1/22/15

I just tried to write as the day went on...

My first watch. We left san diego around 1030pm, I helped Paul get out of the shallower part of the harbor and then he took over so I could sleep. It was rough at first, the boat was rolling all over the place and I could hear Paul putting the sails up, which is great but doesn't make for a quiet sleep. Oliver was tossing around a lot too. By the time I felt like I really got to sleep Paul was waking me up. It was past my turn, being 3am. I was on watch for maybe an hour when I woke Paul up to check the radar and since the wind was up to 18 knots we reefed the mail sail (made it smaller). We didn't really have to but we were being overly cautious and it was good practice. Paul somehow got the lines tangled or something and had to go mess with it, which is fine, he was tethered in and it wasn't very rough, but it makes me nervous at night. The stars out here are amazing. There is still quite a bit of light pollution coming off of the mexican coast but nothing like LA. It is very peaceful. I have a lot of good books to read so I started in on one of those. 

We almost didn't leave Paul was kind of pushing to wait another day but we had nothing to do and he had already put the dinghy on the boat and strapped it down. I think he was getting cold feet. He said he was tired and I was like well we are going to be tired having to stay up whether it be tonight or tomorrow so lets go. You are the one who has been pushing me to sail to Mexico for so long so lets go already! The only way we are going to get more confident is by doing and 12 hours to Ensenada doesn't scare me very much. None of this really does. I mean I have my moments of fear, mostly irrational (like falling off the side but being tethered and getting caught in the propeller…nightmare stuff, your welcome ;)) but I think that is good, will keep me cautious. I hope we meet some friends tomorrow in Ensenada who have a kid so Oliver can play. We are definitely going to need naps. This would be a million times easier without a child but I know we won't regret it. We will put the jib up too since the wind is so good and try to kill the engine...so much better to sail if we can.

We had some wind and had the sails up but it didn't last so then we had to take them down. Paul didn't sleep very much but he is catching a nap now. I took one this morning when he said he wasn't tired I sure was. Oliver woke up around 0630, the sun was coming up, it was our first Mexican sunrise. I wish we could sail more the engine's so loud. We will get to Ensenada around 2pm I think then we gotta run around while we have daylight and get to immigration and what not, I am hoping it is easy. Paul thinks he saw a whale blow but I didn't see any. I guess there are grey whales along the coast, heading south. 

Otherwise uneventful. Oliver and I are reading books and playing with some flashcards. The land is pretty boring, I mean no cities, mostly mountains. Oliver is being good but he did just ask to get off the boat to run around. It's beautiful weather must be in the seventies and sunny. We couldn't count on just sailing this lag because we had to get there during the day for safety and to get to all the check in places we have to go to. The next lag which will be 3 days at sea we will sail a lot more since we wont know when we will get in. We still will never enter a port we haven't been to if it's dark.

We caught our first fish! A mexican stripped bonito we are pretty sure. I saw something on the line while paul was in the berth reading to Oliver but Paul said oh it is probably sea weed so I was like ok whatever it looked weird to me but what do I know…ha! So like a half hour or hour later I was like check that line and he was like holy crap there is a fish on there. So we pulled it in and looked at our fish book to identify it. It was still alive but all the fight was out of it. We sprayed vodka in the gills and it died fast. I still hate that, makes me sad to see anything suffer. Oliver watched Paul clean it. It made a mess, blood spatters. I was like if that was a bigger fish it would look like a crime scene in here. He got some meat off of it. I would say it was 18 inches and a few pounds. After that excitement we were almost to Ensenada I took a picture of the Mexican flag that you can see flying way out. It has a little port and looks like most harbors for now, we aren't too close yet. Oliver went down for a nap…here we go.

We found the dock no problem and met a guy who helped us with the lines. There is a Carnival cruise ship here and we met a guy from BC Canada who got in a terrible storm on the way down and is slowly fixing his boat here. He plans to head south in a month. We went to pay for our slip for the day and try to go to immigration but they told us to wait until tomorrow because if we go today they will charge you more since it's past 230pm….weird they can do that but whatever. So we walked to the main street and poached some internet quick and let Oliver run around. Before we headed back to the boat for the night we stopped to get a drink and a little pizza, how lame of us I know. I had the best margarita I have ever had in my life! The guy fresh squeezed everything that was in it. It even had some orange and mango, it was nothing like I had ever had before. Then Paul made us fish tacos from our catch that were delicious and that was about it.

1/23/15

First thing I hear today from the vberth (the boys got out of bed before me) is Paul going to the bathroom and Oliver telling him to stop singing. Paul was letting off some gas in the bathroom, he was definitely not singing. I started laughing so hard. I mean it's a small boat if you don't have music or the engine on you can hear everything. That still makes me laugh. 

So we woke up and knew we had to go check in with immigration and register the boat and all that so we left to do that first. On the way there this Mexican guy asked us about Oliver and we got to talking, he spoke pretty good english, and then when he learned we were going to immigration he offered to take us…either he didn't think we knew where it was or was just trying to make a buck so we followed him and on the way there (he had a dog) this other dog came out like going to bite his dog and he just karate kicked the thing and it went running back inside. It was hilarious. I couldn't believe it. I was about to pick Oliver up and run the other way. So then we got there and he helped us translate and get through all we needed to do. It took a few hours and a trip back to the boat but we did it. After a nap we headed to the main street and walked around. We bought a Mexican flag to hang on the boat as a sign of respect. We also checked the weather because we heard there was going to be a lot of wind and big swell over the next few days and we were planning on leaving tomorrow for a 3 days sail. It doesn't look as bad as we had heard but we will check again tomorrow morning and make sure. So that leads to right now we are sitting in a starbucks…wow. Will write tomorrow…and try to post pictures:)

Our Bonito fish

The most gigantic Mexican flag (bigger than the ones at Perkins restaurant if you remember)

The marina from the water

This sign makes it look like it's a lot nicer than it is

Paul sleeping on the floor after his watch lol

My first sunrise on watch, I am sure there are many more ahead