Yelapa Video

Yelapa, Whales and Christmas

Hola,
We decided to take a tour of Banderas Bay, stopping in at Yelapa, the Tres Marietas, and on back to La Cruz from Puerto Vallarta.  We heard great things about Yelapa, so we were looking forward to seeing it.  It's a small inlet on the south side of Banderas Bay, apparently discovered by hippies many moons ago.  Now, it's still a quaint village, no roads go there so only boats take tourists to visit.  It is quite beautiful, yet the Mexicans who live there are dependent on the tourist dollars and it is aimed in that direction.  As in many towns here, there are folks selling jewelry, hats, food, horseback rides, fishing trips, and much more.  We enjoyed our time here, yet the 100 peso cost for a one way 50 yd. trip to our boat was a bit unsettling.  So, after one night, we decided to go visit the Tres Marietas, a national reserve of several small islands off of Punta Mita. 
  There is no access to these islands, you can snorkel, dive, kayak and sight see, but no landing.  They remind me of Santa Barbara island off California.  We motored around them, seeing many whales, some breaching and others with their tails so high out of the water it seemed odd.  Very fun to see though. 
   We ended up back in La Cruz marina, with many new arrivals.  It's like old home week, many folks from Long Beach, LA, and Seal Beach.  Today we took a bus to Sayulita, a surf beach on the ocean side nearby.  It was another fun excursion, yet filled with tourists, hippies, and locals selling their wares to anyone and everyone.  I am a bit tired of trying to eat and saying no gracias every 2 minutes.  Blankets, tee shirts, bracelets, silver jewelry, hats, fortune tellers, surf lessons, fishing tours, stuffed animals, dresses, scarves... ok you get the picture.  I feel rude, yet you can't look at them or they'll come over to you.  The economy is not great here, but they're doing ok for the most part.  Lots of new cars, laundrys, shopping malls, and many Yanks to help out with donations for the needy.


For 40 pesos even you can have a new friend!




Lovely sunset... getting redundant




Quite different from La Cruz, only a two hour sail away.

    Tonight, we saw a movie in our marina with other cruisers, "The Santa Clause", sure we've seen it many times before yet here it brought the Christmas spirit home a bit.  It was fun to see it in an outdoor amphitheatre with popcorn, snacks, wine and beer.  Not like the states there...  We all brought our boat cushions, fleeces and pesos for the popcorn.  Leif and I are not doing too much for Christmas this year, as this trip is our present to each other.  There are several events around the area to join in with, we'll see what we feel like doing.  Feliz Navidad

Cocodrilos, or Crocodiles

Finally, two missions accomplished in two days!  We chose to walk home instead of taking the bus, and when looking over a bridge which passed over the inlet to the marina, we saw our first cocodrilo, or crocodile.  He/she was only about 5' long, but definitely heard our shouts of joy at seeing him, as he quickly ran to the water and swam off.  Cool.

La Cruz to Puerto Vallarta, Whales!

Finally, on our way from the anchorage in La Cruz to Marina Vallarta we saw several pods of whales!  I noticed groups of boats gathered together and they didn't appear to be fishing boats, so out came the bino's.  Sure enough, there were huge humps appearing and disappearing near them.  I totally forgot to yell "thar she blows", as I had been so adamant that I would when I saw them.  We slowly circled around behind the boats and stayed a long distance from the pod, while trying to take pictures, tough on a rolling vessel with a high power lens.  I had just previously attended a seminar given by the local institute on how to behave when near whales in a boat, so we knew to stay at least 80 meters off, and behind them.  They are trying to educate the local tourist industry which gives whale watching tours, and they have rules which only allow one boat at a time to be 30 meters from the pod, all others must be at least 60.  Next year the distances increase.  These are humpback whales, although apparently blues do enter the bay as well, not as frequently.  They are keeping a basic count of them over the years and the numbers are increasing slowly. 
   We are in Puerto Vallarta, due to getting some chores accomplished.  Yesterday we went to Walmart for some supplies, and today we have a long list of required check-ins and check outs, with the marina first, then the port captain.  Of course the port captain isn't near our port, it's a bus ride away near the ship terminal.  Then on to find a shipping company for some mail to the states. 
   We've been riding the local buses, which are owned by the individual drivers who decorate them according to their taste.  Most are rather religious, as the Catholics are the dominant group here.  It feels like being in a shrine when riding on them.  But very blessed!  Which is necessary as they drive sooo fast!  The locals are busy getting ready for Christmas, and shopping is much like at home, perhaps a bit less chaotic.  There is a definite gap between the haves and have nots here.  We have been donating to some of the charities, but it is a constant stream of requests. Then, on our gangway there are several LARGE yachts which take out the rico Mexicanos for day rides and whale watching.  They have boat crews to clean, cook, and do maintenance, much like Newport Beach.  I feel more like the locals as I scrub the Honcho, do the cooking, and help sail.  Well, off to town once again, hopefully the last for awhile. 

   We are spending this week in and around the bay at several different places, Yalapa, Los Arcos, the Tres Marietas, then back to La Cruz for Christmas.   

La Cruz, still

We tried to get away, really we did.  However, we are still anchored off La Cruz, and enjoying ourselves by visiting friends and getting DVD's downloaded.  We were planning on sailing to Yelapa, across the bay, then on to Ipala and then Tenecatita.  This is still our eventual plan, but things happen and plans change.  We found a gentleman who downloads movies onto hard drives so we thought, great, we could use some more movies.  This sounded easy, and it was, just time consuming, as we drove with him to his beautiful home in Bucerias, just down the road.  He has a couple of acres of all sorts of fruit trees, pineapple plants and other tropical vegetation.  Ever heard of a "yaca"?  Well he has two trees.  Not yucca.  I thought of Mary B. and her garden when I saw his.
  Then, my kindle which has been a wonderful asset, decided to die.  So, after several calls to service dept., it will get replaced and hopefully mailed somewhere down here.  The mail here isn't overly reliable, so we'll see.  Then our friends in Panama invited us for New Year's, and that sounds fun, a vacation from our vacation!  We're hoping to join them, now need to figure out details on that one.  Gosh retirement is busy.
   The Honcho has been reliable, we cleaned the waterline yesterday, trying to keep us looking ship shape.  We also met some folks on a nearby boat who know our former dock mates on the Eyoni.  It's so fun to strike up a conversation and find out where, when, what, about people.  Everyone has a story worth listening to, and most are amazing.  It's incredible to me how many people are down her doing this cruising thing and have either retired young or just left. 
  

Paradise Village, Nuevo Vallarta

Ok, so, there are supposed to be crocodiles here.  There are these signs on the gangways and posted on the islands across from our boat like the yellow warning signs at home warning you to slow down it's a school zone, except there's a crocodile on it.  I haven't seen hide nor hair of one, so we took a cruise today on our 9' rubber dinghy to find them.  Smart.  We motored for 3 hours and didn't see a sign of one, looking dutifully under all of the mangroves along the side of the river.  NEVER saw a one.  Thank heavens, as it turns out.  We did see a cool green iguana about 3' long swim across in front of us, thought it was a croc.  Apparently, the crocs that are here? are about 12' long full grown, and leap out at you.  And, they have eaten people within the last few years so frequently that it doesn't make the news.  So, I look carefully as I walk to the showers and down the gangways. 
  We are headed towards Tenecatita hopefully tomorrow, weather permitting.  If it looks rough, we will stay a night or two at La Cruz anchored out until it looks good to sail around Cabo Corrientes, the local point Conception; it's where the weather changes here in Mexico.
  We have met some great people here in Nuevo Vallarta, who own a Davidson 44 named Io,  formerly Shockwave.  Our friends Dave and Jan own Pendragon II, also a Davidson 44.  Fun to see the changes on each boat.  The world is a small place.  We had a delicious dinner on Io, and celebrated Bobbie's birthday, then went home to decide on tomorrow's voyage.  I hear there are more crocs down in Ixtapa, gotta go see if it's real.

Leaving La Cruz

We decided to finally leave La Cruz, as I have to find a lab for some tests, and a pharmacy.  This could have been accomplished nearby, but we were growing roots and truly enjoying La Cruz way too much.  It's a place that at first sight doesn't seem like much, there's the marina, and a small village, or town, and school.  Not much really.  Yet, we met so many people, like our dockside neighbors, Jane and Jerry, originally from Sacramento, now living on their boat in La Cruz for 6 months and then in a motor home for the rest of the time.  Great people, easy going and full of friendly and helpful advice on where to get fresh tortillas, the free yoga class each day and great food at...  Then there's the other yatistas, who are an assorted bunch, from those who live here and have sailboats for fun; or those who are cruising like us and are headed south this year as it's unusually cold here.  Everyone is mentioning the weather and how it's chilly, have to wear fleece at night, sometimes.
  One cool thing we finally did was to blow up the dinghy and motor around the point to where we noticed a private beach.  We spent some time snorkeling finally, even though the water wasn't overly clear, it was great to be in the water with the fish and sea turtles.  I saw some turtles on the way, but none while snorkeling.  We did see an iguana there, rather fun.  It was our first time using the dinghy wheels, and landing in surf, small surf, but surf none the less.
 We ate our final lunch at AnaBanana's a palapa that used to be bay front before the marina was built.  They now have a 10' X 10' tarp with a picture of what it used to look like stuck in the sand looking out towards the marina, rather sad, yet funny.  While eating, we perused the multitudes of yacht names and people who had signed their wall, and surprise surprise, there was MATADOR, and Craig and Liz, 2006, big as life written right in front of us.  We had no camera, and no pen to add our names, but these folks were the inspiration for our trip, and are wonderful friends.  On our return trip, we hope to add our names somewhere on the wall, it's pretty crowded though.
    After lunch, we said our goodbyes to Jane and Jerry, backed out of our slip and motored to Paradise Village Marina, in Nuevo Vallarta, about 6 miles away.  Everyone said we'd hate it there, that La Cruz was "the" place to be.  Well, in many ways they are correct.  First, Paradise is at the end of a river and needs to be dredged constantly, and the water is dirt brown with lots of trash floating by.  Lovely.  As we entered, we had 2'.5" of water under us, rather unsettling, but we are by far not the biggest boat, so obviously they get in and out ok.  We get to use the amenities of the hotel, swimming pools, spa, yacht club, so this is one advantage.  It's our first night, and it looks like land of the lost, with trees growing down to the waters edge, and weird screeching noises.  On the other hand, there are huge mansions and mega yachts here, sort of like Balboa without the crowd.  All they need are the Duffy's floating by constantly and it would be the same.  There are little islands off our dock, tomorrow we'll get into the dinghy and check out the waterfront and the river.  I hope to see some different wildlife, not just hear it?  More later on "Paradise". 
    

La Cruz

We've been here in La Cruz now for a few days, first anchored out in non-rolly conditions, then we found out that the marina was a really good deal and moved to a slip.  Big difference from Cabo, $125. for one night there vs. $25. here, and actually better accommodations here.  The marina was built in 2007, so very new, and a ship yard, yacht club, laundry, fish market are all nearby.  It's officially called Marina Riviera Nayarit.  I love being anchored, the freedom of no neighbors is nice, yet everything is a dinghy ride away. 
   We have joined the morning net on the VHF and found a group here who are sponsoring a charity race series, and we couldn't resist.  It had three legs, one to our marina from where ever in the bay you were; then from La Cruz to Punta Mita, spend the night, then back to Nuevo Vallarta today.  We did the La Cruz leg, and of course... we did very well.  We were the smallest boat of 19 boats and came in 4th to finish.  The boats beating us were quite a bit longer, (42'-53') which means faster(we're 35').  And, we were two handing vs full crews of folks.  Not competitive at all :)  The charity is for the local schools, the American school here is one of the sponsors, they have a sailing team and help support the locals. 
  We went to dinner at Philo's, a local tradition here, it had live music and pizza just like home.  Kind of a treat for me, I'm missing burgers, pizza and yogurt.  The food has been great though, last night we had fajitas which were to die for, and two days ago I ordered what I thought was a burger, and it turned out to be a chicken sandwich on a bun, very delicious.  Of course the ambiance was part of it, we were sitting near the marina in the shade of a palm tree sipping diet cokes, or coke light as it's called here.  I thought of Susie at Philo's, they played some Stones music which was very well done.  There is one older guy who plays the washboard, complete with cow bells, cymbals and the metal fingered gloves.  He was the best part for me.
   I think we are going to leave here for the marina at Nuevo Vallarta on Sunday, and see a bit of the main town.  We can take a bus into Puerto Vallarta for 5 pesos or something.
   The town here is traditional cobbled stone streets, or dirt, with small tiendas or stores lining them.  These are mixed in with living accommodations, so you have to be careful not to walk into someones house.  The local market is on Sunday, which we missed last week, but it also supports the local schools and disadvantaged.   
   There are some English Labradors here, just like Penny's, she'd be in heaven.  Someone obviously brought a pair down and they've been multiplying...  Last night there was a group on our panga who had a Portuguese Water dog, and it lived on a J 160 sailboat.  It wasn't too thrilled about the leap from the bouncing panga to the bouncing boat, so one gentleman grabbed it and threw it aboard.  I'm so glad for Shelly and that our dogs have a safe and happy home!  Woody would want air conditioning.