Hola Amigos
Have you gone out and bought the MARCH issue of SAIL magazine yet? If you haven't you may want to as Jay's article is being published in the March issue: "15 Things I wish I'd Known." It's been nearly a year since they purchased the article, and now they are finally putting it to print. Wow, I'm sailing with a published writer!
A webpage request -- Chris and Josie of SV Amelia have graciously done our web page since we left Oregon and they are cruisers, just as we are. This means little time to spend doing "computing" stuff and much more time enjoying the scenery and people around you. We thank Chris and Josie heartily, as they have been very generous. We had Jay's sister lined up to take the web page over, but unfortunately she cannot do it. So we are looking for someone to take over and create a web page for us. We'd like to include photos (scanner) as well as all of the newsletters, and it may take some time initially to set up, but I bet Chris may be willing to share some of his formatting of the initial web page. Anyway, if you are interested in creating/maintaining our web page, please let us know via e-mail. We'd truly appreciate some help...
One other thing, you can "Reply" directly to these newsletters. The "Onelist" system forwards the mail to our "Yahoo" e-mail address. If you do reply, you may want to remove the quoted newsletter in the body of the reply.
We are now in a small little resort town, called Barra de Navidad. It is a quaint little town and there are lots of gringos, which is surprising to us as we'd never heard of Barra de Navidad until we got to Mexico. I think it's a word-of-mouth vacation destination, and so now you know.
We are currently anchored in a mangrove lined lagoon, which makes sleeping at night feel like you are at a dock it's so tranquil. Soaring seabirds feed in abundance throughout the lagoon. Pairs of fishermen in little open boats drift around the lagoon quietly tossing their nets with practiced expertise. The loud roar of an outboard tearing through the anchorage breaks the silence. The joys of living in a crowded anchorage.
There is a beautiful resort, like Fantasy Island, called the Grand Bay Resort at Isla Navidad right at the entrance of the lagoon. You get to the resort from town by panga, or dinghy in our case. The most perfectly manicured gardens make you feel like you are walking in Eden and it has a great three-layered swimming pool with waterslides to boot! We hear the rates are US$400 per night. The only problem, which is typical throughout Mexico, is there are too many hotels (and restaurants), with prices too high so the occupancy rates are low, low, low. The day we were there, there were only two rooms filled. We still enjoyed the facilities, nonetheless.
The adjacent marina with high prices, at US$1.00 per foot per day is what keeps the resort fueled with some money as marinas are in high demand in Mexico -- there are not enough slips for the number of boats down here. Speaking of number of boats. We've been absolutely amazed at the number of boats in anchorages here on the mainland. We had about 37 boats in the lagoon the other day, and it's probably about 30 right now. We've found there are not that many anchorages where only one or two boats can be found. It's usually a flotilla. The anchorages with few boats are usually the ones with cautions in the guide books or a little more exposed to weather -- Isla Isabela, Jaltemba, Punta de Mita, Tres Marietas, etc.
The high number of boats makes moving on to Central America appealing as we are hoping the further South we go, the less boats we'll encounter in the anchorages! In the Sea it was a treat to pull into an anchorage and be the only boat, or maybe just one or two others. When there are only a few boats, it's easy to row up and meet your neighbors and relax. When the flotillas get together, it becomes potluck central (not that we don't enjoy potlucks, cuz the food is ALWAYS good). Flotilla sailing is like a city, however, it becomes more impersonal.
We were up at Tenacatita at the outer anchorage, a bay just north of here, and were walking along a beautiful Pacific-facing beach with no development on it when we encountered several fresh turtle egg nests. You could see where the turtle had crawled up out of the sea, where the nest was made, and the tracks back to the sea. We were really thrilled to see these real-life nests which we'd only seen in magazines or on TV. We encountered three local Mexicans walking towards us and one stopped to chat with us. I was so excited about the turtle nests, I told the man about them. He went on to say that turtle eggs were very delicious. Jay and I just swallowed and said nothing.
The man then related a story of a gringo with a machete killing a local Mexican who was getting eggs from a nest, and how he (or a friend -- as this was all related in Spanish, so some of it may have been lost in translation) shot and killed the gringo. He also told us the local police are his friends and do not do anything about the locals gathering turtle eggs -- only when the federales fly overhead with helicopters do they have to worry. It really saddened Jay and me to hear this story and we wanted to relate that if they eat all the eggs, there will be no turtles left for their children to see. But we decided it was best to say nothing. The three locals then proceeded to raid the biggest nest. We being foreigners in their land felt like it was not our place to intercede, plus with the Mexicans being in such poverty we understand that getting food on the table is part of their survival (tho' I'm sure turtle eggs are a delicacy for them). But we felt helpless and sad at not being able to do anything.
On a brighter note, we are now meeting boats heading to Central America too, so it's been fun meeting them and exchanging general floatplans. So far, everyone we've met, except Onrust, is going through the Canal before rainy season (hurricane season) sets in. We are planning on just hanging out in Northern Costa Rica, unless something else catches our fancy.
People often ask us, "So where are you going after that?" Heck, we don't know. Costa Rica is our destination now. After that, we'll just see what sounds good. We prefer not having itineraries laid in stone, it makes for less stress. You know, deadlines at work, don't they usually stress you out? Work, what's that?
So are you gonna fly down and visit us while we're in Costa Rica? We're looking forward to hosting some visitors again at our future destination in Costa Rica, wherever that may be! As always, please keep in touch and tell us how you are doing. We do get homesick now and then and news from home, whether Oregon, California, Chile, Australia, New Zealand, Scotland, Canada, etc. is always a welcome treat.
Fair winds and empty anchorages,
Leslie & Jay