Author: Neil Scheuerlein

So, we are here for a couple of days. We expect some serious weather to blow through from the north, which should be ok as there is a pretty big land mass north of us. The weather is currently hot and calm. We will see what else we get. We area having Mike and Lai-Lani from the boat Aloha over this afternoon for cocktails and snacks. We have been playing tag down the coast for the last couple of weeks.

We all looked at the weather while we were ashore, and the Merry Lee and the Lost Pearl are planning on heading out Tuesday Morning, we will head out Tuesday late afternoon. We will motor/sail maintaining 6+ knots, they are a bit slower, and it is a long passage. The hope is we get there about the same time, mid day on Wednesday. We will see.

We had Mike and Leilani Costello from the S/V Aloha over for chips and salsa they brought guacamole very tasty! We talked about the boating life, they have been live aboards (retired) for 13 or 14 years. This trip is planned to go west. They are going slow and in no particular rush at all. Their boat is a Hanse 505. It is their 5th or 6th boat. We have not been aboard yet. I would love to see it.

The other boats (Merry Lee and Lost Pearl) are having their Mario Cart night tonight. So, they did not miss being involved, nor did we need to be with them again.

I texted with Dave and my Mom about my uncle Gary. She had issues with getting information on his status. So, I am going to call her in a couple hours and see what she has been able to find out today.

We are sitting at the restaurant that has good food, cold beer and OK WiFi. We have 8 of us at the table, the two new people are Scott and Michelle, they are 2 of 3 of the crew of “Blind Faith” they are returning from the Baja Ha-Ha on their way north. There is a bit of wind, but nothing to be concerned about. We are still planning on leaving tomorrow night.

Still, no pictures. I will have a post when we get to Cabo (I hope).

We went back to our various boats, I ran some fasteners over to Mike on Aloha, and chatted with them for an hour or so. Then came back to our boat. Renee’ and I put the dinghy up, but elected to wait until tomorrow to put the cover on it as the wind was really blowing by then. I checked and it was at about 25 knots with gusts to 30. Josh on Merry Lee called on the radio, as his wind turbine was finally spinning in the wind. He does not know if it is actually putting any current out, but at least it is going the correct direction.

We had dinner, Renee’ made Torta’s (Mexican sandwiches) for dinner, and we ran the generator for an hour or so to charge the battery some more. Then we took showers and played a couple of card games. We are having a pretty quiet night and will have a pretty quiet day tomorrow until late afternoon when we set sail for Bahia Santa Maria about 100 miles south.

We are sitting here in the salon, listening to the wind howl. It is probably still 25-30 knots. We are not too worried about dragging anchor, as (unlike in Turtle Bay) we are anchored quite a way off shore, and there is nobody anchored near us. This means that if we do drag our anchor, there will be plenty of time to take action before we would interact with either another boat or some land feature (like the bottom, or a rock).

I sent an update out via the Satellite to some of the relatives as to what has happened with my uncle Gary in the last two days, and I got a response from my brother Dave and (a second cousin?) Susan as well.

Life Hacks. Chris Brown on relationship

This was from a previous sermon series at North Coast. I am not going to cover it here, but know that it was a good message.

We had a seal hanging around for quiet a while last night, but he was not here this morning. Renee’ was up on deck this morning and watched a Pelican catch a fish and fly away.

It is a quiet calm day. We have checked the weather and it looks like we will be here until Tuesday night. Then have an overnight to Bahia Santa Maria.

We came ashore, at San Juanico. This is a very nice little town, it looks like a suburb of San Diego, only MUCH smaller. We found a small restaurant at the top of the point with pretty good internet, food and very cold beer. So, we are getting our internet fix, checking our mail etc.

This anchorage was pretty calm the first night, but we certainly did some rocking and rolling last night.

We got underway at 6:30, with Lost Pearl at almost the same time. We motor sail for these longer hauls, to make sure we get there before dark if at all possible. So, we were slightly ahead of them. Merry Lee was out of the anchorage by about 6:45 or 7am. It is now coming up on 10 am, we have made about 27 miles by our trip meter (which uses the knot meter on the boat, which is the little wheel that spins in the water). The knot meter is showing that we are making close to 10 knots, but our speed over ground is about 7.5 knots (this is more accurate), this is based on GPS position. We have. been running the water maker, and washing a load of clothes. The water tank is at about 60%. I plan on running it for another 4 hours or so, Josh (Merry Lee) asked about water yesterday, and I expect that he will take about 15 gallons or so which is about an hour of run time on the water maker, and Renee’ wants to run two loads of laundry today, which is a little less than 2 hours of run time. Which means when all is said and done, we will have about 60% at the end of the day (which is where we are now).

We used Jesus Calling this morning for our devotions. It is a fantastic way to start the day, praising our Lord, and thanking him for another day here on Earth, we get to see what he gave us to enjoy. We are reminded that we are to help others to come to know, believe and obey him as well. We do not believe in the prosperity theology, that is we will not have an easy life because we believe, nor that everything will turn up roses just because we believe. God is not a genie to give us everything we ask for. But he promises to be with us not matter what is going on in our life’s. Whether it is good, or not so good. If you are reading this and are not sure of the truth of the Bible, I challenge you to do some research comparing the accuracy and validity of it. You will find that it is the most historically accurate document we (the human race) have. We have copies written less than 100 years after Christ, we have tens of thousands of manuscripts that all show the same story, and when in doubt consider the Dead Sea scrolls, which were found in the 1900’s and match the documents we have. Showing the Bible has not changed. There is also the archeological record, that is when the Bible says something about a location or an event, eventually we (humans) find archeological evidence that it is accurate.

There is my little sermon for the day.

We had a very quiet night. Slept very well. We went ashore this morning with the other two boats (Jeff and Angie, and Josh and Cozette) found a restaurant that had WiFi (ok, not really, they said they did and we were able to do a couple of things but nothing really. I was busy on the phone about Gary (my uncle) we found a grocery store and an ATM, I think that might be the first one we have seen since Ensenada! Walked to the gas station for Josh and Cozette, and then back to the beach.

This is an interesting small town. It seems a bit more upscale than some of the fishing villages we have seen, there are some really nice houses (they look like vacation homes, as at night only one had any lights on), and a bunch of panga’s (small fishing boats), but only one grocery store, and few restaurants. There were a couple of paved roads here, and one Pemex station. We checked about the internet, and there is an Internet cafe, but it requires you to use their computers, and pay by the hour. This is not really what we had in mind, as it will still not allow posting pictures. This might be among the worst locations we have been for internet access, while at the same time, it might be among the best places we have stopped. Oh, well.

We had taken our dinghy ashore, Jeff and Angie took theirs, and we went all the way to town by boat. We are anchored in the next cove east of town. This means that it was about a 20 minute ride to and from. Another boat, arrived today, it is Travis and Jessica (I think) on Decorum. They are Canadian, and we have seen them before (I think Turtle Bay). We are planning to go ashore and take a short hike later today, have a late dinner (lunch was at 3:30) and run the generator tonight. Our battery is at 73%, and that won’t make it through the night.

We ran the generator for a couple of hours. The battery got up to 91%, and we turned off the generator. When we got up at 6 am, we were down to 71% this is good enough for me. We elected to not go on the hike last night, and instead took the time to put the dinghy away. This takes about a half hour and both of us. Then I worked on the course for tomorrow, we have about 67 miles to go. This is a longish day. Since we don’t like anchoring in the dark we plan to leave by about 6:30am. This means it may be just before first light. I am planning on being on deck with a flashlight to look for lobster traps with Renee’ driving, at least for the first hour or so.

We got up at 5:30, had a knocking on the deck going all night, Reneé thought it was a lobster trap, and went up to look. She could not find anything. I went up in the morning and in the light of day, was able to see the Main Sheet block on the traveler bouncing up and down about 1/8” and knocking on the deck when it came back down. I tightened the traveler, and then the main sheet an almost imperceptible amount in both cases, and it stopped the knocking. We got underway at 7am, and found a bunch of lobster traps. We had 20 knots of wind, and once we got past the traps we put up the sails, and were able to sail for about an hour. Then the wind died. Motor back on, sometimes it goes like that.

We are anchored as of 1:30 pm. We are probably about 1/2 mile off shore. In about 20 feet of water, very mild swell, from the south. Oh and virtually no wind, so it is pretty hot. We had an alarm going off as we were dropping the anchor, and I think it is the bilge pump alarm. We are at 14 runs since the last time it was reset (San Diego?) So, not really a lot of runs. In any case, I pumped the bilge down manually, and reset the counter. We will see if that stops the alarm.

We expect to be here a day or two. We are watching for whales, we saw a pretty large pod of dolphins on the way in.

I spent an hour or two on trying to get cell service with DATA on my phone with AT&T. No success. Took a nap and woke up with a text on the Satellite to call my brother and one to call my mom on regular text. My uncle is in the hospital. So then I spent an hour to two on the phone with both of them and the ICU where my uncle is in the hospital.

Now that we are where we can’t do anything, we also have no internet to do searching for anything else. My phone is being pretty finicky, I have 4 bars for service, but about 1/2 the time when I am trying to make a call, it is just sits there. It looks like it is trying to call, but nothing happens. Frustration!

So, after we got all that stuff taken care of I called my buddy, Duane Erickson. He his wife Marjie are getting ready to move to Tennessee. He and his wife spent 6 months here in Baja some time back and decided the cruising life was not for them. We talked for awhile and I made sure he could get to the blog and to the tracking page so he could see where we were and what we were up to. They have made the decision to move to where their son lives, and their daughter who lives in Calif. will retire and move there as well. These two are my hero’s, they bought they boat their last boat in 1984, it is a 40’ Passport, and they sailed Baja shortly thereafter. This was their third sailboat, they are at an age, where it was becoming too hard to sail the boat, and take care of the house etc. All I can say is that I hope when I am their age I can even remember sailing, much less be able to say ok, it is enough, time to let go.

Well, I really don’t have anything else to say this evening. We will probably play cards tonight, then go to bed.