meri's blog

This is my advice...

If you need an FM2 or FM3 processed, renewed, or changed... go to an office somewhere you have had good experience. The employees in the Bucerias office are super nice, but the process is very slow. Of course, this IS Mexico. However, there are super fast places and and not super fast places. La Paz would be a super fast place. Bucerias is super slow, although I must mention I met one couple that a  had fast experience getting their FM3's renewed in Bucerias. I guess it just depends who you get.

Jim and I have established that we will be leaving La Cruz tomorrow afternoon and heading to Tenacatita. That is... unless something happens. I am making the final trip to Walmart today to stock up on whatever else we need. Tomorrow, I am heading for my last trip to the IMS office in Bucerias and will hopefully have a document waiting for me that allows me to stay in the country.

La Cruz isn't the worst place to be. However, when you are trying desperately to get out of a town and meet up with your cruising friends (we miss you Ceilydh!) and instead you get held back due to this thing or the other - well, let's just say  it can get tiresome real fast. We are still in Marina La Cruz, a lovely but expensive marina. Food and restaurants are fairly pricey here. Laundry, however, is cheap so I am paying to have our clothes laundered. Oh joy!

We anchored for 5 nights in Banderas Bay just outside Marina La Cruz. We had barely dropped the hook when we had an invitation to Happy Hour and movies for the kids. What joy! The second night we were having tacos with friends and the third day we had a birthday party at Paradise Village until 5pm.

We're currently in La Cruz (just a hop, skip, jump north of Puerto Vallarta). We motored the entire way down from Chacala. There was NO wind and being less die-hard sailors than we are die-hard-to-get-to-our-next-stop we chose to motor the entire way atop the glassy, smooth, flat sea. That's when our fishing line went zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!

Motoring from San Blas to Chacala was uneventful. We checked out with the port captain in San Blas (in Spanish over the radio, I might add). One of the nicest compliments I've received was having the port captain's office tell me that I spoke good Spanish. pat-pat-pat

I don't know why I think this is so funny... but I do!

Everyday in San Blas... this caballero (cowboy) would swim his horse across the estuary to get to the other side. I'm not really sure what he did once he got to the other side, but the horse would remain tied amongst the mangroves. Then, every late afternoon the caballero would swim his horse back, saddle it up, and ride off into the sunset... literally. And this is what it looked like:

San Blas is an ideal stop for cruisers because it is one of the only anchorages on the Gold Coast/Riviera that has not been overdeveloped with condos, hotels, and California style beach mansions. The historic, rustic ambiance that emanates from San Blas leaves one feeling like they just had a real taste of Old Mexico... not tourist hungry Mexico.

The Jaka (pronounced: Yaaka) is a large oval bumpy green fruit. They grow in trees similar to coconut or bananas... dropping down heavily from the leaves toward the ground. We've seen these monstrosities on the Gold Coast everywhere, but had no way to know what they were or how to eat them.

For a mere 50 pesos ($4US), we bought a 45lb. bag of oranges from the back of a pick up truck in San Blas. The oranges didn't look like much. The tennis ball sized green orbs were covered with brown and black stains. I asked if I could sample the flavor first. The farmer cut one and gave me a half. The fruit was sweet and juicy... divine. Tim lugged the bag back to the boat. It's great to have a TIM!