December 15th, 2001
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Our visit home to the USA was good in
so many ways, but it would have been enough of a treat just to
escape the amazing heat of the Baja Gulf in the summer. We have
never, either of us, experienced heat like that before. Just
before we left San Carlos, we worked hard for seven days prepping
Active Light for the two and a half month storage in the water
at Marina San Carlos. One morning we arose especially early to
get a final coat of varnish on the rails before it became so
hot. Sweat, nevertheless, was dripping off Nancy's nose into
the varnish at 6:00 AM! Neil enjoyed teasing her about that.
It was very good to see everyone back home. We can remember our
first impressions were that there seemed to be so many people
in the USA and all of them in such a hurry. How can we express our feelings of shock, sorrow and deepseated anger over the terrorist destruction of the World Trade Center towers and the attack on the Pentagon on September 11th, 2001. We had another very bad experience flying back to Mexico with America West on our return trip. After being told we were required by ticket contract to fly on September 17th, our flight was suddenly canceled in Tucson. We were shuttled off the Hermosillo, Sonora with no warning nor accommodation whatsoever and met with the customs inspector from hell. This young man had never seen a "Temporary Importation" permit for carrying replacement boat parts into Mexico. After three hours of harassment and haggling, we were on the streets of Hermosillo, lighter in the pocketbook by US$275. and looking for a taxi for the 90 mile ride to San Carlos. Not a good day! If we are ever again faced with the option of flying with America West airlines, we will most definitely take the bus. |
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Active Light survived the layover with no problems other than a little dust on the interior surfaces. We were pleased with the good job that a local fellow named Hector Morales did in watching and washing our boat. We will probably always remember the San Carlos Marina for all the dock parties. Seems like almost anything, like the sun setting or a pelican flying overhead, served as a good reason to have a 6:00 PM gathering for snacks and drinks on the dock. We enjoyed the folks there, . . . especially Ron and Nadine on "Dragon", John & Donna aboard the world-girdling "Dulcinea", and Pat & Roger on "Victory of Wight". |
| We sat out two torrential rain and wind storms spawned by the leftovers from hurricane Julliette. That storm put three boats on the beach at San Carlos and caused a lot of destruction in La Paz, toppling 26 sailboats in a dry storage yard. We were really glad we chose to summer in San Carlos where the storm threat is so much less than in La Paz, Puerto Escondido or Mazatlan. | |
 Neil and his dive instructor, Grover Jeane from "Koloa Kai". |
This Fall will also be remembered by us as a "time of testing". We both took our technician level ham radio tests in Bremerton just before we left the USA. We are proud to say that we both made perfect scores on that exam. Neil took advantage of an very good scuba instructor in San Carlos and received his PADI open water certification after six dives. If he only had some dive equipment! This lack will be rectified in January. We soon had Active Light back up to cruising capability and headed over to Bahia Concepcion on the Baja side, leaving San Carlos at 6:00 PM on a Saturday night, October 28th, for a most delightful overnight sail, our sixth crossing of the Gulf of California. Active Light is such a sweet sailing boat! We motored out for a hour until we found a breeze, set the sails and the Monitor steering vane and settled back for a most pleasant ride. |
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We began a relaxed time of snorkeling,
hiking, reading, and listening to the Chubasco net each morning
for a weather report. We endured the longest hike of our lives,
hiking up hills on the Domingo peninsula until we breached the
summit and could see across to the open gulf on the other side.
The trip back was very arduous, we ran short of water and got
very tired on the way back, but our new hiking boots did very
well. One morning Mel in La Paz mentioned over the net that he was giving a general class radio ham test in La Paz on November 20th, so we started working our way south to be in La Paz for the test, studying the ham book as we went. We spent some time in Santispac, went into Mulege for ice and groceries, had a great late-anniversary dinner at Ray's Place on the beach at Santispac. |
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Our next stop south was a revisit at San Juanico. We found excellent visibility in diving out on the north point and many, many varieties of fish. This rock, just off our port beam, had four osprey nests atop the rock pinnacles. We began to have good luck fishing with hand trolling lines off the boat. On day we caught three skipjacks and two beautiful dorado. We are seasoned enough by now that we instantly released the skipjack. The next day Nancy nearly lost the little finger of her right hand to a yellow fin tuna who straightened the hook as he got away! |
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Our return to Puerto Escondido
had to be anticlimactic after the wonderful times we had there
during LoretoFest last May. Few cruisers were in port, the water
on the dock from the artesian well tasted salty due to the flooding
by Hurricane Julliette, but the Sierra Gigante mountains behind
the port were still as beautiful. Lots of changes are alleged to be in store for this gem of a port as various Mexican agencies are vying for establishment of mooring fees, water fees, parking fees, and boat launching fees. Yes, Mexico is changing fast. The people are still very, very nice, though. |
 Pepe & Sue Maxwell, Neil, and local guitarrist, Jorge in the corner playing at "The Dock" cafe in La Paz. |
In La Paz, we quickly fell into place as musicians, as we both have a bit of a reputation here in the Baja area, . . . we think and hope, as good musicians. Neil began playing right away three nights a week at "The Dock" restaurant in Marina de La Paz with Pepe and Sue Maxwell. Lots of fun, good people, those two. There are music jam sessions at a local restaurant each Wednesday evening. Good to see our excellent cellist friend, Susan of "Woodenshoe", again. It is peculiar to cruising folks that you learn people's first names and which boat they are from and hardly anyone's last name. It is much more important whether or not they have a rubber dinghy, solid dink, what type of ground tackle they have and whether they know how to anchor safely. |
 Neil is the oldest kid in the upper right hand corner of the bandstand. |
Through Susan on "Woodenshoe",
Neil was asked to help out in a couple of concerts with the Youth
Orchestra of La Paz. The first concert was in the town square
(the "zocalo", where the city cathedral is always located)
and it went well. What a nice bunch of young people. They were
typically short of trombones, heavy with saxophonists, and no
French horns. The saxophonists had lots of questions for Neil
about improvising jazz (pronounced "chaz"). These city parks are just beautiful and serve as gathering points for everything from karate demonstrations, to a type of bingo for the older set, to amateur talent shows for youths vying for scholarships. The events seem to happen every weekend since we have been here. |
 The band shell in the city center park in La Paz. |
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 We don't know what this bingo-like game is called, but it is very popular with the senior citizen set in La Paz on Friday nights. The card is covered with pictures of simple objects. As the names of the objects are called out over a PA system, one places a bean over the picture. You need to cover all the pictures to win. Most of those tents in the distance shelter more bingo players, some of them sell things to eat and jewelry and crafts. |
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| We were invited to dinner at the home of a local restaurant owner, Jorge and Sylvia Briseno. We went with Pepe and Sue, as well as with Ed and Daisy from "Siesta". We brought our instruments and played and ate and sang until 3:00 AM. (dinner typically does not start until 11:00 PM in La Paz). What gracious hosts, what a lovely family, what a beautiful home. | |
 Sue & Pepe, Ed & Daisy, Abuelo Mab, Sylvia & Jorge, Nancy & Neil. |
 Sylvia & Jorge Briseno |
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Life in La Paz goes on much
as always. The city is especially beautiful when viewed from
the water around Christmas time. The palm trees which line the
waterfront (malecon) are wrapped with spiraling white Christmas
lights.Santa Claus puts in a nightly appearance up and down the
main streets perched atop a Coca Cola truck, throwing handfuls
of candy to the kids. The La Paz cruisers' radio net is as rude and snippy as usual, too many of these Americans have been here too long and need to find something better to do than snip at each other and make racists comments about Mexicans. The food is still good, the people are still "old world" gracious, and the December breezes are warm and soothing. |
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We are anchored out in the "virtual"
marina of Bahia Santa Cruz. The prices went up to US$3 per day,
this is for an anchor spot, a dinghy dock with fresh, allegedly
potable water, ice, laundry, bottled water and propane refills
delivered to your boat, a nice swimming pool, and "pretty
good" shower facilities ashore. Best of all there is a good
place for Nancy and Neil to exercise ashore each morning. Neil
even has his own sand-pit karate dojo where he practices all
his kata three times through every morning. Our original plans were to accomplish our last refit and provisioning in Mazatlan. This was changed since the Marina Mazatlan has closed pending a bankruptcy lawsuit. In the meantime, Neil is studying for his extra class radio test on December 20th. We both passed our general test on the 20th of November. Nancy will fly home for another visit with her mother soon after Christmas and bring our new Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon (EPIRB) back with her. We may be able to get into Marina Mazatlan in February if they have reopened by then. That would be nice because they have a very good stainless steel fabricator there (Rosetti) and there is a great Sam's Club for provisioning. But one way or another, our plan is still to leave for the South Pacific Marquesas Islands around the first of March, 2002. That's only two and one half months from now. Yikes! |
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Nancy and Neil S/V Active Light La Paz Harbor, BCS, Mexico |
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