Last I wrote we were enjoying our time in Manzanillo and so I will start where I left off. We spent over a month at the anchorage in Las Hadas enjoying the hospitality of the hotel as well as having some great times with fellow cruisers. We really enjoyed the little town of Santiago which was within walking distance of the anchorage and it will be remembered as one of our favorite places while in Mexico.
We decided it was finally time to leave Manzanillo and so we headed back north to Marina La Cruz in Banderas Bay where Mark made a quick day and a half trip back to the states to renew his tourist visa. Unfortunately we could not travel together because of the dogs so Amanda and I ended up flying into Tijuana a week after Mark returned where we crossed the border and spent three weeks visiting friends and family and checking out possible schools for Amanda (more on that later).
While Amanda and I where off having a great time in California and Arizona Mark decided to move Chrokeva from La Cruz back to Mazatlan. He was fortunate in that we ran into some old friends from the sailing vessel Yah Tah Hey in Puerto Vallarta (Warren and Nancy) and Warren agreed to be crew for the trip back to Mazatlan. The entire passage was approx 160 miles and from what I hear was basically uneventful (always a good thing). That brings us up to date as Amanda and I have just arrived back to Mazatlan a few days ago and we are currently anchored at Stone Island which is a great little anchorage just outside of Mazatlan. Our plans for summer hurricane season change on almost a daily basis but as the saying goes "cruisers plans are written in the sand at low tide". As it looks now we will be spending hurricane season in Marina Mazatlan. The summer rates at Marina Mazatlan are great and although Mazatlan seems to get hit often with hurricanes the marina is situated far back into a estuary and we will be tucked in as far as possible so we feel confident it will be a safe hurricane hole. We had seriously considered going back into the Sea of Cortez for the summer but finding a place to put the boat in the Sea during the summer seems almost impossible and with a trip back to the states pending in August and the fact that we really want to do some inland travel here in Mexico over the summer Mazatlan seems to be a logical decision for us.
