Food, Eating & Bebidas

I was going to add a movie of the preparation of the soup to the blog but it crashes each time I try to upload the thing!!

Since it is near the New Year we decided to jump on the bus and get into Puerto Vallarta. On the way to and from we did some Geocacheing of the virtual sort and for lunch ended up at a favorite place, La Distileria. This was where, last year several times; the group of the moment slurped some of the best Margaritas and had items off of the wonderful menu.

La Distileria has a fantastic view of the old section of beach and the bay (Banderas) as well as a large segment of the malecon!! It is a second floor affair and the seating maximizes the view. You can sit and watch the whales and dolphins while the boats of various descriptions pass by. That would include the parachute pulling boats… something for the bucket list for some, I am sure. Anyway, I decided on the soup on the menu shown to be a Classic, Oyster Soup prepared at the table. After observing the preparation the taste was more than I could believe!!!!! This was incredible; truly. The follow up for me was the ceviche (on the menu as, “Cebiche”) and it was TDF. Sandy’s chicken cordon bleu was melt in your mouth tasty and Mary stuck to her beef tostadas which were very good as well. This is the sort of place that you do NOT want to leave as the day melts away toward sunset, but we had to leave despite our reluctance. It really would be possible to have lunch there and sit waiting around for the even meal too.

You would think that it would have been enough to have had a spectacular meal but, Noooo!! When we got back to the boat in La Cruz de Huanacaxtle it was suggested that we head for Tacos on the Street… another sought after establishment. We had missed them several times last year because they only open a few days per week. They are open more often this year but the proper days had eluded us until that moment. After quick showers and a radio call to arrange for cocktails on New Year’s Eve (the next day) we were off to discover why Tacos on the Street was so popular. Whoa! It is because they are beyond expectation. There are only three things on the menu. You can have a rib eye soft taco, a rib eye quesadilla, or a rib eye hard shell taco; just specify how many of each. This can be followed by a home made flan that is very tasty indeed. In the time it took to get seated, about a half an hour we were sated and ready to get back to the boat for a round of Mexican Train dominoes that Mary has found to be her game of choice.

Something else that is in better supply this year is the Bohemia Obscura (dark beer) that I remember from years ago. It had all but disappeared for the last 15 years, in fact. All I can say is, “yum,” for that! There are lots of Mexican beers that I like but the few that really get the job done are the seasonally available Bock, the ever present Pacifico, the Negro Modelo, Dos Equis Amber and several others as we come across them from time to time.

All-in-all, it was a satisfying day of eating the local stuff. Have I mentioned I am starting to lose weight again? Everything here is so fresh and prepared without so much of the garbage fillers used in the States. It is much easier to find things that have zero bad things in the ingredients.

Dion Goes South

Quadrant and such...

If you followed our progress during our journeys last year you are familiar with our autopilot, Dion the Wanderer, and his predilection of going to starboard from time to time. Well, we thought that we had solved the issue this year when I cleaned his contacts and moved some metal that had accumulated near his “heart” (the fluxgate compass). Our passage from San Carlos to La Paz was amazing because Dion did not hiccup even once… hmmm, that’s not entirely correct, as we entered the channel to La Paz Dion turned himself off but since we were there we didn’t think too much about it. I guess believing that you can fix something is a powerful way of putting off fixing it.

The Pump suspected of being undersized

Control heads

So, we were ready to head for Puerto Vallarta (La Cruz de Huanacaxtle) and popped out on our way via Los Muertos. Dion seemed to be partially functioning during that first day but by the second day of the three day passage it was very clear that he had died. Normally as soon as you set him on a course he would take control of the wheel and not allow you to make any adjustments until you put him in Standby mode. That is what he was designed to do and some of the time he actually did it. During this last gasp you could set him to On but then he would allow you to tweak his course… hmmm, not good. Then he went crazy and veered off course by more than 90 degrees and would not come back on.

The "Brain" - hmmm, insufficient?

What this meant was that we had to hand steer for two days. Fortunately it was a fairly easy passage with relatively flat seas and wind on the right quarter most of the time. The steering was nicely balanced so there was less effort involved than there might have been.

That brings us to the current state of things. We are now researching the best way to replace Dion with a really stout autopilot. We have asked lots of people to make suggestions and the answers are rolling in. What we have is a Navico autopilot of probably early 1990’s vintage. The hydraulic pump seems to be in good order as does the fluxgate compass. It is probably the “brain” that has given up on the unit and should be buried at sea.

We have been headed south at a fair clip this year once we got Faith ready in San Carlos. It was almost like being on a delivery schedule at first. Now that we are back in the warm zone the rest of our southerly meanderings will be at a more relaxed pace. This is especially the case without a working autopilot!!

La Paz... Again!!

Minney's is THE place for more stuff

After what seems like months of running around getting things done to make the boat ready we are, whew, finally on our way into a new season. It was really only about two months since we got back from the South Pacific but it has been so filled with activity and “get-readies” that there has barely been time to breath. On the way down the coast we stopped by places like Minney’s to get parts and such. What a great place, along with Downwind Marine in San Diego these are fantastic boat-folk stores! By way of catch-up, while we were away there was a hurricane (Jimena) that swept north into the Sea of Cortez and Faith ended up in the path of its rain in the aftermath of the down graded tropical storm. This dropped 26 inches of rain and we had a small amount end up in the galley area of the boat. The marina crew pumped it out in our absence but there is damage to the sole of the galley. We installed the new windlass when we got to the boat and started restringing all the lines in the work yard and the slip when we finally got there. Elvis got inflated and the motor worked on the third pull!! We were comfortable in our new (to us) travel trailer while all this was going on but the work was slow. Luckily my brother Lee and his wife Julie were there too so we had diversions before we were to leave San Carlos. It seems to me that the blur of boat projects and guests arriving while we tried to play and work had us ready to leave but not ready as well. Our first attempt ended about an hour out of San Carlos when it was noticed that alternator was not working.

Some have called it Boat Jewelry!!

We had just installed the new inverter so we returned to the anchorage and further tested the whole shebang with long distance coaching from Alan, Dr. Electron, and re-reading the manuals. When Alfredo had the alternator done (rebuilt) and installed we tested a bit more then declared ourselves ready to go again. The visiting crew (JJ & Cher) agreed that it was decision time for them too (see Sandy’s blog to update all that bit of flexibility). We either had to get to La Paz or they needed to fly, ride, and walk back to La Paz in time to catch their flight. As one of the cruisers said when we were chatting about guests coming and going, “You can pick the place or you can pick the time… but you can’t have both!” As it turned out we had a great motor-sail down to Isla San Francisco, one of my very favorite places, and at least JJ & Cher got to see one of the places that we were going to take them too had we been able to stick to our plan of picking them up in La Paz. The whales, dolphin, turtles, birds and fish cooperated, for the most part, and our guests got to see lots of “stuff” on our delivery-like journey down the Sea. We managed to get into La Paz in time to get them to the hotel (La Perla) and up to La Fonda for a spectacular meal… again, whew, made it.

Elvis on station again!!

Now we are going to provision a bit and get ourselves more back to the main plan and sail to La Cruz (Banderas Bay – think, Puerto Vallarta). There were those small issues in getting this far after we left San Carlos too. When Alfredo installed the alternator he placed the three small washers that keep the thing at just the right angle on the wrong side of the bracket. As we motored it was clear that we were burning through the belt. Ugh, in the first anchorage, Isla San Francisco, I corrected that and everything worked marvelously after that. The generator can now charge the batteries as well and we are able to make coffee from the inverter too!!! This last may seem like a strange use of power to some but the thing is that when you have more than just the two of us on the boat the amount of coffee that can be made by other methods (French press or stove top percolator) is insufficient. We needed a way to keep up the guest demand and stay sane ourselves… this has answered that nicely. By the way, if you come across a stainless steel stove top percolator that makes more than eight smallish cups let me know!! It was something I thought would be easy to find but all attempts to secure one have ended in failure. It’s just one of those odd things that living on a boat brings to your attention from time to time. So, here we are in La Paz with a few moments to rub together and time to contemplate again. It is such a luxury after months of going and doing and seeing that this morning feels like a new day of a different sort indeed!