Ruminations of a Sailor: A Change in Plans, with a Twist of Lemon

The Virgen de Guadalupe
is omnipresent, guarding us all;
this was at the entrance to
yesterday's lunch at
Super Burrito, signaling it
was OK for us to depart

As the saying goes about life handing you lemons, let’s just say we made some lemonade this winter.

In February, our inaugural journey from Guaymas direct to La Paz was not the smoothest we’ve had but you get what you get once you leave the dock, even when you check every source for wind, water and weather conditions on your path. We were anxious to get out on the water, away from the dock and start exploring. In that vein, we put up with some unpleasant moments as we made our way south.

Bike and hike to the vista with Trisha! Great view

While en route, we noticed our rigging was suffering from the bashing and immediately scheduled Luis the rigger in La Paz to inspect our rigging. The prognosis? The rigging itself was fine but the support structures of both of our masts (main and mizzen as we are a ketch rig) was compromised and needed what we’ll call ‘immediate attention’. That lead to Arturo and Carlos coming on board to inspect the supports and issue a report. The news wasn’t good. As you might imagine, safe rigging on a sailing vessel is right up there, at the top of the “features” of importance.

Beautiful La Paz harbor facing north

These guys are good at what they do, and of course they were very busy at that juncture. We got on their waiting list which dragged from three weeks into four. Patience was running low and we were making decisions to limp our way north back to Guaymas where our local vendors – the ones who had just built our dodger – agreed they could do the work. Once we declared our intent to cancel the work in La Paz, the local crew suddenly became available and thus we extended our stay in La Paz for a second month.

View from our front window

"Senor Bullhorn" barked names of the next patient

We rented an apartment for 30 days, on the high end of the estimated time of completion, which is directly across the street from the IMSS Urgencias – Social Security/Medicare urgent care facility for this region. It’s a busy place pretty much all day and night and thankfully, the ambulances almost always turned their sirens off on our block. Anxious, waiting families dotted the area at all hours, making this a truly humbling place to reside. You might ask why we picked that apartment – but that’s a story in itself, and as with many of our stories, better told over a beer to share the humor of it all.

Arturo & Carlos inspecting,
view from the cockpit

For those who dare or care, here are the photos of the project. The structure was in our galley, blocking access to the forward berth and the bathroom/head as well. The whole process was pretty amazing.

Building layers of fiberglass posts

The new support posts for the mizzen
mast, installed in the engine room

Ouch! Compromised old steel supports removed,
not so great for holding up our 55' main mast

Setup for hoisting and
holding the rigging

A welcome sight - Sergio
tuning our rigging, post-project

Expensive new sculptures?
How about 2 sets of new fiberglass
compression post bases, ready to install

The apartment was a lovely 2-bedroom setup, with washer and dryer, a land-based shower (meaning big flow with plenty of hot water) and a flushing toilet. Hey, as boaters know, those are game changers. Bigger than our floating home on the river in Portland, we settled into a meagerly outfitted kitchen and made it our own. The 25 minute walk to the marina to check on boat repairs offered plenty of interesting routes which we traversed daily.

Celebrating our move
back on board, with
incredible
Chateaubriand

Since we were ‘stuck’ in paradise for this extended period, and Mike’s L knee was bothering him – extensive kneeling with installation of the windlass, inverter and ongoing engine room projects – we thought of the orthopedic surgeon who inspected my back two years ago with the cyst issue. (Side note, that cyst remains although it shrunk and I am so glad I didn’t have invasive back surgery.)

Mike had arthroscopic knee surgery on March 7^th. All went smoothly with Dr. de la Toba (ortho) and Dr. Perla (physical therapy) and Mike just completed his weeks of physical therapy. He’s doing great! Rafael and the PT crew were helpful and challenged his repair capabilities, in a good way.

We moved back on board on Tuesday 4/26 and watched as they finished the job. Our rental was up and we needed to move. That day, Arturo and Carlos completed the repair work, which entailed several steps: removed the inside setup they installed to lift the masts and access the repair areas, built new structures from layers of fiberglass, reinstalled the two large sections of floor they removed and cleaned up the fiberglass residue as much as possible. We had the rigging tuned, all good. We also had our jib repaired and Mike put that up yesterday in the light morning breeze.

We are ready to depart La Paz and have an expedited trip north to Guaymas, Sonora, once again crossing the Sea of Cortez to store Pura Vida in the yard and head back to work in Portland by early June.

There are many amazing murals throughout La Paz

Happily afloat on arrival in La Paz. Nice dodger!

Trimming bouganvilla in the hot afternoon sun

Statuary in el centro, La Paz

Spring flowers abound

While this wasn’t what we’d expected from our ‘winter getaway’ we can’t say enough how thankful we are for everything. We have been blessed with professional repair staff, friends who we visited with on their way through town, the many nice people at the marina and places we visited, all within walking or a short Didi/Uber ride away. As time went on, Mike could join in the walking, dropping one then the second crutch as PT strengthened his leg.

We experienced so much more about Mexican culture and local traditions by living in a busy neighborhood and becoming part of their community. These weeks brought us closer to the realities the locals face.