Déjàlà is Going Postal, No, Hmm, We Mean Musical

If you can't live longer,

Live deeper.

Italian Proverb

Sailing away from Bahia LA to Animas Slot - Little wind, a motoring passerby took this photo

For the majority of our time cruising, we have followed or, if you prefer, have been taken care of by the rhythms of nature with their corresponding rhythms of winds and seas.  For type A’s like so many of us, a transition took place.  Transitioning to following rhythms rather than fight, harness or change them.  Transitioning to learn, read, and anticipate them, although not always successfully, for best comfort and practicality.  

Benjamin and Nikki
This great young adult took Nikki for walks in the evening at Bahia LA
She loved it.  Treated like a princess...

Many more tools and technologies allow us to see the larger weather picture and, hopefully, decipher what it means for us in our miniature part of the sea or ocean.  Sailors and explorers from eons ago had much less to go on yet managed.  Despite all this technology and forecasting, nature can, and will, still throw us curve balls, keeping us on our toes, not complacent. 

Starting line of small regatta from Bahia LA to La Mona
We were aboard SV Letitgo

More than ever we have a better understanding of the unpredictability within the predictable of our natural surroundings.  We acknowledge and have a better comprehension and appreciation of its power rather than irrational fears of its various forces.  More of a slower-paced flow-like living rather than a schedule-based race to the next day.  More of a noticing of simple things and small details thanks to quality time rather than short glimpses between, not necessarily meaningful, rushed happenings/events and deadlines. More observing than ruling. More experiencing than merely pushing through. 

After the rains, caterpillars were everywhere. Nikki tried to smell one and sneezed for a long while
Not sure what the caterpillar did to her but she did not want anything more to do with them

When was the last time you felt like your surroundings invaded you, letting them be part of you

When was the last time you felt the air of a storm taking your breath away, nearly splitting you in pieces?

When was the last time you watched the complete progression of a sunset with its sometimes very subtle changes of colors, density of contrasts, transformation of sounds, or alteration of air temperature/quality? 

When was the last time you simply sat with a loved one being at peace not to say anything but only share the moment? 

One short summer in the Sea of Cortez

Two years of sailing

So for a few months, we go back to the city life with its schedules and deadlines, not sure how we will react to it other than to say it will be with a new understanding and a new perspective. 

What Nikki did when we told her we were going back
to the US and away from beaches, sand dunes, crabs and lizards...

THEN – the plan is to head back to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, in early March 2014 to start the great journey across the Pacific and head to the Marquesas, Tuomatus, Tahiti, Fiji, and beyond but aboard someone else’s beautiful vessel, namely Music.  We will be traveling with Captain Wayne.  We will hopefully be of help to him.   

Little Déjàlà between two boats in the yard
Left a sardine boat under construction
Right a Louisiana shrimper being revamped

We have to be careful what we ask for and this is another answered conundrum for us.  We wanted to go to the South Pacific but didn’t really desire to do it on our own boat not knowing how we would take it back to Canada or the US from there and also knowing that it wouldn’t sell easily with a small electric outboard and no fuel-driven engine.  We had thought finding someone to share the trip with would be a great way to accomplish our goal but didn’t know where to start with this quest especially not having many acquaintances in the sailing community.  Somehow things fell into place when we met Wayne on and off over the last two years and now a great new adventure is taking shape… 

Building of anchors and steel boat

Nikki will need asylum somewhere while we travel in countries she could never set foot on unless awaiting very lengthy quarantines including hefty fees and possibly not very gentle treatment.  We don’t think it would be fair to our beach/land loving little mascot to be trapped this way.  We will miss her tremendously but hope to make, in our absences, the best arrangements for her.

So, we barely finished our first adventure on Déjàlà knowing we will soon prepare for the next one – with a motor nevertheless, on Music.  It’s Music to our ears (arrgh…   couldn’t help it – sorry).