May 12,-13 2013, Sunday, Mothers Day, Yelapa to Manzanillo

After the anchor entanglement, we headed straight out to sea.  Word was that Cabo Corrientes could be dreadfully windy and it was best to round it in the morning before the winds came up.  Well, that plan was shot, it was already noon.  However, the wind was only about 7-8 knots so it looked like we would be OK.  In fact, the wind never did come up and we cruised along at 3-4 knots all afternoon, getting back into the routine of passage sailing after so long in port.  It is good to be sailing again.  It is my watch most of the afternoon and an easy sail.  We finally rounded the point about sunset and set a new course We decided that I wold take the midnight to dawn watch so Alan can get some sleep so I went to bed right after dinner. 

When I get up at midnight to take over, the engine was on and the auto pilot was steering the boat.  Typically, the wind had died. The night is dark with no moon and the ocean sparkles with phosphorescence all around us.  Off in the distance is a glow from Puerto Vallarta and to the south another glow that we assume is Manzanillo.  It is amazing how far the city lights shine, even from a fairly small town.  We are fairly close to shore and there could easily be fishing boats around us.  Since the fishing boats seldom have lights on we would not be able to see them in the dark.  Knowing this has the effect of keeping me very alert all night.  I am up walking around the deck and peering off into the darkness every 15-20 minutes.  Alan has turned on the radar and it is showing a lot of mysterious blips but I cannot see any actual boats.  There is a light of a large ship off in the distance for about an hour, slowly moving past us but nothing else.  I finish up the murder mystery that I have been reading.  Alan shows up to relieve me about 4am, having actually slept a solid 4 hours.  My turn to tumble into bed.

When I get up next, Alan has activated the AIS, our newest toy.  This is an electronic box that picks up signals from other ships and displays them on the iPad.  All of the big cargo ships now have to have an AIS system that broadcasts their position, name, course, speed, name, etc.  A lot of cruisers also are installing the system on their boats.  There are two versions, one is broadcast and receive and the other is receive only, which is what we have.   It shows our position and the position of any ships within a particular distance.  It can be set for 5, 10, 15, 20, 30, 40, 60, etc. mile incraments.  Clicking on the icon gives the ship’s name, speed, position, distance away, size and a lot of other info. Now that Alan has it all synced up and working, we can see that there are a lot of cargo ships all around us.

The wind has picked up and we can turn off the engine.  It is not a very pretty day, sort of hazy/overcast.Our intention on this leg of the trip was to stop at several harbors along the coast, Chamela, Tenecatita, Barra de Navidad.  This section of the Mexican coast is called Costa Alegre and is supposed to be very lovely.  The problem was that the timing was off and we would either be trying to enter in the dark or hanging out for hours waiting for dawn.  We decide that we have seen enough small mexican beach towns anyway, so we just keep going.  We are enjoying sailing and anxious to get south of the hurricane belt as soon as possible.

It has been overcast all day and as the day grows later the sky is looking darker and darker, wind is building and there are whitecaps.  Finally even a few rain sprinkles.  We have been discussing the fact that we are now in the rainy season and the further south we get the more likely we will get rain squalls.  The problem is not so much the rain as the fact that they come up very quickly with a LOT of wind.  On the theory “better safe than sorry”  Alan decided to take down our big light wind jib and replace it with a small staysail and reef (shorten) the main.  Usually I man the helm while Alan does the sails, but I decided that this was my turn.  I need the practice and the wind is not to strong yet.     I brought the jib in, rolled it up, unhanked it from the forestay and got it stowed below in about 15 minutes, and then got the small jib hoisted easily.  Little by little I am getting more confident at this.   Reefing the main is harder and takes both of us.  We got the sail lowered and hooked by the mast easily but for some reason Alan could not seem to get the other end of the sail secured.  Meanwhile I was trying to tie down the lines while the wind kept catching the sail and the boat tossed around on the waves.  Suddenly there was a “rip” and the sail tore in my hands, a 10” tear right at the reef point.  My fault.  I had been trying to tie the sail to the boom instead of just tying it to itself.  We got out some sail tape and managed to tape the tear together.  Not a pretty patch but enough to keep it from ripping any more.  We finished up tying it down and settled in for another night of sailing through the dark.  Luckily the wind did not get any stronger.

As we sail on through the night, I experiment with the AIS app.  It is installed on both iPads which is a good thing because we are having trouble getting them to charge.  We have a 12 volt charging station set up in the cabin which has worked fine for months.  Now they only charge for about 15 minutes and then stop charging.  We plug and unplug them, change cords and chargers.  Nothing works, so we have to keep switching them back and forth.  Charge one as much as we can and then use it while the other is charging.  Up until now I had only turned on the iPad once an hour to log our position, maybe once in between if we were coming up on a waypoint, so battery life was not a big issue.  But now we are in the shipping lanes and we have the new app so I need to leave it on a lot more to keep an eye on  all of the big container ships coming and gong around us.

The AIS shows ships up to 20 or 30 miles away and more but visibility is only about 6 miles.  It is really scary to know that there is a giant cargo ship heading straight for you at 15-20 knots and not be able to see it.  I am not sure if I like this or not.  Usually it is clear that they will pass with no problem and a couple of times I figure out evasive action.  But there are at least two occasions when I cannot figure out what to do and end up waking Alan to help.  This means that he is not getting the sleep that he needs, so I decide to let him sleep past the end of my watch.  Now the watch schedule is all messed up and I am really tired too.  Luckily we arrive at Manzanillo in the morning and can sleep.