Zihuatanejo!!!

No, we did not try this...the bay looks a little to crowded if you fall

Jerry and Skeeter locking up the dinghy after a day at the beach

Breakfast with Janet and Dave from SV Cuervo

I did not try the email, you think it would have been faster than Telcel?

Jan, Dave, Jerry, Shilo (bar owner), bartender ( don't remember his name), and Marty and Debbie that we met in town who have been coming to Zihuatanejo for 4 years and know all the fun spots like here at Barracruda ( Hangover bar)!!

Zorro's Bar...Jerry, Dave and I had a few of these frigin cold beers one afternoon cause it was frigin hot here!!!  Fun times

The streets of Zihuatanejo are so clean and all the block have the same look to them, the town has been working hard for the past 4 or so years to improve the look and it has paid off.  There were many streets that cars were not allowed to go through, very pedestrian friendly.  We loved all the shops, restaurants and bars!

Our second to last night we had a new neighbor

There were guys out everyday all day fishing right next to us

Sergio from one of the best little palapa restaurants on the beach....he also make little fishing fly luers, we will see if we catch anything when we leave

There were tons of dogs all the time on the beach, most were friendly, but some were not so much...this one was so stinking cute...she loved skeeter.

We have really loved Zihuatanejo the last 4 days, but our time to keep heading southeast has come.  We are pulling up anchor around 1pm today (Thursday) and heading on our first long trip in a while 350 miles and about 70 hours to Huatulco this is averaging 5 knots, now that we have our bottom cleaned we should be able to go about 5.5 knots, but it will still be a long trip.  We got all our provisions, the dinghy up, fuel, and plenty of cold beer and are ready to go.  Unfortunately we will not be buddy boating with anyone, but it should be a good trip, as long as the weather stays this way.  Hopefully we will catch some fish.  We had dinner with Kirk from SV Freedom Kirkland who caught a pretty good size dorado on his way down here form Manzanillo, so now it is our turn. 

Happy Sun, Sails and Coconuts

Isla Grande!!

The anchorage at Isla Grande was very very popular with the weekend partiers...everything from swimming to tour boats to jet skies and of coarse fishing!

Isla Grande anchorage, really nice for swimming but a little rolly for sleeping..actually the second night was really rolly

Dave and Janet on SV Cuervo took us to dinner, when we beached the dinghy we were about to walk around to the other side of the beach were there were some reasturant still open, but as we were walking Hugo from the reasturant Lili Ciprioni literally ran after us to get us to come and eat with them.  They showed us our menu which is the picture above.  Then they pulled out tables that were already put away and put tablecloth and candle for light and brought us a couple of buckets of beer.  It was a great experiance, probably one of the most unique and exciting dinners we have had in a long time.  We want to thank SV Cuervo and the awesome resturant and Hugo for a great evening.

What great friends and fun times

The food was fabulous!!

There were a couple of whales on our 10 mile trip south to Zihuatanejo!

I really thought I got some good pictures, but they were farther then I thought

As we were heading into Zihuatanejo Bay!!

Buddy Boating to Isla Grande

Dave and Jan on SV Cuervo decided to buddy boat with us 181 miles to Isla Grande, which was going to take about 36 hours.  We decided to leave at sun up which was around 7 am on Thursday the 17th and start our journey southeast. 

Sunrise leaving Bahie Manzanillo

The first day was a great motor boat ride we did have about a 45 min detour while we had to navigate around a 2 mile long line that the panga fishermen put out everyday and check to see if they have any fish attached to the lines hanging in the water.  But after that we had an easy first day on the water.  The nights were great too, because we had a great full moon, so it was easy to spot the cruise ships, cargo tanks, and all other traffic on the water.  The second day was great, we did have to slow down for about an hours due to SV Cuervo had their raw water pump clog up and go out on them and their engine was starting to overheat, we they fished out the jellyfish that clogged it and replaced the pump, we know how that feels to have your engine overheat from the time we crossed the sea of cortez.  After that we had a great motor sail down with about 7 knots of wind on our beam and arrived in Isla Grande around 6 pm.

It was awesome seeing tons of Sea Turtles

Shiraz on his watch

Sunrise the second day with SV Cuervo ahead of us!

The anchorage is quite small so we had to fit in with the four other boats, including SV Cuervo, to try to get in close because this is known as a little rolly anchorage. 

When we were setting the anchor skeeter fell off the boat, Jerry was able to climb down the side and I grabed Skeeter up by the colar.  Luckely the water was 80 degrees!!

Sunset from Isla Grande Anchorage!

Today we are going to go snorkeling and swimming and enjoy the 79 degree clear water, then tomorrow we are going to pick up anchor and head 10 nm southeast to Zihuatanejo.

Las Hadas Anchorage

We pulled up anchor around 10:30am on Sunday the 13th to head 25 nm south east to Bahia Manzanillo.  We had a great motor down, not much wind, no swell, just an easy 7 hour trip, it was a little longer because we still have not been able to clean the bottom of the boat.

birds love to catch a ride on the Sea Turtles

They stay floating right up till we go by them

We arrived in Bahia Manzanillo to Las Hadas anchorage in front of there marina and the Las Hadas resort around 5:20 pm, there were about 17 to 20 boats in the anchorage so we ended up have to anchor pretty far out of the little anchorage cove, we thought maybe we would have a lot more rolls, but it ended up not to bad.  Right after we dropped anchor we noticed our friends on SV Cuervo were in this anchorage, we have not seen them since they left La Cruz marina, so we decided to get the kayaks down and go over to visit with them a while. 

Las Hadas anchorage and resort along with other surrounding resorts

In the Manzanillo Bay there are large cargo and tankers ships going in and out at all times of the day

Las Hadas Marina and Resort was very big, but at we walked around we noticed it was pretty old, but still a nice place.  There were a few restaurants right on the walkway in front of the marina and a few around the other side of the resort, and as you walked farther down there were more resorts and more restaurants.  Now of coarse everything was pretty expensive so we only eat out once at an pizzeria near the marina entrance. 

Dinner on Valantines day with Jan and Dave on SV Cuervo

an overlook of the anchorage from the top of the resort...SOMF is the one far out there.  About seven or so boats have left since we first arrived so we look like loners

We have not gone into Manzanillo, but we did take a taxi into town a little and whet to Walmart and Auto zone to get some provisions.  We had Dave and Jan from SV Cuervo over for chicken curry dinner one night, we had a great time, Jan made a peach and sour cherry pie, wow was it good.  We love having people over for dinner because if we make the dinner and supply the drinks they other boat usually will offer to bring a dessert and since I don't bake it works out for Jerry who has a very very big sweet tooth. 

Yummy pie Jan made for dinner on SOMF

Jan and I used the pool one day after doing laundry, which by the way was really expensive $60 pesos a wash and $60 pesos a dry about $10 dollars a load.  Jan tried to have the resort do it but they wanted to charge per piece of clothing, $3 dollars for a pair of underwear, I don't think so.  So after we spent our money in their launder mat we decided we deserved to use their pool.  It was great, since the water has been cooler than normal and also the anchorage has this red tied that comes in the afternoon, we have not been doing any swimming so the pool felt great in the heat of the day.

A trip to Barra!

Yesterday Jerry and I took a 6 peso bus ride into Barra de Navidad, this is the small town on the south side of the bay.  There is a anchorage inside the lagoon, along with a small marina, we chose not to anchor inside due to the shallow spots inside the entry.  We still wanted to see the small town of Barra, there is not much here, very touristy with restaurants, tourist shops, and a nice malecon to walk along to see the surfers.

 Barra de Navidad anchorage in the Lagoon

Jerry and a really neat statue on the malecon in Barra

since we never learned how to surf in La Cruz, now we will just take pictures of them

Sea turtle eggs, sea turtles are in the endangered species act, there are conservation programs all over Mexico to protect the eggs in secure nurseries and release them after they hatch.  This will ensure the eggs gets to full maturity and safely to the water.

Barras beautiful church

I love taking pictures of the colorful streets in Mexico

 After having a great time in Barra and provisioning in Melaque we had a great dinghy launch off the beach none of our groceries got wet, we decided to stay in for the night and I made some great chef salads

  We are planning on leaving this morning for either Bahia Santiago which is 24 miles or Bahia Manzanillo, to anchor in front of a small town of Las Hadas which right around the corner.  Either way we should have a great 6 hour sail, according to the weather this morning there should be 15 to 20 knots of wind....Happy Sailing!

Bahia de Navidad!

We left our great anchorage of Bahia Tenacatita around 10:45am to head 14nm to Bahia de Navidad to anchor in Melaque anchorage, what the cruisers call "Rocky Melaque".  We had a great motor sail down with around 10 knots of wind, no fish but we saw whales, a sea turtle and a Mexican Navy Boat. 

Looking at the beach of Melaque from the anchorage

A small town Melaque is at the north end of Bahia de Navidad and the town Barra de Navidad is to the south end of the bay.  We chose to anchor in Melaque anchorage instead of going into Barra de Navidad lagoon.  We have heard of stories of people running a ground on unmarked shoals, and since we are only planning on staying a couple of days we decided to anchor and put out our stern anchor to help point us into the swells so we don't roll as much.  The first day that we arrived the wind was hitting up to 20 knots so we were not able to get our dinghy down to put out our stern anchor, but we had a great night with very little rolling.  The next morning before going into town we decided to put our our stern anchor, but for some reason we were turned in such a direction that pulling the boat around by dinghy made it hard to get the anchor in the best spot to point the boat into the swells.  Needles to say the next night was really really really rolly, but oh well we can fight it one more day. 

A little friend hanging out by the school

town square, where there are a couple of streets full of shops, grocery stores, and meat markets

the colorful church

in the middle of the plaza at the square

Skeeter dancing for some ice cream

 As like many of the anchorages here on the Pacific Mexican Mainland we have to surf land our dinghy on the beach.  Well we have been so far lucky coming onto the beach, but here we were not so lucky getting off the beach.  It is all about timing the breaking waves, they seem to come in sets, a couple of large ones and then a couple of small ones.  Sounds easy, well not so much for us.  We were not so lucky trying to leave the beach one afternoon and Jerry, myself and Skeeter got soaking wet, but at least we did not flip the dinghy.  But we did decide to pull the dinghy back up on the beach and have a couple of beers while we waited a while, mostly for there not to be such an audience around.  The beach gets full of all the part time Canadians that live down here.

Sitting at one of the palapa restaurants waiting for a easier surf to get the dinghy back off the beach

at least he is making use of SV Red Coats dinghy on land!



Bahia Tenacatita!!

Well we pulled anchor around 8 am to head 29nm toward Tenacatita.  There was no wind to say but there were some very large swells, some has high as 6feet but at least they were spread apart so the ride was bearable.  As we turned to head east more they calmed down a lot more.  We did not put our the fishing poles because it was a little to rolly to reel in the the fish, if we would have caught some.  We arrived in Tenecatita around 2:30 pm, just like our last trip to Chamela we only averaged around 4 knots because of our bottom having so much growth on it.  This is such a great anchorage, probably my favorite so far on the pacific Mexican mainland side.

Sushi, unfortunately we did not catch it, but we had some from a fisherman that caught a 60lbs tuna.

We did a lot of relaxing in this anchorage, no wind, no swells, it was a picture perfect anchorage

Blue Bay resort that we paid 380 pesos a person to enjoy the day and watch the Super Bowl

The lobby where we got all the drinks and food that we wanted during the game, oh yeah it was fun....Go Packers Super Bowl Champs!!

A pool with a swim up bar!!

A small restaurant and a little camp site at the end of the white sand beach

It was beautiful inside, we saw a couple of other dinghy's going through

We saw two small baby crocodiles and an iguana and a couple of birds, but when we tried to get close to them they got scared away



For a couple of days we had some dolphins going around the anchorage, one morning we had one that was playing with skeeter for a couple of hours going all around the boat.

We took an jungle dinghy adventure that went through almost 2 miles of mangrove, known as Estero Verde.