My husband John and I set off at about 09:00 from Marina Mazatlan in Bamboo following our Buddy Boat Dolce Vita and our good friend (let’s hope it remains so) Dennis along with his friend Warner who is hitching a ride down to Puerto Vallarta. We left before the dredger started and also to take advantage of the high tide, as the entrance to the marina is tricky enough without added obstacles.
This will be our first trip beyond Banderas Bay. It is also the first one where we are intending to spend more time in anchorages on the hook and being real ‘Cruisers’.
We have already discovered the learning curve in owning a boat is not actually a curve at all but a vertical line. This trip we are sure will be no exception.
So, back to the beginning, we left Marina Mazatlan heading for Deer Island to drop anchor for a few hours before heading off to Isla Isobel. In raising the anchor we soon discovered the new shackle which had been fitted was not the same size and would not fit in the Anchor Roller. John had to then guide the boat to be near Dennis’ so that he could come and provide some muscle to bring the anchor in properly and then be returned to his boat in order to commence the adventure. Everything worked well regarding Dennis coming aboard and dropping him back to the boat. Deep respect to John for his boat handling skills as I would never have a managed that. Having had a slight prang in Bamboo whilst trying to get into a marina slip on a previous trip I now have a mental block with the two Identically coloured levers which control Forward/Reverse on one and Speed on the other.
The trip down over night was relatively uneventful. There was an amazing sunset and we saw a humpback whale swimming and splashing incredibly close to a small fishing panga. The whale put on quite a show for the panga.
During the night we had to reduce speed as Dennis had a vibration on his new engine .
Friday 31st January 2020
Before we came into Isla Isobel to anchor we found the old anchor shackle and busied ourselves in replacing it, thus hopefully resolving the issue experienced in Deer Island. Time will tell. Whilst trying to concentrate on the replacing of the shackle, a whale came alongside the boat and made its presence known. We also saw one about a mile out diving and splashing in the water. What incredible creatures they truly are. I found the boat handling whilst anchoring very hard and quite unnervingly as to how little space there was to manoeuvre between the rocks and Dolce Vita which was already anchored. John was a superstar, hopefully by the end of this trip I will have nailed it. Sourdough in the oven whilst John went to check on the anchors... Well, put it like this, we won’t need to worry about drifting during the night. However, John will have to dive down and see if can release our anchor before we can go anywhere tomorrow. The fish were amazing apparently, and there are so many birds flying overhead.
The cooked Sourdough, not sure whether it’s edible or will break windows, we will taste it tonight. We head off to Mantagen Bay tomorrow, anchors permitting, so an early start. We are tired from the night sail, so we will be in bed early tonight. The bread was a huge success, amazingly, as it didn’t look especially attractive. All the better for having the Lurpak butter which we found in Wallymat spread over it. We polished it off with a huge bowl of soup left over from the previous night. A few rounds of UNO and we were so tired we didn’t even manage to stay awake until ‘Cruisers Midnight’ (9pm).
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