Our friends on Orinoco Flow stopped in Punta de Mita to clean the bottom of their boat before sailing across the Pacific to the Marquesas. Later in the afternoon we heard that Fred and Beda on Bilikin would also be arriving at Punta de Mita. They had left for the crossing already but turned back because of an electronics breakdown. All of us gathered at Orinoco Flow for dinner. The next morning I started helping Fred and Beda with their electronics. After testing the circuits the the databus for their depth/wind/speed instruments it became apparent that a wire must be cut somewhere. Tracing wires for some time led us to the break at the most difficult spot to access. Fortunately, the person who installed the wiring left extra wire so we were able to cut out the bad spot and splice it back together again. The final project was to wire in their new GPS since their older one decided it wasn't happy either. After we finished they started again across the Pacific. Hopefully everything will go well for them. At of 6:30pm central time we talked with them on the South Pacific Net (8.104 MHz) and everything was working great.
Over the VHF radio we heard our friends Doug and Jennifer aboard Freya were on their way so we decided to stay yet another day to see them. They arrived in the morning so we got together for breakfast of fried platino and bananas to compliment the Spanish tortilla they made. We spent much of the day together and had our final dinner together for a while. They are sailing off for the Marquesas and this is where we turn north into the Sea of Cortez. Early the next morning we motored out of the anchorage and around Punta de Mita being careful of the many submerged rocks off of the point. Chacala, our destination is a sleepy little town of a few palapas and a medical clinic. It is sleepy all year around except for Semana Santa (Holy Week). Today being Easter is the height of the celebration. The beach is packed, the band is loud and the jet ski's are driving us crazy as they buzz around Mandolin. Somehow we manage to focus on our daily study of Morse code while we bounce around in the waves. The hope is that tomorrow Chacala will return to it's sleepy status so we can go exploring.
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