Well. It appears I have been quite remiss (lazy?) in writing
of late. I have to admit that when we are in one place for a length of time I
find it challenging to come up with a subject that I think will be
entertaining, informative or just plain interesting to my readers. That is the
case now.
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| Good times in La Paz. |
As previously reported, we arrived in La Paz on New Year’s
Day at which point our friend, Mary, proceeded to fall and break her wrist.
That entire episode is detailed in my previous blog post so I will proceed from
there.
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| Homes on the "golf course" in Los Muertos (photo from '09). Golf course is now pretty much dead grass and sagebrush. |
Shortly after Mary flew home we attempted, once again, to
continue on to La Cruz de Huanacaxtle in expectation of a 2+ month stay in one
of our favorite places. The farthest we managed to get was the anchorage at
Bahia de Los Muertos (Bay of the Dead). As an aside, the developers are working
hard to change the name to Bahia de Los Sueños (Bay of Dreams). It seems this
is a response to the reluctance on the part of buyers (mostly retirees) who are
put off by the thought of living in a “dead place”.
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| Beautiful water in Los Muertos. |
On that first day as we transited the Ceralvo Channel I
began to detect a bit of “Ode de Diesel”. We’d originally planned to bypass Los
Muertos (we insist on using the original name) but the farther we progressed
the more pronounced the odor became and if you have ever smelled diesel fumes
you will know precisely why it became prudent to stop and investigate the
problem. Once we were anchored that was diagnosed and corrected quickly (tho’
it took a bit of time to eliminate the s-m-e-l-l) but when Chris arose the next
morning and stepped into the forward head he discovered another dilemma. The
new electric toilet had decided to siphon water somewhat continuously during
the night and there was quite the puddle on the floor. Fortunately, boat
bathrooms are made for water! The walls and floor are gelcoat (fiberglass) and
there is a handy dandy switch that runs a pump to drain it into a sump and out
of the boat. Still, it presented another problem to be solved. The boat was not
in danger of sinking but if the siphon continued it could drain our fresh water
tanks. After several unsuccessful attempts to correct the problem, we decided our
best option was to return to La Paz where we happen to know a very good boat
plumber.
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| Restaurant on the beach. Weather this year was chilly, overcast, windy, drizzly at times. |
Los Muertos is a beautiful anchorage with emerald green
water and a white sand beach but there are few amenities. There is no store so
what you bring is what you have. The restaurant on the beach will allow you to
use their internet if you patronize them but there is no cell tower or other
internet service available. The weather had turned kinda crappy so we spent a
few days on the boat but we were unable to receive the SSB net to get the
weather predictions and with no internet couldn’t get GRIBS (weather fax) so we
were “flying blind” so to speak. Finally the wind & chop eased enough to
take the dinghy ashore where we had a wonderful lunch, downloaded the GRIB
files and, by walking around the corner to a rise, Chris was even able to call
the marina and re-reserve the slip we’d so recently vacated.
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| Faith back in her slip in La Paz. |
So…we arrived back in La Paz five days after we’d left. As
it turned out, the toilet fixed itself and Chris deduced that somehow the solenoid
had gotten stuck. It has functioned perfectly ever since. By then, however, the
minimal weather window we’d counted on had slammed shut with no end in sight.
After much discussion we decided that 2 attempts were enough and La Paz was a
perfectly fine place to spend a couple months during the winter. After all, it
is where we were last year.
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| Even in a marina the Mexican sunsets are gorgeous. |
Thus…we have now confirmed that the so called “La Paz
Vortex” is still functioning well.
