Malulani Finally Arrives (Jan 30 - Feb 6)

Malulani, with Skipper Floyd and Dirk-the-Dutch crew, finally arrived in La Paz on Monday January 30. Floyd had planned to stay a couple of nights at the marina, and then we’d take off for Mazatlan 240 miles across the Sea of Cortez. But there were delays… they’d torn the mainsail in a couple of places and had to have that sent away to the local sail guy, the cooling pump blew a gasket, the fresh water pressure pump was leaking, and one of the four 40 gallon bags that holds freshwater sprung leak. Huh. Ok.

And the rig is funny. Not funny “ha ha.” The boom sits too low on the mast. The mainsail, when raised, will not lift the boom off the boom crutch. The topping lift has to be used to hold the boom up a bit, which makes for a really baggy sail. Huh. The mainsail is the oddest I've seen, with a flap of a few inches of extra canvas near the mast on either side of the sail, to which a zipper is attached. Apparently it used to zip to some kind of cover... Floyd had bought it second hand, and it doesn't quite fit the mast and boom.

It’s Floyd’s first boat, which he bought in a derelict state, and has been fixing for the last 4 years. He said what prompted him to buy it are the same feelings that prompted Charlie Brown to buy a scraggly stick for a Christmas tree. Huh. I’ve heard better reasons. If you want a little lost puppy go to the pound, don’t buy 46 feet of blistered fiberglass. Anyway… what he’s been able to do is remarkable, but its still has not morphed into the nautical equivalent of a tall, green, well decorated Christmas tree. Anyway... apparently I did not ask enough questions before agreeing to crew for this trip.

Floyd at the Nav station.

Dirk, who has a fair amount of experience sailing in the difficult coniditions off of Holland, said that Malulani won't point (sail to the wind) closer than 45 degrees. A typical sloop will sail within 35 degrees or better. Floyd insisted that he had it sailing closer than that on the way down. I figured there's really only one way to find out...

Dirk at the helm -- wearing Floyd's Navy hat.

I had dinner the first night with Floyd, his friend Sam from the boat Pegasus, and Axel who also has a boat down here. Sam is waiting for his beautiful Hans Christian 33 to be picked up by a freighter that will deliver it to Florida for him. It turns out that I had heard of him though Vicky in Puerto Vallarta. He was the boat she was towing up to La Paz when she got dismasted. Read all about it on Latitude 38’s website. Axel was also recently featured in Latitude 38 for running his last boat, See Ya, aground coming into La Paz. Read all about it. There were some good stories to be shared over burgers and Negra Modelo (the best beer in Mexico). Sam is a really nice guy, and drove us around town almost every day we were here to search for parts for the stuff that keeps breaking and to buy provisions.

Mexican supermarkets are different. They have a booth set up in the meat/deli department, from which a DJ-butcher guy makes announcements, plays music (I heard the Scorpions and some kind of Latin rave music), and slices cold cuts.

The picture to the right is Dirk inquiring about salami from the DJ-butcher guy. Note the amp/speaker to the right.

Interestingly, this large supermarket will sell you coffee, but you’ll have to go elsewhere if you want coffee filters. Contact lens solution is another item they deemed unworthy of carrying. But chicken was cheap: something like a dollar a pound. Of course, if you BBQ the chicken with the fatty skin on (which is the best part), the dripping fat will make a little fireball of your BBQ, no matter how low the heat is. Actually, when Floyd shut off the flame and it kept on burning, we thought for a minute there we may have stumbled on some kind of self-cooking food. Surprisingly, it was not blackened, was moist but thoroughly cooked, and tasted very good. We had a few good dinners on board at the dock, followed by "movie night" screened in the salon on the flat screen, with the film selected from Floyd's large DVD collection. That was nice. We've institued the "if you cook, you don't clean" rule, of which I'm a big fan. So some things are going well.

The departure date was pushed back several times while parts of the boat were getting fixed. Floyd, who is described by his friends as a nice guy, was getting annoyed and dealt with it by complaining to anyone that would listed about how things shouldn’t be breaking and how much the broken parts had originally cost and how much their rebuild had cost and how much the repair was costing. After a week on the boat in La Paz with the complaining, I was frustrated and ready to go -- either with or without Malulani. Sam’s sense of humor and good attitude were a welcome relief from the increasingly grating atmosphere on Malulani, and he assured me that Floyd will be a much nicer guy once things get fixed and we get moving again. I’m hoping so.

On the lighter side... this is Lucy the Goose (Goosey Lucy). She was blown into the marina in a hurricane a few years ago, and has been fed so well she decided to stay. She’s about the friendliest goose I’ve even seen: she’ll actually let you pet her and doesn’t bite. But if you feed her once, she’ll swim up to your boat, honking, begging for a handout.