Steph and I keep joking that we can’t wait for the adventure to “actually start”. We left San Diego, high-fived for the um-teenth time, toasted yet another leg of our journey and watched the Coronados fade behind us as we crossed the Mexican border. Twelve hours later, we landed in Ensenada with the dream of throwing government officials our passports and running back to the boat to FINALLY begin the trip.
But that wasn’t the case. Mexico needed some “necessary” documentation my Dad had to ”overnight” to arrive, remarkably, 3 days later (thanks again Padre!) So here we sit in the Baja version of Groundhog Day listening to mostly American music protected nightly alongside a sparkly fountain (think Bellagio x0.05) that was definitely built solely for the cruise ship industry.
I busied myself with preparing for what I hope will be our first overnight voyage since we left, walking about 2 miles to the nearest auto shop to get a new oil and coolant change for Mr. Perkins, some bungee chords, and an inner tube for our gybe preventer (thanks Mike!).
Since we left San Diego, we have formulated some near biblical rules and regulations to suit the dogma of cruising life. Rules 1 through 3 state: thou shalt not plan more than one or two tasks for the day of departure; thou shall eat a full breakfast and take time in the morning for self care; and thou shalt double check weather and logistics and be totally willing to stay another day, as thou shalt always choose the more conservative option. We’re getting used to making tough, complicated decisions every day.
Despite spending another 4 days in a place we wanted to leave immediately, we can’t help but feel the rush of being somewhere new, even if we can’t walk ten feet without someone trying to sell us something. We cheers-ed Piña Coladas even though we were swindled into a higher price and given fake tequila. But there’s a skip in our step, and everything feels a little easier now that we’re gone. Maybe it’s because we’re glowing like sailors often do when they land in a new place. Or maybe it’s because we’re just having a good time. Either way, we’re here until Wednesday, and we don’t regret a thing.
Post Script (by Stephanie): Wednesday came, the highly anticipated day of our “overnight document” arrival. The second FedEx said it was here, we skipped up to the Marine office, snatched it and walked 10 minutes the immigration building.
Unfortunately, we had a typo in the hull number. You could’ve heard our chests fall in that small, white government room. This meant no TIP for us and Thatcher’s Dad would have to overnight a corrected document, meaning another 5 day wait.
After some comfort tacos, we decided we couldn’t wait any longer. We called Thatcher’s Dad and asked if he could overnight the paper to San Diego. Then we rented a car to drive up the following morning. It was an adventure of its own, cruising along the beautiful Mexican coast and crossing the border (which took an hour going from Mexico to America and 0 seconds going from America to Mexico). But we returned to Ensenada in time to hit the immigration office before they closed and finally got our clearance. We cheers-ed to another “start” of the trip.
Sail Agora 