Dec. 2004 Paradise Village and Puerto Vallarta

Here we are on A dock in Paradise Village. What a beautiful resort! Lovely docks, pools, and restaurants. We are all "decked" out for Christmas.

This is our small pinata. It was actually so big, we had a hard time finding a good spot for it. After Christmas, we gave it away to one of the dock workers so he could keep it, till next year, for his kids.

This was Ralph's new girl while in PV. What can I say, she was certainly much more slim and firm than I am, and a much better tan as well!! Besides, it's been a long time since I've let Ralph sit on my lap, like that!

Yes, those are angel wings...after all, 'tis the season! And, anyone who knows me knows I've deserved those for a long time! Yes, they look like ears with funny feet attached, but they're not...THEY'RE NOT!! That's my story and I'm sticking to it!

Will the drinking never stop?? Same people, different venue. We are at a bar called Burros, on the beach in Puerto Vallarta. After all that walking and touring, you can't deny us a drink, or two, or three, or...

Next year, I'm going to have this picture made into Christmas cards. What a cute couple, don't you think. Feliz Navidad y Feliz Ano Nuevo to all our friends and family!

Our boat was one of less than 10 in the marina that were decorated. We really enjoyed doing this, it was a shame that more boats didn't participate.

We also went carolling with some of the cruisers. One huge power boat shut all their blinds as we were approaching...heck, they hadn't even heard us sing yet!! Bah, humbug to them too!!

Ever a kid at heart, I thought we had to have a Christmas tree, no matter how small. Note the unique compass cover. I'll bet no one else has one like that! 







Here we are, after Christmas, and awaiting our youngest son, Jeff's arrival in Puerto Vallarta.

Another view of A dock. The old black ship is a copy, to scale, of Columbus' boat, the Nina.

Every week, Paradise Village has fireworks.

Quite spectacular!

One morning, behind us in the marina, some fishermen came in with their nets. They catch bait for the sports fishers. It was intriguing to watch them cast the net...always in a perfect circle. It must take lots of practice.

Dec. 2004 Punta Mita and La Cruz

They are big on tubas in Mexican bands...not so much call for them in Vancouver!

A beautiful sunset in Punta Mita. We made it across the Sea of Cortez and are now in our first anchorage in Banderas Bay. It is lovely and warm. It is much more tropical here, than on the Baja side of the sea.

Tis the season! This is a typical Christmas display in a yard outside a local house in Punta Mita. Most of the houses had at least one of these displays outside, and behind a locked gate. All displays had a manger scene, or at least a picture of the virgin, as well as the Christmas tree and many gaudy ornaments and lights.

Fishing boats in Punta Mita. Just a lovely scene.

These boys were so pleased to have their pictures taken. They children are warm and friendly. The ones who want to "guard" our dinghy are not always the most honest, but we have to remember the poverty here and not leave temptation available to them. For the most part, we have found the Mexican people, especially those in the small towns, both friendly and honest.

As you can see, the vegetation here is much more lush.

Here they are re-thatching the roof of a beach palapa.
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From Punta Mita we headed a bit farther around the bay to the south, to a town called La Cruz. The water was quite polluted here, so there was no swimming. However, the town was quite quaint. This is La Cruz from Fortuitous.

Here there was a lady making and selling piñatas in her house. They were very large so we asked for a small Santa. We were to come back the next day to pick it up. This is the lady and that is our small piñata!

This is a street in Colonia. As you can see from the photo, they are all decorated in preparation for Christmas. During our time in La Cruz, it was the Festival of Guadalupe. We knew nothing about this and no festival was taking place in La Cruz. We took a taxi to another even tinier village called Colonia. There, there was a religious pageant, music, and fireworks.

The music was lively and enjoyable. The kids and adults in the band were all in uniform and really enjoyed entertaining.

This lady wasn't too pleased about having her picture taken, obviously. We did buy tacos from her, and we did ask to take the photo.

These are fellow Bluewater Cruisers, Brian and Marilyn off Icarian. We are having a drink and dinner at a bar called Philos.

This is Leon, one of the local entertainers. He plays washboard and is soooo entertaining. He just loves what he does and enjoys it so much, you just get pulled along with him.

December 2004, Cabo San Lucas

On our way down from Bahia Santa Maria to Cabo, we saw this wonderful rainbow!

The coastline as we are approaching Cabo San Lucas. It is beginning to warm up, but it is still cold out on the water.

This is the approach to Cabo. Very rocky and barren, but you can see greenery in the background. We had no idea, nor were prepared for what would lie around the corner.

Here, you can see a cruiseship in the gap. It almost appears to be on land.

Here we are just coming around the corner. Yet another cruiseship. We felt that we had finally arrived...palm trees, time share salespeople, hawkers on the beach, cruise ships, and finally warm water. We anchored and jumped off the boat for a swim. And for my kid's information, yes, I really did jump off the boat and get my hair wet! This was the first time I was warm enough to swim, 25 degrees.

Celebrating our arrival in Cabo. As you can see, the socializing has not lessened. Here we are on the beach in Cabo with Kim and Linda (Endeavour) and Julie and Mike from Slacker..This was another big milestone for us.

While in Cabo, Endeavour was swarmed. Although difficult to see here, the end of the boom is covered with a huge ball of bees. Ralph happened to "bee" aboard Endeavour, at the time, and helped them get rid of all the bees by spraying them with sea water. Even after cleaning up, for several weeks Kim and Linda found bee bodies in various nooks a crannies. Kim and Linda left for Puerto Vallarta shortly after this. We were heading to Mazatlan...at least we thought we were!

Another Islander Freeport that we found in the marina in Cabo. We had to spend time waiting for our replacement batteries to arrive from San Diego. The ones purchased there were faulty and we could not go on without new ones.

This was the busiest harbour, tourist-wise, that we have been in so far. There was at least one cruiseship per day, with up to three on some days. The sea-doos and pangas buzzed around us and we ended up feeling like we were in the middle of a huge washing machine! It was not our favourite spot, but we welcomed the warmth of sun and water, something we had not experienced until here.

This is looking directly at the beach from Fortuitous.

This would be yet another bird trying to take up residence on our boat. I don't know what it is about Fortuitous and birds, but this poor fellow (a very large pelican) decided he'd make a stop on our solar panel. I guess he didn't count on how slippery it would be and ended up skidding right off and down between the panel, lifelines, and aft cabin top. He struggled but could not free himself, so Ralph helped him free his wing...but not before I looked him up in our bird book to discover whether he was good eating! Sadly, no, but we impoverished cruisers can't be too choosey, you know!

Here we are leaving to go to Puerto Vallarta...I know, I know, I said we were headed to Mazatlan. Well, after installing our new batteries, we did head out for Maz. Unfortunately, it was not to be. We got beat up for 4 or 5 hours and made no progress. We turned around and went back to Cabo. We regrouped and headed out for PV the next day...a better direction wind-wise, so a more comfortable trip.

This will be our next boat!

The actual cape (cabo). You often see photos of boats near that arch, in travel brochures. The city is off to the right.

Good bye Cabo! Mainland, here we come!

On the first morning, after our overnight passage, we had several of these little squid on our deck...quite a mess!

Looks like a storm a-brewing, but nothing materialized.

We have been visited many times by dolphins during our time at sea. These fellows visited us on our way to the Mexican mainland.








Funny, you can watch them until they leave you (20 minutes or sometimes more) and never tire of their beauty and effortless diving and swimming. What a treat to see them in the wild!

Nov. 2004 Turtle Bay and Bahia Santa Maria

Here we are in Turtle Bay. This is Kim and Linda (Endeavour) and another cruiser, Linda, on Entelechy. Turtle Bay is in the background, and the town, dusty and small, is located behind and just to the side of this bar. We had our first Corona in Mexico here. This is a rite of passage for all cruisers...I don't even like beer, but had one anyway!

Jan and Rich aboard Slip Away, our sister ship. Wow, what a great job they have done with their renos!

Ralph proudly displaying his first tuna! However, afterward was not such a pretty sight...the cook trying to deal with very rolly seas and a very bloody fish! We didn't know we were supposed to bleed this fish...seemed to be doing a damn fine job all on its own! Found what appeared to be a good recipe but, once cooked, it still tasted like tuna! Tuna should be in a sandwich or a salad...not a main course, in my mind.

All ashore for a pot-luck in Bahia Santa Maria. We had fifteen cruising boats attend this, both Canadian and US boats. No shortage of food or drink at the pot-lucks.
The pot-luck from above. Fortuitous is out there somewhere. We really enjoyed this place! Here, we traded with a fisherman. We got 4 lobster for 2 cokes, 2 pencils, some candy and a small stuffed toy. MMMMM MMMM GOOD!

These are some of the people we are travelling with. We sometimes leave a place together, sometimes separately, but we all seem to meet up again somewhere down the line. The people are the greatest!

Here I am trying to learn how to use the outboard. A tiller seems to be difficult for me to grasp...no pun intended. Pull left go right, pull right go left...what is that all about anyway!

Here we are off on another hike. This area is a small spit of land and on the other side is Mag Bay. We had to walk right through this little village, no way to skirt it. I felt a little uncomfortable, but there were no problems.
This is a tidal area. During low tide, it would be impossible to bring in the fish boats.

We arrived at the other side after quite a long, dusty, and hot walk. Time for lunch. Kim and Linda doing just that...what's with that hat, Kim?

Denis and Michele, on Aquastrian accompanied us on the hike. They are fitness nuts, but we managed to keep up with them.
This was our picnic spot...quite neat! You can see the wreck in the background.

After lunch we took a walk along the beach. We could not believe how many birds we saw!

There were several whale bones along this beach, and the remnants of a wreck as well.

This is a very, very rare "elephant cactus". Can you see it?