The art of decision-making

After traveling over 1000 miles in the past month you reach Puerto Chiapas, Mexico right before the first hurricane of the season. Do you…

A)    Stay in Chiapas, Mexico?

B)    Sail on to Bahia del Sol, El Salvador?

C)    Ship your boat across Guatemala to the Caribbean?

D)    Sell your boat and buy a farm?

We live in a choose your own adventure world, which is generally pretty great, except for the fact that sometimes we are terrible at making decisions. It’s hard enough for us to choose where to eat dinner let alone where to keep our boat for hurricane season. You may or may not be surprised to discover that we’re one of those couples that walks up and down block after block trying to decide where to eat. The conversation generally goes something like this:

“What are you hungry for tonight?”

“I don’t know. Anything sounds good. How about you?”

“Same.”

“Are you sure you don’t have a preference?”

“Nope, no preference. I’d be happy with anything. How about you?”

“Same here.”

“What about that place?”

“That place looks okay, doesn’t look great, but I’m open to anything. What about this place?”

“That could work. It’s pretty empty though.”

“Yeah.”

“This place looks pretty good.”

“Let’s add it to the list of ‘maybes’ and come back to it if we don’t find something else.”

“Cool.”

We really could be talking about anything.

It goes on like this until our blood sugar reaches dangerously low levels, at which point one of us averts catastrophe by choosing from one of the nearly infinite dining options. The thing is that it’s rare for either one of us to have a strong preference and we’re both pretty easy to please. That should make it simpler, right? Wrong. As former facilitators, we like to reach agreement on our objectives, catalogue our options, weigh the costs and benefits, try to ascertain whether the other person is partial to a particular trajectory, yada, yada. I think we like thinking about the options more than we actually like choosing. When you choose, you advance to the next chapter, for better or for worse.

In a choose your own adventure the only thing you have to base your choice off of is what has happened as a result of your previous decisions – you have no knowledge of all of the future twists and turns that might result from each choice, no knowledge of the doors that might open and those that might close. You are a player in a game and you don’t know the bigger story and how your choices influence the outcome. For all we know, choosing street hamburgers last night could be the beginning of the end for us.

Fortunately, the choice to stay in Chiapas, Mexico rather than pushing on to El Salvador was clear. It was a decision we reached quickly without too much hemming and hawing. I’m not quite sure how Bahia del Sol in El Salvador floated to the top as our favored hurricane hideout in the first place. We heard it was cheap, safe to leave your boat and…well, I think that’s all we needed to hear at the time. It didn’t take long, however, for us to change our minds.

We arrived at Puerto Chiapas five days before Hurricane Barbara charged into the Gulf of Tehuantepec, claiming the lives of several fishermen and surfers and wreaking havoc on coastal towns in state of Oaxaca. Reason #1 to stay put: The hurricanes are arriving early this year and may be more ferocious than expected. Tied safely to the marina dock, in a placid pond-like basin, we barely clocked 15 knots of wind at Marina Chiapas and we felt zero wave action or surge. Reason #2 to stay put: Marina Chiapas is calm – its long and labyrinthine entrance means it’s very well protected. This is especially important since we’ll be leaving Serenity while we head home for two months.

As we were patiently watching the weather, a deluge of additional reasons made Chiapas the clear winner:

Reason #3: On the last night of our passage to Puerto Chiapas, we motored through a thunderstorm. Apparently, it was one of the first big ones, heralding the commencement of rainy season. Thunderstorms are now a near nightly occurrence. Fancier boats with radars can spot and dodge storm cells more dexterously than those of us that rely on more rudimentary implements (eyes and ears).

Reason #4: Marina Chiapas has a screaming deal for hurricane season. Upon our arrival, the marina manager, Enrique, gave us the hard sell. Well, actually, he didn’t really have to try too hard because the price is that good. Starting in July they’re only charging $200 per month for any boat, regardless of length. This includes electricity, water, and security. The staff at the marina will even visit our boat on a semi-regular basis to air it out. Compare this to $100 a month for a mooring ball and $30 a month for port fees in Bahia del Sol. We’ll be paying $70 more per month, but we think it’s worth the money (more on that later). There certainly isn’t a better deal in Mexico, unless you do dry storage.

Reason #5: One word – showers. There are also showers at Bahia del Sol…but they involve a dinghy ride. At Marina Chiapas, all I have to do is walk up the ramp. Spoiled. There’s also a freezer stocked with 50 cent boles (think homemade, creamy, delicious otter pops – pronounced bo-lay) and a refrigerator stocked with 1 liter Coronas for $1.75 apiece. Who can pass that up? Cold beer + bole + shower = my new favorite activity.

Reason #6: After traveling over 1000 miles in a little over a month, we were both feeling a bit drained. Although 250 additional miles isn’t much (funny how our perspective on distance changes over time), we weren’t excited about pushing through our exhaustion. Plus, there’s that whole hurricane and thunderstorm thing.

Reason #7: Despite what we’ve heard about the relative ease of clearing out of Mexico and into El Salvador, we weren’t excited about the logistics and any complications that might ensue. Easier to stick with what we know.

Reason #8: The prospect of exploring Chiapas, the southernmost Mexican state, was alluring to both of us. Staying in Chiapas would also make it easier for us to travel overland to the Yucatan Peninsula to visit family (something I’ve wanted to do for years).

Reason #9: Once we started telling other cruisers about our plans to leave our boat in Bahia del Sol, El Salvador for two months while visiting the Pacific Northwest, the stories started streaming in. Cruisers told us about entire trees that float down the river, into the bay, without any regard for what they run into on their way out to sea. One couple intended to leave their boat in Bahia del Sol last summer and upon seeing the conditions in the bay, turned right around and headed back to Chiapas. Every other blog I read about Bahia del Sol mentioned the strong current and the potential for surge. Some moorings have been known to drag and the dock at the marina has splintered during strong storm events. None of these stories instilled an awful lot of confidence. It might be totally fine, but why chance it?

But really, once Jeff strung his hammock up, the decision was final…we were staying put.

The only reasons not to stay in Mexico were that my visa was set to expire in early June, our plane tickets had us flying out of San Salvador in early July rather than Mexico, El Salvador would be cheaper overall and, yeah…that’s about it. We were able to reason our way out of each of these potential barriers and we’re feeling pretty good about our current status.

Our Delorme InReach (aka satellite tracker) shows us off of the coast of Africa at the moment, but I assure you that we are not in Africa, nor are we in the “care” of pirates. Serenity is nestled safely at a slip in Marina Chiapas in the beautiful southern state of Chiapas, where she’ll stay until we jump back onboard in September. We’ll see where this adventure leads.

Our “location” off of the Ivory Coast according to DeLorme.