la paz

La Paz has a reputation as a black hole. As the story goes, once you enter La Paz, you never leave. We got here a week ago, and have come to discover just a few of La Paz's charms. First and foremost is Super Burro. Super Burro is our new favorite taco stand. Five bucks will get you 3 beef tacos, a couple Sol cervezas and as much wifi as you can stand. Down the road from Super Burro is CCC (apparently prounced "say-say-say"), Mexica's answer to Fred Meyer's. Underwear? Pasillo cinco. Pineapple juice? Pasillo diez. Plasma TV's? Just past the hammers and a la izquierda.

Because of it's black-hole-esque quality, there's a large community of cruisers who have long since planted roots in La Paz. They have even gone so far as to establish a clubhouse - Club Cruceros - where local cruisers hang out and drink coffee, talk boats, and swap books. They have an expansive movie library that you can check out DVD's from. And every year the club throws a huge Thanksgiving dinner at one of the local marinas including tables full of potluck dishes and 19 cooked turkeys. We were missing our families (and my mom's scalloped tomatoes!) for the holiday, so we hung out with 200 other gringos. As is our duty as Americans, we ate ourselves into a starch and tryptophan induced coma and then waddled home moaning about how much we ate this year.

Another of La Paz's charms is its waterfront. Known as the Malecon, their waterfront is a tiled walkway lined with beautiful bronze sculptures that runs the length of the city. All along the Malecon are great sandy, white beaches on one side and interesting little shops and restaurants on the other side. Street food vendors offer such delicacies as corn on the cob coated in mayonaise, cotija cheese and hot sauce or bags of fresh fruit mixed with salt and hot sauce. Don't knock it until you've tried it. Mexicans may not have a great bob-sledding team but they absolutely, unequivocally know food.

As much as we love La Paz, we're ready to take off. The harbor is too polluted to swim in and when the wind is just right you get that whiff of what can only be described as "bouquet of Mexican city". We're gonna run out to the islands just north of town and get a fix of nature for a spell. We'll back shortly. Apparently, no one escapes for long.


Thanksgiving dinner. Yummm....


Sarah from s/v Stepping Stone getting her cheesecake on.




Strolling the malecon on the way back from Thanksgiving dinner.


One of the statues along the malecon.


Christy raiding the tortillaria.


We love the produce in Mexico.



We've been getting attacked by pelicans every day as they dive bomb the fish hanging out in the shadow of our boat.

24°09.737'N 110°19.739'W

finally

You're probably all smart enough to figure this out on your own (unless you're reading this from an RSS reader - and come to think about it, why aren't you?) but in case you didn't notice, the new paint and wallpaper is up on the blog.

Which also means the website is finally (finally) done. We didn't get all the pages up that we wanted to so that means we'll be adding more pages down the line when we get around to it. And you all know how fast that happens.

Have a look see for yourself:

www.svhelloworld.com

lipstick on a pig

From the word go, we have planned a full website to go along with this blog. I've been working on it since we left for the Inside Passage back in May. You'd think with not working, I'd have all kinds of time to work on our website but frankly, I've been busy. (Those naps aren't gonna happen on their own, ya know.)

So now, we're just about ready to roll out our website - today or tomorrow. Along with rolling out our website, we're putting some lipstick on this here bloggity blog. Keep an eye out for changes coming.

bahia de los muertos

After three or four days, the norther blew itself out and we weighed anchor. We made north for Bahia de los Muertos to meet up with the whacky kids from s/v Stepping Stone. On the run north, we put out two hand lines in hopes of hooking some mahi mahi and whipping up some sushi. All we ended up with was two 1/2 pound bonitas (which we totally kept and barbeque'd because hey - we're not proud).

There's a beautiful (BEAUTIFUL) resort in the bay here called GranSueno which happens to be almost completely empty. So for the price of a cold Pacifico, 30 pesos, we were welcome to use their facilities. Including their waterslide, infinity pool, swim-up bar, beach, freshwater showers, pool table, and fantastic bar.

We hung out at the resort for a couple days, went for a hike, and snorkeled. We've spent some time at the local palapa bar, El Cardon, eating the galaxy's best nachos ever. This is the third anchorage in a row that we've got wifi.

This anchorage was also Kristin and Colin's jumping off point. They are headed to the windsurfing Mecca of La Ventana so they jumped ship here and muled all their stuff up the road in search of a ride. We loved having them on board, they were super fun. We can't wait to hear about their travels. Their blog is here:

Colin and Kristin's blog

Fair winds, guys!


Kristin and Colin walking the white sand beach of GranSueno Resort.


One of the private pools at the resort.


Sarah lining out Kristin and Colin about the trains in the bar.


The bar at GranSueno.


Christy reading in the bar's pool.


Kristin, Colin, Christy and Sarah at the top of the hill on our hike.


Chillin' at the palapa bar.


Taking Kristin and Colin and their camping gear and kite surfing gear into shore and onto their shoreside adventures.

23°59'36.27"N 109°49'37.65"W

los frailes

We got Kim offloaded to the airport to catch her flight back to the States and were happy to put Cabo to our backsides. Colin, Kristin, Christy and I made a 4AM exit in hopes of avoiding the afternoon sea breeze out of the north. We had an uneventful motorsail to north to Los Frailes. We saw a bit of wind in the neighborhood of 10 to 15 knots but nothing too terrible. Colin trolled a line in hopes of catching some more tuna or dorado. We were all craving some sushimi and ceveche but no joy. Our Mexican Flag squiddie proved no temptation to the local fish population. We did catch a plastic bag with it so the day wasn't a total loss.

We anchored in Los Frailes with a significant part of the remaining Baja Ha Ha fleet. Watching the weather, we learned of an impending "norther" in the next few days. As we don't really know how serious these northers are, we chose to stay put in Los Frailes rather than try to run to anchorages further north. During our stay here, the four of us have partook in several beach fires, snorkeling off the boat, spear fishing, laying about in the sun and all sorts of typical lay-about laziness.

At one of the bonfires, we caught rumour of a palapa bar ashore. Since we aren't using refrigeration on board, the idea of cold beer was too much to resist and we organized a shore party the next afternoon to seek out said palapa bar. We joined forces with Megan and Luke from s/v Sapphire and Amber and Jeff from s/v Rock Star in search of frio cervezas. After walking through the village and over a road and stopping a gringo who gave us vague directions, we ran across a shaky sign that promised cold beer, just a mere 600 meters to the right. In the back of a man's house, about a half mile off the beach was a fantastic little palapa with room for three or four tables, a beer cooler, and a grill. A couple old Mexican guys sat in the corner nursing Pacificos. This finally feels like Mexico. Compared to the excessive neon, expense and glitz of Cabo, the dirt roads, remoteness, and 15 peso ($1.15) beer of Los Frailes is heaven.

We had the crew of s/v Sapphire over for drinks and a friendly game of Rage. Mostly because we really like them but also because they have an icemaker (ice is the new currency amongst Mexican cruising boats). While they were over, we pulled out miracle fruit tablets that supposedly turn sour food into sweet that Casey gave us when she visited us in Catalina. We set up a smorgasbord of limes, onions, chocolate chips, tequilas, and rum & juice to taste test the power of miracle fruit. Here's the results:

Limes: taste like candy. I could have eaten limes all night.
Onions: taste like onions. Not good.
Chocolate chips: taste like chocolate chips.
Tequila: taste less like tequila but enough that it still sucks.
Rum & juice: WAY too sweet to finish, sadly.


The anchorage of Los Frailes. If you look at the beach in the foreground, you can see Colin's kite.


Colin busily updating Facebook whilst poaching wifi in Los Muertos.


Kristin studying Spanish.


Christy chillaxin' after taking a dip in the water.


Luke and Megan from s/v Sapphire hanging out in the palapa bar.


Enjoying some cold Pacificos.


Luke partaking of a Pacifico Ballena (whale size). Yum.


Eating limes like they were candy.


Uh, Megan? You have something in your teeth.

23°22.749'N 109°25.551'W