El Fin de Mexico/Inicio de Belize

Mexico is now behind the Tortilla Flotilla.  Our last few days were spent on our personal island in Espirtu Santo.  We randomly stopped here one night tucked behind and island because the mono-haul in the Flotilla ran aground right off the reef.  When we woke up in the morning, we realized that we were 30 yards from an uninhabited sandy beach.  We spent the day gathering wood for a bonfire that night, did some exploring of the island, and even got in a good game of bocce (Meg and I lost by one to Team Salty Dog, who we were up 7-0 and lost our composure).  That night the bonfire was fun and we all drank some Franzia (which is cheap box wine they picked up in the Bahamas) and had some good laughs.  One of the Flotilla members, upon canoeing back to his boat at the end of the night stepped on a piece of glass (he claims it was a croc hiding and waiting for his fresh gringo meat) and cut his foot open pretty bad.  He probably should have gotten stitches, but decidedly against it and just to check it out in the morning.  Luckily Gualby has a certified nurse and pharmacist on board to clean and wrap his foot, and gave him antibiotics that only recently expired.

We waited in Espirtu Santo until we could get the best wind to make the jump to Belize.  We found that the best would be to leave late afternoon, and do an overnight passage.  I was a little nervous as I had only be on a true sail during the day, and not more than a few hours.  We decided on doing three hours on, three hours off, with Meg and I being one leg and Con and Penny the other.  I took the helm for a good portion of our shift and really got a feel for Gualby.  It wasn't that extremely hard after a while.  You just set up your line using the GPS then try to find a star ahead of you to keep your heading correct.  It did get a little harder when the star you were using disappeared behind a cloud and you had to go completely off the GPS (which lags a few seconds, making it hard to stay on point) or harder yet using the compass.  I think I did pretty well for my first overnight, at least that's what First Mate Meg said, but still need some work to be trusted by myself.  It was absolutely beautiful to see the sun rise right before we got relieved of our 4-7 am shift by Con and Pen.  Just seeing the sky slowly turn from black to pink to an almost blood-orange, right before the sun topped the horizon, was simply awe-inspiring. 

We made it into Belize water at about noon and headed for our destination of San Pedro on Ambergris Cay.  It is a small town that has some great restaurants and some really cool bars.  It is a bit touristy, but the people and the overall vibe of the area make it my favorite spot so far.  Here are some of the pics from the end of Mexico.

Meg and I being idiots in Cozemel

Saw him walking out of the store..I'm gonna see it to Coke

Crazy mangrove in the middle of a canal

Really cool house in Punta Allen

House made of an old Modelo boat that the guy had up on cinder blocks

No they are not dead, just three bros taking a siesta

Crazy croc we found waiting in a panga boat after leaving town

Beach view of Mayan ruins in Tulum

Mayan temple shot from the coast

Great shot of Salty Dog from shore

More Ruins

Shot of coast from Mayan ruin in Tulum

Mexico Cruise

Alright, Alright.  I know I was one of the many people, before becoming a crew member, who thought that all Gualby did was cruise around and just decided not to blog about it or post any pictures.  I now am completely on their side.  It is sometimes extremely frustrating being detached from the rest of the world.  We haven’t been able to pick up ANY internet since leaving Isla Mujeres, which includes stops in Cozumel, Tulum, and our current port in Punta Allen.  There is a small room in the back of one of the supermarkets here where you can pay 30 pesos for an hour of internet.  Meg and I did this the other day just to check e-mail and look at pics of our new niece Maren.  We had to share the room with two young hippies that didn’t smell top notch and smoked cigarettes the whole time and talked loudly in what I believe was French.  This is not an ideal atmosphere for web surfing.  Anyway, this intro isn’t an excuse, it is just an explanation to anyone who thought I would be posting every few days how difficult it is to get internet for more than a few minutes a day.  Now back to the voyage.

We left Isla Mujeres early morning for the 40 mile sail to Cozumel.  We had decent winds coming from the SE, but unfortunately we had to run the motors all day because of being caught in a nasty 3-5 knot current.  Once I looked out a porthole and would have guessed we were doing at least 8-9 knots, but found out that the current was letting us do only about 3.5.  Long story short, it took way longer to get to Cozumel and we didn’t get there until after dark.  Cozumel was cool and a lot cleaner than Isla Mujeres.  One downfall was how Americanized it was.  For an few example: people coming from the airport, only about a mile from where we were docked, came into town in taxis or drove their Audis that they kept on the island, and headed straight for the gigantic two story International Diamond Exchange.  It also felt less authentic due to the fact that there was a Ron Jon Surf Shop, a Fat Tuesdays, a McDonalds, Burger King, and even a Taco Bell.  Don’t get me wrong, I love Taco Bell, but they can’t hold up to a good street taco at half the price, which I unfortunately didn’t see one vendor while exploring the town.

One very interesting thing that occurred happened when we were just hanging out on the boat with the rest of the Flotilla.  There was only one other boat docked in the same bay as us and we saw them dingy into town.  They seemed like a nice American couple in their 50s and waved nicely as they went by.  After a while they returned to their boat, but instead of taking a straight line to their boat, they looped around the Flotilla, which we found very unusual.  We began to notice a large group of Mexicans gathering on the shore right in front of our boats.  We didn’t think anything of it at first, but then the husband of the couple took his dingy into shore to meet them.  At first we thought maybe he was getting some workers to help with a house he owned somewhere on the island or mainland.  However, he came out with a dingy full of half adults and half kids, leaving the others waiting on shore.  Within 10 minutes after returning to his boat, they had anchors pulled and were heading out of the bay.  Although unlikely, we came to the conclusion that this lovely middle-aged couple might be people runners, bringing children out of Mexico one boatload at a time. 

Upon leaving Cozumel, we didn’t get the most favorable winds and again had to motor almost the entire time to get to Tulum.  On the way there, Con and Meg hooked a HUGE Black Grouper, which was on the outskirts of a fish sanctuary so we couldn’t keep it.  When we arrived we had to maneuver through a reef surrounding the area, which made it hard to get past the breakers, but we managed.  There was some great snorkeling in the area, but unfortunately we couldn’t find any conch or lobster.  One of the main reason for the Tulum stop was another Mayan ruin right on the coast.  These ruins were a lot cooler than Chichen Itza.  It was smaller, but didn’t have all the street vendors that we met before.  We got there very early and were the first few people allowed in the park.  It was a great experience and we had almost the entire place to ourselves before the tour busses came in.  I liked it better than Chichen Itza because we had more access to some of the ruins, and with it being on the coast, we were able to walk along the beach and get some great pictures (below).

After Tulum we headed Punta Allen, a small bay with a cool small town closer to our checkout point further south.  To represent how small the town is, all the roads were sand with small bungalows lining the streets and a speed limit of 10km/hr.  In order to regulate the posted speed limit, speed bumps made of thick rope laid across the road.  Also every day the entire town is cut off from electricity from 3:00-5:30, which made it difficult when we tried to get online the other day.  You might think that these setbacks would make this port a boring and frustrating one.  However, this has been my favorite one so far.  While hanging out in town, just exploring the area, the atmosphere was unbelievably quiet and peaceful.  The random passer-by would happily smile with a “Hola, Que paso,” which we would kindly respond the same.  Surrounding the town, and most of the area, were mangroves spanning deep inland.  One day we decided to explore them and found some extraordinary canals all through the mangroves, with some only a few feet wide.  That, however didn’t stop local panga boats (which are 20ish feet long a only a few feet wide with a high bow and a crazy local steering the 40 or 50 hp outboard at the back; a large motor canoe) from flying through the mangroves with little notice of who is coming right at them.  We almost took one head on until we started screaming and Meg raised her paddle high in the air so it could be seen over his bow.  I am now posting this from a restaurant in town, and upon walking into town we found a 9 ft croc sitting in one of the panga boats.  We initially thought that someone killed it and brought it aboard their boat.  It wasn’t moving until we got a little closer and got a good hiss from the croc in response.  We were told that there weren’t any crocs in the mangroves but this definitely proved to be false.  This is probably the last Mexico post..Next stop Belize.  Will post pics, about to loose battery.

-Mike

First Impressions

I made it!  Arrived in Cancun Thursday evening to be greeted by many taxi drivers that REALLY wanted me to use their services.   I chose one and told them I needed to go to the car ferry in Punta Sam.  They began shaking their heads and talking mucho rapido to each other.  Finally after talking to someone who actually spoke some English (my Spanish is a little rusty), he told the driver where I needed to go, and the driver nodded as if he actually knew.  After waiting around for a while, I got in a van with seven others and a few babies (the babies sat in the front seat in their mothers laps with no seatbelts..they were more than a little nervous).  We started to drive through Cancun, and one by one, the other travelers got off at their respected resorts.  After about a half hour of this, I was alone with the driver heading to meet with Meg and Con.  I got dropped off at the ferry and began to look around for them.  After some back and forth emails, I found out that I wasn’t at the right ferry, and wasn’t even in Punta Sam.  So I had to get another taxi and another half hour drive before I finally met them.  We took the ferry back to Isla Mujeres and then took dingy back out to the boat.  

The first full day was incredible.  We decided to do a little fun cruising in the bay between Isla Mujeres and the mainland with the crew of one of the other boats in our flotilla, Bryan and Angie.  I began to learn the lingo, names, and locations of some of the equipment on the boat.  I was taught, although it will take a while for me to do it by myself, how to raise the front sail (named Code-Zero), jib, and main sail, and how to switch the jib in order to tack.  I spent a good portion of the trip at the helm just getting a feel for Gualby.  I quickly realized that sailing is so much more involved than people think.  Trying to keep the sails full, adjusting for which way the wind was blowing, and trying to look around the Code-Zero to make sure I didn’t hit any other boats or run aground was a hard task for someone who has only sailed once (It was during summer camp on a lake with no wind on a nine foot wooden POS).  After a little while, I began to get a hang of it and got her up to about 7.5 knots (for those of you who don’t know that’s ­­­8.6 mph, and it’s pretty fast for a catamaran to go).  It was a great first full day, full of laughs, beers, and me looking like a lobster at the end of it (forgot to put on sunscreen).

The next day we hung out, went to town and got supplies to make tamales and some other things needed.  People think it’s easy to go the store to get ingredients, right?  Well, when you have to dingy into shore, dock, walk to the market, figure out what the hell you are actually buying by looking at the label (hoping you’re right), and then returning, it took about four hours.  It was well worth it to eat the plethora of tamales that were made. 

Sunday we decided to splurge and rent a taxi for the day and go see the Mayan ruin Chichen Itza (2012 is right around the corner!).  It is “supposedly” the most spiritual location in North America, but when we got there, after having to pay over double what we were told to get in, it seemed more like a Mexican Disney World.  All I saw were foreigners hustling around, staff trying to herd people into groups to take on paid tours, and street venders lining both sides of the walk way trying to entice us to by something by saying, “One dollar! Everything one dollar!” I soon found out that nothing is a dollar, and he’s full of crap.  After we began to walk around, we realized how unbelievably HUGE this place really was, and advanced the Mayans really were.  Our tour guide, who introduced himself as Tony ‘Bologna Macaroni Pepperoni’, told us that it takes about two hours to walk through it all.  It took us two and a half at a quick pace and we didn’t even see all of it.  It wasn’t as spiritual as I would have hoped (we weren’t even allowed in any of the temples), but it was awe-inspiring just to think of a civilization that old creating their temples and statues on such a vast scale.  After Chichen Itza, we stopped at a nearby cenote (sort of a huge fresh water hole) for a quick swim and headed back to Isla Mujeres.  I loved the cenote, as I had yet to shower, and relaxing in the fresh, cold, clean water was good enough for me.  We got back to Gualby exhausted and all were in bed by nine that night. 

Sorry if this is long but I’ve been typing it for days and this is the first chance I have had to get internet.  In the future, hopefully it will be better and the posts more frequent and shorter, so hopefully you had the will and time to read this far and get this info.  Here are some pics so far.  I’m planning on posting them all on facebook, so just look there if you’re not much of a reader.

-Mike

Penny and I at the helm

Pumping drinking water.  You appreciate it more when it takes 45 min to fill a liter

Sunset in Isla Mujeres

Meg and I at Chichen Itza

Looking down on cenote

In town in Isla Mujeres

Gualby and the Crew

Welcome to my blog!  For those of you that don't know, I am leaving to join my sister,Meghan, her husband, Conor, and their great dog Pennylane on their catamaran Gualby (don't ask what the name means.  It was already named that when they got it and even after research, the origin was never found).  I am planning on leaving tomorrow 2/17 on a one-way flight to Cancun, then taking a ferry to their boat anchored on the coast. 

Some of you might be asking yourselves, "Why the hell is he doing this?" My answer is simple: Why the hell wouldn't I be doing this!?  This is once in a lifetime opportunity that I don't intend to pass up.  Life has been tough for a while, and having a change of pace is just what my body and mind needs to reboot and figure out where I am in life, and where I want go.

I was writing this post just to see how it looked and to give a little intro.  I'm planning on posting as much as I can, but with limited internet access it might be difficult, so check back often.  Time to go finish packing my backpack that is the size of me.
-Mike
p.s.-Here are some photos if you haven't seen Gualby or the crew before (Some might have seen them...I stole from Meg and Con's blog):

Gualby when it was first discovered

No sails yet, but still sea worthy

Finish product

Fearless crew: Meg and Con

Penny on the lookout