South to Carrizal

Wizard anchored at Carrizal

The day after Christmas...on the road again...
Such beautiful pristine coastline...until you see the smoke stacks of Manzanillo  off in the distance... too bad, it's sight takes away from the view of beautiful hotels and villas perch on the cliffs we pass by.

We sailed...or I should say we motored from Melaque down the coast a few miles to Ensenada Carrizal, a beautiful remote anchorage, known for it's diving.  We were the only boat there except for some daily dive tours, until Shindig shows up!  It was fun to see our friends again and joined them for "happy hour"with their guest and fellow sailor, Tana visiting for the week.  We marvel at how lucky we are to be anchored in this undeveloped bay  having cocktails with ICE aboard the festive Shindig decorated in Christmas lights!  We plan a dive and the next day all headed out to the point where we snorkeled several coves, dove in a really cool cave hole with surge and lots of colorful fish.

The dingy master and co-pilot

John is always pushing my "envelope" to get me to try new things and this certainly was a first to swim in an ocean cave and let the surge  carry you back and forth into a cave...once in the cave the water  was very clear and almost calm, yet surge pushed you up and down as the volume of water gushes in and out.  Explored a blow hole, too and let the spray wash over us. Very cool.

Inside the water "cave"...you can almost see John

Next day Shindig sails off to the next bay...and in sails other cruisers on Cyclades. We meet Danny and Debbie who are 10 yr+ live aboards cruising Mexico.

Trying my "stand" at paddle boarding 

Debbie is a paddle boarder and invites me to try.  It's quite easy and we navigate the whole bay checking out the rocks and fish as we pass over. The water is so clear! But, boy the next day I was sore! The core muscles group used to hold your balance and the twist of your hips to paddle does give a great exercise and I can see why this is becoming such a popular sport!

Whose the Granny in the glasses?  Making way towards Santiago

Three days out in a remote anchorage makes us want three things:

1. -need more beer or cold margarita with ICE!
2. -need to empty the garbage
3. -need some internet (we are secret information junkies!) 

So off we sail to the next bay of Santiago....