Voyage of the Sea Bear

A little smile, a little wave

Many Parades look the same. To a small extent, this one was no different. But a little careful examination of these pictures does show that there is a difference here. Children were present in almost every float and dance troupe.  Peeking under the plastic bushes, or out of the cab of the truck were little smiling faces. For me, it made this parade a bit more memorable.

Here are some of the other images I captured:

Little Dancers

Good drummers, and another little watcher

King of theWorld... in a few years

Oh baby. Not all the dancers were little children.. And not all were girls..

Dolphin and a few male dancers..

Over all it was a great show. Zihuatenajo is a vital and colorful community. Carnival is a good way to see what the town is really made of… good, energetic people.

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Jesus is with us when we beach our dingy.

The dingy is how we get to shore. It’s like your minivan or car. If we want to go visiting, or shopping, or go out to dinner, we get dressed up, and put our shoes and stuff into our water resistant backpack. Then I climb down the stern ladder into the dingy. JC lowers the outboard engine to me, using the davit, a little crane-like device. I bolt the engine to the dingy, JC climbs down into the boat, and we’re off.

We are currently using the Port-a-bote, a cool folding boat that’s 12 ft long, and will carry four adults easily. With just JC and I in it, it gets up on a plane quickly, and is much faster than the inflatable Zodiac we have. It’s a bit weird in the ocean, because if flexes when it hits waves and such. So there is a bit of excitement whenever we’re zipping about.

Landing the dingy can be trecherous. Some ports have a dingy dock, and you just pull up, tie off, and climb out. Other places, like Zihuatenajo, have a designated part of the beach you are expected to land at. Timing is important, in the approach, in exiting the dingy, and in departing. If you ride a wave into the beach, and lean back in the boat, the ocean can do most of the work for you. Just before we  hit sand, I have to take the motor out of gear, kill it, and tilt it up so the prop doesn’t hit the sand. JC bounces out as the wave retreats, and should be in little or no water when she does. Then I climb out, and we drag the dingy up over the high water mark.

That’s how it’s supposed to work. Many things can go wrong. I’m facing backwards while I kill/lift the outboard. That means I’m NOT looking at the beach. If the bow digs into the sand on an outgoing wave, the next incomming wave will hit the flat stern, and probably gift us with several gallons of seawater into the boat. If we slam into the sand quickly, both JC and I can fall forward, throwing off our well-timed ballet. Even after one or both of us are out of the boat, if it is allowed to turn sideways, we can get swamped. So it’s not a trivial process.

This is where Jesus comes in. He is often standing on the beach, in his red tee shirt, waving us to a clear parking spot. He wades out into the water, to steady the boat and guide us in. After we’re both out of the boat, he helps us carry the boat up the beach. He watches the dingy while we are in town, and helps carry the boat back to the water when we are ready to leave. We tip him 10 Pesos both on arrival and departure. That’s about $0.80.

Having someone with solid footing help us out when our foundation is moving is a great help. Just knowing he is there makes me more confident, and more likely to move in rhythm with the surf. And if I do screw up, he usually reduces the severity of the price JC and I both have to pay. It’s good knowing he’s there, to help us, day or night.

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It’s becoming a bit of a tradition to be on deck for sunset to watch the sun go down. Usually we have a drink and enjoy the show. Tonight was no different except that one of the usual bit-players did some grandstanding.

Ever since I scrubbed the critters off of the bottom of Sea Bear’s hull, several schools of fish have been hanging around. A couple of times a day they come up to the surface en-mass and they seem to be eating bubbles. I guess there is more there than what we see, but it LOOKS like they break the surface of the water, creating the  bubbles, then  go nuts eating them. Some sort  of low calorie fish diet, I guess.

Anyway, when school is in session, they attract attention. Bigger fish swim by, and birds dive out of the sky. It’s like a big rock hitting the water when those birds dive in. The birds are mostly Boobies, with some white long tailed hawk-like birds as well.

Tonight’s show started with the regular bubble-fest. The little guys were really going to town, and both the grey surface feeders, and the silvery flashers were playing right off the side of the boat. Two Frigates were circling high up, and a couple of the white hunters were diving in, and scoring about a third of the time. A single Pelican was also touring this end of the bay, but I didn’t see him dive in. About a hundred feet away, this little dark fish jumps out of the water. Straight up he comes, and it’s not an exaggeration that he cleared 8 to 10 feet of air. Right behind him was a 24 to 30 inch silvery fish, and the big guy also cleared 8 feet at least. JC and I both shouted, it was amazing. A few seconds later they both jumped again, and repeated the stunt. Dolphins jump like that, but I’ve never seen little fish get so far above the water.

Anyway, it made for a spectacular sight. Sunset was like a postcard. We keep hoping that one of these evening we’ll see the fabled “green flash”, but in all honesty, I’m happy with the sunsets just the way they’ve been. Birds diving into the water, and fish diving out. Who knows what we shall see tomorrow.

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The closing SailFest BBQ / beach party is today. Sorry for the lack of postings the past few days, we had a glorious lightning storm that took out the WiFi Radio. And of course, the Mexican TelCel radio failed to re-activate this month, I´m working on getting that turned back on. So right now I´m in one of the common INTERNET cafes catching up on email, etc.

The weather has been a bit strange, they say it <NEVER> rains here this time of the year. We got two and a half days of down-pour.  Thunder and lightning. A bit of wind. Anyway, the Sea Bear still has a few leaky hatches, and the dorades leak as well. I´ll work on them a few at a  time.  I bailed  6 to 8 inches of fresh water out of the dingy three times (should have saved some for washing / showers). But the weather has been wonderful the past few days, we did our first-ever sailboat race yesterday and it was quite educational.

This next week is Carnival, that too will be my first. Masks, ribbons, and signs are going up across the streets, and this festive town is getting even more so. We´ll hang around for another few weeks before we start back northward.

Off to the beach for lunch, then to a friends house to watch the Superbowl. Till next time, this is Captñ Harold, from Zihuatenajo…

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Even here in paradise there are chores to do. Especially here.

Yesterday I put in my ear plugs (still fighting a bit of an ear infection), flippers, mask and snorkel. Grabbed a scraper and took a look at the bottom of Sea Bear. There were 2 inch long white bi-valve seashells, with long pink tongues hanging out, all along the white “water line” painted on her hull. These things weren’t there two weeks ago. I also noted round perriwinkle thingies and a lot of green mossy grass-like stuff. Farther down are bunches of “dark stuff” I didn’t inspect closely.

As I scraped these things off, I soon had lots of little buddies. FISH! Anywhere from 3 to 12 inches long. They did a pretty good job of making sure the shells didn’t reattachthemselves. After a while, bigger fish arrived and when I got done, pelicans and other birds were there making sure the bigger fish didn’t get too cocky as well. Ahh, the food chain in action.

Since I will be wearing ear plugs, I really can’t go much more than 6-8 feet down. I float like a cork, so I’ll need to dig out the weight belt.  I have no idea about what works best to scrub with, so maybe I should go buy a few scrubby-tools. Plastic scraper, shiny steel wool, green sponge pads, maybe a metal spatula for the tough guys. Anyone have any suggestions? It’s a red ablative paint there under the water line, but I can see round 1 inch spots where the paint is completely missing. I sense a new paint job in my future. Sigh. I bet bottom paint isn’t cheap, either.

  Anyway, suggestions are always welcome.  If you know of any tricks, tools, or specific products to make the cleaning and maintenance of my bottom any easier, add a comment to this article and let me know. Or you can sent regular email to me at “seabear at  miller period org”.

I’d better get to the hardware store and see what they have on the shelf. The SailFest race is Wednesday, and the parade is Saturday. I gotta make sure my bttom is smooth. pretty.

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While we wandered around on Manzanillo’s waterfront, I was impressed by several of the statues I saw there. They varied from primitive, to modern. The bronze statues captured a sense of motion that was quite special. I’ll just insert the pictures and you can see for yourself.

You know this guy is a hard worker, hauling his fish to market.

Pulling in the nets. There are a couple of stylized fish, starfish, shrimp, etc in the net.

The sense of motion here is fabulous. Between the flapping coat tails and the pitched deck, you know this guy has a bit of a breeze blowing.

This one was different. It was a much older style, I got the feeling it was a fish/ocean/fertility goddess image.

This statue is a ways out to the bay, she’s holding out a starfish, I think.

And finally, something completely different, our favorite pooch:

If you get the chance to walk the waterfront in Manzanillo, pass along my respect to these and the other works of art there.

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We’ve been here a week, and I’ve been negligent in updating this web site. There are many reasons why, but in a nutshell, this is a neat town. We’ve anchored across from town for a couple of reasons.

Probably the biggest reason is that Z-town, like most Mexican smaller cities, discharges sewage straight into the bay, and moving across the bay gets us away from the smell. Over here the water is clean enough to swim in, and much clearer if you are snorkeling.

Anchoring on the far side, off of La Ropa, puts us directly across from the mouth of the bay. The wind often changes direction, but the ocean swells always come from the mouth of the bay. To keep the boat from swinging broadside to the swells, we put out two anchors, one from the bow and one from the stern. This way we always point into the swells, regardless of the current wind direction. It takes longer to get underway, or to set the anchors, but the end result is much more comfortable.

We made some new friends, preparing for the Sailfest. The Sailfest is the main reason we came down here,  it is a neat fund raiser for local schools. You can see more information on the Sailfest here . Anyway, between visiting, shopping, swimming, snorkeling, and laying about, we’ve had a pretty good time.

Next week we will be hosting visitors on board the Sea Bear, doing some racing, and helping behind the scenes to make Sailfest successful. Once or twice a week a cruise ship pulls in, and town gets over run with tourists.

It seems the prices go up at the same time, but maybe that’s just my imagination.

Last week a pair of Grey Whales swam into the bay, and the “whale watching boats”  followed them around for a few hours. I didn’t take any pictures, bu JC got a good one of a dolphin jumping completely out of the water.  You cannot believe how many times you have to snap the shutter before you can actually get a picture like this. I think they can hear the camera turn on, because they usually vanish as soon as we pick up the digital camera.  Another tricky shot to get is a good night view of town from the boat. Each evening we watch the sunset, and the lights in town come on. Zihuatenajo  covers several hills and is quite lovely at night. However, the boat moves, and when you combine that movement with the longer exposure time needed to capture a low light night shot, you get something like this:

 It’s pretty, but not quite what we see. Unless we’ve had a few too many  margaritas. Which does happen, but not often.

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Slight delay in our trip. We are back in Manzanillo, getting repairs done to our diesel engine. We hope to re-depart in a few days. In the meantime we are at anchor out side of the Las Hadas marina (again).

We were about 5-6 nm out past the southern point of the bay when the “over temperature”light and beeper went off on the engine control panel. I quickly shut down the engine, and turned the helm over to my First Mate. I climbed down below and opened the engine access port. First glance showed the engine belt was very loose. The second glance showed the reason for the loose belt was that the pulley on the end of the Fresh Water Cooling Pump had sheared off and was laying in the bottom of the bilge. The engine wouldn’t be running for a while.

At almost exactly the same time as I gave the order to turn around and head back to Manzanillo, the wind dropped to zero. I don’t mean that it slowed down, or even that it changed direction. I mean it freakin STOPPED. And it stayed stopped for several hours.We had a good wind when we left, although it had been slowing down some. We were trying to deploy our big red, white and blue spinnaker sail, and were not having much luck. Anyway, here we were with no engine and no sail. Needless to say our forward speed was minimal. A few dolphins stopped by to visit, they always seem to show up when we’re dead in the water, or doing over 7 knots. We also had a sea tutrle  surface, then raceoff into the distance, just to show us that he was much faster  than we were. <sigh>

Eventually, much later in the day, the wind did start up. I was never so happy to see 0.3 knots of speed on the dial. By the time we got back into the bay, we were doing over 4 knots. I radioed in and raised “Distant Shores” and updated them on our situation. Entering a crowded anchorage with no engine, and dropping the hook has to be done right the first time, or you could bump into other boats, or drift onto the rocks. It was good to see several inflatable dingys waiting for us to act as little tug boats, pushing us into position. All went smoothly.

After securing our spot,  JC and I went into town, and located a machine shop that was recommended by a fellow cruiser. The price  quoted us to fabricate a replacement was less than I expected, and today we are off to drop off the broken bits, so they can be used as a pattern.

The trip into Manzanillo also gave us a chance to see their Waterfront district, called the “Malecon”. I was very impressed. Many nice bronze statues of a nautical theme, a large computer controlled water fountain synchronized to good music and a huge modernistic sword fish sculpture.  I really liked the big fish. I’ll see if I can get more pictures when we return to town this morning.

Anyway, we will again attempt to resume our trip once the new pulley is installed. Until then, we are forced to hang loose and enjoy this wonderful town. It’s a tough life.

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So we managed to get a slip for a few nights in the Las Hadas Marina. There are a few things to be aware of before docking here. Boats are “Med tied”, which means you tie the bow to a mooring ball (or drop an anchor 150 feet out), then back into the dock, tying your stern to the dock. It’s like backing into a parking spot. If you’ve never done it before it can be pretty scary.

  Once you are safely tied up, you can take advantage of the Hotel Las Hadas swimming pool, and other ameneties. The pool is pretty neat, with waterfalls and islands, volleyball nets and a “swim up bar”.

This evening we decided to splurge a bit and have a nice dinner at the Marina Grill, in part due to a “Pay Pal donation”. (Thanks  Barry and Priscilla!) We are tied up about 30 feet from their front door, and have been smelling the wonderful food they cook for a couple of days now. The staff was exceptionally courteous, the food splendid, and the atmosphere was unforgettable. I cannot recommend this place high enough. Dinner for two was about $40, including drinks, appetizer and steak. I give it 5 thumbs up.

We  plan on casting off at daybreak tomorrow. JC and I will sail straight through (2 days) to our next, and probably farthest south port. Zihuatenajo is home of a yearly cruising fund raiser called the “Sail Fest”. It begins the second of February, and I’d like to assist in both the organization and actual fund raising. I expect to be out of contact for 2 to 4 days, so no updates until Thursday or Friday. Until then, Fair Winds!

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The guide book called it a “fun, self guided dingy excursion”. The map shows it as a 4 to 5 mile (each way) trip up  a river. We had to see for ourselves.

After a pancake breakfast, JC put a few things into her pack while I finished raising the solar panels on Sea Bear.  The solar cells were adding 5 to 10 amps back into the ships house batteries for most of the 9 hours of daylight  we see. 65 to 75 amp/hours was enough power to watch a DVD and run the microwave for 20 minutes and keep the VHF radio on for most of the day. Anyway, I wanted to make sure we got our fair share of solar energy.

One thing we did forget was the camera. We brought bug spray, but really didn’t need it. We brought orange drink, and we drank that before getting back to the Sea Bear. We took enough money to buy some veggies, and to pay for parking. More on that in a bit. I also took a 25 lb dumbbell weight to use as an anchor, because the guidebook said to. We didn’t need it.

The first challenge was to clear the sand bar at the mouth of the little river. It was shallow even at high tide. The tide was going out, so the current was pretty strong, but we made it with the propeller only digging into the sand once. On the right of the mouth of the river is where the TV show McHales Navy was filmed. The restaurant there has been torn down, but there are still signs and white painted palm trees.

At this point, the river is 30 to 50 feet wide, and anywhere from 1 to 10 feet deep. Both sides are walled with mangrove trees that look to me like big rhododendrons,just  like we had in the front yard in Oregon. There were lots of little birds, and a few larger ones. No big croc’s yet, and JC was sure she heard someone say that there were no crocodiles here at all. I wasn’t so sure.

After a few hundred yards we reached the first tee in the river. We were told to turn left there, and be sure to go around the new downed tree to the left, between the tree and the broken off stump. This was about when the first Panga blew past us doing Warp 8. Pangas are 20 foot long, heavy fiberglass, over powered, open boats favored by the Mexican fisherman as both a work vehicle and as a runabout. They can be run right up onto the beach, and I’ve seen them launched by having a pickup truck put their bumper against the stern and push them right into the surf. Anyway, they can hold a driver and a dozen tourists, and this one was full. They all yelled and waved as they went by. It took a few minutes for us to get settled after the wake hit us, and to bail some of the river back out of the dingy.

We were going just fast enough to maintain steerage. I was really hoping to see some wildlife, I just wasn’t sure what. We did see a big white egret with a red tree crab in his beak. We saw blue an grey herons. And then another egret, that flew from one side of the river to the other, with the same red tree crab in its beak. Deja-vu!

During the trip up to the little town at the end of the river, we saw that same egret, or one exactly like it, fly from one side of the river to the other, with the same crab in it’s beak about 5 times. It was really strange. The farther up river we went, the narrower it got. There was no real bank on either side, just roots. Occasionally the currents would get weird, because the water was flowing through what looked like the bank to us, but was really just more mangrove roots. Anyway, it was hard work keeping the dingy from impaling itself on the sharp, cutoff tree roots and branches. JC also has an aversion to spider webs, so I tried to keep her side of the boat clear of the brush, mostly.

After about 90 minutes, we exited the dark, overgrown tunnel of brush into a large lagoon. Off to our left was some boats and a friendly looking guy waving us over. As we approached the beach, we did manage to hit the last obstacle possible, a submerged stump. Ah well, the parking valet waded out and pulled us off, thereby ensuring his tip. Signs posted in this area said in both Spanish and English that this was a guarded, safe place to leave dingys and that donations were appreciated (and expected). So we left the dingy in good hands, and wandered up the road.

The town is pleasant enough. Many resteraunts along the beach are available. There is even a couple of clean, modern looking hotels. We bought fresh vegetables, cantaloupe and a few other misc. items. Wandering down the main drag (about half paved, the other half sand) took all of a hour. Then it was back to the dingy. We id our 20 peso donation and reclaimed our dingy. A couple of good shoves, and we were afloat again, and ready to retrace our float trip.

The journey back to the Sea Bear was amazingly like the trip out. Even the white bird with the red tree crab hopped across the river twice more for us. Alas, no crocodiles, or even iguanas. Just birds, and red tree crabs everywhere. But the good news was no mosquitoes either. And I’ll take those kind of blessings whenever I can.

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