Wastin away again in margaritaville

Hey all, sitting here on somebody's stoop stealing their wi-fi service. We are at Playa Coyote a few miles south of Mulege, on the Sea of Cortez. The sea is lapping and iridescing about 50 feet from my keyboard. I am writing this beneath a waxing gibbous moon. The tide is coming in, and it should be pretty high as we approach the full moon. We sailed Valdesca today, our second day of sailing. After we got here, we had to wait a couple days for some spanking south winds to die down. It was way too rowdy for us. We are learning the Beaufort wind scale and at about 15 knots of wind, the scale says that there are many horses visible on the sea surface. I take the "horses" to be whitecaps. The first couple days here there were way too many horses out there for us. Today was pretty spunky. We went way out, a couple miles anyway, and then tacked back and forth up the bay a good long ways. We started out with a reef in the main, shook out the reef after a while, put it back in a while later, and then things really got cooking so we took the main down all together and sailed under jib and mizzen. Valdesca sails quite happily on two sails. The waves were getting pretty big--maybe 3 ft rollers--as the wind built up. After about 4 hours we came in because the wind just kept getting stronger and stronger and the waves bigger and bigger. We had quite a little kerfuffle as we doused the main and I couldn't undo a knot I tied earlier and the jib was flogging around like crazy and the jib sheets got all fouled after one of the figure eight knots came out. Tim said later, "Jeez, things can really go to hell fast out here."' Ain's that the truth. The winds down here are ferocious. And the gusts only more so. Our second night, we broke a tent pole and ripped our brand new tent--the North Face minibus. Spent the next day scrounging in Mulege for some way to fix the broken pole. We found a fix, and I patched the tent with a piece of sail fabric. Good as new, almost.

Valdesca sails like a champion. She is beautiful, and happy to be off the trailer and doing what she does best. Tomorrow we pull her out to get the bottom painted. We have made friends with the folks at NOLS and their boat guy is going to paint the bottom. He is also helping us on some other details--a whisker pole for the jib (necessary for so much downwind sailing as we'll be doing going south), a way to mount the stern anchor. We met the director of the sailing program, Roger, from Barcelona, of all places. Great guy, gracious, and very helpful. He made many suggestions for routes, places to visit, stops for water, sites to see, and tricks for Drascombe sailors.

We are likely going to stay here on the beach for a while longer. We have a lot to learn and there's no reason to rush off. We have a gorgeous camp beneath some palms, $5 a night. Can't beat the view and the fresh air. We are on a beach with a bunch of loose nuts from the States. Some great people, who have been very welcoming and helpful with radios, weather reports, and other local knowledge. Will likely go do some geology with one guy who is a raven researcher, among other talents. He has two pairs of ravens here he has been following for years. One pair is Kai and Ote. The other pair is Romeo and Julieta. He says ravens can live for 45 years. His 70th birthday is tomorrow and he is going out in his sea kayak to Coyote Island to spend his birthday with Romeo and Julieta. He says he once saw Julieta using a chapstick tube like a skateboard, pushing off with one foot along the sand. And once Romeo was scooping up sand with a little half sphere of plastic.

We are seeing ospreys, reddish egrets, snowy egrets, phainopeplas, vermilion flycatchers, and gazillions of dolphins. We are eating delicious empanadas stuffed with fruit made my a lady up the road. Vendors come by with fresh shrimp, fresh vegetables, empanadas and tortillas. They bring water and ice, blankets, t-shirts, fish. One guy tonight sold 40 pizzas! That means about every person on this beach but us bought a pizza.

Tap Tapley, who founded the Mexico NOLS program, is right down the way. We met him a few days ago. His was the first house on Coyote Bay, about 30 some years ago.

There is a magnificent house for rent right next to our camp. It's on the water and looks beautiful. We have made friends with the caretakers, Carmen and Manuel. Come on down! Valdesca is anchored right off the beach.