After waking up this morning in the La Cruz anchorage, I got a hail on the VHF from Dick Markie, the dockmaster at Paradise Village Marina. After switching off the hailing channel he told me to come on in - they had a spot for me. So I motored over, saw a mamma whale and her calf lounging around (ho-hum) and entered the Nuevo Vallarta breakwater. Docking was a piece of cake with experienced dock hands. You'd be amazed how crazy it can get docking a boat when there are dock hands who don't know what they're doing. So often they just pull and pull, and can really screw things up. In La Cruz, the guy who took my bow line pulled so hard that the stern nearly went into my neighbor's boat. Luckily I got him to stop pulling long enough to get a stern line on, but sheesh. I've single-handed myself into enough slips, and seen enough overzealous help from inexperienced boaters or dock hands, that often I'd rather do it myself. Anyway... these guys were perfect. They were relaxed; they let me do the work with the engine, then they tied the bow and stern lines perfectly while I hopped off and tied the spring. It also helped that this slip is hideously large. It's a 51-foot slip and extremely wide.
I didn't do much today as I'm still getting used to the heat. I walked around a bit, and had lunch at the yacht club, worked a bit, then laid down for a nap. I'm a great napper when it's 85 degrees out. Tonight I went up to the shopping center after reading some reviews of local restaurants. I had a very good coffee (triple espresso macchiato) and then went upstairs to a churrascaria, which was very good. If you haven't eaten at a churrascaria yet, you owe it to yourself to give it a try. It's a Brazilian thing. You get yourself a salad and some sides, and then these guys walk by with skewers of all sorts of meat and carve some off onto your plate. The one in San Francisco kicks ass, but I can't remember its name. This one was okay. The meat was good but didn't stand on its own, flavor-wise; it definitely needed the hot sauces the leave on the table. They also need better salad and sides. But for 180 pesos, it's not bad.The rest of tonight I've spent working and checking prices on the Internet in preparation for my next visit to the boys. I'm still trying to figure out a plan for the next 90 days, as I have until June 1 to get north of 27 degrees latitude (out of the Tropical Storm Zone) for boat insurance purposes. I even toyed with the idea of keeping the boat in the Sea of Cortez, in Guaymas or sailing around even farther north, but the bus trip from Guaymas to Phoenix/Tucson or El Paso is $100 round trip, and the plane fare to Panama City isn't any different than from San Diego or LAX. So yeah, I'm still on track to head north towards San Diego / LA in a week or so, though I could be stuck in Cabo for a couple weeks waiting for weather. There are worse places to be stuck.Tomorrow I'm going to ride my bike into downtown PV. I've experienced enough busses and I need the exercise. Here's hoping I survive PV traffic. I think I'll wear my helmet. The Mexican Superclasico (Chivas of Guadalajara vs. Club America of Mexico City) is tomorrow at 5pm, so I'll be looking for a crazy Mexican sports bar with paper streamers and fireworks to watch that. Ole!TT
