Category Archives: Location

Categories by location. A general catch all for anything involving a certain area.

Stabilizer Failure

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Tuesday, December 3, 2024 – It was supposed to be an uneventful day. The plan was to do chores around the boat in preparation for our 6.5-day passage to Puerto Vallarta, then head out at around 1500 (3:00 pm). 

Since we weren’t paying for another night, the marina encouraged us to leave earlier since check out is officially 1300. Their nudge turned out to be a giant blessing in disguise. Eric started up the main engine at around 1330. There was an issue with the stabilizers – when turned on, the screen said “server rebooted, call factory.” 

Eric has spent the last 1.5 years renovating Kosmos. We plan to write more extensive posts about the renovation, but for the moment we’ll summarize the work with: 1) The boat was 18-years old and many things had reached their life limit and needed to be replaced – including a lot of components on the stabilizers, and 2) We outfitted the boat 18 years ago when there were only two of us. Now that there are three of us; we needed to configure the electrical and water to be better suited for three people.  

Eric immediately called John Gumb Yacht Services, the company that did our stabilizer work, to help troubleshoot the problem. John Gumb had no silver-bullet answer, but the initial trouble shooting indicated it may have been electrical in nature. Eric called Weber Marine next, the company that did our electrical work (and more!). Weber also had no silver-bullet answer. 

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Ensenada Check-In and Lunch at El Rey Sol

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Monday, December 2, 2024 — There were two main reasons why we usually went to Marina Coral instead of Maina Cruiseport whenever we were in Ensenada. The first was that Coral has a fuel dock, and they used to offer a discount on fuel if you stayed in their marina. However, Coral no longer offers this perk. In fact, it is currently cheaper to buy fuel in San Diego than in Ensenada!

The other reason is that Coral will help you with your Mexican check-in paperwork for a nominal fee. This service has paid off in spades for us in the past, especially when we needed help getting a new Temporary Import Permit (TIP) after our first one had expired (note to cruisers: Always make sure to renew your TIP prior to expiring. Getting another new one issued on the same boat can be a nightmare). 

Nowadays, Cruiseport offers a check-in service, too. Between the lack of fuel discount and the fact that we can get check-in services at Cruiseport, we may choose to go to Cruiseport in the future. While Coral is very nice, it’s also pricey, has serious surge issues, and is on the outskirts of town. Of course, Cruiseport has issues, too, particularly with soot from the cruise ships, noise and touts. You have to pick your poison.

Yesterday, the marina had told us to be at the marina office at 0930 to do the check-in. After they packaged up all of our paperwork for the authorities, they shuttled us into town, where all three offices (customs, immigration and port captain) are conveniently housed in one building. 

This was the busiest we’d ever seen it. We had to wait over an hour for our turn, but once we were served, the paperwork took the typical 45-minutes to process. 

Once we were done with that part of the paperwork process, we celebrated by having lunch at our beloved El Rey Sol. As always, the food was wonderful. 

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Keith’s Perspective on Joshua Tree/Le point de vue de Keith sur Joshua Tree

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Joshua Tree national park was amazing! The first day we drove there. We stopped to get food at a place called Farmer Boys. We went to my friend Heath’s campsite.

Le parc national de Joshua Tree était incroyable! Le premier jour nous avons conduit jusqu’à Joshua Tree. Nous nous sommes arrêtés pour manger à un restaurant qui s’appelle Farmer Boys. Après ça nous avons conduit jusqu’à l’emplacement de camping de mon ami Heath. 

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Joshua Tree National Park

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The family that we went camping with in Yosemite last year invited us to go to Joshua Tree National Park with them and several others for spring break. Joshua Trees are the largest species of the yucca genus (evergreens with sword shaped, tough leaves and white flowers). In addition to a large collection of Joshua Trees, the park is also famous for giant piles of rocks dotting the desert landscape, and people come from all over to climb these rocks. The park is also popular for stargazing. It has many hiking trails, too. Christi adores Joshua Tree. Eric and Keith had never been.

On Tuesday, the weather was clear and sunny. The three-hour drive northeast from San Diego to the high desert was beautiful. Southern California has had an unusually wet and cold winter, so the landscape was greener than normal and full of flowers, with snow capped mountains in the distance.

The campsite was located in Indian Cove, a small alcove on the outskirts of the park, conveniently located right off the main highway. While the temperatures were balmy during the day, it was cold at night. We’d decided it would be too cold for tent camping, and renting an RV was more expensive than renting a cabin/house. What was great about Indian Cove was that it was next to a residential area, so we were able to find a place that was only a 5-minute drive. With many national parks, such as Yosemite, it can be quite a long drive between the park and the closest amenities outside the park.

We arrived at the campsite at around 1400 (2:00 pm). Here’s a photo taken from atop one of the surrounding rock formations.

The boys spent the afternoon climbing rocks and playing a game called “Joe’s Gas Station.” Christi and Eric did a little bit of rock climbing, too.

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