At Anchor in Punta de Mita

We finally left the dock at Noon after the usual last minute chores:

1. Checking out from the Marina (We checked out with the port captain yesterday)

2. Coiling and stowing the power cables and hose

3. Having our last breakfast at the Vallarta Yacht club.

4. Saying good-bye to all our friends who weren't leaving today.

5. We then motored over to the main harbor in Puerto Vallarta, about 5 miles down
the coast, to fuel up.

6. Then we were off to Punta de Mita. The anchorage here is by the north entrance to
Banderas Bay.

We anchored and are now getting ready for dinner.

We're here with 3 other boats, all headed up to Mazatlán. We're planning to
depart at 8AM tomorrow morning (CDT).

The way points for tomorrows journey (if your plotting our voyage on a map) are:

20 42.100 N - 105 33.700 W
20 44.010 N - 105 35.670 W
20 47.160 N - 105 37.020 W
21 53.500 N - 105 48.000 W
23 16.000 N - 106 30.000 W
23 16.142 N - 106 28.118 W

This is a total of about 170 NM. At 6.5 Knots planned, it should take us 26
hours. So we'll have 1 overnight and get into Mazatlán Friday morning.

That's the evening update from Raptor Dance

Warmest Regards,
Bill and Mary

Getting Ready to Head Up to Mazatlán

We’re getting ready to head up to Mazatlán, targeting a Monday, April 4th, departure.

We'll be reachable at this email until early Monday morning. After that, the winlink.org email is best as we won't be able to check the raptordance.com emails until we arrive in Mazatlán

Let me know by reply email if you like hearing about this level of detail. Also drop me a note if you have any questions or want more info about some of the systems we've been working on.

We had a few more items to work on than we thought and they (as always) took longer than anticipated. That’s it’s the nature of cruising.

We’ve also managed to get in pool and social time, so it’s not all work ;-}

In the last week we:

1. Changed the oil and filters in our engine, transmission and genset. This took half a day, we hired “Teapot” Tony a local British ex-pat, mechanic to do this for us and give the engine and genset a thorough check out.

2. Debugged and fixed a low flow raw water problem, this took a full day which required:

a. Cleaning the raw water filters

b. Changing the raw water impeller in the engine

c. Getting Guillermo the Diver (the best local guy) to clean the through hull from the outside and check for any plastic bags in the inlet or other blockages.

d. Using a great kit that we bought right before we left to back-flush the plumbing from the through hull to the engine. I recommend this kit to all cruisers. It’s called “Blast It Out” – basically a series of different sized rubber stoppers with a hose fitting and valve. You can check it out at http://www.blastitout.com

3. Ran a cleaning cycle on the water Maker (2 hours).

4. Reconnected our Sonic Speed Knot meter – Our original unit failed back in November, we got a replacement under warranty, but had not hooked the new unit up until yesterday. We were running with the old paddle wheel sensor, which gets dirty and requires cleaning every few days. This took half a day.

5. Cleaned the outside and polished the stainless (2 days – hired a great local team of 2 guys to do this), they should finish up today (Saturday).

6. Cleaning the bottom of the boat and checking the Zincs (they didn’t need replacing yet), again by Guillermo the Diver. Note the water here in the Marina is not something I want to get in! Mary and I did clean the bottom and replace the Zincs in Tenacatita.

7. Run new cables for the new Laptop computer.

I had to return my work computer to Cisco at the end of March, so we bought a new IBM T42. The existing boat computer is a Shuttle XPC, It works great and we have a 17 inch Plasma display on a RAM mount at the Nav station.

The only problem is that it to run it under sail, we need to run the inverter as it’s a 115V unit. If we’re going to be sailing for many days in a row, the battery drain means that we need to run the genset a long time to recharge them. If we’re motoring, it’s not problem as the alternator generates more than enough electricity.

So the new laptop has a travel power supply so we can run it off 12 Volts. With it’s very low current draw, it will work great under sail for days at a time with little additional drain on the
batteries.

We still have a few things to do:

Today we’re going to head into town and do some provisioning. We most certainly are going to pick up some rotisserie chickens at Plaza Commercial along with the great roasted potatoes that are cooked below the chickens getting the drippings of garlic and chicken fat (yum!). These are the best roasted chickens we’ve ever had!

On Monday we also need to checkout with the port captain (done for us by the local “Paper Man”, Juan Pablo for a small fee), then we’ll head over to the main marina to fuel up and head out to Punta de Mita for the night. We could get delayed if the weather turns unfavorable. We’ll be listening carefully to the weather the next few days.

Mary and Bill's Paella

One of our favorite dishes to prepare either for entertaining or just for us, is our version of the Basque dish, Paella. This has proven to be extremely popular with our guests, both on board or at home.

Some of our friends have asked for the recipe, so we thought we’d share it with all of you.

If you try it, let us know how it turned out.

Mary and Bill’s Paella…

This is very variable recipe, depending on what seafood looks best that day, so go shopping and buy what looks good.

The pan that you make the Paella in is important. It should be a large diameter shallow skillet. The recipe below works best in a skillet of at least 12 inches or a larger paella pan. We have a 15 inch Paella pan at home. If you don’t have skillets that size, spit the recipe between two pans.

• 2 very spicy sausage (e.g. Hot Italian)
  
• 1 to 2 Tbsp chopped garlic (use more if you wish)
  
• 1 cup Arborio rice (use more as you wish)
  
• 2 1/2 cup chicken broth or stock for each cup rice
  
• Good pinch Saffron (Heat some broth and steep the saffron ahead of time)
  
• 1/2 cup chopped tomatoes
  
• Crushed red pepper as desired
  
• 1 to 2 cup peas (frozen are OK)
  
• Shrimp (best with shells on) – about a dozen large
  
• Mussels (They work better than the clams.) – about a dozen large
  
• Fish such as salmon, and /or scallops, squid, octopus or ? (We like salmon or scallops) – about a pound cut into bite sized pieces
  
• 1 sliced roasted red pepper for topping

Crumble the sausage and sauté until brown. It should not be cooked until done at this point. Remove the sausage and reserve.

Add olive oil to the pan if the sausage did not render out much fat. Add the rice and cook, stirring frequently, until lightly browned.

Add the garlic and return the sausage to the pan. Careful not to burn the garlic. After the garlic is lightly browned add the stock, saffron and tomatoes.

After this simmers a short time taste the broth to see how much more red pepper you want to add. Then add it.

The peas go in next but wait until just before you add the seafood (at around the 10 minute mark).

The total cooking time for the rice is about 20 minutes. You’ll need to taste the rice to determine if it needs more liquid but remember that the mussels will add some. Also you will need to determine how long the seafood will take depending on size. Have the seafood room temp before putting it in.

When adding the seafood, push the pieces into the rice. All the seafood won’t necessarily go in at the same time, it depends on the size of the pieces.

When everything is in, add the roasted red pepper decoratively across the top.
At the 20 minute mark the rice should be done but still al dente.

Generally the peas and fish go in at around 15 minutes, the shrimp and mussels at 17 minutes and everything is done at 20 minutes (plus resting time).

Turn off the heat and cover with a lid or a towel and let the rest off the flame for at least 7 minutes. Then serve and enjoy!

Enjoy, We’ve tried a lot of different seafood ingredients but this combo is our favorite. It has infinite possibilities. You can also use chicken, pork, clams, etc. Meats such as chicken or pork should be cut into bite sized pieces and browned before hand, as we did with the sausage.

February and March 2005 on Raptor Dance

February and March have just flown past.

Our last post was from our Guadalajara trip and we've been very busy since. Take a look at our website for some pictures of our Guadalajara visit and subsequent activities.

We left Barra de Navidad on January 30th, working our way back up the coast to Puerto Vallarta. We had a great time in Barra and the neighboring town of Melaque.

We then spent a lovely week in Tenacatita, enjoying the swimming, snorkeling and camaraderie of the fellow cruisers.

We followed our steps down and returned to Chamela and Ipala before returning to Banderas Bay.

The surf was quite a bit higher in Chamela this time and we got soaked going in for lunch on the second day there. We didn't even try going in on the first day.

On our way in, just as Mary hopped out of the dingy to pull it up the beach. I looked back and yelled “Oops” as a sneaky (we counted the sets… it wasn’t supposed to be there yet!) wave broke over the stern turning the dingy slightly pushing Mary into the water.

On the way out, another wave broke over the bow and filled the dingy to the brim. The nice thing about inflatables is that it just slows them down a bit. It was a lot like driving around in a hot tub... Except for the part about the shoes almost floating away.

I pulled the plug in the transom when we were out of the surf and the water drained out. It wasn't until we got back to Puerto Vallarta, however, until I could hose all the sand out of the dingy.

We didn’t get the dingy out this time in Ipala as we were only staying the one night. We attempted to swim into shore for lunch, but the water was substantially colder in early February than it was when we were there in December – so we ate on the boat.

We left Ipala at first light and rounding Cabo Corrientes mid-morning was no problem. It’s often very rough rounding Corrientes so one needs the check the cruisers weather resources, like Don of Summer Passage’s weather report on the Single Side Band Marine Radio each morning. Don called for calm conditions that morning and he was right on.

Entering Banderas Bay for the second time felt like coming home. We really enjoyed our time here in November and December and were looking forward to renewing old acquaintances and seeing the sites that we didn’t have time for on our fist visit.

It’s amazing that when we both were working and only had a week or two off at a time it seemed that we could visit a destination and pack a thorough vacation in a very short time. Now that we’re retired, “months” isn’t long enough!

When we got back, we took care of some maintenance items that had built up and then flew up to the states for a 3 week visit.

We spent the first week in Camp Hill, PA visiting Mary’s folks. It was her dad’s 90th birthday back in January and we were overdue for a visit. We had a lovely visit, but it was cold – in the 20s and 30s with snow flurries while we were there. We basically stayed inside…

We brought a little bit of Mexico back to PA with us playing “Mexican Train” dominoes with the family. Interestingly, you can’t get the “double twelve” or “double fifteen” sets required to play Mexican train in Mexico! So, we stopped at the Harrisburg PA Toy’s-R-Us and picked up a set. If you’re interested in this game, be sure to pick up a set with color coded dots. It’s much easier to play – especially after a glass of wine or two!

The next two weeks we were back in our “vacation home” in Sonoma County. We had a chance to visit with friends and run errands, take care of chores, buy those boat parts you can’t find in Mexico, do taxes (yuk!), etc.

In our short time home, we did manage to get quite a bit done, see many of our friends, taste some outstanding Sonoma wine (greatly missed here in Mexico) and in general it was a great 2 week “working” vacation.

One of the highlights of the visit was attending Barrel Tasting in the Russian River Valley with some of our cruising friends who were also back home at that time.

As nice as the visit was, it was great to get back to Raptor Dance on March 11th, just in time for the start of the Banderas Bay Regatta on March 12th.

We lined up Doug and Kumi from Kanaloa, John from Persistence and Gene and Linda from Omaha, NB (they have a condo here in Paradise Village) as crew.

Prior to the first race, the Regatta organizers set up a “boat parade” as all the competitors exited the harbor at Nuevo Vallarta. We flew our dancing raptor battle flag and played the theme from Jurassic Park, turned up high, on our external speakers – the effect was awesome!

Since we just got back the night before the regatta, we only had the time right before the first race to practice. We were a few seconds late crossing the line at the start of the first race, but quickly made up that time and were well on our way to trounce our competition when the webbing at the head of our Genoa (the forward most sail) blew apart, which caused the Genoa to come down.

Our crew did a great job and we were working extremely well together. We assembled a great group on very short notice. We still had fun, even in the face of adversity!

The winds were not heavy enough to continue sailing with the staysail alone (we would not have made the finish line by the time the race was “called”) – so we retired. Since we started the race that day, we were scored as a “Did Not Finish”. An important distinction as we will see later.

We have a high tech, Spectra sail suite and our sail was fine, but the attachment point for the halyard is made from two strips of very strong webbing stitched to the leach (leading edge) and luff (trailing edge) of the sail. The sail is made up of many panels that meet at the head of the sail and all overlap. Overall, the sail at this point is about ¼” thick with many layers of Spectra fabric. Of all our sails, it’s the thickest part of any (the head of the mainsail is done differently with a metal headboard). We couldn’t find a reliable sail maker who could make the fix in time for the remaining races, so we futilely attempted to fix it on our own.

We tried with two industrial sewing machines to stitch on replacement webbing and only succeeded in breaking needles. We tried hand stitching, but even trying to drive our biggest needle with a hammer, we were only able to do a few stitches. We couldn’t fix it in time for the race on the second day, so we joined the folks on Legacy and raced with them on Day 2. We had a great race and Legacy finished 3rd in their class for day 2.

We tried again after the race on Day 2 to work on our sail, but it was clear that we didn’t have the right equipment or supplies to make progress. So we bagged up the sail and loaded it into the back of Barry of Minerva’s truck (Barry has the UK Sail Loft in PV). Barry was also the Regatta chairman so he couldn’t get to our sail until the Regatta was over. He did a great job fixing the sail. He glued and hand stitched the new tape on, breaking 9 needles in the process. We also thoroughly checked out or other sails for UV damage and chafe.

Barry theorized that the webbing degraded due to bird guano from the occasional bird perching on the top of our mast, combined with UV degradation that caused the webbing to deteriorate. Interestingly I had just inspected it before the race and it looked OK to me – apparently the problem was not visible.

At the party that night my throat started to get a little scratchy. Later that evening I started running a fever – I had come down with the flu. Due to the incubation period involved, I most likely got it up in Sonoma during our visit home. Mary also came down with it 2 days later and we were both out of circulation for over a week.

So we missed the last day of racing in the Regatta… But the wind was so light that day that only one boat from the main fleets finished! There was also a class of smaller boats that were sent on a very short course - They all finished.

In our class, Fleet 4, there were 6 boats. Three dropped out before the first race. We started the first race with two competitors, but we didn’t finish any races. So, based on the way points were awarded, because we had one start, we had enough points to place 3rd in our class! Not very satisfying, but the hat and plaque we got as a prizes are very nice… Oh well…

Every night of the Regatta there was a party with live music, dancing, food and drink. We had a great time and Mary even complemented me on my dancing (quite a feat! Or is that quite a feet?)

We’re now both over the Flu, anxious to get going again. We’ll be here next week getting ready to depart for Mazatlán and the Sea of Cortez approximately next weekend (the First weekend in April).

That’s the news from Raptor Dance in Paradise Village Nuevo Vallarta!

Our Guadalajara Trip

Here is the delayed report on our Guadalajara trip week before last.

What a great bus system Mexico has. There are multiple levels of service. We took the ETN company's bus. This was top of the line, perfectly clean, air conditioned, reclining seats, leg rests so you can stretch out and sleep (many of the long distance buses leave at night, arriving in the morning.), movies, music and more room between seats than airlines first class. The bus was configured with 2+1 seating. The weak point was the sandwich meal. No problem. We won't starve.

We had arranged for a room in a Bed and Breakfast Quinta Don Jose (see: http://www.quintadonjose.com) in Tlaquepaque, a suburb of Guadalajara. Many of the homes in the area have been converted into galleries. So there were all sorts of shops with exotic or unusual home decorating items, a few jewelers, ceramics and pottery and (of course) restaurants. We spent time wandering this area.

There were wonderful parks and plazas, especially in the central area, that were great for people watching. The children were a real treat to watch. We did the usual: cathedrals, government buildings, monuments, museums and the largest market we have ever seen, Mercado Libertad. It was multistoried and jam-packed with stalls with everything from parquets to electronics. Besides all the merchants selling wonderfully fresh fruits and vegetables, there were fish mongers and butchers. Then one entire level was full of booths selling meals. We scouted them out somewhat before deciding which one to choose. We continued on our way, only to see more that we wanted.

One very interesting place was the Cultural de Cabanas. The central area was full of Orozco murals, on the walls and ceilings. A freelance guide was very helpful in understanding the time and the murals.

Tonala is a nearby town known for it's pottery and pottery factories. We did visit the area, seeing their wares and getting a factory tour in Spanish. It was a family business, with each member having his own specialty, such as right diagonal lines or dots. The pieces were very intricate, covered with complimentary patterns and designs.

At one restaurant, we had a Oaxacan delicacy we've been looking to try: Huitlacoche (wheat - la - COACH - ay), a mushroom that grows on corn cobs. We had it in a chicken dish that was absolutely fabulous.

In the US the farmers in the corn belt throw the rare fungus away - they don't know what they're missing. They even call it by the unappetizing name of "corn smut".

It was a fine three day visit. But it was also great to come home, to our boat.

Warmest Regards,
Mary and Bill

Update from Barra de Navidad

It's been a little while since our last update. We are still well and enjoying ourselves and the surroundings.

I don't know how the time can flyby so quickly here! There are a few routine things in the day.

We listen to the cruisers' "Amigo net" on Marine SSB (8.1220 MHz USB at 9:00AM CST) for the weather (if we are up that early).

Then at 9:00 AM on Marine VHF Channel 22A is the local Barra and Tenacatita cruisers net. This keeps everyone up to date on who is arriving and any activities going on, as well as a source of help and information for each other.

Also around this time the French Baker (from the town of Bara) comes by in his panga (the panga is the all purpose Mexican boat for fishing, water taxi and whatever is needed.) selling freshly made French bread, almond and chocolate croissants, and assorted pies and sweets. This is definitely nice and possibly addictive.

We try to get in a swim at the pool everyday. Everyone seems to gather from 2 to 4 for a swim and chat. This is a very social lifestyle. That is one of the most enjoyable parts. We have folks stopping by during the day. And we are visiting with each other at sometime during the day, either on their boat, ours, or at a local restaurant.

In between all this there is visiting the local towns, grocery shopping, e-mail and the ever present boat chores.

It's been fun renewing friendships made on the Baja Ha Ha, Cabo and Puerto Vallarta as our paths cross here in Bara. We say good by to friends here, knowing we will be seeing them again, somewhere along the way.

Last week the hotel and marina sponsored a fishing tournament. That brought in a huge amount of people and boats�huge power boats. There was a lot of music and activity those three days. I did hate to see the sailfish, and swordfish strung up for weighing and viewing. We even saw one that was only 4-5 feet long brought in. What a waste! I understand in many tournaments, a person is placed on each boat to verify the catch and weight and then the fish is released. That, unfortunately, was not the case here. Tuna and dorado were also caught. At least these were filleted and eaten.

Other activity here lately involved the MTV crew filming a contest and commercial, another film crew with a reality TV show, and last week, an episode of Fear Factor. This gave the hotel a party atmosphere with all the young people around.

As I'm writing this, Bill has the steering column taken apart and is greasing the dickens out of it.

He'll need to finish up soon. It's about time to head to the pool for a swim.

Warmest wishes,
Mary and Bill

Barra de Navidad

Let me try a slightly different format. Below is a brief additional update with imbded photos. Please comment and let me know if you like this format better. I can only do it when I'm connected directly to the net, so we'll still only post text only messages when at sea.

If you want a larger view, you can click on any of the pictures. But to get back to this BLOG, use the BACK control on the browser. The "Home" icon on the pictures will take you to our website

You can also see ALL our pictures posted on our website at http://raptordance.com

We go a lot going on in Barra de Navidad and across the bay where we are in Isla Navidad - see: http://www.islanavidad.com/

Since we got here on January 1st we've been busy exploring the area, trying the local restaurants

and enjoying time at the pool.

One restaurant we particulary enjoyed is Restaurant Maya - see http://www.restaurantmaya.com/ in the nearby town of Melaque. We visited with Simon and Charlyn of Lily Mae and had a wonderful dinner.

It's quite a bit warmer here than anywhere we've been so far so our sun shade is very important. We've also purchased a hammock and it's a very nice way to spend the afternoon.

That's a quick update from us for now.

We hope you have a great weekend.

Regards,

Bill and Mary

Wines in Mexico

Living in Sonoma County spoil you! When we sailed out the Golden Gate on September 30th, we had 6 Cases of wine on board. Here it is in early January and we’re out of wine ;-{

We thought that we’d be drinking more beer in the Mexican heat, but even in the heat our preferences definitely run to wine and we’ve been doing more entertaining than anticipated.

Our tastes run in the direction of big, balanced, fruit forward reds. In varietals my top three in order of preference are Zinfandels, Syrahs and Pinot Noirs. Mary’s preferences are Pinot Noirs, Zinfandels and Syrahs. Yes, we of course also like Cabernet Sauvignons, Petit Sirahs and the occasional Merlot, but most are generally too wimpy! We’re long time members of ZAP, Zinfandel Advocates and Producers – see http://www.zinfandel.org

When it’s hot out we also like nice crisp whites. In whites, we also like a good crisp balanced wine with good fruit. We tend to shy away from wines that are over oaked or too buttery. We both like Chardonnays and Sauvignon Blancs.

One winery in Mexico that we’ve found that has nice drinkable wines is L. A. Cetto in the Tecate – Ensenada – Valle de Guadalupe area of Baja California. Their wines are available if you look carefully for them. In particular, they make a nice Zinfandel at a surprisingly low price point of around $6 US per bottle. They also produce Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon, but the Zin is our favorite. If you like soda pop – they also make a White Zinfandel – but that’s not REAL wine!

That's the news for today from Barra de Navidad!

Warmest Wishes,
Bill and Mary

Update and news from Thailand...

We are now in the marina at Puerto de la Navidad. This is just across the small harbor from Barra de Navidad. The marina is on the grounds of the Grand Bay Hotel here on Isla Navidad (which is really a peninsula, not an Island).

With all the storms hitting Southern California, the effect down here is that the wind died and it got hotter! So we left Tenacatita on Saturday and came over here to plug in the air conditioning ;-}

We'll probably stay here for a few weeks before working our way back up to Puerto Vallarta in February.

We decided to visit locations further south via land excursions rather than sail as 1) there's not much wind, 2) it's a long way between anchorages 3) since we'll be heading back to the Sea of Cortez in the spring - it's a long round trip, 4) it's at least 10 degrees hotter in Zihuatanejo and 5) we're at the southern end of the "nicest" part of the coast.

That's the major update from us... We're off exploring the locale including the local village of San Patricio Melaque and nearest city: Manzanillo.

A now for some news from Thailand:

When I was at Wells Fargo, I worked closely with Dudley Nigg, who retired in 1999 and set sail on his Island Packet 45 "Happy Now".

He and his wife Philippa were on Happy Now in Thailand when the tsunami struck and I though you might find their report of interest. I've included their complete email below.

Warmest wishes,
Bill and Mary
--------
Hi Everyone,

So many of you have written asking how things are here that I thought I would send off a quick e-mail describing the effects of the tsunami here. Contrary to the news that I have had described to me, Thailand is not in chaos, and even Phuket on a day to day basis can seem frighteningly normal.

Yet behind all this when I volunteered down at the community center a few days ago, and friends were searching for the son of friends - then nothing seemed normal. Boards were covered with horrifying photos of victims of the sea under the heading, "Can you identify any of these people?"; lists and lists of victims, in hospitals or dead; people searching for their loved ones, putting photos up, "Have you seen this person, this child?" so much to make ones heart bleed; then the lucky ones, walking wounded, who have lost everything including passports.

All the embassies had set up emergency centers to deal with these issues. The biggest problem was looking for people who had not appeared on any of the lists... When I asked, "Can I help you?" the answer, "I am looking for my wife," was the hardest to deal with! So many unidentified bodies, being taken to so many places with no central record keeping. And so many people simply missing.

The next day I went back but left very shortly, the flow of people had so reduced I felt I was redundant, so we went across to the beaches to see how they had fared. Andrea had asked us to check out some hotels where she has clients booked and which had informed her it was business as usual for them.

We started at Kata Nui beach; the sight of their wedding last year and the hotel where we had stayed. Kata Bhuri is set back from the beach and other than the fact that the pool beside which we had had the ceremony was full of sea water and grunge they are unaffected and the tourists were vacationing, lying in the sun, enjoying the courtyard pool which was as blue as ever.

The Kata Thani, being beach front had fared worse, every ground floor room had had the windows smashed in and workers were shoveling out sand and debris - but the upper floors were unaffected and the gardeners were hard at work getting the grounds back to normal. Once again tourists frolicked in the waves and sat in the sun. All that seemed to be missing were the rows of beach chairs and umbrellas!

As we traveled north the story got sadder. The next beach up, where the kids had stayed, the water front restaurants had been demolished. At Patong, the real hub of tourism on the island, the road along the front was closed, and in the small section we saw, a car was dangling out of a restaurant window! Wrecked cars, smashed in by the wave, still littered the area. It looked like a bomb had gone off.

That is as far as we went but further north still and on the islands is where so many lives were lost. People simply disappeared, washed away by the speed and force of the wave. Yet when we drive into Phuket town and on this side of the island, it is easy to forget that any thing has happened.

One hears amazing stories. From the yachties perspective in Thailand we all had a miraculous escape. The marinas were hardly affected. Our Marina had a warning call, then a large swell came thru lifting the whole marina to with in a few feet of the top of the pylons, and then it all subsided, so close to disaster but actually no damage.

For the 150 or so boats anchored in a bay for Christmas they too simply rose over a huge swell which then rushed ashore clearing the beach of restaurants, deck chairs and people. Since then they have been helping the locals rebuild their businesses on the beach. The Thais are resilient people. We definitely have the feeling that around here they are bouncing back. As Dudley points out in a capitalistic society disaster brings jobs, and we saw many, many people working in the devastated areas, and hopefully they will earn enough to replace their tuk-tuk or their long-tail which was washed away.

Other areas were not so lucky. The two marinas where we stayed just before Christmas in Langkawi, Malaysia were both decimated with the wave roaring in, swirling around and then sucking all the yachts out, sinking some, damaging others. We all know we are lucky to be alive and even considering our plans for 2005!

And as for our plans. The route we had planned to take is to areas of far greater disaster. Sri Lanka we know we can not go to. The Andaman Islands, originally our first stop, will take a while to recover and we need to leave next week so have decided to miss them. The Maldives have already contacted our marina and told them to please let us all know they hope we will still
go there. So despite what you hear on the news, "The Maldives are finished as a tourist resort area," I think they are bouncing back as fast as they can.

Instead of the Maldives we have decided to go to Cochin on the south west corner of India. We had never considered it before but now we have heard about it and started to research it it an exciting alternative. In fact it is in the book Andrea and Brandon gave us for Christmas, "The 1000 Places You Must See Before You Die!" so we are excited again. I am a little apprehensive as it means 10 days at sea getting to Cochin as well as the 12 day trip from the Maldives to Eritrea. I will just be especially glad to see Cochin when we get there!

We are busy preparing the boat for a three month voyage: checking the tension of the rigging, packing away the kayaks, getting in basic food supplies, putting in safety lines, checking the emergency equipment. It has been a long time since we did a major ocean crossing. We are excited to be on our way again and will be back writing monthly, rather than semi annual
updates once again!

Our very Best Wishes for a Happy New Year to you and yours

Love

Dudley and Philippa
S/V Happy Now
IP 45

Happy New Year

Hi Everyone!

From beautiful Bahía Tenacatita on the Mexican Riviera, Mary and I want to wish you all the Happiest of New Years!

The last few days we've been snorkeling, doing boat chores, getting fishing gear set up for the next opportunity, learning Spanish, doing some computer work, contending with a busy social calendar and generally having a relaxing time.

Every day there's a swim into the beach from the anchorage followed by activities on the beach and in the local Palapa. Which is nothing more than an open thatched shelter with tables, chairs and a kitchen.

We've been learning to play "Mexican Train" and "Chicken Foot" dominoes and bocce ball. Interestingly, you can't buy "double 15" (for chicken foot) or "double 12" (for Mexican train) domino sets in Mexico. The days go fast.

Yesterday afternoon was the weekly dingy raft up. The "Mayor of Tenacatita" (another cruiser) drops anchor and all the dingys tie up together and pass around stories, appetizers, boat cards and books and videos to trade. Following that, we had some friends over for an early new years celebration. It was also Philip on Carina's 60th birthday.

In a few hours we'll up anchor and head 10 miles down the coast to the marina in Barra de Navidad for a week or so to get a real network connection, take care of some re-provisioning and get our January mail shipment.

Tenacatita remains our most favorite anchorage so far and we will most certainly stop here again on our way back North.

Warmest Wishes,
Bill and Mary