Friday, October 17, 2008

Good bye Guaymas...almost



We washed the boat, went shopping, said good bye to Horacio the Dock Manager, Paid our bill, cast off the lines and then the Motor over heated! AGH !!!! So, one more day. The Capt says he will have the salt water pump fixed by tonight. As for the Haul out....We put that off until the 8th of November. Too many words to explain.

some of the traditional styles of dress





For the past week these clothing styles have been on display in front of the Municipal building.
Very colorful and interesting. You will have to see the whole picture show (yawn) when we come home..ha ha

We finally find the Yaqui's



We were correct in thinking the Yaqui's were in Guaymas....we found them putting on a show outside on of the churches. About 9 old guys singing and playing drums, flutes, fiddles and a harp. Another 5 guys dancing to the music. The only item we bought the whole day was this small Yaqui painted head with horse hair. Kinda cute, no?

The cruise ship arrives in Guaymas



The cruise ship arrived at about 8 am on Thursday...We went over to the plazas, not much to see at 9 am so we sat down and talked with a group of women...having a girl's day out. They all wanted to take a picture with Wayne...guess they thought we were from the Big Ship! After wandering around we headed over to the food area and had a wonderful bowl of "typical Sonoran" food. Excellent beef (at least I think it was beef) soup and fresh whole wheat tortillas.

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

We find the Canon de Nacapule




Directions were sketchy at best...turn left at Hambone Realty, right at the trailer Park, go on a dirt road for 3.1 miles ( of course there were about 4 different dirt roads to choose from), park under a tree! We had a nice walk until we came across this 5 foot green snake in the middle of the path...I just love snakes, I had to say SNAKE 100 times so I wouldn't have dreams about snakes....
The Canyon was very spectacular with beautiful yellow and red 400 foot cliffs on each side. The trail was mostly a do it yourself trail that wandered around and in a dry stream. The clear pools of water were...ah ....a lovely color of copper. We were the only people in the canyon but we saw evidence of spray paintings on many of the rocks....1000 years from now they will be native rock paintings. People from all over will wonder what the painting represent.

Yankees in search of 1000 year old cave paintings



On Tuesday, we go in search of the 1000 year old cave paintings but all we see is 50 miles of straight roads and a burning car! Come to find out, you need to call in advance to see the cave paintings...but of course there isn't a phone or a number to call. So.....we go back 50 miles to San Carlos to find the famous canyon of clear waters, unique plants and palm trees.

Yankees in search of Yaquis



On Monday, the Capt and I decided to rent a car and take a road trip. Our amigos at Singlar told us about the very interesting Yaqui villages about 40 miles south of Guaymas. The Capt figures out the route, we find the village Church...no longer in use except for the grave yard, some houses but no Yaqui. We figure they are busy gearing up for the big festival in Guaymas on Thursday when the Cruise ship comes to town . So, from our experiences we can see that the Yaqui are very low key people, live off the land, like their privacy, don't leave any carbon foot prints and don't believe in paved roads.

Monday, October 13, 2008

Norbert the No Show


The Rey del Mar...arrrrh, a pirates life for me, a booze cruise pirate ship went out the night of the storm...7 people braved the Seas.
We stayed up till 11 pm playing Scrabble and waiting for the storm to hit...big winds predicted with 9+ inches of rain. Nada, nunca, nothing...we slept like babies and woke up to clear skies and most importantly......HUMIDITY DOWN from 89 to 11%..now we need lotion all over us so we won't start looking like prunes!

Sunday, October 12, 2008

Hurricane Norbert is coming



How to prepare...first make your boat look like a spider in a web and then go and check out some of the shrimp boats that have come to anchor near us ..I counted 57...then...

we look at the sunset and decide to take a picture of us Before the storm.

Friday, October 10, 2008

More picts of Guaymas



We like the town and people of Guymas but the harbor is something else....you can only see about 6 inches down in the water....must be all the shrimp!
The gazebo is in front of the San Fernando Church, 2nd pict is of the government house in the plaza de tres Presidentes and last....the Capt finally finding some mangoes.


These cute girls stopped me outside the entrance to the dock and asked if they would see our boat. I told them they would have to do a dance for me...as you can see they have batons in their hands. They will be part of the welcoming committee for the big cruise ship. Typical pre teen age girls...lots of laughing and picture taking with their cell phones.

Guaymas


We are currently in the Singlar Marina in Guaymas...very nice facility,e friendly people and close to the Historical section of town and our favorite...Pollo Feliz~
This is the view from our boat with the San Fernando church in the background and Mickey Mouse in front!

The Cruceros are coming


How did they know that we were coming to Guaymas? Actually, a huge cruise ship is due here in 6 days, 13 hours, 6 minutes....less now. The whole town is crazy about the ship's arrival. This is a huge count down poster located in the town Square. I went to take a pict of the Capt and these 2 cute gals jumped in the photo.

Thursday, October 9, 2008

Sailor in distress



He looks just fine now but a day ago, Jim, was on his last legs...hadn't had water for 3 days and his boat was out of commission. We had left San Carlos for a sail up the coast when we saw a flashing light from the shore..closer inspection found Jim in his camp in desperate need for water. All he wanted at the time was water so we gave him 5 gal and went on our way. We anchored about 1 mile south for the next night. A northerly came through during the night and the seas were very confused. Next morning we see is Jim on the shore waving us down...his boat had broken lose and was on the rocks, could we give him a ride into San Carlos. After some close inspection and letting other boaters know what was up we gave him a ride...told him he would have to take a shower...he started to cry real tears..."a shower, how wonderful, thank you soooo much!" His spirits were at a low (he had been here for 3 months living off the land and sea), now boat and motor were gone. After some food and teaching him some basic sailing he perked up so much so that he decided to give the sailing thing another try and then cleaned our boat bottom!
Good guy and good story

Saturday, October 4, 2008

Din ah is served


The Beauport is anchored next to us here in San Carlos. Apparently, she is a former Canadian ice breaker refitted to the tune of $1million. We hear the call to breakfast and dinner every day..."Dinner is now being served, please make your way to the dinning area". We keep yelling over to them to give us a few more minutes but , humph, they just don't care! We hear that they have a French chef, "would you like a croissant?"...Hey, it's just a ROLL!... a Captain and 3 crew. We have asked our Canadian friends to dinghy over and talk Canadian to them..."Pardon moi, do you have any Canadian bacon, eh?" and when they say "Oui" we all climb aboard and have a peek. No luck yet. Funny thing is that we NEVER see anyone outside...suspicious or maybe they just don't want to sweat like the rest of us.

W is feeling a bit better


We are anchored here in San Carlos waiting for Wayne to feel up to moving over to Guaymas. Actually, he is better but not much energy to do anything but read.

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

Over night passage to San Carlos


It was just way too hot and muggy to stay in Santa Rosalia so we filled up with petrol at the Singular dock and took off across the Sea to San Carlos. We left around 7 pm and arrived in San Carlos at about 8 am. Two huge dolphins greeted us coming into the anchorage! This anchorage is full of boats but once again not many people....to HOT...need I say more? The motor across the Sea was quite nice and for about 30 minutes we had a school of dolphins under our bow racing back and forth. They looked like lightning bolts flashing in the dark sea...how do they not crash into each other???
We haven't seen much of the town because Wayne came down with the flu and has been sick for the past 3 days. So, my journey ends here for the time being. He is on the mend and we will be going into town to find a farmacia.... ta ta for now

Too hot to stay in town



La Paz isn't the only town with sidewalk hazards! It was so hot and humid in town that we only stopped in air conditioned places and believe me there were not very many! We did find all the necessary stores...ISSTE (grocery store), fruiteria, Chyitas hot dogs (we are not big on hot dogs but if you like them then this is the place), Church, museum, bakery and most important....the ICE CREAM STORE WITH THRIFTY ICE CREAM!!! We had beer for lunch and ice cream for dinner and we got out of town. We both were sopping wet with sweat. We will have to visit the town when the weather is about 20 degrees cooler.

Santa Rosalita



Santa Rosalita is an old mining town...dating back to the mid 1800's when copper was discovered. It is a friendly working man's town with absolutely no tourism. The church above was built by Gustave Eiffel in Brussels and then taken apart and reassembled here 110 years ago! It is very beautiful inside with cobalt blue stained glass windows...no airconditioning. The town is quite small with many wooden houses...shops underneath and homes above. The town reminded me of what Capitola might have looked like if it hadn't gone "yuppie". The wall in the picture above was about 100 feet long and made entirely of blocks of obsidian!

We made it to Santa Rosalita



Santa Rosalia is an interesting town.....the harbor is in need of improvements...lots of sunking boats and who knows what...anchoring is a challenge. Half the place is falling down and the rest is ah....interesting, yeah that's it interesting.
This needle fish flew into our dinghy while it was hoisted up about 5 feet in the air! Messy fish guts all over the dinghy. Yuck.

Next stop was Punta Mezquitio


Yup, that's me catching a huge fish...actually it was about 1 foot long and another Jack...not good eating. This beach is called Shell beach and for about a mile all you see are shells and more shells. Why they wash up here I don't know but there sure were a ton of them! I'm sure you can't see the sweat on my face but it is there! Must have been 100 in the sun and 98 in the water. As soon as we made it back to the boat we jumped in the water and hid out under the hulls in the shade for about an hour. We did cool off but it only lasted until we climbed out, took a shower and dried off, then we needed another shower!

whale shark in the anchorage


We took our time going up the coast. Wayne wanted to show me San Sabastian, an anchorage that he loved some 20 years ago...Well, it sure was lovely...we had internet and a whale shark!
This guy/gal was about 15 feet long and came cruzin' by the boat for about an hour. They are filter feeders...not people eaters. We ...at least Wayne.... would have jumped in but he had an ear infection and the wind was picking up and we were on a lee shore and it was getting dark and the next safe anchorage was 1 hour away so.....next time. Sure was exciting to see this huge fish up close!