Overnight in Yelapa

1/5/15 - 1/6/15

La Cruz to Yelapa, ~12 NM

Left early afternoon with a nice strong wind on the north side of the bay, 15-20 knots from the NNE. Around the center of the bay, the breeze softened significantly and shifted eventually to the SE and S. During the last hour or so, we mixed motoring and trying to sail in order to make Yelapa before nightfall.

Anna botched the marina exit by getting our windvane's control lines tangled around the electronic autopilot's control bolt, locking the wheel in place. Of course, we didn't realize this until after we were off the dock and reversing away from our slipmate. There had been previous discussions about the stowage of these lines and, suffice to say, it became a very sore subject during that incident.

We avoided any contact with other boats or the dock, but the autopilot was damaged in the struggle and spilled its 21 ball bearings into the cockpit. We quickly covered the cockpit drains with tape, so we didn't lose any. Meanwhile, Anna took us over to the fuel dock and took care of our first real diesel fill since San Diego. At this point, we weren't on speaking terms, and I threw myself into fixing the autopilot and damaged wooden steering box (the control bolt split the wood in the chaos).

Steering Situation, Post-Repair

Only Permanent Damage: We'll fair and paint mañana

It took about three hours to get everything back together. The slight rolling of a quartering sea wasn't helpful, but with a lot of masking tape and swearing, I managed to get all the bearings placed in their plastic retainers (there are three with seven bearings each on the SPX5) and the wheel assembly snapped back together. Before we got to Yelapa, we'd taken the wheel off (Anna was able to steer just holding the shaft) and reassembled the vane's drum, autopilot and glued/screwed a backing block for the steering box. We needed to clean the interior of the pilot anyway. Combined with a thorough greasing of the worm drive and cleaning of hard growth between the rudder and keel in Punta Mita, JUMBLE's steering is now smooth as ever.

Luckily, I had done this same job once before for Sean and Steve on TABLETALK, back in San Diego. That job took significantly more time and in a stable, shop environment. This incident illustrates how useful it is to be intimate with all of your boat's equipment. Knowing how many bearings you have to collect from your cockpit grate and storage boxes and how everything fits together without the manual or a diagram is a blessing. I'm not suggesting that cruisers disassemble their equipment just to put it back together, but if something breaks and you fix it yourself, you gain familiarity with the how it all goes together and the next failure isn't nearly as onerous. If we'd had to buy a new wheel/motor assembly, it would have set us back many hundreds of dollars and weeks worth of cruising time. There are no West Marines in Mexico and boating gear, except for fishing gear, has been very hard to come by. We haven't tried importing parts, but from what I'm told, it's a major pain and charges are high.

Enough technobabble!

Yelapa was a relaxing time, we picked up some moorings, for a steep $200 pesos each. Yelapa is a very marginal anchorage, open to the prevailing NW wind. Otherwise, I'm sure it would be crawling with sailors. The bay is very steep and deep in the center. There is a narrow shelf, very close to the beach, where you can anchor in 50 feet or so. There's another area off the town where it's 80' less than 100 yards off the shore. We sounded one area less than 30'. It was marginal: close to some rocks and a fixed concrete pier used for offloading pangas. In any case, all the decent anchoring areas were filled with moorings, apparently in an attempt to coax nervous cruisers to the area, much like Catalina Island back home. Dammit.

I'm whining again.

The night was a little rolly, not much worse than La Cruz. JUMBLE and TUMBLEWEED circled around their moorings until a good land-breeze filled in for the first half of the evening. Anna made some great personal pizzas. Dough from scratch, of course. The next morning, Wes and I got partially soaked landing our dinghy on the steep, gravely beach. Anna, with the backpack, jumped off the bow unscathed. We paddled in, rather than risk the outboard on such a short trip. The few folks hanging out on the beach at 10 am had some entertainment.

Beach Bar

River Behind the Bar

We landed at the far end of this beach

We all were eager to get moving by afternoon, so we agreed on a short hike to the smaller waterfall north of the village. A much grander waterfall is further inland along the river, a few miles inland. Our route took us through town, then past plenty of souvenir stalls on the route to the waterfall. It was pleasant and, I hate myself for using this word, quirky. Aside from a couple fellas on the beach peddling pictures with large iguanas and marijuana, there wasn't much tourist hassling.

We arrived at the little waterfall after a languid stroll. 30-40 minutes? Pretty cool, especially for us desert dwellers. I think the last waterfall we saw was along the Columbia River 5 or 6 years ago. Sadly, we weren't the first or only ones there. Wes had the right idea and asked one of the locals in attendance how to get to the pool atop the falls and we struck out into the jungle. Predator, with our beloved governator, was filmed nearby and the larger waterfall to the west was apparently featured in the movie. Real adventurous stuff, ya know.

After a couple false starts, we found the trail, by following the town's haphazard HDPE water supply pipes. Whole bundles, tied to trees and strung over canyons, led us further up towards the pool.

Our favorite shot of the trip

After a short, not too strenuous hike (in flip flops, of course), we reached a sweet, natural infinity pool atop the falls and enjoyed our first swim in fresh water. The bottom was 4-5' deep, deeper upstream, clean sand and very little muck or slime. Neat-o.

Looking back down

The yellow thing is one of many plastic water pipes that supply the town

On the way back, some locals had opened up the beach berm to drain the river and we waded knee to thigh deep in some fast water. Pretty fun actually. A small dog jumped in a got washed out into the bay, but he just swam back in, completely undisturbed. The gravel beach was perfect for grinding all the dogshit out of the siping in our sandals. Dogshit was a major hazard in the Banderas Bay region. Lots of dogs and, at least in La Cruz, a fair amount of fleas. We managed our beach launch with no casualties.

With a somewhat sketchy forecast of Northers from the Sea of Cortez, we headed for Cabo Corrientes in flat calm as Wes sailed for Punta Mita for some surf. The crew of JUMBLE had no conception of the rugged, troubled seas that lay ahead :)

Tune in next time for chilling tales of high adventure and anxiety aboard our intrepid little vessel!

Wes slips his mooring. Adios amigo