Morelia

After visiting Guadalajara we took another 3.5 hr. bus ride to Morelia, another UNESCO Heritage Site. Most of the buildings date back to the 16th & 17th century. Here is one of the beautiful statues in the centre of a large park. In the background is the aquaduct that was built in the 1600`s.

Amongst the beautiful old buildings, the city remains busy with cars and tourists. Part of the old - a cowboy from the outlying ranch area, with his two horses and bags of goods for the city.

One of the beautiful courtyards in the interior of all the buildings. The arches are a common theme throughout.

Another area with incredible domes.

The main cathedral is the most significant part of the old town. It`s twin spires are visible from every direction. It covers a city block and took over 100 years to complete.

One of the remodeled hotels.

trip to Guadalajara

After many nights on the boat, we took a 5 day trip inland with our friends Bill and Janet from Optical Illusion. Here we are on a double decker bus doing a city tour.

Guadalajara is one of the UNESCO sights. This is one of several cathedrals.

This is the old university and cathedral. There is currently a debate about building sky scrapers down town. The cathedral is 65 metres high. As the city is preparing for the 2011 Panamerican games building will be erected up to 20 stories.

hanging out in Barra

Here is Steve and couple of his friends hanging out in Barra-de-navidad lagoon.

note Steve's new home made stabilizer

08/09 cruising expenditures

Expenses below are only related to boating.

---------------Nov 08-----Dec 08
provisions---264.83-------731.80
fuel----------122.00-------92.80
boat---------713.53-------------
Mic-----------50.00-------------
travel ins.----45.00--------45.00
boat insuran 208.00------208.00
entertainment 150.--------41.00
skype/cell
marina--------------------310.80

Total--------1553.36-----1429.40

07/08 crusing budget

Crusing expenses from the time we left in 07 until we hauled our boat in April 08

Total money spent for the season $14848.37, which puts us at an average of $1856.04/month.

Break down of the main expenditures as follows:

Boat -----1807.47-------12%
Fuel------1070.20-------7%
Moorage--3017.62------20%
entertain--1252.75------8.4%
Boat ins---2740.00------18.4%--yearly cost
Medical Ins 1135.50-----17.3%-- yearly cost

We will see how 08/09 cruising season works out.

Barra-de-Navidad- getting ready for Xmas 08

Following another boat into the lagoon. 3 boats went aground the day before. Narrow entrance and shallow bay - 8 to 12 feet of water.

Some of the boats in the lagoon. This year at Xmas there were 23, last year between 60 to 80. Finacial crisis hits us all. We are lucky to be here.

One of the many visitors in the bay

Santa comes to Barra for all good boys and girls. Don Julio if you have been nice. What a great way to spend Christmas. The cruisers had a Christmas party at the Sands Hotel - turkey, ham and all the trimmings. Over 50 people from boats in the lagoon came in for the festivities. What great fun it was. The Sands encourages cruisers to dingy in and use their pool and showers. Happy hour is from 2 - 6 so it is a hang out spot for all of us.

New Years Eve. We had leg of lamb and shrimp appys on Optical Illusion (Jackson`s boat). Played Mexican Train and managed against all odds to stay up to bring the New Year in. The Grande Bay Resort put on an excellent fire works display.

Steve and I are now off to enjoy the pool and have a cervesa. The very best of wishes to you all for 2009.

Tenacatita Bay Dec 15 to 21-08

Going on a jungle tour with 6 other boats, to Tenacatita

As you can see the mangro overgrow the river very fast. This is one of the areas that the panga`s do their jungle tour out of the Blue Bay resort.

Snake crocs and crabs are in the mangrov.

He is only about 2 ft. but they are there and hard to spot.

We came out of the swamp into Tenacatita, over the hill to the aquirium and there are canadians camped everywhere. We are with our friends, Janet and Bill jackson from White Rock.

San Carlos to Barra-de-Navidad

As you can see the weather was cool. The captain refused to wear jeans, but did admit that some long underwear was in order. The winds were about 20 - 23 kt for about 400 miles.

This is the nook that we anchored behind in Topolobombo after running about 200 miles. We were in here with a couple shrimp boats. It was very rolly, but we did get some rest and set off again in the morning heading directly to Mazatlan. The winds continued.

Here we are in Mazatlan at the El Cid Resort. It felt like coming home. We stayed for a week, had dinner at Fat Fish and did some provisioning before setting out again for Isla Isabella which was 85 miles, an easy overnight sail.

Fishing off Cabo Corrientas. Steve caught this guy. He thinks it weighed about 15 lbs. It gave him a good fight for 20 minutes. It was not great eating - the meat was dark red and quite dense.

We anchored in a small bay at Ipala. Kids were asking for donations for thier school, which we provided.

San Carlos -getting ready to go 2008

San Carlos Bay

Our boat is being shipped down the highway to the marina. We are riding along.

In an effort to provide a bit more insight from the co-captian of ourboat, I will try and add some info to the messages we send out.How are we doing? After a couple weeks of work on the boat we areboth feeling happy and are trying to relax now that we are in thewater. San Carlos is a nice little town, primarily owned by Americansout of Tuson. It is warm here - usually 80's in the day and 60's atnight and the sun shines every day. There are good restaurants, myfavorite is the Palapa on the beach where they serve fresh fish, Greekfood (yes Greek) and Mexican. We have gone a couple nights for dinnerand looked at the stars and listened to the surf.
Right now we are on a mooring ball in the bay. It is busy because ofthe fishermen. The Humbolt (Giant) squid are running right now andthere are Sienna and Tuna. There was a fellow just cleaning aboutten tuna on the dock (I'm doing laundry at the little restaurant).The wind picks up in the afternoon, but the mornings and evenings arecalm and beautiful.