The boats pictured above love the ocean when it is flat. Sailboats enjoy it too when in an anchorage, but generally prefer to have enough wind to sail, and that usually means waves. Glassy pond weather is predicted to continue until Monday, so guess what……

Bob, our weather router based in NZ says wait until Sunday or we will be bobbing around on the ocean like a cork. Actually, bobbing around on a windless ocean in a sailboat is nothing like a cork. Its awful. As one empathetic boat neighbour here in San Jose said “it destroys your soul”.

So we continue to work on small boat projects (these are endless), buy water from the Tienda across the street to keep the tanks full, and think wishfully about the possibility of wind in just the right amount showing up no later than Sunday.

We did however receive our certificate of insurance 2 days ago. While sharing hardship stories with the captain of a particularly beautiful 77 foot ketch earlier today, I discovered that they are also waiting for wind to sail to Hawaii and they are so far not able to obtain insurance cover for the leg from Hawaii to Alaska. The boat is clearly worth several million dollars or more so would be considered a “high value boat” that would bring a very handsome premium to the insurance broker. This is additional evidence that obtaining boat insurance is becoming seriously problematic.

We left La Paz as per plan V1.2 and overnighted in Caleta Lobos after a brisk upwind sail. Early the following morning we departed in wind free conditions and motored the entire distance to Los Muertos. After a comfortable night at anchor we left equally early for Los Frailes. The wind suddenly shifted to a less favourable direction but it was not uncomfortable in the anchorage. Another early start the next morning and a plan to arrive in San Jose del Cabo by noon, refuel, reprovision, sign the final version of our insurance papers and be ready for a departure to French Polynesia mid-day on Wednesday. But…

The wind piped up within an hour of leaving Frailes, from the SW, and was of course right on our nose. We motor sailed into 20 kts of wind (probably should have just sailed) and approached San Jose del Cabo around 3 PM. A small pod of humpbacks (probably a mother and child) greeted us and then accompanied us for the last 40 or so minutes prior to us dropping the sail outside of the marina. The boat was tied to the dock by about 5 PM and a quick inspection of our email account revealed that there were no insurance documents waiting for us. Sigh…..

We have been working on insurance renewal since January (our existing policy expires on 24 March) and the broker in NZ kept saying it is “too early”. What he didn’t say, but we learned from other brokers, is that the company insuring us last year can no longer insure Canadian boats. After becoming a bit more forceful regarding the importance of having insurance for the next year prior to our departure from Mexico we received an eye watering quote from the broker, but using a company different than our current provider. A US$1500 increase over last year’s premium and lots of additional and difficult requirements. The most difficult of which was “three blue water experienced crew to be on board for the duration of the voyage from Mexico to Tahiti”. Between the three of us we have more than 100 years of sailing experience and two of us (Peter and the captain) have sailed from Vancouver to Mexico more than 150 miles offshore. Preparation and execution of that voyage are similarly demanding compared to French Polynesia. I also argued that by 24 March, we would all have bluewater experience. We finally received a “binder” on Friday, 14 March. Further documents to follow early this coming week.

But, now there is no wind. Our weather router suggests that this coming Thursday is the best bet so our plan is to be ready by Wednesday, just in case. So we will be leaving (fingers crossed) 18 days later than originally planned, mostly because of insurance and now because of weather. We are eating all of the carefully acquired and stored provisions acquired in La Paz but fortunately, a large and good supermarket is only a 15 minute Uber ride away. We will replenish.

And the hot showers are nice too.

Our weather routher, Bob McDavitt, located in New Zealand now says Saturday (9 March) is the day! And it will be. We spent today fueling the boat and bringing the water maker back to life. The watermaker exercise went well but the fuel situation is not as good as it should be. The photo shows the gauge reading when the tank is actually full, as measured by filling the tank and noting the fuel in the top of the filler hose. Sigh…….

We are hoping to motor as little as possible because even when full, Marathon does not carry much fuel in her tank. So we will have 9 jerry cans of fuel on deck and in the aft lazarette. We will still need to be very careful with fuel. As someone said “why motor from one place with no wind to another place with no wind”?

Not Enough Wind

The weather router has told us to wait until 7 March in order to be sure that we sail away from Mexico rather than motor. We much prefer sailing to motoring so we are following his advice. This gives a few more days to finish unfinished projects, buy more provisions (particularly those that we are consuming while we wait) and polish our approach to sailing the boat over the roughly 30 days that it will take to reach the Marquesas.

“oops”

Most of the really big jobs are now done and we can start to fine tune “the plan”. As always, little problems come up from time to time and result in altered plans. The Gantt Chart tells us that after the standing rigging was replaced we would head out for several days of sailing to stretch the new wire so that it could then be retuned for a Pacific crossing. When attempting to put the headsail back up, I discovered the situation captured in the photo above. Most sailors, at least those with roller furling headsails will know that the gizmo that I am holding in my left hand should be above the shiny bulbous bit, not below it. The riggers reassembled the furling gear incorrectly. Fortunately, it was a relatively simple but time consuming fix to set things right. So we are still at the dock but will head out, maybe tomorrow, for some rig stretching sailing.

The big picture plan remains the same. We will depart La Paz on or about 3 March, depending on advice from our weather router based in New Zealand who may suggest a different date to take account of good, bad or both weather systems. We might stop in San Jose del Cabo to refuel (diesel and food) after a day or two of motoring and up to 3 days of eating. Then we point south and head for the equator, planning to find the spot where the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ) is thinnest. The ITCZ is full of nasty squalls with rain and fierce wind, or no wind. Finding the least worst way to cross it will be aided by our weather router. Roughly 30 days after our departure from Mexico we hope to arrive in the Marquesas.

We will spend roughly 2 weeks in the Marquesas before heading for the next logical island group, the Tuamotus. A month or so after arriving there we will head for Tahiti, and maybe Bora Bora. We will leave the boat somewhere and fly back to Canada on 18 June. This date is written in stone based on a 90 day visa on arrival and already purchased air tickets.

For those interested, we will add a link to our real “float plan”. Also, at the bottom of the “links” column on the right hand side of the page, is “Where is Marathon“. Clicking on that will provide our real world location which will be updated every 24h by a satellite connection. After reaching the Marquesas, it will be updated less frequently.

….can remind sailors very quickly that not everything about sailing is fun. And some of the worst jobs and outcomes seem to be associated with being “on the hard”. Even the festive atmosphere in Marina del Palmar, one of the Abaroa family yards, in which very loud mariachi music prevails all day, doesn’t make it much pleasanter. Marathon needed new bottom paint despite having been painted in the Bercovich yard only a year earlier. Hopefully this job will last longer given the expense and hassle involved.

The good news is that no blisters were discovered and the crew did a great job of sanding the bottom and applying two coats of new paint. The bad news is that it took five days, cost a lot of $$$ and we left the yard with a really filthy boat because of the very large mega-yacht that had all of its bottom paint removed right next to us. The black dust was into everything.

The captain was able to complete a number of jobs over the five days, perhaps the most important of which was cleaning and lubricating all 6 of the sheet winches. The first, second and third of these was actually interesting and provided a sense of accomplishment. By the time number 6 was done, it was just a chore.

Back in Marina Palmira, we have lots of interesting things to do and one last major project. The standing rigging will be replaced over the next several days because it is just over ten years old and insurance companies prefer that it be younger than that.

Flashy new blue bottom paint – Hopefully good for 2 years or 5000 miles?

We are days away from returning to La Paz to reset and resume our voyage to French Polynesia for 2019. Details soon!