Back to La Cruz

2-2-13 – La Cruz, Nayarit, MX

View from the cockpit at La Cruz

We are now back in La Cruz de Huanacaxtle (or just La Cruz for obvious reasons)  on the North side of Banderas Bay.  Yelapa (on the South side of the bay) was a very interesting stop and worth the trip, the cost and some rolly nights at mooring.  After 18 days of pay to dock/moor; it is a glorious feeling to be back on the hook, spending zero dollars a day to moor the boat.  There are about 50 boats in the anchorage at this time.  Since we left La Cruz about a month ago, we can see a dramatic increase of the number of boats and the size of the anchorages footprint.  I guess cruising season is in full swing now and La Cruz is a good place to be if you’re a cruiser.  Besides a decent anchorage there is free access to a dock at the marine to tie up your dinghy, the great town of La Cruz with all of its cruiser amenities and easy access to the Mexico bus system.  Incidentally, besides packing 16 people in to a van the size of a VW Vanagon, the buses have been great, basically clean and very inexpensive way to get around.

On our wanderings for cheap chevice and cervezas we ran back into our old friends John and Sue on s/v Wizard who had just arrived at the marina after a long trip North.  Their trip North left them with some things to fix on the boat and the reminder that going North is nothing like going South.  A point we are already thinking about.  Oddly enough we have no plans right now.  It is a weird feeling to not have any definitive plans to leave, dates to be somewhere, etc.  I guess we’ll watch the Super Bowl on Sunday and see what happens. 

Elizabeth at stop #1 for street tacos.

In mentioning the buses here; we recently took a little day trip to the surfing/tourist/generally trendy town of Sayulita.  It is a two bus affair each way, but for a grand total of about $7.50 USD we made it there and back for two people; not bad.  Sayulita is definitely as described above.  Lots of surfers and lots of the clichéd general vibe that seems to go with that.  I thought it was still a cool little place and would like to spend more time there.  It seems there are more restaurants than a person could eat at in a year; and to top that off we had some of the greatest fried shrimp tacos ever right on the street.  First of all, all tacos served from a little stand with plastic chairs literally in the street seem to be good.  Then some of these little stands get a reputation for being even better than the average.  This one was excellent.  We were on a street taco sampling mission so this was stop two of the day and we were limited to one taco each but you could tell this was a place worth visiting again.  Instead of sitting at a restaurant overlooking the beach, we bought a couple of beers at a tienda and sat in the sand with the rest of the surfer, camping types to drink our beers.  A guy speaking good English came by to sell us some doughnuts and sold them as “the greatest hangover helper, bikini friendly doughnut experience you will ever have”  He hand made them and had caramel, plantain or 420chocolate.  All of them were $20 pesos each except the chocolate, which were $20 USD each.  We went with the caramel and it was everything he described.  The trip to Sayulita was fun, the little town was funky and a good place to hang out.  Mental note: Worth visiting again.

Campground on the beach at Sayulita

Saw lots of SUPs and surfboards here

One of many streets in Sayulita that look like this

Ready to hang out on the beach

Beach dog sharing our doughnut

Upon returning from our trip to Sayulita we found a big metal boat anchored conspicuously close to us in the anchorage.  The informal rule is that the guy there first has right of way.  We decided to stop and say hi, mention how much anchor rode we had out and just introduce ourselves so if we they got close to us later in the night we wouldn't be such strangers.  It was a little nudge from us to say “we think you are too close to us, but not close enough to make a big stink about it”  The boat was fairly incredible and the guy was from Denmark and somehow it came up that he had been to Alaska and this wouldn’t be his first time across the Pacific.  Back at the boat we Googled the boat and what do you know, his website says he’s logged over 53,000 miles in the last three years on his custom built 60 footer.  It sort of makes you feel silly when you imply to a guy he’s anchored too close and then find out he’s gone 53,000 miles.  I guess he probably knows how to anchor at this point!

Random restaurant in La Cruz

It’s morning net time, so it’s time to see what’s happening in the world of Banderas Bay, see what the weather will be like, who wants to trade stuff for coconuts and then listen to the “social net”.  Yes there is so much stuff happening around here that they have a separate net each morning to cover the social goings on around town.