The Ride Home

The ride home was four full days, including the second, which was too long.  Our days’ runs were basically, 400 miles the first day, 610 the second and 500 the third and fourth.  The one great uncertainty in my mind had been the horrific climb out of Santa Rosalia on the first day.  We climbed it in second gear, crested out at 18 miles an hour finally with the engine temperature 30 degrees above normal but still well below red line.  The grade was labeled “La cuesta de el infierno” on a road sign. . .the grade of Hell. . .and the copilot, having an eye free to look over the edge gasped as she counted the wrecks littering the canyon floor below. 

We must have gone through six or seven military checkpoints and each one had to search the boat and tool box, though all were uniformly polite and one pair of young officers offered to come with us home to be our Spanish teachers.  Passage of the border was essentially painless after a half hour wait in line.  Passage of the San Diego to LA freeway was not painless at all and took many hours.  We pressed on after an American Highway Restaurant Dinner until we’d climbed clear out of the LA basin and camped for the night at midnight at the Buttonwillow rest area, along with a hundred big rigs.  This was a day of 610 miles more or less, including the wait at the border and 2 hours of stop and go driving on San Diego freeways. 

The  third day was the run from Buttonwillow to Yreka, 500 miles and feeling a bit wounded all day after the long run on the second day.  The weather was sparkling clear and warm through much of the day, but once we climbed out of Lake Shasta the reality of return North began to sink in.  We were driving well above the occasional snow drift through the late afternoon and had absolutely fabulous views of Mt. Shasta through the early evening as it went from a white distant peak to a glowing sunset giant close by at Dunsmuir and finally began to recede as a blue white peak below a high rosy sky in the dusk as we passed through Weed.

The last day, from Yreka on home to Seattle was mostly through very familiar territory and it was fun to see how quickly the miles slipped by.  There were some long hills to climb in the morning but from Eugene northward no hills to cause any problems. We managed to hit stop and go driving for some miles in both Portland and Tacoma but still were home in time for supper that night.

Appendix 1:  Weather by the Day

Appendix 2:  Major Equipment Carried

Boat:    West Wight Potter 19’, 1984 vintage, on 1998 Garges Baja Trailer

Truck:  Chevrolet, 1992, 4.3L V-6, 3-spd auto w/overdrive (not used on trip)           

Sails:   Stock main w/2 reefs, jiffy reefing & points

            Small Jib (75% of fore triangle, high cut, original equipment, as new)          

            Medium jib (85%, recut from heavy sail, not used on trip)    

            Working jib (110%, high cut, original equipment, good condition)

            Cruising spinnaker (light nylon chute, hank only at head & tack)      

Dinghy:

            Sea Eagle 330 inflatable “kayak” always towed, never deflated on trip

Ground Tackle:

            Anchor on bow, Simpson Lawrence “Claw” (copy of Bruce) 11 lbs, with 35’ of ¼”

            Chain and 125’ 3/8” nylon stowed in forepeak compartment

Kedge, Danforth type 10 lbs w/30’ 3/16” chain & 100’ of 3/8” nylon, stowed in bilge in mesh bag

Folding grapnel, 6 lb.  No dedicated line, only used for dinghy          

250’ coil of 3/8” nylon, coil seized and stowed in mesh bag, for shore line.

Several small coils of 3/8 nylon with and w/o eyes

2 hanks 1/8” nylon

Electrical:

            5 watt solar panel on fore hatch (sufficient for 1-3 hrs reading/working per night)

            Wheel Chair Sized Absorbed Glass Mat Battery (small) under forepeak     

            2 cabin dome lights, running lights    

Stove:  Inexpensive butane unit, used on galley flat (used 4 cans of fuel on tip)

            Non skid mat kept stove & supper in place nicely     

Stowage:        

One larger “Tuff Tote” type lidded box stowed where porta pot originally was, under galley flat, for canned goods.

Numerous “Serving Saver” plastic boxes of 3 sizes (to hold notebooks, charts, books, medicine chest, silverware etc etc).  Mostly stowed under V-berth

Toilet:  Sani Potti, stowed under the cabin stairs.

Navigation:

            Compass, Plastimo Mini Contest, w/light

            GPS, Magellan hand held, stowed in rack, used w/Velcro on bulkhead

Radio:  Uniden Atlantis hand held VHF

Charts & Guide books:

Full set of Gerry Cunningham’s charts, mini guides, tide tables and cruising guide for the area.  Excellent and used constantly.

Lonely Planet Baja (little used but excellent)

            Charlie’s Charts guidebook to W. Coast of Mexico (little used)

            Rains’s “Mex Wex”

Steinbeck’s Log from the Sea of Cortez

Safety:

Harnesses & tether—worn whenever underway when solo, generally whenever leaving cockpit with crew aboard.  Tether spliced around mast and long enough to lead outside shrouds forward and allow re-boarding at transom ladder from either side.  Not used.

Life jackets (kayak type) for all hands

Full Coast guard signaling requirements

Foul weather gear (mixed lot of Pacific NW stuff) Used jackets frequently, generally wearing shorts & not concerned about splashes on legs. . .

Bedding:

A pair of older, synthetic fill sleeping bags zipped together served well.  Some nights were cool enough to wear sweats to bed as well.

Appendix 3:  Stores Available

In Loreto I found only one small “supermarket” which had in general a small but adequate selection of all required food for the trip with the possible exception of canned main dishes.  These were very limited, though the beans and menudo were very good, the “ensalada de atun”  (tuna salad) was really quite good as sandwich fixings, as were the ordinary cans of tuna.  The tinned “pate” and “jamon del Diablo” (deviled ham) were fair to awful, depending on how you feel about such things.  Fresh vegetables and fruit were available in quantity and variety and were excellent.  Local white, fairly soft cheese was excellent and lasted for several days.  Local meats are from range run stock, tend to be a little chewy but very tasty and often extremely lean.  We only used meat on first nights out, having no refrigeration. Local dried fruits were excellent, especially the figs, peaches, apricots, h’mm. 

In La Paz we shopped at the CCC giant supermarket, which puts most USA facilities to shame for variety and availability, as well as uptown in the Mercado (rather like a real-life Pike Street Market).  In general, anything made in Mexico will be less expensive than comparable food products in the States.  Some may seem a bit odd however.

In La Paz you can find fairly complete marine supplies by shopping around the 4 or 5 principal chandleries.  All are helpful and parts support looks good.  In Loreto the local ferreteria (hardware store) is mostly oriented toward ranchers and the panga fishermen.  There are dive shops and probably more marine hardware than I noticed.

Appendix 4:  Obscure but Valuable Contacts

Muffler Shop in Santa Rosalia
TALLER CISNEROS (Gaspar is the proprietor)
Colonia Cuahutemoc
(En frente la escuela)

Automatic Transmission Shop in La Paz
GRUPO HERMANOS SANCHEZ
Tel:  2-79-71
Encinas No. 1015
El Revolucion Y Madero
Col. El Menglito
La Paz, BCS

General Auto Mechanic in La Paz
(Omar Castillejas is the proprietor and excellent)
TALLER AUTOMOTRIZ
Tel:  044-612-2-6-50-05
Rosales / Lic. Verdad y Josefa Ortez de Domingo
La Paz, BCS

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