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We skimmed the little dinghy
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Our next little adventure was getting invited to a "potluck dinghy raft up." To our surprise, this is exactly what it sounds like...a bunch of cruisers from different boats each make a hot dish, then pick a spot in the bay and tie all the dinghies together. Very
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Speaking of books, Naomi, Roger and I have decided to start our own book club, tentatively titled "Sea-rebral Sailors". The first book we all read was The Godfather, and we discussed at length some odd sub-plots to the mafia tale, such as several detailed chapters dedicated to the surgery to a mafioso's mistress who was "too big down there." Somehow I don't recall that making it into
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Careyes After departing Tenacatita, we had good wind and set our Monitor windvane up, which did all the steering work (sad to say, our electronic autopilot, "Otto"
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Paraiso Bay
The next day saw us heading a short distance north to a verrrrrry small bay called "Paraiso", spanish for "paradise". This is sort of off the well traveled route and out of the way, and I had some anxiety getting into the narrow bay, which was analogous to entering a fjord. But, once we
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We had a tiny beach all to ourselves (for most of the day, anyway, until a panga dropped off two women--one of them topless-- and their 3 dogs). But by late afternoon everyone but us had left, and we set up a small camp under the palm trees and made rum drinks, snorkled, and read. After nightfall, Roger was determined to build a beach bonfire, and he did so. It was a perfect night, with
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Chamela Bay
The next day we motored a short distance to a bay called Chamela. Along the way, we saw two whales-- the first we have seen in several weeks. Chamela was a nice surprise-- our charts didn't make it look like much, but it's got a nice several-mile-long beach and two islands in the middle, which help block the swells (and thus improved our sleep). It's also almost completely undeveloped, except for a
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We dinghied to shore and nearly dumped the dinghy. Dinghy-ing through surf is probably one of the more dangerous aspects of sailing, since catching a breaking wave at the wrong moment can flip the dinghy, sending the outboard (and propeller) flying. As it was, I scraped up my shin, but that's all.
As our boats sat offshore and as we dined on plates of breaded shrimp (80 pesos, or $5.50), fish tacos (30 pesos, or $2) and a fish filet in butter
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In other words, our "cost of living" is now approximately 45% cheaper than it was 3 months ago, and with very few other expenses apart from a little diesel (and of course, the wind is free), how could life get any better?
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Actually, as cheap as it is, we are trying diligiently and persistently to lower our costs even further-- by fishing. I have a streak of obsessive compulsive disorder (as my mom used to say, "Nathan, you have a one-track mind") and I'm determined to crack the code of how to catch the elusive mahi mahi. In the meantime, I spend a lot of time around sunset with the very cool Cuban hand line that my father in law Roy brought us. One of these days, I expect to post a pic with us holding a whopper...until then, I'm limited to
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Ok, that's it for now. We will be passage-making for the next couple of days en route to rounding Cabo Corientes, where we got our butts kicked by the rough weather on the way down...stay tuned!
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