Journal Entry – December 16, 2004 – 22°05N 106°25W, 0610

Author: Scott and Pam

My second three hour watch is coming to an end. I just saw the first two boats we’ve seen in more than 24 hours. One appeared lit up like a Christmas tree, the other seemed to have almost no lights at all. I wonder where they are going? Here today, gone tomorrow would be an appropriate description of the wind. After our excellent day of sailing on Tuesday, we have had virtually no wind since early yesterday morning. It seems to be picking up and hopefully we can get back to sailing. We are now about 110 miles from Puerto Vallarta. We will. decide later today whether to stop at Isla Isabela for the night. We have too far to go to arrive during the day tomorrow, so we will come up with a plan for an early in the day arrival on Saturday. Scott woke up yesterday with a head cold, fortunately he doesn’t feel too badly. I started to teach him how to play cribbage. I look forward to playing again, it brings back fond memories of playing with my family. Fish report, the statistics of flying fish have increased on this trip. We found a fish in the cockpit yesterday morning. I may have heard him land in the night, but I am not sure. If he did come in for a landing while I was sitting in the companionway, he missed hitting me in the head by a few feet. I really hope that doesn’t happen. Minutes after Scott (I have decided it his job) threw that guy over, I came back out into the cockpit and could now smell fish. I looked on the portside catwalk to discover another one had just landed. There was also fish innards hanging from a reefing line, the fish was on the dog house. It really is pretty yucky, we decided we now need a daily dead fish patrol. It is time for my next nap and to listen to and check in on the Amigo Net on the SSB radio at 0700. Will today bring some wind?

Scott here, I am now on watch and taking over Pam’s journal entry. We have 25 miles to go until we reach Isla Isabela or we will fall off to a nice beam reach to PV. The wind has picked up (9 knots) and we may have a nice sailing day. When Pam wakes up (1030) we will make our decision on the itinerary. Good news, we were able to check in on the Amigo Net this morning with a strong signal. We have been plagued by faint transmission, but nothing that a manual and some fidgeting with the SSB radio couldn’t solve. I am feeling rather punky today, I hope this cold passes quickly, but at least it is just a nuisance and not debilitating.

Now it is 2200 and we made the decision to sail to Isla Isabela (20°50N 105°53W) and it turned out to be a great plan. We arrived at the island around 1430. There are two choices of anchorages here, on the south side near the bird observatory (Pam was not interested in anchoring anywhere near thousands of bird nests), and there is an anchorage on the east side near two giant rock spires that tower over 150’ tall. I guess we are building a reputation among the other cruising boats. As we pulled into the other anchorage there was another boat anchored and they quickly deployed their dinghy and drove over to say hello. It turned out to be Jerry from Po-oino Roa, and he was eager to give us tips on the best place to anchor. After anchoring Jerry confessed that when they saw us pull around the corner, Kathy was taking a shower in the cockpit and was naked. Jerry quickly grabbed the binoculars as said “no need to worry honey it’s just Tournesol and they are not going to see you”. We invited Jerry and Kathy over for a cocktail and snacks and agreed to meet in about an hour.

Once we were safely anchored and tidy, Pam and I jumped into the beautiful blue water for a swim, Pam got to try out her new lycra dive-skin. The water was a warm 82 degrees and crystal clear. Although we were anchored in sand, this was our first anchorage with coral and rocks and our boat sat over a coral head, but we still had at least 10’ of clearance. You could also hear our anchor chair rubbing on rocks somewhere near the anchor. After our swim we prepared for company. We did not have much in the way of appetizers, but we managed to put out nuts, cheese and crackers. Kathy and Jerry came over and we talked about our respective trips and where we were going next. Kathy brought fresh jicama in lime juice and canned sausages cooked in teriyaki sauce. They also brought us some of the fresh fish they had caught while staying at Isla Isabela. We can’t remember what kind it was, but it was a treat cooked on the BBQ. We finished our nice evening off by watching “Big” and getting a pretty good night’s sleep (we were both up several times checking on the anchor and our position).