CABO TO CABO – THE BASH TO NOWHERE

May 25, 2020

We had originally planned to leave Cabo on Monday, but the promised weather window kept slipping into the future. It now looked like it would be mid-morning on Tuesday before the wind died enough to round Cabo Falso and even then the seas would be ugly. There were a few clouds in the sky when I got up. I hoped they signaled a change in the weather. The upcoming weather window did not look long enough to make it to Turtle Bay, as a big blow was predicted beginning on Thursday. Unless something changed, we would be spending quite a while visiting Bahia Santa Maria.

Cloudy Morning in Cabo

I got up, took a few pictures, heated water for tea, and sat down to write. I had hoped to cover the entire trip from La Cruz to Ensenada in one blog post but faced the fact that it would need to be divided into at least two.

We spent a lazy morning. Everybody made his or her own breakfast. Then I did the dishes. At noon, we hauled up the anchor and motored over to the fuel dock in the harbor to take on water. Sean and Samantha took the dinghy ahead to make a Costco run. Cabo was deserted. All the charter boats were tied up at the wharves and the restaurants were closed up tight. We needed 150 gallons of water, so were glad we had stopped to refill. There was nowhere to fill our tanks before we reached Ensenada, so we would have to be more careful of our water usage. It seemed the Vacuflush heads used a lot of fresh water. I would have preferred to pump my own over having to ration flushes.

The dock attendants wore face shields and looked like the Terminator. I put on my mask and went into the market on the dock. I paid 210 pesos for a six-pack of light beer (about 3x the normal price.) Even the mineral water cost double what I usually paid. We offloaded garbage and Sean and Samantha eventually met us and loaded three large boxes of food aboard. We had enough food to sail to Hawaii and possibly back.

Dock Attendants in PPE

Dockside Market

Leslie and I busied ourselves stowing the food while we motored back to our spot in the anchorage. The weather was perfect and we spent a very enjoyable afternoon.

In honor of Memorial Day, we had burgers and salads for dinner. Then we watched Blazing Saddles and another episode of The Terror before retiring early. We planned to be up at 7:00 to leave by 8:00 the next morning.

May 26, 2020

I got up about 6:40 and made coffee for the others. While the water was boiling, I did the leftover dishes from the night before, wiped down the table, and stowed the beverages we had left out to dry the day before. Everyone else was up by 7:15 and Leslie made pancakes while Sean and I helped Jack ready the boat to sail. By 8:08, we had hauled up the anchor and turned the bow out to sea.

Dawn in the Cabo Anchorage

I had received a report that seas in the area of Cabo Falso were five feet with a short period. They were definitely close together, but weren't that large. It was a bit rough going around and Samantha was sick, but it didn't last long and had calmed down by 11:00. It got colder the minute we turned the corner. Visibility was poor. It was almost foggy. We knew there were a couple of boats a few miles ahead, but we could not see them.

Rounding Cabo Falso

The Arch from Outside

I stayed on deck until noon, sending and receiving my last few text messages. Then I ducked below to write and warm up a little. When the sun came out in the afternoon, I went back on deck.  Sean fished.  He caught lots of skipjack, but nothing worth keeping.  

Sean and Fish

Leslie made a nice dinner of chicken, leftover pasta, carrots, and broccoli. Sean and Samantha had shopped at Costco, so we had massive amounts of carrots and broccoli, but no other vegetables except half a cabbage and some onions. I went to bed after dinner, sleeping in the main salon because my cabin was too noisy and bouncy. The problem with sleeping on the settee was that the cushions were too hard and I woke every couple of hours because my hips were hurting. Being on a boat, I probably would have woken, anyway.

May 27-28, 2020

I took the watch at 3:00. It was calm and not tremendously cold. There were a tanker and a large power boat passing in the distance to keep an eye on, but my watch passed uneventfully. I listened to podcasts and started watching an episode of Netflix. We had passed into Mountain time, so it started to lighten before my watch was over.

Sunrise at Sea

Jack relieved me a few minutes early and I went below to boil water for us and watch the remainder of my Netflix. When our tea was ready, I went back on deck to drink tea and keep Jack company until the sun cleared the cloud bank. We we approaching Magdalena Bay when it got light.

Samantha & Marina

I napped for a couple of hours and then got up when Leslie started making breakfast. I had a bagel with cream cheese and bacon and spent the morning on deck, watching the scenery slip by. We saw a fin whale and Sean caught half a dozen skip jacks, but nothing edible. It was pleasant in the morning sun.

I stayed above until we cleared Bahia Santa Maria and it started to cloud over. When it got chilly, I went below and spent the afternoon reading about the 1918 influenza epidemic. The parallels between that epidemic and the coronavirus epidemic were striking. In the 1918 epidemic, the virus weakened patients, but it was bacterial pneumonia of varying types that killed. I suspected that the current situation was no different and started to understand why antibiotics are given even when the disease originates with a virus.

Passing Bahia Santa Maria

Sean made a beef stir fry for dinner. It had gotten rougher and he had a bit of a time trying to cook. Samantha was sick again. I did the dishes, since I was unaffected. Then I wrote for a bit and went to bed.

I got up for my watch at 3:00. Things were calm and fairly pleasant. All went smoothly until I stood up to check the gauges at 4:30 and it suddenly got very quiet. My first thought was that I had kicked the engine out of gear, but the controls were nowhere near where I was standing. I walked back to the helm to make sure that the engine was still in gear. By that time, Jack had poked his head out of the aft cabin to ask what was going on. The transmission oil pressure, which had been fine twenty minutes before, was then zero. Our transmission had quit.

The autopilot stopped working as our speed fell to near zero. I attempted to keep the boat pointed in the right direction while Sean and Jack took a look at the transmission. There was nothing we could do. Eventually, we set the sails and proceeded north at about one knot. Our beautiful windless weather window was now working against us.

Sailing at Dawn

I stayed up until it got light. It was very overcast and there was no sunrise that I could see. I went to bed about 7:00. Ghosting along at one or two knots, I was able to sleep comfortably in my cabin. I slept soundly for about three hours.

I got up when everyone was making breakfast. We discussed our options. All else being equal, Cabo was the nearest place to repair the transmission. Unfortunately, all else was not equal and Jack rejected that idea. Cabo was outrageously expensive and the boat would not be easily accessed from San Diego. We then discussed sailing to Turtle Bay, but we would then be trapped there without access to parts or possibly even a mechanic. We eventually settled on the idea of sailing straight to Ensenada where slip fees were reasonable and parts and labor easily located.

We drifted around at one or two knots, making little headway against the current. At times we went backwards. Leslie baked brownies and I practiced the guitar. Jack, who had been awake since the tranny quit, took a nap. It was peaceful and pleasant as long as we didn't look at our track or calculate how long it would take to get home.

 Our Track Under Sail

The wind freshened by 2:30 and we sped up to four knots. I contacted my friend, Blair, for a weather update, since we were having trouble pulling one down from the IridiumGo. He predicted increasing wind for the next five days, building to around 22 knots on Monday. This was nothing Magic Carpet could not handle. The wind we expected to pin us in Turtle Bay, when we were motoring, was now the engine that would carry us northward.

Things progressed nicely all afternoon and we charged northward at up to 7.5 knots. Morale was high. Our plan was to tack westward at dark and sail west all night. We tacked west and the wind, which was supposed to have built all night, died. We could not make any westward progress whatsoever. I went to bed at 21:00.

May 29, 2020

I woke at 1:30 to find that we had tacked back north. I got up to inquire where we were going, since my navigation program showed us having sailed in a circle. It turned out that the wind had mostly died and we were hove to about twenty miles from shore. I went back to bed, but never fell back to sleep. I got up for my watch at 2:40. We were still hove to and drifting north at about a knot.

Around 4:00 in the morning, Obsession, a sailing vessel that had suffered an engine fire and retreated to Magdalena Bay to replace their started motor a couple of days earlier, passed within half a mile of us. We hailed them to be sure they were awake and saw us. Just to be safe, we tacked back south to avoid both Obsession and the shore.

Jack had been up on and off all night, so I let him sleep until he woke up at 6:30. I stayed up, drinking tea and watching Netflix until 8:00 and then slept for a couple of hours.

Dawn over the Back Deck

I got up around 10:00 and grazed on this and that. No one else was interested in breakfast. Later, Leslie made pancakes. After much debate, Jack finally decided to turn around and head back to San Jose del Cabo. Once we turned south, we sped along at 6.5 knots very pleasantly, all afternoon.

Leslie made meatloaf for dinner and we began to get big swells rolling us. We altered course a few degrees to mitigate the rolling. We all stayed up to watch As Good As It Gets with Jack Nicholson. That extended a couple of hours into Leslie's watch, so Sean and I popped our heads up every few minutes to make sure we didn't hit anything.

Main Salon of Magic Carpet

I tried to go to sleep in my bunk after the movie, but some unidentified object was rolling around on the deck over my head and I couldn't possibly sleep through that noise. It was too dark and rough for anyone to want to go out there to investigate, so I took my pillow and blanket and went to sleep in the dinette.

May 30, 2020

I woke once when a stack of books hit the floor, but mostly slept soundly until my alarm went off at 2:45. We were sailing a broad reach at five or six knots and the wind held steady all through my watch from 3:00 to 6:00. It was very cold and mostly low overcast. It was damper than previous nights. Usually, I stayed up to watch the sun rise, but that morning I couldn't get below soon enough. I went below as soon as Jack relieved me. I made a cup of tea to warm myself and went back to sleep in the dinette.

All of a sudden, Leslie exploded from her cabin, hair flying, and exclaimed, “That can has to go!” She had identified my mystery noise as a spray can rolling back and forth above our heads. Sean went up and retrieved it, now that it was light out. One problem solved. Our bunks were noisy enough with the water streaming past and the mast constantly creaking. That can was just too much! I went back to sleep.

The seas grew larger and larger. Every so often, an exceptionally large sea would roll us far over on our side. I was sleeping soundly when a big wave destabilized our cache of five-gallon water jugs and they all went bounding across the cabin. I awoke and realized that we had gybed. Samantha and I secured the jugs and I moved across the salon and went back to sleep on the settee. I managed to sleep until 10:00 when it got too rough to bother trying to go back to sleep.

Sailing Past Mag Bay

We spent the morning grazing and chatting. At one point, Sean opened the refrigerator and a beer jumped out and popped open, fortunately landing in a plastic bucket on the floor. Sean shut the refrigerator door in a hurry before anything else could attack him. It was too rough to cook or do dishes. We had tacked back towards shore but were going to run out of water before we got around the corner at Magdalena Bay.

About 13:30, Leslie retired to take a nap and I realized that everyone else was sleeping. It was very cold. Despite being midday, I put on all my warm clothes and went topside to keep watch. I set an alarm so we wouldn't hit the shore if I dozed off. Then I opened up my laptop and began to write.

It was my turn to make dinner and I made my special tuna casserole from penne, tomato soup, onion, jalapenos, cheese, and cumin. I served it with a salad garnished with feta and pecans and whipped up a lime vinaigrette. I had been dying for some homemade salad dressing.

Sunset Below Mag Bay

After dinner, I watched an episode of Netflix and tried to go to sleep in my bunk. It was fairly calm, but we were on the wrong tack and I couldn't get comfortable. I eventually had to go sleep in the dinette.

May 31, 2020

I got up to take the watch at 3:00. It was warmer than it had been, but very damp. The wind was light and we bobbed along at three knots. Despite being light and somewhat puffy, the direction of the wind remained constant throughout my watch. I saw many cargo ships passing outside of us on the AIS, but none came close enough to make out their lights.

Copper Dawn

Jack took the watch at 6:00, but I stayed up until 7:00 to watch the sun rise. It took some time for the sun to clear the marine layer and finally shine across the water. News from San Diego was bad. Rioting had broken out in La Mesa. There had been riots all across the country and the National Guard had been called in thirteen states. Matt reported helicopters hovering over downtown Oakland. We were glad to be at sea.

It was so calm that I had a good nap until Leslie started cooking bacon. After everyone had finished preparing breakfasts, Leslie made banana papaya bread. I was not fond of papaya, but the bread was tasty enough. The papaya made it quite moist.

I was cold and stayed below. It was calm enough that I could practice the guitar for an hour. In the later afternoon, the sun peeked through and I went out into the cockpit to doze under a blanket it the sun. Once again, I realized that no one else was awake, so I sat up and paid attention until Sean roused.

Flying the Kite

We continued along at somewhere between two and a half and three and a half knots all day. The promised wind that was supposed to arrive at 16:00 failed to fill in. At 17:00, we tried putting up the spinnaker. Without a spinnaker pole, that failed to increase our speed and only resulted in us needing to change course. We took it down and resumed bobbing slowly in the right direction. All hope of arriving on Sunday vanished. We were just hoping to make it before dark on Monday.

News from home was sparse and all bad. I was in no hurry to return. Once the spinnaker was secured, I sat down to write.

We were getting close to shore, so decided to clean out the refrigerator by eating leftovers for dinner.  I went to bed shortly after dinner.

June 1, 2020

I woke to change sides of the settee at 1:30 am when we tacked back towards shore. I took my watch at 3:00.  It was so much warmer that Marina didn't want to snuggle in the sleeping bag, anymore.  She camped out on top of my blanket for the first couple of hours.  Fortunately, it was warm enough that I didn't need the blanket.  The wind had picked up and we were sailing along at five or six knots.  That kept up throughout my watch.

Sailing into Puerto Los Cabos

It was overcast and didn't look like there would be much of a dawn.  I went below to nap for a couple of hours.  When I came back up after lunch, we had rounded the cape and were passing Cabo.  The wind died as we proceeded further east.  At times it was difficult to steer and there were moments of panic when we got too close to land.  Finally, about 18:00, we arrived outside Puerto Los Cabos.

Sean Pushing Us Along

                                                                                         

Passing Close to the Breakwater

We put the dinghy in the water and Sean tried to push us along.  At first, it seemed like he would be sucked under the hull, but the outboard eventually overcame the boat's intertia and we began to move forward.  The breakwater was getting close before we got control, but we got through safely and it was much easier to manuever inside.  

Our assigned space at the work dock was a straight approach and Jack managed to bring that forty ton vessel into the dock gently enough for Leslie and I to step off and stop her without heroics.  It was good to be ashore!

We had arrived after hours, so couldn't accomplish anything more that day.  We got takeout tacos from the marina restaurant and sat down to watch a bit more of The Terror.

Relaxing in Puerto Los Cabos