Ocean, a trawler and a motorcycle
(A Slightly Different Cruise to Mexico)

"Something has changed and the guy now says that we might have a weather window in the next 48 hours." My friend announced as he was getting of the phone with his weather service.

"He couldn't say with any certainty how long it will last, and he also couldn't see any other window in the foreseeable future. What do you think?" He asked, but we both already knew the answer.

For over a month already we had been moored in Boot Key Harbor, in Marathon, in the Florida Keys, aboard his 42' trawler waiting for relatively decent weather to begin our trip to Guatemala's Rio Dulce.

From Marathon to our first stop, Isla Mujeres, a small island off the coast of Yucatan Peninsula, is approx. 400nm. We estimated that it would take us around 55-60 hours, which was quite a bit longer than the anticipated 48 hour window, but we were eager to finally start our adventure, so we quickly re-fueled and re-watered, and by 8pm that evening we were on our way.

I stood the first watch. The weather was great. The moon was full. The autopilot was doing all the steering. I only occasionally corrected the course by a degree or two and the rest of the time had fun watching on the radar a pod of dolphins that were playing under our bow.

Sometime around 5am we passed by Key West; around 7am we witnessed almost simultaneous moonset and sunrise; and around noon we passed by the Marquesas and Dry Tortugas.

We saw whales playing in the distance. I think that they were sperm whales, but they were too far to say for certain. And then as the sun began to set, we suddenly found ourselves engulfed in the most beautiful shades of pink and purple. If someone had painted the picture, people would say "kitsch", yet like this in nature it was absolutely magnificent.

In the morning the ocean was dead calm. I watched two dolphins as they idly swam parallel with the boat. Occasionally a flying fish would break the surface and for a very long time glide only inches above the glassy water.

It was the nature at its best, but as the day progressed, wind picked up, ocean began to ripple and as we entered the Yucatan Channel and the Gulf stream began ripping from the south at some 6+ knots, and the N-NW wind increased to 15, the ocean around us began to churn. And I literally mean, churn.

Our 45 tone vessel was tossed like a nutshell and everything inside the boat that could fly, did just that. Even

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