Category: 2020-12 (December)

Up at 5:30, underway at 6 am. Saw the sunrise, started the watermaker by 6:30. BUT, forgot to select it to “tank” for 3 hours, so great water straight back to the sea. Oh well, finished up with somewhere more than 90% in the tank. Dumped the holding tank, and charged the battery. We arrived at Marina Cortez by 2 pm. Got the out board motor sent off to get running, coordinated a visit with Rich Boren Cruise RO water makers and other stuff for the boat. Finally out for dinner and a beer All while catching up on FB. The blog will get done later. 

 

0500, winds over 25 knots. Down from the hill in front of us, we had 150 feet of chain out, in 30 feet of water. That means about 5 to 1 scope. Which generally speaking is “good” not great, but “good”. Problem with that is that we anchored on a slope, which means as we drag, even just a little we go into deeper water, and soon we are in 35 feet of water, and with out much dragging we ware down to 4 to 1 scope. (Amount of chain out divided by the depth. Good – we were dragging away from the rocks, Bad – both anchor alarms (same program running on two phones) had been silenced, so when I woke up from the wind, and checked the anchor alarm, it was blinking. This really got my blood pressure up to start the day. I adjust the radius of the alarm, which is a way to see if we just set it too tight, and watched it for about a half hour. Then a little before 0600 Reneé asked me how long I had been up and how the anchor looked. I explained what was going on and we got up and put out another 75 feet of chain. This involves starting all the instruments, and the engine, then moving the boat forward enough to remove the anchor bridle (two ropes that go from the forward cleats to a hook on the chain, this relieves the stress on the anchor windlass) then letting out the chain, and adjusting the anchor alarms on both phones (making sure the alarm is not silenced!) Then watching it to make sure we are not moving any further. The moon is up, but it is just a sliver, otherwise pretty dark out there.

There is our excitement for the week. 

Oh well, the coffee is brewed and we are awake now. 

Battery status:

Battery capacity is down to 28%, generator is running, charging at 70 amps. We used 444 ah from the battery, which means a couple of things:

1. It is going to take 6 or 7 hours of running the generator to recharge.
2. This is more than we could have ever taken out of the old AGM batteries, the limit on those was 50%, or 375 ah.
3. Recharge time is less than it would have been on the AGM’s at 50%, that would have taken 10-12 hours.
4. We made it two days! We arrived here 2 or 3 pm on Friday and have not run the generator since then.
5. I was planning to run the generator today so that we could charge the battery, and do a load of laundry. There will be plenty of time to do the laundry later in the morning.
6. Even at the lowest point of discharge, battery voltage was 13.16 volts. As opposed to the AGM’s which would have been down to 11.8 or lower. This means that all the dc loads work better due to the higher voltage.

Generator off at 11:10. Started probably about 0630, so maybe 4 and half hours, The battery is at 79%, the load of laundry is done, we have had showers and the water heater is full of hot water again. Battery still has 130 ah consumed, We put in 314 ah in that time. 

We briefly considered running down to San Francisco, about 2 hours south. This would have shortened the trip into La Paz by about an hour and half, so instead of 10.5 hours, about 9 hours. But when we went on deck with the instruments on, we saw 22+ knots of wind, and white caps out on the Sea. We will get up early tomorrow and underway by 6 or so, and go a bit faster than the 5 knots that I used for those times. We will plan on being at Marina Cortez by 4 pm or thereabouts. 

Other than the excitement this morning a very quiet day, with lots of wind. Reneé made cookies, pasta salad and Cole slaw. We also read our books, and listened to Christmas music. 

No pics today

We woke up about 7 am, listened to the net on the SSB Amigo Net 4149 Khz Upper Side Band, or 4146 frequency, at 1400 Zulu time. We will also try to check in, or least listen to the La Paz Net channel 22A at 8:00 am Monday thru Saturday.

The NETs are a way for cruisers to stay connected. They have a check in period for emergency traffic, cruisers underway, then finally for cruisers that are anchored/docked. This is followed by the weather report and a chance for anyone to send a message to anyone else (like stay on this frequency for a few minutes after the NET is over for some personal communications). There are also general announcements given, like updates to the COVID status. SSB has a very long range, we had people on the net near Puerto Peñasco (north end of the Sea of Cortez) and as far south as Acapulco or Puerto Vallarta. As a comparison, we heard 70 degree and 80 degree sea water temps, discussed this morning. This covers an area of about 1000 miles or more north of where the NET was hosted from.

We were here last February 19, and 20. We were anchored near the town, in about 16 feet of water and we snorkeled. I suspect the water was warmer then, but we might give it a shot here again. We are planning on staying through Monday to avoid high winds on Sunday. 

Our plan for today is Breakfast (cereal) they kayak for a bit and a trip into town. 

We kayaked around the bay, found the restaurant (closed for the next 2 days, as the boss is out of town). Talked to some fisherman cleaning rays, and then back to the boat (had a beer). Lunch and snorkeling for awhile then a nap, and happy hour, (beer, sausage and crackers). Then nothing for a bit, in a really great quite bay. Then put the kayak away and watched another sailboat come in and anchor much closer to town. We checked the weather and will probably get underway very early Monday morning and go straight to La Paz.

Details about the snorkeling, we started from our boat, I swam under and checked the status of the bottom, it is OK, but will get cleaned in January before we leave La Paz. I scrubbed the heat exchangers for the the fridge and freezer. We went into the beach, and stayed within 10-15 feet of the shore as we swam looking at the fish, we saw Puffer fish, we saw a ray, (12-15” in diameter) we saw lots of coral, we saw black fish (very small) schools of sand colored fish (about 1 foot long) and bunches of yellow and black stripped fish. It was like swimming in a fish tank. This snorkeling took us about an hour, and was very pleasant, water temperature was 75 degrees, and air temp was about 79 degrees. It is nice to have a hand held depth and temperature gauge. 

Dinner tonight is fish burritos from the Bonito that Reneé caught the other day.

Well, not to rolly, until we went to bed. Then really rolly until about midnight, calmed down some and finally some good sleep around 4. Then up at 7 to get started. Perhaps we can get some naps in today. 

Breakfast burritos and coffee to start the day!

Quite a bit of wind again today. We coasted along at about 5 knots with jib and mainsail out with the wind almost directly behind us. Running the watermaker and washing machine all day. At the end of our trip we pumped out the holding tank and ended with something more than 90% in the water tank.  We anchored in 30 feet of water at San Evaristo in the north east corner. Very well protected for wind and waves. We expect to be here two nights. 

We did not sleep that well, the boat was moving a bit last night. Not much just enough to drag the chain around on the rocks/gravel under the boat. Since it was so quiet it was enough to wake me up. Renee’ had issues with wet hair keeping her awake. So, she used her blowdryer this morning to fix that. We looked at the charts and thought about what we are going to do as we continue south. At this point our itinerary looks something like this:

Thursday night (tonight) in Puerto Los Gatos, if it is crowded then we will go another couple of miles to Tembabichi. This is a short day, only about 20 miles.

Friday (12/11) and Saturday (12/12) night, in San Evaristo. A very protected bay. This is because we are expecting some wind on Saturday. This is about 35 miles.

Sunday (12/13) night, Isla San Francisco (10 miles), or Isla La Partida (30 miles), or Espirtu Santo (35 miles). 

Monday (12/14) La Paz, depending on where we were Sunday night, 50 miles or less.

Monday (12/21) Fly to Tijuana and back to California Returning 1/2/2021. 

One thing that happened relative to the new batteries and charging system, the display for the inverter/charger stopped showing battery percentage. The info was still available from the Victron Energy battery monitor either on the face of the instrument or via Bluetooth. Just not on the local display. I found a cable disconnected on the back of the battery monitor. The wire is a little on the short side, and a bump to wire can unplug this. I will have to figure out a way to keep that from happening. In any case, it is all working again.

We arrived in Puerto Los Gatos about 1 pm, a bit of excitement, the weather guessers said that it should be mild with minimal wind. Of course we had over 20 knots from behind us and that meant for an interesting time furling the gib (so, not so mild). Anyway, we got it in and then the mainsail as well. We ran the water maker for almost 3 hours, and ended with about 90% in the water tank. It only shows 10% increments, so we could have been at 99%, but we were not full. We have a couple of loads of laundry to do, so we will start that the next time we run the generator, and the watermaker. We also charged the battery, with the final on that of  95%. The only other boat here is S/V Pellucidar. 

Today has been rainy, and we discovered that the boot around the bottom of the mast leaks. Tonight is popcorn and a movie. Then bed in a rolly anchorage.