La Paz, aka La Pause and Velcro Bay

Tom and I have heard the jokes about cruisers referring to La Paz (The Peace) as a place that is difficult from which to leave, calling it Velcro Bay and Bungee Bay, hard to get unstuck and always getting pulled back. 

Tom, Gene (La Brisa), bartender Conchita, and Nick (Iolanthe), hangin' loose in La Paz

In addition to La Paz being a wonderful city where there is always something going on, turns out it's a great place to just hang out, fix things and do numerous boat repairs. There seems to be a plethora of repair shops and resources, not to mention numerous cruisers and ex-pats who know where and how to get stuff done. Here in Marina Palmira we have our boat managers Ross Marine Services, plus the fairly new La Paz Cruiser's Supply, Techs Mex, and finally Cross Marine Works, whose expertise has been invaluable to us. In La Paz a simple task like shopping or purchasing a part usually only takes 1/2 to 3/4 of a day, not the entire day as it does elsewhere. Heck, the other day I did a morning run to the pharmacy, left via shuttle at 9:00 and walked back to the boat by 11:00 a.m., a record! 

In the past few weeks we have entertained ourselves with a couple of days and nights of Carnaval...

La Paz Police Force gets ready to keep "la paz" at Carnaval

Juguete, Swan, Cinnabar and Victory enjoy the parade from Tailhunter's third floor patio.

...including nightly fireworks, parades, and persistently loud tuba music until 02:00 a.m. At about 02:05 the music would be drowned out by a cacophony of sirens which must have been the La Paz Police Force's way of saying "SHUT UP!!" The sirens continued until about 02:30. After a couple of nights of this we escaped to La Ventana for the remainder of Carnaval. 

The marina has a shuttle that will drop us off in town and I have been enjoying exploring the downtown with its little shops, markets and coffee houses, and then the walk back through the neighborhoods or along the Malecon.

Planter of recycled materials at DoceCuarenta, my favorite espresso bar.

La Paz is the capital of the state of Baja California Sur, and it feels like a capital compared to other places we have been in Baja. There are numerous resources, very few unhealthy stray animals, and even the sidewalks seem to be much better than other places we have been in Mexico. Even so, they are not perfect and we see a lot of this...

One of the nicer sidewalks (but unmarked, 3-level change!)

...and scratch our heads at this:

It was funny watching her trying to walk down that sidewalk.

We have enjoyed hanging out at Marina Palmira and meeting other cruisers who have chosen a liveaboard lifestyle. 

Sylvia, crew of Pac Cup's first all female doublehanded boat (2004), with Jeanne (sv Eagle), crew of Pac Cup's first all female fully-crewed boat (1994). 

I'm amazed at the number of cruisers who have pets on board. Most are small as you might imagine...

Gene and Ace from La Brisa

...but check out this pet owned by our dock neighbors aboard Victory!

Dawn and Odin the Great Dane

Last week a "Classic Northerly" blew threw and caused quite a bit of excitement in town. We had plenty of warning so that morning we re-secured the boat, pulled down the canvas, and battened down the hatches before heading down to Marina La Paz for the monthly swap meet. Waves were splashing over the Malecon, high winds carried sand and earth throughout the city, and several boats dragged anchors and drifted to shore. Down at Marina La Paz the patrons of the swap meet were entertained by one boat that came in, tried to dock, and was promptly blown into some other boats. 

Tom and others fend off with boat hooks, while others try to pull the boat to their dock.

Everybody jumped to help and eventually the boat was secured safely to its dock with little or no damage to it or other boats.

Over the past couple of weeks we have worked hard to get Cinnabar ready to cast off her lines in La Paz and head north. The Ross's helped us get some engine and genset parts down here via personal courier (other cruisers flying back from the U.S.) and Rob from Cross Marine Works helped us replace our engine injectors. 

Tom worked a couple of days replacing a failing part (exhaust elbow) on our diesel genset but was frustrated and baffled when he couldn't get it to fire up. Good fuel, clean air, strong starter, electrical engine cutoffs operational - yet the motor just would not start. Finally, he suspected some dust/crud had fallen down into the exhaust port around a valve seal, not allowing the exhaust valve to close, and thus causing insufficient compression; but he couldn't figure out how to easily fix it. Rob Cross, mechanic extraordinaire, arrived this morning with some magic "Engine Cleaner" spray. Tom's thinking "yeah, right - these miracle elixirs never work". After one spray into the intake manifold and a 5 minute wait, the motor jumped to life. "No Way!". The cleaner cleared the crud. Bravo!

Miracle worker Rob, tools of the trade, and his happy customer.

Our sails are on, dodger/bimini/solar panels installed, our neighbors on A-Train drove us to Chedraui Supermercado yesterday for a big provisioning run...

Who says you can't find what you need in Mexico?

...I've downloaded books from the e-library, and we hope to cast off Wednesday morning. It will be sad to bid adieu to some people whom we are just getting to know, but we look forward to getting to know some more folks better when we return to La Paz in May. Anyway, since our homes are boats who knows where we might run across these crazy cruisers again? 

"I thought it was an adventure, and in reality it was life."

Life is an adventure. 

More pictures from the past few weeks are HERE. 

La Ventana - Kites and Wahoos!!

A number of years ago, in 2000, Tom and I traveled to Israel for the wedding reception of a close family friend. The family invited us to tour through Israel and part of Egypt for some scuba diving and ocean recreation. While at the beach at Eilat we spied some people who were trying a sport we had never seen before. They were on smallish boards, like snowboards, and were being pulled through the water by giant, crescent-shaped kites. They didn't seem to be in great control of their kites; in fact one poor guy was heading straight for Jordan and was soon lost from sight. Hopefully he got rescued or figured out how to tack his kite before hitting land on the other side of the Red Sea! Forget about that sport, it looks ridiculous. 

Skip ahead ten years, the equipment and safety evolves, and there are GoPro videos of sane people enjoying euphoric kiting session in the S. Pacific tradewinds across the warm, idyllic turquoise waters of the Tuamotu Archipelago (French Polynesia). That, combined with running across a few a cruisers who are avid kiters, was enough to overcome the old bias. Since then Tom has been dying to learn this sport. 

Last week, after installing Cinnabar's new batteries, we decided to take a break and visit La Ventana which is renowned for its steady winds, excellent kiteboarding, and bluewater spearfishing tournaments. People go there from all over the world to take kite lessons and to enjoy the warm, flat water and mostly reliable winds.  Palapas Ventana was personally recommended to us by our friend Mike (of Mulege fame). So Tom made the arrangements, we rented a car, and headed down the dusty road to La Ventana, just an hour or so from La Paz.

The welcoming patio at Palapas Ventana

After some initial confusion, trying to check into "the office" when we actually needed to check into the restaurant (silly us), we got ourselves sorted out and were told that Tom's instructor was ready for him. His instructor, "Chente" (Mexican nickname for Vincent) was a strapping young Belgian man with a huge smile and a big bag of ice on his leg. Uh oh, kiteboard injury? No, just too much dancing the night before!

Chente, instructor extraordinaire

We dropped our bags off at our casita and Tom headed down to his lesson while I grabbed a cold drink and settled myself on the patio to watch the antics on the beach below. Tom was down there several hours while Chente gave him very concentrated lessons. I could see that Chente was focused at all times and not at all distracted by everything else going on around him. Tom was very impressed! 

See Tom and kite down on the beach?

The next day I got up early, sat on the porch of our casita, and was amazed at all the wildlife in the area. Out on the water was a huge school of dolphin following a bait ball of fish and accompanied by sea birds squawking overhead. There were so many birds around me, flitting among the cactus and scrub, that it was hard to keep track of them; vivid golden hooded orioles, yellow-breasted chats and dainty goldfinches, frenetic gila woodpeckers punching holes in the cactus, perky red-crowned cardinals, energetic hummingbirds, and morning doves who claimed our foot wash basin for their bird bath. 

Tom's lesson began at 10:00 and would last the entire day. Chente started by taking Tom up the beach and giving him instruction on how to control the kite in the air (NOT easy) while at the same time getting your board set up in the water, getting your feet onto the board, and then preparing to have the powerful kite rip you out of the water. The challenge is to stay balanced on the board while the kite wants to yank you over and slam you face first into the water. Fun stuff. 

Chente makes it look so easy

Tom eventually went into the water and "body-dragged" (key kiting skill) himself from one end of the beach to the other, while Chente rode along on his quad giving instructions to Tom via the radio on his crash helmet. 

Tom's excellent body-dragging technique

The next challenge, like with water skiiing, was to stand up on and ride the board. Chente was very impressed that Tom actually got up a couple of times. This back-and-forth-up-and-down the beach went on all day.

Chente drives Tom back up the beach

Later that afternoon the owner Tim showed up at the beach with his friend Ross (an impressive guy from Boston who skippers expensive oil crew boats down in the Gulf of Mexico) and spearfishing guide Stan with FIVE wahoo, the result of their day of spearfishing off nearby Isla Cerralvo! Tim explained that due to the unseasonably warm water the wahoo were showing up early. 

Tim, Ross and Stan with their wahoo

Tim whipped up two kinds of poke and a plate of sashimi and served them to us up at the restaurant. What a feast!

The weather forecast for the next day was no wind, so instead of kiting we elected to go on our own spearfishing expedition in the hopes of getting some fresh fish for our freezer. We talked Chente into joining us as his last hurrah before heading off to a new 2-month kite instructor job in the Bahamas.

The next morning we headed out early for our expedition. Spearfishing guide Stan, from Bulgaria, was a diving machine. 

Spearfishing guide Stan, the fish should be very worried!

He gave clear instructions on how to lure and shoot the fish (don't look 'em in the eyes!) and with no further ado he got the spearguns ready (7' long bluewater 'rifles') , threw his "flashers" into the water (shiny, sparkly things to attract the wahoo), threw everyone's floats into the water (the floats track the fish once shot), and the divers followed. Ideally the wahoo are attracted to the flashers and can be seen from the surface. Easy, right? Well, not so easy as wahoo are long skinny fish. It's much easier to shoot a fat fish! 

While the divers drifted in the current eagerly scanning the blue abyss for any sign of big gamefish, I happened to land the first fish from the boat, a small bonita caught with rod and reel. Near the divers, elusive wahoo would warily alight into view, in small groups of 2-5 fish, do a quick scan of the scene, and soon continue away on their continual cruise for food. Sometimes the fish were shallow, sometimes deep, and with just moments to prepare, getting a good shot was a challenge. After a couple of near misses and one escape (Stan's "chingon" ("effen great") shot - sure!), we eventually got a wahoo and a pargo before Tom and Chente needed a landlubber break on Isla Cerralvo. While they got their equilibrium in order Stan continued to free dive and when Capitan Yonni and I got back from a few spins trolling for yellowtail Stan had shot a large cabrilla.

It was getting late in the afternoon and we had just enough time for a couple more drifts to look for wahoo. Hopefully we would get at least one more. Just as Capitan Yonni said "El mar está vacía" (the sea is empty), Tom spied a wahoo and missed it, he alerted Chente, who also missed, but luckily Stan was prepared and shot it as it swam by him. After a good fight, and a second spear to prevent escape, Tom was able to land the wahoo... 

Tom terminates the second wahoo, avoiding sharp teeth

...and the day's take was 2 wahoo, 1 cabrilla, 1 pargo, and 1 bonita. 

Chente, Stan and Tom with the day's catch

Stan and Yonni filleted the fish and shared it all around, so we went home with a freezer-load of fresh catch. Hooray!!!

We enjoyed a delicious dinner of fresh fish with our new friends and I trundled off to bed, admittedly slightly nervous about leaving Tom with Chente in the kiteboard equipment store adjacent to the restaurant.

All in all we had a great time at Palapas Ventana. Owner Tim does a superb job of having all sorts of activities for his guests, or you can just read, relax and walk on the beach. I'm certain we will be back.

A great time at Palapas Ventana!

More pictures of our fun time in La Ventana are HERE.

Cinnabar Gets New Batteries and I Get a Hat

Some people think that living on a boat, enjoying the outdoors and (currently nice) weather, is a dream come true. And it’s true that we are finally, in a way, “living our dream”. However it is also true that anything worth having is worth working for, and living on a boat most definitely has its share of work. If you walk down the marina dock you will see people on their boats working very hard at any number of projects.

While at dock we can plug into shore power and use the marina’s electricity. When we are off the dock we have to make our own power. We can charge the batteries using our 75hp (56kW) Yanmar engine, our 6hp (4.4kW) Panda generator, and our 310W solar panels. So we need to keep all these systems in good running condition as well as making sure our batteries can hold a charge. Typical boat batteries have a life of something like 5-8 years. Ours were 7 years old.

When we arrived back in La Paz we could see that when connected to shore power our batteries would not hold a charge above 12.4V, i.e. they were on their last breath. They were also getting hot (130F) from working hard to hold a charge, not a good thing, especially when MY favorite seat is right on top of them. So we ordered some new batteries, three (8D AGM) for the house bank and one smaller (G27 AGM) engine starter battery, all to be shipped down from San Diego (costly!).

After much cogitation, numerous emails, and placing the order, our batteries finally arrived this week, delivered by truck from San Diego. Tom managed to convince the delivery guys to actually bring the heavy batteries to our boat instead of leaving them in the dusty parking lot.

Batteries and other items arrive from San Diego

Down the ramp at a very low tide. Sure glad we had help.

The other guys we hired to help us exchange the batteries inside the boat were already on another job and would not be able to arrive until the next day. So Dennis from Ross Marine Services helped Tom move the batteries aboard for storage. The big ones weighed 160 lbs each and the small one weighed 62 lbs .

Strongman Dennis helps Tom put the batteries on the boat for the night.

Tom was keen to get started and he was able to remove and install the engine starter battery himself.  It barely fit into its own battery box and was a challenge to get it in; we had to move fuel levers, fuel hoses and wires aside to squeeze it in. I doubted a piece of paper could fit between the battery and the box. But...

...as it turns out there was just enough room for a terminal screw and washers to fall down into the box (terminal screw = connectivity).  GAH!!! Would we have to take the heavy battery out to retrieve it?

Luckily…no. Before we sailed down here our experienced sailor friend Bruce gave us this long, thin, snaky retriever tool with a claw on the end:

My new favorite totally awesome tool.

“You WILL need this someday,” he said. He was right. It worked!!

Close up of claw after capturing the escaped washers and bolt.

Tom finally got the terminals all connected even though it was a bit of a pain switching from using old automotive terminals to new marine terminals. We also had to trim the wooden hold-downs so they would fit over the new battery.

Tom soon switched to the die grinder to do this.

Tom finally finished the project about 11:00 p.m. that night. 

The next day Chava and Sergio arrived bright and early to help remove the old batteries and install the new ones.  They had to manhandle all six of the 160 lb. beasts in and out of the boat.

Down the companionway

Lifting into the battery box.

The battery box was VERY tight with no tolerance for any size differences between old and new batteries. In fact Tom had to drill a hole on some plastic side pieces to accommodate the threaded rod for the hold-down.

Drilled out plastic to accommodate the rod

Switching from the auto lugs to the marine blade lugs was also a challenge, especially since Tom did not ever cut the DC power during the reconfiguration. He used the old starter battery as an alternate power source. Luckily the job did not require any new cables. He almost finished the job that night, however the wooden hold-down needed some holes cut into it and we did not have a hole saw. The next day he borrowed a drill press from one of local service techs to cut the center retainer (hold-down) board to make room for the new lug configuration.

The retainer board was finally screwed into place and job was completed! And it only took 3 days of sweaty, hard work! This is typical for boat work, what we thought would be a one-day job at most took three times as long due to various unforeseen circumstance.

Cinnabar’s new and improved battery bank is now back in business.

If you live on a boat this is a beautiful sight.

Next on the menu: we need to order some parts for the engine and generator so they can be serviced and continue to play their part in making power for the boat.


Ahhh...“Living the dream” on a boat can be very hard work and is not for everyone. Yesterday a very nice man, holding a straw hat with a flowered brim in his hand, walked up to me and asked me if I would like the brand new hat that his wife bought. I was confused; if she bought it didn't she want it? “No,” he wistfully said, “she left the boat and she won’t be coming back to it. Ever.” (Sniff!) I didn't ask about the details, but I assured him the hat had found a good home. 


Technical stuff, boring to many, sexy to us:  Our house battery capacity is 765 AH (3 x 255 AH) of which about (383 AH ( 50%) is regularly usable.  We use about 200 AH per day, mostly for the fridge/freezer,  so we can only go about 2 days without generating some recharging power.