Departure Imminent

La Paz, BCS, Mexico

Lots of last minute jobs.  A frenzy of activity and we are almost ready to leave the boat for the summer.  And not a bit too soon; the weatherman in predicting daytime highs in the low 40s for next week.  I did use the relatively clear skies and our new improved solar array to give the batteries a big boost (equalization) before we leave - pretty cool!

Walking along the Malecon in the late afternoon tells the tail.  In the evening, this place will be full of people, but right now the only idiots who would venture out in the sun are us - we had to go down to the bus depot to get some tickets on the shuttle to the airport for Saturday.  Airlines do not fly to places like Canada from La Paz.  Instead, you have to travel to the larger airport at San Jose del Cabo, a little further south on the peninsula (this is where the recent G20 conference was being held so the airport should be in tip-top condition).  We will take a 3-hour shuttle bus ride from La Paz to the airport, then fly on Westjet to Vancouver, and on to Edmonton, arriving as usual in the middle of the night.

The boat is as ready as we can make it.  All of the sails, solar panels, and loose stuff is packed in down below and we have enough dock lines deployed to handle the Queen Mary.  With any luck all of these precautions will be unnecessary, and it will be a perfectly benign summer here in La Paz.

Testing of all of the systems before we abandon the boat did turn up one annoying issue.  One of the bilge pumps was not working at all.  I spent the better part of the day cleaning all the accumulated crap out of the bilge, then testing the pump and float-switch (These are down there at the bottom of the bilge, at the extreme limit of my arm-reach, making for lots of fun).  It turned out to be a simple case of corroded wires.  I have replaced the offending circuits and the pump is in business again (hopefully never to actually be needed).
Now that Susanne has the sewing machine out, she whipped up some spiffy covers for the little storage access holes at the sides of the cockpit.  These have always been a problem when it rains as they fill up with water - there is no drainage and everything in the compartment gets soaked.  Hopefully these covers will keep the majority of the water out, in the unlikely event that it ever rains here - they are still in the middle of a drought.

Basically, the boat has never looked better, or been more ready to go to sea.  I just hope we actually get to start using it when we get back in October.  We have spent far too much time sitting in one place and just working on the boat, and not near enough time enjoying the fruits of our labour.  Of course, the more we do to the boat, the more projects we find that we would like to do, but we have to draw the line somewhere.  Maybe we should upgrade the chart plotter?  Add AIS?, get a dinghy that holds air?  The deck could use another coat of paint.  The bright work is in need of some TLC.  Please somebody - stop me!

Just for information, this breakwater is between us and the marina next door.  This was not in place the year that the big hurricane caused so much damage to the boats here.  Marina de la Paz blamed a lot of the problems on the fact that the docks next door broke loose and the boats and docks came plowing through into our marina - this breakwater is an attempt to prevent that issue from recurring.  Note the series of posts in the shallower water, which we have heard referred to as "boat shredders".

For those of you who might be wondering, here is the progess
 on the new clubhouse.  In another month or two, it could be complete.

{GMST}24|9.3042|N|110|19.6152|W|Marina de La Paz|La Paz, BCS, Mexico{GEND}