April 18, 2005 - Huatulco (State of Oaxaca), Mexico

We spent 5 days in Manzanillo, 3 days at the Las Hadas Marina where we took advantage of the resort’s beautiful swimming pool and had unsuccessful repair work done on our refrigerator. We played in a local tennis tournament at the nearby Costa Real Resort, and were blown away by the level of play of the locals there. We tied for last place.

From Manzanillo, we sailed 180 miles further down the coast to Isla Grande, an island just north of Ixtapa. Although the island has numerous palapa restaurants during the day, the entire island is vacated at 6 pm which makes for a wonderfully quiet anchorage at night. In the clean water of this anchorage, we scrubbed the bottom of the boat and salvaged a 60-pound delta anchor that someone had abandoned. Now we have a very good second anchor.

We moved 10 miles further southeast to Zihuatanejo where we spent one night going to dinner with some cruising friends and ending up at a very good blues club, Blue Mamou, before calling it a night and dinghying back to our boat. The next day we motored back to Ixtapa and docked Dream Caper at the marina.

We flew home for a 3-week stay. Portia played in several tennis matches for her teams, and then spent one week in Palm Desert on her annual tennis clinic/Pacific Life Tennis Tournament trip with her tennis pro and 7 ladies. It was great fun getting back on the tennis courts. Meanwhile, Steve spent an inordinate amount of time buying boat parts, researching refrigerator systems and other boat related chores which kept him running around. We squeezed in a trip to Tahoe where we managed to ski a few days in gloriously sunny weather which felt like early Spring. Although we were able to spend some time with family, unfortunately we were not able to catch up with friends. We left SFO with almost 200 pounds of boat parts and supplies.

We stopped in Mexico City on the way back to Ixtapa and spent 3 days visiting the Archaeological Museum, the Sun and Moon pyramids at Teotihuacan (which we climbed the day after the solstice, and were able to absorb some of the energy leftover from that event), downtown Mexico City and the floating garden area of Xochimilco (which was a kick as it was more like a bumper-boat event). We enjoyed Mexico City very much as it was easy and fun using the subway and bus systems. We dragged our 200 pounds of luggage back on the plane and made it to Ixtapa without having to pay excess baggage fees only because we pleaded with the Mexicana baggage staff and moved things around so we could carry an extra bag on board.

Back at Ixtapa, we were delighted to have Steve’s parents, Art and Evelyn, visit us for 4 days. We anchored in Zihuatenejo Bay, did some snorkeling, dined out, played Mexican Train (dominoes), explored the clean village of Zihuatanejo and just enjoyed their company. Two days after his parents’ departure, we were happy to have Steve’s brother and wife, Brian and Cheryl, join us on board for 4 days. We sailed to Isla Grande for one day where we were overwhelmed by jet skiers, banana boat riders and island visitors who inundate the small anchorage with their activities. We were able to enjoy snorkeling once we moved to the quieter west anchorage. Back at anchor in Zihuatanejo, we dined at several fine restaurants and enjoyed hanging out together.

We spent another week in Zihuatanejo resting up, provisioning, and getting the boat ready to head south. There is an annual guitar festival in Zihuatanejo every year where international performers play at different restaurants and concert centers. We attended a dinner concert and the closing performance. Great music in a wonderfully quaint setting.

It took us 2 days and 2 hours to make the 300-mile trip from Zihuatanejo to Huatulco. We had calm seas and were able to sail the first day because we had some wind, but on the second day we motored most of the way. Due to a current in our favor, we averaged 7 to 8 knots. There was very little traffic at night to worry about, usually just shrimp boats which display bright lights. Porpoises visited us often and there were hundreds of turtles lounging in the seas, some with birds standing on top. Most would just annoyingly peer at us as we slid by.

Just as we anchored in a small anchorage north of Huatulco the starboard engine conked out and would not start. That night the generator went kapoot (the water pump) which meant our refrigerator/freezer no longer had a power source. Our refrigerator normally is powered by the house batteries or generator/shore power, but for the past several months it will not operate from the batteries. So, in less than an hour we lost one engine, our generator and our refrigerator. Things looked grim. Portia thought about jumping ship.

But, the next morning, Steve replaced a broken alternator belt and the engine reluctantly started and continues to perform just fine. We happily motored with both engines one hour to the only marina in the area. Our friends on Comfort Zone had space in their refrigerator to take our thawed meats so we did not have to eat everything at once. We made 30-40 cruisers at the marina’s Friday night (potluck) dock party very happy when we brought barbecued salmon and Korean barbecued beef as these items had totally thawed. After much pedaling around town on our bicycles finding the various parts and a machinist who would put them together, we were able to get the generator water pump repaired and the generator running again! The machinist would only take $5 when Steve offered $10.

We are still in Huatulco which is 200 miles southeast of Acapulco. This area is called Bahias de Huatulco because there is a string of 11 pristine little coves (bahias or beaches) all of which we plan to explore in the next two weeks. This area is also important to cruisers because it is the last attractive and yacht-friendly port prior to leaving Mexico to Central America and the Panama Canal. It is here that boaters wait for a projected weather window of 4 to 5 good days (non-gale force winds) before making the 250 mile (Gulf of Tehuantepec) crossing to the southern Mexico border. Beyond the Mexico border, most cruisers bypass the 120-mile coast of Guatemala because of reportedly unfriendly marine officials and inadequate anchorage and marina facilities. When we leave here, we plan to make a 450 mile voyage (5 days) directly to El Salvador.

But for now, we will head inland to Oaxaca. Oaxaca is supposed to one of the best arts and crafts centers in Mexico, has many fine museums, a renowned market and numerous archeological sites. Steve is happy because it is known for its chocolate.