We are now heading south from Mazatlan.

Moonrise and Moonsets:

The moon rises and sets every day, appearing on the horizon just like the sun. The time depends on the phase of the moon. It rises about 30 to 70 minutes later each day than the previous day, so the moon is out during daytime as often is it's out at night. At the time of the new moon, the moon rises at about the same time the sun rises, and it sets at about the same time the sun sets. As the days go by (as it waxes to become a crescent moon, a half moon, and a gibbous moon, on the way to a full moon), the moon rises during daytime (after the sun rises), rising later each day, and it sets at nighttime, setting later and later each night. At the full moon, the times of moonrise and moonset have advanced so that the moon rises about the same time the sun sets, and the moon sets at about the same time the sun rises. As the moon wanes (becoming a half moon and a crescent moon, on the way to a new moon), the moon rises during the night, after sunset, rising later each night. It then sets in the daytime, after the sun rises. Eventually, the moon rises so late at night that it's actually rising around sunrise, and it's setting around sunset. That's when it's a new moon once again.
This was a phenomenon I was not aware of until the other night. It was frustrating and fascinating to watch the moon set at about midnight. The moonset was as glorious as the sunset but with its departure the seas were black.
I have to thank my Uncle Ned for his advice to learn my radar well; Mexican charts are filled with errors. Land is not where the charts say they are, in fact can be out by miles.There has been many times that we have been anchored in the middle of an island on land. We have a Koden Radar which overlays onto our Coastal Explorer software. It is fabulous as you can see where the land really is on top of the chart. This is quite important as we will need to travel with one foot on the shore when we do the Tehuanepec. The boat will appear to be traveling on land when in fact it will be 1 mile offshore.
We will probably have internet service most of the time; however it has been a surprise quite often at where we have been able to pick up the internet.

We are using several different methods to receive our weather while underway. We have a subscription to Buoyweather.com that allows us to imput our data for our whereabouts; Lat and Long then put the aprox area we will be in the next 24,48,72,96 hours. It then sends us the weather through our ICOM Single Side Band. We listen to the nets that are brodcast on the SSB . A weather person informs us to what is happening out there. We have the Xaxero's WeatherFax 2000 program that allows us to pick up weather. There are also many stations on the SSB that broadcast voice weather, so we are as ready as we can be.

We have said goodbye to many boaters that we have spent the year with in the different anchorages. There are a few doing the same trip as us and there is a new group that are arriving anyday from the Baja Ha Ha. Some of them will also head south and I am sure new friendships will be made.

We would like to say that there a few couples we will truly miss and we know that they will follow the blog. Please drop us an email and let us know where you are from time to time.

Aren't you scared?
One of the great teachers of religion and mythology, Joseph Campbell, said, "The meaning of life is to feel alive." Modern life offers people few opportunities to feel alive. Nothing about going to the mall, watching movies, sitting in front of a tv (watching programs of others sailing), working 40-50-100 hours a week with a 4 week vacation did it for us. I think the pursuit of feeling alive pushes some people to jump off bridges secured by a rubber band and do other crazy life-risking stuff. (Which I would never dream of ).
Boating is far safer than doing most of the things we do everyday -- driving, flying, crossing the street. About 95% of the time boating is done in normal conditions; the other 5% is the challenge. While that 5% includes some conditions we have yet to experience, we have studied what others have done and are prepared for the worst. Our boat is strong and so is our determination. If all we feared was the unknown, we would have never left the house. We would not be on this interesting journey.
We attended a seminar highlighting Central America to Ecuador with several other boaters from our dock and were somewhat disappointed in the lack of concrete information; however it served to be the catalyst to the sharing of knowledge. This week has left us excited about the continuation of The Genesis.
We met many new and wonderful people in Guaymas. We hope to someday meet up with these new boating friends again in different anchorages along the way. The locals that we met have enriched our lives in so many ways. This is a town we could live in if we ever wanted to re-locate.
So, after spending 5 weeks in Guaymas, secured to a dock, we threw off the lines and headed into new territory. It wasn't planned that way but it is working out that way! The mainland portion of the Sea of Cortez has very few anchorages, and the ones that do exist have their challenges. Bar crossings, silted in waterways and much shoaling are the largest challenges. We have a distance of approximately 450 nautical miles to get to Mazatlan. The forecast for Thursday, is calling for Northerlies at 35 knots. A decision was made while underway to practice for the Tehuanepec. (You will learn more about this nasty when we are ready to leave Mexico) The longest passage Ken and I have made at one time is 56 hours when we had to get to an airport so Ken could fly home for his Mom's funeral. This passage will be 75 hours. The 56 hours was also shared with our friends Wayne and Wendy. This passage will be done by us.
We left Sunday at 0530 hrs and traveled until 0800 hr this morning. (Monday) We stopped for 1 hr to have supper and participate in the SSB net so that we are being tracked by fellow boaters. This is a wonderful practice that we will continue to participate in on the whole Central America trip. This morning we anchored in an open bay caught a bit of a catnap, maintain the engines, get tomorrows meals ready and will depart at 2000hr. The reason for the break is so that we arrive in day light at our destination. We will have a bar to cross and we would never attempt this at night unless in an emergency. There are no good places to stop but you can just drop an anchor in the shallows while you check things out before continuing, it just means a little or a lot of rolling. The plans are to be in Mazatlan by noon Wednesday. I guess when you add the pit stops it will be more like 90 hours.
The daytime is a normal boating day with us sharing the driving. At 1800 hr after dinner we begin our 3 hr shifts. I begin with 1800 - 2100 hr then 0000 hr -0300 hr. Ken does the in betweens. Ken has the male sleep gene and can sleep at a drop of the hat. Me it is not so easy but it is getting much better.
We actually do not mind the overnight passages. Nature is amazing and I am sure next weeks blog will be about some of the things that have come to join us to keep us VERY MUCH awake at night. I have yet to come close to falling asleep.

AN UPDATE TO THE ABOVE BLOG

We made it to Mazatlan in record time. We had a current pushing us to speeds above 7 which got us in at 0100 at night. The seas were calm and the tide was a flood allowing us to get over the bar in safety. Total time including the 8 hr stop (would have gotten in at daylight had we not stopped) was 72 hrs. Not bad.

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Hurricane Watch

The new stainless steel bimini is now completed and the canvas almost finished. It will provide us with the much needed shade that we will encounter on our travels. This summer we used tarps hung with lines. It worked and helped us determine how we wanted the new bimini engineered.
What can I say, boating is similar to writing a message on a sandy beach and watching the waves erase the message. Here we will stay for awhile longer.
Tuesday WAS the day planned to depart and head south. However Hurricane Rick has changed our plans.
THE SATELLITE PRESENTATION OF HURRICANE RICK CAN BE EXPRESSED IN ONE WORD...SPECTACULAR. THE EYE IS QUITE DISTINCT AND IS SURROUNDED BY VERY DEEP CONVECTION. ON THE LAST AVAILABLE VISIBLE IMAGES ONE COULD SEE THE SUNLIGHT REFLECTING OFF THE EASTERN SIDE OF THE EYEWALL AND THE STADIUM EFFECT THAT IS TYPICAL OF INTENSE HURRICANES. MORE IMPORTANTLY...SUBJECTIVE T-NUMBERS ARE 7.0 AND 7.5 ON THE DVORAK SCALE FROM TAFB AND SAB RESPECTIVELY...AND THE OBJECTIVE T-NUMBERS HAVE REACHED 7.7 AND A 3-HOUR AVERAGE OF 7.4 DURING THE PAST HOUR OR SO. BASED ON THESE DATA..THE INITIAL INTENSITY HAS BEEN INCREASED TO 155 KNOTS. THIS MAKES RICK THE SECOND STRONGEST HURRICANE ON RECORD IN THE EASTERN PACIFIC AFTER LINDA IN 1997(Information put out by the Hurricane Centre)

If we departed on Tues. we would be smack in a Hurricane Category 3 or 4 by Thursday, the way it currently is being reported. Soooooooo, we stay. We have made a decision to be taken out of the water and put on the travel lift. They will keep us on the lift with blocks under us. It is as stable as we could be on land. We will then strip her down totally and wait for the winds and rains and hope for nothing at all. There are many boaters currently returning to their boats after a summer hiatus. It will be a very crowded yard as I believe all of us in the water have made the decision to be hauled out.
This hurricane is expected to pack a punch even harder than Jimena. When Jimena hit here, it had been down graded to a Tropical Depression. They expect Rick to hit as a hurricane 3 or possibly 4 arriving on this side of the Sea of Cortez on Thursday. It is too early to tell as hurricanes are very unpredictable at this time of year.
Currently, the storm was generating waves up to 50 feet (15 meters) high near its core, with reports of 16-foot (5-meter) seas off the Mexican coast and "large and dangerous surf" along the coast.
Mexico, lying between two warm oceans, has been battered throughout its history by the storms that form as the oceans heat in summer, sending humid air up like a hot-air balloon, gulping more humid air to generate high pressure and screaming winds. These tempests are categorized according to wind strength, from Category 1 (73 mph) to Category 5 (155 mph or more)
1959
Mexico (Named Mexico) Oct. 27: Hurricanes are less common, and Category 5 storms extremely rare, on Mexico's Pacific Coast, making the Mexico hurricane one for the record books. Hitting western Mexico with 162 mph winds, it took at least 1,000 lives and possibly twice that many, while destroying one-fourth of the homes in Cihuatlan (Jalisco state). A massive landslide near Minatitlan (Colima) alone killed 800. Venomous snakes and scorpions uncovered by the slide killed still more in the aftermath. It remains Mexico's deadliest Pacific hurricane. 1,000-2,000 dead, $45 million damage.
Rick is expected to be worse.
Again you can track the storm at http://www.eebmike.com/
We will keep our heads down and try and stay dry. We will be safe and I hope I have NO pictures of the storm to share.
Until next week.
.

An Insight to the Future and A History Lesson in the Past

A Picture of 1/2 The Biosphere 2

This week we wandered north to the City of Tucson, Arizona. The city has a population of approximately 1,000,000 and is the second largest city in Arizona, and is the home of to the University of Arizona.
We had many boat parts ordered from West Marine and charts sent to the Motel 6, where we were staying. On our arrival the manager went out of his way to make sure our stay would be enjoyable. The first two days were spent shopping and buying things that we have found difficult or impossible to find in Mexico, and anticipate to have more problems finding them in Central America.
Tucson is a very clean and busy town. The city’s geography is cactus forests, rolling hills and to our surprise mountains. We were informed at a ski and golf store that there are several downhill ski resorts in the area.
Tucson lies in the border land area and has a blend of American Indian, American and Mexican heritage.
Tucson was founded in 1795 when it was American Native agriculture land, it then passed to a Spanish outpost, then to a frontier town with gambling and silver, copper mines, to what it is today, a thriving city.
The City of Tucson is 2400 feet above sea level and covers more than 500 square miles of land.
Tucson is the sunniest city in the United States with 350 days of sunshine. It is warm in the day but cools at night making it a pleasant place to visit. It did make the pool cool however as there was no heating.
We did play tourist for a full day. Our first visit was to Biosphere 2. This unique structure was created to better understand how natural environments create habitable conditions for human sustainability.
It was used to explore the complex web of interactions within life systems in a structure that included five areas based on natural biomes (ecosystems) and an agricultural area and human living/working space to study the interactions between humans, farming and technology with the rest of nature. It also explored the possible use of closed biospheres in space colonization, and allowed the study and manipulation of a biosphere without harming the earth.
The first closed mission lasted from September 26, 1991 to September 26, 1993. The crew were a medical doctor and researchers, a total of eight persons.
The agricultural system produced 83% of the total diet, which included a wide variety of crops including bananas, papayas, sweet potatoes, beets, peanuts, lablab and cowpea beans, rice, and wheat. No toxic chemicals could be used, since they would quickly impact health. During the first year the eight inhabitants experienced hunger as they adapted. During the second year, the crew produced over a ton more food, average caloric intake increased, and they regained some weight lost during the first year.
Some of the domestic animals that were planned for the agricultural area during the first mission include four pygmy goats and one billy goat, 35 hens and three roosters, two sows and one boar pig, as well as tilapia fish grown in a rice and azolla pond system originating millennia ago in china.
A strategy of “species-packing” was practiced to ensure that food webs and ecological function could be maintained if some species did not survive. The desert area became more failed due to condensation from the space frame. The Savannah was seasonally active; its biomass was cut and stored by the crew as part of their management of carbon dioxide. Rainforest species grew rapidly, but trees there and in the savannah suffered from lack of ultraviolet rays and weakness caused by lack of stress wood, normally created in response to winds in natural conditions. Corals reproduced in the ocean area and crew helped maintain ocean system health by hand-harvesting algae from the corals, manipulating calcium carbonate and pH levels to prevent the ocean becoming too salty. We were told that this alone created a tremendous amount of work for the marine biologist. The mangrove area developed rapidly but with less undergrowth than a typical wetland, again possibly because of reduced light levels.
Biosphere 2 suffered from CO2 levels that "fluctuated wildly" and most of the vertebrate species and all of the bees used for pollinating died. It was explained to us that bees need the UV Rays in order to have good eye site. The bees kept flying into the windows and all died. Insect pests, like cockroaches, boomed. In practice, ants, a companion to one of the tree species in the Rain Forest, had been introduced. By 1993 the tramp ant species became dormant, therefore several bird species were lost.
Due to the decrease in CO2 levels the scientist began showing signs of mental anguish. It was decided when the Doctor could not answer what 2+2= that oxygen would be introduced into the biosphere. They noticed that with the increased oxygen the plants also began to change.
It was deemed that this 2 year mission was a failure, however through time and research that was gathered many scientific breakthroughs have occurred. It was a failure as far a space station but it pushed science much further and still is teaching the researchers a great deal. We could have spent a week here learning so much but with only 1 ½ days to take in as much as we wanted to see 3 hrs was all we could give this unique place.
We traveled from Science and the future to History with its past.
Tombstone, Arizona. “The Town Too Tough to Die” Home to legendary men of the American West like Doc Holiday and Wyatt Earp, and the gunfight at the O.K. Corral.
Tombstone sprang up around the mines discovered by Ed Schieffelin in 1877. The settlement became a village in 1879, and a city in 1881. It had a population of 10,000 people during its hay day now 1200 people call Tombstone home.
In the 1880s, Tombstone was a booming mining town that brought a rush of those looking to strike it rich. Gold and Silver was the lure that also became a magnet to thieves, card-sharks, murderers, rustlers and an abundance of unsavory bad guys. The streets came alive with hundreds of saloons, gambling halls and bawdy houses. Chinese were brought to the country to work in the mines, and with this came the opium dens.
A trip to the Boothill Graveyard is a travel back in time to when the graveyard overflowed with those shot during poker games, killed in drunken-induced gunfights and even hung for simply becoming a public nuisance. Undertaking was no doubt a lucrative profession. One headstone reads “ Lester Moore-Here lies Lester Moore, 4 slugs from a .44, No les, no more.” Moore was a Wells Fargo agent and had a dispute with a man over a package both died.
Tombstone is perhaps most famous for its Gunfight at OK Corral when the Earp brothers, Wyatt, Virgil and Morgan, along with friend Doc Holliday shot it out with the Clanton and McLaury Gang. The fierce gunfight was quick and when the bullets stopped flying, Billy Clanton, Tom McLaury and Frank McLaury lay dead. Billy’s brother, Ike Clanton kept his life that day, but was eventually murdered near Springerville Arizona. Virgil and Morgan Earp needed weeks to recover from serious wounds, but Doc Holliday was barely grazed by a bullet. Surprisingly, Wyatt Earp was unscathed.
On the highway back to Mexico we passed the Titan Missile Museum. The Titan II missile was the largest missile ever built by the United States. They stood alert during the Cold War to protect the country. You can tour the underground silo but we ran out of time. They have now been deactivated.
Our return to Mexico was painless and we had our 180 day tourist card reissued allowing us to stay longer thereby not rushing our departure in November.
Well its time to get back to travel mode in the ocean which means checking out all our systems and securing everything for the swells. Until next week.

We are just North of the red dot in the larger indent. I couldn't find the perfect map to show Guaymas.

The threat of Tropical Storm Olaf coming our way is now just a memory. It became a remnant low having come to land in Topolobampo 160 miles south of us. The low is however bringing rain and wind. I never thought I would welcome rain but we basically haven’t seen much for over a year.
I think that as a coastal town Guaymas has become my favourite to date. This community has not seen the Americano influence and is very Mexicano. We are a rarity but have been welcomed by everyone we have met. They love to know that you are from Canada. This is probably the most interaction we have had with locals, being invited to their homes, their church, and their favorite restaurants.
Ken had his final Doctors appt. on Friday and the Doctor was very impressed with the outcome. To celebrate we were to go to an outdoor concert, but it was cancelled due to the threat of Olaf. We instead went to the bar with friends we have met here. Karaoke in espanol. It was funny when the only English song appeared and the guy with the mike came straight to us. Racial profiling at its best. I just said “ No hablo inglis” He laughed. Everyone at the bar knew the words to Hotel California. I found that reading the words helped understand a little bit more and we had a translator Huratio to help. They are passionate about their music. We left at 0100 hr, they at 0400 hr. It was a hoot. I never would go to a karaoke bar at home.

Huratio and his family. A man with a big heart!

I have been walking with Gail from the boat next to us every morning. It is not uncommon now to have the locals we have met honking their horns and waving as they pass by, the newspaper sellers stop us and have a conversation, the policia talk with us about how we are enjoying Guaymas. Again my blue eyes enter many conversations. I finally am thinking Spanish again after not hearing it for months. I try hard to speak it when I can and appreciate the helpful corrections on pronunciation. I am more impressed at how much Ken has picked up. Usually related to parts he needs. I don’t think he realizes just how much more he understands.
Ordering things to be done on our boat have been successful. We have the canvas guy ready to go. The stainless steal for the bimini is being started Monday. New plexiglass for the helm is ordered and Ken also will have it cut on Mon.
All the various packages we have ordered from across the US are all being shipped to the hotel we will be staying at in Tucson. The only glitch seems to come from Canada when RJ tried to send a parcel. I believe even that is worked out now however. I try not to look at the hemorrhaging bank account.
We are working also on how we can get our Yellow Fever shots and certificate done while we are in Mexico. This is necessary for many countries we will be transiting from Panama on. Our good friend Antonio (Mexican Dr) from Vancouver will try some medical friends in Los Mochis.