A New Type of Cruising

We're happy to report that our boat is working perfectly now! Our stay in La Paz was long but well worth it now that all the work is done. We were thrilled that our new paint job has gained us about two knots of speed (which goes to show how bad it was.) Our sail drives are purring along and appear to be working well. Our wax job was quickly lost under a thick coat of salt spray, but that's to be expected.

Our biggest bit of news is the change that having a car brings to the cruising life. It's just a big paperweight that you have to take care of but, when you have a car in a city it suddenly makes the provisioning difficulties disappear. No more one mile tromps through city streets in the pounding sunshine to the grocery store and then the cab ride back. No more struggling to get to three different stores in one day using public transportation. Got a hankering for that taco stand across town? No problem now. Just hop in the air-conditioned spendor and settle down into the leather seats. Oh the luxury! Having a car is definitely a luxury that you don't appreciate until you have lived without one. It's so ingrained in most Americans' lives that I don't think people can even imagine life without one.

We left the car behind in La Paz while we traveled up to Puerto Escondido by boat. Once here, Patrick and Jack took the bus to La Paz, picked up the car and drove it up to Escondido. We will leave it here when we travel north to Santa Rosalia, and then perform the same procedure to get it to Santa Rosalia. We will continue to play hop-scotch with the car and the boat and move on up north. The plan is that eventually we will leave the boat for a month or two this summer and take the car up through the States on a car trip. Grand Canyon, here we come!