Well! Come back in a day or two to see how they were conquered!

And that was the first time I saw Tiki-cheri!

Love. Love. Love!  Every boat needs a hug!

Tiki-Cheri  needs new rigging. I wanted it to have new, dependable rigging so we could head out feeling safe as could be. We also needed to have the engine serviced and of course we need a new dodger. tiki-cheri also needs her bottom cleaned about every six weeks, especially when she is sitting idly waiting at the dock. There are times when action seems a long ways off indeed!

Necessarily a number of men have entered my life, men with mostly fabulous names : Rafael, the angel, Rodrigo like El Cid, and Jesus.

First Carlos the rigger:

It took him a month  to get the accurate measurements and finally place the order with rigworks in San Diego. As I understand it, the order is on the way and with luck he’ll be able to start when I get back next tuesday. Let s hope!

This is Rafael the welder, an artist welder I’m told who can weld the finest welding things!  He was brought in to coax the screws on the roller furling to release the cable.

He brought a helper, who held things and passed things and ran back to the car for things.

This is El buso, the diver.

His name is Rodrigo. He’ll be here every six weeks to clean the bottom of the boat and scrape off the barnacles and other attachy-sticky things that can damage the paint on the hull and thus also the hull. I ‘m ever so grateful to be able to hire for that job, which in a marina is unpleasant at best. At least here there are no cocodrillos (crocodiles) like in Marina Vallarta!

Taking advantage of the Inktober project to put together my comic book about buying my sailboat. Hopefully when Inktober comes to the end of the month, I will have completed the story.  This is the plan! and then with those drawings I can start on turning the story into a comic book.

A traveler spends a lot of time waiting mostly in line ups to go to wherever, anytime.

When all that waiting is over it’s time to face a strange new world.

Mostly, getting a taxi  in a foreign place at night feels a lot like this:

or like this:

Where to?

The  Salvadoran taxi driver knew the station I meant and was probably used to going there.

He dropped me off and carried my suitcase in right to the ticket booth.  Spanish was the first language here,

the staff was friendly and very helpful and more than happy  to help me practice my spanish.  I could have been in Mexico already, but I had yet to cross that now infamous border.

I settled in to the Executivo bus, so comfy and clean and luxurious really and slept some.

I slept on and off, unsettled by all that was said in the media about this area of the world, especially the unrest in the southern states and the recent shootings there.  I was looking forward to being on the other side of the border into Mexico. That in itself was king of strange considering that a few years ago it was the opposite.  So when I was drawing this I thought of those « Dirty devils » I’d seen dancing in Panama, those characters with the purses.  The purses made them somehow less of a threat, but still a great symbol of that eternal fight between good and evil. The long and short of it was that slept some, and woke often.  It stayed dark outside, with no lights at all along the highway.

**** I haven’t inserted a pic for the border crossing… will have to do that…  the thing was that I didn’t get to officially cross the border and there was no one to explain that to me… it was an issue I had to deal with later…

We arrived inn Guaymas in the early morning .  I saw the sun rise over the hills and the scenery took shape.  There were only a dozen people on that great big bus, and they dissipated quickly on arrival, so that by the time I came to the waiting room, I was quite alone there.

Once I travelled without cell phone or internet, until the internet cafes, but I had no GPS to guide me through the streets of city or to my way out of an airport or a train station.  Then I relied on people, the available personal, strangers sometimes.  Usually it worked and at the same time I interacted more.  I must say, I like the independence and reassurance cellphone data provides.

That’s the thing about taxis, if you can’t find them, they’ll find you.

I’m not happy with the background person…

This one is arriving at my destination, finding the right place to stay, hotel or other is a huge thing when a person is travelling.  It’s about the long hours in transit and looking for a quiet place to re-coup at the end.  Los Jitos was a great choice.

After 24 hours of travel in subways, planes, busses and taxis, finding a bed in a quiet room.

Looking forward to crashing into sleep for the next few hours.  Los Jitos provided with characteristic Mexican welcome!

Happiness is:

No, of course not.  I’m not too tired to go look at a boat!

Give me 5 minutes.

!

and off we went to see a boat.

End of part 1. I can t edit the image as I would like on the phone. Time to start a new page !

And there she is.  my new sailboat , so far named Fantasy.  I made an offer on this sailboat which was accepted on September 13th, a very lucky day indeed!  I am now in Puerto Vallarta until the end of the week and on the following Monday, or Saturday if I can I will be in  Vancouver wiring the money to escrow so they can start the title search.  I am really hoping that all will be done quickly so I can get back by the 18th and step onto MY sailboat!!! I am so very excited with all this!

I’ve been travelling quite a bit the last couple of months.  I was in one place for a full year and I needed some travel, so off I went.  Panama, for a little more Spanish, and back to Vancouver to visit the ones I love, and now in San Carlos Mexico where it is extraordinarily hot.  The trip down was so interesting.  To start with, I didn’t really want to go through the US, because of all the turmoil there, yet for both trips, I had little choice and went through SFO.

I travel solo most everywhere and safety is important to me.  I am cautious by nature and I make sure the odds are in my favour.  I do listen to the advice of locals, I read articles, I prepare myself as well as I can.  In Panama I elected to go to a school in Panama city in an area reputed to be safe.  At the school I was told to « stay on the bricks, you are safe on the bricks. »   the streets of Casco Viejo are bricked.  Past the bricks you are not always safe and alone at night as a woman and obviously a tourist, you are not safe.  In the end I did venture off the bricks, in other safe areas and my travels were enriched by it.  But for this trip, in this case there has been so much in  the media and on fb about the troubles in the US, and so much about Mexico it’s hard not to be influenced.  I have traveled to Mexico and around Mexico before and I have felt quite comfortable there.  So I felt that the odds really were on my side in the journey.

San Carlos is somewhat remote, in that is a very small town, out of the way of main thoroughfares. The most economical way to get to San Carlos Mexico is to fly to Tucson AZ, and then take a bus from a bus station about 20 minutes away from the airport by taxi.  One of the buses does do an almost direct route to Guaymas, Sonora, clearing customs at Nogales, and doing a quick stop in Hermosillo before going down to Guaymas. The last bit of the trip was by taxi to my hotel in San Carlos.

Although I was reluctant to go that way, I really had very little choice.  The cost of getting to Hermosillo by air was not reasonable and I would have needed a bus anyways, or to rent a car somewhere along the way.

I was reluctant because of all the shootings in the USA.  I had also  heard, and for years, some unpleasant reports about going through Mexico by road, by night.  Oh yes, did I mention that my last flight arrived in Tucson just as the sun set.  It was dark by the time I retrieved my suitcase from the baggage claim and went looking for the taxi stands.  It isn’t just the dark, it’s also that when arriving late, most employees are gone.  Information was closed, most of the booths were closed as were the restaurants.  Mostly though is the fact that there really is no one there to ask directions to.  Eventually though, I did spot the taxi stands and headed across the street to find a taxi.

Reluctant, is just another way to say that I was worried about the outcome of this trip.  I always try to arrive at destination by mid afternoon, to give myself plenty of time to find my way in daylight.  This just couldn’t be arranged for this trip, so there I was. It was some consolation to have set up the location device on my phone so Nathalie could see where I was. At least, as long as I had my phone I could be found… or my phone could be found.

I didn’t even have to hail that taxi, he saw me coming and he was hailing me, the trunk was open already and my suitcase flung in the back while I hoped in.  The taxi driver spoke with such a thick Spanish accent we spoke in Spanish… his flowed mine stumbled, but we understood each other.  He knew the bus terminal, so no problem.  This very kind man insisted on taking my suitcase inside and deposited it right in front of the wicket.  There, Spanish flowed on, and the ticket on my phone turned into  a paper ticket for the bus which was an hour away.  The waiting room filled slowly with passengers going back to Mexico and little children sleeping.  The bus finally arrived, I was handed a little bag of snacks and water for the trip and I went to my assigned seat. This Executivo bus was probably the most comfortable bus I have ever been on.  I need not say just how pleasant and comfortable the trip was.  I slept some, and read a bit, enjoyed my own snacks and drank my water.  Customs at Nogales was uneventful.  Our bags were unloaded, and put through the X-ray machine or whatever it is, and we picked them up on the other side.  No one asked or looked at my passport except when my paper ticket was issued back in Tucson.  And as that wasn’t a customs officer my passport was not stamped… am I even in Mexico now?  Arrival in guaymas was accompanied by the sun rising over purple mountains, and we slipped into the bus terminal. It was too early there for the information booth, if there was one, to be opened, so I wandered about the station a bit to find the wifi password, and then went outside to find a taxi. About 20 mins later, one found me and drove me straight to my hotel, informing me that there are many Canadians in San Carlos!

There I was.  End of the trip which went very well.  I was safe all the way there. I am so glad I overrode my fears and worries, I enjoyed the voyage, the people I encountered and this new experience!

I guess with every trip I am a little more knowledgeable, a little more confident, with every trip I am glad I didn’t let my guard down, I did my research and always kept my wits about me.  Also I trusted in a successful outcome because there are more kind people out there than the media would have us believe.

And loving it!  A new experience for sure!

Desde mi ventana:

I picked up a small package of Artist Trading Cards at Opus just before leaving for Panama.

I thought I’d do a series of drawings along the way, from the windows I look through.  Windows, like travel, offer a small view, a snap shot of the countries visited.  I thought the tiny space was just right for this project.  The cards are 2.5×3.5.

Card #1 is from my window at Super Gourmet in Casco Viejo as I sipped my tea.  A very friendly place with an extensive menu, and of course a lovely window.

Card #2 is from Benissio in Casco Viejo where I was having breakfast this morning.

Card #3 is from the Dodo at Plaza Francia where I had a breakfast again.  I reflected on the size of tea portions.  So far I’ve had tea in a demitasse, a regular cup and today I had an entire pot of tea.  Feeling blessed today!