Adios Banderas Bay
01/10/2003 - 01/15/2003
The west coast of Mexico from Puerto Vallarta to Manzanillo is often referred to as the "Gold Coast". Numerous cruising guides and travel books built up our expectations for the next 110 miles of Mexican coastline to be the best part of cruising in Mexico. With anticipation, we prepared to leave Puerto Vallarta and Paradise Village. The call of the "Gold Coast" and its famed anchorages motivated us to wrap up our resort living in paradise.
Goodbye Paradise, Hello Gold Coast
A couple days prior to our planned departure, our friends, Marianne and Richard, on MR Destiny arrived at the Punta de Mita anchorage in Banderas Bay. During the past few weeks, we continued to try to coax them via email to sail further south than Banderas Bay. With our friends in close range, the door was open for us to continue enticing them to go south. We unplugged the shore power cord and water hoses to head straight to Punta de Mita to join them at anchor. The two hour sail from Paradise Village to Punta de Mita was awesome. In 5 to 10 knots of wind, we sailed along at a speed of 5 to 7 knots. Immediately after commenting on the great conditions and beautiful day, we looked back to say goodbye to Paradise Village. Just as we looked back, a whale emerged from the water and breached! Finally! Neither Duncan nor Robin had ever seen a whale breach outside of the confines of Sea World. After close to a month in the marina, the sea and the winds treated us to a warm and wonderful welcome.
Punta de Mita -- Whisper and her neighbors at anchor
Having visited Punta de Mita anchorage in December, we quickly scoped out a place near MR Destinyto "drop the hook" -- this is sailor talk for anchoring the boat. To top off a wonderful day, Marianne and Richard brought all the fixings for pizza toppings as well as homemade dough over to Whisper. While munching on the delicious pizzas, we continued to pressure our friends to head south with us or soon thereafter. As the night drew to a close, we realized we may need to stay in Punta de Mita one more night to continue the sales pitch. The next day we played in the water and cleaned the gunk from the marina off the waterline of the boat. An email arrived from the folks on Snowbird indicating they arrived back in Paradise Village with the new circuit breaker for the windlass. Darn, we missed getting the part by a day. Greg and Susan on Tavana offered to pick up the part and meet up with us in Tenacatita. Another fun dinner filled with persuasive talk about the "Gold Coast" concluded the day's activities. Well, enough pressure on our friends. Tomorrow we start the journey to the fabled "Gold Coast".
Yet Another Cape
A docile looking Cabo Corrientes
According to cruising guide books, stories from veteran cruisers and weather forecasters, Cabo Corrientes is another major milestone cape to pass on the West Coast of North America. Banderas Bay is bounded by Punta de Mita at the north end and Cabo Corrientes at the south end. Charlie's Charts states "This cape acts much the same as Cabo Falso in Baja and Point Conception in California. As it projects into the prevailing winds, local winds are accelerated causing turbulent, disturbed seas and creating strong currents". After listening to the weather forecast in the morning and looking at the cape from afar, we decided today's forecast sounded like a good day to head around Cabo Corrientes.
One more time
Clink, clink, clink goes the windlass as we bring in the anchor chain. Silence. Uh oh. With 30 feet of chain and the anchor left in the water, the windlass stopped working again. Okay MacGiver, get out your bag of tricks. Duncan hauled in the chain and anchor. The good news is that 30 feet of chain and a 60 pound anchor is much easier to manually retrieve than 150 feet of chain and a 60 pound anchor. As we headed toward Cabo Corrientes, Duncan worked on a new plan for the windlass work around. We discussed returning to Paradise Village to pick up the new circuit breaker from Snowbird since the next several destinations required deploying and retrieving the anchor. As Robin motored toward the cape, Duncan worked down below on a new MacGiver solution. In less than an hour, Duncan removed the faulty circuit breaker, "hot wired" the windlass and installed a 100 amp fuse. Onward ho!
Another great day of sailing
With anticipation, we approached Cabo Corrientes. Robin kept expecting the wind to pick up. Upon realizing the wind was going to stay at a consistent 5 to 10 knots, Duncan hoisted the gennaker to give us a little more speed. Originally, we planned to sail 90 miles to Chamela which meant we would sail through the night and arrive in Chamela in the morning. Typically, around sunset the wind dies and the motor becomes the primary means of propulsion. Around mid-afternoon, we decided to change the plan and spend the night in Ipala with the hope of another beautiful day of sailing the next day rather than motor through the night.
Over the last year, we have struggled to figure out the best dead downwind sail configuration. Today, Duncan tried a new configuration with the gennaker poled out at the tack. This configuration worked really well. We are continually reminded of how many different ways there are to set up the sails depending on the conditions, wind and swell.
You say I-pala, I say E-pala
The tiny fishing village of Ipala
Just as the sun started to set, we arrived in Ipala (pronounced E-pala). As we slowly motored through the anchorage, we noticed a little white buoy in front of one of the anchored sailboats. We assumed the buoy was marking the location of his anchor. We motored by another boat to inquire about their depth and scope. They pointed over near and beyond the little white buoy indicating other boats were anchored over there earlier during the day. They also told us that during the day the pangas had layed a fishing net across the bay, but the net was no longer there. Carefully trying to avoid putting our anchor on top of the anchor marked by the white buoy, we set our anchor and laid out 150 feet of chain. After a relaxing dinner in the cockpit, we hit the sack.
What is that little white buoy marking?
At 8 am, we started to retrieve the anchor chain. With Duncan standing on the bow and Robin in the cockpit, we simultaneously noticed a panga full of fishermen on the other side of the bay pulling up a fishing net. Duncan noticed a white buoy very similar to the one we thought marked our neighbor's anchor. Hmmm, that looks an awful lot like the white buoy marking that other guy's anchor. As the fishermen retrieved their net and Duncan retrieved our anchor chain, Duncan realized the anchor chain sat on top of the fishing net. Uh oh. Humbly, we explained this to the fishermen in sign language and cryptic Spanish. They helped guide the chain off the net. Duncan looked back to the cockpit and asked "How do I say sorry?" One of the fishermen replied "lo siento". Yep, that is how you say sorry in Spanish. We "lo siento"-ed our way out of the anchorage and headed toward Chamela.
Yes, the "Gold Coast" is spectacular
Between the delayed departure and very light winds, progress to Chamela was slow. We commiserated with another boater, Russ on Fainche. who was also en route to Chamela. His delays were not only related to light winds, but he caught a 53 inch Dorado (mahi-mahi). Graciously, he offered to give us some once we both arrived in the anchorage. Around 3 pm, the realization that we would not arrive in Chamela until after dark motivated us to turn on the engine. Soon thereafter, we received a call on the VHF from our friends on Mermaid. They provided information on where the best place was to anchor. Three hours of motoring at 6 knots per hour allowed us to arrive right before sunset. Bahia Chamela looks like a wonderful bay and anchorage. Tomorrow, we will take our first steps on the "Gold Coast".