December 18, 09 - Costa Baja Marina

I left Earl for a few days. I don’t know everything that happened in my absence, but Daisy got stung by a bee and Earl got some type of intestinal bug. Obviously they need a mother around. Earl blamed his disease on food he ate downtown, but I have my doubts. I got sick as well within a day of my return without the assistance of eating any locally prepared food. Hopefully, that is all now behind us. Christmas is suddenly here. La Paz is all decked out with lights and Xmas trees which seems incongruous to me in the Mexican desert environment. There are Santas wandering the grocery stores and the Xmas background music, usually Feliz Navidad, is ubiquitous.

I flew back into to Cabo San Lucas instead of La Paz. The difference between the two destinations is apparent even on the plane. The La Paz flight is a small plane and the passengers are quiet. The flight to Cabo was a party, all the more because I had been upgraded to first class. There was lots of drinking, laughing and calling back and forth across the aisles. I had decided to take a bus to La Paz. According to information on the web, that would be about a 2.5 hour ride and the buses left every hour or so. Our plane arrived around 1, so I had hopes of being back at the boat by 5. It turned out to be a learning experience. First, the airport in Cabo is crawling with people to ‘assist’ you. I mentioned I wanted to go the Aquila Bus Station in San Jose, and before I even had a chance to look for a cab, I found myself sold a bus ticket to the bus station, for more money than I thought the cab was supposed cost. (Not that it was much either way.) I sat on the bus for 30 minutes while it filled up, and we finally took off, with the first stop being the liquor store. Most of the passengers, almost all US, got off and came back with open beers and bags. The next stop was the bus station. Only three of us got off, as the bus apparently makes the rounds of all the hotels, which takes Lord knows long, but the passengers, well lubricated did not appear to care. They were already on vacation. Once at the bus station, the next challenge was communicating. There was a bus at 1300 and one at 1330. The man at the counter was very sweet, but spoke almost no English and I was flustered, since he seemed to assume that I was paying for the other two people who had arrived from the airport with me, so I did not ask the most important question, which was not ‘when does the bus leave’, but ‘ when does the bus arrive’. It was a pleasant, and very slow trip, though various villages, back streets, traffic jams and even one fiesta. I assume the bus has regular stops, but apparently they are willing to make additional stops for grandma or who ever, as needed. I finally arrived at the bus station in La Paz at 7. I suspect that the 1330 bus was an express that would have been faster. The fastest service is apparently the Peninsular Executive, which was also listed on the schedule. They apparently run every two hours and are nonstop to La Paz from Cabo and San Jose. If I fly into Cabo again, I will call Peninsular first and find out where and when to take the bus to La Paz.

I had hoped to go out to the islands for a couple of days this week. It was not to be. For one thing, there seemed to be quite a long to do list of little jobs. For another, we had our first experience with the sustained north winds that can come up in the winter. It was probably not terrible conditions compared to some we have been in up north, but we have gotten pretty used to flat water.

We have bought a new weather machine, a serius. We are hoping that it will give us more detailed information for the Sea of Cortez than we have been able to get from the sat. phone weather net. As usual with electronics, we are missing some cable to complete the installation, so we will have to wait until Stuart brings it with him on Saturday when he arrives. We are looking forward to seeing Teri, Meaghan , Steve, Heidi, Jamie, Elora and John tomorrow. As I mentioned, the plane flying into La Paz is small, and apparently half the passengers will have the same last name. Meaghan’s friend, Kasey, and Jon, Becky and Daniel will be arriving a few days later. I am sure they are all ready for vacation in the sun and we are ready for a vacation with them.

We decided to rent a car for the time that the kids are here. Renting a car is not quick thing here. I don’t believe I have ever seen so much paper work. We were very fortunate in getting a nice new car from National. Some people we met here were not so lucky. The car they rented came complete with spiders which bit them. Then came the fun part – driving in La Paz. The main roads are not bad, but most of the rest seem to lack street signs. Instead, at almost every corner, there is an ALTO (stop) sign, usually hidden in the trees. Judging from the local drivers, a stop sign here is merely a suggestion. At the most, people seem to simply slow down a bit. It is a little scary.

We spent most of yesterday trying to track down a leak in the water system. We started getting water dripping in the engine room after the boat was washed down in San Jose del Cabo. Earl thinks that one of the guys must have sprayed water up the vents in the stack, some of which found its way inside. The water gradually dried up, until the day before yesterday when Earl was filing the water tanks, it suddenly started dripping again. We tore the boat apart, emptying refrigerators and moving them. The boat is put together like a jigsaw puzzle. You can get behind and under things by lifting or unscrewing panels. Earl chased waterlines all around the kitchen area. After making a huge mess, he determined that we did not have a leak, but that some of the water which had come in in San Jose had been moving again. We are pretty sure that it was following the course of a green wire which carries the lightening ground from the mast to the bottom of the hull. So it turned out to be a wild goose chase. On the bright side, Earl knows more about his boat then he did before, and we have clean refrigerators.

We had a lovely couple over for drinks and chili last night. They are on a sail boat and came down as part of the Baja Haha. They were from Ventura California, but sold their house two days before they left, so their boat is now their home. They are off tomorrow for Mazatlan for a month. We hope we catch up with them sometime along the way.

Today is Earl’s birthday. We will celebrate by doing a little exploring by car and no boat jobs.