Category: 2019 – 2020 Season 1

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.

We got underway about 7:30 and headed south. Escorted out by a small pod of dolphins. We have a load of laundry going, and once we were a couple of miles out I put the water maker in service. We are down to 50% again. That is 3 loads of laundry, showers and two days of not making water. We actually just started the 4th load of laundry. We are still catching up from a week in Turtle Bay. As I have said, today is a short sail day, (we might get to sail, but right now the wind speed is around 5 knots). Tomorrow, is a bit longer…

This morning we used Morning Mercies for our devotions. The topic was Glory, we either focus on glory here on earth, and that causes lots of grief as we try to keep up with the Joneses, or try to be the richest, or whatever, but if we keep our focus on the Glory of Christ, we rely on the knowledge of our eternal home, we will experience the Glory in due time when we get there. Rather than the temporary glory that will not satisfy, and keep us looking for more, the next high the fill in the blank that just doesn’t do it.

Today as we motor along, the swells are moderating, it remains a bit overcast, and the wind is about 10 knots, but right on the nose. So, no sailing. We are listening to Sirius XM, it is nice to be able to listen to music or news or whatever without commercials.

Like I said it was a short day. It is almost 2 pm, and Lost Pearl, Merry Lee, Ikigai and us are all in port and waiting for the next leg tomorrow. A little rain today, and no wind.

We had a quiet afternoon, enjoyed looking at the beach (no desire to put the effort in to going ashore. Heard later that the waves were pretty big. Renee’ read a book, I played a game and we both had naps. Tonight we will watch a movie. Pretty much what we do on an off day like this, either a movie or a game. Last night was Rummy 500, tonight is a movie.

At about 6 pm, Two locals in a panga came by, seems like they were looking to see if we needed anything. Afterwards, Ikigai left, we said goodbye and said that we will probably see them somewhere else. They have a pretty long journey planned (circumnavigation in about 4 years). While we were on deck checking out the locals, we got to see a school of fish jumping out of the water. I thought flying fish, but they did not get that far out of the water, so probably not. Well, no internet, no cell service and with that, this won’t get published until tomorrow at the earliest. Good night.

I just got to thinking and checked my notes. I did not say where we have been for the last two nights. Bahia Asunción. There are lots of marine mammals. What does that mean? Well, you know the neighbor who leaves their dog outside all night, and it is lonely, so it barks all night long. Not an alarming bark, just a bark a second of silence and a bark repeat all night? Well that is what I heard last night. One seal (or sea lion) barking all night. Renee’ slept right through it, and when she got up and went outside, said that there were about 6 of them playing near the boat. Oh well. Maybe I will get a nap later today.

We are running the generator and doing a load of clothes again this morning.

Tomorrow, we are planning a pretty short day, Bahia San Hipolito, is about 20 miles from here. The next day (or trip if we stay more than overnight) is to Punta Abreojos about 40 miles or so down the coast. We have read Charlie’s Charts, and it suggests that it is a better idea to do this entrance in daylight This is Bahia De Ballenas and is connected to Laguna San Ignacio which is a whale refuge. So, we will probably stay an extra day here.

The next stop south is Bahia San Jua’nico. Which is about 80 miles. That will be a pretty long day. Followed by Bahia Santa Maria which is another 100 miles. From there we will go into Bahia Magdalena (Mag Bay) and stay a few days. From there the next stop is Cabo about 180 miles.

I am reviewing waypoints on our chart plotter. Deleting the ones that we will not be going back to, (everything north on the west coast) and just came across Moss Landing. The furthest north we took the boat. 693 miles north of where we are now. We were there Sept. 3, 2019. That does not sound like very far in a car, but on a sailboat, that is a couple of months of moving a little bit each day. Or in our case, including repair and maintenance in San Diego, that is 3 months ago.

This lack of WiFi is a bit of a pain. We sometimes get email notifications, but can’t open the email. This happens even we we have WiFi in a restaurant or elsewhere. As an example, we were ashore for awhile today. I tried to get to my email, and got nothing. We got back to the boat, and I got a notification about an invoice for PredictWind (this is our satellite connection and weather) I think it is set up on an autopay on a credit card, but I don’t remember, and I can’t check it without going ashore. Of course the dinghy and the kayak are already put away. In other words we are talking about a 2 hour ordeal to get ashore and check the invoice, and then another hour or more putting it away again.

So, we did not go back ashore. I will check on it the next time we have WiFi. We had dinner, showers, and played a game of Rummy 500. Renee’ was reading a book on her iPhone, and I was playing games on my iPad. I heard a noise at the front end of the boat and Renee’ pointed out that it would not hurt to go take a look. So, I took a flashlight and headed up to the bow. As I got to the front of the boat, about a half dozen seals took off to the left, when I shined the line at them they dove again and kept going. I looked to the starboard side of the boat and saw about a six more when I shined the light at them they took off, and then the couple forward of the boat took off. All in all something more than a dozen of these guys were playing near our bow. No harm done, I went back below and wrote this.

It is not quite 8 pm, and I think it is time to go to bed. I did not sleep well last night, and we are sailing tomorrow.

We went ashore, of course we got wet got the dinghy in with Josh and Cozette. About the same time, Jeff and Angie came in. Renee’ and I walked out of town and got propane. YEAH! We are back to being able to cook and BBQ at the same time. We walked through town and found a restaurant with WiFi, which is where we are. There are 8 of us here today, the boats are Make Me Laugh Again, Merry Lee, Lost Pearl and Ikigai (with Mike and Chris). All the guys are ex-USN. Ikigai was in Turtle Bay as well.

We are debating on whether to stay here two days or leave in the morning. At this point the consensus seems to be to spend another day here. With the hard and fast schedule we are on, we will probably just stay here. The water looks very clear and the weather is great!

This is way better than Turtle Bay, and we stayed there for a week.

I have given up posting pictures for awhile. Over an hour and it said failed. Oh well maybe next time.

SUNDAY DEC 1 A travel day

Up at 6 am, it seemed pretty windy overnight, but pretty still when we got up. It took about a half hour to get the anchor up. Lots of kelp, and it was really buried in the sand/mud on the bottom. We had to move the boat past the anchor to pull it out of the bottom. When we got it to the surface, the anchor was packed with mud. As I started to pull the anchor up (before seeing the mud, the chain was tied in knots of kelp. We have a machete on board (left behind by previous owners) I used it to cut the kelp off, it works well for this. But it was a lot of work. We went out about 3 miles, turned south, dumped the holding tank and started the water maker. When we got over 50% in the water tank Renee’ started the first load of laundry. The wind came up and we had about 15 knots for about 2 hours, then it was gone again. We had been motor sailing, so we lost a little speed, and had to put the sails away, so that they don’t just flap.

We listened to Pastor Larry Osborne’s message on Life Hacks, about 6 ways we don’t follow God. It is all about obedience,

He pointed out that the Bible has the direction for our life, either explicitly or implicitly the Bible will not always give you specific direction as to day to day decisions, but it will give you direction

Jesus said if you love me you will keep my commandments. John 14:15 we are to go into the world and disciple others, and we are not done until they obey. Great Commission.

The 6 things that get in the way (sabotage) simple obedience

1. Let your conscience be your guide. This is not biblical, we think that we were given our conscience to follow God’s standard, he gave it to allow us to live up to OUR standard. The Apostle Paul, 1 Corinthians describes how he feels about his conscience. He states his conscience is clear, but it is up to God to judge him.

2. Asking for more proof, when God has already given clear direction. Gideon, in Judges 6:36-40 putting the fleece out. (Fleece was wet, and ground was dry, then dry and ground was wet). Downside was the whole people wound up depending on throwing lots to let God make the decisions. Judges 8:27 Golden ephod, (casting lots), all Israel prostituted itself over this ephod.

3. We confuse risk with faith. God did not say, to go out on a limb so that he has to rescue us. Prob 19:3 our own follow brings destruction. We are given direction to follow what he tells us to do, as an example Peter was given direction to walk on water. This was not stepping out in faith, this was doing what he was told by Jesus. Only a fool goes out with our getting the facts first. Jesus said that, Luke 14:28-32

4. Thinking that we don’t need to ask God about the little things (I have this one). Sometimes the answer will be silence, sometimes NO. But we have to ask. A biblical example, the Israelites were told to take the promised land and to destroy (kill) all of the inhabitants, they were incredibly sinful, including sacrificing their children etc. they made a treaty (ricked into it, but three days later realized it and then decided that they had to follow the treaty). They had to live with the consequence. Had they asked God, he probably would have told them NO.

5. Asking God what to do, but forgetting to ask when to do it. The right thing at the wrong time it never the right thing to do. Moses in Acts 7:30 he knew he was to be the deliverer for Israel this is where he killed the Egyptian, and wound up living in the desert for 40 years. Rather than the palace for those 40 years. This was because he was not delivering them when he was supposed to. Sometimes, we go too early, sometimes too late.

6. Failing to ask our spouse. When we were married, we become one. God speaks to the new one, not either of the previous two. Eph. 5:21-22 SUBMIT to one another, the marriage is supposed to be mutual submission. Wives are to submit, husbands are to love her as Jesus loved the church. Up to death, whether physical death, or death to a dream or desire. Etc.

Later:

We anchored at a little after 4pm. Motored all day. Had a small bit of wind for about an hour 12-15 knots. With the engine running we got to 9 knots through the water, and 7.5 knots speed over ground. But it quickly died to 0-5 knots (true) coming from astern, which means with the engine running and the boat going at about 6.5 knots, the apparent wind speed was around 1.5 knots on the nose. Useless for sailing. We were able to maintain radio communications (most of the time) with Lost Pearl, but not Merry Lee. They are all a couple of hours behind us. Since we really could not sail, I saw no advantage of arriving after dark. So, no reason to go slower than I have to. We ran the water maker for about 5 hours, ran a load of clothes, and at the end of the day, the water tank is at about 90%, the holding tank is between 20-30%, the battery is fully charged, the bay is fairly calm, and I am having a beer. All in all a pretty good day.

I plotted out the course for the next trip down the coast. This looks like the biggest city we have seen since Ensenada, we need propane (well ok, maybe need is a bit strong, we have two tanks and one is empty).

We will probably stay two nights here. There is NO SCHEDULE PRESSURE! My nuke friends will understand this. It is AWESOME!!!!

Renee’ is cleaning the heads. She spent about an hour on the foredeck just enjoying the sun and the water as we came south today, very flat seas and almost no wind out there. I just drove the boat, OK that might be an exaggeration, as I put the auto pilot in control, and with the engine on, I even plugged in a route and let the auto pilot make the turns to keep us on course and get us south of the point and the island before I took back over and brought us in close to find a spot to anchor. We are anchored at the east end of town, in about 25 feet of water about 1/4 mile off shore, we are the third sailboat to anchor here, there is also a fishing trawler and a bunch of panga’s. There is a pier, but it does not look very useful, so if/when we go ashore, we will just go to the beach.

I just got the notification from my calendar, tomorrow marks the anniversary of my starting work at Duane Arnold in 2013, I have been retired since March 30, eight months. I don’t miss it a bit! I do miss the daily interaction with the people, but not the going to work.

We had a good nights sleep. There were some strange noises out in the bay last night right before we turned in, Renee’ took a flashlight out and found what looked like a couple of dolphin around the boat. I came up and they were staying just out of range of the light. But I caught one of them doing a flip in the air about 100 yards away from us in the spotlight! As we were sleeping, I was woken up a couple of times by noises that I am not used to on the boat. They sounded like more marine life. We will have to watch today for what is out there.