Sailing from Matanchen Bay to Mazatlan - 150 miles and 31 hours

 We stayed in Matanchen Bay for 3 nights.  The first night, there were 5 other boats; the last night, we were the only ones anchored.  The bay and the beach are fairly large and unpopulated except for the 34 restaurants along the beach (I know it was 34 because they were on the sign - I have no idea how these restaurants all make it given that they seemed empty while we were there).  

Matanchen Bay is near San Blas, which we anchored in on the way south in January.  It's a great spot to anchor except for the jejenes (aka no-seeums) and other biting insects.  Before dusk, we closed all of our hatches and windows, which seemed to work.  Interestingly, the jejenes are one of the most important pollinators of the cacao plant https://www.sciencefriday.com/articles/meet-the-flies-that-pollinate-cocoa-trees/- so most everything has some purpose even when they are annoying 😉

We left Saturday morning at 8:00 am.  We knew the winds were going to be high that afternoon, but we wanted to do this trip on the weekend so it wouldn't interfere with Tom's work schedule.  Sailing upwind into the waves was not fun!  I was uncomfortable and we were only going 3 knots per hour.  Plus, when we tacked, we had to sail in the wrong direction (i.e., to the West vs to the North).  What was supposed to be 131 miles and just about 25 hours was 153 miles and 31 hours.  Fortunately, the wind died down around 9:00 and we motored during the night.  

Earlier in the day, we encountered a pod of dolphins that came up to our boat and swam next to us for 30 minutes or so - they were jumping and doing this funny tail flip thing.  https://youtu.be/1tpvnksP2uA

Piedra Blanca de Mar

Before we got to our anchorage (Stone Island on the south side of Mazatlán), we were worried about our sail drive (transmission, which is pretty new) & engine because it's been leaking oil; while we're here, we'll need to pull our boat out and get it checked out.  Since pulling your boat out cost quite a bit & is a process , hopefully we'll get to schedule other maintenance as well like get the bottom painted.  

Stone Island - we made it!