Tuesday was maintenance day in Acapulco. The aft toilet had quit flushing two days earlier. Seems the controller wasn’t “controlling”. A quick call to Dick Brunson at Marine Sanitation in Seattle, and they were ready to ship down another controller. But in an email they suggested some other things to check first.  I went through that routine, and to my astonishment, the toilet worked again. So we’re chasing an intermittent fault, and I declined the shipment offer. It would have likely been stranded in Mexican customs for a long time.

The air conditioner in the pilothouse would stop running after about ten minutes. An email to Pete Eunson at Nordhavn led to a connection with Lance Lage of LC Yachts, who works in Mexico out of San Diego.  His man Kevin Masters was in Acapulco, fortuitously, and by late afternoon Kevin had diagnosed an airlock in the cooling water circuit. We were quickly cool again. Air conditioning may sound like a luxury to some of you, but in the humid, hot tropics, it’s pretty important, especially for sleeping. A well rested helmsman is a much safer helmsman.

Monday night Mike had wandered off to the beach on the ocean side of the peninsula we’re on. He met a Mexican family sitting around singing and playing a guitar.  Mike joined in the playing, and had a great time comparing music styles. He had his Ipod along, so he could share his music with them.  The evening led to an invitation to a club down in the tourist district where one of the fellows was playing in a band Tuesday night.  That evening out was also great fun for Mike. I’m not so good at staying up all hours, so I went to bed at 11 PM instead of heading for town.

Wednesday morning, the 1st of December, I looked out to see another Nordhavn 46 had arrived. I went visiting aboard Eagle’s Nest (Nordhavn 46-78) to meet Bob and Mary Lunde, from Ramsey, Minnesota. They had been north to Alaska, and were on their way south through the Canal, up to Alabama, the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway, north up the Illinois River to Lake Michigan then Lake Superior.  We had a nice visit, talking about contrary bilge pumps and Naiad stabilizers on Eagle’s Nest  and contrary air conditioning on Resolution.  We also shared stories about electronics installation problems with Alcom Marine Electronics, in Newport Beach, California.

The Lundes have a height challenge with their Nordhavn 46, both in clearing one 17 foot high fixed bridge on the Illinois River and in the covered dry storage they use for winters on Lake Superior. So Bob had Philbrooks hinge the mast half way up, and rig an ingenious method of using the boom winches to raise and lower it. A picture is worth a thousand words here, so I won’t describe it any further than to say it’s pretty slick. Mike and I watched him lower and raise the mast so he could change a running light – quite the deal. I face the daunting task of pulling all the rig down, including the exhaust stack shroud, to clear the bridges on the French canals. But that will be a one-time project, and I’ll get Nordhavn to send over one of their young commissioning experts to help.

Acapulco Cliff Divers

Two cliff divers with Andy Lund

Around noon Friday we took a taxi out to the “Bredana”, the site of the famous cliff divers of Acapulco. They put on quite a show for a half an hour, diving about 150 feet down into a narrow cut in the rocky cliffs. We talked to a couple of the divers after the show – one had been diving for

five years and was 21. We then taxied down past the cruise ship terminal to the “Gigante”, a large supermarket, to provision for the run to El Salvador and Costa Rica. Pretty good stock, and the vegetable selection was just fine.

Our last evening in Acapulco we spent in a Mexican bar across the street from the Yacht Club drinking dollar beer under a palm thatched roof. There was a large group of resident gringos drinking the cheap beer, complaining about taxes and sounding smug about the warm Acapulco weather as they talked about friends back in the USA. Negra Modela is pretty good beer, especially at the price.  This was a fitting end to our five day stay in Acapulco.

I’ve been closely monitoring weather all week, trying to judge when it would be best to transit Tehuantepec. Monday and Tuesday look like a good window from the longer range weather charts I’ve pulled up on the NOAA and US Navy (FNMOC) web sites. Don, the weather guru on the “Amigo” net, is of the same opinion. So we’ll leave Acapulco Saturday morning. I’ve booked space at the new marina in Huatulco, 200 miles east of Acapulco for Sunday. Enrique, the dockmaster at Marina Chahue, says the international clearance only takes a couple of hours, so we’ll be on our way across the Gulf of Tehuantepec Monday morning the 6th of December. That keeps us on schedule to reach Los Suenos, Costa Rica, 1100 miles from Acapulco, by December 14th.

"Resolution" arrives in Huatulco, Mexico

As planned, we were underway from Acapulco at 730 AM Saturday, December 4th. We’ve been running all day in light following northwest winds and seas. Dolphins have been leaping and cavorting around us periodically, and we came across a few more sea turtles basking in the sea. One had a bird standing on his back.  A couple of large seagulls decided the paravane booms were good places to perch, and scan the sea for prey.  We talked to Eagle’s Nest by VHF radio in the afternoon, to find that they were having engine troubles and were diverting to Puerto Escondido, in hopes of finding assistance at the Mexican navy base there.

We arrived Marina Chahue at 5 PM, assisted on the radio by a fellow named Monte on a sportfisher called “Barracuda”.

The marina is in a bay just to east of Huatulco called Bahia Santa Cruz, or locally Bahia Chahue.  We gave the Piedra Blanca rocks off of Punta Rosas (east arm of Huatulco harbor) a wide berth to the east, also avoiding another low rock just west of Punta Santa Cruz. The charting is pretty sketchy, so we used “Charlie’s Charts of Western Mexico” and John and Pat Raines “Mexico Boating”, both cruising guides. Raines is more accurate. The marina entrance is guarded by a breakwater on the west side and is lit and buoyed. The rocks show up fine on radar, but a night entrance for first time visitors is probably not wise.

We were met by John Hanson, a friend I’d made on Nordhavn 57 Starweather while in La Paz last spring. He is from Nova Scotia, and is crewing aboard – great to see him again. We also met Dana Nelson, Mitch Bucklew and Chad Harlan, who were delivering a 60 foot Westship called the Mary Dee down to Los Suenos. So we all went in to Crucecitas, the nearby town, for dinner.

Marina Chahue has excellent floating concrete docks and good power.  A fuel wharf, tanks and lines are in place, but the pumps and permit are awaiting approval of the Mexican federal budget. Enrique LaClette, the dockmaster, is great, even driving us Monday morning to the Capitania for the Zarpe (the international departure clearance form) and then taking the passports to the airport (15 miles) for Migracion and Aduana clearance.  The Capitania actually took a credit card for the 735 peso charge for clearance in and out of Huatulco plus the Zarpe.

The little town of Crucecitas (Huatulco) is very clean and pleasant – a 16 peso cab ride from marina. We found good vegetables at the central market, shrimp at a seafood shop nearby and bread right off the central square. La Fuenta - supermarket/dry goods - is about a half mile east of the central square. It was under major renovations inside, so was limited on refrigerated/frozen goods temporarily. I checked weather at an internet café in town since the marina, still under development, didn’t have internet for boaters.

By 2pm Monday December 6th, we had our clearances and were ready to go, with a favorable forecast for Tehuantepec for the next 72 hours. Starweather had left at 7AM and Mary Dee  left at 1 PM, after fueling from a tank truck along side the new fuel pier.  Mike took us out of the fairly tricky docks and harbor with his usual aplomb – what a pleasure to have him along, and able to handle the boat so well.

Following all the advice about Tehuantepec, we closely paralleled the shoreline, rather than taking a rhumb line course directly across the Gulf to Puerto Madero, on the Guatemala border. That added about 35 miles to the journey, but staying close in is much safer, if a Tehuantepec gale were to spring up. Strong north wind we can deal with, but heavy short seas in this shallow gulf would not be good.

We passed the gritty industrial town of Salina Cruz, at the head of the Gulf, in the middle of the night, then picked our way through the shrimp boat fleet in the early hours of the morning. As I write this Tuesday afternoon, the sun is out (so what else is new?), it’s 89 degrees, the wind is blowing about 10 knots from the northwest, the seas are about three foot rollers behind us, and we’re making 7 knots about 375 miles northwest of Barillas, El Salvador, our next stop. We’ll skip Guatemala, just skirting its coastline.   We expect to see Starweather and Mary Dee in Barillas on Friday morning, December 10th.

Favorable currents and easy seas pushed up our average speed, and we arrived at the entrance waypoint for Barillas at 1 PM on Thursday, December 9th.  The infamous Gulf of Tehuantepec is now behind us, and I no longer care that the forecast calls for gales and 10 to 12 foot seas there for Saturday – three days out.

A panga from the marina 12 miles up the river met us to lead us across the bar and up the winding channel.  The entrance is not marked and the charting is 120 years old, so using GPS plotting systems is not very safe. In fact, I watched our track meander inland over a headland on the Navnet chart plotter as we cruised up the center of the channel.  Off to the right a 7500 foot volcano loomed, rising straight out of the plains, topped with a cloud plume.

A panga fishing off Barillas

Fuel dock in Barillas, El Salvador

The 7500-foot volcano in Barillas, El Salvador

We moored to a buoy and were met within ten minutes by all the El Salvadorean officialdom - the Aduana (Customs), the national police and the Navy.  I gave them all ice water as we sat around the table and filled forms.  A quick look at the boat, and they were all done in 20 minutes. We went ashore, I checked in with immigrations for passport stamps, registered with the marina, and that was that. What a pleasant improvement over the Mexican paperwork chase.

Barillas is a private club with 50 or more mooring buoys strung out along a 200 yard wide stretch of the river. They operate a shoreboat system using pangas, taking you into a floating dock. Texaco fuel is available and Prestomar operates a full service boat yard with haulout next door, to service the shrimp fleet.  The club has a pool, a little shop, internet service and a nice little restaurant/bar. The services are great.

Our generator had been overheating and shutting down ever since we left Acapulco. We had checked the sea strainers and coolant levels, finding no problems. That left the cooling system as the probable culprit, either the impeller, which pulls in sea water, or the thermostat, which works just like one in a car. I’d been in touch with Barillas in advance, and they had lined up a mechanic from Prestomar to help us out. But we met Dana Nelson and Mitch Bucklew, the delivery crew from Mary Dee in the bar, and they volunteered to help.

They tackled the impeller first, and to my chagrin, I didn’t have the right size socket wrench, so with their tools, they opened up the impeller housing. Indeed, the impeller, a rubber / plastic affair with blades which spins to pull water, was shredded. They pulled it out with two screwdrivers, dug out shredded blade chips from the discharge hose, greased up and installed a new one (from my parts stocks), Mike put things back together, and we were in business. Thanks guys! I bought them dinner ashore in appreciation.

We left Bariillas Friday afternoon, December 10th, in company with Mary Dee, electing to get head of apparently deteriorating weather rather than stay another day in very pleasant Barillas. The 51-hour trip down the coast from El Salvador past Nicaragua to Los Suenos, Costa Rica was a bit bumpy, with pretty steady 20 to 25 knot beam winds and four foot seas from the northeast for at least 36 hours. We ran well offshore, on a direct rhumbline course, first gaining a one knot current advantage for ten hours, then loosing a knot for almost 24 hours, then gaining it all back for the rest of the trip, once the seas moderated after we’d rounded Cabo Velas, the western tip of Costa Rica. The Mary Dee  anchored up behind Cabo Elena, north of Cabo Velas for the night – too rough for their 60 foot Westbay – but we were just fine pressing on.

Mike McFadden on watch en route to Costa Rica

We arrived Los Suenos about 5 PM Sunday, December 12th, and by 7 PM we’d washed the salt crust off Resolution.  Mike is trying to teach me how to professionally help him wash a boat, and so far I’m still at the beginning stage. I apparently don’t rinse adequately –“LOTS of water” says Mike! Oh well, he’s patient, and I buy him beer to convince him to go easy on me.  We then met up in the marina bar with Dana, Mitcn and Chad, the guys off Mary Dee who had helped with the generator, and with John Hanson, off the Nordhavn 57 Starweather, who had arrived earlier. Mike, John and Chad partied till quite late, but I went to bed.  Sleep is good after standing watches for two days with only the two of us.

The next morning about 10 am, the ship’s agent handling our clearances arrived aboard Resolution with Aduana (customs), Migracion (immigration) and the Port Captain’s rep all in tow. The paperwork took about an hour, with no inspection, and in 36 hours we’ll have our three month temporary importation permit.  Our passports were stamped, ship’s papers were copied, the El Salvador Zarpe was collected, and everyone smiled and nodded politely. The whole process is exactly like clearing in a tanker or container ship, complete with a “General Declaration”. I remember them from clearing airplanes on international flights.

Los Suenos (“the dreams” in Spanish) is a beautiful spot, on Herradura Bay, about 75 miles southwest of the capital, San Jose, with a modern, 200 slip marina, a very nice Marriott Hotel adjacent, a golf course and a large development of condos and expensive homes on the hillsides around the bay. The developer has done a first class job, with sewage treatment facilities, good water supply, lovely, lush gardens and all the amenities. I suspect the Costa Rican government’s emphasis on good stewardship of the land and on ecotourism has helped.  Many sportfishing boats from the east coast of the US are based here, and “catch-and-release” fishing for billfish, marlin and tuna is a really big deal.

We’ve been doing maintenance for the past couple of days. The auxiliary “wing” engine is hard to start – fuel starvation symptoms.  We’d had a check valve in the supply line replaced in San Diego, supposedly to cure the same problem.  A masthead running light bulb had burnt out, which earned Mike a climb halfway up the mast. I goofed and ran the washer/dryer in rough seas, and it jumped its tracks, so we’re searching for someone to fix it. Tomorrow we’ll change the oil in the main engine, and take on about 800 gallons of diesel fuel, at $2.46 per gallon – ouch! Mike’s going to continue his ongoing buff and wax program on the cabin exterior.

Thursday morning, December 16th, we head up over the mountains for San Jose, where we’ll stay for two days at the Hotel Grano de Oro, a 35 room hotel in a converted old mansion, recommended by Tom White.  So we’ll have an opportunity for some touring in San Jose. We fly home to Seattle through Houston on Saturday morning, December 18th.

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