 Yet another Nordhavn has embarked on an exciting adventure. This time it’s Ken and Roberta Williams who are heading out to explore the great unknown – well, unknown to them, anyway. The duo will be cruising about 2,000 miles from Mexico to Costa Rica.
The Williamses are no strangers to traveling via Nordhavn. They purchased their Nordhavn 62, Sans Souci, in 1998 and traveled up and down the West Coast as well as crossed the Atlantic on her as part of the Nordhavn Atlantic Rally.
They sold her shortly after the NAR’s conclusion, opting to play in the Bahamas on a 27’ Glacier Bay while waiting for their new Nordhavn 68 to finish construction. They took delivery of their new Sans Souci last August, brought her up to Seattle and then back down to San Diego to participate in the FUBAR rally. It was a nice warm-up to their current journey, although Ken admits to being nervous. “The rally was much easier because there were other boats around. Doing this alone will be a whole new experience.”
Thankfully for all of us, Ken is letting us in on the experience with him through his excellent blog. We’ll be updating this site with each new entry Ken submits, but if you’d rather have a copy or the report sent directly to your inbox, click here. Greetings all.
January 31,2008
Tenacatita Bay 19 18.044N104 49.963W]
Jan 31, 2008
Greetings all!
I had a long list of projects for today, and successfully accomplished ZERO of them. Days at anchor are like that. Somehow, the time passed, but I can’t say a lot got accomplished.
Well…. There was one major personal achievement today…
The cruiser net I discovered on VHF Channel 22 whetted my appetite for more. I found it a valuable resource, and know that additional cruiser nets exist that I’ve not been able to hear. That’s because they take place on Single Side Band (SSB), which has always seemed to me an intimidating device. I’ve been “going to learn it tomorrow” for years now. Today was to be the day. Before going to bed last night I read the instruction manual for my Icom 802 SSB cover to cover. Then, this morning I woke at 6am, so that I could experiment with the radio for an hour before the first Net was scheduled to be broadcast. I quickly discovered that it was much simpler than expected, and that I should have been using the SSB for years. Sure enough, at 7am I was listening to a weather update. I spent a couple of hours listening to other cruisers (that’s what I’ve been told us boaters prefer calling ourselves) discussing anchorages, the weather, marinas and more. Often, I could only hear one side of a conversation, and I still don’t know the rules on which channels (if any) I am allowed to transmit on, but it was still a worthwhile effort. Now that the ice has been broken, I’ll automatically listen to the nets while cruising. The toughest thing to figure out is “what frequencies and when”. From now on, before cruising in a region, I need to go to google, and research the cruiser nets in the area. I overheard someone on Channel 22 giving out the schedule and frequencies. I also found a schedule and list of frequencies in a local magazine I found: Vallarta Nautica.
After lunch, we decided to take the tender and try to explore, but before heading out, I realized that the tender needed fuel. No problem. We are prepared for anything on Sans Souci. Here’s a picture of Roberta’s mom passing me the fuel line from Sans Souci.
There is a river that starts here at the bay, and goes back through the jungle for miles, ultimately arriving at a small beach where there are some beach front restaurants. I was warned that the river is under six inches deep in parts, and that I should tread carefully, but that it is an incredible experience. We tried, but couldn’t even make it into the mouth of the river. We had waited until too late in the day, and the wind had come up. There were breaking waves in the mouth of the river. Obviously, this is a project for a windless day, or one when we can get started before the wind comes up.
I wanted to swim to shore, and hike around to explore, but we had Roberta’s parents in the tender, and our dog Shelby. They outvoted Roberta and I three to two, so we decided to explore from on the boat. I wasn’t overly worried about it. We’ll be back here to Tenacatita in a little over a week, along with some Nordhavn-owning friends who are flying in to take over for Roberta’s parents. They will want to see Tenacatita, and I’m sure we’ll do the river trip with them.
The bay is huge, roughly four miles wide and four miles deep. There is a village (city?) at the eastern edge of the bay, called “La Manzanilla”. We thought there could be a dinghy dock there, or at least a beach we could land on, so we shot across the bay.
 
As we were crossing the bay, the wind and swell were coming up. We were starting to see some white caps, and although you can’t tell it in these pictures, there was a three foot “chop”. The tender (a 15’ AB Inflatable) did fine, but John and Nova looked very nervous. The village of of La Manzanilla looked like a great place to have lunch at one of the dozens of very attractive beach front restaurants, but clearly our guests were convinced we would be capsizing any moment. Roberta was running the tender, and doing an outstanding job – but, we decided to cut the expedition short. The village looked too good to miss. The marina isn’t far away, only about 15 miles. We should be able to drive back here tomorrow or the next day before Roberta’s parents depart.
Here are a few pictures I snapped on the way back to the boat:
In the background you can see the beach with wheeled tenders
Sans Souci, at anchor, with the flopper stoppers out
Sans Souci
Tomorrow, I move the boat to the marina at Bahia Navidad (everyone seems to call it “Barra”). It’s a very short run, and the weather is supposed to be perfect. About a third of the cruisers left the anchorage late this afternoon. My guess is that these are northbound boats who saw the perfect weather forecast for the next few days, and wanted to start the run north to Puerto Vallarta.
Thank you,
Ken Williams
Sans Souci, nordhavn68.com
January 31,2008
[Tenacatita Bay - 19°17'49.51"N, 104°49'26.46"W]
Greetings all!
Before I begin: PLEASE NOTE – I do enjoy reading your emails (to: kenw @ seanet.com) BUT, my internet connection is very limited and very expensive. I received at least four copies of my own update back yesterday, each preceded by a one or two sentence comment. The comments were great, but paying for downloading my own update gets old. Text is not a problem. Feel free to be as verbose in writing me as you would like – BUT, DO NOT include pictures, video or audio files. If you are responding to my update, DELETE my update after you hit the reply key and then start typing.
Also: If for some reason you do not like receiving these updates (they go to thousands of people), my feelings will not be hurt, and there is a simple way for you to stop receiving them. There is a link at the bottom of this email which says “unsubscribe”. Just click it and you won’t be pestered again.
And, lastly: if you are reading someone else’s copy of my updates, and would like your own: All you need to do is to go to: http://www.nordhavn68.com and click on the link for subscribing to my blog.
And with that said….
Our goal yesterday was to make a short passage (only 40 miles) from Chamela Bay to Tenacatita.
I had asked the weather router whether or not it looked good for the passage, and he said it would be calmer if we relaxed for a day or two, but that there was no reason not to go.
We seriously considered just relaxing for a day or two at Chamela, but there were three things arguing for getting moving:
1) The swell at the anchorage in Chamela was no fun. Even with our flopper stoppers out, the boat was rolling non-stop, 24 hours a day. It just wasn’t comfortable.
2) We couldn’t easily get to the beach. I mentioned in my last update that our tender is completely wrong for a beach landing, and Roberta’s parents won’t swim in. Sitting on a boat watching others have lunch on shore grates on you after a while.
3) We have a reservation at Barre Navidad, which is a difficult to get into marina, for this Friday – and, I’m worried that if I show up late I could lose my slip.
Other cruisers were telling me that Tenacatita had much less swell, and a beach I should be able to land on. This, plus 2 knot winds when we woke yesterday, was good enough for me. It was time to move. I knew we would be safe, and figured a little seasickness would be a fair trade.
For the journey I decided to pull our tender. On our prior Nordhavn we pulled the tender all the time, but that was in the Pacific NW and the Med, where swell is not an issue. I wasn’t sure how the tender would do when surfing up and down waves. Also: rather than taking down our flopper stoppers (the giant fishing-pole looking things hanging off the side of the boat which stabilize us at anchor), I wanted to just put the “fish” (the plates hanging at the bottom of the poles) into the cockpit and save a lot of time and trouble.
Thank goodness for the lack of wind, because there was plenty of swell to make up for it! We never experienced over 5 knots of wind throughout our whole trip south. However, the waves (or, should I say “swell” as they weren’t breaking) were large. I do not know how to quantify size, but I’d guess them at easily 10 to 15 feet. I had been told they were on a 16 second interval, but they seemed much closer. We never felt any danger, nor was it particularly exciting, but it was interesting to watch the boat drop into a trough with the surrounding water at eye level, only to be lifted a few seconds later to the crest of a wave. My only fear was for the tender. I have always used two lines when pulling a tender; one to handle the load, and one as a backup. It was hot and sticky yesterday morning, and I hadn’t slept the night before, so I erred, and was too lazy to chase down a second line. Lesson learned. The tender had a much wilder ride than we did, and the entire journey was spent watching it slide around behind the boat. The tender completed the journey just fine, but I wouldn’t do it, in this high a swell, again.
Overall, it wasn’t a bad ride at all! No one felt any discomfort.
Our arrival at Tenacacita was once again made more interesting by the poor and inaccurate charts. As I had on our approach to Banderas Bay I used the radar, the depth sounder, and my own eyes, to figure out where we were. The chart was virtually useless. None of the depths matched up, even after adjusting for my computed location. I was also consulting Charlie’s Charts, and the Rains’ Mexico Boating Guide, but of which have been of tremendous assistance. Looking ahead on our voyage the charts, which are already borderline, become essentially non-existent. I will be depending on the cruising guides. I’m going to speak with Nobeltec today to see if it is possible they have more charts than I’m seeing, and I’ve somehow not installed everything – but, I don’t think so. I think there just isn’t much coverage from here to Costa Rica.
Within Tenacatita, there are at least three different anchorages to pick from. We chose the one that appeared the most popular, and dropped anchor alongside 30 or so other boats (almost all sail boats). To my great disappointment, even though we are anchored in front of a hotel, there doesn’t appear to be a wireless internet connection I can tap into. Argh!
My “project” after arrival was to figure out an issue with our 25kw generator. It has decided that it does not want to give electricity to the air conditioning. After lots of experimenting, and calls/emails to Nordhavn, it appears they may have to send me a part. This isn’t a huge issue in that Friday we will be into a marina and on shore power. In the mean time, I have the 16kw generator which is working fine. We’re really working the generators hard, which is new to me. Ordinarily, when cruising, I only run the generator a few hours a day to charge the batteries, but it is hot and sticky here. Everyone wants air conditioning ALL the time, and my batteries wouldn’t last long powering the air conditioning. This means 24 hour a day generator usage. We could just sweat – but, why have toys and not use them?
After getting a little greasy working in the lazarette I was ready for a swim. We all jumped in, had a nice refreshing swim, followed by an early barbecue and off to bed.
I realize I’m not saying much about Tenacatita itself. To be honest, I don’t know much yet. Everyone on the boat is just waking up, and we’ll soon be off to explore. There is a jungle cruise I’ve heard about, that we’ll tackle. I want to try out my hookah system (for diving). I’d like to drop the jet tender, for long-distance exploring. Lots to do! I’ll try to get some pictures for tomorrow’s update. We’re safely at anchor and life is good!
Thank you,
Ken Williams
Sans Souci, nordhavn68.com
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Chamela Bay - 19°34'57.04"N, 105° 7'41.79"W
Today was a lazy day, just enjoying life at anchor.
My “big project” for the day was to drop the tender. We could see a dozen little restaurants along the beach and thought it would be fun just to tender to shore and explore. I put out a call on the radio asking if anyone knew if there was a tender dock. I was answered by Chuck, on Jacaranda, who advised that there is no tender dock, and that I should be very careful. The waves break on the beach, and he had seen a tender flip, with injuries, on his last visit to the bay.
Given this warning, I tendered close to shore to check things out. Conditions were calm, yet there were breaking waves everywhere. They weren’t breaking badly, and I was fairly sure we could make it – but, Roberta’s parents are in their 80s, so I knew it needed to be a soft landing.
Our tender isn’t made to be beached, which is a problem. In an earlier blog update I mentioned this, and one of the readers suggested I try an “anchor buddy.” It’s just an anchor line which is made of bungee cord. I’ve never used it, but if I understand correctly, the idea is that you:
a) Drop anchor about 50 feet off the beach
b) Power the tender to shore, stretching the bungee cord
c) Step onto the beach
d) Let go of the boat
You need a long rope attached to the tender, so that you can pull it to the beach later to step back on. The Anchor Buddy is really intended for dealing with tides, but I thought it might work in this situation.
I went back to Sans Souci, and loaded Roberta and her parents.
Arriving back at the beach, I realized that my idea had been a poor one. There was no way to get the tender close enough to shore to allow everyone to step out. The swells for the waves were starting over 50 feet from shore, and by the time I would be close enough to be in a couple feet of water, I would be dragged to the beach whether I liked it or not.
Had it been just Roberta and I, we would have just dropped anchor (on the tender) and swam it to shore. I might even have been able to make the anchor buddy thing work – but, clearly Roberta’s parents weren’t going to be able to wade, or swim, through the waves.
Never one to give up, we trolled along shore looking for someone with a panga who might be bribed into coming out to get us. At first we thought we had failed, but then one Mexican gentleman, who was swimming with his son, noted our struggle and signaled me over. Roberta explained in Spanish that we needed a panga ride to the beach, and he seemed to understand. I tied to a nearby mooring buoy and 10 minutes later we were walking on the beach.
Roberta’s parents sipping an adult beverage at Manuelitas
We chose a restaurant, Manuelita’s, and to our surprise, had a great meal! Roberta even made the comment that it was the first day that it really felt like we had “arrived.”
While having lunch, we saw a couple arrive from a sailboat, and we understood the proper way to handle tendering in. Their tender was small, and had wheels on the back that could be flipped down. They hovered, watching for a break in the waves, and then ran the boat fast to the beach. When the tender reached shore, the wheels touched sand, allowing them to jump out, and easily roll the tender up on the beach.
This explains the expensive tender that we had seen left behind in Puerto Vallarta. I don’t know yet that I am willing to pitch my expensive tender overboard, and buy a lighter tender with wheels, but I’ve started thinking about it.
Although our meal was excellent, it was not paced for someone in a hurry. I had told our panga captain to expect 90 minutes. Sixty minutes into our meal I realized we hadn’t received our salads yet, much less our main courses. It was going to be at least another hour. Thus I hiked back down the beach to give a few more dollars to the panga man, and advise him of the delay. He expected my gratitude, but looked very unhappy.
After completing our meal, and hiking back to the panga, we could see why. The wind was coming up!
Getting into the panga and getting it off the beach was a major effort. The wind was picking starting to pick up speed rapidly, and when we stepped onto Sans Souci the wind was over 20 knots. The swell was also picking up, and our flopper stoppers were doing the best they could, but Sans Souci was rolling non-stop. It would be an uncomfortable night.
As dusk was settling in, we noticed another Nordhavn, a 50 called “Sally G,” pulling into the anchorage. After they had dropped anchor I called on the radio to introduce ourselves. I asked where they had come from, and Dave, the owner, said “San Carlos.” The only San Carlos I knew about was 600 miles north, so I assumed I had misunderstood him, but I hadn’t. He had run non-stop from San Carlos! Dave said he was en route to Zihuatenejo, another 300 miles south, and had given up 3.5 days into his 5 day journey after being beaten up all night by rough seas between Cabo Corrientes and Chamela (see yesterday’s update). I asked how rough, and he said “35 knot winds, and seas as high as 15 feet!” I then asked “Why are you in such a hurry to get to Zihautenejo?” And, the answer caught me completely by surprise. “We are planning a trip to the south pacific, and wanted to see how we would do on a long passage with just the two of us.”
Nordhavn owners are always finding new ways to surprise and amaze me!
Thank you,
Ken Williams (and, Roberta, and her parents – John and Nova)
Sans Souci, nordhavn68.com
Kenw@seanet.com
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
I planned our voyage based on a 12 hour trip from Puerto Vallarta to the anchorage at Chamela Bay, 100 miles south. In other words, to arrive at 3pm, we would need to leave Puerto Vallarta at 3am. This would allow us to grab a few hours of sleep, and still arrive before dark, with time to spare, in Chamela.
In order to simplify the night-time departure we decided to move the boat to anchor outside the marina. We would drop anchor as the “outer most” boat, so that we wouldn’t have to zigzag through other boats in the dark.
First though, I needed to clear out with the port captain. Unfortunately, I had forgotten that the La Cruz port captain’s office closes on Sundays. I put out a call on the radio to other cruisers in the area, as to whether or not this would be a problem, and the consensus was that I should go ahead and go, and beg for mercy with the Port Captain at our next major port of call (which will be the marina at Barra Navidad). I looked in the cruising guides to see if I could find the phone number for the Port Captain’s office in Puerto Vallarta. We were in La Cruz de Huantacaxtle, a smaller city, and I was guessing that nearby Puerto Vallarta might have a larger office, which could be open on Sunday. I couldn’t find a phone number, but did find a VHF radio channel: 13. So, I called on 13 for “Puerto Vallarta Port Captain”, and back came a Spanish voice that said “Adelante Sans Souci” (Go ahead). I explained that I needed to clear out, and the local office was closed, and could I do it over the radio. The voice on the radio asked the name of my boat (in Spanish), and the number of persons onboard (again, in Spanish). They then said they would pass on the message. So, perhaps I have cleared out….
Another couple of boats; Jenny, a Nordhavn 46 and Wandering Star, a Selene 43, had spoken about leaving at the same time as us. Unfortunately, there is no practical way for us to travel as a fleet. Sans Souci is capable of traveling at 10.5 knots, whereas these boats max out at around 7.5 knots. For fuel conservation, we generally travel closer to 9 knots, and I’d guess these other boats travel closer to 6 knots. In other words, the trip which would be 12 hours for us, would really be closer to 18 hours for these slower boats. If we really wanted to travel together I could certainly slow down; I’d save a lot of fuel, and have someone to talk to on the radio the entire way. But, this wasn’t likely. I wanted to get there. On the Fubar we found that by leaving a few hours after the slower boats we could remain in radio contact for much of the voyage.
It was not to matter anyhow. When I spoke with David on Jenny, he had made the decision to spend a few more days in La Cruz. I couldn’t blame him We should have allowed for a month or more in the Puerto Vallarta area. Then, the Salzers, from Wandering Star, stopped by the boat to let us know they also would not be going. We had been waiting for the wind to subside so we could leave the port, and it had already gotten to 4pm and we were still showing 12 knots of wind inside the marina. The Salzers said that the weather would be much better towards the end of the week, and they wanted to wait for a smoother ride.
If we were to depart, I had only about 90 minutes to make a decision. Whenever anyone mentions a weather delay, this becomes a giant red flag. I hadn’t noticed anything in the forecast which indicated trouble ahead. This called for an immediate call to “weather Bob” our weather router. The bottom line on the weather, from Bob, was that we were likely to see 15 to 20 knots of wind, with six foot swells (waves). Importantly, the swells would average 16 seconds apart. Longer swell times mean the boat has more time to gently ride up one wave before tackling the next one. Nothing here meant “don’t go.” However, as the Salzers had indicated, the seas would be calming on Friday, and if we waited, we’d have a much smoother trip. After speaking about it, we decided “let’s go.”
Step 1 was to get out of the marina, and the wind was not co-operating. It was climbing when it was supposed to be lowering. 13 knots of wind was not enough to really interfere with maneuvering out of the marina, so we went for it, and left port perfectly. Outside the port there was 18 knots of wind, which made anchoring a bit more interesting, but still not a problem. We anchored away from the pack for an easy departure.
At 2:30am Roberta and I woke and started pulling anchor. So that I could see, we shined the spotlight at the bow. We then followed our own tracings on Nobletec to exit Banderas Bay.
Cabo Corrientes, the south eastern point at the mouth of Banderas Bay (the bay with Puerto Vallarta) can be rough. One cruising guide advised staying five miles off the point, and said that even at that distance the seas had resembled the water in a washing machine. We were in calm seas, with only 5 knots of wind, so I wasn’t at all worried. Our route was planned to take us five miles off the point, and Roberta steered the boat an extra mile out to sea “just to be safe.” I wouldn’t call the seas rough, but I would call them “confused.” There was no obvious pattern to the seas, and the swells (lumps in the water), randomly placed, moving, close together, and perhaps four feet tall. We swished around for a couple hours, but overall it was anti-climatic (which is a great thing!)
As we continued southeast, I noticed that 1325 rpm, which generally moves us at 9.5 knots was instead giving us an “uncomfortable” 7.5 knots. The wind was coming at us on the port side stern, and had climbed to 12 knots, and the swells were coming at us from starboard side stern. I remember that on our prior boat, a Nordhavn 62, that when swells are coming from behind, the auto pilot tended to over-react and make for a bad ride. My hopes that this boat would be better were not rewarded. Each time that the stern would be pushed sideways by a swell, the boat would over steer to correct, and push itself too far the other direction. I kept seeing the words “rudder limit reached” appear on the auto pilot. I thought about trying to reprogram the auto-pilot, but I have a rule that “unless I really know what I am doing,” I don’t mess with things while underway. We were uncomfortable, but overall, we were moving the right direction.
After a few hours of not picking up speed, I decided to use the sat phone and call the owner of the second Nordhavn 68, David. I was trying to figure if it was the zigzagging causing the loss of speed, or if there was an adverse current. David had something I did not – access to a fast internet connection. I was hoping he could do a little research and tell me what the current might be. Our navigation software (Nobeltec) allegedly has current information, but we are truly in the boondocks here, and if Nobeltec had the information, I couldn’t figure how to get it. David did some googling with no greater success than I.
I decided to “put the pedal to the metal” and stepped it up to 1400 rpm. We briefly moved up to 8 knots, and even saw 9 knots for a bit, but still had long periods where we ran as slow as 6.9 knots. Our fuel burn had grown from 13 gph to 18 gph with only a marginal speed increase. I thought about dialing in more speed, but it was clear the payback wasn’t justifying the cost. At almost exactly the mid-point of our run I passed a north bound sailboat motoring north (I keep referring to it as north and south --- but, if you look at a map, what I am calling south is more east than south). The sailboat was named Cyrano, and I could see that he was getting slammed. I was still curious about the current, so I called him on the radio to ask what he thought. I told him it felt like there was at least a knot, or even two of adverse current. He responded “At least!” I’m still not 100% certain, but hope that he was right.
At 4:30pm we dropped anchor in Chamela Bay, well before dark. The bay is much larger than expected; 4 miles long by a mile deep. There are two large islands in the center which divide it in half. At the tip of the north end of the bay there is a village with a row of what appears to be ocean front restaurants. About 20 boats are in the anchorage. We dropped anchor, and then, even though exhausted, proceeded to drop the “flopper stoppers.” Cyrano, the northbound sailboat, had advised me that the anchorage had a lot of swell (meaning: the boat would constantly be in motion at anchor). For those not familiar with Flopper Stoppers, these look like giant fishing poles which hang out the side of the boat, each dangling a giant aluminum plate beneath the water. The theory is that these will stabilize the boat and make life much more comfortable. We’ve only put them out a couple of times thus far, and the process isn’t easy. There are five ropes per side, and only one rope is labeled (Note to self: remember to label them!) The first took a lot of experimentation and 45 minutes, the second took less than 10 minutes.
We barbecued some hamburgers, and were going to settle in when the President’s State of the Union speech started (we have sat tv). We decided to watch it, and within minutes all four of us were asleep on the couch. When I awoke the speech was over. I woke the rest of the group, and sent everyone off to bed….
Here’s a picture of Roberta’s parents having breakfast this morning.
You can see the flopper stopper in the background.
Thank you!
Ken Williams
Sans Souci, Nordhavn68.com
Sunday, January 27, 2008
This is a very short update. I’m really just passing along all the great email I received yesterday as a result of my blog update. There’s a lot of good information I thought others would like to have.
We will be leaving the marina in a few minutes to go to anchor just outside the marina. Our plan is to depart at around 2am headed south 100 miles to an anchorage near Manzanillo, called “Chamela”.
The wind and waves are higher than I’d like, but well within the capabilities of the boat (approx. 15-20 knots of wind from the north, swells up 6 ft.)
I’ll report more once we are safely at anchor.
-Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Greetings all!
We are in Puerto Vallarta at the new La Cruz marina.
Yesterday morning I discovered something which caught me by surprise. I’m a little embarrassed to admit that I hadn’t already known about these, but I listened for the first time to a “Cruiser Net”. I have noticed several people ending their VHF radio transmissions by saying “Standing by on Channel 22.” I’ve never heard of any special significance to Channel 22, so I decided to start monitoring it to see what the attraction was. At first, all I heard was various boaters calling each other. Until…. Yesterday morning at 7:30am, when Channel 22 suddenly became something more akin to a radio show than a calling channel. There was a moderator “Don” who was firmly in control. He described it as the Bandera Bay Cruiser Net, and starting taking roll call. Over 50 boats responded! He then asked for new boats, and another 10 or so boats, stated their names, followed by his asking about boats that were departing. I still had no idea what this was, so I kept silent. He then asked who had “reports” to give, and a long series started of various boaters pitching in stories that would be of interest to the boating community. There were discussions of immigration issues, announcements of boating-oriented meetings being held around town, invites to social events, comments on boating stores in the community. This was followed by a weather update, a question/answer session, a “swap meet”, and more. I’m sometimes a slow learner, but it eventually occurred to me that this was something that was open to all cruising boats in the area, and a very valuable resource. Apparently most heavy boating regions have something similar, and it is just a matter of asking around to find what local “net” there is (what time, what channel). Very cool! How did I not know about these?
During the broadcast I overheard David Schramm from the Nordhavn Jenny asking where there was a good boat store in the area. I found it amusing. Did he not know we were in Mexico? However to my complete surprise someone responded saying there was a huge marine store (Zaragoza) on the highway near Marina Vallarta. Thus, after the “net” ended I hiked over to David’s boat, and said “I have a rental car. If you are going to a marine store, I can drive.” Few people are more popular in a marina than someone with a car, or someone with a dive compressor, so to no surprise we attracted a full carload of boaters within minutes. And, as claimed, it was a great store! We shopped for an hour, and returned with smiles and full shopping bags.
Back at the boat, we had a full crew working on cleaning. “Jose” was recommended to me by Nordhavn owner Richard Maybin as “possibly the best boat cleaner in the world.” With a recommendation like that, I had to give him a try. He and his two helpers worked on my boat for two full days. I couldn’t believe how hard they worked. The tab: $100.
For lunch, I decided to hike into town with Roberta’s parents to try out a little restaurant, Philo’s, which I had heard recommended. I have to describe what I saw when I entered the restaurant, as it struck me funny. The restaurant, like most here in Mexico, is semi-outdoors – minimal walls and tables under a big palapa. The tables are long picnic benches aligned evenly with bright colored table cloths. Sitting at the tables were perhaps a dozen persons, most of whom could easily be identified as “boaters.” I had to grin, because they weren’t sitting in “groups, ” nor were they sitting facing each other. In fact, they all were facing the same direction (the bar). Each of these persons had a laptop in front of them, and was wearing a headset. Most were talking loudly to an invisible friend. At first I thought I had stumbled into the call center for some South American telemarketing firm. But the “weathered” appearance of the salespeople, told me there was something I was missing. Then I put it together. This was a restaurant with good internet, and a welcoming attitude to boaters! Most of the boats in the marina do not have access to wifi, so these folk were gathering at the restaurant to “surf and skype”. I hadn’t realized Skype had become quite so popular amongst boaters. It allows you to make phone calls virtually anywhere for almost no cost. Calls in mexico to the US can easily be a $1 a minute, or much more. Thus, using the computer as a fancy telephone is a very good idea. We had a very nice lunch, and when a new arrival to the restaurant couldn’t get his wireless working, I participated, along with a team of other boaters, in resolving his problem. A very nice way to spend the afternoon….
 In my last update, I mentioned a mystery, that has now been resolved. There had been a Nordhavn 76 next to us “Spirit of Ulysses” which left the marina headed south several days ago. However, he (Richard) left behind his tender! I had been expecting a call from him saying “Have you seen my tender?” But, instead when I spoke with him he gave me “the rest of the story.” He took delivery of his boat this summer and configured it with two inflatable tenders; both are high quality expensive tenders. After having used the boat for a while, he has discovered that what he really needs is a tender that can be easily “beached”. I’ve had this same problem. The tenders I have aren’t really designed to be beached. They are too heavy to be dragged across the sand. Richard had made the decision to “swap” his tender for something simpler and lighter. I may consider doing the same….
I’ve started doing the trip planning for our next run south. Our next major destination is the resort known as “Barra”. Everyone has told me this will be our favorite stop on the trip, and we’re excited about getting there. Barra is approximately 150 miles south of here, which means a 15 to 20 hour run. For safety reasons, it is critical to arrive in the daylight, so I’m thinking about how to break up the trip. There is an anchorage 50 miles south of here, Ipala, but the word is that it is very borderline (a skinny bay, open to swell, and with lots of fishing nets). There is another at 100 miles, Chamela, which is alleged to be great (wide, good holding, sheltered). Our working plan is to go to anchor just in front of our existing marina, on Sunday night, and then leave in the dark (at 2am) for a 2pm arrival at Chamela. This has us departing in the dark, but a night-time departure from anchorage is much less challenging than a night arrival.
That said, I received this email from weather router Bob Jones earlier today:
“Good Day Ken, right now the pattern looks good, but there is some concern for the 29th-31st that could give you a bumpy ride "at best". We have some time, so I'll look at the new data set that comes in here around midday. I should have the update to you by around 1500EST (2000GMT). B/Rgds, Bob/OMNI”
It will be sad to leave here. There’s a lot we haven’t done. For instance, we still haven’t visited the city of Puerto Vallarta. We consider Puerto Vallarta itself “optional.” This is off the subject, and has nothing to do with boating, but when I was with the other boats on the Fubar rally (San Diego to Cabo), I would occasionally encourage people to visit Cabo, and not just skip by it on their way to La Paz. Several Fubar boaters, who don’t realize we live in Cabo, would turn up their nose, and say “No way – it’s a horrible place!” I do understand what they mean, but there is more to the story. The downtown area in many popular tourist destinations have been taken over by tee-shirt shops, loud bars, annoying timeshare sales people, discos, and even strip clubs. Trust me, Cabo is a wonderful place, but sometimes the charm isn’t immediately obvious. Thousands (over 5,000) Americans and Canadians live in the cabo area. There are beautiful homes, spectacular golf courses, white sand beaches and world-class restaurants. The weather is perfect, and health care is surprisingly inexpensive and good. I would argue that an arriving boater who spends an evening at the “Giggling Marlin” and then thinks he or she has seen Cabo, is missing the true story. I don’t know that I would argue that the ex-pat (gringo) communities surrounding Cabo represent “real mexico”, but they do represent wonderful places to visit. Any visit to Cabo should include Todos Santos and San Jose Del Cabo. Puerto Vallarta is also a popular retirement community. There are thousands of gringos living here, and most aren’t found downtown. Many are here in La Cruz and neighboring Bucerias. Visitors will notice that the restaurants are generally better and less touristy.
My other project has been trying to form a strategy for running the coast of Guatemala and Nicaragua. I have spoken with boaters who say these are wonderful “not to miss” places, and those who say “stay 60 miles off shore to avoid drug runners and pirates.” I have a month to make the decision, so I’m just reading, talking and thinking.
I should correct something I said in my last update. I mentioned speaking with another boater who, like us, was headed towards the Panama Canal. I misspoke. We are headed towards the canal, but NOT through the canal. We will come very close but stop our trip south at Golfito in Costa Rica. Because of hurricane season, most of the boats around us are at a decision point. They will either start working their way back north, head south through the panama canal, put their boat into some hurricane hole (a VERY well protected marina), or “on the hard” (dry dock). We are quite unusual in that we are heading almost to the canal, but not going through. Instead we will put the boat onto a freighter, for shipment back to Alaska, where we are cruising with a group of other Nordhavn owners this coming summer.
Lastly, following are some pictures I took, followed by some excerpts from some of the emails I’ve received the past few days. As always, please note: I welcome email, but DO NOT send me big files. Email here is slow and often expensive. Receiving 2 megabyte files is a real problem.
Thank you,
Ken Williams
Sans Souci
Nordhavn68.com
The marina here at La Cruz
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Dinner in Bucerias (Roberta and her parents |
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The beach at Sayulita (a popular surfing destination)
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I had to slow the car to allow this snake to pass in front |
Our table at Mezzogiorno – an incredible Italian restaurant in Bucerias |
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Thursday, January 24, 2008
Greetings all!
I apologize for being slow sending this update. It has been a struggle to get email working here in Puerto Vallarta. I’ve got it going now….
The first leg of our voyage went very smoothly for the most part. I am proud to report that we have successfully arrived in Puerto Vallarta after making the 300 nautical mile passage from Cabo San Lucas Mexico.
We had estimated the cruising time at 33 hours, based on an average of 9 knots cruise speed. This meant we had to leave at 5am, so that we could arrive at 2pm the following day. It is important to arrive before dark, so that we wouldn’t be trying to enter port or drop anchor at night. Unfortunately, this meant leaving our departure port in the darkness. To make this easy we moved the boat to the fuel dock during daylight, so that we were already positioned just in front of the harbor entrance, ready for departure.
Roberta’s parents (my in-laws), John and Nova, are traveling with us for the first week or two. Some of you may remember that they traveled with us for the final leg of our Atlantic crossing. They are fun to travel with, and love nothing more than dancing. They were even dancing on the bow of Sans Souci as we pulled into Gibraltar.
Our departure went smoothly. It was a little tricky, in that we were in total blackness, and there are so
Sunrise, just after departure |
me turns required to exit the harbor. I tried using the night vision camera, but it required me to be inside the boat, and I wanted to drive from outside where I could see better. Instead, we tried the spot light. Roberta stayed inside the boat and worked the spot light while I drove the boat from outside, shouting at her where to point the beam. This worked well. She kept the beam trained on the walls I was trying to avoid, and in 10 minutes or so, we were out in the open sea.
When running overnight, we assign “watches”. With only four people on board, this meant two two-person teams; Roberta and her mom, and me and her dad. Each team would take turns every four hours driving the boat. I require two person teams, so that one person can “drive” the boat while the other acts as the “gofer” (go for this, go for that). When one team is on the duty, the other team can sleep. Neither of Roberta’s parents know anything about driving the boat, which means that it is really just Roberta and I doing the shifts, with her parents doing “gofer duty”. During my shift, I did have to leave John (Roberta’s dad) at the helm while I would do engine rooms checks, which was always a little nerve racking. If I was in the engine room and something came up, he would need a way to contact me. We experimented with him honking the horn, but I couldn’t hear it in the engine room. I then showed him how to drop the throttles. The change in the engine rpm would be my clue to rush back to the helm. My hope is that he’ll never actually have to do this, in that our rule is that Roberta or I wait until nothing is on the radar before doing our hourly engine room check.
Around noon, 60 miles out to sea, my engine room check did spot a problem. I have a little temperature gun I use to check the temperature of various things in the engine room. I’m just looking for anything that seems wrong. The gun is great – I can just point it at anything from several feet away, and immediately know the temperature. I check the shaft bearings, the transmissions, the hydraulic system, and even the walls of the engine room itself.
The port side shaft seal, where the main prop shaft exits the boat, was reading 145 degrees, versus 85 degrees on the starboard (right) side. I’ve read about tightening and loosening shaft seals, but have never tightened or loosened one personally. For those who are not familiar with the shaft seals, also known as a stuffing box, I’ll do my best to give a brief explanation…
In order to avoid water leaking in around the prop shaft, wax-soaked rope is squeezed in between the prop shaft and the hull of the boat. This rope (or, stuffing) acts as a shield to keep water out. If the rope is too loosely stuffed, water can pour into the boat, and if it is too tightly packed there can be friction between the shaft and the packing material. The heat I was observing was telling me that the packing was too tight, and that unless I could loosen it up, the packing material would soon wear away, and I’d have water pouring in.
Loosening the shaft seal is very simple for a trained mechanic, but very difficult for a software developer (like myself). I slowed the boat to a crawl, and called Jeff, a captain in Seattle who works on my boat. He explained how to loosen the bolts, and use a rubber hammer to loosen things up.
Roberta had heard the boat slow, and woke up to come see what was up. I asked her to come help “loosen the shaft seal”. She looked about as excited as I was. With my father in law driving the boat, at about 2 knots, Roberta and I entered the engine room. I thought about shutting down the motors, but the seas were rough enough that I didn’t really want to be drifting, and with no way to easily lock the shaft, the shaft was going to be spinning one way or the other.
The “tough to get to” brass thing in the center of this photo is the stuffing box. There are two nuts on a bolt on each side of it. The outer nut is for purposes of locking the inner one. As you can see, getting to the nuts is not easy. Knowing that touching the spinning shaft could have disastrous consequences, and that John was upstairs alone, weren’t making it any easier. I loosened the locking nut, and backed off the inner nuts several turns. I then hammered with the rubber hammer, waited a few minutes and checked the temperature. 135 degrees. Progress, but not done. I then loosened some more, and now the temp was at 110 degrees. I decided to tighten down the nuts and see what would happen over time. Tightening down meant Roberta and I together, so that she could work one wrench, while I worked the other. When next I measured the shaft, we were down to 82 degrees, and we had water dripping into the boat. I thought about tightening it back up, but decided that it was better dealt with in port, and that I could accept some dripping during the balance of our journey.
The weather was very acceptable for the passage. For most of the trip we had 15 knot winds from the port side. Waves were perhaps 3 to 4 feet, with some white caps. Inside the boat, we felt almost no motion. Because of the constant beam sea the stabilizers had to work hard. I was very impressed with how well they handled the seas.
Here are a few pictures from the passage:
For most of the passage, we saw no one. At times, I had to convince myself the radar was working. We would set it on 32 mile range, and not see a single blip. To prove it was working, I would put it out to 96 mile range, and see land, and then feel a little better.
My biggest problem was getting to sleep. When Roberta is driving, I am supposed to be sleeping, and visa versa. On a long passage, my system adjusts, and I fall into a rhythm. This passage was too short to really fall into a rhythm. I couldn’t seem to relax. I did make an honest effort, but sleep was clearly not part of the plan.
As we approached Puerto Vallarta, there was one area where things got interesting. There are some prison islands, we passed south of, called “Las Marias”. From the cruising guide I know that these are used as a prison, and that I should not get close. It is somewhat amusing to look these islands up different places. On my paper charts, there is this notation:
CAUTION: Las Marias are reported three miles further east, and Isla Isabella farther SW than shows on this chart. The reported positions cannot be reconciled with existing hydrography.
Notice there is no mention of staying clear of the islands. On Nobeltec it does mention that they are a prison colony and says to “keep well clear in order to avoid detention by Mexican authorities”. How far exactly is “well clear?” The cruising guide quantifies it a bit more, and says “stay 20 miles away.”
Given the uncertainty as to the location of the islands, and the fuzziness of how far to stay away, I decided to pass 30 miles south of them. Apparently others had the same idea. We were suddenly surrounded by cruise ships and freighters. One ship the “golden princess”, was obviously on the same waypoints as us. I asked him to change course, and give us some room, but we still passed within a mile of each other.
Our arrival into Puerto Vallarta was more complicated than it should have been. The city of Puerto Vallarta is situated at the back of a wide bay called “Banderas Bay”. At the north end of the entrance to the bay there are rocks that poke out for at least five miles, some of which are charted , and some of which aren’t. Rather than take a chance, I routed us to the center of the bay, which should have deep water and be safe. I had been warned that the charts are off by several miles, and wanted to take no chances.
I can now confirm that the charts are indeed off by miles. The combination of no sleep, incorrect charts, and rocks near the surface, had me highly focused on the radar. I was using the radar to compute the distance to different points on land, and using these distances to help me determine where I was on the charts. For instance, I could measure (on the radar) my distance from the northern entry to the bay, and the southern entrance to the bay and then use this to locate myself on the chart. I felt proud of myself for figuring this out, but then unhappy when the charts indicated the depth should be 2,600 feet, and it was only 480 feet. I was never able to correctly match up the depths on the chart with my position as computed using radar. I was 99.9999% certain that I was miles from the rocks, but that other .0001% was worrying me. I doubt I ever came within 5 miles of the rocks, but it was quite unsettling to not know my location.
Speaking of which, once inside the bay, I had only a vague idea where our marina was located. It is a new marina, called Marina Riviera Nayarit, located about 20 miles north of Puerto Vallarta. It opened only last month, and isn’t on any charts. The inaccurate charts, high winds in the bay, lack of sleep, and uncertainty about my location were making it tough to find the marina. Making things worse, I was within a few miles of where I thought it should be, and they weren’t responding on the radio. Finally in frustration I said on the radio, on channel 16, “This is Sans Souci, if anyone knows what channel Marina Nayarit is monitoring, please tell me.” Back came the response “This is the Nordhavn 46 Jenny. We can help you.” Yay!!!. Jenny was anchored at the entrance to the marina. After asking the GPS coordinates I asked about the wind. It was only 5 knots at the entrance to the marina. That was much better than the 15-20 knots in the center of the bay. Thank you to David Schramm on Jenny! In speaking with David later, he is also going south to the Panama Canal. I’m sure we’ll run into each other many times during the trip.
The entrance to the marina is a popular anchorage. There were perhaps 50 sailboats, and a couple power boats I had to zigzag through to reach the marina entrance. The marina entrance is virtually touching the beach, and there was a large yellow catamaran parked just in front. No problem though, we maneuvered around it and entered the marina. It’s a huge, beautiful, new, marina, which has been open less than a month. It is still under construction, but coming along nicely. Clearly someone is spending a LOT of money. Most of the slips are in place, but for now, at least 2/3rds are empty. The marina finally responded on the radio, and gave me my pick of parking places (slips). I asked about depth and was told that the marina is 12’ deep. I’m not positive this is true, as we were throwing up lots of mud on our way to the slip.
Here’s something that I found interesting: Similar to the anchorage in front, 99% of the boats inside the marina are sailboats. I’m accustomed to the marinas in Cabo where the opposite is true. In Cabo the marina would have been packed with sport fishers, with only a few trawlers or sailboats. I’m not sure why….
We did see one very interesting trawler – another Nordhavn, a 76’ called Spirit of Ulysses. We have seen this particular Nordhavn a few times before. It was built in Taiwan at the same time as our boat. I toured it there, and found it a very interesting design. It is a “forward pilot house” Nordhavn 76. As far as I know it is the only one like this. Richard Maven, the owner, gave me a tour in Taiwan, and I remember really liking the layout. There is a HUGE walkway in the bilge, where he has placed all his pumps and equipment, for incredibly simple access. We were in commissioning at the same time in Dana Point, and he went north at the same time as us, and then we both wound up back in Dana Point together, and now discovered each other again at a remote marina in Mexico. He is also headed to the Panama Canal, but on a tighter schedule than us. He left this morning headed south to Barra, where we’ll be next. One thing which completely has me stumped: There is a tender sitting next to his former slip labeled “T/T Spirit of Ulysses”. It can’t be a coincidence, can it? Hopefully he didn’t forget something…
 There has been a lot of discussion in the Mexico press of a “ladder” of marinas which would open up this region to more boating. Many of us who have lived in Mexico for years have had our doubts about if it would really happen or not. After seeing the new marina at Puerto Los Cabos, and now the new marina here in Puerto Vallarta, it is sinking in that Mexico is serious about encouraging nautical tourism. Very cool!
There is one minor annoyance though: While checking in at the harbor master’s office, the harbor master asked if I had been to see the Port Captain yet. I said “Huh? – I thought there was no need to do that anymore.” In the old days Mexico made all boats clear in and out of every port. This was a major pain in the tail, and made boating in Mexico miserable. I’ve read many articles saying this practice was abandoned last year, and in Cabo I’ve moved between Cabo, San Jose and La Paz freely. Apparently no one on the mainland agrees that the rules have changed. At the port captain’s office I asked again why I had to clear in and out of the marina. He said “It is the law.” The process was fast and painless, so it wasn’t a big deal, but it was a surprise. I get to do this at every marina as we move south. Argh.
Behind the marina is the town of La Cruz de Huanacaxtle. It’s a small little Mexican town, with dirt roads, that is going through enormous growth. It’s the same thing we’ve seen in Baja. American tourists are buying condos, homes and timeshares, at an amazing pace. In Cabo we actually have negative unemployment. I suspect the same may be true here. I spoke with a restaurant owner tonight who said that this town had perhaps 30 people when she moved here, and now there are new developments being built virtually everywhere on the beach. It’s an interesting little town. In some ways it still feels very much like a small mexico town, but there are obvious signs of growth, with all of the construction. We have found several excellent restaurants, and wish we had more time to stay here longer. It’s a great location, with Puerto Vallarta an easy drive in one direction, and Punta Mita just down the road the other direction. Our goal for the next few days is to drive around and explore all we can.
That’s it for this update. If you missed my prior update, and want to read it, you can find it at: http://www.nordhavn68.com/aspx/m/357395
Also: If you want to email me (at: kenw @ seanet.com) PLEASE do not include my own blog update. The internet is slow and often expensive here. Shorter is better….
Thank you!
-Ken Williams
Sans Souci,
www.Nordhavn68.com
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