Eric did not sleep well from all the rolling in the anchorage. First thing in the morning, he deployed a flopper stopper. It helped some, but it was still uncomfortable. The water was too shallow to put out the paravane, so later in the day, he fixed the broken flopper stopper. The flopper stopper had metal clips and it was the clips that had broken. He just tied knots in the line and deployed it. Much to his pleasure, it worked! Having the second flopper stopper helped even more, but there was still a lot of movement.
Our friends on Oceananigans arrived in late morning. With all the rocking, we were desperate to get to day land. Shortly after they arrived, we went to shore with them to do the hike up the ravine.
This was the view from the top of the peak seen in the above photo.
We left at 0800 for Ensenada Candelero on Isla Espiritu Santo. We were frustrated to find that the exhaust leak is back. 🙁 The sea conditions were smooth overall, though there were enough small waves that we ran stabilizers. It was a 5.25 hour trip. To give you a sense of distance between the islands, here are two photos that we took shortly after leaving San Evaristo. They could almost be knit together into a panorama. The first photo is of the southern tip of Isla San Jose on the left and Isla San Francisco to the right (the rocks in the middle are the hazard we mentioned that Eric had manually entered into the chart). The second photo is Isla San Francisco on the left and Isla Partida in the back, middle. Isla Partida is so close to Isla Espiritu Santo that they almost touch.
The anchorage was stunning, with beautiful aquamarine water contrasting dramatically with the rugged hills and rocks.
We were the second boat in anchorage, but a steady stream of boats came in behind us. By sunset there were at least eight more boats in the anchorage with us. Shortly after we anchored, the wind did dramatic change and we instantly turned 180 degrees. It may be the most dramatic wind change we’ve ever seen.
Our plan was to do our chores, go snorkeling, and then go to shore for dinner. Somehow, the day disappeared. By the time we were ready to go snorkeling, it was so late in the day that it was already time to go to shore! The wind was still strong, and it It was chilly enough that we needed long pants and long sleeves for warmth (as opposed to bug protection, which is why we’d sometimes worn long sleeve or pants on warm/hot days). Here was the sunset, taken from the beach in front of the restaurant.
The first thing that Eric did when he got back up on Tuesday (November 8) was to go check the dinghy for damage. He was horrified to see that there were two large holes in the side. Fortunately, they were up high enough that no water got in.
He saw there was also damage to the seat in the middle of the dinghy.
Q: What is the difference between paravanes and flopper-stoppers? You guys seem to use the words interchangeably in your blog posts.
A: Paravanes are a stabilization system designed to be used while the boat is in motion. It involves lowering weights into the water to add more resistance to the motion of the waves. Our “fish” (weights) are 45-lbs on each side. More details can me found here and here. Unlike active-fin stabilizers, the paravane poles/fish can also be deployed at anchor to help dampen the roll in anchorages.
Flopper-stoppers are light-weight (2-lbs) flat, rectangular plates that can be hooked to the end of the paravane polls (instead of the “fish”). They are meant to be used only at anchor. They can be pushed down by a wave pretty easily, but they are resistant to coming back up, which dampens the motion. At anchor, flopper-stoppers work better than the “fish.” Since they only weigh 2-lbs each, flopper-stoppers are significantly easier to deploy and retrieve than the “fish.”
We didn’t buy real flopper stoppers until after the blog went inactive. In our old posts, we did talk about deploying the flopper-stoppers, but we had been mistakenly using the word incorrectly. What we’d meant in those old posts was “utilizing the paravane ‘fish’ while at anchor.” Sorry for the confusion.
In the recent posts from the Sea of Cortez, we’ve been careful to use the two terms accurately. When we first arrived in the Sea of Cortez, we were using flopper-stoppers at anchor. But after two failures (first, second) we’ve given up on flopper-stoppers and are back to using paravanes at anchor.
Sunrise on Thursday November 3
After we finished our morning chores, we went snorkeling along the rocks behind the boat again. Eric and Keith also donned wetsuits for extra jellyfish protection. The spot was still nice and we got to enjoy it more fully this time.
