“Akimbo, Akimbo, this is Dave.”

Clever. He found the vhf radio OUTside of the Hidden Port Yacht Club in Puerto Escondido (now locked), mounted THERE for just such a purpose. Akimbo and i were on a mooring buoy out in the harbor. It was 8 or 9 pm. I had just finished dinner and dishes and was getting ready to dinghy in and walk up the road to meet him where the bus from La Paz would let him out. He was early, having expediently rented a car rather than taken the bus. In fact, while i hadn’t answered earlier, he had time to have dinner at the restaurant at the marina. I don’t know what premonition prompted me to turn on Akimbo’s radio, but there Dave was.
“Dave! Hi, this is Akimbo. I’ll be right in.”
Dave is a parent of one of Tyler’s Waldorf classmates, so we have been acquainted for years. As the week went on, we enjoyed lots of conversation, music (he’s a good guitarist), food, and getting to know each other better. This leg of the trip, and coming south with Bud & Rhoda, felt different – because i had been to these places before, and i had been to them alone. It was fun to feel familiar with where we were, know what to look for, and to share. Also what's new is seeing more boats here - three months ago traffic was much more sparse.

The next day was Dave’s birthday – and the equinox. We started south at about noon. The wind must funnel into Puerto Escondido: it looked like a day for the solent jib, but just outside of the harbor the wind went light. We switched to the genoa, eventually the drifter, and finally had to motor into Agua Verde. There were three other boats there, but i was glad to see they hadn’t taken the spot where i had hoped to anchor. As soon as we were secured a school of porpoise came into the anchorage right behind Akimbo. I’m guessing there were 20 or 30 of them, many of whom were small enuf that we had to guess they were infants. There was a lot of tail slapping and jumping going on for about half an hour. It was a delightful show.
We seemed to cross paths with them again the next day as we sailed south to Puerto los Gatos and they were headed north. It proved to be our only day sailing upwind, so our only day with the main up along with the genoa. We shared the anchorage in Gatos with one other boat. With no wind the next day and not willing to listen to the engine, we went for a hike in the morning and snorkeling in the afternoon.

Two fishermen’s camps set up on the beach, and later four or five NOLS drascombe long boats came in and camped as well – having rowed most of the day.
After that we had a good downwind romp with the genoa alone down San Jose Channel. We were overtaken and left behind by a large school of porpoise, guessing well over a hundred of them. We had planned to stop at Amortajada, which provides good shelter from the waves…but not the wind. So we carried on to Isla San Francisco, where it turned out 17 other boats were holed up.

The next day didn’t offer weather that would let us explore the small island community that i noted on my way north, Isla Coyote, so we carried on south. I fell for the late morning lull and put up the drifter by itself, thus calling the wind back up. This turned into a great (if tense) sleigh ride, touching 9 knots at one point. We tucked into the caldera between Islas Partida and Espiritu Santos, “Caleta Partida” (along with 7 other boats), for a good night’s sleep. We decided to spend one of our extra days here, dinghied into the beach and to say hi to our neighbors.

Our last day of sailing didn’t have as much wind as forecast but got us to La Paz anyway, leaving us a day to walk around La Paz before Dave would fly out.
Dave's message he would write to the world: "stop the killing." Thanks Dave for joining me down here. I appreciated the extra hand aboard that you so willingly were. It was a pleasure to share sailing in this beautiful place with a fellow enthusiast. Jack and Cinny's plans have to wait, so looks like i'm on my own again for a bit. Guess i'll look for a "hitch hiker" or two for crew over to Mazatlan in a week or so...unless one of YOU heads my way.