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We had a good rest in Turtle Bay, and are beginning to experience warmer weather. All the crew is doing fine. We arrived in Turtle Bay an hour after dark 11/1, but with a beautiful full moon, we were able to negotiate the entrance without much trouble. It took us a total of 3,350 minutes to sail from San Diego to Bahía de Tortugas, with 1,010 minutes of it motoring, and the rest sailing with a wonderful wind. We found the Mexican people in Turtle Bay to be gentle, loving people. Two little kids greeted us the first morning after we arrived, paddling to our boat on a kayak, asking if we needed to get rid of any garbage. We gave them our garbage, one dollar and some lollipops. They were very happy. The Baja Haha is a once-every-year event, and the deserted anchorage all of a sudden became a small city full of anchor lights and beautiful sailing vessels. We took on fuel from Ernesto, from a diesel fuel drum on a panga (the Mexican term for a skiff or small boat) at 66 US cents a liter. We took on 170 liters, approx. 45 gallons of diesel fuel. On this second leg to Bahía Santa María we are determined to sail almost all the way, using our much smaller diesel generator to keep our batteries charged, our freezer cold, our hot water hot, and our water-maker continuing to make water. Benito, the Mayor of Bahia de Tortugas greeted us as we landed our dinghy on the beach. (We have now equipped our dinghy with two wheels on the transom, which can be folded out of the way until needed. We had never heard or seen these wheels on a dinghy, but we found out in San Diego that they come in handy when landing in the surf with large tidal ranges seen in the Pacific Ocean coast of Mexico and Central America.) At least a dozen young children were smiling and asking in disarray if each could take care of our dinghy as we landed. Daisy and I requested that they appoint a single representative, and each pointed to himself. Through some eliminations and persistence on our part, plus the watchful eye of Benito, the Mayor, they all finally selected Alexis, as the appointed guardian. He agreed to be there when we returned from our walk through town.
Benito, the major of BT Alexis (top,right), our boat guard Daisy and some Turtle Bay kids We walked around the town, looking into the "abarroterías", or small stores, stocked with the basic staples. We got up to the Hotel Veracruz, where Daisy and I had delicious margaritas, with fresh salsa and tortilla chips. The houses were of modest to poor construction, but all of them, without exception, had a satellite dish of some sort. And the whole town was well aware and totally engrossed in the World Series, favoring Arizona, of course. We took care of a number of problems we discovered during the trip down from San Diego. We have a talented crew, and between all of us, we were able to wrap everything up with plenty of time to spare. We enjoyed seeing the water temperature reach 69 degrees. On the second day, Richard Spindler, the organizer of the event, editor-in-chief of the Northern California sailing magazine Latitude 38, and self-proclaimed Grand Poohbah, announced that we would have a picnic on the beach. The town people rounded over 200 spiny lobster, and sold Mexican beer at a make-shift palapa (kind of a bar/lounge) on the beach. With some cool music and a lot of food brought in from all the boats, everybody had a great time amidst over one hundred dinghies, most all of them with wheels, on the beach. I came in paddling in our kayak SNOOZE, and Daisy and the rest of our crew got a ride on a panga. We left our dinghy, CAT NAP, tied to the mother ship SIESTA since we did not have much experience in doing dinghy landings on the surf at a beach. We decided to watch others do it first. We are now enroute to our next stop, Bahia Santa Maria. The wind is light, and our speed is about 5 knots. We should get there in another 48 hours, approximately. Our new drifter just fell in the water. The halyard broke at the shackle splice, so we retrieved it, bagged it and will get it all together when we get to BSM. So we are running with main and staysail at an angle to the waves to steady the motion of the boat a bit. Gary and Hank hooked a tuna just before dark. It put up a good fight just at the time we were about to settle for dinner. Oh, yeah, another fish for the barbeque.
Hank, fighting a tuna at dusk Hank, showing off the tuna, prior to filleting...
With some luck, this update will appear on the tropictree.com/siesta web site, which is referenced at our web site. Somebody check and see if it came out and let us know via this email address. We would also welcome an update on my Mother's health from any family member. We have not heard in a few days. All the best to you all from the SIESTA!"
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