Puerto Chiapas to Bahia de Jiquilisco

2/18/15 – 2/21/15

260 NM

We left Chiapas around 1400 and had a very ordinary first 24 hours. Minor teething issues from being in a marina for two weeks were quickly rectified. The 19^th being my birthday, Anna made a nice dinner and we shared the last two beers around 2000. We don't drink on passages, but made an exception this evening. Little did we know what was in store for us.

JUMBLE was running 25 NM off shore, near the border of Guatemala and El Salvador. The offshore breeze started slightly earlier than usual, filling in nicely at 10 knots from the N by 2030. We planned for a good night of sailing and discussed preparations for the Papagayo winds we were bound to encounter in a few days off Nicaragua and Costa Rica: stowage, securing deck gear and generally being prepared for a blow.

The offshore wind ramped up quickly after dinner. It hit 20 knots and we dropped the main, not expecting the wind to last. Within a few minutes, we realized that this was a mistake as the wind was reaching the high 20s and the waves suddenly got nasty with the bowsprit poking into the water and lots of spray. We had difficulty holding the bow into the waves with just the mizzen and it was a fight to douse the 170% genoa. We set the 105% and tried to continue on course, which was now a close reach, the wind coming from NNE and our course being generally E. The 105% isn't our best sail and the top was twisting off the the gusts. We set a double reefed main to get enough power to head upwind in these conditions. Once we had the main set, the 105% was too much as winds were reaching 30 knots and we considered the blade jib or storm jib, both much better sails. Given our proximity to a weather shore, we decided to douse mizzen and jib and motor sail NNW on a starboard tack towards shore and shelter. Our other option, certainly more comfortable, would have been to run off south or west, taking us away from our destination. The waves were steep, but only had 25 miles of fetch. On a starboard tack, our engine intake was solidly in the water and once near shore the waves would be much smaller. When we finally reached shore around 0300 or 0400, we spotted a cluster of shrimpers, lights burning bright, hugging the shore as well.

So from 1000 until the wee hours of the morning, JUMBLE motored into steep chop and took quite a beating. The autopilot repair held, and we were able to sit safely at the nav station with the lower hatchboard in and the canvas flap down over the companionway to keep out the spray. We took the top of one weird wave through the companionway, sideways. JUMBLE was tossed to 45 degrees a couple times and we had a few items come loose inside, but nothing too serious. We were only able to make 3 knots the first few hours, but once closer to shore the waves had less punch. The wind lost none of its ferocity near shore. We experienced our first gale at sea. Without instruments I can't be sure of the exact speed, but 35 knots at least. In the early morning, as we started to skirt the 60' contour near shore, the rig sang a tune I hadn't heard before, so I'm sure there were gusts above 40 knots. Mountains and volcanoes line the shore here and I suspect the norther was accelerated by these and in the canyons between them. There isn't as much weather recording in this part of the world, so we've only been able to confirm with one other sailboat further ahead of us who caught some action in the 30s and the locals here in El Salvador who told us a Frente Frio (Cold Front) passed through that night. Our forecast, less than 48 hours old, had called for light and variable less than 10!

Daybreak on the 20th

Only 1 or 2 miles off the beach

We took 1-2 hour watches from 1000 to 0800 the next morning, when things calmed down almost as quickly as they had started. The off watch took the bunk. On watch I took the floor or nav station, Anna favored the nav station. I had been slightly seasick before the wind started, maybe two weeks in a marina, but it didn't get much worse once it started blowing. The hilarious thing was remembering our first few Catalina trips, mild as they were, and how much sicker we both were then. Being a little sick at least gave me an incentive to go out into the cockpit and get soaked taking a look around. Not that it mattered as all the fishing traffic had already run for shore. I timed my lookouts to every two “incidents”, which I defined as 'prop leaving the water', 'wave breaking on hull' or 'boat stopped by wave'. All of these were distinct sounds so you could keep your eyes closed. This corresponded to about 15 minutes at first, but all these were gone near shore. Near shore we had to keep a close eye on the chart, GPS and depth sounder until daybreak. One funny thing: when we first got hammered, the depth sounder went crazy beeping and reseting itself continuously. It took us a moment to realize that it was because it was being lifted out of the water by the choppy waves. Probably a common occurrence, but the first time it's happened to us. 

All clear 

Things cleared quickly and it was a lovely, relaxing morning with a big breakfast and calm seas by 0900. Our overriding concern during the night was damaging gear, we never felt unsafe, just uncomfortable. The only casualty was one of our air-vanes for the self-steering, presumably lost over the side. It's something easy to fabricate, plus we have two others. If we'd stowed our deck gear properly, we wouldn't have lost it. Lesson learned.

Our plan was to make it all the way to Panama from Chiapas, but we didn't pack as much fuel as we should have and used more than expected the evening of the 19th. With the Papagayos blowing along Nicaragua (according to our bullshit forecast) and east swell to confirm it, we decided to moor at Barillas Marina in El Salvador on the morning of the 21^st. It's called a marina, but it's more of a resort with a mooring field deep inside a lagoon. You need a pilot to navigate the bar at the entrance. We have a guidebook, a few years old now, that has waypoints, but the bar has definitely moved since then, so we waited for a panga to come out and guide us in.

This post has already gone on too long and we need to depart early tomorrow morning for the tide, so I'll wrap things up, but this is a pretty nice place and very reasonably priced. One of those stops you're glad you stumbled upon and wish you could stay a little bit longer. We did get to rest up, do a little walking and enjoy some nice scenery. Maybe we'll come back for the volcanoes.

Crossing the bar

Lempa Shoals

Inside the Bahia de Jiquilisco

Dock and Moorings

Semi-Domestic Spider Monkeys on the Plantation

Tree o' Monkeys

The caged fellow quarrels with the Alpha

"How Cute!"

Alpha Female "Maria"

Little Gator

Croc' didn't show up in shot

View from a hammock

Horse Ranch, Polo field to right

Bananas

So we're bound for Panama on the 24th. If we make another unscheduled stop, hopefully it'll be as pleasant as this one.

Huatulco To Puerto Chiapas

1/31/15 – 2/3/15
250 NM

I'll make an effort not to ramble as much in this post. JUMBLE had a good, mostly uneventful crossing of the Gulf of Tehuantepec. We encountered some 20 knots winds a bit off the bow our first evening entering Salina Cruz, which hosts a large commercial shipping facility. There appeared to be fires on the hills behind the town, sort of BladeRunner-esque. I think these are the port's super-bright lights, but maybe there's a PEMEX refinery or something. With the offshore breeze, the smell was of smoke and dust, but not the usual smell of burning trash we've come to associate with populated areas in Mexico. Two large ships were anchored and another was moving at very low speed. Our charts show offshore lighted buoys/moorings, presumably for loading tankers. We passed very close by one that showed on our charts as a yellow flash, but I never spotted it.

The Shrimper Menace

Everyone hates Frigatebirds

An all too common sight along this coast

By the next morning it as calm and flat as we hugged the shore a few miles off just in case the wind decided to start howling. The only traffic was shrimpers, who seemed to be operating around the 100' contour, mostly. One sailboat passed a few miles to the south of us heading north in the afternoon. Around this time our Raymarine SPX5 wheelpilot, a product I cannot say enough bad things about, quit on us. When we're actually sailing, we use our Sailomat self-steering vane (a superior product), but for motoring we need the electronic autopilot. Hand-steering is anathema to us and I assume any other sane cruiser. Anyway, for the next 40 hours or so, we sailed whenever there was a enough wind for the vane to work and worked out a system to steer with the mizzen while motoring, although this required at least a puff of wind. We went over our weather window and got a little bit of Tehuantepec wind one evening, 25-30 knots and gusty, but only for a couple hours before sundown. Good sailing.

Spin Sheet on Genny for better lead downwind

The most we got from Tehuantepec

For Puerto Chiapas, I'll let the pictures do the talking. Helpful marina, but a very bad place to be stuck when you're broke as there's no anchoring. Raymarine puts a $5 brushed hobby motor, the kind you'd find in an cheap RC car, in their $1600 pilot. Raymarine will charge you $75 for a replacement with the little drive gear. They won't ship to Mexico. When we get back to the States I'd like to make a franken-system with higher quality drive components. There was nothing available locally. The motor's brushes had fallen out and the commutator was shredded. We found a small robot parts outfit in Colorado willing to deal with us. This is where we finally encountered the difficulty of getting things shipped to Mexico and we were not the only ones stuck in “parts purgatory”. The Marina has an address for shipping and allowed us to use their phone to make a few international calls, but it took about a week and a half for our little package to arrive. $12 for 2 motors, $67 for shipping. All told, JUMBLE had a much easier time than most, given the horror stories we heard. We now understand why many people structure their re-supplies around flights home or visits from friends.

Exotic fertilizer: less manure smelling, more stale coffee or fish

Side Channel towards Muelle de Pesca and the Marina

They're more impressive from a distance

It also made us consider how misleading it can be to think of cell phones (everyone in mexico seems to have one), internet and social networking as a sort of gateway for the developing world into the 21st century. Sure, it's a great thing and cell towers are easy to build and profitable. However, being able to find something on the internet and actually being able to access it through a reasonable supply train are totally different things. Talking to some of the locals it's often a case of either go without or have friends or family bring the items over the border themselves. The basic logistical and political problems can't be defeated by innovation alone.

Anyway, the crew of JUMBLE kept busy and enjoyed hot showers for 15 DAYS. A real hemorrhage of cash. We tackled numerous small projects that have been piling up:

-Comprehensive mosquito netting; compromise between ventilation and tightness
-Clean and lubricate all blocks, many had become 'talkative'
-Replace windvane drive lines with spectra for less stretch and friction
-Divide and hinge port bunk storage to eliminate toolbox on starboard
-Route main halyard to avoid chafe problems on spreader
-Run additional anchor chain into bilge instead of vee-berth; modify floorboards to allow access
-Inventory all lockers (only 1/3rd done)
-REPLACE AUTOPILOT MOTOR
-Cleaning, laundry and sundry

Anna is one cool cucumber. 50 mph in a pickup bed

Wine from CINNAMON and schnitzel

We lined the bottom with pieces of yoga mat

The gaff is JUMBLE's most popular perch

Right at the last minute, after the drug-sniffing dog came aboard and we had our Zarpe to exit the country, we met a Dutch cruiser, Ben, who shared GBs of e-charts with us. We made a show of turning on the motor, checking lines, hanking on sails and otherwise killing time as we waiting for the files to copy. Technically, you're supposed to leave immediately after the inspection and I think they were a little annoyed with us, but the charts are tits. Thanks Ben.

One brush in the gearbox

Pressing the gear

Rewiring

We'll see how long this fix lasts.

Acapulco To Huatulco

1/26/15 – 1/29/15

240NM

This way an uneventful leg. Very Hot, with light winds. Solar panels working at full throttle. Too boring to log all the motoring and light air sailing. There was a cycle of thermal winds from 1200 – 2100 (5 to 10 knots) onshore, calm from 2100 to 0000, then offshore winds (often 5 knots and never more than 8) from 0000 – 0900, then calm and very hot until 1200. This pattern seems the norm for most of mainland Mexico this time of year. At least in JUMBLE's very limited experience. We motored about a third of the time, but covered about half the miles with the iron jib.

Haircut Needed

In a more exciting vein, we caught our first real fish a couple hours out of Acapulco with the lure given to us by Santiago It was a Crevalle jack, a very common fish in this part of the world and nothing special. It has very dark, oily flesh and it's considered poor table fare by many snobs and ninnies. However, it's quite popular amongst folks in Central America and Mexico and the younger, smaller fish are supposed to be lighter in flavor. The filleting was quite tough on my knives and a hatchet came in handy for the heavy bones behind the gills. Anna made some excellent sushi (think basic tuna roll) the first day and we marinated and bagged the rest for a few more meals.

Trying to beat the heat

As we approached Huatulco and the Gulf of Tehuantepec, there was an easterly swell that could only have come from the frequent gales that blow there. The wind was calm locally and we reached Huatulco earlier than planned at 0100. The anchorage is tight and we had planned to wait until morning to anchor, but the prospect of heaving to with no wind and moderate swell was unappealing so we chanced it. After a couple of set attempt and lots of grinding on the chain, we decided to call it good enough and keep anchor watch for the nearby cliffs, buoys and channel.

Huatulco Bay

Looking out of the anchorage

JUMBLE didn't drag until our last day anchored in a strong afternoon onshore breeze. Conveniently, we were in town enjoying internet and sandwiches. Slightly concerned with the strong winds, we rowed the dinghy back as fast as we could with 2 jugs of diesel and 3 jugs of water against the wind. Not very fast. JUMBLE had drug about 40-50' into the bay and no one was surprised. The bottom is only 15' down and all rock and coral, not a patch of sand in the area up against the eastern cliffs, but the bay is surprisingly well sheltered from swell and I'd recommend it if it weren't for the deluge of tourists. No, this isn't boat snob talk: the number of tour pangas prevented diving except right next to boat and some teenage prick crashed into JUMBLE on a Jetski and then sped off while we hurled every English and Spanish curse we knew at him. Just a scratch, but a couple hours of putty, fairing and painting are needed.

On the plus side, Huatulco was the driest place we've visited on mainland Mexico. Same basic 90s in the day, but 40% humidity and even into the 70s at night. Very, very nice. A USCG ship was in town on the cruise ship dock, but they seemed to be partying it up and didn't respond to our requests for a weather forecast. On the second day we got a neighbor in the anchorage, GRAINEDO, a large French catamaran. Michelle, the dad aboard, gave us some expert tips regarding the Canal, Papagayo winds and so-forth. With a 36 hour window, we left to cross the dreaded Tehuantepec on the evening of Saturday the 31^st.