Winds of Change

The Northerly Winds have started to blow over the Sea of Cortez, and that’s an unequivocal sign that change is on the way.

Mind you, it has still been very warm. But the average temperatures have started to come down gradually, some days have been pleasant indeed, and some evenings were almost cool.
With the more tolerable weather, fellow cruisers who took off-season time away from the extreme heat are starting to return to San Carlos and their boats. We have met with old friends, and some of them have sailed away already. We made new friends, but some set sail as well. We bid farewell, wish fair winds, and hope our paths will cross again.
And us … we are staying.
The white caps on the sea during the day and the cool breeze during the night do make us itch to go cruising again. The kids have started to ask when we will let the dock lines go.
But we are not ready yet. And we are staying.
Adriana’s professional skills have been on demand. I am still serving the mandatory resting period for the small surgery I had. The list of pending projects on Pesto is still significant. And the Tropical Storms continue to swirl out on the eastern Pacific Basin.
And so we stay.
Something similar happened last year, while still in the US. Choice and Circumstance kept us a long time moored in Richmond, at the Northeast corner of San Francisco Bay. A time that felt too long at times. By then, I had the expectation we would be cruising for most of our time aboard Pesto. And the stillness in Richmond, associated with the shortening, cold days of Fall got me blue, moody, frustrated.
Not this time though.
By now, I’ve realized the problem was not on our rhythm last year, but with the expectations I had. I’ve grown accustomed and appreciative of these longer stops that we occasionally make. This is a Journey after all. Some times we cruise. Others we live aboard somewhere.
I do miss Adriana, who has been traveling a lot, but I know she is fulfilled, and that comforts me. I have been enjoying the company of the kids a lot, as much as I have never before. By now, we are all fully adapted to this lifestyle, and the long hours spent together inside the cabin have been extremely pleasant. We homeschool, I cook for them, they invariably praise my meals and thank me for them, we talk, we watch movies together, and we play. We play all the time. We laugh all the time. We are having a ball. I watch them grow everyday, and intensely love the little persons they are turning into. Weekdays and weekends alike, we enjoy our slow-paced breakfasts together. Because we can. We are in control of our time, and we are very appreciative of that.
The Stillness of Richmond and the Stillness of San Carlos may have happened at similar times of the year, and were equally unforeseen, but they feel very different. While the former was unexpected and tainted with melancholy, this one is being welcome, enjoyed in peace. There, we had to adapt our plans, for we had missed the pace to make it to the Sea of Cortez before winter, as we had previously planned and expected. Here, we are making new plans. With peace of mind and time on hand the mind flourishes, ideas abound, and we realize a world of possibilities ahead.

Soon the days will be even cooler, the water fresh again, there won’t be tropical storms anymore, Adriana will have completed her last job, I will be fully recovered and Pesto will be ship-shape again. The time will come to leave Marina Real, Bahia Algodones and San Carlos. We may possibly cruise the Baja California peninsula for a little while again, and then … then, at some point in time, we shall point Pesto’s bow on a new direction. Just a few degrees on the compass which can make a huge impact on how the upcoming chapters of our Journey will look and feel like.

As I think of the next paragraph, steam starts to come out of the coffee maker, filling the cabin with the delicious scent. It’s the start of another pleasant slow-paced breakfast. It’s also an indication that it is time to wrap up this post.

Something is definitely brewing.