One disturbing event on our crossing of the Sea of Cortez. About 1500 (3:00pm) on November 19, out in the middle of freakin’ nowhere, we heard a little bird twittering. Looking around, I saw the critter, in a tiny flash of yellow, black and white: an Audubon’s warbler. Heading east from the Baja peninsula. This…
We left Cabo San Lucas on November 16, shortly after the power boat wakes made staying anchored impossible. Destination: Cabo de los Frailes, about 45 miles distant – we alternately sailed and motored up around the toe of the Baja Peninsula and into the southern Sea of Cortez, traveling north again for the first time…
November 14, 2007. As dawn grew into morning, we passed the usual boat-rally stop of Bahia de Magdalena. By now we wanted to put some distance under the keel so we headed directly for Cabo San Lucas, the southernmost point of Baja California, in the Tropic of Cancer and some 315 miles from Punta Pequena.…
Instead of jumping out of Turtle Bay (on the Pacific side of Baja about halfway down that 750-mile-long peninsula) and spending a two night offshore trip to get to Bahia Santa Maria a couple hundred miles further south via a more direct route; and because the reinforced northwesterlies continued to build, we explored the coast…
We rounded Cape Scott on Vancouver Island BC on July 6, 2007. About 40 miles later, in the first fjord at anchor, some cruiser asked me if I was going on the Baja HaHa. So it proceeded down the coast – about the fourth time this happened I realized that the HaHa was an event…
There are many ways to travel to Mexico by boat. Some people join large rallies out of Southern California like the Baja Ha-Ha or the FUBAR rally for power boats, I suppose for the cameraderie and planning that an organized event provides. Other folks buddy-boat with one or two other vessels for short passages or…
Sometimes a boat does not need a full-on locking companionway cover. Just a little fabric flap for those warmer-weather, casual days when one needs only a bit of canvas and windowpane to block the breeze yet still let light down below. Here’s how I did it: with the horizontal sliding portion of the companionway hatch…
March, 2007. A no-see-um screen for the companionway hatch is more complicated than deck hatch screens. No easy shower-cap solutions exist for the Fox’s companionway, oh no. Our companionway has a sliding overhead cover that is at a roughly 90-degree angle to the hatch proper, which in turn fits into a very nicely-manufactured stainless steel…
Sidney, BC, Canada, March, 2007. Having heard there were places in the world where biting insects invaded boats, I decided to make some bug screens for the Fox’s two deck hatches and companionway while we were in insect-free BC, Canada. Details: the deck hatches’ bases are 22-1/2" wide x 25-1/4" long, with a rolled aluminum…
In 2005, when we were still living in Seattle at Shilshole Marina, we bought two 85-watt Photowatt solar panels (manufactured in France, 20" wide, x 48" long, x 1" thick) for the Fox, hoping they would give us free battery recharging while at anchor. We installed them on either side of the stern pulpit and…