El Faro Lighthouse

On Thursday, January 10th, we hiked up to the El Faro lighthouse, the second tallest lighthouse in the world! On most days the view from the top is spectacular, but on Thursday it was foggy. It took us almost an hour by bus to get there, then the entire hike up and down took around an hour and a quarter. The hike can be very steep at times. There are sweeping switchbacks of gravel path that make the climb a little easier, but the girls favored the steep, rock climbing paths and in addition there is a set of 341 uneven stairs.

The Start of 2008

We had a nice start to 2008 with dinner out at our favorite restaurant here, Fat Fish, followed by a movie (National Treasure 2). Fortunately, the movies are in English with Spanish subtitles!


Jay clebrated his birthday on January 2nd along with our friend Linda from Warren Peace. We once again enjoyed a dinner out followed by cake and coffee at Linda's brother-in-law's hotel suite. If was a fun night and we came home very very full! During the dinner a Mexican singer serenaded the birthday boy & girl while making a paper flower out of a napkin. This special talent was of great interest to Jocelyn & Jenny who tried to duplicate the craft and when the singer noticed their efforts, he came back to our table to teach them.


There don't seem to be many hard and fast rules here in Mexico concerning pets, Diesel can even ride on the bus! But whe we visited old town, we came across this sign...very descriptive!




















We visited Old Town Mazatlan and saw the Mercado, the Plaza Machado and the beautiful cathedral.
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We have really enjoyed our time here at the El Cid Marina in Mazatlan. The grounds are beautiful and everyone has really enjoyed the pools and hot tub.

Christmas aboard Malachi

We had a wonderful Christmas celebration aboard Malachi (our first one ever!), we put lights up outside, and we even had a tree! We were really happy to have Grandma Laura join us for the holidays and our good friends Steve & Linda from Warren Peace joined us for a delicious dinner of turkey, stuffing, yams, mashed potatoes, corn & carrots, coleslaw, cranberries and pumpkin and apple pies for dessert - thanks Linda, they were rico sabrosso! Just before Christmas, we visited a neighbouring marina and watched a Christmas show put on by the Salvation Army orphanage. There were about 70 very talented young singers and dancers who entertained us all and Isreal, the Major, sang several solos - what a wonderful voice! Thanks to the cruisers who attended along with several observers from the condo next door, over $3000 was raised for the orphanage!

Feliz Navidad!

To all of our wonderful friends and family, may you be richly blessed this season and always and may the wonder of the saviors birth ignite in you a joy beyond measure.

Love: Jay, Marg, Jocelyn, Jenny & Diesel

Feliz Navidad!

Malachi under sail!

BURP! aka Bluewater Unofficial Rendezvous Point

There are many Bluewater Cruisers tied to the same dock as us at the El Cid Marina in Mazatlan, the other night 20 of us went out for pizza to celebrate the season. It's really nice to have a mobile community, especially when you arrive at a new port and run into friends your first time in town!

Mazatlan!

After a few days at anchor in Los Frailles where we swam, dove, snorkelled and enjoyed a bonfire and potluck on the beach, we crossed the Sea of Cortez. After an excellent sail, we arrived in Mazatlan at 8:30 pm and braved the narrow entrance into the El Cid marina. There are several Canadians here and probably eight or so Bluewater Cruisers. Last night we enjoyed dinner a Fat Fish, a local rib restaurant, with three other Bluewater boats thus experiencing our first real BURP! A great time was had by all. We'll be here in Mazatlan until the first week of January, then we'll be heading back into the Sea of Cortez.

Baja Bound

Well everyone, first thing I'll say is that internet is tough to find on the Baja! And when you do, it's at a cafe on a desktop computer and it's a dial up connection....remember that?

Anyway, we have arrived! Yesterday, we arrived in Cabo San Lucas, the Southernmost tip of the Baja also known as Lands End. We visited several anchorages along the way, Turtle Bay and Santa Maria being our favorites. The weather has not been what we expected, it's been cool and overcast and the water's really been too cold for swimming. During our trip down, we saw lots of aquatic life, whales, dolphins, sea lions and even marlins! We fished and seem to be able to catch tuna just fine, but we're holding out for wahoo or dorado, actually our first catch was a blue shark!

We've been travelling with a fleet of 7-10 boats mostly from Canada and will likely dispurse in the next week as some will head North into the Sea of Cortez while others will head South towards Puerta Vallarta. We will be spending Christmas in Mazatlan and are looking forward to meeting up with several cruising friends from home.

Our Spanish language skills are getting a good workout as we ask for directions, order a meal or converse with the Capitan del Puerto. While we were in Magdalena Bay, the Port Captain gave us a ride in his Panga so we could provision in San Carlos....it was a fast exciting trip. There were to mercados there and we were able to buy simple groceries only. The port captain hauled and launched his panga instead of leaving it in the water, so when we finished shopping, we walked to his house, loaded our groceries in the panga which was on the trailer and connected to his truck and hopped in, he drove us through town and launched the boat with us five ladies and our groceries - it was quite the adventure!

This morning we observed about 50 bat rays, just about 100 feet from the boat, trying to fly out of the water! They made huges splashes and sometimes did somersaults, what a fun way to start the morning! Cabo San Lucas is a busy tourist town and we'll be exploring today and getting some more groceries as our supplies are getting low again. It's sunny and the water's finally warm enough for a pleasant swim - a balmy 78 degrees. We're looking forward to going up into the Sea of Cortez to Las Frailles which is supposedly a great dive and snorkleing location.

Mexico!

We crossed the US/Mexico border at 5am on November 15th and arrived in Ensenda in the early afternoon and were able to complete our entry before the office closed at five o'clock.

After motoring almost the entire time, the wind finally picked up enough to sail, but we were only about 45 minutes out. We arrived just ahead of a thick fog bank which blanketed the entire city.

Checking in at the Centro Integral de Servicios was a simple and friendly process. It's good to speak some Spanish, have lots of patience and copies of all of your documents including insurance
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San Diego

We spent a week in San Diego and got a tremendous amout of work done thanks to the car we rented for the week. Most of our time was spent restocking and repairing and Christmas shopping, so much so that we were seldom at the boat, but the dock were were tied to was always full of cruisers who had lots of useful information to share and much to the girls delight, there were lots of kids! Finally!

The kids from Shambala (Australia) and from Aquarelle (Vancouver Island) organized a cricket match for all of the cruising kids and their parents, there were about 30 of us who participated - it was a lot of fun!




















We had such a fun time visiting with several fellow Canadian cruisers and meeting many others. The cruising community is so wonderful, everyone helps everyone and it's so fun to show up in a new place and run into people that you know!

We spent a day at Sea World which was so much fun! We never tire of that place! Thanks to our friends on Maryke Violet who watched Diesel for the day and to our friends on Warren Peace who were our chauffers for the day.














NOTE TO FELLOW CANADIAN CRUISERS: Downwind Marine publishes a cruising guide that states that HAM radio operators need to get a permit to operate their radios in Mexico. We went through the process described in their guide only to be told that the requirement was for Americans not Canadians. Save your time and your money and skip this step.

Happy Halloween!

We spent halloween on Catalina Island at Two Harbors where residents of the town worked together to create an awesome haunted house! Being cruisers means you sometimes have a little extra time on your hands to make costumes and play dress up and we took advantage of the day and visited the haunted house dressed as the Incredibles! (Diesel too!).

Pumpkin Carving!

The folks here at Pacific Mariners Yacht Club in Marina Del Rey take halloween very seriously. The members spent the entire day and evening decorating for their big party tomorrow night. We were invited to join them carving pumpkins and we had a great time doing so.

WHEW!

Wow, we've finally cleaned up all of the ash from the boat and are looking much more respectable! We are currently guests at the Pacific Mariners Yacht Club in Marina Del Rey and the people here are most welcoming. We are getting ready to go carve pumpkins for decoration at the halloween party tomorrow night. Tomorrow or Sunday we're planning to explore Venice Beach. Us girls wanted to go see Ellen Degeneres, but she never called back to confirm....so sad!

We've finally got all of our scuba gear and are set to explore the deep blue sea. We're really looking forward to our next stop at Catalina Island which is reported to have amazing aquatic life....we'll report on that soon.

Malibu Fire

The clear blue skies we've become accustomed to since arriving in California were darkend today as a result of a huge fire burning in the Malibu Canyon. As I write, the skies are thick with smoke and ash and the sun looks like a red fireball obscured by the haze. Even with the hatches and port holes closed, a film of ash covers all surfaces down below and cleaning efforts are futile

Santa Barbara

Think you've seen it all? Well take a look at Booger, Kitty and Mousie, three of the most unusual characters we've met thus far!

Congratulations!

I am pleased to let you all know that Jay, Jocelyn and Jenny are now all certified PADI Open Water Divers! After a grueling week of intense study and diving, all three passed with flying colours! I managed to complete everything but the ocean dives (phobia issues) which I'll attempt to complete somewhere that has clear warm water but until that time I'm happy to snorkel on the surface while watching my family below.

It's Lobster season in Southern California and Jay can't wait to go hunting all we need now is some dive gear and a bigger boat to keep it all in!

We'll be moving on from Santa Barbara tomorrow and would like to visit Channel Islands Harbour, Santa Monica and Catalina Island. We are having the time of our lives!

Happy Thanksgiving, from our family to yours!

Santa Barbara

We are in beautiful Santa Barbara and it is sunny and warm! Our overnight trip here from San Luis Obispso started out very rolly and windy but evened out sometime in the middle of the night. Diesel faired well and looks mighty handsome in his life jacket. He, like the rest of us girls, always breathes a sigh of relieve once we're secured in port.

We have arranged for SCUBA lessons for next week and will be spending the weekend doing all of the text book work on the boat and will hit the water on Monday, by Thursday we'll all be certified!

San Simeon and Beyond!

It's interesting you know....at home we would all be watching the clock waiting for our favorite show to start all the while missing the awesome shows of nature created just for us.

We did an overnight trip from beautiful Monterey to San Simeon, home of the extraordinary Hearst Castle, and once the anchor was set we sat back and watch our favorite show! A large group of dolphins danced and played around the five boats in the anchorage while the sea otters swam lazily by munching on whatever shellfish they had brought up from the bottom. What a surreal experience! At one point, three dolphins swam right towards the side of the boat then swooped beneath the keel and leapt up on the other side! No TV show can beat this kind of entertainment!

For all of you fellow cruisers contemplating a stop in San Simeon, we would just like to let you know that, while there is a large pier in San Simeon (20 feet tall)the only way ashore is to beach your dinghy in the surf. Thus said, we would go again as we all enjoyed the tour of the Hearst Castle.

Today we travelled from San Simeon to Morro Bay and are presently at the Morro Bay Yacht Club. Diesel loves it here, he gets to spend his days harassing the Pelicans and Sea Lions that dare to come anywhere near the boat!

Monterey

We had a great sail across the bay to Monterey and the light West winds offered the perfect opportunity to fly our gennaker a sail which we are very glad we have. We were treated to yet another private dolphin show, this time a pod of 6 or so Risso's Dolphins - we thought they were baby grey whales as they look quite different from common dolphins.

The girls took in the Monterey Bay Aquarium on Tuesday as a Science field trip and had a great time. Favorite exhibits included the sea otters and the jellies but the young white shark was cool too!




Monterey has an excellent farmers market on Tuesday nights and we took the opportunity to pick up some fresh fruits an veggies, the best we've had yet!

Marg & Jay took a tour of the Chateau Julien winery and vinyard while the girls and Diesel played at the beach and visited fishermans wharf. Diesel loves the water and is becoming quite the surfer dog!