Turtle Bay Mexico

We are in Turtle Bay Mexico. It is just like the tour books say it is Coyote Ugly. There is nothing here except a small poor village of less than 1000 people. There used to be a cannery, but when that closed so did the town. The people that are left are very friendly and helpful. Pangas are running around all day willing to do anything for a buck. We went to the two restaurants in town and had a drink at each one. This is beer country. Trying to find a Margarita was almost impossible. Then they were not very good. The people who eat in town choose to eat on their boats the next night. This is Mexico!!!

Our trip down was great. It took us 54 hrs to sail 360 miles we were hauling. We had 15 to 18 knts of wind the first day, and ended up motoring that first evening when the wind died. About 11:00 at night the wind picked back up and continued to build the whole trip. Most of the next day we had 20 to 25 knts then at night it rose to 20 to 30 knts. The strongest wind we had was 37 knts. We sailed down wind with just the Main up, no reef, and were doing 7 plus the whole time. Michael Lewis saw 11.7 once on his GPS. What a ride! It was a little bumpy with very steep 6 to 10 ft wind chop. We had nothing break unlike a number of boats in the fleet. At the end when we arrived in Turtle bay I told myself I can really get into this. It was a great trip.

WE caught 5 Yellow Fin tuna on the trip. We had one fall off the gaff and one was too small, but we still have a nice bag of fresh fillets in the refer. WE cooked tuna for three meals and tuna tacos for lunch today. They are great. We look forward to the next leg from here to Bahia Santa Maria. 250 miles further down the coast.

Will write more when we arrive there on Monday

Later Dave and Helen

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