Up till 0100 last night and awake and at the fuel dock at 0700 this morning. We’re fueled, washed down and almost put away. We’ll be leaving in an hour or so for Punta Mita for the night, then the big jump starts manana.
Watch for updates here. We’ll try to drop a line every day at least to give coordinates.
Hiva Oa is our next landfall.
We motored the six or seven miles over to Nuevo Vallarta this morning and got our Zarpe. The Zarpe is basically our exit papers from Mexico. Very important since there has been a rumor that someone got to the Marquesas after sailing the 2500 miles or so and were not allowed to enter because they didn’t have a Zarpe (see photo below of the doc and the nice immigration folks who checked us out and inspected the boat.
There are five or six other boats in the marina who are ready to leave too. Seems there’s a favorable wind pattern for the next five days or so and we’re all rushing to get final work done and provision the fresh vegetables. We took delivery of about 20 lbs of vaccum packed frozen meat this morning and the veggies will be acquired at 1700 at the Friday Farmers Market in a few hours. You can feel the stress on the dock as the boats are rushing to get all this stuff ready. We were up last night after midnight and probably will be tonight as well, but we are ready and will leave tomorrow morning. Some things on the list just won’t get done, but the important ones are covered. You’re never as ready as you’d like to be. At some point, you just go.
The nice folks from Mexican Immigration gave us the thumbs up to leave
So, follow us…We’ll get back to blogging every day or so as we voyage across the Pacific. I’m trying to get the position reporting program to reliably work. If I can, great, but if not, I’ll add Lattitude/Longitude numbers and with a little effort on Google Earth, you’ll be able to track us if the program won’t.
Our Zarpe
Hmmm, some very creative (some might even say “sick”) answers out there. But as you can see these are excellent and fine looking light holders so folks coming back to their boats at night after one two many Kava–Kava’s don’t mistake Charisma for just a big shadow they have to motor through. Extra points for Rich’s answer which was very topical! I might need to get one of them man-dress things to complete my wardrobe.
Hmmm, in looking at this fine device, I might try and fit an upside down bottle of rum with a cork and hose. Would be just the thing for making cocktails on the high seas. The bottle wouldn’t slide all over the place as the boat rolls about.
So, once again, many thanks to the fine folks on Kanga (Jim and Jeanne) for providing this excellent piece of equipment.
Sent from my iPhone
As we’re getting ready to depart, your test is to identify these craft made devices given to us as Bon voyage gifts from our friends on S/V Kanga >
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Yay! Now we can really use the Ham bands as we’re crossing.
With that done, now all we need to do is change the oil and filters and finish provisioning. Current plan is to leave a week from this coming Thursday (April 5th). We could leave earlier but the Pacific High isn’t settled yet, so while we could get some good wind for the first few hundred miles offshore, the trade-winds are really light. The folks who have already left are complaining about little wind and rough seas. We can wait a bit for a more comfortable ride.
Here’s some pictures of the town. The story is a few posts “back”
The town's main dock where the small ferry boat comes from Puerto Vallarta. This is basically the only way to get here other than by horseback or boat.
The town goes straight up the mountain, so very steep. Here's a view down into the bay (Charisma is in the left rear of the photo)
This is as wide as the streets get since they have no cars.
But they do have horses that they use to carry stuff through town.
Very colorful!
Another view of the town back from the bay and along the river
And finally, the happy dogs of the town.
One last trip with our boat buddies. These are the pictures from our Yelapa adventure detailed below
All good adventures should start with lunch on the beach
The local dogs know where to hang out. This little puppy was learning early
Heading up the trail looking for the waterfall. Very tropical.
Some of the "huts" were very well designed...
...some looked a little rickety
No cars here, so the horses do the work
Wildlife along the trail
Lush, partly jungle along the trail
There were multiple river crossings along the way
We missed this "sign" the first day. Can you see the word; "waterfall"?
We found it the second day. Here's Dave "claiming" it for Camanoe. (The water looks dirty because of the sandy bottom, but it's really very clear)
Ann enjoying the cool water after a very hot and sweaty hike
We’ve had some good times with a lot of friends that we’ve met along the way so far. Camanoe and Dos Leos are two boats who have now left. Camonoe has gone South and Dos Leos has gone North. We of course, are soon to be heading West.
"Charisma's" in the cockpit
Ann enjoying a sundowner
A great pot luck featuring fresh caught shrimp grilled on the BBQ
We’re mostly supposed to be working on finishing projects for the boat and provisioning in expectation of leaving for the South Seas on April 1ish, but when the opportunity to go across the bay to Yelapa (about 16 miles), with two of our favorite boat buddies Camanoe (with Dave and Stephanie) and Dos Leos (with Bob and Deanne) we jumped. We were only going to go for an overnight, but once here, we decided to make it a two night event.
Yelapa is a small bay, maybe ¼ mile across, which is mostly isolated from the rest of the world. The only way to get here is by boat or an arduous four wheel drive journey on unimproved roads. From the anchorage it looks a little like a Mediterranean coastal town built up into the cliffs above the bay. Both lovely and somewhat primitive and broken down. There are really two towns here. The main part of town goes straight up the cliffs. The houses are built somewhat precariously on the rock and you make your way through town (really up town) by a winding series of steps and paths. They use a combination of walking, horses and donkeys to carry stuff and the occasional ATV. The paths are not big enough for cars and there are no cars here anyway. We hiked up through town marveling at the architecture as well as the faith in the foundations which for the most part look a little “iffy”. They wouldn’t last a minute in earthquake country is all I can say to describe them. On the way up, you are following a stream that tumbles down through town and when you get to the top, there’s a 75 to 100 foot waterfall that cascades into a little pool. This is where the town gets its water, which is then gravity fed down the hill into the houses.
The other part of Yelapa is the beach part of town that follows a river up a shallow valley. This part of Yelapa is mostly thatched roof houses, although some were more substantial. It makes an interesting juxtaposition between the cliff side look and the more tropical jungle look. There is both here.
Our first day here, we moored just off the beach on a mooring that the locals rent out. This is a deep bay and difficult to anchor in so enterprising locals have created a mooring field for boats. They get rent (about $16 US per night) and more boats come since many don’t like to anchor in the first place. Once secured, we took a water taxi ashore through small breakers and jumped off into the surf and up the beach to a nice thatched roof restaurant where we rubbed our feet in the sand while enjoying cervezas and fish tacos.
After lunch, we decided we would take the hike up river to a different waterfall from the one in town. The hike itself was worth the day as we got to see architecture that you just don’t see in California. A combination of thatched huts and adobe cottages. Some were in better shape than others. Most had a combination of chickens, chicks, dogs, horses and cows tied up or laying out in the yards. We walked through “town” on a small cobble path that just had room for either two walking abreast or a horse, which meant we moved to the side when a horse came through. Jungle was interspersed with the homes, so there were banana trees (with real bananas hanging just out of reach), coconuts and lots of other fruits that we don’t know the names of or whether they are safe to eat. We were told the walk up the waterfall would be about an hour and a half. “You go up this path, then take the bridge across the river, go up and cross through the water two times then through the gate…” were the best directions we had.
Two hours later and after walking through the river four times, we realized we had probably missed a turn somewhere. Time to go back. On the way back, about a half mile down from where we stopped, we saw a broken down gate with the word: “waterfall” scratched onto it-probably with a nail. OK, now we knew where to go, but it was getting late. Maybe tomorrow.
Round trip, approximately 8 miles, including river fording a little climbing and a mostly unimproved trail. We got back to the beach at 6 PM. We were very lucky that one of the panga drivers was still around to ferry us back to our boats. All of us collapsed onto the boats. By all accounts the next day, each of us in our three boats were mostly asleep by 8PM.
Flash forward to the next day. Hailed a fisherman for a ride to the beach. We paid $1.80 per couple for the ride. The fishermen had a load of lobsters in the boat. Had it had been later in the day we would have bought a few and had a bbq. However, it was early morning and we had a mission: Find the waterfall!
Once dropped ashore, we heading back up into the hills along the trail through the town, across the bridge and we forded two rivers. We were looking for the sign, but there was a strange noise coming down the trail. Thump, thud, kerthump! We all jumped aside just in time as a small horse came down dragging a dozen cut trees. About six per side. Just the right size to build a little palapa or hut to live in. Then as we were discussing this, another horse dragging more timber and another followed finally by a caballero. You definitely feel like you’ve gone back in time here.
Anyway, back to the waterfall, we found the gate, went another half mile, climbed some rocks and there it was, just as promised. A nice waterfall with a pond about 30 yards across. Hot feet, sweaty bodies. Shoes and shirts came flying off and we were all in the water. It was glorious. And the best part, there was not another soul in our part of the waterfall. We all swam some, then just sat on a little beach in the middle of the pool in about two feet of water and enjoyed another beautiful day in paradise. The evening ended with a fun game of “Catch Phrase” (which the girls won 2 out of 3 rounds) with Camanoe and Dos Leos. This is a departure point as Camanoe continues on south to Manzanillo and will not be around before we depart. We will greatly miss these guys and wish Dave, Stephanie who is flying home in May, a safe voyage as Dave continues on single-handing to Hawaii. We are certain we will see these fine sailors again and look forward to reading their blog at camanoe.wordpress.com. I will miss having someone to go play with (who will “ash me” next year) and Bob will miss long conversations all about boats. We will both miss enjoying the local culture with both of them. Thanks for the fun times! As for Dos Leos: More fun yet to come until we depart later this month. Someone hide the Tequilla please.
By the way, the Mexicans don’t celebrate St. Patrick’s Day so no green cervezas. P.S. Thank you Jerry for pointing out that we have been slacking in our blogging duties :
We’re in California for a week doing our taxes (ugh). Nice to see friends and family (like the lovely dinner last night with Pat and Jerry), but wanting to get back to La Cruz to finish the boat prep for the big jump. Target date: April 1. That’s when we’ll be ready, then we’ll wait for a weather window.