March 6th (2009) – Tenacatita – Jim’s Blog #82

Current Location – Tenacatita – Lat: 19°17.87’ N / Long: 104°50.35’ W

Today, March 6th, marks the 500th day that Sheilagh and I have been “on vacation,” as one of our daughters put it. That’s closer to the truth than we’d like to admit because the economic situation is causing us both to reconsider “being retired.” We will be heading up to California in April to set up our condominium for our own use, and Sheilagh will be looking for work in the area of therapy for children – to help straighten them and their parents out before bad habits are firmly established.

I will be flying back to Mazatlan to stay with the boat during the month of May. Then in June two Navy buddies, Jim and Craig, will be flying down to help me take the boat north to San Diego. When we get there I am hoping to live as a kept husband, but I may have to be a Wal-Mart greeter or a McDonald's hamburger flipper to make up for the 50% of our retirement that has disappeared in the last year. The one bright note is that I did the math for our estimated tax next year, and we will be paying less than I used to pay over 35 years ago. I wonder how the economy will handle millions of baby-boomers like us who will no longer be supporting the government with high taxes as we have been doing for many years now.

We really like Tenacatita because it is a quiet bay away from any sort of urban life, with no reason to wear anything but a swimming suit all day. We took the boat up the river on what is called “the jungle ride” to get to the small town of Tenacatita, where we had lunch with Archie and Beverly of “Sea-Tacean,” John and Patricia of “Paloma,” and Louis, Frank and Boudreaux on “Cirque.” None of us saw anything other than birds and crabs; so it was a far cry from a real ride through a jungle. Nevertheless the mangroves get quite thick, casting cool shade and a mysterious sense of being in the middle of nature as we twist our dinghies through the narrow channel cut through the mangroves.

Coming back later in the day Sheilagh decided she wanted to get out of the boat at the beach and walk to the hotel down the beach to get on the internet. I advised her that we had groceries onboard and I needed her help to get back out through the surf safely. I even offered to bring her in again afterwards. Imagine my amazement when she hopped out of the boat, despite knowing that her actions involved mutiny, a maritime offense with a penalty calling for her to be hanged from the yardarm. She said she didn’t care, and how would I find any other crew to do the cooking and other crewing duties she currently does. I was trying to figure out where there is a yardarm on the boat to carry out the sentence as she walked away.

Then I had a heck of a time getting out through the surf on my own. There was a low tide at the time, and the water at the mouth of the river was too shallow to use the engine. So I hoisted the prop out of the water and relied on the oars to get over the shallow area. For several minutes I rowed toward the surf, being bumped up into the air when it passed under, and eventually there was sufficient depth to put the prop down and start the engine. I saw a slight break in the surf, moved to the back of the boat and tried to start the engine. Just as I got it started one of the oars fell overboard; so I had to back up toward the shore to fish it out. I grabbed the oar, flipped the transmission lever to “forward,” and the engine immediately died.

By then the boat had slewed around sideways to t he surf just as a sizable wave hit the dinghy and started to tip it over. The boat nearly flipped, until I leaned on the high side, preventing a capsize but spilling about six inches of water into the boat and into the bags of groceries. I jumped back to the rowing position, cursing the lack of a crew and sending a dark glance at Sheilagh who was now watching from the beach. It was then that I decided to use the boom as the yardarm for punishing her mutiny – that is if I ever let her get back onboard. I quickly rowed through several more lines of surf, got the engine started without losing an oar this time, and powered past the next few breakers. I bailed the boat out with a cut-down bleach bottle we keep in the boat for that purpose, as I motored back to the boat. When I got there, I dumped the salt water out of the grocery bags, wiped off the bread and chips bags, and left everything out to dry.

For the next hour I went through a number of thoughts as to how to punish my crew, then how to punish my crew without losing a cook and plumber in the process, and finally how to ignore the whole thing without losing my sense of control over my crew. After a beer and a nap I realized that I had never really had any control over my crew anyway; so I gave it up.

Two sets of close cruising friends (Jim and Susan of “Windward Bound” and Dave and Marsha of “Juniata”) came into the anchorage and we met another couple, Dave and Suzi of “Sidewinder” on the same day. We used the opportunity to host a cocktail party for all of them on our boat, which was a bit crowded in the cockpit. Most of the attendees brought their own drinks and snacks, along with books and movies to swap. It was a good mix of people and we had a great time swapping stories and ideas. The next day Juniata invited all of us over to their boat where we ate the fish that Dave had caught that morning. We were also entertained by Dave with his imitations of birds landing on various parts of the boat and taking the opportunity to relieve themselves in the process. He seems to have bird psychology and their thought processes down pat. Since “bird brains” are notoriously small, Dave may be giving more of his own thought processes away than he should.

On Thursday I spent the morning cleaning the green fringe from around the bottom of the boat, which is not an easy job. It’s easiest to do it in the water rather than leaning over the side of the dinghy, but it’s also pretty messy as the green stuff floats by and sticks to one’s suit and T-shirt. In the process my scraper dropped off my lanyard as I was using the brush, and I was unable to find it on the bottom, even though the bottom was only 16’ deep without any growth to hide it. I’ll have to try diving for it on a clearer day. In the afternoon I attacked the waves with my kayak with a newer technique I had developed earlier, and I found I was able to surf the larger waves quite easily, but I often got rolled over as the surf caught up to my kayak at the end. Now I have to figure out a way to handle that problem, but I did get a number of good rides and only got dumped about three times for the 15 rides I got.

We went back over to the town of Tenacatita on Friday, when the produce comes in every week, and got some great veggies and an essential case of beer. Thankfully Jim and Susan of “Windward Bound” followed us over there, because our outboard refused to start for the trip home. They gave us a tow through the mangroves all the way back to the anchorage area. Sheilagh and I were using oars to keep our dinghy from running into the mangrove branches on either side of the narrow channel. At the end of the river we unhitched and finished the trip by rowing through the shallow bar and out to the boat.

Dave of “Juniata” noticed we had been rowing and came by to see what our problem might be. We were exhausted and not ready to fix anything at that moment; so he suggested we check our spark plug when we had the chance. Right after a shower and a nap we replaced the spark plug and the engine started right up. A piece of metal had connected across the gap on the old spark plug; so it hadn’t been generating a spark. Now we have to decide if we want to carry a 5/16” wrench with us everywhere we go in order to be able to check the spark plug on the fly in a similar situation in the future. That’s why cruisers often carry more and more stuff in their dinghies.

On Friday we had the weekly Tenacatita raft-up of most of the cruisers in the anchorage. The leader sets an anchor and each dinghy ties sideways bow to bow and stern to stern of the dinghy that was tied in before. Eventually the circle is closed with all bows pointing to the center. At that time the boat cards (identifying the boats and owners) along with used books are passed around clockwise. We always pass on the romance novels but usually pick up a good action or spy novel, as we unload the books we have read. When that exercise is complete, the food that everyone brought is also passed around clockwise. As the food comes by it might be dessert, or an appetizer, or a side dish, or an entree depending on the order of the boats. On Friday we had some 20 dinghies; so it was critical to eat as the food was being passed around or else one’s plate would fill up and it would be necessary to pass on some very good dishes.

Everyone brings his or her own drinks, which means there is little sharing of beverages. After the dishes make it around the circle once, they are continued on if there is any food left on the plate. Often the great-looking dish from the dinghy on your left will be empty by the time it finally reaches you. But usually everyone gets plenty to eat and there is seldom anything left over. After eating we all take turns telling a bit about ourselves, our boats, and our intentions for the next couple of weeks. Several cruisers mentioned that they would be returning to the U.S. or Canada for the summer to get temporary jobs to replace some of the losses from their “cruising kitties” occasioned by the bleak economic situation to the north of us.

Since many have sold their homes, they have to find a place to stay while they work up north, if they aren’t ready to take their boats north with them. It's against the law to work in Mexico unless you get a permit, just as its unlawful to sell anything you own to someone else for cash or any other mode of payment. A couple of cruisers mentioned in a more private discussion that they can’t afford to live outside of Mexico for the near future, because their boat is all they have to live on and they can stretch their dollars much better down here. Thankfully we kept the condominium in San Diego; so we have a lot more flexibility.

Many non-cruisers have the belief that we cruisers are living the “good life,” but they aren’t seeing the whole picture. I think a lot of people never really pursue their dreams because they suspect they’ll find that dreams are a mixture of good and not-so-good experiences (as in daily life); so it is better to maintain an unreal vision of the dream and never find out that scum actually grows on the underside of the “dreamboat.”

More later . . .