April 29, 2012
This morning I was up at 5:00 am. I made and ate breakfast and prepared the
Deanna B to go to sea. I hauled up the anchor at 6:00 am and
headed out. All the weather forecasts called for northwest winds.
When I was about 2 nm off shore I sent Deanna a spot message so that
she would know that I had left the bay and was heading out to sea. I
was under sail with a NW wind and was making 7 knots. My chart
plotter gave my estimated time to Mazatlan as 27 hrs. Things were
going great. Then the wind changed to the southeast. I slowed to
nearly a stand still. I started the engine and motored. The best I
could do was to get the wind to 20 to 30 degrees off my bow. The
headsail came down because it was just slowing me down. All the
forecasts had called for NW winds. The course was 105 degrees.
Should I set a course to the NE and wait for the forecasted winds to
change and allow me to sail back south to Mazatlan? The winds
increased to 15 to 20 knots but continued to blow from 125 to 135
degrees. By 12:00 noon I was down to 4.5 knots and the chart plotter
was now giving my time to Mazatlan as 40hrs. That is disappointing
when you sail for 6 hrs and your ETA has increased
by 13 hrs. As the wind increased, I set the mainsail just right
and by motoring at 2200 rpm I was able to get the speed back up to nearly
6 knots. This made me feel a little better but with the increase in
wind speeds the seas grew as time went on and that did drop my speed
again. As it got dark the winds did drop and with them the seas. I
motored on with the winds still coming from the same direction and at that point I was cursing
all the weather forecasters in the world.
April 30, 2012
By daylight the winds had shifted another 10 degrees to the south. I
was still motor sailing at the same rpm but I was able to get the
headsail back up and my speed back up to 6.5 to 7 knots. By 12:00 I
was only 20 nm from Mazatlan and passing through fog banks. When I left
the Baha I was able to see the mountains until I was nearly
50 nm off shore because of the clear dry air. I was now unable to see the
coast near Mazatlan until I was less than 10 nm of shore. Back into
the high humidity!
When I arrived at Mazatlan at 3:30 pm the channel
into the marina had been closed because of the size of the waves at
the mouth of the channel caused by 36 hrs of SE winds. This forced me
to motor 5 nm south to Stone Island to find a rough anchorage for the
night. The waves were breaking and big enough to surf on .. around the point and the islandenough, but by coming straight in between them on large but
not breaking rollers I was able to anchor. I ran out 150 ft. of
anchor chain even though I was only anchored in 20 ft. of water. I
was not taking any chances of dragging onto the beach behind me.
There was one other boat anchored in the same area. I was very tired
but I sent Deanna a spot message and then called her to let her know
why I hadn’t gone into the marina. I was able to heat some soup on
the stove even though the boat was rocking at a pretty good rate. As I sat in
the cockpit eating my soup I watched some fishermen setting their nets
seaward of me and I wondered how they expected them to stay there in
these seas. By 7:00 I was in my bunk and sound asleep. After 38 hrs
with only 45 minutes of sleep it is very easy to go to sleep.
May 1, 2012
When I woke up at 7:00 this morning both boats were gift wrapped in
those damn fishing nets. The fishermen were working at unraveling the
mess. The other boat was free first and it was of out of the bay and
heading back towards the channel into the marinas. 30 minutes later I
was free and following. When we arrived at the channel there were
still large seas running into the mouth. It was interesting looking
up at the number of people on the cliffs above.. with their cameras, and
watching to see if the sailboats would be successful surfing into the
narrow channel without winding up on the rocks.... and we were
successful!
Deanna B did turn slightly to port as the wave picked her
up from the rear but I was able to straighten her out again in time to
make the channel. Surfing into a narrow channel on big seas is
something that I do not enjoy doing. Later I was talking to a sailor
who was waiting to go out through the channel and he said that after
watching us coming in he decided to wait another day before attempting
to leave. After tying up at my slip I had a very appreciated shower
and breakfast at Gus y Gus restaurant. My plans are to spend 2 days
getting Deanna B ready to leave for 3 months and then drive home to
Patzcuaro on Friday. The happy end to another successful voyage.
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