Zihua and Acapulco

Zihuatenejo was both a pleasure and a disappointment. We had heard so much about this small, Mexican city and were anxious to spend some time here. From the water the town is very pretty with palm treed beaches and a large, calm anchorage. Ashore the beach restaurants and bars are pleasant, the clubs and restaurants in town were lively, and the entire city is geared towards tourists from all over the world. It is a walking city with small streets and alleys, a large mercado centro, and many small stores selling t-shirts and souvenirs. We had one memorable dinner when we found an old restaurant that specialized in “pozole” the spicy Mexican soup that is the specialty of the state of Guererro. We dined in upper 80s temperatures (10 PM) eating soup that definitely had some kick. Crazy, but the complimentary Mezcal served with every dinner was a help. Late beers at the Sunset Bar on the beach also helped. We sat on the beach under a thatched roof watching our boat float calmly just 200 yards away. We could have swum home.

The disappointment in Zihua was the quality of the water in the bay. This was the worst water we had seen in our travels and, despite the constant temperatures in the 90s, we were unable to swim in the area. The bottom of our boat grew foul with marine life (or death), and although we enjoyed our time ashore we were uncomfortably warm with little hope of cooling off even on the boat. We elected to cut a few days off of our stay in Zuhua for the next leg of our sea passage where the ocean breezes would be a welcome change from the sweltering heat in the bay.

We had almost decided to bypass Acapulco (24 hours from Zihua) in favor of sailing all the way to Puerto Angel (another 40 hours south). Normally we like to limit overnights to one at a time, but we had heard many bad things about Acapulco from crime to dirty water to lack of anchorage or mooring space, but we had two good reasons for stopping and we thought we would make the decision when we approached Acapulco.

Our two reasons for stopping were (1) I had seen the cliff divers of Acapulco years ago on Wide World of Sports, and I really did want to see them live and (2) way back in 1945 Andrea’s parents had taken a delayed honeymoon trip (delayed by WWII) driving from Minneapolis to Acapulco. Driving from Minneapolis to Acapulco would be enough of an adventure now with highways, regular gas stations, etc., but we think it must have been a true odyssey in 1945 with limited roads, hard to find fuel, and a population that had not been exposed to the English language via TV and music. We had talked about this trip before and of course we had talked about Acapulco.

We approached Acapulco at 9 AM after a day of sailing and a long, dark night of motoring with just the stars. There are no other boats out here, no moon and, alas, no wind. We decided to pass on Acapulco and continue on to Puerto Angel thinking “we are young, we are fresh, why not?” when a quick check of our fuel tanks showed that without better wind we would either run out of gas or it would take us several days to sail the entire distance. Great decision. We loved the Acapulco stop as you will see.

We managed to get a mooring at the famous Acapulco Yacht Club and after a swim in the club pool, pina coladas at the club bar, and showers at the club spa (our first hot showers in over 3 weeks) we felt human again, This is a first class yacht club and they took good care of some second class boaters. Then it was off to walk the malecon and find the cliff divers. Acapulco is a huge city and it shows in the streets, the traffic, the air pollution, and the crowds so the long walk in the city heat was not a highlight. But we did find the cliff divers and for $3 each we got a place on the observation deck some 70 feet above the water and some 60 feet below the divers. The jagged cliffs are separated form the observation deck by a 20 foot wide arm of the ocean that surges with each incoming wave. The divers, 5 of them, entered the water on our side of the cove swam across to the cliffs, and then started climbing the rocks straight up. Just the climbing of the rocks was breathtaking. Barefooted, wet, wearing only bathing suits these guys climbed straight up the 140 foot cliffs Just watching them climb, knowing that the only fall would be onto the rocks, not into the water was scary. As cliff climbers they would have been worth the price of admission, no diving necessary.

But dive they did. Huge arcing swan dives out over the rocks and into the narrow slot of water at the bottom. They timed the dives from the top so that they hit the water when the waves surged into the cove. This seemed to require that they make their leap at exactly the wrong time, when the wave had surged out of the cove leaving little water behind. Fantastic. I don’t think I can adequately describe how high above the water the cliff divers were. We were on an observation platform halfway down the cliffs and I could feel the vertigo there. The divers perched on narrow rocks, wind blowing, looking at the ocean surge, and then leaping out and down were twice as high as we were. Muy loco Mexicans is the only way to describe these daredevils. Muy loco.

The Acapulco bus ride: We have traveled by bus frequently in Mexico. We take the buses everywhere and have seen La Paz,, Mazatlan, La Cruz, Puerto Vallarta, Manzanillo, and many other smaller towns via bus. We have had varying experiences. Some towns have small, crowded buses, some have modern air conditioned buses, most have buses with badly worn seats and shock absorbers, and the buses in Manzanillo were somehow built without any shock absorbers. We even had the memorable “suicide bus” in Manzanillo where we got a crazy guy at the wheel who apparently got to go home as soon as he could finish his route (he was fast, cut people off, drove up the sidewalks, and grazed at least one road divider). But Acapulco has our best bus memory.

We were walking back to the Club de Yates and looking for a bus for the two mile trip. We found a bus pulled up outside a small liquor store and asked the guy sitting in the driver’s seat in fractured Spanish if the Yacht Club was on his route. No luck. “Club de Yah-tays” apparently needs to be pronounced “Cloob de Yah-tays” for anyone to understand. Go figure. But from behind us a voice said “Si, this bus is for the Yah-tes”. So we get on . No one else is on the bus except the guy who couldn’t understand my question. We pay him our $.70 and sit down. A few minutes later the fellow who told us the bus went to the Yacht Club climbs on board with two quarts of beer in his hand. He proceeds to sit in the first passenger seat, gives the other guy a large cup of beer, and starts drinking. He is the driver. His friend he makes the designated driver and indicates he can take the bus. The regular driver is in the passenger seat, drinking from the bottle, the new driver having trouble shifting the bus is drinking beer from his own cup, and both of them offer us some of their beer. We are the only passengers. And awa-y-y-y we go. Apparently this is a non-stop. We pick up no one else. We wander down the road towards home. We wonder. Where are we going. The guy driving the bus does not know where the Yacht Club is, but his passenger directs him. At the Yacht Club the bus drops us off at its only stop, says goodnight, makes a u-turn, and heads back the way we came (maybe back to the liquor store). Whether we stole the bus or just had a private ride we don’t know. We do know that we were in stitches the whole way.

Finally the last Acapulco thought: This is a city and not the prettiest sight during the day, but back at the Club we could see all of Acapulco across the bay. The town sparkled. To say it was diamonds in the night is not enough. You couldn’t have decorated someplace as beautifully as this. Several hills had lights sparkling throughout. No clusters of lights like we have at home from the auto dealers were apparent. Everything looked like you’d want your Christmas tree to look. Incredibly beautiful and incredibly romantic, we sat on the boat for hours looking at the lights before bed. We had a great visit to Acapulco and now we are ready for the long sail to Puerto Angel.

Barra to Z-Town

We sailed into Barra de Navidad (19 11.5/104 40.5) at mid-afternoon (Monday, Nov 10) after a slow, relaxing sail from Tenacatita Bay (20 miles). Barra has a huge lagoon behind its beach, and this is a well protected anchorage which is what attracts the cruising sailors. Once again we are well ahead of the cruising season here, and we had an anchorage that might accommodate over 50 boats with only 3 other cruising boats for the night. Ashore we explored a town full of happy hour bars and a variety of restaurants and shops. We had beers watching the sunset and we had dinner overlooking the water. The town is small and clean and hosts tourists by land as well as by sea.(Maggie Larcher said she vacationed here over 20 years ago, must have been a teenager, and recommended several sunset bars. I think I found her picture in one of them.)

There is a mega resort and marina at the lagoon entrance, and we were able to pick up their wireless signal so we were able to send the previous e-mail with a log of our travels from La Cruz to Tenacatita, and receive notes from all. We also picked up our first newspaper in several weeks and read some election news and sports for the first time in a long while. We did stick our heads into the marina at the Wyndham Resort long enough to see that (1) it is very, very nice and (2) it was way out of our price range, so it was back to the lagoon for us.

Barra de Navidad provided several entertaining items in addition to the sunset bars. We saw a tree with pelicans roosting in its branches. If you think the large Brown Pelicans are ungainly as they hit the water you should see them landing in a tree. First they weigh an awful lot for a bird. Also they have webbed feet, not the best for branch hanging. And of course they are the aforementioned “ungainly” birds. Imagine one of these landing in a tree. They hit the top branches and then try to grab just about anything while they are falling. This particular tree must have had about 50 of the big birds perched precariously throughout its branches staring dumbly as one bird after another landed, fell and then hung on.

We also managed to see the circus in Barra de Navidad. Throughout Mexico we have seen the small traveling circuses that set up in town for a one or two night performance, and we finally decided to see one, $2 admission fee for adults. This one was particularly small with no rides and just a single ring, but the entertainment was priceless. First the animals came out and were led around the ring. No lions and tigers for this venue. We had 3 goats, a llama, a Shetland pony and a monkey, and around and around they went. One of the handlers had some greasepaint on his face (he was the lone clown in the circus, (or should I say “lonely”) while the other two were just teenagers in jeans and t-shirts. They had a slack wire performer and a high wire performer (same guy, different tacky costumes) and a juggler, and then back came the animals with the goats running under the llama, the pony jumping over the goats, and the monkey jumping over everything else. Cheap entertainment at twice the price.

Two nights in the lagoon was plenty so we set sail for Manzanillo at mid-morning. Again we got a beautiful sail in calm seas. We may be early in the season, but we are getting the best possible weather for sailing. We anchored first in Santiago (19 06.3/104 23.8) which was a long beach with very nice homes along the waterfront. The next day we proceeded to an anchorage outside the Las Hadas marina (19 06.0/104 20.7). We had heard nothing about this anchorage and only decided to stop because it was described as “well protected”. Las Hadas turned out to be the prettiest place we have visited in Mexico. The anchorage is surrounded by steep hills with white buildings, palms trees, and lots of bougainvillea. The marina is small and all of the boats are Med moored (stern in with only an anchor off the bow, no side docks). The marina dockside is a wide, red brick sidewalk encircling the harbor. With small shops and cafes (Frida’s was our favorite stop) the entire place made you feel as if you were in some Mediterranean seaport. The Las Hadas Resort is next to the marina and we were able to use the pools at the resort. We spent four nights anchored at Las Hadas, met other cruisers, drank beer’s at Frida’s, took a bus ride into the city of Manzanillo, swam in the pools, and all the while we kept looking at each other and saying how beautiful the whole place was and how unexpectedly pleasant.

We stayed at Las Hadas long enough to catch up on the NFL scores using the wireless connection at Frida’s and on Monday morning (Nov 17) we set off on the 190 mile trip south to Ixtapa and Zihuatenejo. Even though we have a fast (as boats go) sailboat we plan our passages at 5 miles per hour. The boat will sail faster (regularly reaching 8 mph) and we can motor at over 6 mph, but when all the zig-zagging and slow sailing and motoring into the wind are taken into account we still only cover about 5 miles per hour so this trip was going to be a 36 hour passage. We left at dawn so that we could make the trip with only one overnight leg and two daylight legs and still arrive before dark. The boat sailed great and Andrea kept revising our arrival time from 6 PM to early afternoon to mid morning to… No matter, despite fast sailing early in the trip we still entered the anchorage at Isla Ixtapa (17 40.8/101 39.4) at 6 PM. We quickly anchored, ate and fell promptly to sleep.

The next morning we were greeted with a peaceful little beach with sparkling clear waters. The island is about 10 miles from Ixtapa, but only a short panga ride from a large resort hotel so there are small boats bringing tourists to the island for snorkeling and fishing. The boats that had gone out fishing early in the day also brought their passengers to the beach where the palapa restaurants were ready to cook the fresh catch. Our entire day consisted of snorkeling and a trip to the beach to drink beer in the shade (yes it’s still hot). At dusk all of the pangas left, all of the palapas closed, and the island, which has no electricity, was black and deserted. This made for a very dark but peaceful night on the hook.

After two calm nights at Isla Ixtapa we were ready to move on so today we motored the last few miles to Zihuatenejo (17 38.0/101 33.3). We are anchored off the beach and thinking about heading to shore to explore. More later.

La Cruz to Barra de Navidad

If you have the free Google Earth and are trying to find us check the lat/longs at the end of this message.

With some difficulty we finally arranged to have a new solar regulator purchased in San Diego and mailed to an address some 6-10 days in front of us. With this latest problem half way behind us (we still have to get the solar regulator and install it) we were ready to leave La Cruz and Banderas Bay.

We had a 19 hour trip to our next planned stop in Chamela Bay so we decided to leave La Cruz at 1 AM and arrive (hopefully) at Chamela around dusk. Night time anchoring or even approaching a strange anchorage in the dark is one of the sailing no-no’s. This would be our only trip in the first few weeks that could not be completed during daylight hours, and the 1 AM departure allowed us to sail with only 5 hours of pitch black darkness instead of a whole night. The 30 mile trip across Banderas to Cabo Corrientes (Cape of Currents) would take until dawn, but would have us rounding this Cape at the calmest part of the day. Good planning. What we got was brilliant lightning flashes for about two hours followed by torrential rain squalls that cut visibility to zero. But there was no one else out there, and we motored along nicely at 5 knots. Daybreak was beautiful. We were in deep, blue water and by 10AM we had great sailing winds from the beam. We set the boat south and sailed merrily along enjoying some of the best sailing of the trip.

Andrea was excited more by the dolphins than the sailing. Schools of dolphins raced along side of us throughout the day. At one point we had about 8 dolphins under the trampoline between the hulls. We turned on the motors late in the afternoon when the winds settled down and set anchor at 6 PM. We could hear the Mexican music from the beach while we congratulated ourselves on a successful passage. We were the only boat in the anchorage off this small beach village and, other than the Mexican Navy boat that pulled along side during the day we had seen no other boats on the entire trip from La Cruz.

A windless sunrise promised another warm day. Temperatures are constantly in the 90’s although the night time temps have dropped considerably and sleeping is much more comfortable. We moved the boat a few miles south to a small island in the bay and spent the afternoon swimming and snorkeling in turquoise waters before motoring back to our original anchorage for a peaceful evening off the Chemela beach..

By dawn three other boats had entered the anchorage, but we were ready to move on. Next stop the small cove called Careyes (named for the endangered Carey’s turtles that nest here). Careyes has two resort hotels, but they have roped off large portions of the cove for swimming and moorings for small excursion boats so there is little room to anchor. Still this was a pleasant stop with green water and colorful buildings.

After leaving Careyes we were treated to a long sail with good winds from the stern. We decided that sailing was the order of the day and we headed further offshore to keep the winds from blowing directly behind us. The catamaran sails well, but it doesn’t really like wind from directly ahead (duh!) or even directly behind. The sailing was superb. Blue water, dolphins, good winds and the boat moving smoothly, just like they advertise in the boat brochures.

This leg to Tenacatita Bay was only 15 miles, but we sailed nearly 30 miles to get there. We dropped anchor in the lee of a small reef with 3 other boats and, after introducing ourselves on a short dinghy ride around the anchorage, we invited everyone over to Manana for a round of cold beer. The group was from Norway, Vancouver Island, Dallas and, of course, Aptos, and we had a nice time talking about where we had been, where we were going, when we were going and why.

Is it Sunday morning? Beach campground was crowded last night. Looking for a reason we finally realized that it was Sunday and this was a weekend crowd. We dropped the dinghy in the water and took a long “jungle river tour” with another couple from CA. The river tour does indeed wind through mangroves and swamps, narrowing at times to less than a few feet, and with iguanas and butterflies in the trees, but the promised crocodiles never appeared (Much to my relief. You may recall my inordinate fear of huge crocodiles form last year’s posts.) Cruisers are warned not to let small dogs swim in the river because the crocs regularly feed on swimming iguanas. I guess the crocs here are near sighted because that would be one ugly dog. The river tour winds through the jungle for about an hour and ends in a lagoon where you can simply walk across the small beach to the ocean and, can you believe it, a palapa bar. Eureka!! We wined, we dined (well mostly we just drank beer and ate chips) for the afternoon before the return trip down river. An evening snorkeling on the reef finished out a beautiful day.

The anchorage is populated by three dolphins that seem to call this home. Two of the dolphins are paired and are seldom more than a few yards apart while the third dolphin is a loner who likes to hang around the anchor chains of the boats. Since he has a chunk out of his dorsal he has been named “Chip”. We were told about these dolphins before we reached this anchorage. They are friendly and always swimming around the boat very slowly and peacefully.

We are sailing slowly (less than 2 kts) south towards Barra at the moment and it is sunny, quiet, smooth water, slow, warm (hot). If you are reading this e-mail then we have reached Barra de Navidad which is the first place we will find internet access. Barra is about 140 miles from La Cruz, and it looks like it will have been about a 1 week trip to reach there.


Google Earth

First, set your Google Lat/Lons to decimal readings (it’s easier). Go to Tools, Options, 3dView and check the box Degrees, Decimal Minutes in the Show Lat/Lon section.

The following are degrees and minutes: Paradise Village 20 41.267/105 17.784; La Cruz 20 44.9/105 22.6; Chemela 19 35/105 08; Careyes 19 26.7/105 02.18; Tenecatita 19 18/104.50 (Jungle River behind beach); Barra de Navidad 19 11.5/104 40.5