Second Leg 520 miles - Huatulco, Mexico to Barillas Marina, El Salvador

Departure Date - March 29th

The great Gulf of Tehuantepec crossing (spooky music)

We depart Marina Chahue' at 5:00 pm, Tuesday with weather forecasts of three foot seas and less than 10kts of wind.  We don't even make it out of the bay when we hit 20kt winds and six foot seas...great.  I swear to God, when I get back to land I'm going to hunt down these "weather forecasters" and strangle someone.  Either that or I'm going to apply for a job. The interview - " so, how good would you say you are at guessing games?", "oh 50-50, I guess", "Great, you're hired!".  Now I know, the weather is one of those things you can't count on, but come on...can't we get a little bit closer with our predictions?

We continue to get a bit beat up for the rest of the night and part of the next morning.   We start to consider whether or not our timing was on as if it's this bad here, what's it going to be like when we hit the gulf?  Then, for no apparent reason, the weather gods smile upon us.  The seas lay down and the winds die off.  We get to the beginning of Tehuantepec with basically perfect conditions. 

Glass flat seas and winds under 8kts.  Well it's about damn time.  At one point we got this reading on our wind gauge.  I'm guessing you probably don't see this too often, particularly in T-Peck.

One of the benefits to flat seas is that you're able to spot just about anything floating on the surface.  We start spotting turtles.  And I don't mean, just one or two.  We stopped counting sometime after 150.  There were SO many turtles you could play hop-scotch on their backs across the bay.  Whatever the turtle conservation program is here, it's working.  Some must be in a serious REM sleep as they don't even bother to get out of our way and bounce off our bow as we cruise by.  One guy actually went under the bow and came out spinning at the stern.  Hell of a way to wake up from a nap.  And I used to think the alarm clock was a shock.

Most are subjected to carrying passengers like this guy while trying to catch a mid morning nap. 

These birds aren't the only hitchhikers around.  We get our fair share during our night shift.

99 birds sitting on a wire, 99 birds on a wire, if one of those birds, should happen to fall, 98 birds left sitting on a wire. 

Okay, I'll admit, it's lame, but hey, it's late and I'm tired, what can I say?

We spend the next 48 hours in dead calm.  Wow, what a blessing. 

Of course, as with every silver lining, usual comes a storm cloud and calm seas are no exception.  No winds and temperatures at 90 degrees with 80% humidity  makes everything hot and sticky.  Crew members (particularly the furry ones) start praying to the "wind gods" for relief.  Floor and fan space start going at a premium.  All hail to the wind gods!

The bulk of the crossing goes fairly well, but with a slightly growing chop.  Then we encounter some major lightening storms during one of the night shifts.  Fred has to dodge the storms using radar during his entire shift.  The last thing we need to is to get hit by lightening.  We've heard of boats having this happen to them and none of it is good.  As usual, Fred does a super job navigating and the only thing we get out of the storms is a bit of rain. That little girl in the yellow raincoat from Morton's has been working overtime on us, so a fresh water rinse is welcomed.

After four long nights at sea, we arrive in Barillas, Saturday, April 2nd around 6:00 am.  We have to hangout at the waypoint outside the breakers for the marina to open as we need to have a panga driver meet us and take us through the breakers as there are numerous shoals and danger points along the entrance to the marina.  Our driver shows up about an hour or so later and we follow him in.  This proves to be some of the worst water conditions we experience with large rollers hitting us abeam.  Unable to deploy the fins, we start to rock and roll, to and fro.

We enter Barillas Marina which lies in a estuary about 10 miles in and get moored up.  This is the first time we've had to moor out and not be at a slip, so we need to get the dingy in the water and get the boys to shore.  Neither of them grasp the concept that they can't get off the boat.  They see land, but there's no good way to get there.  Unfortunately, we have to delay the dingy launch until after the officials come to the boat, make their inspection and check us in.  The poochies do not understand the concept of "waiting".  Between Zeus' howling and Thor's constant  fidgeting around the boat checking for any hidden gangplank to get him to shore, things get a little tense.  We're all tired, hot and one of us has to pee like a racehorse.  Which, btw, where in the hell does that saying come from?  Do racehorses pee more than other equines?  I mean what is the deal with that saying?  Moving along...

Dingy launched, shore leave taken, we head back to the boat with at least one unwilling passenger (Zeus), who we have to basically pick up and put back in the dingy as he realizes there's no escape back on the boat.  This has been a very long passage for everyone and he makes his displeasure of having to be incarcerated back onboard, pretty clear.  He attempts to jump overboard just moments before getting back to the boat requiring Fred to haul his wet ass back into the dingy.  NOW we've got wash the damn dog.  Dog washed and shoved BACK into the boat, we start up the generator to get the A/C going to cool things down.  Not used to the sound of the generator, Zeus goes into hysterics (what a shocker!) and begins to try and claw his way out of the boat.  This, btw, does not improve over the days we spend moored with the generator running.  We are quickly running out of valium for the dog and tequila for us.  Thor, it should be noted, is just thrilled to get to land, use "the facilities" and be in a cool environment.  It's nappy time for him. 

During our brief stay in Barillas we do get into town one day for some grocery shopping.  The marina runs a courtesy bus for anyone interested and even includes your own private security guard, complete with sawed off shotgun, to watch over the bus.  Kinda deters any false sense of security about going into town if you need an armed escort, but what the hell.  The guy with the gun is on our side, right?  The town is called Usulutan and while the grocery store was less than stellar, walking around the few blocks from our bus proved pretty interesting.  It was quite a bustling, if ever so small, metropolis.  Here's few shots we got during our visit....

That's about it for the short time we spent in El Salvador.  We catch up on some rest and prepare to depart Friday, April 8th for Costa Rica our last stop before arriving in Panama.