Chacala, Nayarit

Chacala (21 09 72N 105 13 56W)

Environmental conditions: Chilly-ish in the evenings (perfect for sleeping), dreamy during the day; water temp perfecto, but some jellies!

Fridge temp: Perfect

Battery state: 13.2V (i.e., perfect)

Euchre score: Girls 1; boys 1

We departed San Blas around 0820 on calm seas, no breeze, but lots of sunshine. We took the opportunity as we puttered out of the bay to check in and out with the port captain, since we’d forgotten to do it during the two days we were in port — oops. Because of the calm, we also took the opportunity to tune the drifter a bit by moving it up the torsion rope about 1’ in hopes of straightening out the foot when sheeted in. The wind never really came up enough for us to test our fix. Next time.

There were whales all around, seemingly frolicking and in no rush. It was fun to watch. Unfortunately, they’re hard to capture in photographs and Jody’s just not that quick on the shutter. Wah wah. We’ll just have to save those sights in our little brains.

Chacala is about 20 miles south of San Blas, where we settled into a very warm, very lovely, quaint little anchorage where a few of the cruisers we’d met in San Blas had also dropped their hooks. It was quite relaxing, so we stayed on da boat the first day, had a swim, and maybe a nap. The following day, we checked in with the port captain, who was all of about 16 (not really, but looked like it), then set off on our walkabout around town.

We meandered down the beach and followed a dirt road up a hill to one of the schwanky resorts (which had a yoga studio), then wound our way back down to the beach where we found a garden of cairns. Pretty neat. We crossed the beach to check out the other side of town, grab a couple of provisions, some grub and homemade soap and baked goods from vendors on the beach. Then it was back to da boat for another swim and more relaxing. It’s a tough life, don’t ya know?

The Advance Team weighed anchor early on the 9th to head for La Cruz, as Kristin was catching a plane in a couple of days to visit her mom in Florida. We lingered another night before making our way to Punta de Mita the following morning.