April 2003 - Ship Logs

Tuesday, April 01, 2003 1430
Zihuatanejo

Fools Day. A good day for Captain Mary Ann to make her report. We sit at anchor in front of the fishing village of Zihuatanejo. John has gone to town in the small dinghy—the one with wheels—to transact some business at an internet café. I know that he took the wheeled transport thinking that it is much more cool looking. It is. And I’m sure he first considered the fact that his “coolness” would not have to be put at risk. There is a dock ashore.

We have come to this anchorage from Marina Ixtapa which is around the corner and just a few miles north of here. We spent three nights at the Marina Ixtapa which is an absolutely beautiful facility and one that can handle larger boats. Since slips for larger vessels are scarce, at a premium, and always reserved in advance, I was surprised that there was space for us in this very specially located marina. I was surprised even more to see on our arrival that there was space for a whole fleet of motor yachts. I was surprised that an overnight stay was only seventy cents per foot. My surprise left me when we discovered that these beautiful docks have no services. I guess that the marina has been in a state of being finished for years. The very posh clubhouse looked finished but was empty of personal and customers. Perhaps it had no electricity. Maybe the developers of this fine facility have run out of money. “Running out of money”: That’s not an uncommon problem for a developer. Thank heavens that there seemed to be at least enough bucks to buy the dock boys some very spiffy uniforms. They looked quite elegant.

Mooring at an unfinished facility was not a problem. Tennis courts are available. Also guests of the marina can get onto an adjacent golf course at very reduced rates. There are maybe a dozen outdoor restaurants to choose from just steps away on the walkway that fronts the marina. Table cloth restaurants. Restaurants where the waiters wear clean well fitting uniforms and who would never dream of addressing patrons as “You Guys”. How refreshing. In three nights we hit up three of these restaurants.

Marina Ixtapa is famed for the entertainment provided by a different sort of sea life. There are crocodiles in the yacht basin. One first sees a slight ripple on the water and then—just like in the old Tarzen movies—the ominous looking creatures slither to the surface, their backs appearing first. I think that they concentrate on looking like logs. So I say, “Never trust logs. They may bite you.” Other than myself I really have no interest in what a crocodile eats for dinner. In fact, I could care less if he eats at all. So it was not out of kindness that I almost wished one crocodile success in securing a certain treat that he was keeping his eyes on. The treat was a very bad mannered and undisciplined dog that seemed to be taking over the docks as he bounded along constantly barking and knocking into people, not to mention leaving giant poo poos every where he went. “Old Rover would probably taste very good to a crocodile,” I thought to myself. Then I decided that Rover’s owner was much more deserving of becoming a taste treat. Perhaps if he ever made an appearance on the dock he would trip over his dog and fall into the drink

Late night entertainment in Ixtapa is enjoyed at the nightclub in the top of Landmark ower which is located right in the center of the marine land walkway. How enjoyable it is I don’t know. We were never able to gain admittance. On our first night at the Ixtapa Marine we were walking about after dinner and, investigating the tower, we discovered the entrance to the nightclub. It was a small black most intriguing door. Behind it painted on the wall were scales and musical notes. And in front of the door a very large sign lettered the word NIGHTCLUB! Exciting! I suggested to John that we go in for a nightcap. He agreed thinking it a “cool” idea. But when we went to enter we found that the door was locked. Strange.
Locked on a Friday night? So the next night, having enjoyed another fine dinner in another one of the many fine restaurants, we decided to try again. It was getting quite late—almost 8:30—so we hurried along. When we got to the nightclub we again found the door locked. “This can’t be right.” I said to John and Isabel. “It’s Saturday night! Who ever heard of a nightclub being closed on a Saturday night? The door must be stuck.” Having said this I gave it a few kicks for testing purposes. Immediately the door opened and a well dressed kind of waiter looking man appeared. He was not smiling. “Yes?” he said.
“We’re here for the party.”
“We don’t open until ten o’clock, Senora.”
“Ten o’clock! What about the Early Bird Special with reduced rates?”
“I don’t know where you got your information, little lady. There is no bird show here. Come back at ten o’clock. That is when the music and dancing begin.”

Some time during the night sounds of music began drifting across the water. We listened with pleasure until we fell back asleep again. Beats even the Early Bird Special. We didn’t have to pay for the entertainment.

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April 2, 2003 0900
Zihuatenejo anchorage 17.37/101.33

I have been here in the pilothouse since 0730 listening to the various ham single sideband radio nets; Picante, Amigo, Manana, and others. They are of indifferent quality, but all give some modicum of weather information if you can hear it through the static. There is a fellow out there someplace on a vessel named ‘Summer Passage’ who sounds for all the world like a real weatherman and who checks in every day on these nets and gives a wx report covering everyplace from mid passage to Hawaii all the way south to the Papagallos. Today is actually the first day I have been able to hear him at all, but there are always some relays of his report from others who can clearly hear him first hand.

Further good news on the weather scene (didn’t say weather front), the OCEN software that I brought from home a month or so ago is working again and we are getting NOAA wx overviews of sea state, winds, and other practically indecipherable stuff. I was hoping to get pressure charts where I could just see how close the pressure gradients were and guess at the winds, but do not seem to get that information, or else, more likely, I don’t know what I’m seeing anyway. The only bad wx news is that now I am getting wx fax audio through the speaker on this computer, which is a little distracting but better than no wx at all. Reports to the south have 30-35 knot winds with 25 foot seas in Tehuantepec and south, so we are going to hang out here for a few days and let things settle down before moving down to Acapulco, which itself is well north of the bad wx. Not much reason to hurry as the books all say that the best time to cross Tehuantepec is mid April and May. I’m going to have to fly somebody up to the nearest US major airport to pick up the new primary navigation monitor as there is no one coming down here to bring it with them.

Also expect to have to find a crew person in Huatulco to accompany us as far as Costa Rica due to a ridiculous insurance requirement foisted off on us as a penalty for clean living, I guess. Oh well, it will be somebody else to confuse with my Spanish other than Isabel.

Speaking of Spanish, yesterday I took the small tender ashore to send an update to this log from an Internet Cafe. I planned to use the tried and true ‘Griffin Anchoring System’ where you throw out a small mud anchor before you hit the beach, the anchor line stretches out, you jump out of the boat when it hits the shore, tie the bow line to a rock or something, and the boat springs back out to deeper water. So I aimed it at the shore in view of two new friends who undoubtedly were anxious to see this new technique rather than the usual wheeled approach. I throw out the anchor, run her at the beach, the stretchable anchor line comes taut, and I jump … up to my armpits. The boat crashes around in the surf until my two new friends stop laughing and saunter over to help me drop the wheels and roll her up the beach. “Damn,” I said. “Got these floppys all wet.” “You ever hear of a baggie,” one of them says? “You ever try this before,” says the other. So much for new friends.

So, on with my Spanish story, I walk over to the office of the Puerto Capitania to let him know we’re in his bay, although this is only six miles from our last Mexican port of Ixtapa. He is engaged with an American cruisero who decries in english, “…but sir, these are all of the papers I have.” His friend chimes in that those are, indeed, all of the papers he has. I see that he has the same papers that I have. The Capitania is unmoved. He isn’t even speaking, just his head. NO! The two Americans depart to make up some more papers. I step back in the line behind a Mexican lady to give the Capitania time to finish his NO mood and recover whatever accommodating nature he has. My turn. I hand him my papers. He scans them and glares at me. “Que quiere,” he grumbles? “I came to register,” says I. “No habla espanol?” “Si, yo hablo espanol, mas o menos. Quiero registrar con usted mientras a ancla en su Bahia.” Probably my longest sentence ever. He smiles. “Tu espanol es bien. No necessita registrar. Tiene buen dia.” A victory!

We have met a number of cruising sailors down here. Cruising sailors are all there are, no powerboats, so we sort of stick out. The sailors refer to themselves as ‘cruiseros’, while we have the distinction of being ‘yatties’, which sounds somewhat perjorative when they say it but they aren’t being purposely insulting and they are all more than ready to lend a hand when I need it, which is frequently. A couple of computer literate sailors have been aboard the last couple of days trying to figure out why my new ‘sailmail’ device won’t work, which is pretty damn nice of them. They discovered that the USB extension cord that I bought in Manzanillo is defective. For the most part they are all mature couples who have retired to spend the remainder of their active years aboard their tiny craft bobbing about at anchor in out of the way places, risking life and limb going to other out of the way places, and talking to each other on the radio. A life appealing to some, but not all, typical yacht club members.

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Thursday, April 3, 2003 0915
Zihuatenejo anchorage 17.38/101.33

It was bound to happen sooner or later. I mean, how much bad luck can one boat have? You will all be relieved to know that we have finally managed to land the small tender through the surf and get it back out to sea with only minor difficulty. The new technique of just running her at some little speed straight at the beach worked well except that she stopped with quite a lurch. The wheels are locked down and come just below the propeller so no damage to the prop. Once on the beach Mary Ann leaped out of the boat and started pulling like hell on the two little lines that I have affixed under the bow to improve the lifting leverage and I pushed from behind. We got her up about ten feet and I was about to call it a day when a young Mexican came by and replaced Mary Ann at the bow so he and I hauled her clear above the tide line.

Muscles really help in cruising down here. I noticed that both wheels were spread out on the sand and needed air so we bought a bicycle tire pump at the Mercado for US$5.00 and pumped up the tires before humping it back to the surf, which helped a lot. We got the bow out into the surf, Mary Ann was aboard, I gave a mighty heave and climbed in to start the engine just as another Mexican ran over and gave us a last push out to sea. The motor started right up and we cruised away, although I thought that we should go back to town to celebrate our success.

Posting updates to the web page at an internet café yesterday took about an hour and a half, most of which was consumed with getting photos to attach to the email. Very, very slow internet service down here, but at least there is internet service and there have been several at every port town we have visited. We still do not have email on the boat, but I about at a point to decide that I don’t need it. Our ship cell phone system has been shut off for several weeks as our handheld cell phones work perfectly well and, being digital phones, are much, much less costly although still expensive. The satellite phone system is also shut off and for the same reason. It won’t connect to the server anyway so no loss there. And, as you know, the newest email system, sailmail, doesn’t work either, being unable to connect with any land based single sideband connection. In the final analysis, the handheld cells work fine, VHF cruiser nets are informative, and there are periodic internet cafes so who needs onboard email? Of course it is a little embarrassing that virtually every sailor in the bay has email while we, the only yacht in the bay, do not. Oh well, such is life.

I didn’t get to the southbound cruisero meeting yesterday at 1500 at Rick’s Bar as I was sending email, but Mary Ann reports that the folks who are north bound say that new marinas in El Salvador and Nicaragua are friendly and adequate spots to stop over. I’m not going to risk it, however. Those countries were pretty lawless up until a couple of years ago and I don’t think I want to take a chance on having the state Superintendente de Policia decide that my boat would make a nice official yacht for his buddy, el Presidente. Probably overcautious on my part, but, what the hell, I didn’t lose anything in Nicaragua. Many of the others, however, seem intent on stopping off to see the ‘sights’. Last time we were in Nicaragua. 1996 I think, it was all bullet holes and stony faced people staring at you while in the evening there were rallies where red faced speakers shouted about how they were being exploited by the US, at least I think that is what they were saying. I was pretty far back at the edge of the crowd at the time. No mas para mi.

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April 6, 2003, Sunday
Still at the Zihuatenejo anchorage

Isabel and I hang on our anchor at sea . . . abandoned. John flew off yesterday leaving us with multiple instructions on how to handle emergency situations should any arise. Captain John is very knowledgeable about emergency situations. I have great confidence in his assertion that no problem will be new to us. “Everything that could possibly go wrong on this boat had already gone wrong,” he told us. “So deal with it. I’ll be back at four o’clock on Monday. Take the wheeled dinghy to shore and meet me at Rick’s Bar.”

Sometime just before dawn this morning a situation new to me did arise. I was reading in my bed when I heard sounds seeming a bit different than the noise of water movement against the boat in an almost becalmed sea. First there was a faint clunk followed a short series of faint but regular lapping sounds. Immediately I popped my head up to the porthole for a look. There was a small boat being rowed along side of the Mary Ann. The man in the boat was so close that had I reached my arm outside of the porthole I almost could have touched him. The clunk sound that I heard must have been his oar hitting the side of the boat. My first thought was, “My God! A dinghy thief! How do Isabel and I ‘deal’ with this?” Then the man in the dinghy, seeing my illuminated face in the porthole, waved his arm in a sort of salute. But he didn’t move on. He just drifted. What to do? Obviously, the thief had no fear of me even though I had caught him right in the act of sneaking up on our dinghy. If I was going to challenge the guy I had to make a show of force. I jumped out of bed and quickly rounded up the rest of my battalion, Isabel. Together we rushed to the stern where the dinghy was locked up. There we saw three other little boats, all in close proximity to the Mary Ann. Were we under siege? No. The men in the boats were fishermen. It then occurred to us that every night we have been seeing thousands of fish. They make a complete ring around the Mary Ann feasting off all of the sea life that has become attached to the bottom of the boat, which has not been cleaned since January. Here in this Zihuatenejo anchorage we have unintentionally become a popular fishing ground. It is time to get out the scuba gear and scrapers.

This anchorage is really pleasant. It has begun to feel like a small town. I love small towns. For the first time we have become acquainted with most of our floating neighbors in sailboats and have joined them in the many activities that they plan ashore. There is so much to do ashore in this small fishing village. Rick’s Bar is the known gathering place for all American expatriates. It reminds me of the setting in that old movie, Casa Blanca. starring Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman. Only instead of “Play it again, Sam” at the piano, there is the guitar man. There is an amateur night in which John, Isabel, and myself hope to if we get our act worked up and perfected before we have to lift anchor. (We have purchased a guitar for John and tambourines, castanets, and “around the neck” drums for Isabel and me in anticipation of this event.) Saturday night is the really big evening at Rick’s place. Most enjoy steak dinner on the roof garden dining area. You can’t complain about the way the steak has been cooked because the patrons must cook their own. After dinner the big show begins: a group of high school musical students in wonderful costumes performing folk dances and singing classical Mexican songs. Before the entertainment is over the patrons are dragged out on the floor to join the dancers. For this entertainment a two dollar cover charge is added to one’s bill for the evening. Finally the sombrero is passed to pay the dancers and singers.

On Sunday nights one can get a taste of Zihuatenejo at the outdoor basketball court where various restaurants set up food booths for the serving of their best specialties. When it isn’t Food Festival night, you can watch for free fourth, fifth, and sixth grade boys playing competition basketball. I like to shout, “Tira! Tira!” which is “Shoot! Shoot!” in Spanish. Probably, had not my hair bleached out a bit in the sun, most Mexicans would mistake me for a native local.

I cannot leave my report without describing a very special afternoon spent with the sail boaters. Around noon on Thursday a group of about twenty five met at Rick’s Bar (of course) and then boarded a bus to the Santa Brisca Café which is in a residential area at the outskirts of town. The Santa Brisca Café is open only one day a week, the day following Hog Slaughtering Day which, in this state of Mexico, is always on Wednesday.

There is only one item appearing on the menu: Pazole or Hog Soup. The only variety is in the spicing of the Pazole. A physician and his family run the restaurant. It is an open air restaurant, partially covered, and located in the back of the doctor’s house. Musical groups play and there is singing and dancing. Rick says that anyone who is anyone shows up on Thursdays for the doctor’s After Hog Killing Soup. Rick should know. He seems to know everyone in town.

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Tuesday, April 8, 2003 1039
At sea 17.19/101.50

Returned from Los Angeles with the new plotter monitor, having shipped the old one back to the factory in Virginia for warranty credit. Forgot to take my temporary import license paperwork so had a little problem with the Aduana (Customs) dude, but he finally saw the light of day and let me off with a duty of US$74.00. They weren’t unreasonable to deal with at all and I would not have had a problem if I had followed the rules and done the paperwork. Even carrying spares in your luggage requires that you fill out a bunch of paperwork to be correct, but I didn’t see them opening any bags to look for contraband parts so it isn’t much of a problem unless you show up with a big flat screen monitor in your hand. Then, of course, they get curious.

Today we are enroute from Zihuat to Acapulco in kind seas with good weather, running about six miles off shore. We’re following a course I laid out on the electronic chart that should take us in a straight line to Acapulco, but of course exactly where we might be on the ground is anybody’s guess. The Mexican charts are pretty vague about details and I believe that I can now say that they simply cannot be relied upon for close navigation. Entering these strange harbors is very much like the old joke in the northwest about the guy who took his boat to Alaska navigating by restaurant placemats instead of nautical charts. We have been getting a consistent one to one and a half knots of current help all the way from Sidney, BC, but the current has turned against us now and our speed over the ground is slower by a quarter to half a knot, give or take. Countless small dolphins are cavorting all around us and their acrobatic leaps are something to see. The dolphins down here jump much higher than the dolphins we see around the northwest, and so do the whales, although we haven’t seen any whales since Puerta Vallarta.

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April 9, 2003 Wednesday 0945
Acapulco anchorage 16.50/99.54

Boy, is it ever getting hot down here! Mary Ann said that she was told that it was 100 degrees the other day, and it feels like it. The water temperature is up to 83 degrees as well and is as blue and pretty as you can imagine out on the ocean. The wx has been very benign for our entire trip and we are hopeful that the remainder across the Gulf of Tehuantepec and the Papagallos will be equally kind. The boat is running well for the most part. Minor exceptions include that the wind speed and boat speed measuring devices have quit again. Not critical by any means, but useful devices to have.

We are about out of fuel with only 400 gallons remaining out of 3,000 capacity. According to the books which we have been using that tell us such things, this is about the last big fuel port until Flamingo in Costa Rica, a distance of 1100 miles , so I hope that these DDC fuel consumption read outs are accurate as our range at the average 20 gph we have been burning is just about 1500 miles. I’m a little apprehensive about that and intend to take on whatever fuel I can find in Huatulco, 300 miles to the south. If I had a choice I would take the Tehuantepec section at flank speed to get across as quickly as possible, but with this fuel capacity I wouldn’t get there. I wish now I had raised more hell with Sovereign when they put in 1250 saddle tanks instead of the specified 1500 gallon tanks.

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April 10, 2003 Thursday 0900
Acapulco anchorage 16.50/99.54

Bad news. Yesterday I spent the usual innumerable hours at the fuel dock squeezing in every gallon I could manage, but when I was done I had only taken 2025 gallons. So if I started with 400 gallons I must now be carrying only 2500 galloons or so. That would reduce my range at ten knots to about 1000 miles assuming an average 24 gph, just a hair greater than the distance between gas stations on the next leg. Since September of 2001 we have run 466 hours and burned 11,229 gallons for an overall average consumption of 24 gph. Lately, from Mazatlan to Acapulco, we have run 85 hours and burned 2025 gallons for an average consumption of 24 gallons as well. During this period the DDC displays have consistently read 20-21 gph so I suppose the difference is fuel consumed for the generators. I have arranged for a fuel truck to meet me at something called San Carlos bay in Huatulco when we arrive so that will reduce the distance to Flamingo, Costa Rica, to a more manageable 800 miles or so, and a little closer to my comfort zone. I don’t understand the fuel situation as I had previously filled and measured one of the saddle tanks in 200 gallon increments and marked the sight gauge appropriately, which I thought would be pretty accurate in terms of capacity. Each tank measured 1250 gallons plus by that method. In addition to the fact that with 400 gallons on the sight gauge we coujld only take another 2025 gallons, my records show that when we fuelled up at Cabo we had 800 gallons aboard and we took on 2057 at that stop. A mystery indeed. I’ll have to measure the tanks again at the next fuel stop, but I’m not optimistic about finding more capacity. Sometimes I could just kill my naval architect and boat builder as the former doesn’t think of things that should be included in the plans, while the latter doesn’t follow the plans anyway. Oh well, enough of that problem. I guess it won’t solve itself by me worrying about it.

We now have the air conditioning man and his son aboard testing the AC system. I think the system is working fine, but Mary Ann thinks it should be able to keep the boat cooler. Actually, the aft salon is cool, but the pilothouse is hot due to all of the glass, and that even with an auxiliary fan running pretty constantly. I have another auxiliary fan running under the console in an effort to keep the electronics from cooking off on the amateur theory that excessive heat forward may have contributed to the demise of the plotter monitor. It’s so great to not only be a mechanical wizard but to have an aptitude for electronics as well. I should have been a door to door salesman. Hell, I was a door to door salesman!

April 10, 2003
Acapulco Anchorage
Addendum by Captain Mary Ann

John has just left to return the two air conditioning men to shore. I feel that I should write something concerning the purpose and function of air conditioners. I thought the purpose of our air conditioner was to circulate cooled air throughout the boat so that the temperature inside of the boat would be lower than the temperature outside of the boat. John seems to believe that the purpose of the air conditioner is to cool down all of the air that surrounds most immediately the outside of the boat. What other reasoning would prompt him to continuously open all of the doors and windows that I attempt to keep closed during the running of the air conditioner? But no matter which way one chooses to look at it—inside cooling or outside cooling—I felt that the system was not “working fine”. Outside of the pilothouse the temperature was 100 degrees and inside it was 105 degrees.

John was meeting with very little success in his attempt to cool the air outside of the boat. “Give it up, John,” I said with as much patience as I could muster up. “The way this system is working I would be very surprised if you cooled the air outside the boat down even one degree.” Then I went to shore and told the marina that we needed the services of an air conditioning expert.

The air conditioning unit is now fixed and working beautifully. At least it is working beautifully on the inside where the temperature in the salon is seventy three degrees F and still falling. Unfortunately, the repairmen didn’t have as much success in controlling the temperature outside of the boat. It is still 100 degrees. Maybe when John gets back and throws open a few doors?

The problem of the air conditioner was really simple. A stuck valve did not allow the water to flow through the cooler. Now with the boat being so cool and comfortable and with us having the option to close the doors and windows to our unwanted guests—the bugs and mosquitoes—I’ll bet we could even lure Craig Johnson back on the boat to venture with us into even warmer climes and great scuba diving!

I have been looking much forward to our arrival here at Acapulco, for John and me a journey into nostalgia. Our first major vacation as a married couple was to Acapulco. We fell in love with not only the city—which at that time was little more than a village—but with all of Mexico. Time and time we came back. In later years we changed our mode of travel and in an adventure that lasted more than five years the two of us explored on our motorcycles the Baja and all of Mexico. The country looks quite different hanging over the handlebars of a motorcycle than it does propped up on a Captain’s chair, and the difficulties encountered—which are many—are definitely more grueling in their nature. But I remember the reward of discovering and spending time in these enchanting storybook places. Las Brisas in Acapulco was one such place. A game room in our home is wallpapered in blown up photo shots of us and our children experiencing what we have decided are our lives best moments. One such photo is of John and me, still in our motorcycle suits, hot, sweaty, bare foot, and smiling at the whole world because we were so happy to be seated on the wall of our own private flower filled pool at our suite at the Las Brisas Hotel in Acapulco, Mexico.

On our return here I wondered, “Would this place still be so magic as I have remembered it? Would I still think it fairy tale story book quality?” The answer to both questions is yes. Isabel, John, and I went to dinner at Las Brisas last night. We sat out on our balcony in the warm humid night air and looked out over what is described as “A bowl full of diamonds”, the bay of Acapulco at night. And I thought to myself what I thought the last time that we were here: “ I am in the most wonderful place in the world.”

If I have one disappointment in this adventure it is that we have had difficulty connecting with friends with whom we have hoped to share our journey into waters yet unknown to us. It is understandable. Everyone has their own agenda. They are unable to join us for a variety of very good and totally acceptable reasons: Carol and Sonny are exhausted from their month long travels in New Zealand and must be allowed some time to recover. Carol M. has scheduled trips to Europe and Washington D.C. and doesn’t know how she can possibly squeeze in a trip on the Mary Ann. But she “would like to”. Husband, Pete, would not “like to”. He thinks that the Mexicans have a real problem. They do not speak English. However, when the Mary Ann arrives at some country whose citizens are able to make themselves understood, he will be glad to join us. Eugene and Phyllis are preferring the dry heat of the desert. But they will be able to join us later . . . during hurricane season. My cousin, Creed, is busy winning the war in Iraq. Sally Jo and Gene are busy baby sitting their grandchildren. And on and on it goes.

The thing is this. I have spent too much time trying to act as travel agent for my friends. I look at the chart and I see where it may be convenient for them to join us . . . a place where there is an airport close to a port that we will be entering along our route. But I have only a very rough idea of the date on which we will enter that port. You may think this stupid but it is not! When Columbus hoisted his sails and set off on that journey that led his to the discovery of America, did he know what time that he would be arriving? No. He did not. In fact, I believe that he was headed somewhere else. John and I don’t know what time we will get to wherever we are going or, for that matter, even where we are going. I can say, that like Columbus, we will always be pushing on. This ship does not back track. This ship has no agenda.. We go when we go. We get there when we get there. If we have one purpose in this, our new life, it is to remain totally unscheduled. How can that work for friends who are still wanting to come aboard at a time that will be convenient for them? Here is my plan. You all become your own travel agents.

Decide when you can come and contact us. (We are in and out of cell range all of the time.) We’ll let you know if there is space for passengers at the time that you request a booking. Then a couple of weeks before it is time for your boarding, we will be able to tell you what part of the world we are in and to name a port that has a dock or a safe anchorage where we can bring the boat in and pick you up. We will put you ashore at any place of your choosing. It is your job to figure out how to get to the boat and how to get back home. We’re looking forward to your visit. Call us!

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April 12, 2003 Noon
At sea 16.32/99.20

Water temperature is now 82 degrees. Mary Ann even jumped in last night as it was hot. I arose in the middle of the night and moved outside to the boat deck to sleep on the padded benches in my shorts with no covering. Not the most peaceful place to sleep with the music blaring from the local party boats, but we made a little noise ourselves before going to bed as we played a home made CD I bought from a taxi driver for 50 pesos. We were sitting out, all the lights on, music blasting as loud as I could crank it, drinking whiskey and dancing under the stars. Totally cool, I thought, although Mary Ann worried about what the anchored sailors might think.

We’re running along now on lightly rippled seas, swells about two feet, and light breezes. A very comfortable seven miles off shore in about 400 feet of water. Don’t have a wx report as static on the SSB too great to pick up Amigo net and am not able to pick up New Orleans wx fax for some reason. I did get one satellite image yesterday which showed a huge storm off North Africa, but don’t know what I am supposed to do about that from here so I left anyway. Must always be a storm someplace. Passed a Mexican navy patrol boat idling off shore an hour or so ago and thought he might pick us up, but not so. He was probably watching the birds riding the turtles like we were. So far we have had zero trouble with authorities here and the few with whom I have spoken have been courteous and helpful. In fact, we have had so little contact with the authorities that yesterday I cleared out of Acapulco for Playa Flamingo, Costa Rica, even though I plan to stop at Huatulco to take on 600 gallons of fuel. Hope my luck continues as legally we are no longer in Mexico and will have some trouble if the Huatulco Capitania de Puerto asks for our Zarpe from our last port. Other than taking on fuel from a fuel truck at Huatulco I don’t intend to go ashore there, just going to wait for a wx window to make the run down to Costa Rica.

Have been polishing fuel since last fuel up and now on the last thousand gallons. Don’t know exactly what I’m doing but figured to use the centrifuge so long as it was here. Not too complicated a device to run so long as you can get the water seal in place. Everything seems to be running OK.

Big electrical storms within towering cumulus nimbus clouds light up the sky, but no thunder sound reaches us. Must be too far away, but they look close. Doesn’t concern me as I have already had my electrical fix today when I got a nice shock while trying to get the air conditioning started. Figured I must be getting close to fixing it if it was starting to fight back. I sometimes think that I am getting a little paranoid about this equipment, but I try to remember that nearly all of it works nearly all of the time and it is, after all, a boat.