We woke up early, did not sleep well and did not have a good day. Sometimes they go like that. The weather is better, and the water has calmed down which are good things.
Renee’ went to the store and I worked on a video. This is the video from the drone that was done when we were in Santispac a couple of days ago. This video was originally shot in 4K, it is the first time I have edited a video, and the first file was saved in 2k, but I am using the free version of Vimeo (where the video file is) and there is a limit of 500k per week. I already uploaded a video this week (More Dolphins) that was about 56k. This video at 2k was about 493k, and the original at 4k was 3.2 GB. Unless I want to spend about $100/year this is what it is going to be.
So, check out the video and let me know what you think. While it took me all day to do this, I had to learn how to do it first. So, it was probably an hours worth of work to get to the video.
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 passport 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:
We got up very early, 2:30 with a plan to be underway by 3 am. We were a bit late and actually started about 3:20. Once underway, I had issues getting the radar to turn on. We had also expected to have the moon rise at about 11:30. But it was pretty overcast, so no moon and no stars. We tried about 3 or 4 times, before I figured out that the radar needed to warm up before we could turn it on. So, after waiting long enough it did. We set course for the crossing and just started plugging away at it. After an hour or so, we discussed where we were going, and I realized that we were headed to San Carlos, as that was the way point that I had put in the previous week. But, Renee’ had called ahead and found out that they were full at the marina, so we changed to Guaymas, and that added about 2 or 3 miles to our trip (not really significant) and we redirected where we were headed.
We had breakfast underway and listened to a sermon from North Coast for our devotions for the day. Renee’ tried to nap on the way out, but it was too rough for that. So, she folded clothes and then came back and sat in the cockpit with me.
We checked the weather the day before we left and expected to see about 15 knots of wind from the north (90 degrees to port as we headed across). What we got was 20 to 25 knots with gusts to 35 knots. But all from the north. We got a couple of hours of sailing with just the Main Sail and the Stay Sail doing 6.5 knots. This is pretty fast, considering that we have been motoring at 6.5 knots most of the time. We finally arrived in Guaymas and as we got close to land, Renee’ called ahead and found a marina to dock at. Great news! It is a Fonatur marina same as several we have stayed at on the peninsula. (Puerto Escondido and Santa Rosalia). The better news is that unlike Puerto Escondido, this is owned by the Fonatur company and like Santa Rosalia, the dock price is VERY reasonable, in this case 7 pesos per foot. Our boat is 45 feet long. So, 315 pesos per day, or $13.24 per day (or about $400 per month at the daily rate, which compares to $1,100 per month in San Diego).
On the way across I got to watch some dolphins come by and we saw some sea gulls all the way across and of course some pelicans.
We got to the marina and backed into a slip, but just as we got there we figure out it was the wrong one and we had to go around to the other side. I used the bow thruster too much and it stopped working.
This was the end to another very long day.
To summarize:
We still have a broken water maker, a broken alternator and now a broken bow thruster, we only have an estimated 50 gallons of water. But, we are tied up in a marina and it has showers and laundry and is in town and it is pretty inexpensive to tie up here.
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 passport 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:
We got up at 6:30, and got ready to go, had breakfast, did our devotions, and called Capella III about my jacket that we left on their boat last night. We arranged to pick it up on our way out to run the water maker. So, at about 8:00 we picked up the jacket and then headed out. Once we were out far enough I started the generator and the water maker at 8:40. Then we put the sails out and did a very leisurely sail out for about 15 miles or so, which took several hours. At some point during the day, our boat speed was down to about 0.5 knots, but we were not going anywhere.
While we were out Renee’ put her line in the water, using a cedar plug and a weight (the plug is designed to float, and the weight keeps it below the surface. After a couple of hours of this, I looked back and asked Renee’ if she had something on her line, so, she went and checked and started bringing it in. No real fight, but it was pretty big. When she had it alongside the boat we got pictures and video of her first shark! She was pretty sure she could not pull it onto the boat with the line she had and it was too big for the net, so, I got the gaff and when she got it close I gaffed it through the mouth and up through the top of its head.
“Sharks don’t poop” that is a quote from one of the fish books, so you have to ”catch, kill, and gut” quickly. So, we brought the shark on board, ran the fillet knife through the brains, and then tried to cut off it’s head. The knife was not doing it, so I went and got the hand saw that we bought at Lowes It is a folding saw with interchangeable blades that are about 10” long. This worked well in removing the head, and the tail then I gutted it with the fillet knife and turned the mess over to Renee’ to remove the skin and cut into stakes. We measured the shark at about 36”. We think it is a black tip, but it might be a bull shark, not really sure.
After a while, we decided to turn around and head back in finally dropped the anchor at Mulegé at about 4:30 or so. In about 15 feet of water. The first time we dropped anchor, it drug as we tried to set it, so we pulled it up to try again, and figured out what the problem was, we had filled the anchor with seaweed. This is not a great anchorage, as it is not protected, is somewhat shallow and has seaweed. We checked the weather and it is supposed to be very calm tomorrow. Our plan is to go into town (about 3 miles up the river, that is too shallow for the boat) in the morning then come back to the boat and move to a more protected anchorage in Bahia Concepcion in the afternoon.
Oh and it is raining now. We have not had much rain since we left San Diego, but perhaps there will be enough to rinse all the salt and dirt off the outside of the boat. It really needs a bath.
Details: we ran the water maker from 8:40 am until 3:40 pm, 7 hours at 20 gallons per hour. We put 140 gallons in the tank, the “Acu-guess” (the brand is Acu-gage) instrument started at 10% the tank is 260 gallos, so we should have about 166 gallons (less the 6 gallons or so used to flush the water maker) 160/260= 61.5%. Sure there is a bit of a fudge factor here so it could be a bit more or less, but the instrument now says that we have 90%.
We are thinking about what to do next. We have been in communication with Jeff and Angie on Lost Pearl (who are with Josh and Cozette on Merry Lee). (Our boat kids). Jeff said that it would be 3 to 5 days until they get as far north as Santispac, where we were planning on meeting them. Saturday or Monday of next week, then we would head back to Punta Chivato and spend the night and get an early start the next day to cross to San Carlos. Do we stick around here for another week before crossing, or do we say sorry can’t do that and cross.
Dinner tonight will be leftovers, all the shark went into the freezer. We have lots of variety for leftovers: Spaghetti, Chinese, Enchiladas, Tuna, and Pizza. We have to eat some of these or toss them as they will get too old.
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 passport 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:
The sharkThe gaffed shark (the squiggly line is a plastic string for the cap that goes over the pointy end of the gaff)Look how calm the water isWhat came up with the anchor the first time we tried to anchor
We got up early (6:30) had breakfast, did our devotions, and left Santa Rosalia after filling the holding tank with water. Went out 3 miles and dumped the holding tank then continued on to Punta Chivato.
A fairly uneventful trip, we saw quite a few dolphin, (we even got an escort for a bit) and had very calm seas. The highest wind I saw was about 4 knots true. When we got to Punta Chivato we anchored in about 15 feet of water. It was early afternoon and we elected to do a whole bunch of nothing. It is a bit cool/overcast so we just napped and read our books.
I did figure out that we have not run our water maker since February 29, we still show 30% in the water tank, but I am expecting it to be empty soon. We are planning on crossing to San Carlos on Wednesday, and we will run the water maker all the way across. It is supposed to be about 70 miles, which should be about 12 hours to cross.
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 passport 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:
