After about 10 weeks of not sailing we left La Paz on 2/27/2016 and headed to Muertos and then to Mazatlan. We were worried about how Hartley would do with his inner ear problem. The vestibular neuritis never seemed to go completely away and he still gets dizzy if he turns his head too fast, and he has a fairly constant background balance irritation. Fortunately being on the ocean didn’t seem to bother him any more than being on land. The sea was kind to us as well and was very flat.
I had been in the States for almost 3 weeks dealing with my thrombocytopenia (low platelet count) and was given some medication that is supposed to last on average 45 days but sometimes more and sometimes less. I was very glad to get back to Hartley, home , and the ocean. We were ready to move on.
As I said the sail was very quiet. We left La Paz about 9 am and arrived in Meurtos about 5 pm. We motorsailed (that means we used the sail and the motor as there was not enough wind to move us along at a reasonable speed but the addition of the sail stabilized the boat and added a little to the speed.) In Meurtos there is a nice little cafe sitting at one side of the bay called the 1535 restaurant. We were too lazy to put the motor on the dingy so Hartley rowed over. In any case we had bought new oars and hadn’t tried them out yet, they work good. We had been there before when we sailed up to La Paz and again enjoyed the food and the beautiful view.
We left for Mazatlan the next morning at about 7 am and had a nice uneventful sail over to Mazatlan arriving about noon 29 hours later. I was really glad of the quiet trip as some friends of ours on Southern Star had done the same trip a few weeks earlier and got caught in some unexpected bad weather. Their autopilot quit working and they had to hand steer , a very tiring thing to do for 30 hours Turned out they really dodged the bullet. The cable had come loose and caught on something and that was all that saved them from losing all their steering.

While in Mazatlan we decided to do some touring. We went up into the mountains on a tequila tour. Learned all about how to grow blue agave , harvest and make tequila.

The next tour we did was the Copala tour. We stopped at Copala and a couple of other small towns to get the feel of the area. Copala is a tiny town near the beginnings of the Sierra Madre mountains. They make miniature wooden carvings of the town and sell them to the tourists. Despite my vow not to buy things I had to buy one. One of the other stops, actually both days, was at a bakery. They have an oven which they heat ( in days past with wood) now with propane, put the dough in, close the door and bake the bread. No need to keep adding heat once the stones of the oven are hot, they just keep the heat perfect until the bread is done. The bakery goods did not fall under the category of “I don’t need more things on the boat” as they did not take up room for long, at least  not on the boat. They were delicious.

Another town was Malpica where they made floor tiles (and bread!!!).

The houses were brightly colored.

 

The third trip was to the the old city of Mazatlan where they have a big market. The variety of food was amazing.

They also had all sorts of souvenirs to buy. I found a good excuse to buy a couple of Mexican baby dresses as Dr Gibson was due any day and obviously needed them. They also have cliff diving and Hartley got a great shot.

We were very lucky to meet up with some friends from the Baja Ha Ha, Kris and Alex from Full Glass. They had been traveling further south and were full of great stories. Now they are heading back to the States and will put their boat on a transport ship back up to Victoria on Vancouver island.

Then after our travels I got my blood drawn and found out my platelets were low again, necessitating another quick trip to Phoenix. While there I got to see both my daughters as Lya lives there and  Ariel was on spring break. Ariel and I stayed at our friend’s Jacque’s house and the four of us had a great time. Lya unfortunately had to work so she didn’t get to do some of the “stuff”. . On Monday night we went to a introductory pole dancing class that lasted almost 2 hours and had a blast. After that we went out to eat (at 9:30 pm) to an Ethiopian restaurant, just because none of us had ever eaten Ethiopian food. Really good.On Tuesday I had to go to the dentist but they went to the science museum and had fun. That evening we had a picnic dinner at Hole in the Rock which is a park with a rock with a big hole which overlooks the zoo and a big pond with lots of ducks. I should have timed my trip better as I had to leave on Wednesday, but they went to the zoo, Thursday they had massages and their nails done. On Friday, Lya , our oldest daughter, had the day off so they went to Sedona and did a Pink Jeep tour and went to Slide Rock, a stream with slippery rocks you can slide on.  On Saturday they went to the Renaissance Festival

and that night Ariel flew back to Arkansas . End of spring camp!

In the  middle of all this we stopped by to look at our old house in Phoenix and saw that they finally had a bunch of big equipment there, acting like they might start some work on the property.

A couple of days later we looked again and they were knocking down the old house. We explained to the man in charge who we were (former owners for 25 + years) and he let us stay and watch for awhile.

I just had to add this picture of the note Lya wrote on the living room wall.

As for me I flew back to Mazatlan on Wednesday and on Thursday we left about mid day and did an over night trip to Isla Isabel. We had some really good wind the first 6 hours and flew along. A nice sail but that meant we got to Isla Isabel before dawn and had to sail around the island for about an hour until it was light enough to see where to anchor. There is mostly rocks and so you have to be able to see the sandy spots to drop the anchor. The water is beautifully clear..

We spent the day hiking around the island. There were only 5 boats there and only one crew besides us were ashore that day so we had it pretty much to ourselves. The only other people there were a group of scientists who monitor  the wild life and a bunch of fishermen who have fishing shacks set up on the beach.
The island is like a mini Galapagos. It is very isolated. The animals are protected and are not afraid of humans.  The only predators are black ship rats that were introduced to the island many years ago and are trapped as much as possible. The  trees are very short, just a bit bigger than you would consider brush, and are loaded with frigate birds, I mean hundreds of them.

They were nesting and hatching their eggs at this time of year. We got to see a few new born goslings. There also were lots of blue footed boobies.  They nest on the ground,really no nest at all they just sit on the ground and keep their egg warm with their feet. Their feet are very blue!

There are lots of other birds too, just incredible. On the ground and some in the trees were many , many iguanas.

They, too were not afraid and just sat there as you walked by.
After a full day there on the island we left to sail overnight to Nuevo Vallarta. The reason for the overnight trips was that the timing was important. The first overnight was so we could spend the day at the island but not overnight as the holding for the anchor is poor and if the wind changes direction you are in trouble. The second was to be sure to be at the marina before 2 pm as it closes then and we would have to wait another day to be allowed in. That’s all for now, more later.