Turn Around Time

The tide comes in, the tide goes out.  The La Paz anchorage is a half mile wide, three mile long, entrance to a much bigger lagoon.  Four feet of tide running in and out creates a two knot current running east or west, depending on if it is ebbing or flooding.   Add to this, a north wind and you've got an interesting anchoring situation where your boat will be facing into the wind but is also all the way forward on the anchor rode.  Wind across current makes an ever present chop.  

It's wise to bring up your anchor and reset every few days as the La Paz Waltz twists the anchor and rode around and around.  The rich oxygenated water helps the green slime build up fast on the rode so it is also beneficial to let out 30 feet for a few days, then bring it back in to let the sandy bottom clean the ground tackle.  It seems like a lot of boats have been here for a while given the shape of their sails, the growth on the hulls, and the white bird poop on the decks.  Sometimes those boats break loose and start to waltz around the anchorage, especially during a good northern blow. It's not the most peaceful anchorage you can imagine.

With our starter battery bank low, we needed to come into Marina de La Paz to get a good shoreside charge, and to top off the water tanks, provision, and get the part for the water pump ordered or machined.  I called into the marina and the front desk staff assured me they had no availability for the next week.  So I pulled the batteries out and took them ashore in the dinghy to get the local electric guy, Victor, to see if they could be resurrected.  After some shopping our friends told us that Neil, the marina manager, was trying to hail me on VHF 16.   I stopped in to see him and, sure enough, he had a slip for me.  

Nepenthe and White Raven, both crews are from Olympia WA

The boat's at anchor with no way to start the engine and no way to raise anchor with the windlass. But now there is a slip in the marina waiting.  What to do?  I went to a friend (who I just met) and asked if I could borrow his batteries... his only batteries.  Soon I was splashing my way out to Nepenthe with two big six volt batteries aboard.  We got them hooked up, started the engine, used the windlass and brought the boat into the dock,  where we removed the batteries, and put them back on my buddy's boat.  Thank you Cliff and Iris.

20 recreational pangas tie up at the marina

We spent four days in the marina and got our alternator and batteries sorted out.  I convinced Klassen Diesel in Vancouver BC to make me a new part for the raw water pump and they sent it off via international FedEx to Deko Importers in San Diego who sent it on to La Paz.  While waiting on shipping, we said goodbye to Noreen and Myron who caught their flight back to San Carlos and we washed the boat, inside and out.  Then we provisioned ( lots of wine ) and went back out to the anchorage and dropped the hook.  

Some of the days were so windy that we had to stay on the boat.  The dinghy ride to the dock would be a wet one. When the wind is up, the port is closed and all the dive, snorkel, and kayak pangas have to stay at the dock.  Occasionally a boat will come into the harbor during a wind event because "any port in a storm" is the rule.  But nobody exits during a closure.  Two sailboats limped into the anchorage after having a rough go of it in the 30 knot winds, 8 foot waves out beyond the harbor.  On had broken steering gear and engine trouble. Another had a broken prop shaft.  You really have to watch out for those strong northers and get into a hidey hole before you get stuck in big seas.

We found some shade fabric in town and started sewing a big awning cover to use in the summer when we put Nepenthe on the hard.  Connie played a little bit of music at the Club CucCruceros patio and also was the first act at Capuchino's open mic night.  

When our engine part was due to arrive,  I again went into the office to see if we could get a slip, and again, I was told by the front desk staff that there was no room.  Later, I talked to Neil and he arranged us a spot.  Funny how things work here sometimes. 

Part in hand, I compared it to the old part and behold.... they were not the same.  The new part was missing a feature that enabled it to straddle a big nut on the pulley wheel.   Dang!  Foiled again.

The service manager at Klassen Diesel suggested I take it to a local machine shop so I took it to Malcolm at Custom Fabrication and Machine and he put his machinist on the job.   

Old Part, New Part.  Note the difference.

Pulley nut sticks out a bit.

After the machine shop's magic.

Today I got the part back from the shop and Connie and I installed it without a hitch.  We tested it and all looks good.  Then we decided to treat ourselves to BBQ ribs in town.  Walking through the Restaurant / Banking / Shopping district we were blown away by how far La Paz had come in the eight years since we've been here.   Music on every corner.  Clean streets and sidewalks.  So many restaurants.  Art everywhere.  The Malecon was full of people roller skating, jogging, walking, biking.  Ice creme shops everywhere.  Clearly La Paz is a very cosmopolitan place these days.  

Tomorrow we have one more day of calm winds then three days of over 20 knot winds, followed by three days of calm wind.  Our plan is to run as far north as we can tomorrow, possibly to Isla San Francisco, lay low for three days, then run north again, hopefully getting into San Carlos by the 16th or 17th.

If it holds, this could be our crossing weather next week.

 

  And so we say goodbye to La Paz.  We stayed a bit too long but it's a wonderful city to be stuck in.

Approach to LaPaz

After two days as Isla San Francisco we checked the weather again using the SPOT device and found that soon the wind would drop.  That third morning we were the second boat to leave the anchorage, departing at about 08:30.   Once we got out of the wind shadow of the island the swell hit us from the north and stayed just off our beam quarter for the rest of the trip, making it a joyful and painful ride all the way down to Isla Pardida.  Without wind, we motored.  Later, when Connie took the wheel, we got some wind and so shut off the engine and enjoyed a slower but more pleasant ride.

As we closed with Pardida we were also closing with a big freighter.  Taking bearings to the vessel, those bearings did not change. We were on a collision course.  And yet, we were very close to the island. Surely that big ship would not cut it that close. We were wrong.  Noreen was at the wheel and I could tell by the look on her face that she really wanted to turn away,  so turn we did and ran a parallel course to the ship before getting back on our course by crossing the stern of the ship.  Yes it was a collision course. Yes we were the stand on vessel.  No, the ship was not budging on its intended course.  That’s the first odd thing we encountered as we approached Isla Partida.

Next, we started to close in our on our intended landfall.  I had put in waypoints and read all the pertinent information on a little anchorage named El Cardonicito, but earlier we had talked about going to a different little bay called Las Cuevitas, and that’s what Noreen put into her chart plotter.  As we approached Las Cuevitas, I got confused because of the different location just when Connie started to turn upwind to furl in the jib.  We got the jib in then somehow a white cushion went overboard and suddenly we were in a cushion overboard drill while just a few hundred yards from a tight anchorage I knew nothing about. That’s the second odd thing we encountered as we approached Isla Partida.  

At the wheel, It took me four tries to get close enough to the cushion for us to touch it.  Connie took a brave dive over the lifeline with the net and just then, the lifeline gave away.  She plunged to the deck hitting her knee on the bulwark, dropped the net into the water, and almost fell overboard.   Noreen and Myron were able to coax the cushion aboard and Connie went below to get some ice for her knee.  That’s the third odd thing we encountered as we approached Isla Partida.

 

I looked at that little anchorage and said, “Well this place is bad luck.  We’re going to El Cardonicito.”  Rounding the corner, we ghosted into the anchorage, having the place all to ourselves.  Towering rock walls on either side, clear blue water, white sandy bottom, and a little sandy beach at the head of the narrow bay.  We fussed the anchor and chain into a good holding, shut off the engine, and took a sigh of relief.

A rough, bouncy crossing, a ship trying to run us over, a cushion overboard drill, and Connie almost head first into the water, was all enough to require us to get out the Captain Morgan rum to give Neptune the first sip and then to share the bottle along with tostados and guacamole in the cockpit.  Oh the sailing life!

Calm, beautiful night at anchor.  Lovely morning.  When I tried to start the engine, the starter batteries were dead.  How can that be?  We’ve got three ways to keep the starter batteries charged.  There is a dedicated solar panel and controller for those batteries.  There is also an alternator which is supposed to charge the batteries while we are motoring.  There is also a thing called an ACR (automatic charge relay) that senses when one bank of batteries is low and then pulls power from the other bank. 

How could all three methods fail, you might ask?  

I found all this out after a few hours of head scratching and cursing. 

1.  There was a bad connection in a crimped wire connection (That I put in myself) to bring power from the solar panel.  Solar charging… nada.

2.  Evidently the alternator was not working at all, and maybe had not been working for a long time.  Later we found out that the regulator was faulty.

3.  A nut on a wire post on the ACR had vibrated loose and that connection was intermittent, causing a little fuse to blow and halting any power sharing between the house bank and the starter bank. 

 

After hot wiring the big solar array to the starter battery bank, we got enough power to get the engine started and the anchor aboard.  Then around the corner we went for a short anchor and all went ashore to explore the area between Isla Partida and Espirto Santos where the fishermen have their outposts and the sand spit crosses between the two islands.  Big rocks, whale bones, a shrine to a deceased fisherman, shallow blue water.  

Later, after giving the starter batteries a little more time to charge. ….Around the corner we passed Whale Island and dropped the anchor in Ensenada de la Raza.  Later that night, strong winds erupted followed soon by big waves from the west.  We were up much of the night with the boat bucking at anchor and everyone worried that we’d go adrift on a lee shore.  The anchor held and by morning, sleep deprived and irritable, we launched off into the swell and waves and wind, hauling up the main sail with two reefs in place.  Then we rolled out the jib and Connie took the wheel and off we roared to the south, bucking and heaving.  Later as we approached LaPaz the wind and waves eased, we let out more sail, and made our way into the harbor of LaPaz where we dropped the anchor just outside the Malecon (The waterfront walkway).  

Hey, we made it to LaPaz!, twenty one days out of San Carlos.  We were pretty much out of fresh food and beer and the only wine we had left was a few bottles of the “special” stuff we bought in Arizona that Scott is not allowed to drink without Connie getting her share.  Noreen and Myron had already booked their flights out of LaPaz, back to San Carlos so they were busy up there in the vee berth packing up their stuff.  We went ashore and had a celebratory dinner at Rancho Viejo, the same place we had our celebratory dinner back in 2010.   That evening the LaPaz “waltz” began as the swift current pulled all the 50 odd boats first to the west then later to the east with the wind staying constant from the north which results in boats going all which ways and round and round, twisting up anchor chains and occasionally bumping a few boats together in the night. 

Unusually high winds were predicted for the next few days.  How will Nepenthe deal with that?  Will her starter battery bank ever get fully charged?  What about the bad alternator? And how about that jury rigged raw water pump?  Will Myron and Noreen get to their flight ok? And more important, will Scott be able to get ashore to replenish the wine supply?  

Nepenthe in the slip at Marina de La Paz