Sail Further

I plan on laying my boat up "on-the-hard" in La Paz, Baja California Sur, for hurricane season. To hedge the peso-denominated expenses I went long the Mexican peso exchange-traded-fund: FXM. Deutsche Bank recently published a study of assets that currently have the most speculative interest. I was surprised to see that the Peso is the most "crowded-trade" in their study (MXN ... you can click on the image to embiggen): I don't think this bodes well for the Peso in late-June when US dollar weakness is expected to reverse with the end of the Federal Reserve's "quantitative easing" program. To cover or not to cover US dollar shorts??? (and of course what to do with the lateral play: commodities).

I posted this message to the Yahoo southbound cruisers group. It got rejected because I didn't delete the original e-mail I was replying to (sailors using HF for e-mail are pretty bandwidth starved). The topic was really old so I thought the original e-mail would be useful for context. I'll post it here instead. I would still recommend visiting the Grand Bay Marina as long as you're forewarned about the expense. The amenities at the resort are pretty amazing. There's an ATM that dispenses US dollars at the Paradise Village Resort Mall in Puerto Vallarta so it's possible to load up on dollars before heading to the Marina in Navidad. > From: "southbound_group-owner@yahoogroups.com" > Subject: Message not approved: Grand Bay Marina -- Barra de Navidad > I have an update on prices at Grand Bay Marina. > If you're a cruiser on a budget I'd give the Marina a wide > berth. Charlie's Charts (12th Ed., c. 2009) quotes a daily rate > of...

And now for something completely different: San Jose, CA 1997 This is the "bringup" team at Exponential Technology, Inc. We are popping champagne corks to celebrate booting MacOS on our x704 microprocessor first silicon. This was Jim Blomgren's startup before founding Intrinsity . Intrinisity designed the A4 microprocessor powering the iPhone 4 and got bought by Apple last year. I guess I should be kicking myself for not going to work there in 1998 when they asked me to...but twelve years until cash out, who has the patience??? (this moment in computer history brought to you by the Telcel Banda Ancha 3G cellular modem. The modem is made by ZTE, a mainland China company. With all the recent talk about "back doors" and "kill switches" it kinda makes you wonder...)

Punta Galera is described in Rains' guide as a "marginal anchorage"; I didn't find it any less sheltered or more rolly than Puerto Escondido or Puerto Angel. It also has a nice point break easily accessible from your anchorage. If finding surf breaks is your priority rather than shoreside services I'd recommend skipping the other two and spending your time anchored here. As magicseaweed.com would describe it: "a less demanding point break" rather than one of the " Thundering beach breaks with board and back-snapping brutality such as Puerto Escondido"

I have a new algorithm for beating the heat while cruising Mexico. Written here in C++ pseudocode for your edification:

This is Jorge Martinez the proprietor of Tour In El Salvador (www.tourinelsavador.com) with my new long board. He leads excellent tours and caters to cruisers (post-tour shopping trips, etc.). Jorge took me to a surf shop in San Salvador after I struck out in the surf towns of La Libertad and Playa El Tunco. He even negotiated a reduced price for me. Whatta guy.

S/V Further crossing the bar. Bahia del Sol is the hotel and resort that hosts the Annual Cruiser's Rally to El Salvador. I signed up for the rally 'cuz: 1). It's free 2). There are only two marinas to choose from in El Salvador and it's on the way North from Panama 3). I thought I'd probably at least get a t-shirt out of the deal. The downside is the notorious sand bar that has to be crossed at the entrance. The bar shifts so often one of the hotel's pilot boats has to guide you across. Also, you can only cross at slack high tide to safely draw enough water. Surfing the waves into the estuary turned out to be pretty tame (although watching the depth sounder tick down to 3-feet of water under the keel is pretty stressful). Breaking the waves leaving was a pretty wild ride. You have to try and time the waves to balance possibly getting swamped versus launching off the back of the wave. Also, I suppose if you got turned sideways and you got hit with a big wave you...