Hanging out in Chacala!

Hanging out in Chacala!

Jan 2, 2018

We retraced our tracks north to return to this quaint, relatively quiet harbor anchorage.  I say relatively, as even for me, this is a hopping place - at least over the Christmas / New Years week.  Dan is steering the boat northward.  Winds were light, but  we only had 9 miles to go.

We were greeted by a few other cruisers as they rowed their dinghies to shore.  Wes on SV Arcola from Canada chatted with us right away.  He was anchored next to us and had made his nice looking boat out of steel.  I had the opportunity to SUP over there last night (on a full moon) and enjoy a pleasant gathering with a few others.  

We also met John Olsen on S/V Tir Na Nog.  He has been sailing the Sea of Cortez for well over a year now. Several friends were vacationing on the boat with him - Grant from Denver and Amy from the mid-west.  One afternoon at a beach palapa, I joined them in a couple games of “Lottria” which is a Bingo type game to learn Spanish.  We liked it so much, that Dan went out to the store and bought it for our boat.  

The beginning of New Years Eve was spent visiting Hannah and Kevin from Colmena who just happened to pop into the anchorage, noticed Malo, and found us enjoying a Margareta at a local restaurant  “Chaco Mool” where we could get WIFI.  We had celebrated Thanksgiving with them 5 weeks earlier in Turtle Bay.  It was really fun to catch up on what had happened to one another during that time.  The next morning, they headed farther south.  Such it is with cruisers, they come and go - forever moving somewhere.  

I have been practicing saying  “Feliz Año Nuevo!” to some of the local people.  Almost every time I seem to get a lot of corrections in my pronunciation.  The sounds in this language do not roll easily out my mouth.  I still try to smile and that is universal. 

Here is our beach new years day.  As you can see, it is still a busy place.  

There was a really sunny day so we decided to hang out our sheets and quilt, as they were getting rather damp while living on a boat.  Here is Malo as a clothes line.  Later, we even took out our mattress to air that out.  It worked well.

Also on  New Years Day, Dan suggested we put the motor on the dinghy and take it to a long beach a little farther south.  Dan loves to drive that dinghy and he likes to go fast.  

The beach was pretty inaccessible to enter with our dinghy, so we found some interesting cliffs that also looked like a great snorkeling spot.  And it was.

Dan was first to jump in, doing his usual back roll into the water.

I really enjoyed the snorkeling too.  There were many fish, some colorful, some not so much.  The waves provided a general up and down action, which added to experiences as we floated along the service.  The visibility was super. We also saw lots of needlefish along the surface of the water.  I will look forward to finding other snorkeling spots as we continue onward.  

We ended the day with some dinner in town and a beautiful sunset as we walked back to take our dinghy to Malo (the boat in the picture).

I will shorten this post and do another one.  The WIFI cannot handle all my photos.