Adventures

Huatulco, Mexico was a complete and total surprise to us. In my mind it was gonna be a dusty end of the road town at the bottom of Mexico.

Not at all.

I mean, sure it was dusty. And it was at the bottom (almost) of Mexico, but end of the road dead-end town it was not. We had a great time there. From what I gather, the town is one of the very few planned towns in Mexico. Very cool town all told.

There is a crap load of great diving, snorkling, fishing…etc. to do there. There is also a cruise ship terminal but the town has not seemed to succumb to the usual bullshit that is normally tacked on with such a thing. There is the normal touristy stuff, but it has not completely taken over the place.

We spent about a week in a couple anchorages around the area and a few days in the Marina so we could get a few parts shipped to us. (i’m not even gonna go in the that story with the BS DHL put us through).

As with most of cruising, a lot of time is involved in the checking of weather to make sure you have enough or not too much wind for your crossing to your next destination. And honestly, since we left Banderas Bay (Puerto Vallarta), I really did not give weather much of a thought. We would just go. The weather down in this area this time of year is pretty benign.

However, to go south from Huatulco you have to cross the Bahia Tuantecpec which is notorious for biblically hellish winds that can crank up from 0 to 50 knots of wind in a matter of minutes. So we had to make sure we had a nice mellow weather window before heading out.

Local knowledge dictates you keep “one foot on the beach”. And they mean this almost literally. Some boats will follow the coast line in 30 feet of water only a few hundred yards off the shore. We did not go to this extreme, we stayed between 5 and 15 miles off the coast. Because we had very nice weather.

And because sometimes you get bored, I took a video of the windvane doing what it does so well, steer the boat so we don’t have to.

Our destination was Bahia del Sol, El Salvador. Which is 440 nautical miles away from Huatulco as the crow flies, but since we hugged the coast, we actually traveled 475 miles. Took 4 days.

After we got our parts and got them installed. Checked out the weather and had a good window to take off. We did just that.

The crossing was very mellow. We actually could have used a little more wind than we had. We motored half of that distance due to no wind at all some days.

We caught a number of fish. Unfortunately they were not the delicious kind, so they got thrown back.

One got thrown back dead, due to a case of mistaken identity and a serious run in with my filet knife before we realized the mistake. He was a Jack Cravalle, which put up one HELL of a fight (you were right Dan Freeman), unfortunately for him, I completely suck at identifying fish and thought he was some sort of tuna.

P.S they taste like shit.

We also snagged and drug a fishing net and floats on our rudder for we do not honestly know how long. But somewhere out there off the coast of northern El Salvador there is what is possibly a Guatemalan fishing net floating about. If anyone sees anything on the news about a border war starting up between these two country’s local fishermen, lets keep this little bit of info on the down low….cool?

The big finale of this trip is the bit where we have to cross a bar in order to get into the estuary where we could anchor and clear into the country.

You can only cross this bar at high slack tide with the help of a pilot to guide you across. This is no joke. Shit is fo’ real!

The next two pictures were taken by us, from shore the next day of another boat doing the same thing we just did.

Yeah….whut!!??

Due to light winds and our stubbornness/desire to sail as much as we can. We missed the tide on Sunday morning. We got to the location Sunday evening about an hour or two before sunset. So we scooted up as close to the shore as we dared and dropped anchor in about 40 feet of water just outside the surf zone where the waves were breaking on shore. This makes for a very, very, very rolly anchorage. Luckily we were both very tired from the crossing and have a lot of faith in our anchor gear.

About an hour or so before high tide the next am we get a call on the radio from the guide and we meet him at the spot agreed upon.

That picture does not look like much. But trust me when I say there is a bite mark in my helm seat that may not sand out.

The plan. He watches the waves and waits for a lull, then he tells us to give it full power and follow him in.

All the while we are sitting there in the Pacific Ocean about a 1/4 mile off the beach, a very short 50 yards from breaking waves that we are about to drive our boat across. For you non-boaters reading this. That last sentence describes almost EXACTLY the spot where you never want to have your boat. And yet there we were.

Over the radio he says, GO GO GO!

And we………go.

We have a fat slow sailboat, with a small engine. GO GO GO is not an option we actually have, but we gave it hell anyway.

As we approach the waves, they sorta die down a small bit. The pilot’s timing was spot on. We are crossing over the bar in 12 feet of water, which means there is only 6 feet under the keel.

This picture was taken from the pilot’s boat.

The next waves is rushing up behind us. It picks up the stern of the boat and we start surfing down the face of the wave. It’s a small wave. But when you are driving your home, everything you own in the world (with the exception of a beat up Jeep at a friends place in Montana and a small box of pictures and books in Tawn’s parents basement in Chicago) small is a very relative term. In addition there are other larger waves breaking on either side of the boat, but the pilot has us in the sweet spot and we surf 2 more waves and then…..poof….we are in calm water.

We enter the estuary and motor up to the docks of the marina about a half mile away. Are greeted by the guide, and the people that run the El Salvador Rally, some other fellow cruisers and immigration officials. Someone hands us a drink and we are in El Salvador!

I never thought I’d be writing a survival story….especially while motoring in no wind or seas with a boat full of food and a fridge full of cold bebidas….but I am, and it all started with a bee.

CB and I do 3 hour shifts, I had just started my afternoon shift just of the coast of Guatemala when a bee landed on a Nalgene bottle in our cup holder. The bottle contained aqua fresca (a drink CB makes containing fresh limes, water and sugar) and I couldn’t fault the little dude…that’s one refreshing drink, and he was probably blown off shore and thirsty…this was a failure on my part. Next thing I know the little bastard sends an all wings on deck call out to his homies and I see this swarm coming at our boat. I hate bugs…so this upsets me greatly. They started coming in waves and I had just finished taking a shower on deck. So I was drenched, nekkid and batting bees off me who wanted water! I grabbed a can of Off from the dodger pocket and started spraying away. This did not have the desired affect as the bees started swarming everything covered in the Off. CB who was asleep in the aft cabin smelled the Off and wondered where the orange smell was coming from and why there was a crazy lady spinning and swatting in the cockpit. I got down below and was trying to put in screens as they were headed down below. I was screaming at CB about bee attack and he looked confused until three landed in the window. I was batting them out of the companion way hatch and trying to get the screen in when CB pushed me out into the cockpit and sealed the screen…with him down below of course…with the food and cold bebidas. I was swarmed again and ran to the front of the boat where fewer bees were….still nekkid, but armed with a sarong and a towel. All thoughts in my mind are to the X-files movie Fight the Future…look what happened to Scully when she was stung! So while batting away bees and covering up in the sarong…I attempted to seek shelter from the sweltering sun…oh, I also had my cup of coffee. CB handed me a bottle of fizzy water…worried about my survival situation…but in reality for me to drink it so he could make a bee trap out of the bottle. As I waved my towel above my head to shoo away the bees and drank my fizzy water and coffee, I felt the searing sun on my back and shoulders…the bees had now taken over mid ships and I was forced to the bow sprit. I sat down and clipped the towel to the sides of the pulpit to create a shelter from the sun.

Meanwhile, CB was below making bee traps an killing bees with the swatter. With two traps deployed in the cockpit, the bees abandoned their front lines and moved back to the traps. My situation improved and I was able to grab my clothing. Then CB, who was busily swatting bees from under the screen (still down below) suggested that I go back to the cockpit and remove the Nalgene because it was distracting some bees from the trap. WHAAAT! You do it I say…he said he was guarding the inside of the boat:-\ So I take down my shelter and wrap myself in a towel and made my way back to the swarm…I tied a bowline around the loop in the Nalgene and flung the thing overboard and ran back to my shelter. This was the turning point in the war…now all the bees were focused on the traps and plunged to their death. Their stupid bee brothers looked down into the trap and thought nothing of the death and mayhem below and just plunged on in…take that bees! Whoever said bees are endangered are dead wrong…they just all retired to Guatemala.

I survived my ordeal and am living to tell the story. If ever you find yourself off the coast of Guatemala and are attacked by bees, build one of these handy devices, it may just save your life!

Take a drinks bottle, cut off the top, invert it inside the bottom and add sugar water. The bee can get in, but something to do with the way their eyes work prohibits them from flying out…good stuff!

Every now an again you need a break from paradise. While in Barra de Navidad, we put the boat up in a marina for a few days to take an inland trip to Colima City (the capital of the state of Colima). We made hotel reservations, got some bus tickets and packed our back packs to head inland to see some terra firma. The bus was a huge surprise with reclining luxury seats and your own private movie screen on the seat back. The trip was about three hours. Of course, we had no clue or plan what we were going to do in Colima when we got there. So we headed to the local Officina de Tourismo and checked out what there was to do. Turns out the city itself is really old and has some ancient churches and is well known for its Jardin’s (city parks). There are also ruins within the city where the ancient peoples lived. The ruins were unearthed and repaired. You could walk and climb over most…there was a tomb where bones and pots were found and the archaeologist left them in place and you could walk down into the earth to chek em’ out. We tried (3 different companies) to rent a car but every time we were supposed to meet the rental agents no one ever showed up…so we bailed on that. Unfortunately there is a large park not to far from the city where you can go see an active volcano, swim in fresh spring fed lakes and drive on this road where it seems like you are going up when you are really going down…don’t ask….I never got to see it. That aside, we had a really good time checking out the city.

Colima has a lot of funky weird stuff…this was amongst the weird…kinda gave me the clown heebs

This is one of the really old churches near a Jardin…funny thing, the sculpture in front is of a classic tuba vendor…a naturally fermented drink found in the top of palm trees…guess this priest loved him some tuba…I know I did

Close up of tuba vendor statue…tuba is fermented, but not alcoholic in nature. It is served over ice with cacahuentes (peanuts) on top

On our way to the Parque Regional (zoo) we came across this entrepreneurial enterprise…unfortunately the legal council was out on siesta

Hey guys…what’s up…let’s say you let me outta here and we can grab a beer…on me!

I don’t know what the above two animals are…but I am guessing this is some piggy type creature

These turtles were in the reptile area with crocs, lizzards and snakes…every time we went near they all swam towards us, they were either hungry or wanted escape from the crocs

I don’t usually like monkeys, but these guys were pretty funny…and they didn’t even throw poo at me

These are the ancient ruins. The site was massive. Walking around there you really felt transported to another time and could almost see the palapa tops and ninos running through the narrow streets as you walked around

These are some of the ruins that have not been redone…there is a carving in this wall

More ruins…think this was near the play court…can’t remember the name of the game, but it was like high-li (sp?)

Bonus, while we were at the ruins, the active volcano erupted.

This is he tumba (tomb) that was dug up recently. You can actually descend into it and look in

And here is what they found inside

Mexico doesn’t do “bars” in the sense that Americans expect…but when they do, they go full out with swinging doors and everything…I half expected to see some gunslingers when we entered. It was one of those music screetchin’ to a halt stop and stare entrances that we love so much. Don’t think they got many gringos up in there

When you drink in a bar like that, ya gotta be a man…Cuba libre = double shot of rum with a coke to wash it down

During our stay it was carnival (like Mardi gras and fat Tuesday). There are 10 days of activity and on the last day a large parade for the outgoing carnival queen and the new one. We were there for the last day.

The old queen….

And the new..

It was a typical Mexican parade full of color and extragavant costumes. This one seemed to be more senior centric…but they were cute old ladies and really got into the dancing and partying.

Overall this was an awesome trip…can’t wait for many more inland adventures in Central America.

After leaving Yelapa behind, we did an overnight to Chamela. This was a cool bay with chill little palapas next to a river…apparently there was a town…but we walked up the wrong road and never found it. We hung out a night there and caught up with Josh and Jill on s/v La Gitana (fellow surfer we met up in Punta de Mita). Both boats headed off the next day to a cool island name Isla Cocina which is a bird sanctuary. Great snorkeling and a perfect beach for a bonfire. We made hobos…a concoction from Scotty on s/v Ghost…which consists of meat, veggies and copious amounts of cheese and butter all wrapped in foil and hucked into the fire…good stuff!

The next day we had a long passage of 8 knots to Paraiso…which was our own private paradise. As we pulled into the bay there was a beach with 4 coconut trees and a beautiful white Sand beach…it was amazing. More good snorkeling….I’ll let the photos do the rest.

Palarran in Palm tree paradise

The landscape around the anchorage was a dinghy exploring mecca

This is listed as a great dinghy pass through…I don’t know Hello World…the oh shit factor was a lot higher here than the cave in Canada…we declined to “pass” through

Next stop was Tenacatita…this place was like LaCruz south. Tons of boats that had been anchored there for months…there was cruisers net on the radio and everything…this aside, the place was amazing. We also finally hooked up with s/v Unleashed who had left La Cruz to go south about a month ahead of us. They are now on the return route north.

Catching up with S/V Unleashed (the younger couple on the right) and some other cruisers

There was a cocodrillio reserve done up Mexican style with semi rotted board walks bordered by 3 foot high hurricane fencing that was in need of much repair…did this sway our 10 peso entrance…hell no! The following are photos taken on a regular point and shoot…no zoom required.

I swear…this dude is alive…never did move, but they say a croc can move 30mph on land in short bursts…I’ll take buddies word for it:-)

Next was the jungle estuary tour…who doesn’t like to explore a jungle via dinghy cutting through narrow passages carved by a tidal flow? The birds were beautiful and varied from Pelicans to Snowy Egrets.

There were also a number of large cobwebs that CB always managed to drive through on my side of the dinghy. The river was about 2 miles long and ended in a large lagoon where apparently you used to be able to beach your dinghy and hike over to the beach and have a beer at a palapa…unfortunately about 2 years ago there was a property dispute and a large fence went up preventing any access…then all the businesses went tits up…so we just turned around.

Yoda was just around the corner….swamp land this is, yeessss.

CB really could have cared less about the flora and fauna… he was all about the full throttle return trip. He flew the dink through tight turns narrowly missing pangas flying with Han Solo type skill (so he said) until we came out to the beach…it took us an hour and a half to get up there and only 20 minutes to get back…good stuff!

CB said this was just like riding speeder bikes through the forests on the moons of Endor

The next day it was onto Barre de Navidad…I can’t wait to see this place…updates to follow…I promise :-)