This coast from Mazaltlán to Huatuco is called the Mexican Riviera. For me riviera is synonym of obnoxious resorts, tawdry tourist traps and cheap crowd everywhere.

But beside 4 or 5 highlight places, Puerto Vallarta, Manzanillo, Zihuatanejo, Acapulco, spaced along this huge coast there is barely nothing in between but infinite deserted beaches, no towns or villages insight, but also no anchorages….

This coast near those cities are not spoiled too much by anarchist skizophrenics architecs as the European Riviera can be. I guess because there is space here, also because there is not as many people, locals or tourists on this Pacific side. The coast is barely inhabited, all the big cities and towns are inland in Mexico. So this riviera is not overwhelming, but still, it makes us yearn for Baja when anchored off the beach on a sunday afternoon swearing at the  jet skies which buzz around us like mad mosquitoes. We dream of the incredible light which color the bare mountains of Baja, the sun which filled up our power plant…The solitude and silence of the anchorages of the Sea of Cortés. And we also miss the smooth landings on the protected beaches. Here, the mighty swells of the Pacific find its way no matter what even if we do not feel it much from Nanna. Or we get used to it, a gentle rocking that put us to sleep… It does not take much to get a little surf on the beach and above all it does not take much surf to get us and Galatea in trouble. We have pitchpoled once, everything, including me flying off head first in the sand. We are now over cautious when landing, sometimes we rather swim ashore with the dry bags, anything than making a disgraceful and catastrophic landing. Luckily the water is warm enough and the sun hot enough to dry us fast. So of course logistically everything is a little more difficult on this coast. But is it up to us to find the best spots for what the needs of the moment are.

isa.

The water here is a bit over 20 degrees C so that´s a big positive. Also, we´ve had a very warm welcoming from our neighbours in the anchorage dispite their ´ruddy´boat name – Hooligan- who showed us around downtown the day following our arrival.

All is well onboard, more to come soon…

Since we experienced settled conditions we took the opportunity to spend 2 nights at Isla Isabela, a bird sanctuary and a very sweet spot.

This big rock is on the SE side of the island, and we were anchored just S of it

and while swinging at anchor, we found ourselves a wee bit close to the rocks sometimes…

from there to La Cruz, another 22 hours of SLOW sailing, but again, very nice and we truelly enjoyed being at sea again for a few days. It’s like a prolongued meditation when one just exists, in a peaceful state of mind, and lives in the moment – like we always should- HERE and NOW is all that exists.

BTW, has anyone ever heard of a book named ‘Zen, and the art of sailing a boat around the world’ ? ….or is it still to be written?

So here it is : our very unique  tree decorated with all the little tresors found this summer in the Sea.

So to all of you who share our life through this blog : Feliz Navidad  from La Paz.

isa.

So of course we had a great day, and literally sailed in circles around most of the other participants. Since the race consisted of just one down-wind leg, and Bob´s spinnaker halyard had parted shortly before this event, w had to zigzag downwind in very light air with a heavy genoa when the other participants all flew there big light-air chutes.

Despite this we kept pace with the leader until a few hundred yards from the finish line after sailing at least 50% longer distance. That shows the speed of this vessel.

The most fun part of the day was actually just before the start when we were on a close reach for the start line and made good 13.5 knots in 8-9 true.

Almost lost my hat!

As always, we have a new list with boat projects to do here. Better supply of marine hardware and all other stuff we need here than further south along the mainland coast.

Replacing the attachment ponts for the dinghy on foredeck, rebedding stanchion bases and replacing the bolts. Doing an oilchange on the engine and cleaning the heat exchanger and the exhaust elbow and hoses together with an alignment tune-up for the engine and shaft.

Buying a diverse range of smaller bits and pieces that are needed on board is alwo on the list as doing repairs on the wind-vane (self steering gear) that hasn’t really worked as it should since we bought the boat and probably for quite a few years before that too.

During this time we will also enjoy catching up with some friends we got here and just enjoy life in a big town again with all the produce available in a suoermarket compared to the small stores we provisioned iin during the summer.

Thanksgiving is coming up the 24th of November and we are going to have Turkey and Pumpkin Pie together with 248 other people here, arranged by the ‘Club Cruzeros’.(www.clubcruzeros.org). We are looking forward to this, for me (Magnus) this will be only my second Thanksgiving dinner ever!

www.vivalapaz.net/

I think all of us have heard, and seen how deadly the Rattle Snakes are, and as a matter of fact, there are over ten (!) different species here in Mexico, all of them highly venomous. What we ahdn’t previously heard, and likely not too many people at all, is that more people die from Scorpion bites than from Rattle Snakes….or Sharks for that matter.

We have yet not seen a rattle snake here and only one Tarantula and one Scorpion. Both those during our first week here whiel we stayed in a rented appartment. Considering how many days and miles we have been trekking and hiking these mountains in nothing but shorts and sandals, we might have had a Guardian Angel watching our steps.

That said, the by far most dangerous thing here is the desert land itself. Why? How come?  -The lack of fresh water! Dehydration is the most common cause of premature death in this so beautiful and fascinating part of the world.

Let me share a True Story that I came across today with you:

A Mexican couple was driving along from one place to another on the Baja peninsula in there pick-up car a few years ago. Nothing strange in that, lots of people do it every day right?

Right. But this unlucky couple had a car break-down, an axle broke. Nothng strange in that either, happens ever so often. One has to see the so called roads (mere dirt roads or tracks most of them, (the paved Highway One from Tijuana at the US border and all the way south to Cabo San Lucas the exception) to comprehend it.

Not only did this couple have their car fail, but they weree unlucky enough to have forgot to bring  plenty of fresh water with them! The car broke down just 7 miles (11 km) from a village. They took off by foot toward that village. A few hours later, the man, staggering and totally delirious, made it to a house to try to get help after telling them his story. Three people took off to search for his wife and found her sitting under a bush just half a mile from the house. Dead. By thirst, by dehydration. Her husband so close meet the same destiny.

In the desert, during the day in the summer especially, on needs a gallon (3,6l) of water just to survive. And water is indeed VERY difficlt to find on Baja. This is the reason the peninsula is so sparesely populated, togethe with the fact that it’s so mountaineous that any form of land transportation is extremely difficult. The Highway 1, paved and all, weren’t finsished until 1974 and it still takes several days to drive from North to South.

Oddly enough, this is also what makes this place SO magical and SO interesting. We are far from the first people who have fallen in love with Baja California

A few nights at anchor with no signs of human activity in sight (except in all honesty a bit of garbage and floatsam om the beaches, washed  up during last winter’s ‘screaming Blue Northers) we hiked on land, discovering the cadaver of a Whale, probably a Sperm Whale, and the spinal bone of a Dolphin among lots of birds and other remnants, washe ashore after being washed white by the sea and later by the sun.

A few weeks ago we had a close encounter with a Fullgrown Male Orca (AKA Killer Whale) that surfaced just 3-4 meters from our boat to check us out before he dove out of our lives. This time we had an equally memorable moment when we sighted a Family group of Sperm Whales (cascelots) a few hundred meters to starboard. Lazily floating in the midst of a tidal rip some females with calves. While we were studying them in our binoculars, the wind died out and once we felt we had seen enough of dozing whales we fired up the engine to move on. They hear engines through the water, and within a couple of minutes, the BIG male, apparently decided to make sure we were not a competing Male Whale or a threat to his Harem,  surfaced on our Port side, 30-40 meters off our beam. We saw his eye while he took a good look at us for maybe 30 seconds after which he had written us off and simply dove- showing us his magnificient tale fin.

Too bad we didn’t dig out the camera, we were simply in awe of this encounter and it didn’t occure to us until after half an hour that we should have captured such a moment.  This was by no means the end of his display. Perhaps our presence awoke some hormones in his 40-45 feet long body, because he returned to his family and started a spectacular show of breaching, several times he jumped completely out of the water just to crash down again in a giant Splash.

Even if we couldn’t detect any signs of appreciation from his companions, we were immensely impressed with the show. By now we had the camera in the cockpit, but they were too far from us to get a good picture.

There are plenty of Sperm Whales in the Sea of Cortéz, since they mainly feed on Giant Squids that thrive in the depths of the Sea. In the 70-ies when Jacques Cousteau filmed and surveyed the marine life here, he commented on the large amount of Hammerhead Sharks, whch he also documented. About a year ago we saw a BBC documentary from the Sea of Cortéz where a team of marine biologists (among them the grand son of J. Cousteau!) to follow up on changes in this so special marine environment. They found that the Hammerheads, still found, had decreased considerably in numbers and the population of Giant Squids almost exploded in numbers.

The reason for this remains unknown. As a side account, the Mexican fishermen catch these quite scary Giant Squids with hand lines from their open Pangas (fishing vessels) with outboard motors for propulsion. Tough guys!

Later on this day, I wondered why we -for once- hadn’t caught any fish from the line we tow behind the boat. Just before we entered the anchorage I hauled in the line just to discover that the hook was gone (!) from the otherwise untouched lure. We had no signs of a fish biting during the day, and normally the line should have broken long before the hook got torn away. A mystery, but you can’t win them all!

A quote:

¨The Gods do not deduct from man’s allotted span those hours spent in sailing¨

 -Ancient Phoenician Proverb-