October ‘94
*Additional notes may appear in italics after my mom’s initial journal entries.
A ladybug means you should check the comments at the bottom of the page to see what Mom has chimed in on after reading these!
October 1, Saturday
We got mail and John bought me 9 red roses.
John did odds and ends and fix-its on the boat. He fixed the deck wash pump, so now he can hook the hose up and really wash the deck much easier. He changed the oil in the gen-set at 785 hours, and also installed a new impeller in the macerator pump.
We went into town tonight; John and Samie got an ice cream cone.
Blew a fuse on the sump-pump.
*Ice cream after dinner has definitely always been one of Dad’s favorite treats and I was always more than happy to partake in the tradition! If I’m remembering correctly, Dad would typically get rum-raisin and mom would get pistachio. Funnily enough, I don’t remember what I would get, which leads me to believe my parent’s always got the same thing, whereas I mixed it up each time. Maybe chocolate this time and cookie dough the next, or maybe sherbet or chocolate chip or neopolitan?! Impossible choices for a seven-year-old; I’m sure I simply wanted them all!
October 2, Sunday
We Went to the mercado and got a few things.
Neal came by to figure out where we will put the computer we are buying from him.
Our generator was running and just up and quit, it won’t start again.
We went into Bandito’s dock for the night so we could plug into shore power. When we were backing in the front port station was broken loose, bent and pulled right off the deck when it hit another docked boat (which was not hurt at all).
October 3, Monday
We took the stanchion off and Baja Naval will make a new one. We will have to tape up one of the life-lines which was badly scraped. We can save the netting and re-thread the stanchion by working from the ends and turn buckles.
John got a hold of Sal and it turns out the only thing wrong with the generator is that it lost its ground. Lucked out again.
I wrote a note to ADOT saying that I live in Mexico but she does have my permission to get her driver’s permit.
Steve P. called on the phone with a new frequency.
Danielle called, she might quit school and go to Mesa and work for a year.
Talked to Michelle - she found out today that she is pregnant! How exciting! She would be due the middle of April – but she doesn’t have her first doctor’s appointment until the 20th of this month.
In all the phone calls today, I think we used 70 minutes’ air time, which would be 77 cents per minute, totaling $54 or there-abouts, plus the $2.20 day charge for any long-distance. It will be interesting to see what the whole thing comes to. It’s so ridiculous! But I’m so glad it’s there!
*Communications were really just so different at the time! Internet was still pretty new and not readily available to everyone, cell phones didn’t have screens, let alone cameras (the average person would have probably laughed at the idea), and it was all wildly expensive, as noted here. And if it weren’t for these fairly regular check-ins and calls we were able to make and receive, our family really wouldn’t know where we were. We sent mail out whenever we could, but that was only efficient if we were close to a town. If we needed to get mail off to someone while we were, say, in Baja, we would have to sent the letters along with other cruisers who were headed to port and trust they’d get it in to town and mailed off for us. I’m grateful our family and friends didn’t have to wonder too often where we were or if we were safe.
October 4, Tuesday
John started working on the generator and battery system trying to figure out the problems. He cleaned all the grounding connections on the generator but it still isn’t right.
About 11:00am Steve and Sherry called from San Diego to say they are coming back a day early because Japan had an earthquake which was causing a tsunami or tidal wave to come in on the west coast, due around 5:30pm.
We had heard no warnings here, but the harbor in San Diego was telling everyone to evacuate.
John quit working on the generator and batteries and installed the new station which Baja Naval made (cost $122.50, wow) while we waited to see if we were gonna have to take the boat out in the open water to avoid the tsunami.
The reports we were hearing from Hawaii was that it wasn’t anything much at all – and the warning was cancelled.
We finally got a letter from Mom that she mailed on September 2nd – one month to find us, but it was because the way it was addressed.
*How scary this must have been! I don’t remember it, I probably wouldn’t have understood exactly what a tsunami was; I’m not sure I could have comprehended its massiveness. Luckily it is a pretty easy fix in a boat, as long as you can get out of port and out to sea!
October 5, Wednesday
While we were at the dock, the Port Captain’s Office had gone out into the harbor and cut all the unused mooring lines. Since ours was unused at the time, ours was cut and we lost our little red anchor buoy. Tino, the owner of Bandito’s was able to give us another one, thank goodness. This one is even closer to all the docks.
John is over-charging all the batteries today and bringing them all up where they should be. I guess we should be doing this once a month, anyway.
We need to talk to Sal before we continue working on the generator -but John has rigged it to run for now.
Steve and Sherry’s daughter and son-in-law arrived today from Salt Lake. Marci and Todd are really nice; we visited at their boat for a few hours.
Still no word back from Danielle about school.
We finished building the stands for the computer and it’s all set up and working. Neal will bring the computer and Steve P. is sending an old printer over with Phyllis. So we will be all set for weather and fax and Samie is having fun with the games.
It rained this morning for about 10 minutes, nice, but not long enough.
*It was such a luxury to have this computer on our boat! I don’t remember anything about weather faxes - all I remember are my games, teaching myself to type, and designing various cards and banners to be printed out with one of those late 80s dot matrix printers which simultaneously serenaded you with that god-awful cacophony of doom. As far as games, I believe there were some card games and general solitaire type, but what I remember playing and enjoying the most was Wheel of Fortune in all its pixelated glory. Over the years, technology kept growing (weird) and other boaters were quite generous with this bored only child floating out in the ocean with mostly only my own imagination to entertain myself. I borrowed Game Boys on which I played Zelda and Paper Boy, most notably. I believe people even loaned us their computers a time or two and I remember being taught random games. There some cat and mouse maze/puzzle games that I was enthralled with and have since looked for, but haven’t found. —-> Look, I found it! It was called Rodent’s Revenge!
October 5, Thursday
John helped Steve hook up his deck wash pump and a couple other things while Sherry, Marci, Samie and I went to the laundry and to the store.
We had dinner on the Valiant Lady tonight.
October 7, Friday
John cleaned the water filters.
We went out in the bay for 2 hours and made about 35 gallons of water. Timo is afraid that if we are gone too long, they will cut this mooning also, or that another boat will take it. There are a bunch of boats coming in from San Diego for a race on Sunday.
The moorings that were cut on Wednesday are all being reconnected for the boats coming in for the race. It’s crazy, quite funny to watch.
October 8, Saturday
It’s getting cold, time to start building fires! Ha! It was 58° yesterday morning at 7am and 62° today. We hear on the ham radio that it is in the 80s on down the mainland coast, even the water temp is in the 80s!
There must be 70 to 80 boats in this harbor.
We made contact with Steve and did phone patches to Michelle and Danielle and Michael – Peg was not home. All the kids sound good. Michael has the last week of December and first week of January off – so he can come down.
I defrosted the freezer and cleaned the fridge – ice box is more like it.
Stayed home tonight.
October 9, Sunday
John crewed on Valiant Lady today in a 12-mile race. There were 7 boats entered, they took 4th place. Samie and I stayed on our boat to keep an eye on the mooring. The winds normally blow out of the southwest and today they are blowing 15 to 20 knots out of the east. So the boat has blown around and the mooring line has turned and we are way out of sync; John says Tino uses an anchor for the mooring and it drug and reset with the winds. It makes me uncomfortable!
There was a small BBQ and awards for the race.
It is surprising how much the temperature changed with the winds from the east. It was quite cool the last week or so – but today it was 102° in the shade on our boat. At 8:00pm it was 80°.
There were fires burning on the mountains all around – looks bad, but I think they were out before they reached any homes.
October 10 – Monday
We left the harbor at 1:30pm with Valiant Lady headed for Todos Santos. The winds today are out of the WSW and only around 7 to 10 knots. None of those Santa Annas today.
We had to anchor at the mouth of the cove and wait for 2 boats to leave – then we came around and tied off to the back rock like always. Valiant Lady stayed out where they were. We had dinner with them.
The sail out was beautiful and warm – not any real wind.
Called Mom – the tickets from Phoenix to San Diego are $25 each, but must be purchased before the 13th – so she’s gonna get two for me and Samie; we will ride to Arizona with Phyllis and Mike on the 15th and fly back on the 24th.
*So I asked Mom about this and she’s not too sure, but this entry had me wondering what was involved in planning trips, airline tickets and hotel lodgings at the time. I seem to always remember people talking about travel agents and what kind of deals they were able to get them. It’s really so crazy how much easier it is to do things ourselves now.
October 11, Tuesday
Happy Sweet 16 to Peggy!
I arranged for Debby at Navopache to deliver a card that I’d mailed and a rose to Peggy at school today, which she said (when I called her tonight) made her whole day and I told her we were coming for a week!
I made an applesauce cake and Samie made a poster * which we had for Peg’s B-day, even though we’re not together!
We woke up this morning to Steve on Valiant Lady blowing the fog horn at 4:30am! He had woke up because the wind shifted and his dinghy was bumping the boat. Since we had such bad Santa Annas 2 days ago, he was concerned that we be ready if it got bad and we had to pull out real fast. Which it didn’t – the wind shifted to the southwest and it was a real nice day.
We did watch the sun come up, got the laundry done early, boat washed down, school done and “played” the rest of the day! What a rough life!
The switch on the fresh water pump went on the fritz again – we should have had one picked up and brought down.
I called Mom ‘cause we haven’t heard Steve on the radio for 3 days now – she got our tickets for the 24th and 11:45.
The sky is so beautiful with all the stars – thousands!
*Cue printer “music” with the poster-making comment! You know that sucker was at least four pages long!
October 12- Wednesday
We lazed around this morning and got back to the harbor around 3pm. Steve and Sherry let us use their truck, so we went to the store and tried to get all the propane tanks filled, but the place was closed.
October 13- Thursday
John got the propane tanks filled. Mike and Phyllis got lost for a couple of hours trying to find the harbor – it was 11:30 before they got out to the boat. It was blowing 10 to 15 knots inside the harbor, so we waited until it died down a little. It was 1:00 when we headed out to Todos Santos. Not a lot of wind – but 4-5 foot swells, we anchored about 3:30. BBQed some delicious steaks that Mike and Phyllis had brought from San Diego.
They brought lots of letters and goodies from home. It was so good to see them again.
October 14, Friday
John helped Steve on his boat. We sure “rocked and rolled” all night, it even rained real good for an hour or so. About 4:30am the wind shifted to the ESE, where it stayed at about 8 to 12 knots all day. We finally gave up and headed to Ensenada at 2:30pm. It was a nice sail back.
John hurt his back somehow yesterday and it’s still bad.
October 15, Saturday
Samie and I left with Mike and Phyllis this morning at 6:30am, headed for Arizona. It had rained again in the night and it was still cloudy when we left.
We ate lunch in Yuma at 12:30. It rained off and on all the way, when we left Mesa at 4:30 after stopping at Mom’s for a while; then it rained the rest of the way to the other side of the canyon and it started snowing. Yuk! We got to Michael and Peggy’s at 8:00pm, Peg was already at Jo’s, so Shine drove us down. Andy, Janet and kids, Angie and family were all there, waiting – but the kids were all so surprised. Samie and I stayed at Angie’s house.
Dan and Melissa gave Peg a 1983 Honda Accord for her birthday; nice little first car.
*I feel the need to point out here that at the time, the Honda was only 11 years old!
October 16, Sunday
Samie went to church with everyone – Peg and I stayed here, nice. We all had lunch at Jo’s; Andy and Janet left at 3:30 for home. It is snowing and sticking – stayed at Angie’s.
October 17, Monday
Peg, Samie and I drove to Show Low this morning, took Samie by to see Rane; she stayed there while Michael, Peggy and I went up to Navopache Electric and to Pat’s for lunch. Peg’s car may need a new alternator, it keeps dying. The kids brought me back to Jo’s house – Samie and I stayed here tonight.
*Who remembers Pat’s Place?! An old familiar staple of days gone past in Show Low! My brother worked there for years and we would often go for some delicious pizza and of course I’d wander off to play the arcade games in the other room! Hey, Mom! I need more quarters!
October 18, Tuesday
Spent the day with Jo, then went back to Angie’s for the night.
October 19, Wednesday
Angie and Jo drove Samie and I to Show Low, we got Peg and took her car and dropped Samie off at Rane’s. Peg and I went to Pat’s Pizza and Shine bought us dinner! What a sweetie! We went to Steve and Brenda’s but couldn’t hear John on the radio good enough so I just called on the phone.
I took Peg home and took her car out to Janelle’s to spend the night. Peg’s car just had a loose spark plug – but it needs some transmission work.
October 20, Thursday
I picked Goon up at her house at 6:30am so that she could drive to school, then I had her car till I went back to get her at 10:45 – she has a half day today and Friday. She took me to meet her boyfriend, Jay – nice, cute guy!
Then we rented a movie, My Father, the Hero and got some chips and dip and went to her room to watch ‘em and pig out! Nice day.
Later, I went to Colleen’s to spend the night and Marian came over to catch me up on all the gossip!
October 21, Friday
I picked Goon up again so she could drive to school, then I went by Navopache again for a while. At 9:30 I picked up Samie and Michael and we spent an hour together before he had to go to work and Samie and I went to get Peg. Then we hung out at her house until Angie picked us up at 2:00pm. Then we left Taylor at 3:00 and met Mom and Marie in Payson – ate at Taco Bell and came on down to Mesa. Stopped to see Grandpa and Margaret, getting to the house about 7:30pm.
October 22, Saturday
Samie and I spent the morning at Chelle’s and Danielle was there, she had cut her hair to her shoulders – it’s cute. Faron came home for lunch. It feels so good to be with the girls, I miss ‘em so much. Danielle is trying to get hired at WalMart. Chelle is starting to show a little, she goes in on Thursday the 27th for a sonagram to see exactly how far along she is.
Danielle left for Lakeside at 2:30 – Peg will be so glad to see her! Chelle brought us back to Mom’s at 3:30. Her and Faron have tickets to the Cardinals vs. Cowboys game tomorrow.
Mom and Daddy took us out to eat with Pat and Jack Miller.
We called Rane to see what her sonagram showed – no twins, just 1 boy!
We also talked to John on the phone.
October 23, Sunday
Chelle came by this morning for a couple hours before she went to work.
We just hung around Mom’s – Andy, Janet and kids came over for dinner. Rendy finally warmed up to me enough to play. John called.
October 24, Monday
Time to go home. Mom took us to the airport and we flew out at 11:45am. Samie’s first time on an elevator, escalator, airplane and taxi – all in one day! She really liked the plane, pointing out things the whole time. When we landed, we found John and took a taxi to the trolly station, then the bus home. We got to the boat about 4:30 or 5:00pm.
Good to be home.
*I definitely remember this flight and being so excited next to the window, watching this giant, huge earth pass beneath the wings of our jet plane. I remember being fascinated by the crops and fields, all different colors. I must’ve asked a million questions - which was not at all out of the norm, so can you imaging how many I asked about all the new things!? Oy vay! Maybe this was the trip when Mom started to my “why this, why that” questions with “So you would have something to ask about!”. 😂
<— Look what I found while scanning photos; a napkin was from my first flight. What a nerd. 🙃❤
October 25, Tuesday
While we were gone, John bought $700 in parts, $400 in labor on the generator and $400 for a gas generator for back-up if this one ever quits again. He finally had to pull in at Baja Naval so he could plug in on Friday and came back out to the mooring Sunday night. He said his week was not good at all!
Today we walked to the store. John bought several more parts for the generator for $100.
The wind is gusting 10-20 knots today.
October 26, Wednesday
Started school again – John “cooked” the batteries and mounted the gas generator on the back above our cabin.
Samie is drawing all kinds of Halloween stuff and taping it around, such as bats, ghosts, spider webs and spiders – it looks real spooky!
October 27, Thursday
We found a place to have film developed in 2 hours for $9 – single prints. One other place took 2 weeks!
Did odds and ends on the boat.
October 28, Friday
We had Tino call the laundry mat to come pick us up - a service they offer. After 3 hours of waiting, we gave up!
Steve and Sherry got back from Salt Lake around 3pm, we had them over for a fish dinner.
October 29, Saturday
John is cleaning and checking out everything in prep for Thursday the third’s departure! Steve (Valiant Lady) climbed the mast and put on the new spreader boots for us (he used to be a mountain climber).
October 30, Sunday
Samie took her second test; missed 2 science questions. John “puttered”, and we went out to Alfonzo’s for Pizza.
October 31, Monday
Happy Halloween!
Sherry, Samie and I did one last hurrah of laundry and Smart & Final shopping. Samie dressed up like a clown - Rane had sent clown makeup – she looked real cute. I dressed up like a pirate and we went around to a few boats and over to Tino’s (Bandito’s). She had a good time.
