Big Sea, Little Trip: Part 6 of 6 - Return, Reflect, Repair

June 25 dawned with the wind at Las Cocinas still out of the southeast -- Sue is sensing a pattern here -- but we fired up Cilantro's engine anyway, checked the shaft seal wrap (dry), and weighed anchor. We waved to Mel and Larry on Hemisphere Dancer and began motoring back to San Carlos.

Curtis looks much happier today

We take more photos on good days

After the yesterday's adrenaline rush, today's six-hour trip down the coast was downright pleasant. We coasted past headlands, beaches, and hidden palm-lined canyons. We enjoyed long-distance looks at red-billed tropicbirds and good looks at blue-footed and brown boobies, magnificent frigatebirds, double-crested cormorants, brown pelicans, and royal terns. Another school of leaping devilrays greeted us near the entrance to Bahia San Carlos. 

Isla San Pedro Nolasco, 17 miles west of San Carlos

About 10 miles out, we contacted Marina Seca and were happily surprised that they could haul us out at 1:00 p.m. that afternoon. (Normally they require one or two days' notice.) We anchored out in the San Carlos Harbor for lunch, and then Sue brought Cilantro to the ramp, where the Marina Seca crew expertly hauled us out. An ordinary end to a not-so-ordinary cruise. 

Haul-out at Marina San Carlos

Back at Marina Seca, we spent the remaining hot hours of the afternoon unloading gear, cleaning the bilge and engine compartment, and assessing the damage from the flooding. The most difficult repair would be the shaft seal, which would entail pulling the driveshaft and propeller and possibly the rudder. The most expensive loss was our inverter, ruined by its prolonged soak in saltwater. Part of our battery monitoring system would also need to be replaced. 

Heart Interface inverter

On that note, we escaped to buy some cold beer and check in (and shower!) at our favorite $30/night lodging: Departamentos Adlai, where the simple rooms are spotlessly clean, the air conditioning works, and the managers brought us a platter of freshly cut tropical fruit. 

Sue tries to match the bougainvillea
at Departamentos Adlai

Curtis tries to blend in with the paint

The following morning we stripped the sails and running rigging to take them home for cleaning. Then we readied Cilantro for hot summer storage by covering portlights, winches, and other deck-mounted items with aluminum foil. Sue persuaded Curtis to engage the services of Jimmy (pronounced "Hee-mee") to wash and wax Cilantro's deck and topsides, rather than do it ourselves. For once, it was not difficult to convince him. Jimmy came well recommended and -- we hear -- has his own interesting story of having come to Mexico years ago as a stowaway on a boat from Africa. We left Jimmy in charge and departed for Arizona.

The drive home passed quickly, perhaps because we had a lot to talk about. We know there will always be mishaps and unexpected adventures, but we hadn't expected the learning curve to be quite so steep. At least we brought the boat back, in one piece. Sue was glad to realize that she can be focused and productive in an emergency. Curtis is always calm, at least outwardly, so no news there. "This was the most grueling vacation I've taken," said Sue. Curtis agreed, although he did admit to a history of grueling vacations in his past, after each of which he was relieved to get back to work. Hmm, thought Sue, filing away this tidbit for future reference. 

Queen's wreath vine (Antigonon leptopus) along Hwy 15 in Sonora

Curtis had planned on tackling the repairs to Cilantro in October, in cooler weather, but even the best-laid plans can change. As of this writing, Curtis has just arrived in Bermuda, sailing with our friend Bob on Alaria, his 34-foot Pacific Seacraft. The crew of four are en route from Maine to St. Martin in the Caribbean, so that Bob, a marine scientist, can spend the winter studying coral reefs. Meanwhile, Cilantro is patient, resting up for our return.

Big Sea, Little Trip: Part 5 of 6 - Inner Tube and Peace of Mind

June 23: At anchor once again at Las Cocinas and with engine off, we were relieved to note that Cilantro's automatic bilge pump was managing the leak well, coming on every five minutes to run for a few seconds. Curtis descended into the engine compartment to see about improving his emergency repair of the shaft seal. Sue, meanwhile, climbed into the rather spongy dinghy (it had lost some air during the rough trip south) and rowed over to the only other cruising boat in the anchorage to inquire about buying some diesel. We weren't sure we would need it, but we wanted to play it safe.

Hemisphere Dancer, Mel and Larry's Hardin 45 cutter ketch

Hemisphere Dancer, a 45-foot Hardin cutter ketch, was owned by Mel (Melanie) and Larry, who were just finishing dinner when they heard Sue's "Ahoy!" from below. Mel, a retired professional dancer, and Larry, a licensed ship captain, have lived and cruised aboard Hemisphere Dancer for 18 years, spending much of their time near Mazatlan and points south along the Mexican coast. Their many years of cruising experience far exceeded our months of know-how, but they were immediately welcoming and, after hearing Sue relate the events of our day, happy to help. As the sun was nearly down, Larry suggested we bring our fuel jug over early the next morning to try siphoning some diesel from their tank.

June 24: We dinghied over around 6:00 a.m. with a jug and our shaky siphon, which was one of very few things Larry had not seen before. He and Curtis discussed the shaft seal problem while they tackled the challenge of extracting diesel from a tank beneath the cabin sole. Mel showed Sue around their lovely floating home. At 45' long, and with a 13' 4" beam, Hemisphere Dancer felt huge relative to Cilantro (length 37', beam 10' 10"). There were actual "rooms" to walk into and spend time in, compared to our simple, straight passageway from companionway to forepeak.

Shortly after 6:00, Larry tuned in the daily Sea of Cortez weather forecast on his SSB (single sideband radio). The southeast winds we had been battling were forecast to last one more day and then shift to the west; Larry encouraged us to spend the day at Las Cocinas and wait for more favorable winds. We agreed that was good advice. As we left, trading dollars for diesel and offering our many thanks, Larry gave Curtis some hose clamps and two pieces of rubber inner tube to try wrapping around our shaft seal. An hour or so later, Curtis had successfully used them to stop the leak -- not a drop escaped, even with the engine running. We made a note to add inner tube to our stock of spares. We also pledged to "pay forward" the kindnesses that Mel and Larry had shown us.

Shaft seal wrapped in inner tube; pressurized hose kinked and tied off

We spent the rest of the day exploring ashore. Sue was intrigued to discover several gearstem cacti (Peniocereus striatus), a rare species of night-blooming cereus, snaking their way up through mangle dulce (sweet mangrove) shrubs. They had buds but no open flowers -- too bad! Curtis climbed all the nearby hills and headlands, obtaining spectacular views of the wind-whipped sea. He also spotted a school of dorado (mahi-mahi) in a nearby shallow bay. They were nearly five feet long, with pointy tail fins that broke the water's surface and tipped slowly from side to side as they cruised slowly beneath mats of seaweed. Smaller fish leapt frantically out of the water ahead of these giant predators. 

Buds of gearstem cactus (Peniocereus striatus), a rare night-blooming cereus

View north from Las Cocinas

Curtis, dwarfed by two cardon cactus, scans for birds

Shallow bay where we watched a school of dorado

Big Sea, Little Trip: Part 4 of 6 - No Whale, but a Whale of a Pump

June 23: When we weighed anchor to depart Bahia del Perro, Isla Tiburon, at a sultry 5:32 a.m., we had all of 1.9 feet of water below the keel. That was cutting it a bit close, but we were not surprised by the extreme tides, given the additive effects of the summer solstice and a full moon. Even without this magic combination, the farther north you go in the Sea of Cortez, the greater the tidal ranges: Puerto Penasco and San Felipe boast ranges as high as 22 feet. Isla Tiburon's range is closer to 12 feet, and San Carlos has a mere 3 feet between high and low.

Sue at the helm, leaving Bahia del Perro at sunrise

View of Islas Cholludo and Datil to starboard as we motor southeast

There was no escaping the wind and swells as we chugged southeastward. We had taken a few crashing waves over the dodger, so when Sue went below around 7:30 a.m. to use the head, she wasn't surprised to see a puddle of water at the foot of the companionway stairs. Coming out of the head, however, she was surprised to see water on the cabin sole up by the forepeak. No obvious overhead leaks -- all hatches and portlights were dogged down. She tasted the puddle: salt. Never a good sign inside a boat. Lifting a floor hatch to check the bilge, Sue found it completely flooded, up to the cabin sole, and shouted the bad news up to Curtis.

Over the next few minutes, we got very busy. Figuring that the automatic bilge pump was either overwhelmed or not functioning, we started working the manual bilge pump in the cockpit. It was a Whale Gusher, rated at 25 gallons per minute. Curtis pumped steadily for 10 minutes, and we could see that he was gaining on the leak. Meanwhile, Sue checked every thru-hull and seacock on the boat, closing a few just for good measure, but nothing was amiss. The raw-water strainer looked normal. We hadn't felt a collision of any kind. She readied our dry bags with emergency supplies in case we had to abandon ship and get in the dinghy. Then she took over from Curtis on the manual pump, and he lifted the engine compartment cover in the cockpit. 

"Our shaft seal has burst," he announced. We both peered into the engine compartment and saw water hemorrhaging from the shredded rubber boot into the bilge. The function of a shaft seal is to prevent seawater from entering the boat where the propeller shaft exits the hull. Our shaft seal was a PSS Dripless Shaft Seal, an accordion-style, "dripless" alternative to the traditional packing gland seen on many boats. It was about a year old.

We took turns operating the Whale Gusher. While Sue pumped, Curtis tried various means of compressing and clamping the burst seal to slow the leak. When Sue needed a rest, Curtis took over, and she continued emergency preparations. We discussed our options, none of them good: The nearest marina with the depth and equipment to haul out Cilantro was San Carlos, some 90 miles ahead of us to the southeast. Bahia Kino, 20 miles to our northeast, was a shallow bay with no haul-out facilities. We would be safe there, but we would have to let Cilantro sink in deep water or run aground on a sandy shoal, either of which meant resigning ourselves to total or near total loss of her. If we couldn't slow the leak, motoring to San Carlos would require continuous pumping for 15 to 18 hours. That didn't seem feasible.

Curtis climbed back down into the engine compartment. He noticed a small flexible hose leading from the engine to the shaft seal. The shaft seal had been installed with pressurized water from the raw water system, and now that the seal had burst, it was this pressurized seawater that was flooding the boat. He reached over and squeezed a kink into the hose -- the leak slowed to a strong trickle! Several wraps of tape and cable ties later, we were celebrating the first positive news. Water was still flowing in along the seal interface, but between the automatic bilge pump and periodic manual pumping (every 30 minutes or so now), we could easily keep up with it. Motoring on autopilot, we actually had time to relax a little and think about what to do next. Returning to San Carlos still seemed our best option. [Note: shutting off the engine would have depressurized the raw water hose and slowed the leak even more, but Curtis was concerned that he might not be able to start it again, and we would be left with sail power only, into strong headwinds.]

Curtis in Cilantro's engine compartment, with shaft seal at his feet

In the afternoon, our concern turned to fuel. Before leaving the boatyard, we had jerry-jugged diesel from the nearby Pemex station to Cilantro. After several trips back and forth, and especially after hoisting each jug up the 10-foot ladder, we figured that two-thirds of a tank plus two 6-gallon jugs should be plenty for the short cruise we had planned. What we hadn't factored in was today's long hours of motoring into wind, heavy seas, and current. At the rate we were probably burning through diesel, we weren't sure we had enough to make it to San Carlos. 

Shaky siphon

When the tank gauge approached one-eighth, it was time to transfer our extra diesel from jugs to tank. Refueling in rough seas was interesting. We turned Cilantro's nose off the wind to starboard so that the swells and waves were quartering us and the diesel deckfill would be on the leeward side. Sue was at the helm, controlling Cilantro's movement as best she could and alerting Curtis to especially big swells. Curtis carefully emptied our two six-gallon jugs using the self-priming shaky siphon (aka "Texas gas station") we purchased in Maine last summer. It's a wonderfully simple contraption, made out of clear plastic tubing and a metal nozzle with a small ball held loosely inside it. When you dip the metal nozzle end in the fuel and jiggle it, fuel begins to move up through the tube; the ball acts as a check valve to keep it from running back down. As the tube fills with fuel, the siphon takes over and finishes the job. The constant yawing and wallowing of the boat made refueling a painstaking process, but Curtis -- the Master of Tidiness, Sue decided -- finished with only a small rag's worth of fuel to mop up.

The rest of this long day passed unremarkably, with more black storm petrels scooting and veering among the wave troughs and immature brown boobies keeping us company overhead, gliding just off our boom and mizzen mast. Toward evening, nearing the lovely Las Cocinas anchorage once again, we were slightly more confident about our leak situation but slightly less so about our fuel management. Weary and a bit salt-encrusted, we opted to set the hook for the night and regroup. A fortuitous decision, as it turns out. Day's travel: 76 nm, 13 hrs, 28 min. 

Big Sea, Little Trip: Part 3 of 6 - Bahia del Perro at Isla Tiburon

The dinghy surfs a big swell and tries to pass us

June 21: Isla Tiburon, the largest island in the Sea of Cortez, was our ultimate destination for this mini-cruise. In retrospect, it was a bit ambitious for Cilantro's inaugural sail in this part of the world, but we were blithely ignorant of this as we departed from Las Cocinas around 6:30 a.m. According to the The Cruiser's Guidebook, Tiburon (Spanish for "shark") was at least 60 nm from Las Cocinas, as the booby flies. The south wind should take us there easily, with a few long tacks to avoid a shoal area off Punta Baja that extends 4 or 5 miles out from shore.

Because of the angle of this part of the coast of Sonora, and the offshore position of Isla Tiburon, our heading for much of the day was 270 degrees magnetic, nearly due west, even though it felt like we were headed north. The NW/SE orientation of the Sea of Cortez, and of the Baja Peninsula that parallels it, takes a bit of getting used to.

Winds from the south built to 27 kts, so we reefed the jib and hit our fastest speed over ground yet -- 8.3 kts. Black storm petrels accompanied us, their small dark bodies dipping in and out of the wave troughs. We also saw plenty of brown boobies and blue-footed boobies, small flocks of black terns, and two pink-footed shearwaters. No whales, perhaps because of the warm water (85 degrees F) at this north end of the Sea. A persistent humid haze, combined with our distance offshore, meant that we were out of sight of land for five or six hours, a new experience for Sue. In late afternoon, the wind died down, so we motored the final hour and a half, arriving in Bahia del Perro (Dog Bay) after 11 hours, 45 minutes, and 77 nm. We were dog tired in Dog Bay...

Islas Cholludo and Datil, south of Isla Tiburon

South tip of Isla Tiburon, with Isla Cholludo in background

View from Ensenada de los Perros, Cilantro at right

June 22: Cilantro stayed put this day. Or at least, she was supposed to, but she dragged anchor once, so we had to reset. We spent several hours ashore on Ensenada de los Perros, exploring for plants, birds, and anything else. The terrain here was noticeably drier and starker than at Las Cocinas or Bahia San Pedro, but Curtis found 20 species of birds, including a Brandt's cormorant and a purple martin, and Sue photographed a flower on a sour pitaya (Stenocereus gummosus), a sprawling, night-blooming cactus. See photos of five large cactus species we saw on Isla Tiburon below. Sue also spotted a lone coyote trotting through the brush -- perhaps one of the "perros" of Ensenada de los Perros?

Sour pitaya cactus (Stenocereus gummosus)

Organpipe cactus (Stenocereus thurberi)

Saguaro cactus (Carnegiea gigantea)

Cardon cactus (Pachycereus pringlei)

Senita or old man cactus (Lophocereus schottii)

In the afternoon, back on the boat, we were visited by a man and two boys in a panga filled with homemade fish traps, bedrolls, and minimal other supplies. They showed us a langosta (spiny lobster) they had caught, and the youngest boy, maybe eight years old, asked if we had any candy or soda. We handed over some apples and oranges, which he wasn't terribly excited about! The three of them set up camp on the shore of the bay, near a huge pile of discarded Murex shells that Curtis had investigated on his morning walk. As the light waned, a solitary sea turtle head appeared and disappeared, moving through the bay. The warm glow of sunset was complemented by a spectacular full moon rising.

Sunset in Bahia del Perro, Isla Tiburon

Moonrise over Bahia del Perro, Isla Tiburon

June 22 marked our fifth straight day of south and southeast winds. It would have been nice to wait until the wind shifted to west, north, or east before beginning our trip back south to San Carlos, but we had no weather updates other than our own observations of barometric pressure (steady), clouds (a few fair weather cumulus), and winds (consistently south and southeast). We had been unable to pull up a weather broadcast on our shortwave radio, and we did not have SSB (single side band) radio. There was certainly no cell phone service on Tiburon! We had seen no other cruising boats since leaving Las Cocinas, and only a handful of pangas. The VHF radio carried lively conversations (in Spanish) between local fishermen.

So we decided to head out first thing the next morning and motor into the wind and waves. To sail would have required so many tacks back and forth that it probably would have doubled our travel distance and required sailing all day and all night. Sue didn't vote for that.

Big Sea, Little Trip: Part 2 of 6 - Tropicbird and Two Lovely Anchorages

June 18: After a warm night's sleep, we awoke to a humid wind from the south that blanketed Cerro Tetakawi and the shoreline with low-level clouds. Curtis figured out and fixed the depth gauge issue. Sue organized and stowed our hastily loaded supplies, provisions, and tools. We inflated the dinghy and set up a bridle and line to tow it astern. Sue also worked on changing the weather, with no luck. What did we expect, cruising in June in Mexico?

Fog and a stately cardon cactus on the shore of Caleta Lalo 

Red-billed tropicbird

In the afternoon, we set sail for Bahia San Pedro, 14 nautical miles up the coast, according to the very wonderful Sea of Cortez: A Cruiser's Guidebook by Shawn Breeding and Heather Bansmer. It was a glorious though brief first sail, with 10-knot winds out of the south and a gentle chop quartering our stern. In late afternoon, the wind died, so we motored the last hour or so to the entrance to the bay's entrance. On the way, we were treated to a life bird -- a red-billed tropicbird sitting on the water! Oh, for a proper zoom lens, moaned Sue, hoisting her point-and-shoot. We also passed through a school of leaping rays. We think they might have been smooth-tailed mobulas (Mobula thurstoni), a kind of devilray with a wingspan up to six feet. It is not known why they leap.

The entrance to Bahia San Pedro is guarded by two stark, rocky promontories that protect the large bay inside. There were two boats already at anchor, one at each end of the bay. Although there was plenty of room to join either of them, we chose to anchor directly opposite the bay's entrance, hoping for a bit of sea breeze but without any swells. It worked: we rolled little if any, and a slight breeze was better than nothing.

 

Rowing ashore at Bahia San Pedro

June 19: The next morning, we rowed the dinghy ashore to explore. Curtis forgot something on the boat, so he rowed out and back again (giving Sue a chance for the above photo). Sue was delighted to find a large wash populated by cactus and flowering shrubs. She photographed everything in sight, from guayacan trees to passionflower vines to mistletoe growing right on the beach. Curtis, meanwhile, wandered on a parallel track looking for birds or other discoveries. Did we mention it was hot? We drank lots of water...

A bee visiting guayacan flowers (Guaiacum coulteri) at Bahia San Pedro

Passionflower vine (Passiflora arida) at Bahia San Pedro

Sue could have spent another day or two at Bahia San Pedro, but Curtis promised her many more amazing experiences in the coming days. In the afternoon, we weighed anchor and set sail for Las Cocinas, about 15 nm farther north. The south wind built to 20 knots, and we zipped along, tacking and jibing on a series of broad reaches with the mainsail and high-cut Yankee jib.

Small settlements and isolated buildings were scattered along the coast. We wondered if any roads led to these outposts, or if they were water-access only. Sue was also intrigued by several steep-sided, palm-lined canyons that ended right at the water's edge. They looked inaccessible from land and offered no protected anchorage that we could see, so you would likely need a panga (the open skiff favored by local fishermen) or long-range dinghy to reach them.

Evening arrival at Las Cocinas

We motored into Las Cocinas after a three-hour sail and anchored in 10 feet of water in a curving, sandy beach bay, with one other boat -- a ketch -- nearby. An osprey immediately appeared overhead, sizing up our mast as a nice perch. As much as we love ospreys, we hooted and hollered and waved our arms to keep him (her?) off the delicate windvane and anemometer. Las Cocinas was Curtis' favorite anchorage. The water was a brilliant aquamarine. The spit of land south and southeast of us was low enough to allow a constant sea breeze, but the bay's surface remained placid.

Small, needlelike fish swam around Cilantro at Las Cocinas

View (looking east) of anchorage at Las Cocinas

June 20: Sue rowed ashore with her camera and spent several hours tramping around, photographing plants. Curtis went for a swim and dived on the anchor to check its holding, warily eyeing many small, round depressions on the sandy bottom -- probably stingrays. We spent a relaxing afternoon in the cockpit, stringing up towels to hide from the sun but enjoying the (almost) cooling breeze. 

Toward evening, as we watched skein after skein of brown pelicans fly low across the bay to roost on a spit of rocky shoreline, Curtis turned on our Simrad Broadband 4G radar to see what the system would make of them. When the flocks were still at a distance, they appeared as a single object, but well before they passed us by, the on-screen image resolved into a series of clearly separate birds. Amazing technology!

Coastal sand verbena (Abronia maritima) at Las Cocinas

Mentzelia adhaerens, a type of blazingstar, at Las Cocinas

Big Sea, Little Trip: Part 1 of 6

It's been nearly 4 months since Cilantro's inaugural cruise in the Sea of Cortez, but Sue has been procrastinating about chronicling our adventure. An adventure it was, and not the sort either of us was expecting, although it definitely had its good points. Sue recently read a letter in a cruising magazine that spurred her -- goaded her! -- to write this series of posts. The letter writer was railing against manual bilge pumps, calling them "the most useless piece of equipment you can have on your boat," because (a) your arm will wear out long before the boat stops leaking, and (b) they don't work when you aren't on board.

Launching at Marina San Carlos

We beg to differ, especially with point (a). Our manual bilge pump saved Cilantro when she sprang a serious leak and we were miles from anywhere and anyone. Taking turns manning the pump, the two of us accomplished several things in short order: lowered the water level in our flooded bilge, readied our dry bags for a quick exit into the dinghy (if necessary), tracked down the source of the leak, and worked on emergency repairs, all long before our arms gave out. But this is getting ahead of the story.

June 17, 2013: After two hot muggy days of provisioning, rigging sails and lines, and doing final projects, we launched Cilantro at Marina San Carlos. The 10-minute trailer ride from Marina Seca to the ramp was unremarkable, and once in the water, Cilantro's engine started up without hesitation. Curtis executed a tight 180-degree turn (we love our 4-blade VariProp!) to head out through San Carlos Harbor.

Motoring through San Carlos Harbor

Oops -- the depth gauge isn't reading on our instrument panel. After a short discussion, we decide to proceed anyway, through the well-marked mooring field and harbor entrance and motor north toward a familiar and nearby destination: Caleta Lalo. Having kayaked this bay many times, we knew its rocks and reefs well and were looking forward to setting our anchor in its sandy bottom.

At anchor, Sue fixed a big salad for dinner, and we toasted the sunset with a glass of red wine (Sue) and a beer (Curtis). We stretched out for the night on the six-foot cockpit cushions, hoping for a cooling breeze.

Sunset on Cerro Tetakawi (Tetas de Cabra) from Caleta Lalo

Recommissioning at Marina Seca, San Carlos: December 2012

Once Cilantro arrived at Marina Seca in San Carlos (Sonora, Mexico) the main order of business was stepping her two masts, followed by other recommissioning tasks. We had watched the installation of the main mast in Maine last summer, but we hadn't had to do the work ourselves. And we had never even stepped the mizzen mast (due to some delayed refit work), so this would be a new experience for us too.

A bit about Marina Seca (translated as "dry marina"): it is a combination dry storage yard and work yard. Gated and guarded 24/7, Marina Seca has separate areas for storage and work. When your boat is in storage, you can access it for only 20-30 minutes at a time, usually in the company of a guard who stands by while you inspect, load, or retrieve items from your boat. This system prevents unaccompanied owners from "visiting" and "borrowing from" other people's boats. Once your boat is moved to the work yard, the cost per day is higher, but you have unlimited access to the boat: you can sleep aboard and work on any refit, repair, or maintenance jobs you choose. There are shore power and water hook-ups for the boat as well as access to bathrooms and showers. The main office building is clean and professional, with friendly bilingual staff.

Brown pelicans asleep in the harbor

Why dry storage instead of a marina slip? There are slips for rent at a couple of large marinas in San Carlos, but we prefer the dry storage option: it is generally cheaper than a marina slip or rented mooring, we think security is better, and your boat is more protected from the marine elements. Of course, a dry storage yard means that the wind can deposit layers of dust and dirt on deck, but washing the deck seems preferable to worrying long-distance about storm damage or security on a boat left in the harbor, not to mention having to remove months' worth of bottom growth.

Curtis readies the main masthead

Cilantro was delivered to Marina Seca in mid-December 2012. We were on hand for her arrival, with plans to stay in San Carlos just long enough to step the two masts and prep everything for storage over the winter. The main mast -- some 47 feet long and saddled with an in-mast furling system that about doubles its thickness -- weighs in the neighborhood of 500 lbs, so the marina used a forklift to set it on stands for us. The mizzen mast is only 22 feet long and can be lifted by two people. Both masts, with all their attendant hardware and rigging (shrouds and turnbuckles, spreaders, headsail foils, halyards, etc.) had been swaddled in bubble wrap, cardboard, and mast bags for transport from Maine, so Sue spent a few hours cutting and unwrapping parts and then cleaning and lubricating the turnbuckles with lanolin-based grease. Curtis, meanwhile, worked on fitting the radar dome and wind generator mounts on the mizzen mast. The radar dome needed a custom adapter plate, which Curtis had made at home out of 1/4"thick aluminum. The wind generator had a custom (is any boat part not custom?) stainless steel mount made by a fabricator in Maine. It was designed to clasp the top several feet of the mizzen mast, both for stability and to allow us to lift the entire mechanism off the mast for repairs or maintenance. Curtis also readied the tricolor/anchor light, anemometer, and analog windvane for mounting on the main masthead.

Boatyard neighbors

In between tasks, we met a number of people who were also working on their boats in the work yard. The first couple we met -- Doug and Linda -- turned out to be friends of Curtis' brother from Bend, OR. One of those small world things! They were doing maintenance work ahead of putting their boat in storage and going home for the holidays. A young couple, John (from Maine) and Lia (from Vancouver), had purchased a boat in San Carlos and were readying it to sail through the Panama Canal and back up the East Coast to Maine. Two almost-doctors from California had just finished five months of cruising (prior to starting residencies) when they ran into transmission trouble. After pulling out in San Carlos, they were decommissioning and prepping their boat for overland transport back home. Charlene and Dave from New Mexico were involved in a long-term project: rebuilding a steel-hulled 40-something-footer from the hull up. A retired couple from southern California had pulled their boat just to have the bottom cleaned and repainted; they would be cruising again soon.

Hoisting the mainmast

The day we chose to step the masts on Cilantro turned out to be the day of Marina Seca's annual holiday party for their employees. We would need their stationary crane and a crew of several people to hoist and position the masts, but the rigging crews were quitting at 1:00 p.m. for the party, which meant we had to begin the stepping process no later than 11:00 a.m. We worked furiously to get everything mounted and ready, and at 11:00 sharp -- as Curtis was just bolting the tricolor/anchor light onto the masthead -- the forklift driver arrived to carry the masts one at a time over to the crane area. Several riggers walked alongside the forklift, supporting the roller furlers, shrouds, and spreaders on the mainmast, and the radar dome and wind generator on the mizzen mast. Then the hydraulic trailer arrived to move Cilantro into place beneath the crane. There were two Marina Seca riggers plus Curtis, plus one man running the crane hoist plus another man driving the tractor -- he stayed at the wheel in case Cilantro needed to be repositioned. (The crane hoist is fixed in place and does not swivel or tilt.)

Guiding the mainmast over the lifelines

As the heavy main mast was hoisted slowly into position, held by a noose of large diameter rope, the riggers and crane operator coordinated with each other to avoid tangling the rigging or damaging the delicate instruments on the masthead. Curtis was on deck, ready to guide the foot of the mast onto its step and attach shrouds, furlers, and stays. Sue took photos from below. Once the main mast was secured and stabilized, we turned to the mizzen. Although much smaller and lighter than the main, the mizzen was burdened with an ungainly radar dome two-thirds of the way up and a fully assembled wind generator (with swiveling body and three wafer-thin vanes) at its head. Stepping the mizzen involved careful maneuvering and good communication between the crane operator and the riggers on deck. In the end, after the mizzen was set and stayed, one of the riggers had to go up in a bosun's chair, hoisted by the crane, to gently guide the rope collar up and away from the wind generator.

Prepping the mizzen mast: wind generator (left)
and radar dome (right)

With her masts stepped and standing rigging tightened down, Cilantro had been reassembled, so to speak, and was ready for storage until we could come back down and sail, hopefully in spring 2013. As we drove home to Arizona, Curtis had one nagging thought: in his haste to install the lights and wind instruments on the masthead, he had not paid strict attention to the orientation of the tricolor/anchor light. Its simple, two-bolt mount could go either way: forward or backward. We scrutinized the various photos we had taken of the mast stepping operation. From what we could see, the red and green navigating lights were facing aft! Oh well, more to do when we return.