Seabiscuit and Beyond: Texas, La Paz and Mazatlan

Location: Mazatlan, Mexico

We had a great trip to Texas early in December to visit family and friends then came back to the boat and cruised from La Paz to Mazatlan.

Dave with a dorado we caught while crossing the Sea of Cortez from Los Muertos to Mazatlan

Sunrise at Marina CostaBaja in La Paz prior to our flight to Texas

December 3 - 15, 2021, La Paz to Texas to La Paz: We flew from La Paz to Austin, Texas on Friday, December 3rd. Our daughter, Heather, picked us up at the airport and we had a nice dinner out. We spent the weekend with Ben, Cat, Mavis (Cat's Mom) and the grandkids doing fun things.

Maggie riding her bike in the neighborhood

Benjamin at the Secret Woods playground

Sunday afternoon we drove to Houston and spent Monday and Tuesday going to appointments with doctors, eye doctors, etc., all the annual preventative health maintenance type stuff. We drove back to Austin on Wednesday for more quality time with the family.

While the "big kids" were in school, Cat and I took Archie to the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center

Saturday morning we went with Maggie and her girl scout troop to the Austin Library and
toured the Seaholm Ecodistrict as part of their work towards a conservation badge

Ben had picked up some rough cut beetle-killed pine from Colorado, so he and Dave worked on joining, sizing and planing the boards. Ben has plans to use the lumber for their porch ceilings.

Ben and Dave working on the wood project

The three grandkids, Benjamin, Maggie and Archie, playing with Archie's train set.

Every day is Halloween when you're three -
Archie dressed up as the Spiderman Hulk.

On Monday, December 13th, we flew back to La Paz and stayed at Marina CostaBaja until December 15th.

December 15, 2021, Wednesday - Marina CostaBaja, La Paz to La Paz Anchorage (5 nm, 1 hour): We left the marina about 9:00, cruised south down the La Paz channel and anchored just north of Marina Cortez. We spent a few days enjoying La Paz, wandering along the malecon and eating at the local restaurants.

Sunrise over the city of La Paz from our anchorage.

A statue on the La Paz malecon.
If you look closely at the right side of the photo, you can see Seabiscuit at anchor.

December 18, 2021, Saturday - La Paz Anchorage to Bahia Falsa (7 nm, 1 hour): We heaved anchor this morning and headed north up the channel. As part of the departure protocol when departing La Paz by boat, you are supposed to call the Port Captain on the VHF radio to report your departure, your destination and the number of people on board. We did and got a response from the Port Captain saving that the port was closed. We could go up to Bahia Falsa, Pichilingue or Puerto Ballena but no further. We had heard on the morning cruiser's net that when the wind was blowing more than 22 knots outside the La Paz area, the port captain would close the port to all vessels less than 500 tons (basically all pleasure craft) to keep the pangas and smaller tour boats from going out. We had planned to go down to Los Muertos but acknowledged the port closure and anchored up in Bahia Falsa for the night.

Interesting clouds just before sunset, Bahia Falsa.

December 19, 2021, Sunday - Bahia Falsa to Los Muertos (49 nm, 7 hours): We heaved anchor at 8:00 for the cruise to Los Muertos. At the south end of Isla Cerralvo, a pair of dolphins joined us and rode the bow wake almost the whole way into the anchorage. We dropped the anchor and settled in for the night.

December 20 - 21, 2021, Monday - Tuesday - Los Muertos to El Cid Marina, Mazatlan (188 nm, 26 hours): Anchor up at 8:00 this morning for our journey across the Sea of Cortez to Mazatlan. Dave put out the fishing gear and within an hour we had a nice dorado on the line. That was enough fish for the two of us, so he reeled in the line, filleted the fish and stowed the fishing gear. We took turns at the helm until it was time for the night watches to begin.

Sunset at sea, underway across the Sea of Cortez from Los Muertos to Mazatlan

As we got close to the mainland shore on Tuesday morning, we spotted whales spouting and dolphins swimming. Marina El Cid (where we planned to stay), along with Marina Mazatlan and Marina Fonatur are all located north of Mazatlan, inside the estuary Estero Sabalo. The entrance into the estuary is narrow and shallow and there is typically a dredge working to keep the channel navigable. Once we got close to the estuary entrance, we hailed the marina on the radio to check the entrance conditions and to get our slip assignment. We settled into our slip, went up to the restaurant for lunch and spent the rest of the day unlaxing.

The view of Marina El Cid from the restaurant.
Seabiscuit is at the dock in the center of the photo.

Wednesday morning we watched two Baja HaHa sailboats come into the marina, Maria and Allen on Jamala and Laura and Andy on Ever After. I made a batch of ceviche with our fresh dorado and we did a few chores. Dave discovered some water in the engine room bilge and we traced the leak back to the port stabilizer fin shaft. We walked to the marine yard further up the estuary and negotiated with the yard to get hauled Thursday morning and with a workshop to replace the shaft seal and to paint the bottom (we were planning to paint the bottom in the spring but decided to go ahead and do it now while we were out of the water). With all of that arranged, we went back to Marina El Cid and had Maria, Allen, Andy and Laura over for happy hour ceviche; we sat out on the dock and shared stories and adventures.

Thursday morning we headed down to Marina Mazatlan to pump out our grey and black water tanks, then to Fonatur's marine yard to get hauled out. The workshop crew was scheduled to be off work Friday/Saturday/Sunday for the Christmas holiday, so they hauled us, blocked us up and pressure washed the bottom with the real work scheduled to start on Monday.

Seabiscuit getting hauled at Fonatur in Mazatlan

Heron on the dock, Marina El Cid

We celebrated Christmas Eve with Maria and Allen on Jamala, had a quiet Christmas day on Seabiscuit, then went to Old Town Mazatlan on Sunday afternoon. The day was full of hits and misses. We took a pulmonia (hit) (an open air taxi unique to Mazatlan) to Old Town and got dropped off at the Cathedral. It was closed (miss) so we walked to the malecon and along the shoreline (hit).

B and Maria in Plaza Republica, Old Town Mazatlan.

Dave, Maria and Allen on the malecon.
The highrise hotels of Mazatlan's Zona Dorada (Golden Zone) are in the background.

Mazatlan has a group of cliff divers that typically perform when the cruise ships are in town. They work for tips only and were in the process of gathering up enough tips to make it worth their while to dive when we walked up. We supplemented the tip jar and watched as one of the divers gracefully dove into the water (hit).

Mazatlan Cliff Diver (Clavadista)

Monument to the Continuity of Life on the malecon

From the malecon, we walked to the Market, which was mostly closed (miss), then to the Pacifico Brewery, an industrial brewery with no brew pub or tasting room (miss), then to a neighborhood bar which was closed (miss). We consulted our tourist map and decided to try the Plaza Machado. We found a nice restaurant with an indoor patio and had a cold drink and supper (hit). The square came alive after dark with families out strolling and people selling crafts and "stuff" at their kiosks (hit). We caught a pulmonia back to the marina and called it a night.

Allen with a giant beer and Dave with a tiny beer, Plaza Machado

Monday it was time to get to work. The yard pulled the stabilizer so that we could replace the shaft seals and got busy preparing the bottom for paint.