I can’t tell you how many times I’ve wanted to twitch my nose and transport each of you here… to Shannon… even for just a short time. There’s so much to see and experience. A lot of it is hard to explain, hard to find words to describe, hard to share what your heart feels. There’s often times that aren’t much fun, like the constant attention to things that break and/or just stop working. The wear and tear on equipment and materials, and the damage wrought by excessive humidity, is confounding. It’s not like anything we’re used to in BC. And, the frustration of failed attempts to correct something, even when you know what the problem is… but it just won’t fix, can be very disappointing. Take our engine’s shift cable for instance. This thin piece of wire, covered with a shiny black sheath was replaced just before we left. It’s new, yet its refusal to shift fully into forward before one fix or reverse after the next, continues. It has played coy with no less than four experts so far (feigning the correct response, then returning to it's devilish ways as soon as we move on). And, I’ll not speak of the e-meter or the auto pilot lest they be listening and given nefarious ideas (they appear to be working at the moment). But they (those that have gone before us, who may be smarter than us, or at least more patient than us…) they say this working on your boat in paradise is just part of the journey and so we continue - believing we’re doing the right things in the right places and for the right reasons.
So, enough about the repairs… and onward with the adventure. Now, if you’ve taken the time to sneak a peak at some of the other blogs I’ve referred you to over the past many months, you’ve read some really good stuff and viewed some beautiful photography. Those blogs are extraordinary and the folks who create within their ‘pages’ are great… cruisers and adventures like us. All are talented writers, some are artists with a camera and together their stories reflect the complete life of cruising. We haven’t continued on into the South Pacific like some, and we haven’t sold our home and moved aboard, leaving BC for unknown horizons. Our journey is ‘ours’. We love BC and have every intention of living there in to old age. We’re just taking a few years now to explore and satisfy some urges of our souls… the urge to challenge ourselves (the trip down the coast), the urge to sail in blue water out of sight of land (pretty much most of what we’re doing), the urge to meet new people in a different country and learn about their lives, their culture and their language - six months at a time – specifically those six months when it’s cold and wet at home. And, so here we are. This season is the first of possibly two we will spend exploring the mainland portion of Mexico (from Mazatlan south). Stories of this exploration follow. Wish you were here.
We’re not connected to internet right now so I’m going to record some of our ‘day to day’ happenings as they occur and then post them when I can… so, here goes.
Thursday, Feb. 7
After weeks of waiting and prepping and then reuniting the ships crew, Shannon is finally ready to go. We slipped quietly (or as quietly as a diesel engine can sound) away from our slip and headed out the channel at 0630 hrs. That was slack tide and neither of us had any wishes to tangle with the currents and eddies that occur when the tide is running in the channel. We did, however, have to contend with dozens of small and large fishing boats (of the recreational variety) all trying to leave at the same time. We wended our way through their paths and carefully negotiated the shallow and S shaped exit/entrance and had just breathed a sigh of relief when the largest of all of the fishing vessels decided to blast by us at warp speed. Man did he push a lot of water… We managed to turn in to it just in time, but not before I was forced to give him the official “gee, thanks for that” wave. Anyway, the day was beautiful and seas fairly calm (just large, rolling seas – many seconds apart) and so we began the process of reintroducing the new auto pilot part to the rest of its brothers and sisters. That took about an hour of driving in circles (that’s what you have to do in order to line up the whatchamacallits with the whoozimejiggers so that the auto pilot will be able to steer the boat without babysitting). Anyway, the auto pilot finally told us he was ready to take over and off we went, heading south towards Isla Isabel and on constant watch for fish nets. We’ve been warned about these fish nets by many… and the stories of their ability to foul your rudder and your prop abound. In fact, many cruisers now choose to not even try to visit Isla Isabel because of them. We had made that decision too… given the nets and the instability of the weather (they also say that you should only anchor at Isla Isabel in perfectly calm weather… the anchorages aren’t great for shelter or holding). But, like all good cruisers, we’d changed our minds and decided to give Isabel a try. So off we headed on Thursday morning, the start of a 19 hour journey. Had you been with us, you would have enjoyed one of our best sailing days. It was marvelous! By mid afternoon we were rolling along under a double reefed main and a 1/3 furled genoa… at 5 knots. The sky was blue, the sun was hot and there were just a few whispy clouds on the horizon. We carried on into the night under sail only and by midnight we were trying to slow down. We’d done far too well during the day and realized we were going to get to our ‘daybreak’ waypoint way too soon… like 4 hours too soon. We didn’t want to approach Isla Isabel until we had daylight (in order to avoid those dastardly nets) and so we slowed right down and sailed from midnight on under just the double-reefed main… doing about 2-3 knots. We still got there too early, so we spent from 0400 until 0630 hrs. sailing back and forth and ‘hoving to’ approximately 10 nms north of Isabel. That was fine, rather peaceful really… and the prudent thing to do (for us).
Friday, February 8th
Once we could see where we were going, we continued on our way. Guess how many fish nets and traps we saw? NONE. Oh well, better safe than sorry. By the time we were approaching the islands (Isla Isabel has a few rocky bits off her north shore) the seas had been building and even though the winds were light, the choppy seas were sweeping down the east side of the island. We approached our intended anchorage (east side) and saw that there was no anchorage at all… the pinnacles (large rocks standing out of the water) were not creating any calm water and we would not have been comfortable or safe anchored in their lee. We continued on to the south anchorage and saw two boats already anchored there. The lack of space and the forecast for seas to swing to SW (which they may or may not) gave us cause to decide to move on and try again another time; and so we did… move on that is.
The winds were too light to guarantee us our necessary speed (we now had another 8 hours to go until the next possible anchorage) and so me motored, heading south towards Metanchen Bay. There were a few nets along this route and some fishing boats working the area. We were vigilant. At one point I spied a pole with a black flag on it and, while we were searching the seas for a corresponding float, a panga with two young fellas pulled up to it and started hauling in their net. As we passed, one held up a large fish and called over. Kathy engaged him in conversation the gist of which was that he wanted to sell us the fish. We slowed down and motored back,only to learn he wanted $20 (that would be US) for it. We sped up and steered away with a thank you and a good by… at which point the price plummeted to 100 pesos. Well, that was much better (more like $8) and so we returned. Kathy (brilliant girl that she is) then further negotiated the filleting of the fish (for an additional 20p – about $1.75). Bottom line, for 120p and two packages of cookies, we have fresh fish…enough for two meals. We waved goodbye to Jimmy (with the diamond earrings) and his buddy… and carried on our way. I’d been fishing religiously for hours without a bite… I humbly put away my rod while Kathy packaged the filets for the freezer :-)
Whilst under way, we had tried to call any vessels in Chacala on the VHF with no luck. Another boat, the SV Gemini with Les and Diane on board, did return our call tho’ and we had a nice chat. They were anchored in Metanchen Bay (our destination) and assured us there was room as they were they only boat in there and it was huge. So we continued on and arrived at approximately 1630 hrs. and anchored well (well, except for the shift cable which didn’t seem to like reverse this time). No time was lost in donning swim suits and jumping in to the 82 degree water… aaaaaah, after a long hot day it felt wonderful! You’d have liked it too. The bay really is beautiful. It’s huge with a long sandy beach and some rough looking palapas on shore. We were delighted with the view and the peaceful seas and settled in for a quiet evening.
Saturday, Feb. 9th
We awoke to a beautiful, calm, sunny day and decided to spend another day in this little bit of paradise. We’d just finished setting up the shade cloths and putting together and launching the flopper stopper when, at 1030 hrs., Gemini (having weighed anchor when we weren’t watching) motored by. Les was very tactful but his message was clear. Given the recent history of thefts and a boarding in the Bay, they weren’t comfortable anchored here as the only boat. Now, we can be pretty thick at some times, but it didn’t take too long for these two gals to figure out two boats minus one, leaves one. Hmmmmm. It was 1108 hrs. precisely when Shannon’s anchor broke the surface on its way to the anchor roller. 40 minutes.. not bad, considering all the ‘stuff’ we had to retrieve and unset and pack away… a new record for us I think. It was, after all, a beautiful day and a great day for a downwind sail to Chacala :-)
Chacala lay 22 nms south of us and it really was a beautiful day and a great sail. Heck, we even shook the reef out of the main. We did motor a bit too in order to charge up the house batteries. We’d used them a lot, with all instruments including radar on while we sailed through the night on Thursday/Friday. Gemini was ahead of us and radioed back to report whales everywhere.. and indeed they were. They were breaching and tail wacking and doing all kinds of fun things. Our cameras were busy, although it’s probably like taking photos of eagles in trees….
We arrived at Chacala and by 1630hrs. we had both hooks down. Yup, our first time using a stern anchor (which is necessary here to keep the boat heading into the swells). Even facing the seas as they come into the bay, the boats move up and down and roll from side to side. I’m sure we’ll get used to it, but it is not called a ‘rolly anchorage’ for no reason. They say the anchorage can hold 7 boats. Gemini was number 5, we were 6 and #7 came in just behind us.
A short story… Four or five years ago, when we had been vacationing at Rincon de Guayabitos, we ran in to friends Dorothy and Steen. They invited us to join them on a road trip north to a nice beach they knew of… and we accepted. We drove for about 45 minutes as I recall, parked the van, walked through some older palapas and out on to the beach. The scene took our breath away. The white sand beach, backed with palm trees, curved away from us, semi-circling the bay. And three cruising sailboats, not much larger than Shannon, lay at anchor just off shore. This was the year we’d really been struggling with the decision of whether or not to sail south. That day, that moment we stepped onto the beach at Chacala, we looked at each other and agreed… yes, we’re going to do it. We’re going to sail back to this piece of paradise on our own boat. The decision was made. Thank you Dorothy and Steen.
Chacala is just as beautiful as we remembered, and now we’re one of those cruising sailboats anchored in the bay. Tomorrow we will go ashore and explore. For now, it’s bathing suit time again… and time for the champagne we’ve been carrying for quite a while, waiting for this day to happen. There’s still no internet, so this ‘log’ will continue until I can send it… thanks for your patience.
