When the forecasts yesterday began calling for 20-30 kt. E winds nights and early mornings we decided to divert to Topolobampo to anchor for the night and to change down to our smaller jib this morning. We were underway for Mazatlan again by 0845 this morning.
So far it's been a slow motor boat ride made even slower the first day by either a foul current or a fouled boat. We finally put the engine in reverse to free whatever may have been caught on the prop, rudder, or keel. Our speed gradually came back up to normal so maybe that was the problem after all. We've only seen two ships and half a dozen fishing boats, so the traffic hasn't been as bad as feared. Since the winds were light yesterday, the seas weren't more than a foot of wind chop until we turned in towards Topolobampo. By then the wind had picked up 15-18 out of the NW and we had some good following seas.
The town of Topolobampo is 12 miles from the sea buoy. It was close to sunset and we didn't want to go down an unfamiliar channel after dark. We chose to turn left out of the channel after about the fourth set of buoys, and tucked in behind Punta Santa Maria, a low point consisting mostly of sand dunes and mangroves. We dropped the anchor just after sunset and even managed to catch the evening net.
For most of the time underway Ziggy managed to sleep or zone out. He was awake most of Friday night since one of us was always up and about on watch. Then he really slept hard practically all day Saturday. We played with him for as long as we could that evening before the no-see-ums (sand dunes and mangroves - WHAT were we thinking!?) and sleep deprivation drove us to an early bed. Last night Ziggy recuperated from the arduous journey by: 1) shredding a sponge (his favorite unauthorized toy; fortunately this one wasn't dry so it wasn't completely destroyed), 2) shredding a Kleenex and knocking over the other Kleenex box which had been "Ziggy proofed" with a stone coaster placed on top of it, 3) shredding some toilet paper (fortunately not the whole roll; I remembered I hadn't put this away after we were already in bed), 4) getting past the single piece of "Ziggy proof" tape blocking the hole to the plastic grocery bags bin and pulling one partially out, and 5) gnawing on the bag containing an empty cat food can to be thrown away today (our fault for not putting the trash outside). We're usually better about stowing Ziggy tempters before going to bed, but we were too tired and the bugs were the worst we've seen this year. It's almost 11 AM and they're still biting down in the cabin.
So we have another two days and two nights before we expect to arrive in Mazatlan. Other than dealing with the no-see-ums it was a nice break for all of us.
Hey, a sparrow just landed on the cockpit cap rail! John's going to try and feed it some bread and give it a bath with a spray bottle. Will Nakia acquire a new crew? How will we "Ziggy proof" a wild bird? Stay tuned...
Linda and John