Category: 2020-04 (April)

We got up about 7:30. The boat was rocking a bit with the (very small) swells, and the sun was up already. Renee’ got the coffee going and we started our morning routine. This its Sunday, which means we will have oatmeal for breakfast, and afterwards, we will listen to a sermon.Since we don’t have internet, it will be a podcast that Renee’ has on her phone. We connect one of our phones to the radio via Bluetooth, for control or to play audio from the phone. Which is what we will be doing today.

Later, we will go ashore and do some hiking. At least that was the plan, we listened to the sermon, then watched the fog roll in, probably the only time we have really done that this trip. It is still pretty cool, not sure why, we expected it to be getting warmer as we are in April and in the desert. Oh well, I worked on organizing pictures, Renee’ fished and that is the way we spent the morning.

After lunch, we started to get the kayak down, but decided it was too cold to get wet. So, we got the dinghy down instead and went into the little cove connected to the bay that we are in. We walked around for awhile and finally decided to go to the office and see if anyone was around. At the office, we found Beto who is the owner of the campground/rental place here. He told us about a couple of hikes and that he was shut down for the virus and we stayed away from each other. We looked for the hikes that he had suggested, and wound up walking out on the road for a bit. Then we went back to the dinghy and headed out.

As we just about out of the little bay, we saw a half dozen dolphin. So, we stayed and watched them for  a bit, then out into the big bay and we went across to the second choice we had for where to anchor and looked it over. Nothing special, so back to the boat, and put the dinghy away, once below we started the generator to finish charging the battery and heat the water for showers. Renee’ ran a load of clothes as well. While ashore we saw 3 people. We talked to Beto, and we saw a couple in one of the cabanas here. They are the first people we have seen up close since we got diesel last Tuesday. We have anchored four times since we left Guaymas, and in three of those times, we have been the only boat at anchor there. Five nights as the only ones there, and one night we anchored with five other boats.

Tonight is game night, after dinner and then tomorrow we will go to Puerto Don Juan in Bahia Los Angles. It is about 45 miles, so we will probably try for an early start.

We do have room for guests, if anyone is interested in visiting and spending a week or so with us, drop us a line and we will coordinate. What you have to do/have is you need a sport and will need to be able to get to where we are when you are going to be down. When we know what time frame you are thinking about we can let you know where we expect to be so that you can make your travel arrangements.

If you want to know where we are, click this link:

https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/Make_Me_Laugh_Again

 

 

 

We woke up about 6:30, Renee’ got up and got the coffee going. I stayed in bed a bit longer, then gave up and got up. We had breakfast and did our devotions, then got underway by about 8 am or so.

It was a very calm day, no real wind, nor waves. We motored across and ran the water-maker finally after about 3 hours, had water coming out of the overflow. With that we turned off the water-maker and the generator. By this time it was also time to put the sails away (they had done a little work at speeding our crossing), and prepare to go in. We dropped anchor between 2 and 2:30pm. We shut things down and noted that it was still cool. The trip across had almost been cold. Probably in the mid to high 60’s. In any case, we finished up and read some books and took naps.

Happy hour was cookies and beer. I looked ahead to what we have between here and PUERTO PEñASCO, it looks like we have this stop plus 7 more and right at a month until we need to be there. That is an average of almost 4 nights at each stop. Some, like this one, will only be two nights, some like Bahia Los Angeles will be longer.

One thing we noticed on this crossing is that our depth sounder is acting up. We are hoping it is just dirty, and that we can clean it by diving under the front of the boat. The sensor is mounted in a hole in the bottom of the boat near the speed sensor, but unlike the speed sensor, you can’t remove it while the boat is in the water. It also comes as a complete unit, the sensor and 45 feet of wire. That wire is not supposed to be in the bilge, or run near the electronics, which means it is probably hard to get at,  and zip tied in all the hardest to reach areas.

Of course all of this requires the Corona Virus stuff to have settled down, or we may not have the boat hauled out in May. We might need to continue to self isolate. We are not looking forward to that option. We will see what happens.

We do have room for guests, if anyone is interested in visiting and spending a week or so with us, drop us a line and we will coordinate. What you have to do/have is you need a sport and will need to be able to get to where we are when you are going to be down. When we know what time frame you are thinking about we can let you know where we expect to be so that you can make your travel arrangements.

If you want to know where we are, click this link:

https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/Make_Me_Laugh_Again

 

We woke up around 7 30 am. Had breakfast and listened to the news. Did our devotions, and prepared to get underway. The S/V O’boy contacted us as we were bringing in our anchor. They are headed back  to Santa Rosalia. They have a hacked PayPal account, banking and other issues to deal with.

We went out and once we were clear of the Puerto we started the clothes washing. This means the generator goes on, and then the washer gets loaded and started. Once we were outside of the bay, I started the water maker and started filling the water tank. After the first load of clothes were done, Renee’ started the second one. While the washer is technically a Washer/Dryer, we don’t use it to dry the clothes as it uses steam and takes about an hour and a half longer to dry a load of clothes than it does to wash them. So, when the wash cycle is done, the clothes get hung up inside the cabin. Since the generator was running anyway, I turned on the A/C on heat and turned on all the cabin fans to help dry the clothes.

We filled the water tank, it took about 4 and a half hours, and it was running at about 15 gallons per hour. Water quality is slightly less than 70 ppm total dissolved solids. US drinking water is typically <500 ppm. So, we have pretty good water on the boat. Today, I figure we made roughly 70 gallons of water. That is 3 days + 2 loads of laundry use, for the two of us. So, 6 showers and dishes for three days. Fairly efficient, even though we really don’t have to be, as we have a 260 gallon tank for fresh water.

While we were out today, we saw the S/V O’boy headed south (120 miles to Santa Rosalia), and no body else. We saw some birds, the pelicans are fun to watch, they fly in a straight line, about 3 feet or less off the water. The seagulls seem very curious as to what we are doing, as they tend to circle the boat. Especially when there is only one of them. We saw no dolphin today, or anything else for that matter. After we had been out for about 4 hours or so, the wind came up, it started at about 5 knots when we left Puerto Don Juan at about 9:30 or so, and by 12:30 or 1 pm it was up to 20 knots. By the time we came back into anchor we saw 30 knots. This makes anchoring a bit unpleasant. When we came back into Puerto Don Juan, we changed where we are anchored to a spot that is more protected by the peninsula, and since the tide is in, we are in about 40 feet of water. We checked this Puerto and part of the reason it is such a good anchorage, is that the whole place is less than 45 feet deep. With the tide swings, that means 50 feet of less. We anchored at high tide in 40 feet of water, we put out 180 feet of rode, which is more than normal, but we are in deeper water than normal as well.

We are starting to think about what to bring back to the boat for the next season. One thing we are definitely looking for are good games for two players. We are game players, and while we have limited room for storage, we need more games. Currently we have cards and two other games, one is Qwirkle, which is a games similar to dominos, but done with shapes and colors instead, and Pirateer. Both of these games were suggested by our friend Ken McMillen. With the cards, we play a couple of games, specifically Rummy 500 and Baja Rummy. While both are variations of Rummy, the Baja version takes one more deck of cards than players, so for us to play it takes 3 decks. We play a game almost every other night. The only problem with the games we have is that Qwirkle has the shapes painted on black tiles, and at night with somewhat limited light, it can be hard to see the colors and shapes (at least for me, being slightly color blind). So, if you have a great two player game, we are looking for suggestions.

We do have room for guests, if anyone is interested in visiting and spending a week or so with us, drop us a line and we will coordinate. What you have to do/have is you need a sport and will need to be able to get to where we are when you are going to be down. When we know what time frame you are thinking about we can let you know where we expect to be so that you can make your travel arrangements.

If you want to know where we are, click this link:

https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/Make_Me_Laugh_Again

http://a%20href=

 

We woke up around 7 am. Renee’ got up and got the coffee started and worked on baking bread.

Again, this harbor is very calm. I went through my old notes and found a way to put the map of where we are on my blog posts. Until, I am sure it is working correctly I will leave the link to find our location on the posts.

We spent the morning puttering around on the boat, Renee’ finished the bread (Very good!) We read our books and worked on learning how to edit video. We think perhaps, when the stock market recovers (and our IRA), we will look into getting a drone. In the meantime, we will take more video with our phones. Maybe I will get the Go Pro out and play with it as well.

After lunch, we went ashore by kayak. On the way, we stopped and chatted with the other boat in this bay, S/V O’boy! They were last in Santa Rosalia, and yesterday they had gone over to the town of Bahia Los Angeles to get water and news. They heard yesterday that Santa Rosalia port is closed, and if you go in you can’t leave. We are not ready for that yet, and we are not headed that way anyway. They told us that the WiFi in Bahia Los Angeles is very slow, and the water was very inexpensive.

We eventually got ashore and hiked across to Ensenada Quemado a (small, shallow) bay on the sea of Cortez. The hike was about a mile each way and while it was much longer than the one yesterday over the rocks it was quite a bit easier. It was about a mile each way, with a salt pond at the other end. When we turned around the wind had picked up and the paddle back to our boat was a pretty good workout as well.

We got back to the boat about 3:30 and by 4:20, we had the kayak stowed, and the generator running to finish charging the battery and get the water hot for showers and dishes. It looks like it might rain tonight.

I think the things we miss most out here are family, friends and internet. There is certainly no traffic out here. Even in the cities what traffic there is seems pretty light after being used to Southern California. We have Sirius XM radio, so we get the news, and all the music we like. With none of the commercials. We have the Iridium GO! for phone calls and texting, but it is limited. Renee’ made the comment today that it is one thing that would be nice, that is to get internet via satellite. I did price that before we left, and it was bigger than our budget for everything on an annual basis. (As in over $10k per month).

We do have room for guests, if anyone is interested in visiting and spending a week or so with us, drop us a line and we will coordinate. What you have to do/have is you need a sport and will need to be able to get to where we are when you are going to be down. When we know what time frame you are thinking about we can let you know where we expect to be so that you can make your travel arrangements.

If you want to know where we are, click this link:

https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/Make_Me_Laugh_Again

http://a%20href=

 

We got up at 6:30, had our coffee and got “it” together and underway by 7 am. We had breakfast after we were moving.

As we headed north we looked closer at the charts, and read the books about where we were going. Most of the Sea of Cortez is pretty deep, especially if you go out a couple of miles. This area, though, is a bit different. The book recommends 5 to 10 miles off shore, and as we were already 5 miles out, in about 60 feet of water, we went a bit further out. As we continued to look ahead, we found a spot on the charts, right on our path that had a depth of 0 feet, and it was about 20 miles out, with shallow area between it and the mainland, so we picked a spot out side of that area, and continued on. As we looked even closer at the chart, we realized that the distance to our planned destination (Bahia Kino) for tonight and the distance to our planned destination for the next night (Isla Tiburon, Shark Island) were about the same, from our detour around the shallow spot. So, we skipped Bahia Kino.

We arrived at Isla Tiburon after a long day of motoring. No wind, most of the day, occasionally we saw as much as 10 knots, but it did not last. We had some swells from the south west (about 90 degrees to our course, so somewhat uncomfortable).

It was a long day of motoring, but other than just going in a straight line and listening to the motor, there really  wasn’t much else to do. When we got the anchor down, we thought about going swimming, but the water was a bit too cold, so decided to try again tomorrow.

Amazingly enough, we do have cell service here, really unexpected. We are planning on staying here two nights. Tomorrow will be a late morning, sleeping in, and a kayak ride and a swim. Then planning for the next couple of days. But no schedule pressure.

We do have room for guests, if anyone is interested in visiting and spending a week or so with us, drop us a line and we will coordinate. What you have to do/have is you need a sport and will need to be able to get to where we are when you are going to be down. When we know what time frame you are thinking about we can let you know where we expect to be so that you can make your travel arrangements.

If you want to know where we are, click this link:

https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/Make_Me_Laugh_Again