Category: 2025-03 (March)

Up at 6 am, habits… Reneé watched the news, I tried to sleep some more. Oh well, at 0800 I called the Mechanic (Carlos Flores) he suggested getting oil from one of the pangas, fill it and keep moving. We tried, one of the Pangas said we would get some oil in a half hour. 2 hours later, no oil, so we got the dinghy down and headed into shore. On our way we stopped by the two boats left in the anchorage, one nobody home, the other one sold us a gallon of oil, so we turned around topped off the engine and were underway by about 1 pm.
We were able to sail about 1/2 way to Punta Coyote, then motored the rest of the way. We anchored in the dark, about 8 pm, with a plan to be up at 5 and underway by 5:30. One thin to note, holding here was very bad. We had over 200 feet of chain out and it was a very calm night. Which was good.

Up at 6 am, and we talked about leaving a bit later than normal, than leaving at our normal 7 am or so. Finally got underway at a little after 7. Wind speed at the anchorage was low about 6 knots, with little or no waves. Once we got out of the anchorage and around the point, it was 14+ and 3 foot waves. All day, it was 14 – 20 knots and up to about 6 foot waves. YUCK!!!
This is the sort of day, that makes you say “WHY?!”
We anchored at Los Muertos at about 5 pm. We are in about 25 feet of water with 9 other boats. We are not getting off the boat tonight. Tomorrow we will head over to Blandra and spend the night before going into La Paz.
We did not see anything of note today, no whales, no dolphins, no turtles, no other boats, Nothing.
Now we are having a beer and then diner a movie and bed.
Well, Reneé talked to her mom and sister for a bit. Then around 7 we were ready for the movie. But the TV said nope.
Now I am trying the one in the stateroom. The one in the salon appears to have had an interaction with saltwater. Which as most of you know is the end for electronic devices.
We have not used the one in the stateroom since last year, so first step figure out where the remote is. Then figure out it’s unplugged. Now it’s on and updating software. Then we will see if we can watch a movie.
Well we watched Hunter Killer. We have seen it before, but I didn’t remember that until it had started. Oh well, it was good enough to see a second time.
After it was done, we got ready for bed, and I was checking “things” out. We had gotten an alarm we didn’t recognize before the movie started, and it gone away. That makes it difficult to figure out what it is. I checked all the electronics, and verified there were no alarms on the radio, then I checked the bilge pump counter and saw that it was quite a bit higher than I expected.
So, then I looked in the bilge, and it looks very much like engine oil (this is bad). Then I looked in the engine room and saw a huge amount of oil under the engine (this is very bad). I pulled the dip stick and the oil level is still above the minimum scribe mark (this is the good news).
We have a mechanic scheduled for Saturday in the marina to fix the “small” oil and water leaks. But, we don’t want to motor over there (10+ hours) like this.
I sent a text to the mechanic at 1045 pm, and will follow up with a phone call in the morning.
Where we are is about an hour away from downtown La Paz by car. So, we will see what can be done, and just how much it will cost.
I chatted with the mechanic (after midnight, as I could not sleep). He suggested getting oil from other sailors here, and keep moving over to La Paz. The oil is visible above the minimum scribe mark.
I’m thinking if I can get several quarts (liters) of oil, I can fill it and check it periodically.
I will see in the morning.

Up at 6 am for Reneé, a little later for me. We have looked at the weather again. Tomorrow does not look like an early day will work either. So, a later start, with a plan to either anchor in the dark, or sail through the night to Balandra. That is about 15 hours or 90ish miles. In the meantime, we are stuck on the boat. I turned on the instruments for a bit to check wind speed, we have about 22 knots blowing us away from shore (the direction is preferable, in that if our anchor drags, we will be going away from land. We also have waves, at 1-3 feet. Considering that we are close to land, there is not much FETCH (the distance that the wind interacts with the water before it gets to you) so, these waves would be considerably bigger if we were out sailing in it.
Yesterday we made some arrangements for our time in La Paz, a rigger will come to the boat on Friday to work on our topping lift, and a mechanic will come on Saturday to work on the engine. Reneé will meet the laundry lady on Friday morning, and it will be brought back on Saturday. Sunday we will get to church and Monday morning we will head out. Probably going to Isla San Francisco. This is about 40 miles from the marina fuel dock where we will be getting fuel on Monday morning.
There are a couple of screen shots that show how protected the bay on Island San Fransisco is. We are planning to stay a couple of days here.
Reneé has been trying since we got down here to catch a fish. She has been planning on making ceviche with whatever she catches. Today she was successful. We believe it is a “Finescale Triggerfish” a couple of pounds and 16 or 17” long. NO, we did not measure it. This is based on the cutting board in the picture being 13.5” long. We looked it up on the internet and asked some friends (Thanks Josh Fox! Who identified it). From the internet: “The Finescale Triggerfish are deemed an excellent food fish and are primarily used by locals for ceviche.”
For those of you who have been reading along for the whole ride, will remember Josh & Cozette and Jeff & Angela who became our “boat kids” on our sail south from San Diego to La Paz in 2019. Josh & Cozette sold their sailboat and bought a power boat that they lived in (at least for awhile) in San Diego. Jeff & Angela sold their boat and moved to Montana. Jeff is a Real Estate agent there. We still stay in touch with them when we can.

We arrived about 11:30, and dropped anchor. We had a few things to take care of, coordinating repairs to the topping lift, and fixing the water and oil leak on the engine, and also paying for our slip in the marina in La Paz. So, after lunch we got on the phone and got those things scheduled and paid for. Part of this included looking at the weather and what we had to do to get to the marina. So much for saving some time getting to Baja!
So, we went 20 miles less in our crossing (about 4 hours), and tomorrow we have to get to Los Muertos about 44 miles north of here. Oh and the wind is supposed to pick up a bunch and it will be coming from the north. So, we looked it over and elected to get up at 2 am and get underway by 3. Oh Joy!
We are pretty beat today, and are not doing much of anything. Mostly resting. Tuesday will be traveling to Los Muertos, Wednesday will be our rest day at Los Muertos, Thursday travel to Balandra (a small bay near La Paz) about 45 miles. Friday morning we will move from Balandra to Costa Baja the marina in La Paz to arrive by 9 am. Then the work starts. We will get to church in La Paz on Sunday.

We got up at 5 am for a planned departure of 6 am and were on time. We checked out with traffic control and left the area. The first half of the day was spent motor sailing, and going pretty fast for us 7 knots. Then mid afternoon, the wind got uncomfortable and we were also headed straight into it. This slowed us down, quite a bit. Our original plan had been to go to Los Muertos but somewhere mid day we looked at the weather and decided to cut 20 miles off our trip and put the angle to the wind at a better spot for getting some help with the sails, and a slightly less ugly ride.Sounds good huh? Well check tomorrow’s post for the result.
In any case, the crossing was 170 miles, and less than 7 knots it took from 6 am Sunday to 11:30 Monday to complete.
We elected to pay for off shore access to the internet with Starlink, our normal fee is about $85 USD per month, but that does not include off shore access. We opted in and used the internet to watch and listen to a sermon on Sunday and to make some calls etc. At the end of the trip we opted out to turn it off and used 17 GB of data.
Overall the crossing was as bad as any of our crossings. We have had some better, and some worse. At least neither of us got sea sick this time (both of us have on the same crossing). This was only 2 days with one overnight. The last time we went north a friend: Robert Griffith, was along and we crossed from further south San Blas to Los Muertos about 270 miles, with two overnights. That trip was not as “bad” for the weather, but long, and that takes a bunch out of everyone involved.
When the wind started to die down, we still had to deal with the waves they created and finally about daybreak the “waves” were gone and we just had swells to deal with, they were coming from the north and we were headed west, so the boat was really rolling a lot. As a result virtually anything that could fall did, since some of the waves came over the bow, the deck in the salon was wet from the leaks around the mast. All in all and uncomfortable trip.
We alternated getting naps (or at least laying down and trying to sleep) with two hours on and two hours off.