Trip inland

For a change of scenery, the girls and I decided to take a day trip inland to Taxco. John had already been there, and highly recommended it. Jerry was turned off by the 4 hour (one way) bus ride and did not go. Taxco is located about three-quarters of the way between Acapulco and Mexico City, in the inland mountains at an elevation of 5,000 feet. It is renouned for it silver mines. The scenery out the bus window reminded me of the road to Yosemite. Dry rolling landscape of golden grasses and scrubby brush, with mountains rising up in the distance. Though here there is a blooming tree to provide an occasional burst of color: purple from a jackaranda, fushia from a bouganvelia, or bright yellow from a primavera.

The bus stopped at the bottom of the hill along the main road that curves around the town. We walked up a road so steep it had hand rails, up to the main square. The town has a crowded feel to it, squeezed into the flattish spaces on the hill. We had lunch at a tiny cafe overlooking the square and the main church. The steep, narrow roads and furniture made with the uphill legs shorter than the downhill legs reminded me of the hill town of Sienna in Italy. As did the proliferation of small churches tucked off of little plazuelas scattered here and there among the confusion of steep-walled streets. One thing I hadn’t mentioned about Acapulco… its hot. Really hot and humid. Taxco was refreshingly cool, and had a clean mountainy smell to the air. Nice.












Unfortunately, we couldn’t figure out what was the deal with these guys. They were on pedestals outside of an ex-convent. They sure are disturbing looking... almost enough to make me want to stay out of trouble. The thorns of brambles lashed to this one contain a lethal poison. Libby knew what it was, and we saw a tree of it growing in Papagayo park, but I can´t remember the name now. Sumac, maybe? What a lousy way to die.

We wanted to check out different parts of town, and split up, reuniting at the bus station a half hour before the bus was scheduled to leave. I was on a quest for some silver jewlery to liven up my meager selection of accessories. Audrey wanted to see a church at the top of the hill. When we met up again we all showed off our purchases and swapped tales from the day. I mentioned that I wish I had bought a churro before I left the main square. A few minutes later a churro vendor miraculously appeared. Not one to spurn the miraculous, Libby and I bought a couple of churros. For some reason, Audrey doesn’t like dough fried in grease, dipped in sugar, and sold on the street, and so declined. I though I could spend a while longer in the town, not that there was a lot to do but enjoy the atmosphere.

When we got back to the boat, Jerry asked, “How was the bus ride?” What a jerk...

Exploring Acapulco (Feb 26)

We looked around town a little bit. Visited Papagayo Park, a large public park in near the shore at the center of town that contains a small zoo, amusement park, playgrounds, etc. Saw some of the creatures that call Mexico home.

Crocodiles up close are a little scary to me… even when there is a chain link fence between us.


The tlaquachas (la-KWA-chas) were delightfully cute and playful.

The turtles were feasting on fallen mangos, like the one next to this guy. The mango trees all over town had ripe fruit. It was pretty cool to be able to walk around town picking up sweet juicy mangoes now and then. Even better than an Easter egg hunt.

Audrey and I visited the fort that once guarded the harbor, Fuerte de San Diego. It had since been converted to a history museum, and was actually about the best museum I’ve yet seen in Mexico. Back in the 1500’s, the Spanish galleons set sail from Acapulco to the Phillipines. Acapulco was an ideal location for this for two reasons. First, it is a large and wonderfully protected natural harbor, offering some protection from the sometimes powerful wind and seas blowing along the shore outside. Also, not far offshore (a few hundred miles) the trade winds start blowing steadily toward Asia, which the galleons would use to push them along. Interestingly, the cruisers that I know that are making the "puddle jump" to the South Pacific are taking advantage of those same winds 500 years later. Though they now leave from a little further north (Zihuatanejo or Cabo San Lucas) and have better weather predictions to minimize their time in the doldrums, they still leave at the same time of year (mid-March through mid-April) that the galleons did. Anyway… I found it fascinating.

There was a replica of a Spanish galleon floating in the pond at the park. It really isn’t very big. That is, it isn’t very long nor very wide, though it does have high sides. The galleons brought back loads of treasure from the far east. These made really tempting targets for the English and Dutch privateers (pirates sanctioned by the government) who were generally better sailors. The English didn’t have much claim on the "New World" lands, but they built up the best navy in the world and took what they could. Hmm… this is sounding as dry as a history text book, but really I found it quite fascinating. I guess being here and having more familiarity with the means and limitations of the mode of transportation makes a difference. Anyway… just a bit more. I promise.
So to thwart the pirates, the Spanish build Fuerte de San Diego. It was really well designed, in a five-armed-star arrangement. The many cannons on the top could have easily lobbed a cannonball anywhere from the entrance to the bay to the innermost part of the bay where our boat was moored. It had thick outer walls and a moat, like any self-respecting fort should, and skinny windows to shoot arrows out of, some affording surprisingly well placed views of stairs that an enemy might try to come storming up. The center courtyard functioned like a cistern, and collected all the water needed by the fort for storage in an enormous tank off of the kitchen. The tank was tapped so they had running water in the kitchen sink. It was never taken by a foreign power. Though some guy whose name I forget right now did manage to capture it during the Mexican Revolution. Maybe Hidalgo… or was he the priest that was stirring up fever for the revolution with phrases such as "Vive la Virgen de Guadelupe!" I’m not sure what she has to do with Mexican independence, per se… I’m getting most of my information from somewhat iffy translations.

View of the Club de Yates and our boat from the fort. We could so hit it from here...

In summary, the Fuerte is awesome, both in clever design and its connection to maritime history. Captain Jack Aubrey has not yet voyaged to this part of the world in the Patrick O’Brian books that I have read so far, though I am hoping he will in the few that I have left.

Arrival in Acapulco, boarding Sumatra (Feb 24)

By the time I went to catch up with Jerry’s boat, Sumatra, it had moved from Zihuatanejo to Acapulco. I just spent 8 hours on the bus, on a little round trip north to Puerto Vallarta (PV). The bus down to Acapulco was another 12 hours. Unfortunately, it was both the longest and the most uncomfortable bus ride I’ve had yet. So I was happy to meet Jerry at the dock of the Club de Yates (pronounced YAH-tehs). He said hi and then asked me if I had any money, and could I give him some. For the mooring fees, so he could pay this guy right now. Then he explained that we all shared costs for food, mooring or dock fees, and fuel. Huh. Ok, not unusual, but it would have been nice if he had mentioned it earlier. Nice to meet you, too. Here’s a hundred pesos.

Skipper Jerry at the wheel.

I got to know the other crew when we all went out for drinks and dinner at the Hotel Los Flamingos (formerly owned by the actor who played Tarzan. Seriously.) which has the best view of the sunset in the city. There were four other crew when I arrived. Jerry’s cousin, Libby, a New Yorker who had sailed with him down from San Francisco, had been with him the longest. Audrey is the 69-year-old English lady I met in PV when I saw the boat in December. She is really quite a remarkable lady who has managed to log 18,000 sea miles in the last few years crewing for different boats all over the world, though she claims to be not much of a sailor. John is a retired civil engineer from Portland, OR, who while vacationing with his family in Mexico decided to swim up to a boat anchored in Zihua to see if the wanted crew. They referred him to Jerry. He’s trying to learn as much as he can before he buys a boat. Moe, Libby’s friend and a heck of a nice guy despite the fact that he‘s from Texas, was visiting for a week, and leaving in a couple of days.

Libby and John aboard Sumatra.

When we got back to the boat, there was not a berth in the crew cabins for me. Jerry offered to let me share the aft cabin, his private cabin. That was the first time that any skipper I was with had made such an inappropriate suggestion. No thanks, dirty old man, I don’t want to sleep next to you. I’ll sleep in the salon, thanks very much. Fortunately, he did not continue to hit on me.
We spent a few days in Acapulco, on a mooring ball off of the Club de Yates. Not bad. Nice pool, etc. Acapulco is a huge city, of some 1.2 million people, much bigger than PV and Mazatlan. It was kind of a shock to be in such hustle and bustle again. The taxis, mostly old school VW bugs, created lanes when traffic slowed down, usually crossing the median to do so. It was pretty wild. The water was too dirty to swim in, partially because Jerry doesn’t like to use his holding tank, so we were floating in whatever we flushed down the toilet. Gross.

We went grocery shopping the next day. A trip to the store to buy some food sounds like a simple enough affair… but then add in the fact that fridge and freezer space is very limited, the person most familiar with the galley didn’t come shopping, everyone has different tastes, and the supermarket is Mexican which means you never REALLY know if they’ll carry a given item on the day you’re there. Then add in the Jerry factor. He continually tried to throw into the cart large quantities of perishable food that only he liked to eat and stores of paper products that would last him through another winter. No, Jerry, we already have PLENTY of toilet paper. No, Jerry, we don’t need a dozen sweet rolls, most people on the boat don’t eat carbs. To this he responded by huffing that we were rationed to three peanuts each. Since I had written down the shopping list with everyone’s input at the boat, I became the director of this multi-cart provisioning excursion, and the one who had to tell Jerry to put stuff back, and was therefore on the receiving end of his griping. Libby later congratulated me on coming home without letting a jumbo pack of hot dogs slip into the cart, of which Jerry would eat just one and let the rest go bad.

Actually, just putting the shopping list together was indicative of what kind of skipper Jerry is. At one point during the list making, Libby said that we were running low on vegetables. So Jerry jabbed his finger at the list I was making, and said, "Vegetables. Write down vegetables." Unfortunately, that isn’t really helpful once you’re in the market trying to decide if "vegetables" means carrots, cucumber, squash or radishes. Is it for a salad or to be steamed? Is there room in the fridge for this? How many meals should it last for? Jerry doesn’t have much of a mind for the details of how exactly the food from gets from the market to his plate. Later, it became clear that he also didn’t understand the details of many of the tasks involved in making the boat go. He would not or could not explain step by step how he wanted things done. Instead, for example, he would tell us all to go to the mast to put the sail up, failing to break the task into discreet tasks assigned to specific people, which is how a good skipper runs his crew. The result was a mess, which he would invariably razz us about for not doing it better. Hindsight is 20/20. During the rest of the trip, whenever he have a snappish but vague order, I thought back to the statement that to me epitomized Jerry‘s management style, "Write down vegetables."
As it turns out, the reason Jerry doesn‘t know how food gets to his plate is that Jerry doesn’t cook. Or clean. Or do anything really. The rest of the crew pitches in to cook breakfast, lunch and dinner, and clean up after all of these meals. Jerry expects these meals, though seems oblivious to the work they entail. Comments such as "Hey! French toast!" as if it had magically just appeared, rather than, "Thanks for making breakfast, Libby, Audrey, Emily or John," were irksome. I don’t know if no one ever taught him any manners, or if some point in his life he decided he was too big of a man to say please or thank you. After dinner one night, he got up from the table when he was done and turned the lights out while the rest of us were still eating. Wow. And I’m PAYING to be here?!

Anyway… fortunately, both Libby and Audrey are good cooks and easy to get along with in the kitchen. And John, though not as experienced, is good natured and enthusiastic. As a bonus, my first morning on the boat, Audrey made me a proper cup of English tea. Almost nothing starts my day of better than a perfect cup of tea. Lovely.

Acapulco skyline off the port quarter of Sumatra.

The Next Boat

I took the bus up to Puerto Vallarta to meet Dave and see his boat, La Vie. He was looking for crew to the South Pacific. Every skipper says they have a great boat. Dave really does. He has done a spectacular job refitting it… I won’t bore you with the details. Here he is in the galley -- the only skipper down here I’ve met who is under 40. Bonus.

The only thing keeping me from joining him was a lack of a watermaker. La Vie doesn’t have quite enough water tank capacity for a crew of four. But, maybe I’ll fly out to Tahiti or New Zealand to crew for him for a while…

Since that didn’t work out, I took the bus down to Acapulco (12 hours) to meet Sumatra, with skipper Jerry. I hadn’t met Jerry. But I had checked out Sumatra and met one of his crew, Audrey, over Christmas in Puerto Vallarta. The boat, a Trintella 53, is HUGE and comfortable inside, and there were two crew cabins and a separate head for the crew. Very appealing. Jerry is a doctor, so I assumed he wouldn‘t be pinched for money quite as tightly as Floyd had been.

Remember that phrase from spelling class: when you "assume" you make an "ass" out of "u" and "me". Maybe that wasn´t from spelling class... at any rate, it applied to the assumption I made that Sumatra would be a fine boat. Stay tuned.

A few more days on Malulani (Feb 16-21)

We sailed on to the little town of La Cruz, on the north shore of the Bay of Banderas where we anchored a night. Dirk rowed us all ashore the next day to we could take a REAL shower (not a boat shower) and reprovision. I bought some nice avocados and tomatoes from the guys in the produce truck. Back on he boat Dirk asked me to teach him how to make guacamole. This paid dividends, as he made a tasty batch of guacamole every day after that.

We sailed on to Puerto Vallarta, where we spent the night of Feb 16 in Marina Vallarta with the BIG power boats and the little power boat dogs. We all three decided to go downtown together for dinner. Floyd was the first onto the crowded bus. Which pulled away while he was standing on the bottom step leaving Dirk and I watching on the curb. Huh.

We managed to reunite downtown and had a nice stroll and photo session on the malecon and a fine dinner. There is a “pirate ship” that sails around the city front and fires a cannon at sunset. That was cool. Even if they weren’t really sailing.



The art along this shoreline stroll is quite memorable. Here is Dirk sitting on the lap of a creature who seems like he belongs in the Star Wars bar. Check out the laces on the tentacles peeking out from under the hem of his clothes (see pic at left).


This sculpture below carries a very moving message… I just don’t know what it is. The mama-pillow-headed thingie is crying after the children-pillow-headed-thingies who are climbing to the top of the ladder. Theories?



Dirk had a great line that he’d use when bargaining over a taxi or for something from the market. He would emphatically say, “I am not an American tourist. I am Dutch. I am not going to pay this inflated price that the American tourists pay.” It was pretty effective. This had the unintended consequence of tying him to the agricultural product so popular in Mexico and legal in Amsterdam. Once, after getting a good price on something, someone offered him some hash.

Floyd demonstrated his lack of understanding of “velocity made good” as we sailed from PV, planning to sail turn left (south out of Banderas Bay) around the dreaded Cabo Corrientes. He had the sails sheeted in as tight as he could get them and was trying to aim to the searward side of the point… but not quite making it. He wanted to keep poking along and hope that the wind would shift so we wouldn’t have to tack and could maybe just barely clear the point. Hmm… not such a good plan. We were doing three knots with 15 knots of breeze. The baggy sail just won’t point that close to the wind. When it was my turn to take the wheel, I fell off 10 degrees and the boatspeed doubled. We had to tack to get some more room to clear the point, but we would have had to do that anyway. Floyd griped that he didn’t think we were in a hurry, and wasn’t it much more comfortable when we were [underpowered] and not heeled over so far. Um… 1) Yes, we are in a hurry to get to the very small, rocky, and unfamiliar anchorage before dark, and 2) We’re close hauled. The boat is going to heel some. We`re sailing. It happens.

Anyway… we did not make it to the anchorage before dark. Floyd had insisted when he named our departure time as 10am (which I considered late), that he didn’t mind anchoring after dark, and that there would be a nearly full moon to provide some light. Of course, the moon hadn’t risen when we got there, which he hadn’t considered. He had never seen this anchorage before. I had. It was where Dan and I nearly crunched the keel on the hidden rock in broad daylight. I was white knuckled during the whole anchoring procedure and really mad at Floyd for taking such unnecessary risks. Actually, I don’t know that he even acknowledged the risk. A blissfully ignorant skipper. Great.

As we sailed and motored (when the motor worked -- it conked out a few times) south to Barra de Navidad we saw many turtles and some whales. This picture of Dirk pointing at the whales shows a little more of the excitement and fascination that accompanies a whale sighting than the blurry picture of the far-off whale spout that I took. That night I cooked spaghetti and meatballs. None of us felt so good the next day, and I was not back on solid food for two days. Stay away from the ground meat!!

We arrived at Barra, and Floyd sprang for a slip at the Grand Bay Hotel Marina. I know I already said this when Dan and I arrived here, but this place is gorgeous. Lush tropical landscaping. A string of pools connected by waterslides. A gorgeous view from the spacious and well-appointed lobby bar. Frank Sinatra reonrdings and other standard play throughout the cool interior giving the impression that it has been a stylish place to excape from it all since the 50’s, though it was only completed in the 80’s.


We can’t afford to eat here, so we went out to have a last dinner together in town. The next day I left to meet another boat. Floyd and Malulani planned to stay in the marina for a month to fix things, before heading an easy 20 miles down to Manzanillo to put the boat on a ship to Florida.

It was great sailing with Dirk. He has kindly offered to let me stay with he and his wife if I ever find myself in Holland. I hope to be able to take him up on the offer sometime.

I hope Floyd finally gets where he is going...