Bon Voyage By MichaelLA PAZ, MEXICO

Last night at the dock in Marina de La Paz,
our friend Christian on deck with Windy,
playing with our storm trysail. Christian
and his wife, Norma, of Mana Kai have
been a huge help to us these past few
days. Among other things, thanks to
them, we did our Mexico checkout in La Paz
 in 3 hours and spent only 350 pesos.

And we're off, today!

I can't tell you--well, I probably can, but I don't have the time to--just how busy we've been the past couple weeks. Getting ready for this passage has been a real stressor, but why? Why didn't we get everything ready over the past year and then spend the past couple weeks hanging out with the friends we've made and hopping out to the islands for fun? I wish I could tell you--it just somehow doesn't work that way.

I have been spending an inordinate amount of time this past year, and especially since October, working with Behan Gifford and Sara Johnson on our book, Voyaging With Kids, A Guide to Family Life Afloat that L&L Pardey books is publishing this fall. We got a peek at the cover recently and only last night did I finish reviewing the edits back from the editor. I look forward to a respite from this project, but also saddened to see my close collaboration with Behan and Sara come to an end. After all we've been through via email, we can literally finish each other's sentences.

So there hasn't been a lot of time for us to be excited about what's coming, but the last few hours Windy and I have been trading glances--Can you believe what we're about to do? The girls, on the other hand, have found time to be excited and I see them looking at pics of the South Pacific islands and making plans for the long passage.

Finally, the anchor is off the bow and stowed, the dingy is on the bow and stowed, and our lockers are filled like never before. As soon as I finish this post, we are off to buy fruits and veggies and then we are gone. We plan to spend tonight at a nearby anchorage (on our secondary anchor and rode) and then leave from there in the morning (11th), direct to the Marquesas.

Barring any technical problems, I plan to post here daily during our passage. Also barring any technical problems, everyone should be able to view our progress on a map I embedded on the Farkwar page of this blog (look at the list of pages under the banner up top).

That's all. Time to buy some veggies.

--MR

Coming soon...