Exploring Turtle Bay

This is a stunning large bay with terrific shelter from ocean swells coming from the northwest, which is the general direction at this time of year.  There are many dolphins near our anchorage surfing for food, yet I have not been able to catch a good photo of one.  There are many pelicans and other birds around as well.  The stars at night are magnificent.  There is considerable moisture in the air every morning and the anything left on the deck gets totally wet.  Things feel rather damp inside as well, but will later dry as the temperature warms up.

We were given a general overview of the beach scene from the other mariners.   There is a rickety old dock from which you can get diesel at the hefty price of $7.00 per gallon. Mostly people bring their dinghy’s to shore on the left side of the dock and Pedro greets you, shows you where to park it and offers to watch your dinghy for you for a few pesos of course.  Usually 20 pesos per day.  (about a dollar per day).   It seems like a deal to me, but some of the cruisers think it’s a rip off.  Personally, I am delighted to know I can leave my SUP board and Paddle or dinghy on the beach and feel safe that it will be there when I return.  

There are two main restaurants as soon as one hits the beach - Maria’s and Antonio’s which is really just a bar, but sometimes serves food.  Both have WIFI (of sorts.) People would congregate there, share stories and give updates.

Victor and Maria are delightful people and made some awesome fish tacos.

Dan and Steve enjoyed lunch and a beer at the restaurant.  This is the same place where I am writing this blog and hope to send it via  WIFI soon.  As you can see, it has a beautiful view and nice shade from the sun.  The taco's were tasty as well.

This is the other place called Antonio's and it was a place people hung out at as well. Plus there was a bathroom - El Bano!

Fisherman are unloading their catch from the Pongos.   

These are the boats that have nets and circle them around to pull up the fish.  Dolphins, sea lions, birds galore!

The pelicans live on all the boats around in the harbor.

I took a day trip into town with "the young girls"  Ava, Hannah, Janni,  and then there was me.

Here is the local church and it was very pretty on the inside with lots of stain glass.

The town is located in a dessert, very dry, sandy, dirt streets, concrete houses.  

A restaurants but it was closed.



The main drag.

Car Wash!

There is an ever changing flow of boats that come and go in the bay.  The community gets friendly and a few social events get planned among some of the boaters.  The communication is  done via VHF radio on channel 16 and then moved to another channel.  This might be a typical conversation.:

“Slow-Motion, Slow-Motion, this is Malo on channel 16.”  

(repeat if no response)

once they reply:  

“Slow-Motion here on channel 16”

Malo would say:  

“Slow-Motion can you switch to channel 17?” (or another free channel, as 16 is for emergencies)

Once you are both on the same channel that is NOT 16, you can talk and make plans.  Thus people get together, or ask questions if need be over the VHF radio.  

That is some of the stuff I am learning, how to talk on the VHF!

Ava from Cinderella - she still needs to learn to stand up!  Ha Ha!

Dan's solution to getting the sand out of the dinghy.

I am going to send this off now, as not to make the blog too big.  This has taken awhile to put together, as the internet is so slow.  

Everything is going well though.  Once we leave this bay, we will probably be out of touch for a good three weeks, as we will be in areas without cell or WIFI.  But stay tuned for more eventually.