Yesterday we invited Jim's gang to go out for a daysail today. We had a limited amount of time since no one really wanted to get up early and Anna had to catch a flight home around 3:00 PM or so. We'd originally planned to maybe go to one of the nearby anchorages (Caleta Lobos, Ballandra) to do a little snorkeling but we just didn't have enough time. So, a simple daysail it was.
Daysailing is so much more fun than sailing to somewhere. When daysailing you can just follow the wind, wherever it blows. Or doesn't.
However, when we got up this morning we weren't so sure this was a great plan. The sky was completely overcast and it was a wee bit on the cool side. I kept checking weather reports and they all agreed that today was going to be another beautiful day in paradise. But we weren't so sure. We wondered if the weather prognosticators were looking out the window at all. But, amazingly, long about 1000, the sky cleared and the temperature warmed up nicely. We got underway about 1030 and motored out into the Bahia de La Paz.
As soon as we were out a little ways we raised the main, rolled out the jib and the staysail and shut down the engine. There wasn't much wind but we managed to maintain 2-3 knots most of the time. And since we were daysailing instead of actually going anywhere, who cares?
Everyone had to take their turn climbing the ratlines.
Two of the big highlights of the trip came near the beginning and the end. We spotted whale sharks! The first time, Lulu or Thomas or one of them noticed something near the surface. When we got closer we saw that it was a small (7'-8') whale shark. The second time, we were on our way back in when Thomas and/or Jaxon spotted something really close by. It was right off the side of the boat and at first they thought it was a huge manta ray. But as they got to see more of it, it was clearly a 14'-15' whale shark. Very, very cool.
We tootled around for about an hour and a half, at times with virtually no wind at all. But, just when we were ready to strike the sails, a little bit of wind would come back up. Not much, but enough to keep us interested.
But, eventually, there was no wind at all and it was time to fire up the engine and head back in. Although I muffed my first approach to the dock, the second try went just fine and we docked without incident.
December 22: a fine day for a daysail in La Paz. If your day was even half as much fun as ours was, you had a fine day.
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