October 2013: month in review

Jeff as spock and his spaceship Serenity…Halloween 2013. His eyebrows were drawn with eyeliner and his ears were constructed of plumber’s putty.

The longer we’re out here, the more quickly the time passes. It’s hard to believe that we’ve been in Estero Jaltepeque now for over three weeks and that October is over, terminado, done. The first week of October was dedicated to finishing projects and tying up loose ends in Chiapas (mainly getting my teeth fixed and provisioning – we’re stuffed to the gills with Mexican canned meats). The second week we spent mostly on the water, attempting to sail south in light and variable winds during the day and powering through squalls each night.

When we arrived in Bahia del Sol, the first week was dedicated to more boat projects (remember what I said about never ending?), cleaning the boat (also never ending), laundry, buying more groceries (we ran out of important things like potatoes and onions), getting acquainted with the cruising community here, exploring our surroundings and swimming in the ocean (never gets old). For me, the second and third weeks were dedicated to getting caught up on work work in between boat work, which isn’t terribly glamorous, but that’s life.

While others were off exploring Copan or learning how to surf, we were trying our best not to spend any more money (with the exception of beer, of course). We finally put the hammock to good use, had friends over for lunch and dinner (twice in one month, that’s some kind of record), made a first (semi-successful) attempt at baking bread, spent time trouble shooting our HAM radio (with the generous assistance of our friend Dave on SV Chrysalis) so that we can start socializing even when we’re out to sea, reinsulated our fridge, went swimming in the estuary almost every day, participated in happy hour several times a week, ate a lot of delicious pupusas (the national delicacy), went into the jungle with our friend Santos and his family, watched a lot of Dr. Who and started thinking up some good inside jokes I can tell to our friends on SV Tardis if we ever see them again.

So that’s the scoop – not too terribly much to report, here’s the recap in numbers!

260 … number of miles traveled

7 … nights at a marina

5 … nights at sea

19 … nights on the hook

5 … storms encountered on our passage from Chiapas to Bahia del Sol

22 … boats on moorings in Bahia del Sol (this is approximate)

4.5 … miles (by dinghy) to the estuary town of La Herradura where we bought groceries

75 … minutes it took us by dinghy to get to La Herradura

2 … horsepower of our dinghy’s motor (hence the slow speed)

2.00 … cost, in dollars, for a delicious homemade lunch in La Herradura

20 … number of (HUGE) limes I was able to buy for 50 cents

3 … days it took for our Papaya to get too moldy to eat (only 3 days!)

14.00 … cost, in dollars, per week for the “Cruisers Club” at Bahia del Sol, which offers you: use of both pools and other facilities, showers, garbage, internet, $1.00 beers and 30% off of your food bill – not too shabby

4:00 … time that the cruisers start to convene for Happy Hour at Hotel Bahia del Sol

72 … number of beers that Jeff and I drank at Hotel Bahia del Sol this month (mostly during Happy Hour – our consumption of beer increased exponentially if we were grappling with a frustrating boat project)

24 … number of beers that we enjoyed each week (which is really only a little over 3 per day…not tooooo bad)

1.00 … cost of each beer at Hotel Bahia del Sol

2 … times our anchor dragged in between shifting currents (the anchor line got wrapped around our keel)

5 … number of people it took to get our boat under control the second time it dragged (when we weren’t around to help), including three dinghies

3 … knos, the speed of the current coming in and out of Bahia del Sol

4.5 … knots, our average speed under motor

2 … number of times we hosted people on our boat (that’s pretty much a record for us, we rarely, if ever, host)

3 … new El Salvadorean card games we learned from our friend Santos – 31, Parejas (Partners) and Burro (Ass) – Burro is ridiculously fun

2.2 … inches of rain that came down in 2 hours in one of the heaviest downpours we’ve seen

4.45 … cost of diesel (per gallon) in Bahia del Sol

4.10 … cost of gasoline (per gallon) in Bahia del Sol

38 … gallons of diesel purchased (we hear it gets significantly more expensive the farther south we get)

57 … total number of gallons of diesel onboard

169 … amount (in US Dollars) we spent on fueling up (eep!)

5 … months we hope the diesel will last us

8143 … the frequency used by the Pan Pacific net, that we now check into on a semi-regular basis

2 … number of diodes Jeff had to cut in order to open up our HAM radio to marine frequencies

5 … number of diodes that Jeff accidentally cut (the instructions he found online were a tad misleading, resulting in a couple curse word moments)

3 … number of diodes that Jeff resoddered (the radio is working like a champ!)

2897 … miles, approximate distance (as the car drives) to the farthest place we’ve made contact with on our HAM radio (all the way in Palm Beach, Florida!)

966 … miles, approximate distance (as the crow flies) to Palm Beach, Florida

0 … times we went into the city, either Zacatecoluca or San Salvador (we kept a low profile this month)