I swear that one day I am going to finish writing about some of the various yard projects, because I know anyone reading this enjoys reading about our woes, but there’s some fun happening, and I almost can’t believe it.

It was almost 5 years to the day (5 years and 9 days according to Craig – not that he’s counting or anything) from when we hauled Small World out to when she splashed back into the water. Every year we thought we’d be getting back in the water that autumn, but life had other things in store: the great Covid Panorama; a death in the family; other things that felt important at the time that kept us in Seattle. All the while, Small World continued to bake in the Sonoran Desert.

Craig, as always, was keeping tabs on all the various tasks and shopping lists associated with boat life. He wouldn’t shut up was diligently reminding me about how difficult it would be to bring our girl back to ship shape as time marched on. I, as always, ignored his warnings and assumed he was exaggerating like he always does. “It’ll be fine, Craig,” I said with a tone that said “Shhhhhhhhhhhh.” Blind faith in things working out has worked for me thus far – why change now?

In retrospect, I’m glad I didn’t listen to Craig. First of all, I was right. It did work out in the end. B of all, if I had listened to Craig, I would’ve never been ready for the intensity and duration of work that was needed. I can do hard work, but I’m also smart enough to avoid it when possible. My brain is constantly looking for the most efficient way to do something, rather than just actually doing the task. It has been a really helpful trait while I’m at work, but it’s less helpful with tasks related to the boat that I don’t really understand to begin with. I get stuck trying to save time without knowing what the process is at baseline. Luckily, while I was busy working in front of a computer screen and learning all the hotkeys for Excel and automations for Smartsheet, Craig continued to learn more and more about the various boat systems and built the confidence to just jump right into the projects. I made the task list, and he did the tasks. Dream team (for me).

After a few not so empty threats from Craig to sell the boat, we finally got our girl into the water again. It was about a month of additional work while at the dock in Peñasco, during which Craig made additional threats to sell the boat. But my name is also on the title, and I wanted to see the dang whale sharks, so he was trapped.

Finally, on July 15^th, we left port and headed west to San Felipe. It was as chaotic of a lead up as ever; I didn’t even get to do a final food provisioning run; we didn’t have all the parts we ordered; we accidentally broke into the storage unit to store the van. But there’s food on the Baja, we could make do without the parts, and time was running out. I’m as much of a food hoarder as the next cruiser, but it was starting to feel like if we didn’t leave the dock right then and there, we would never go sailing again. So, my desire to see whale sharks beat out my instinct to be a disaster prepper. I have no regrets.

We left early morning to hopefully get through the 60 miles to San Felipe in daylight. Unfortunately, that meant leaving at low tide when the harbor entrance is a bit dicey with shoals and rocks closer to the water’s surface. Even though we thought we knew the safe route, we were lucky enough to be heading out at the same time as some local pangueros. They alerted us that we were in fact heading into too shallow water and had us follow them to the deeper channel. My Spanish came in handy, but honestly it was mostly charades from afar. I’m pretty sure we still bumped the ground a bit, but we made it out.

The entire day felt surreal. We were actually leaving Peñasco and heading to a new destination. It was a day that felt like we finally snagged that dangling carrot on the end of a stick. By the time we left, I’m not sure either of us really had the blind faith that it would all work out. So many setbacks, so many surprises, such a steep mountain to climb. I love to reference Sisyphus because it makes me feel like a member of the literati, but also because it’s just so apt. Imagine how he’d have felt if he finally made it to the top of that ding dang hill. Shock and awe. Shock. And. Awe.

The passage was mostly delightful. We got to sail most of the way, even using our new to us spinnaker for the first time. We also used it a second time on that passage and that time was less good and I got a good rope burn on my hand to keep me humble. Weezy did a superb job on her first long passage. She made sure to bark at all the pelicans who came too close looking for fish scraps, but mostly she just hung out in the cockpit with us and played tug on the various lines. She’s such a little adventure seeker and I love that we get to do this with her.

Night crept in before we could make it to San Felipe so instead of trying to navigate the anchorage within the jetty walls, we decided to aim for the roadstead anchorage. Historically we have done everything in our power to avoid anchoring at night – there’s just so many things that you can miss. Even as we approached this spot, a panga sped up to us and warned us that they had fishing gear in the water. Trying to spot tiny fishing floats in the daylight is hard enough, let alone during a moonless night. But we did it. We got the anchor set, we had some dinner, we stared at each other in disbelief, and we passed the heck out. What a fucking day.