Gasoline, Mexican style (Betsy)

David and I are still enjoying Mexico and as we travel from anchorage to anchorage we always manage to sample a little bit of the local color.

Today it was a girls trip (plus Ted, one of the husbands) to the Careyes Resort for lunch.

The guys ferried us ashore in Chamela where we strolled down a beautiful sandy beach and up to the main road where one of the women thought we might be able to catch a taxi for the 25 minute ride to Careyes. Not. We're in Chamela, not San Francisco. I suggest that perhaps we can find a guy with a pickup truck to squire us but my idea is poorly received. Eventually I find a young woman whose brother, Luis, is willing to drive us in his van.

Luis quotes a price of about $20 round trip for all of five so we climb aboard and are off. I'm sitting in the front seat chatting away with Luis about the latest iPhone exploit and sharing our thoughts on what the next iPad is going to look like (who would have thought that our driver was actually a full time geek who was just kind enough to give us a ride!) when he suddenly pulls off the narrow road onto the dusty shoulder.

The local gas station.

Luis explains that if we are going to make it to Careyes -- and back -- he needs to buy some gas. The gas station turns out to be a shack with an assortment of jerry jugs, a few bottles of engine oil and a huge pin-up calendar of the hot babe of the year.

 Luis places his order with the gas station attendant who brings out a couple of well used jerry jugs and a length of hose. The man hoists the jug onto his shoulder, puts one end of the hose in the jug and the other in his mouth and in no time at all gravity has done its job.

Human gas pump.

We all pile back into the van and continue on to Careyes and a delightful lunch.

When it's time to go back, Luis is ready and waiting for us. We retrace our steps, climb back into our dinghies and zip back to our boats. I'm feeling a bit richer for my interesting ride with Luis.

Luis and the girls (minus Ted)

(David and I are resting up this evening in preparation for a midnight departure north. Mystic will be traveling in the company of several other boats, all of us hoping the weather window is big enough for us to get around Cabo Corrientes and into Puerto Vallarta before the next big blow.)

Navigating in Mexican waters (David)

In US waters we trust the charts, both paper and electronic. With the help of GPS plotters, you know your position within a few feet. In Mexico, however, many of the charts, generated from survey data taken in the 19th century, are off by one or two miles! For example, it is disconcerting (to say the least) to find Isla Isabela more than a mile to the south east of its charted position. Furthermore, the electronic charts, at least those supplied by Nobeltec, show no detail whatsoever. 

While in La Paz, we met Bill Stockton on board True Love, a beautiful Waterline 53. Bill has written a program called ChartAid that captures a Google Earth photo of any location you choose and geo-references it to the chart on the Nobeltec screen, thus placing the photo in exactly the correct position and scale on the display. One can zoom in to whatever resolution is available from Google Earth. Wow -- what a difference this makes to navigating in Mexico! I can thoroughly recommend this $99 program.

This Nobeltec screen shot shows the charted position of Isla Isabela, compared with the actual position shown by the Google Earth photo.

Zooming in for more detail, you can even see the fishermen's shacks on the beach (click on the photo for an enlarged view).

Mystic is anchored just south of the rocks on the east side. Although the south bight is more protected, it has a reputation as an 'anchor-eater' because of underwater boulders.

Boarded by the Mexican navy (Betsy)

Shoes off, please

We arrived in Tenacatita, one of our all-time favorite Mexican anchorages, and within ten minutes of putting the hook down the Mexican navy came aboard Mystic. They didn't announce themselves nor did they ask permission to board. They just brought their launch alongside and stepped aboard.

Three well-armed men stood on our swim platform and were about to enter the boat when I stopped them and (in my best Spanish) said they were welcome to come into the boat but they needed to take off their black-soled shoes first. They looked at me like I was crazy (and so did David) but I stood my ground and after a moment of "What the ...?" two of the Uzi-wielding soldiers took off their shoes and came inside.

While their companion waited outside the other two asked us two pages of questions in Spanish. Did I mention that David and I barely speak Spanish? We offered them lemonade and chips with guacamole but they kindly declined saying they'd already had lunch on their big gray mother ship. The guys in the salon were polite and friendly and the third guy stood on the aft deck looking totally left out.


Having satisfactorily answered their many questions one of the guys pulled out a small camera and took photos of our passports, our radios and all the electronics in our navigation console. As they prepared to leave I said they couldn't go until we had a photo together. David looked at me again like I was crazy but picked up a camera and took a shot of me with two of the Mexican Navy's finest.

After a few more pleasantries the two guys put their heavy black shoes back on, climbed back into their launch and shot off back to their mother ship.

Mind you, this experience was far more pleasant than any experience we have had with our U.S. Homeland Security. See: We just wanted to have lunch