We departed Las Hadas February 13^th to return to Tenacatita – our favorite anchorage so far.  We wanted to show Grant and Nicole what living on the hook  - away from resorts or marinas – is like.  After an uneventful passage, we enjoyed an idyllic week swimming, snorkeling, visiting with other cruisers, getting in some hammock time, walking the beaches, reading, and the ubiquitous “swimming Rosie". At this time of year, there are always at least 40 boats in the anchorage and there is quite a social calendar organized, starting with the daily radio net.  Additionally, we use our VHF radio as our telephone to hail and converse with others in the area.  There is always something to do, if you choose. One of the questions cruisers get asked is, “What do you do all day?”  Well, we can confirm that life is just too short for a full time job.  The rule of thumb is that you must tackle 3 maintenance or new project items per day, or you will be getting behind.  Add to that the fact that everything takes three times longer than it does “on land”, plus the one touristy thing you want to do each day, and there just ain’t enough hours.   

While in Tenacatita, Catharine organized a community baking day.  One of the local palapas has a big brick oven, and she arranged with Raoul, the owner, to fire it up.  Cruisers in the bay prepared their own baking and brought it ashore.  We had so many bakers that we had to have two bakings that day – over 40 loaves!  Raoul did not charge us for the use of his oven, as the cruisers bought lunch at his palapa. Everyone was so pleased with the turnout that it will be a weekly event.

Grant and Nicole took the bus from Melaque to Puerto Vallarta on Feb 19 to return to “sunny” Portland.  We prepared the (now oddly quiet) boat for the sail north towards Mazatlan.  Our plan was to avoid all the anchorages we’d visited on the way south, and get north of Banderas Bay (where PV is) quickly so we could spend time in places that interested us en route to meeting Cath’s parents in La Paz in mid-March.

We departed Tenacatita at 4:30 am on Feb 21, sailing north.  We had intended to carry on directly to La Cruz (just north of PV), but a very bright red morning sky followed by mackerel clouds had us worried as to what was in store for the weather.  At this time of year, traveling north can lead to problems with strong head winds – we had recent reports of 30+ knots “on the nose”, very uncomfortable – so we opted for caution and anchored at Chamela at 11:30.  We visited with other cruisers here, and went ashore to buy fresh tortillas and produce.  We returned to the boat to find a 25kn+ south wind blowing right into the anchorage, putting us on a lee shore. We up anchored and went down the bay to a small group of islands and anchored in their lee. After 4-5 hrs the wind dropped and came back from the NW. We moved again back to the main bay of Chamela. Then we got a good night’s sleep and departed north, arriving at Ipala at 4:30 pm. Just before we made Ipala we got a hit on the fishing rod and pulled in another nice “Sierra”. There was enough fish for 6 so we invited Kiyomi and Indra for dinner, followed by a nap, and a very early morning departure (1:30 am) let us pass the notorious Cabo Corrientes (Cape of Currents!!) at 4:30 in the morning, when there is less likelihood of high winds/waves. (We went by with 9kn off the land and a very long west swell).  We arrived at La Cruz at 8:10 am on Sat, Feb. 23.

Just in case you think this is all just good fun, (it is actually) there is a lot involved in moving around the Mexican mainland by boat. Unless you have traveled this route before, and preferably by daylight, you can go very wrong. Unfortunately most of the charts for the mainland are very inaccurate, the surveys date back to Montezuma I think. The coastline is as much as 3 miles from the location shown on the charts. This makes any navigation tricky. For instance most anchorages are actually 1-2 miles on shore according to the charts plotted against modern GPS positioning. Our GPS is very accurate - it is within 20’ usually. As you can see from this photo the chart in our GPS varies by 1.3 miles from where we were actually anchored.  We should actually be shown in the lighter section of the chart not over the name Ipala. Whenever we go around a new point we make and fix a waypoint in the GPS for future use as we will be this again next year and may have to do the trips in the dark. The first time anywhere here its much better if you can do it in daylight. 

 Photo Album for Leg 7

       Part II