Happy Thanksgiving-November 27, 2008

Happy Thanksgiving to all our family and friends!!

We participated in the local cruisers American Thanksgiving festivities. We had a catered traditional dinner. The food was delicious. Dinner was followed with music and dancing.
The party was held out in the cruisers patio overlooking the marina. The temperature was in the 80's. We had another beautiful sunset during dinner. Life is good.

Mazatlan-November 25, 2008

We continue to enjoy the city of Mazatlan and the activities it has to offer. We recently attended a professional baseball game. Playing was Venados de Mazatlan vs Algodoneros de Guasave. What an event! Far different than watching baseball in the states. There is total particaption by those in the stand with singing and clapping. There are mascots on the field with continual antics. After each inning souveniers are thrown into the stands. The food stands are quite good and beer flows freely at each section in the stands. Final score was 3-2. We have continued to watch the baseball games on TV in Spanish. Venados de Mazatlan continues to win.

We have mastered the bus sytem. One can get anywhere in the city one way for a cost of 5-8 pesos. We have found and shopped at Wal-Mart, Sam's Club, Home Depot, drug stores and local grocery stores. So far we have been able to find all the items we wanted. The difference is all the stores are obviously in Spanish, so often we look at pictures to determine the right item.

We continue to enjoy meeting new friends everyday. We are the newbee's to cruising here at the marina. Most of the other cruisers have been cruising from 3-10 years. They are from both Canada and the United States. In preparation for cruising we read many books on the subject. However, we have learned far more from the cruisers. Everyday we get new tips. Most of the cruisers return to Mazatlan in November after escaping the summer heat and humidity of Mazatlan. Some leave their boats up in the Sea of Cortez and cruise up there, others go home for the summer and some return to work for 5-6 moinths until cruising season begins again. Most are preparing their boats to head south after Thanksgiving.

The local people are very friendly. The University of Michigan's World Values Surveys compiles data on the happiest countries in the world for the past 20 years. Mexico was listed as Number 2. Canada is listed as number 10 and the United States is number 15. We have found the pace and stress far less here than at home.

Last Saturday we went with a group of friends to share the city. We first went to Hotel Freeman to the top floor where we had a 360 degree view of the city. We watched the sunset. From there we went to a favorite local restaurant. We have no idea the name of it. Some of the best food is on the local streets where a vendor will set up table and chairs and serve food. We had the best "baked potatoes". It was stuffed with butter, sour cream and covered with carne asada. At the table there was salsa, guacamore, radishes and cucumbers. The cost of each dinner was 30 pesos.

Today we were visted by family and friends who were in port while cruising on a cruise ship. We enjoyed swimming at the local beach and having lunch together.

We would love to hear from anyone who reads our blog. We miss our friends at Ventura West and would love to have an update. Either post a comment or email us at AndanzasAdventure@gmail.com.

Mazatlan-November 19, 2008

We are enjoying Mazatlan life. We have been here a week and have adapted well to our new cruising life. We have met many new friends along with old friends Michael and Renee Ditton and John and Debbie Die from Ventura. Marina Mazatlan has a very active social schedule for cruisers.

We have been relaxing quite a bit especially due to heat. It is 90 degress today inside and outside of the boat. We have been exploring the local sights by foot, public bus and pulmonia. Mazatlan has two areas the Goldren Zone and Old Town. We have spent our time in Old Town visiting the cathedral, local markets, plazas, local art studios, and the beautiful malecon(boardwalk) that surrounds Old Town. The Golden Zone is predominately for tourist which we have avoided. The malecon, which is about 12 miles long, has many historical viewpoints and statutes along the route. We have walked many portions of it in the morning for exercise.

We have enjoyed all the local ethnic food. It is very inexpensive to eat here. Local transportation is very inexpensive and one can get anywhere in town. The cost is 50 cents to 80 cents one way.

Today we hiked to the top of the highest working lighthouse in the world, El Faro. We were able to see 360 degrees and had to climb over 360 steps. It was a beautiful view of all of Mazatlan and overlooked the main harbor where the cruise ships come in and where the Pacifico factory is.

Daivd and Alli took an exciting side trip adventure to San Blas which I will let Alli describe.

ALLI:
David and I came up with the grand plan of an overnight adventure to Mexicaltitan, about 200km away in the next bordering state, Nayarit, south of Sinaloa. So we take a local bus from our Marina down to the Golden Zone to the Central bus station, where we need two tickets to Ixcuintlan, where we could transfer to another bus to our destination. However, no buses from Mazatlan will take us to either place but will get us close, a place called Penas. So, 5 minutes later we are on our way! So, we start looking at the map and realize we are actually going to the state of Jalisco, south of Puerto Vallarta! Una problema!! After the bus driver assured us that was a different Penas, we later found out a lot of places were called Penas! So, after reading the guide book further, we decide to go to San Blas, only a little further south, instead. San Blas, had a rich history, with a beautiful beach, old cathedral, and gold/silver Contaduria, and a Jungle River excursion, and we did it all!!! On the La Tovara River trip took us down all the canals of the mangrove/marsh lands that started just outside of town and spanned out to the mountains where the terrain turned to Jungle. We saw crocodiles, turtles, birds and fish.
So after such a successful excursion that we extended it to 2 nights, we were ready to come home Monday. Sunday night we went to the ATM to get pesos for the bus ride home, but it was out of cash. So, we tried again Monday morning, and still no cash... so we went to another ATM and still no cash! We did not have enough to get to Mazatlan! Hmmm... came to find out it was a Mexican holiday and the banks were closed, and the police officers we talked to with giant AK47's just laughed. Thankfully a lady at the nicest hotel in town gave us a cash advance and we ended up back in Mazatlan with 4 pesos to spare! The End.

Now back to Linda. While it appears that we are vacationing we do have boat chores everyday and Angel duty. David drew the short straw today and had to go up the mast to re-engineer the lazy jacks. We had to undo the dingy as we are having chaps made to protect it from the beating sun. We have had to repair the preventor, clean water filters, repair the running lights (which went out crossing the Sea of Cortez at night), repaired the reefing lines, and continually clean dog hair out of the boat.

Last night we celebrated for no reason and had Two for One Pizza Night delivered by Domino's Pizza complete with salsa picante.

David and Alli leave tonight which we are quite sad about. We have all thoroughly enjoyed our adventures together.

Mazatlan-November 13, 2008

Mazatlan, Lat 23 16 214, Long 106 27 307, 200 miles east of Cabo. We have now traveled 1200 miles from Ventura.
Mazatlan is known as the Pacific Pearl. Also means valley of the deer. Population 500,000.

We left Cabo on Tuesday morning heading for Los Frailes with two other boats, Eager Dreamer and SueBee. The coast line was very pretty. The land is quite green due to the recent hurricane through Baja. We were heading straight into 20 knot winds and big seas, getting banged around.

After about 4 hours of this and only 12 miles from Los Frailes we made a right hand turn and headed to Mazatlan as the weather was not expected to imporve and the anchorage was not going to be good with the wind conditions.

What a ride to Mazatlan!!. We sailed all the way. We had winds 17-25 knots with seas of 8-10 feet. Our fastest speed was 11.4 knots. We all have bruises to show for the ride. Upon arriving outside of the harbor our 2 buddy boats went aground at the harbor entrance. They gave us a heads up on what to expect. We also went aground at the harbor entrance and was lifted up off by a wave. The tide was very low and the swells were big. The harbor entrance is very small. We would not want to come in here at night.

We are currently at Marina Mazatlan. When we arrived we took 12 loads of laundry up to have done. The marina is full of cruisers. We had dinner at the marina restaurant last night. Music was playing, and we were dancing under the stars with a full moon. It was a sureal experience after the previous night of being on the water. Current water temperature is 79 degrees and air temperature is mid 80's.

We plan to stay here a few weeks to rest and sight see. David and Alli continue to be with us until Novembefr 19. They have the next week planned for all the local sight seeing.

The underwater photos were taken at Lover's Beach at Cabo. We enjoyed snorkling in such warm water.

Angel update. She survived 10 days of never being off the boat. Occasionally she was scared when the seas were rough. She has enjoyed dingy and panga rides. She is currently very happy to be dock side as we all are also.

Cabo San Lucas-November 9, 2008

Cabo San

























Cabo San Lucas-Lat 22 53 07, Long 109 53 83. 815 miles south of San Diego. Water temp 78 degrees, air temp mid 80's.

We left Turtle Bay with winds of 15-22 knots and seas of 10-15 foot swells. We have all learned to walk gracefully under sail. You don't realize how much noise there is while underway until you get to anchorage and all is quite.

We have seen allot of sea life-whales, dolphins, leaping squid, flying fish, albatros, marlin, tuna, and sharks.

We arrived at Bahia Santa Maria on Tuesday. The bay is huge and calm. There is a rural fishing village. The local people had a beach party for all the Baja fleet on Wednesday which included a rock and roll band. The party felt like we were on a deserted island. We climbed to the top of the mountain and we could see all the way to Mag Bay. David and Alli used the kayaks to get ashore while Wally and I took the pangas. The pangas go so fast and take the surf so well.

Night watch, while not our favorite thing, is beautiful. The sky is full of stars which sparkle on the water. The moon is getting bigger every night. We have had many beautiful sun rises and sun sets.

All of us have met many new friends. We look forward to each anchorage to get together with all of them.

We arrived in Cabo on Thursday. We have been partying since then. Squid Row on Thursday night, Friday a Beach Party and Saturday night was the Awards Ceremony. In our division of Catalina 42's we came in 3rd place!

We have enjoyed the Baha Ha-Ha. It is an experience we will never forget. We would recommend it to anyone cruising south.

We plan to leave Cabo on Tuesday and go to Las Frailus (sp) and spend a day snorkling a coral reef, which is the only one in Mexico. On Thursday we will likely head to Matzalan. Wonderful not to have a schedule.