On the Cruising road again!

Blog Entry March 8, 2014 We are back at the marina in Chaipas in Mexico, about 12 miles north of Guatalma, after a week of inland travel to the cities of San Cristobal and Palenque. Pics are posted to the left. We spent 3 days at San Cristobal where we toured the colonial town and its many, many churches and squares. The people are colorful with their native dress and looks. We also went to a village where the indigenous people are not real Catholics but in order to keep their customs alive during the conquest of the Spaniards they pretended to go along with them but still practice their pagan ways. The church (no longer Catholic) that we went into was amazing with family groups seated on the floor chanting and lighting hundreds of candles in front of each group to fend off the bad spirits. Some also bring a chicken that they kill in front of the candles at the end of the rituals to chase away sickness and really bad evil spirits. We are now thinking that we will leave on Monday and go back 250 miles to Huatulco as we have invited friends to come visit there so we can snorkel and swim and show them around but we don’t know if anyone will actually come. We are thinking that we will hang out in Huatulco for about 4 weeks then come back here to put the boat away for the summer. We will leave for the NW in early May and come back sometime in November. Jim may return to the boat in June/July if any of the grandkids want to sail in the summer. I think that I have the wanderlust and when we return we will then head south towards Panama. Perhaps to meet up with our friends Ramona and Jan somewhere down the line at beautiful anchorages. Several boats have hauled out here at the Marina: They did a great job on the trawler Pegasus painting the bottom, waxing the hull and repairs to the rudder. A sailboat hauled out yesterday for bottom paint and repairs. Enrique the marina manager seems to be working very hard to make everything good and the cruisers happy. We will get fuel here before we go to Huatulco as it is easier here than in Huatulco. Enrique lets you use his jugs to fill and drives you to the Pemex. We think that this will be a great place to leave the boat for the summer and they will look after the boat for free. With the low cost of moorage during the four summer months ($200 per month) Jim can afford to fly down during the summer to check on the boat. Think of us next week as we will be traveling again with a 40 hour passage. The weather window looks good so wish us luck. Linda and Jim