After a morning playing in the kayak and in the water, it was time to get to work but first Julia had an important task, her final exam. She had been doing a great job handling Strikhedonia so for her final exam it was up to her to get us from Ballandra to Puerto Escondido. I would be her first mate but it was up to her to get us out of the anchorage, decide on a sailplan, and safely navigate us into Puerto Escondido.
Up came the anchor and off we went. There was a bit of wind so Julia called for the main and screecher, aye captain! She shutdown the engine for a bit. But after playing with the sail trim we were moving at an anemic 2 knots, since we were getting a late start and still had to wash the boat we gave up and conceded to a motorsail day.
Julia absolutely loved seeing dolphins and we were lucky to have so many encounters over the past three weeks. Today the dolphins pulled out all the stops to say goodbye to her. We had lots of pods all around us with even a more than a few that were kind enough to jump in our bow wake. Once inside of Puerto Escondido there was more wind, but it still wasn’t too tough to get tied to the dock – we had learned a few weeks ago that the marina will let you tie up for a few hours so long as you are going to be renting a mooring ball. Sweet!
Strikhedonia recieved her first good washing since San Carlos six weeks ago. Whew that was a lot of work, but not finished yet Julia and I headed to the showers to get ourselves cleaned up too. On a mooring ball back in shore we went for some celebratory pizza and margaritas a Pepegina’s. It was a good thing we added onion rings as a starter since we were at the back of a long line of pizzas. But we were in no rush, one margarita turned into two and before we knew it we were enjoying some great pizza ninety minutes later. Seeing as I was a bit tipsy I handed off the dinghy driving to Julia who safely brought us back home.
Strikhedonia and me all cleaned up!
The next morning we started up on the work projects, filing the fuel tanks from jerry cans, doing laundry, cleaning the inside of the boat, and completing the engine checks. Oh and keeping an eye on Jean’s flight from Minneapolis to LA (where she would catch a flight to Loreto). Of all the days, Minneapolis has a small amount of snow and her plane required deicing. This dragged on for more than an hour and once off the ground there was a major headwind further slowing down her progress. Even with taking abuse from flight attendants (don’t book connecting flights so close), leaving the plane first (begging others to let her get to the front of the plane), and running through the terminal – it still wasn’t enough by less than 5 minutes. Fuck. Well two days in LA it is…
Work done, Randy (Free Luff), Julia, and I drove to the airport to drop Julia off. Followed by a fabulous taco lunch at El Rey (THE best) before heading off to the grocery store for provisioning. Bummer than Jean missed her flight but at least it was a very productive day.
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