards. They had some kind of a tournament going on with some very good golfers and a small watching gallery. I talked to the guy who rents the carts about batteries and confirmed that the closest source is Guadalajara. He recomended a place called VEHICULOS ELECTICOS at APDO Postal 31-428, Tel 21-50-17, and said his carts can go 36 holes without charging.
After our walk we went back to the boat for a little siesta, then dressed up and went to a fashion show at the Hermosa where I got to ogle all the pretty ladies in bikinis. Finished off the day with a dinner of more frajitas. There's lots of night life around but by the time the sun goes down and the stars come out us folks is ready to head back to our floating home.
As usual it was a beautiful day so we took the Metz out exploring the harbor which is really two harbors; an outer one which we are in which is adjacent to the city and which has the PEMEX farm, the tug docks, the pilot station, a couple of large ship docks, and the small boat area which we share with a bunch of small fishing vessels of various descriptions. The inner harbor is in the mouth of a large lagoon which extends several miles to the northeast. The navy base, a small boat launching area, and most of the big loading docks are there. Near where we are anchored, sort of in between the two harbors, is a sand beach backed by several palapa restaurants which seems to be a gathering place for all of the kids of Manzanillo; at least it seemed so on this Sunday afternoon. Hundreds of them were having a great time in the water and on the sand.
We ran all around the outer harbor and into the inner harbor past the navy base and were about to turn around when I spotted a strange looking shape amongst the big fishing boats parked a couple of miles up the lagoon. As we got closer, it became obvious that we were looking at a shape out of the thirteenth century, an honest-to-God sailing galleon. It turned out to be a replica of Columbus' Santa Maria which made it's maiden voyage across the Pacific to Japan last year as part of a peace movement called "Mer Hombres y Paz". I'm not sure why it is docked here among the fishing fleet, but there was a little sign saying that it was open to the public; so we ran back to the boat, got the camera, and went aboard. Her name is "Marigalante L.M." and she carries Alvarado, Veracruz as her port. She's full size, not a scale model like the Golden Hind which has been cruising the coast, and has some lovely bronze castings of Mermen and Mermaids on her bowsprit and deck. I have no way of knowing how authentic she's built, but she sure looks the part. There are a few modern touches, like steel cables, exhaust ports, and a radar antenna nestled in the rigging; but she's all wood, high of side, and broad of beam. Below there's a huge room, maybe forty feet across and fifty long, with a table in the shape of a cross at which a hundred could sit. On it, and around the sides of the room, are displayed plaques, trophies, and gifts from the many ports and countries she visted on her tour. Many are from Japan and other oriental countries. It would be interesting to know more about her, but most of the written material was in Spanish and the young man who welcomed us aboard spoke no English. I'm sure there have been articles written about her; we'll have to find one.
By the time we got back to the boat we had a good demonstration of why few of the yachties anchor here. There is a large industrial plant to the south of the harbor and, when the wind blows from that direction, a black, gritty dust is carried over everything. Our decks are black and under every open hatch is a gritty fallout. When it's coming down even your eyes feel gritty. Fortunately, it was only a couple of hours before the wind swung around and the air cleared, but I suspect this will be a daily occurance. Too bad; I like it better than the fairyland across the bay.
Toward evening a few other boats arrived including the "Migrant", a boat from Bellingham which, the skipper told us, just arrived from Pitcairn Island coming home from New Zealand. Another one of them, the Silhouette with Tom and Kris who we'd met in Mazatlan. After they got through hauling water they joined Jim, Anna, and us on the Sea Raven for some drinks and conversation. Somehow it got to be ten o'clock before we broke up and we never did have dinner, just lots of goodies including some shark cevichi which Anna brought. Um, good!
From the restaurant it's about a ten minute walk along the waterfront to the port operations center. Here is one of the few places we've found where the Port Captain, Migracion, and the Port Operations office where you pay your port fee are all in the same place. I suppose it's because this is such a busy port. We've seen more shipping activity here in the last 24 hours than we did in Mazatlan the whole time we were there, and the port operations center is a busy place, swarming with people. They still make you work a little for your paper; first the Port Captain on the third floor, then the office where they type your invoice, then across the street to get your receipt typed, to the caja to pay your fee, back to the second floor to Migracion, then to the third again to the Port Captain, down to second to Migracion (this time to check out), back to the Port Captain for final florishing signature, and stop by Migracion on the way out to drop their copy.
On the last leg we ran into Tom from Silhouette, walked back a ways with him, and met Kris at a little deli for a cold drink. We decided to go together to check out the source of charts which we've heard is across the channel from Port Operations. By the time we got back to the boat though, we found we had a small problem. The big tug which has been running around moving ships evidently came roaring by, very close and very fast, throwing a wake which dumped a few gallons of water through the open port in our galley. We had to take all the pots and pans out of the locker and mop up the mess. Lois was fit to be tied! If she could have gotten her hands on the captain of that tug she'd have killed him. I helped get the bulk of the water up then decided I'd best get out of the way while she cooled down; so Tom ran Kris and I over to what turned out to be the navy library to look at charts. Unfortunately, they only had Mexican charts for sale and we have all we need of those. The ones we're missing are a few covering the islands off Costa Rica and Panama. They also have hundreds of other charts from all over the world but have them filed by number rather than area or issuing agency (a chart 4550 from Brazil is filed next to chart 4551 from Canada) so it would have been a major task to find what we wanted, especially when we're not familiar with the detailed geographical names. Maybe we'll have Nan bring down a set of Mahini Cruising Services charts when she comes for a visit.
In the afternoon we had another adventure, this time culinary. Jim and Anna from Ickimasho, who have been here before, lead us to a palapa restaurant (or bar) called "El Ultima Tren" (The Last Train) which has an interesting mode of operation. You order your drinks (beer, pop, or mixed) and then they start bringing on the goodies which are posted on the menu for the day. We started out with an excellent seafood soup with half of a small crab sticking out of the bowl served with ceviche and crispy tortillas. After that came a potato salad made with chicken, a huge platter of the little crabs which had been sauteed in garlic butter, a tasty fish dish served with corn tortillas, and finally sliced hicamas. Each of these dishes was served like an hors d'oeuvre so it took about two hours and there were lots of drinks consumed before we were through. The method used to figure the check was easy; they just put all the empties in a bucket and when the time came to pay they multiplied the number by 2000 pesos. There were eight of us (including Brian and Holly, Tom's teenagers) and we had 22 empties so our bill was 44,000 pesos or less than $2.50 each, a pretty good price for getting stuffed with good food and drink.
To finish off the meal we all walked up town to Bing's, the Mexican equivalent of Baskin & Robbin's, for an ice cream cone, then took a walking tour around the town. Manzanillo is a busy, dirty, little city, and very un-touristy. The center of town appears to have been built around a rocky hill topped by houses which divides the stores and buildings on the waterfront from those to the south. In about a half hour we walked completely around the hill, closing the loop by dodging railroad cars as we took a much used shortcut down the tracks. Before going back to the boat we stopped at the Conasupo for a few vegetables and a case of cerveza. We'll do a bit more shopping in the morning before heading out. We got a call from the Palana Rosa this morning. They are in Las Hadas and have our handheld radio and a package of mail for us, so we'll toddle over there.
We were on the way back to the boat with our haul when Homer, our guardian angel, decided to give us a hand again. He steered us by the little scooner, Migrant, where we got to talking to Dick and Anita Johnson about charts. Turns out that they are Bellingham Chart Printers, the people who make the chart copies for Mahini Cruising Services. That's the way they make the money to cruise the south seas. Well, Dick had a set of their charts from Cabo to Panama and gave us all of them from here south; said he was through with them, that he and Anita are going to hang it up and sell their boat after 19 years of cruising. That gives us everything we need until we decide which way we're going.
Back on the boat, we put things away, hauled anchor, and ran over to Las Hadas where we picked up our mail and handheld radio from the Nua Nua where Palana Rosa had dropped it off. Needless to say we spent the next couple of hours reading the mail which Nan had sent more than a month ago. It is awful nice to get something from the other end now and then. We must have sent out well over a hundred letters and these are the first we've received since before Thanksgiving. I suppose it may be another month before January's mailing catches up with us.
Once we got through all the cards and letters we went to work scrubbing down the decks which were black from the soot we picked up on the other side. It actually came off pretty well with just a lot of scrubbing with a stiff brush. It took about an hour to get the outside presentable again. We went over to Giovanni's for a dinner of frajites again; that's something you seldom find so we figured we might as well enjoy them while they're available.
While I was sitting here Lois vacuumed the boat and washed down the windows and rails, so now we're clean inside as well as out. That will almost surely cause the wind to blow and the spray to fly tomorrow as we head south. I went out hunting for someone going north this evening and was talking to the lady on Heather Wind when I reached for their dinghe to keep from drifting away, slipped, and went over the side. I thought I'd lost my glasses but found them lying on the table where I'd left them. How embarrasing! After I took a shower and got all cleaned up we figured we'd might as well splurge and go out to dinner again; so off to Giovanni's where we found a nice Canadian gentleman who said he'd be happy to drop our mail in Pheonix as he went though. That system has worked pretty well for us. Wish it would work coming the other way!
09:30 Tuned in the "Panama Cruising Net", a group of what is now about sixty boats who keep in touch by checking in on Ship-to-ship single sideband Channel 6 Charley (6521.9 Khz) Mondays and Thursdays. Some of them are already about ready to enter Costa Rica and pass back some good poop. Today we learned that the way to check in to Costa Rica is to get a "Zarpe", or checkout paper, in your last port in Mexico, then fly a quarantine flag in the harbor of the port you enter until the officials come out to check you in. I guess we have to come up with a quarantine flag somewhere. That shouldn't be too hard; I think it's just a big yellow flag. Also learned that Aurora is back in the water after having her blisters fixed and is on the way south.
The rest of the trip was pretty boring. We saw no whales or dolphins. Occasionally a booby would glide over our bow or try to take one of the fishing lures, but other than that we were alone. The day was hazy so we couldn't see the shore most of the way so we just rode along listening to the drone of the engine. In the afternoon a breeze came up from the southeast, directly on our nose, a situation we haven't had since last spring in the Sea of Cortez, so we splashed our way along for a while doing a number on Lois' clean windows. (Note my prediction of yesterday!)
17:30 We're supposed to be at Maruata but we ain't! I had taken a Satnav reading off of Spring Moon's copy of Charley's Charts because they have normally been more accurate than the navigation charts, but this time either Al recorded the data wrong, his Satnav was wrong, or I transcribed the numbers wrong. We still have an hour to go! No problema, we've plenty of daylight left, but in the future I'll be more careful.
We heard an interesting explanation as to why Satnav readings often disagree with the published navigation charts. Most of the Mexican charts, including U.S. Defense Mapping Agency charts of Mexico, are based on surveys done in the last century. Latitude, which is easy to measure accurately, is usually pretty good; but longitude requires a more accurate time reference than was available at that time to be accurate. The entire west coast of Mexico is from one to three miles further east than the charts indicate.
18:30 Anchored in a neat little cove at Maruata. There are two other boats here; the Happy Motion and the Shawanasy. Pat and Harrison from Shawanacy came over in their ding to welcome us into the cove. They left Manzanillo last night and had planned on going straight through to Isla Grande but got tired of fighting the chop from the southeast so dropped in here for a rest. They're pushing to get to Zihuatanejo in time for the Superbowl game so will be leaving again early in the morning. It's amazing to me how people, who are in other ways quite unconventional, can be caught up in the football craze but there are a lot of the boats which have either been staying in Las Hadas or running for Zihuat during the playoffs just to be near a big screen TV.
As we were coming in I tried to talk to the other boats on our VHF radio with very little success. The transmitter is becoming so intermittant that it is almost unusable and the handheld we got back the other day isn't fixed either. I'm afraid our friend in Mazatlan didn't do a whole lot of good for us. If we can find someone coming down I'll try to get Nan to get another radio to us. We might find a repair shop in Zihuat or Acapulco but I'm almost afraid to give ours up until we have a backup. At least now we have a good receiver. If it goes to the shop we have nothing!
We had a comfortable night but along toward morning the wind changed, setting us across the swell and making it a bit rolly. So, after breakfast we got out the little danforth and using Metz as a tug pushed the Sea Raven around and set a stern anchor. That solved the rolling problem so I decided to go exploring. I first ran the Metz along the long curving beach where the surf starts out big and gradually diminishes to almost nothing behind some rocks where a little freshwater stream flows into the sea. Westward of that the beach is divided into three beautiful coves by high rocky projections covered with brush and cactus. Just off these, three more rock islands break up the seas so that each of the beaches has it's own type of surf; the first very gentle where we could land the Metz easily, the third roaring and open to the full force of the Pacific swell, and the one in between sort of in between.
Back at the boat I decided to swim ashore and take a better look. We're about a quarter of a mile off the beach and the water is warm and carressing so it was an easy swim in. The surf is nice but quite short, probably because the bottom slopes upward quite steeply, so I got ashore without even getting rolled under. I first walked down the beach toward the highway and an airstrip which Charley's Charts show just off the beach. Yep, it's there, a wide, paved runway with a nice white line and a couple of horses running down the middle which looks like it hadn't been used since it was built. At the end of the runway sat a motorhome and, as I approached a guy in a swimsuit called out, asking me if I wanted a Cerveza. Never one to turn down a beer, I went in and drank one while talking with Larry, a man of about forty doing a solo tour of Mexico and Guatamala. He came down the east coast to Guatamala and is now on his way up the west side. He said that this morning our beach a little farther east was covered with the tracks of dozens of turtles. It's close to a full moon and I guess they are coming out to lay their eggs. He likes this type of place so I recommended Chacala and Tenacatita to him.
I then walked westward along the half mile long beach toward the rocky islands. Behind the beach, which is clean and completely free of trash, are coconut palms and a few palapas but this morning it was empty. At the west end I found the little stream flowing from a freshwater pond which several white egrets shared with a couple of rooting pigs. Wading through that (the water is only knee deep) and walking past what appeared to be a small palapa restaurant, I came to the first of the three beaches. This was the quiet one, about a hundred yards long and with only a gentle surge reflecting the roar of the surf outside. A Mexican with a dive mask and fins was the only other person in the cove.
Just beyond this beach another little freshwater stream flows down, not into any of the coves, but directly into one of the hundred foot high rock hills! Although you can't see through, you can hear the thunder of the surf as it roars through this sea cave, and the surge of the sea comes to meet the gently flowing little stream. It's the kind of thing even Disney would have trouble making you believe! Beyond the stream are a couple of more blowholes and tunnels through the rock, and then another beach, this one with a tumbling surf which swings around the rocks to surge up the golden sands. Here one young couple sat sunning themselves and reading. I couldn't get to the final beach, the one with the full surf. I guess you have to go around the back way to reach it - or swim, so I headed back to the boat to report my adventures to Lois.
It was now early afternoon and she was ready to go, so back to the beach, this time with the Metz and the camera in a waterproof bag. We'd watched a panga enter the surf from the little stream so, by going the way he did, we had no trouble. By now there were a couple of pangas in the pool and the method by which they are brought there is interesting. When I say little stream, I do mean little! The water isn't more than two or three inches deep and the pool is fifty yards away and maybe fifteen feet above the sea at the tide level at the time. To get a loaded 23 foot panga up that stream is no mean trick. It's done with lots of tugging by a bunch of people, sliding the fiberglass boat up the sandy bottom of the stream.
The fishery here seems to be primarily octopus and lobster. Every panga seems to be equipped with a Hooka and the octopi, particularly, seem to be numerous. The fishermen were loading large plastic milk bottle carriers full of octopi into trucks at the edge of the pool. They also had a few lobster but most were small. On the quiet beach we found a couple of young men with plastic shopping bags full of twelve to eighteen inch long octopi which they had evidently just collected from the rocks off the beach. The octopus is a tenacious thing, clinging fiercly to an arm or a fin or a mask. The kids had quite a battle getting them in the bags.
At the stream which flows through the rock we found some ladies doing the wash, scrubbing the clothes on the rocks in the approved manner. This stream too is only a few inches deep, but the water is clean and clear and presumably fresh, though we didn't taste it.
'Bout this time we decided that the sand here would make much better non-skid material than that I picked up at Tenacatita which is still wet; so, after helping a bunch of laughing teenagers get their panga down the stream into the water, I ran the Metz back to the boat and picked up a couple of coffee cans and a strainer which we used to sift out several pounds of nice clean sand. We finished off the afternoon with a cerveza at the palapa by the pool where a group of nicely dressed men and one young lady sat sipping their drinks. All-in-all a very nice day at a very nice place. We'll stay another day.
Oh! Back at the boat I called Nan on the High Seas radio and found that she and Donna are coming to visit on February 4th. Great! We'll meet them in Zihuatanejo and might even bring them back here unless we find a better place.
From the hatchery we walked down the airport runway as far as the village where several dozen neat partially brick and partially palapa houses are laid out in neat blocks each with its own, usually fenced yard. Many of the yards had gardens, some with bright displays of boganvillas and other flowers. All were clean, even those with chickens and pigs in the yard. Some people even sweep the dirt streets around their houses. It took a bit of hunting, some of it down dead end streets, until we found the road back to the beach. It winds along the back side of coconut and banana plantations and ends up at the middle beach. Along the way horses, donkeys, turkeys, and pigs wander about seemingly with no constraints. I guess there must be ways of telling whose is whose, or maybe they are community property. Sure wish we knew enough of the language enough to ask the questions and understand the answers.
We stopped at the palapa restaurant again for a ceveza, then went back to the boat where Lois relaxed with a book while I took a Boogie board to the beach. We've had them for a year now and this is the first time we've had them out. They seem to work pretty well except that on this beach the surf is so short that I couldn't get much of a run. By the time a wave was steep enough to carry me along I was only twenty feet off the beach in about a foot of water. The board does a nice job of keeping you moving though; I'd keep going until I was up on the dry sand as the wave receded. Later Lois went swimming with me, using her board as a float. One day I'll get her to use it in the surf.
Along about 4:00 o'clock a couple of other boats came in, one of them the "Stone Raven" from Vancouver, B.C., friends of Al and Beth Warawa on the Spring Moon. I'd gotten a message from Al that I should give his radio manual to Stone Raven if I saw them so I popped over in the Metz. Earl and (I forgot her name) have a nice ketch but it's a mess. They have a black dog and a white cat on board and the whole boat is covered with hair. They also have a motor home down here, I think in Zihuatanejo.
We had chicken for dinner as a change from our usual seafood diet. We'll be having it for a while; it was from one of the big packages from Price Club which got thawed in Santa Rosalia and then all stuck together when it was refrozen. It tastes OK but Lois had to do the whole package, about thirty pieces.
Beyond Punta Lazardo the mountains move back a bit to make room for a long sand beach and coconut palm plantation. Bright green behind the beach, the trees stand tall for mile after mile with only a palapa now and then to break their ranks. We'd had the lines out from the start but it wasn't until we were within sight of Bufadero Bluff that we hooked up, this time with a fish new to us that I think was a Pacific Amberjack. He had the coloring of a Yellowtail but the wrong shape, thicker in the body and with a rounded forhead and lower jaw which made him look mean. In any case, he was a fine fish and gave us some nice looking fillets.
12:30 Anchored in the cove at Bufadero Bluff, or what the road map calls Playa Azul. The book says this is a rolly anchorage so we took no chances, anchoring fore and aft into the swell.
This is an interesting place, at least on a Sunday afternoon. It was swarming with people, obviously not locals, out for a day at the beach. A half dozen or more palapa restaurants line the shore and children and adults were playing in the low surf, having a hot soccer game on the beach, or swimming in the warm waters of the bay. We started having visitors almost immediately. First a small inflatable paddled by a boy with two men and their beer cooler enjoying the sun; then a panga or two full of young men and girls, and lots of Boogie boards paddled by kids of eight or ten years. Lois made the mistake of giving some of the early comers a cooky and a pop. From then until the sun was almost down there was a constant stream of kids. One young pair seemed to have appropriated the inflatable and were running kind of a ferry service, bringing both other kids and adults out to see the barco grande.
One man of about forty swam out to the boat and, when I found he spoke pretty good English, I invited him aboard. He sat on the deck with us in his wet swimming suit while we asked questions about the area. He said he had lived ten years in Chicago. He now lives in Lazaro Cardinas, a fairly large town near here from which most of the pale skinned city folks on the beach come. He said this is the best and most popular beach on this section of coast. He pretty much confirmed what the books say about the harbor at Lazaro Cardinas; it's not a place for yachts, just a big commercial harbor, so we'll make a long run straight to Isla Grande tomorrow.
By sundown the beach was deserted and we had a very comfortable, non-rolly night thanks to our stern hook.
Today's run was another long and somewhat boring one. This morning it was quite hazy and we soon lost sight of the shore. Most of the day was flat calm with just sort of an undulation of the sea as the long and low Pacific swells from the north and south met each other. We caught a few fish, this time more of what I'll call "Little Bonita". They have the same markings as the larger variety we were catching farther north, silvery undersides and stripes on the back, but are smaller, 16 to 18 inches, and have a darker meat. Two of the three we took had full egg sacks. The books we have aren't adaquate to indentify the fish we catch. This is the third variety of fish that fit the description under Bonito. These tasted good, but not as good as the lighter fleshed ones we caught near Tenacatita.
We were visited by dolphins several times during the day and a young tern decided to hitch a ride with us, sitting for close to two hours on our lifeline even when Lois went out to hang clothes to dry. We also got the first good look at a big shark. I thought at first that its long, curved fin was a piece of trash because it must have been lying on its side. As we came close however, it rolled and slid under water directly toward our moving boat, giving us a great topside view of its back, pectoral fins, and tail. Must have been eight to ten feet long. At the same time we hooked another of our little bonito and Lois was worried that the shark would take it. If he had, we'd have merely lost a lure.
I spent quite a bit of the day getting weatherfaxes from Norfolk, Virginia, the primary weather station for the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico. A few of the boaters are getting ready to cross the infamous Gulf of Tehuantepec where the "Tehuantepecers" can bring winds of 40 to 50 knots and seas of twenty to thirty feet. They occur when a high pressure in the Gulf of Mexico accelerates the air through a gap in the mountains north of Tehuantepec. The U.S. Weather Service on the east and west coasts seem to ignore each other - San Francisco cuts off all weather data east of Denver, and Norfolk stops about same place. As a result San Fransisco tells you when there's a gale in the Gulf of Tehuantepec but they don't predict it, and Norkolk shows the high in the Gulf of Mexico but they ignor the effect on the other side; you have to make your own prediction. I've been gathering data so that when the time comes we can make a good one.
17:00 Anchored at Isla Grande, an island about ten miles north of Zihuatanejo and a favorite spot for both yachts and tourists staying at the big hotels in Xtapa. It's a pretty anchorage, with lots of neat rocks for diving, a protected sand bottomed cove, and a beach with several palapas behind. Three sailboats are here, plus a monster yacht called the "Enchanter" which flies a British flag and carries London as her home port. Tomorrow we'll go exploring.
After breakfast I spent some time cleaning up the Metz, checking the Johnson (no water in the lower gearcase, the thing I've been worrying about since we took it apart), and getting them into the water. A brisk breese, better than 20 knots, was blowing off the shore this morning so it was close to noon before we ventured off the boat. By then the beach was crowded with pale skinned people from the hotels in Ixtapa and Zihuatanejo. The island is smaller than I had pictured it but has three nice coves, two of them on the north and east sides where they are well protected from the swell. In each cove are several palapa restaurants and in front of each restaurant are tables with umbrellas and lounge chairs which you may rent for sunning. On each beach there are also several places renting snorkling gear; masks, snorkles, and fins; and one place renting scuba gear. On the beach near our anchorage you can also rent small sailboats, sailboards, or little outboard powered motor boats, or you can get a panga to take you waterskiing or fishing. Vendors walk up and down the beach and through the restaurants hawking their wood carvings, beads, T shirts, and whatever.
We landed the ding on the beach and did a quick survey of the places in "our" cove, threading our way through the sunburned bodies on the beach. They all looked about the same so we picked one and plopped ourselves down at a table. I'd stuffed a 20,000 peso note in my pocket with the idea of having a taco or two and a cerveza but when the girl brought the menu we saw immediately that we'd have to lower our sights. A half bottle of beer was 2,500 pesos, they had no tacos, and the cheapest thing on the menu was ceviche for 7,000. We settled for that, sort of a cheap and watery imitation of the stuff Lois does so well. We talked with a young Canadian couple at the next table who are down for a week. I guess you can fly a package deal direct from Vancouver, B.C. for a very reasonable price, but the man said that once you get here everything is more expensive than it would be in Canada.
Lunch finished, we set off in search of the dive shop to see if we could get our scuba tanks filled. It's only a couple of hundred feet across a little saddle from our beach to the one on the south side. Today it wasn't as pleasent a place because the wind was coming from that direction making the water choppy, but there were still several dozen people in the water, evidently getting snorkling instruction, and quite a few in the restaurants on this side. The dive shop wasn't there so we followed a path across the hill to the east to the third cove where we found several more restaurants, these nicer looking than the others. With a bit of asking we also found the dive shop where the operator told us we could get our tanks filled for $25.00 each. In Puerto Vallarta the price was 12,000 pesos, or a little over $5.00. Well, we'll check in Zihuat and if that's the going rate, pay it and use our air for heavy maintenance only.
At one of the restaurants we got to talking with a nice couple from San Francisco who said they had been here five days and were going home Thursday. They are thinking about buying a boat so, after a bit of conversation, we invited them out to see ours. Had a nice hour or so chatting with them before they had to get back to the beach. They said the ferries from the mainland stop running at four o'clock, so we conned them into taking back a letter to Nan and a nightgown to Kris and I ran them back to shore.
The wind was down by then, so before dinner we did a little survey trip in the Metz. To the south and east of Isla Grande is a bay, protected by the island and Punta Ixtapa, where dozens of sailboats and sailboards were playing in front of the big hotels. It's a pretty bay with lots of big rocks sticking up between the island and the next point, a long sandy beach, and lots of green palms along the shore. It's not hard to see why Mexico chose this as a prime tourist center. When we got back I went for a swim and, contrary to what Charley says, the water is not clear, at least it wasn't today! I could hardly see the bottom of the keel. I don't know what all the snorklers are looking at. Maybe they're just enjoying the warm water, or getting full value for the money they've paid.
11:00 Zihuatanejo, what a contrast! Our impressions of this place are favorable from the first sight. The bay is almost round, about a mile in diameter, and surrounded by mountains, open only to the southwest. The city and prime anchorage are to the north, although boats can, and do, anchor anywhere along the shore to the east. On the east side there is a long, beautiful beach, El Ropo, backed by the ubiquitous palapas and a few non-obtrusive hotels, and to the south is another, shorter beach, Las Gatas, guarded by a reef and seemingly accessable only by boat. Panga style boats ferried tourists to it from the pier all day long. We made a swing around the bay, then anchored about a quarter mile from the pier where a navy vessel is moored. There are quite a few boats in the harbor, I'd guess forty or fifty, but the water seems clean. There seems to be no industrial activity.
After we'd sat and watched things going on around us for a while we took the Metz and made another, slower pass around the bay, this time following close to the beaches and then through the anchorage to see if we knew any of the boats that are here. Although there were quite a few people swimming and on the beaches, they aren't packed as they were at Isla Grande, and don't give the impression of being crowded. The reef off Las Gatas looks like it would be fun snorkling. In the anchorage we recognized a few of the boat names but none which we have known well except for the Flying Eagle and Peter and Elizabeth were off the boat. The dinghe landing area seems to be on the beach along side of the pier where four or five were pulled up. They didn't seem to be locked; maybe there's not a theft problem here.
Our little tour complete, the water and beach looked so inviting that we decided to go swimming, so we anchored the Metz off the north end of Playa Ropo, went over the side, and swam to shore. There's essentially no surf, just a low surge onto the gently sloping sand. We had walked down the beach a ways and I'd swum back to the Metz for some money to buy a Margarita at a beach front bar when Gary, the young man we met yesterday, approached Lois waiting for me on the beach. He and Jeanne, his lady, are staying at the hotel just above the beach. He invited us over to their "private" spot on the beach, a shaded table on the sand and under the trees where you could control the amount of sun you got. We had a beer and talked with them for a while and agreed to join tham for dinner later at a place down the beach which they said served excellent seafood.
The rest of the afternoon we spent on the boat lazying around and watching things going on in the bay. There were a few water skiers, lots of sailboarders and Hobie cats, and once in a while someone would take a parachute ride behind a speedboat. The ride to dinner was a little different. The restaurant is about a half mile from the hotel so instead of walking we picked up Gary and Jeanne with the Metz and motored down. The wind had picked up a bit in the afternoon and the surf along with it but Gary and Jeanne waded out, jumped in, and when we landed we all did the same thing, the four of us whisking the Metz up onto the beach before the next wave could get to it. The water and air are so warm, and the sand so soft, you don't need shoes and you don't worry about getting wet.
Dinner was excellent, and we got better acquainted with Gary and Jeanne. They're Gary Goudzwaard and Jeanne Behrens, live in Petaluma, are fortyish, and both have jobs in sales. Jeanne has a sixteen year old son who's staying home alone while she's vacationing. She's fussing about that but having a great time anyway. Gary's a diver and has done quite a bit of traveling, diving in some neat places like Tahiti. They promised to call and meet Kristie and Bob when they get home. Getting off the beach was kind of exciting. Gary and Jeanne shoved us off through the surf and walked home to save us a landing in the dark. We didn't get too wet, just a little. Fun day! I think Zihuatanejo may go to the top of our list for Mexican cities to visit by boat.
We started out poking our way through the shops near the beach, bought Lois a swim suit, checked the location of Farmacias, Ferraterias, hair dressers, and Large Distanca telephone service, then sort of angled our way off to the northwest until we found the open market. It's like most of the markets we've seen with areas set off for meats, poultry, fish, and loncherias, and produce scattered everywhere in between. We bought a few vegetables and some fruit (We'll stock up before the girls come), and headed back for the beach. It was getting pretty warm so we stopped at a malacon restaurant for a Margarita and went out on the patio to sit in the shade. From there we could see that we had some new arrivals in the harbor, two huge cruise ships, the Sun Princess and the Cunard Princess, both starting to unload their passengers. The Sun Princess looked like she was anchored awfully close to the Sea Raven!
We finished our drinks, walked down the beach to the Metz, and heard from one of the yachties there that the Sun Princess was looking for us. Evidently the captain had screwed up, anchored too close, and now wanted us to move. When we got back to the boat, sure 'nough, the towering Sun Princess' stern was shading our boat which now appeared to have shrunken to the size of one of Alice's toys. It wasn't long before one of the launches appeared and asked us to move because they were having to run the engines to keep the Princess off of us. Well, I'd already decided to move in spite of the inconvenience, but I thought I'd call the captain and let him ask me to do so. I was expecting an apology and at least a "Please move." --- No way, the S.O.B. acted as if WE were the ones who were inconveniencing him, telling us that, now that we were back on the boat and were aware of the danger of him swinging into us, that any damage would be our responsibility! Lois was so mad she could spit! I considered hanging tough, but we wanted to go to the beach plus the noise of the Princess' engines and the roar of the launches as they ran back and forth to the pier wasn't something we wanted to have in our ear all afternoon; so we moved. I suppose the captain of the Princess figured he'd risk his job if he admitted a mistake, or maybe he's just rotten. By five o'clock they were both gone again, taking their thousand-odd touristas with them. Good riddance!
Back to pleasant subjects; move accomplished (we set a stern hook out this time), we headed off for Las Gatas across the bay to see what's there. As we had noted yesterday, the beach there is protected by a reef which turned out to be coral, and the pool behind the reef is mostly covered with coral so that there's only a quite narrow strip of sand bottom, especially at low tide. We anchored the Metz in about four feet of water and swam in, carefully avoiding the coral on the bottom. It's mean, as a scratch on one finger attests. On the beach we found two dive shops (who charge 10,000 pesos to fill a tank instead of 60,000), several palapa restaurants, dozens of vendors hawking their wares, and several hundred sun bathers and snorklers doing their thing. We walked the length of the beach, had a cerveza and quesadias at a restaurant, met a few people we knew, and got a lot of sun. On the way back we stopped for another swim to shore at Playa Ropo and sampled the Margaritas at the "Cash Bar" on the beach at the west end. Lois likes her new swim suit, a florescent pink thing that must have cost us about $10.00 per ounce. So do I! She's got a pretty good bod for a lady of sixty!
Today it was past 2:00 when we got back to the boat but we felt better as soon as we'd gotten our clothes off, run over to the little beach directly behind our anchorage, swum in and had a mid-afternoon Margarita with a quesadilla to top off our lunch in town. The little restaurant on this beach has good food, good margaritas, and is considerably cheaper than the fancier places at Playa Ropa or downtown. We'll have to try it for dinner. By the time we got back to the boat it was martini time and there you go, the whole day gone and nothing done. It's a tough life we lead!
On the way back we got off the bus at an interchange where the roads from east and west meet and caught another bus going east toward the airport. That road crosses another ridge before dropping down into a river valley with miles of coconut palm, citrus, and mango plantations. The airport is about ten miles south of town. We got off there, or rather at the airport access road intersection, asked a lady standing there how far it was to the airport, and when she said it was ten something away decided to pass seeing it, at least for today. It was getting a bit warm for a long walk with our clothes on. Another bus took us back to town and after a bit of shopping at the market and some lunch we headed back to the boat to cool off.
The afternoon was about the same as yesterday. This time we ran the Metz down to the end of Playa Ropa, swam ashore, had a Margarita at Coconata's, walked up and down the beach looking at all the sunburned tourists, then swam back and came home. Peter and Elizabeth came by around 3:00 and we gave them some maps and literature on Washington and British Columbia. They're all hopped up on a farm in the Chelan valley or somewhere like that. Then about 6:00 Mike and Linda from the Lady MicLin came over for Margaritas and we ended up drinking and munching our way well into the night. We'd planned on going out for dinner but Lois fixed up such a spread of hors d'oeuvres that we lost interest. Mike and Linda are one of those young couples, less than forty, who sell all and go cruising until the money runs out. They're from Seattle; he's a medical technician and she works in something similar. They figure they have another year before the money runs out and they have to go to work again, at least for a couple of years. It's an interesting life style, one which would have terrified us who were indoctrinated with the need for security. Mike's dad died at 52 while still working and I guess Mike is resolved not to miss the things his dad did. We're lucky to have the security and, at least for the time being, the health to enjoy it.
In the afternoon we ran over to the beach in front of the Malacon and had a beer and some fish tacos. We'd just gotten back to the boat with a bag of ice for the freezer when we got a call from the "C Jay", a boat bringing mail for us from Manzanillo. So now we're almost caught up on mail. We understand there is still a package that came through La Paz on a boat named "Magic Carpet", and we still don't have the prop hub zinc which Nan sent to Manzanillo, but other than that we're up to date. We got quite a bunch of Christmas cards and several pictures of Lois' new granddaughter, Hailey, who is of course the cutest baby ever. That made Lois' day!
In the evening Mike and Linda came over again, this time bringing a video tape of world class windsurfing and another young couple, Don and Michelle from a little 24 foot boat called the "Iphageneia". Don works in Alaska during the summer, taking people for wilderness and kayaking tours in Glacier Bay and the Fairweather range. More work-a-while, play-a-while boaters.
That was the only excitment we had on this day. Once we gave up fishing we just idled our way along, reading or dreaming while Gennie and the HRO made water. Funny, we've never given the HRO a name; I guess it's because watermaking, although very important to our lives, is not normally a human activity. In the world we came from water falls from the sky; it's not made bay machines or people. We ran for about eight hours, a long day but on the way back we heard another boater on the radio say that he had, "Packed 400 pounds of water today!". That's fifty gallons. We made 120 gallons by just sitting around and listening to the engines run. Our HRO is one of the greatest labor saving devices we have on board. We'll have to think of a name for him, (or her).
17:00 Anchored again in our same spot, 120 gallons of water and one pan of smoked mackerel richer. We'll start with a full tank of water when the girls get here.
NOTES HEARD ON THE RADIO
Local gringo's recommendation for Montezuma's revenge:
Acanol - 2 tablets plus 1 later as needed
Colfur - 1 tablet every 6 hours
On the way back I borrowed an antenna for our handheld from Jim on Ickimasho and managed to work out a system for radio communications. I can transmit on the handheld which won't recieve, and listen on the Polaris which won't transmit. I get a little feedback now and then but it works!
In the afternoon we went over to a big sailboat called the "Palhauna Rosa" where Wally and Carla showed us through their boat and fed us some tea and cookies. They are from Vancouver, B.C. and the boat is new, a motorsailer with a hard pilothouse built on a 63 foot Mapleleaf hull. It's sure a beautiful boat, and set up for single handing. All the sails are roller furled with electric winches. The inside is finished and furnished like a modern apartment with everything from a Kitchenaide dishwasher in the galley to a Jacuzzi tub in the master stateroom. There are separate air conditioners for the salon and the master stateroom and, of course, all the woodwork is yacht quality. They even had special tiles made for the bar next to the galley. It's the only boat we've seen in the four years we've had our boat for which I might consider trading the Sea Raven, but then it probably represents close to a million dollars. Wally is in some kind of a grocery business which is obviously doing quite well. They aren't sure they are sold on cruising the coast of Mexico; I get the impression they like to be on the dock with lots of people around and a golf course close, rather than in the isolated anchorages always at least a dinghy trip away from where ever.
We stepped out for dinner, taking one of those dinghy rides to the beach and going to the La Palmera in the Hotel Zihuatanejo where we'd heard there was a good guitar player. He, Roger, was very good, and the food was also! They had a more varied menu and more Mexican dishes than usual.
Note for the record: Flying Eagle left today headed north. Peter says there is a guy named Mauri in Playa de Coco in Costa Rica who has invited any boater to come visit. Could be a big help! He's a Ham and comes up regularly on 21402 khz at 2200 Zulu. More?