Passage to Cabo San Lucas

Day 2

In the wee hours of the morning we got to the Sea of Cortes, the body of water that separates Baja from mainland Mexico. We expected the seas to pick up, but they didn’t at first. All was status quo with the ride until about sunrise. Then the wind and waves slowly but surely picked up all day long. The pick up was so gradual that it was truly a nice ride for the better part of the day. The sun was bright and visibility was good. The wind was on our nose and so were the waves, but the waves small and the swells were gentle and lazy and were far enough apart that it was still reasonably comfortable.

Of course, by dark it had picked up enough that we were hobby horsing a lot, but it still wasn’t too bad of a ride overall. By 2200, though, it had picked up enough that it finally made it to the “no fun” category. The moon didn’t rise until midnight and it was dark out with poor visibility.

We have continued to make excellent time, so in the early afternoon we again upped the RPM’s by another 50 RPM. According to our calculations, we were on course to arrive just after sunset, and we needed just a little more speed to get us there while it was still light. We are crossing our fingers we continue with such good speeds.

Day 3

The wind and seas continued to Continue reading

Stability, Kayaking and Departing for Cabo

Christi was up before dawn yesterday. Don’t be too impressed”¦ the sun doesn’t rise until 0800 here. The pre-dawn silence was suddenly shattered by two people talking. One, who sounded like an adolescent boy with a changing voice, said “I like that boat Kosmos”. The other, a deeper adult male voice, said “Yours is much safer than that one. See the poles there? Those are stabilizers. That boat is so unstable that if you don’t put the poles down, then the boat could flip over.” Christi opened the back door to Continue reading

Hanging Out in Bahia Navidad

After we had found out the price of the marina, we had resolved to only spend one night and then move to the anchorage in the morning. But after talking to the cruising couple later in the afternoon, we had started to reconsider moving. The anchorage is naturally flat calm, but can get rocky from all the speed boats zipping around. The bottom is soft mud with poor holding, which means you have to put out a lot of chain. Bringing in a lot of very muddy chain didn’t sound good. That would make our anchor locker a gross mess. And, the water is shallow, so sometimes mud laden waves splash onto the sides of the boat, sometimes getting over the walls and on the decks, and getting mud everywhere. And mosquitoes can be a problem, though with the wind so strong probably won’t be. When we had gone to bed that night, we still hadn’t decided for sure whether we were moving or not.

That night was a restless one for Christi. She woke up often to blow her nose. In the morning, she felt absolutely miserable, too weak and tired to do much of anything. Christi waking up sick sort of made the decision about moving for us. We were staying. Life in a marina is Continue reading

Passage and Arriving in Bahia de Navidad, Jalisco, Mexico

Day 2

The slow speeds continued all night. Eric was starting to worry that we were dragging a fishing net, but the current eventually changed and we sped up. Eric heard the Pilipino monkey boy on the radio in the early morning before dawn. He was shocked. What is that guy doing here? Eric suspects it is an imposter.

Like yesterday, the day was sunny with just a little bit of haze and perfect temperatures. There was still no real wind or wind chop, but the swells were just as bad. At 1030, we rolled up 5,000 hours on the engine. That is 208 full 24 hour days! Wow. We really have spent a lot of time at sea, haven’t we? After 5,000 hours in every kind of condition imaginable, we can accurately say Continue reading