WINTER WEATHER IN MEXICO; SHOPPING AT THE MERCADO; SOLAR POWER
Mazatlán, Sinaloa, Mexico, Saturday, 26 November 2005

Winter weather in Mexico

For those of you suffering through the early stages of winter in the Northeastern or Midwestern U.S.A. or in Canada, let me tell you that it is no picnic here either. Yesterday, for example, I am awakened by the sound of distant thunder. When I stick my head out of the hatch around 0600 a light drizzle has already begun. A watery sun is trying to get up into the overcast sky from behind a rocky promontory to the east of the harbour entrance. I start coffee. A few minutes later the rain begins to pelt down and, since the skylight tends to leak in heavy rain, I leap to find the canvas cover. Quite unusually for life aboard a sailboat, although we have not used the cover for eons, I am able to lay my hands on it instantaneously. I dash outside to pull it on, straighten up one or two things on deck to make sure that a strong gust will not blow them overboard, and return wet to the cabin below. Did I say that the temperature is around 70°F?

The rain lasts for an hour or so. It is more like a tropical storm with the winds switching around 180° as the squall passes through. I see people out on their boats checking gear and anchors. Water pours from the awning in a waterfall. When it finally ends and the sun comes out weakly illuminating a sky full of big cumulus clouds, the ones inland and to the east tinted orange by the pollution emitted from the electricity generating plant about ten miles away (Mexican power plants are notorious for their pollution).

I have promised to check my emails this morning at 0930 to see if I have been given a translating job. I have to bail out the dinghy and try to dry things up a bit. I row off leaving Kathleen alone on the boat. There is no wi-fi in this harbour and I have to head into town to find a place to download the text and where I can sit to work on the translation. I am sprinkled by rain but make it to shore without a soaking and with only the normal “dinghy butt”.

I only write this to let you all know that we are not completely without “weather” here. We talked to a girl working at a restaurant at the Machado, for example. She says that, last year, it got really cold on Christmas Eve; it dropped down to 8° C (about 46° F) overnight. “Frio!” she said energetically and hugged herself to keep warm at the remembrance. We asked her when the coldest part of the year would be? She looks at us incredulously and exclaims, “Right now!”

We find the weather here is definitely cooler than on Baja. We attribute this to the cool and moist Pacific air masses that are now arriving without interference by the mountains making up the spine of the Baja Peninsula. The Pacific waters off the coast here are also colder than in the Sea of Cortés. Daytime temperatures are in the low-80’s (F.) and high-60’s at night. I wear shorts, t-shirt, straw hat and sandals going to town and next to nothing on board. At night I sleep under a sheet or a light fleece blanket. Winds are generally weak and have a northerly component.

It’s a struggle but I think we can handle it. The only complaint really is at the dampness. Relative humidity is high and, at night, the dew is extremely heavy. On the first day we went ashore to arrive back about 2000, we had left open the skylight and hatches for ventilation. By the time we arrived back aboard everything inside was damp and clammy. We have learned to close things up more when leaving the boat and otherwise we have just learned to grin and bear it.

Shopping at the mercado

We both enjoy shopping at the mercado, the covered municipal market in town. I have memories of visiting border towns like Matamores and Reynosa around 1959; the stench and the flies at the market made me nearly vomit. I approached Mexican markets with a large degree of scepticism.

But, here in Mazatlán, today’s market is quite different. Although not luxurious in appearance, it is spacious and spotlessly clean. Not a housefly in sight. Without exception, every meat, poultry and fishmonger has refrigerated counters for displaying their wares and the products look great. If I put Frankfurt’s Kleinmarkthalle at 10 a scale of 1 to 10, I would give Mazatlán mercado an 8 or above.

After checking into the internet café to find that I was not getting any translating work after all, I walk over past the cathedral to the mercado. I pick up a one-pound block of lightly-smoked tuna, atun ahumado, that we have tried before and found to be delicious on crackers or bits of tortilla. I have been thinking about making a smoked-fish chowder. Having some on board is anyway a good way to store fish at sea when we have no refrigeration; it’s equivalent to having smoked or dried meat.

It is early afternoon and the market is busy. I drift around checking the stalls until I arrive eventually at the butcher from whom I bought some meat yesterday that I wanted to cook tonight. I bought it on sight and then was unsure just what cut of beef I had acquired. In a somewhat difficult technical discussion about cuts of meat, I then finally learn that what I have would be better used for a sopa, i.e. a stew or a soup. He points out various other cuts and we discuss cooking methods. I learn a few new words but am somewhat overwhelmed. I resolve to buy a Mexican cookbook in Spanish as a means of furthering my language education. At another stall I buy some chicken breasts and head for the bus stop outside.

A “Morelos” or “Toreos/Palya Sur” bus costs only Pesos 4.20 and will drop me right in front of Club Náutico. One comes along almost immediately. That’s the great thing about public transport in Mexico: the camions are cheap, clean, frequent and friendly.

Back on the boat, Kathleen has been busy cleaning the topsides and down below, and baking several loaves of oat bread. The sun is warm by now, the boat is well dried off and we decide to take lunch in the cockpit under the awning and play canasta. I have successfully lobbied against keeping written score until, now that I am better at the game, I have some chance to avoid total humiliation at Kathleen’s skilled card-sharking hands.

Solar power

It is amazing how a slight amount of haze in the sky or overcast heavens can cut the output of the solar panels. Were I keen, I could keep both 55-watt solid panels aimed more-or-less directly at the sun at all times by moving them around the deck. Of course, I could never leave the boat. This all gets tedious, however, since you have to be after it all the time. Not to mention that the sharp edges of the solar panels scratch or score the paint and varnish-work and, strapped on the cabin roof at sea, become a worry if it gets rough. So far there has never been a problem at sea but I am always a bit nervous about them.

In San Carlos, therefore, I bought two stainless-steel brackets from another boater who had moved his solar panels to the roof of his newly-constructed pilot house with the intention of mounting at least one panel permanently to the lifelines portsides next to the cockpit. Here it is out of the way and, using a length of wood, I can tip the otherwise hanging panels up to a horizontal position the better to catch the sun. The other panel will be mounted opposite on the starboard side when I get two more brackets made.

With one panel mounted, the days now lasting only about ten hours, and the skies sometimes a bit hazy, I find I am however not able to keep the batteries charged up. I talked about this to Carl and Julie of S/V Journey out of San Francisco, a very nice couple who have been here for the last few days and left yesterday for Puerta Vallarta. Carl has a 34-foot “Islander” and carries about 350 watts of solar-generating capacity permanently mounted over the aft end of his vessel, runs a TV and refrigerator and probably any number of other electrical or electronic items. I have no idea where on Vilisar we could even put such a spread of solar panels. But at least Carl does not have to worry about keeping the panels aimed at the sun for efficiency; he always has enough of them in the right spot, I guess.

The solar power issue is only one aspect of the electricity supply issue aboard. The engine alternator does not seem to put out enough power at present and likely the voltage regulator needs to be set higher to allow the batteries to get more energy. In addition, we still have not done anything about replacing the old batteries. This is a financial issue at present; a new Group 24 battery will cost about Pesos 1500 (ca. US$ 150) which we don’t have to spare at the moment. It would be handier to get it here in Mazatlán where things are more readily available physically to where the boat is anchored. On the other hand, we always seem to be able to get the boat started when we need to and we only use the computer during the daylight hours when there is lots of solar power flowing through the batteries into the laptop. I guess it will have to wait.

Another item I wanted to have dealt with here in Mazatlán is that the engine is losing oil at a higher rate than it used ever to do. I don’t think it is leaking it into the cylinders since there is no blue smoke coming out of the exhaust. I know it leaks a little around the oil filter banjo fittings but I am afraid it might be leaking elsewhere too. Everyone recommends Victor Gambrosa around here as a top diesel mechanic. I have simply not been able to get in touch with him. We didn’t use the engine much on the way over here and do not intend to do so going farther south. But still, I should like to have it taken care of. Perhaps I can get in there and fix the leak around the oil filter. Yuck! Hate doing this.

Once we have picked up the repaired staysail on Monday, done a laundry and tanked up with bottled drinking water, we shall probably take off for Isla Isabela, San Blas and Puerta Vallarta on Tuesday or Wednesday.