Merry Christmas

We wanted to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and let all of our friends and family that we love them and miss them very much.
Merry Christmas!

.....so this is mainland Mexico

We really have been enjoying ourselves here in Mazatlan. Anchored in the old harbor we are located away from the tourist spots and marinas of Mazatlan. We have been taking the bus, shopping in the open air market and eating with the locals which is without a doubt a much richer experience than being with all the other gringos in the resort areas of Mexico. Once away from the tourist spots you stop looking like a walking, talking money tree and the locals start treating you like a person...not really unlike being in any tourist spot in the U.S. I suppose.

The food here is quite a bit cheaper than on the Baja side of Mexico and the fresh fruit and vegetables are amazing. Since Mazatlan has the largest shrimping fleet in the world we have taken it upon ourselves to gorge ourselves on fresh shrimp almost daily....it is a tough life but hey someone has to do it :). We have gotten pretty good at cooking both coconut and garlic butter shrimp.

Before leaving the states we were warned over and over about how dangerous and violent Mexico was but I have to say after visiting various ports over the past few months I believe that this is the biggest misstatement of facts that I have heard in a very long time. Most of the people we have run into here are unbelievably warm and friendly and there dedication to family is touching. Religion plays a big part in the culture here and is evident in about every place you go in Mexico. It really is a wonderful culture and it seems ashame that there is such a misguided view of how things are in Mexico by many in the U.S.

Baja Mexico to Mainland Mexico

After taking care of our business we left LaPaz last week and headed over to Isla Espiritu Santos and Isla Partida for a few days of R&R. The islands in the Sea of Cortez are amazing! The water is so clear it is like a hugh aquarium and the terrain is stunning. The photos we took really do not do it justice but we thought we would post a few anyway.

Leaving the islands we headed south to Muertos once again to make our crossing from the Baja side of Mexico to mainland Mexico. We were able to buddy boat with our friends Ken and Lori from the beautiful sailboat Trim. The crossing was approx. 200 miles across the sea of cortez. The weather was great....10-15 knots from the north/northwest and swells of 2-4 from the north at approx. 6 seconds. It was the best sailing we had since leaving San Diego. We even had a little bit of excitement when Mark hooked a 5 foot marlin, with all the sails up it turned out to be quite a fight pulling it in. We arrived in Mazatlan 26 hours after leaving Muertos a bit tired from the crossing but none the worse for wear.

Currently we are anchored in the municipal anchorage located in old town Mazatlan. We will post more about this lovely town as we get to know more about it.

La Paz.....part two

It has been awhile since I updated the blog. We spent the Thanksgiving holiday with other cruisers here in La Paz. It was very nice but we really missed our friends and family.

We are still in Marina Palmira in La Paz. We had planned to head over to Isle Espirito Santos and Isle Partida right after Thanksgiving but due to a mess up with Mark's government pension we were forced to stay here a little longer to try to resolve the problem. As some of you know making phone calls to the states from Skype can be a frustrating thing and trying to talk to a government agency over Skype is as you can imagine almost impossible. We should have word by tomorrow if everything is resolved and if so we will be leaving in the morning.

Our past few weeks here have been spent getting to know La Paz and the people. We even made it over to the Anthropology Museum (something Amanda had on the top of her to do list while we are here.

La Paz

We made it to La Paz late Tuesday and are currently tucked into a slip at Marina Palmira where we plan to stay until after the Thanksgiving holiday. This is the first time in many months that we have been at a slip and it felt great to be able to wash Chrokeva down with fresh water. I was so excited to see the boat clean again I even decided to post a few photos on the blog although it would have been much more impressive if I had before/after photos :)

The crossing from Muertos to La Paz was one of the roughest I can remember as the seas were still very confused and steep due to the norther that was passing through. The boat did great but the crew of Chrokeva (including Jasmine and Dancer) were pretty shaken up by the end of the day. Mark hand steered almost the entire day to try to keep us from getting too beat up. Needless to say we all slept very well Tuesday evening.

The boating community is very active here and everyone is extremely helpful. There seems to be alot of boats that end up staying for many years after arriving in La Paz but we have alot of world we want to see so that will not be us. Right now we plan to leave the La Paz area heading for Mazatlan around the next full moon (December 2nd).

Los Muertos (part two)

We are waiting for our first norther here in the Sea of Cortez in Los Muertos. It seems whenever Southern California gets a Santa Ana condition the Sea of Cortez gets a norther. The last weather report said it should be coming in by tomorrow and lasting through Monday so we are planning right now to leave Muertos for La Paz on Tuesday (two days before Thanksgiving). We are expecting 40+ knots of winds and it seems our new anchor will get to start paying for itself finally.
We hope to be settled in in La Paz by Thanksgiving as we here there is a hugh pot luck with the cruisers there. I provisioned the boat with a large turkey breast before leaving the states so we should be set no matter what.
In the mean time we really are enjoying this little cove. Yesterday we walked down the beach and came across this beautiful resort (Gran Suenos). Amazing is the only word that can describe this resort. Everyone was so friendly and invited all the cruisers over to use the pool and restaurant facilities and enjoy this beautiful resort.

Muertos (by Mark)

We Leaving Frailes we headed east out of the anchorage. Then heading north we passed Punta Arena and got our bearing for Muertos. Once in the shadow of Cerralvo Island and the point of land that makes Bahia de los Muertos the wind pretty much disapeared along with the sea state. We dropped anchor at about noon and were pleased to find the most relaxed little anchorage we've seen so far, along with clear water just the right temp for swimming and nobody in a real big hurry. To top that off they have a small beach club restaurant with just the right amount of shade and cold refreshments to be had. Jackie and Amanda are having fun along with me getting acclimated to the warmer temp here. We should be staying through till Saturday morning then pulling out for La Paz hoping to find little treasures like this further on in our adventure.

Baja Ha-Ha 2009 (by Amanda)

LOS FRAILES (The Friars)

We left Cabo San Lucas on November 9th heading to Los Frailes which is our first stop on our way to La Paz. This really was the first day of our cruising life since up until now we were still on a schedule and in the company of what seemed like a whole city of boats and people all with the same goal of making it to Cabo San Lucas. It seemed strange to be without our crew (Marcus and Stan) and to have left the HaHa fleet but Mark reminded me that we have been on our own and dealing with all the challenges of living onboard and moving the boat for many years and of course he was right. As soon as we pulled anchor and put up the sails it felt great to be out on our own again and have the freedom to go wherever whenever we felt like it.

The seas out here seem very flat in comparision to the pacific side of baja but the wind which built to 18 knots in the afternoon and blew right on the nose reminded us that this still is the ocean and the challenges still exist. Once behind the headlands and protected from the strong north winds Frailes was a welcome stop for us.

Sitting on the beach here seemed almost like a dream especially after spending several days in the mega tourist area of Cabo. We plan to spend at least one full day exploring this are before heading to Ensenada De Los Muertos on Wednesday.

AND WE'RE OFF.......

We started off our cruising life on October 25th 2009. We had originally planned to leave with the Baja HaHa on the 26th but due to the prediction of large swells (15-20 foot) we made the decision to leave on the evening of the 25th before the rest of the fleet. The first leg (San Diego to Turtle Bay) was very quick as we were trying to out run the weather coming from the north. The next two legs (Turtle Bay to Santa Maria and Santa Maria to Cabo San Lucas) were much slower and winds were very light. We ended up doing 750 miles in 11 days due to the schedule that the Baja HaHa sets. Although most would think this was a very slow pace the truth is this many miles in a week and a half on a sailboat really is quite fast and it felt more like the rat race we are trying to get away from rather than the cruising life we have been looking forward to. Now that we are in Cabo the HaHa fleet will disperse in different directions and everyone will set there own pace. Our pace will be much slower from here on out.

Right now we are sitting in Cabo San Lucas on anchor and since we have a pretty good internet signal I thought it would be a good time to post a few photos of our trip down. We plan on leaving Cabo on Monday and head around the cape to Los Frailes. After that we have decided to beat our way up to La Paz and spend a little time in the sea of cortez before heading over to mainland Mexico.

As time of our departure nears closer the reality that we are finally leaving has really begun to set in. Mark is now officially retired although I do not believe he feels much like a retired person since we are up before the sun every morning to start our long list of projects and do not stop until after dark (or cocktail hour).

His latest project was to sew chaps for our new (to us) dinghy. It was a pretty big job which no doubt is why you have to pay a professional $900-$1200 for a set. This type of expense is just not part of our budget so Mark broke out the sewing machine and three days later we have some pretty darn nice looking chaps.

Wow time really has flown!

We left Newport Beach for the last time on June 22nd heading to San Diego where we plan to stay until leaving with the Baja HaHa on October 26th. It is really great to be back in San Diego but now that we are here we are looking forward to leaving and heading south to our next adventure.
Amanda graduated high school on June 4th with her eyes set on seeing some of the world in her near future (a decision that I am sure she will no regret making). Mark has pushed his retirement date back to the end of September due to the fact our wish list keeps getting bigger and the extra money will come in helpful about now.
I have posted a few recent photos of the graduation, a trip we made to Catalina during easter break and a few really cool dolphin photos that we took from the bow sprit of the boat.

2009!!!

Yeah it's finally 2009!! I cannot believe the time has passed so quickly. It seems that is was just yesterday we sold the house and moved onto the Chrokeva.
Amanda will be graduating high school in June, Mark will be retiring from the Fire Department in September and we will be heading to Mexico and beyond sometime in October. We feel very lucky that we have already made the transition to living aboard two years ago and since we spend so much time moving the boat from place to place within So. Cal. the adjustment to the cruising lifestyle should not too difficult (at least we hope not)

The to-do/wish list is a mile long and no doubt will take a small miracle to finish everything on the list but we figure what does not get done before we go will have to wait until we are out there. The good news is with so much to do I imagine the next few months will fly by quickly.

With everything there is to do I probably will not be spending much time updating the blog but will try to keep it updated with info and photos as the time gets closer to us cutting the dock lines.