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Thursday 6th April 2017 A pleasant motor north to Chamela in very light, mainly

Left Tenacatita Bay in pitch darkness and a flat calm at 6.30 this morning - had to use my headlamp while raising the anchor.

A lovely sunrise at 8am, by which time we were passing the many offlying rocky outcrops north of Tencatita - several were very large and all were clearly excellent seabird nesting sites.

The charts have been showing depths of well under 20m where the depth sounder was giving 65-90 m .... typical of charts in this part of Mexico. When I had Internet, I should have downloaded Google Earth photos of this coastline to see the true picture and give a better idea of depths.

The wind was a gentle southwesterly over most of the day and has now died away completely with the onset of darkness.

The beach was busy with people, some playing soccer, and fishermen's pangas often came in and out during the afternoon. The waves crash onto the beach - I saw no-one going for a swim.

I'm pleased to report my windlass is now behaving beautifully - I just wish I had more chain available to give more choice of where to anchor. I need to splice on the long length of multiplait rope that is presently tied to the end of the chain but is of no use like that since the knot and shackle being used won't pass around the windlass. I'm hoping to do that in La Cruz when I get there early next week. In the meantime, I can only anchor safely in shallow water... very restricting unless, using a snubber to take the strain first, I take the chain end off the windlass and re-join the rope to it beyond the windlass, placing the rope around the windlass afterwards to let out more rode - complicated ... and needing the reverse procedure when raising the anchor! Not something to be done in a hurry! (My main anchor and 100m of chain are stowed away in Victoria!)

I'll post today's photos separately after this.

Written by : Jeanne Socrates