We're looking for the trash fence...

Here is what that filleted serial cable looks like after you've ID'd all the wires to the pins.

I have been noticing a problem with the position displayed in my Icom M504 VHF. My current latitude is 24°09.200N. But the VHF was displaying 2°49.200. The GPS data is fed to my VHF and my SCS PTC-IIUSB modem from the NMEA 2000 network via the Actisense NGW-1-ISO (NMEA 200 to NMEA 0183) gateway.

I contacted Actisense support and they suggested I upgrade the firmware in my NGW-1-ISO. That involved a multi-day hunt for serial cables here in La Paz. In the end, I found them at Sterens which is on Forjadores across the street from the Plaza de La Paz (AKA the Soriana shopping center) with help from the gang at Club Cruceros de La Paz. BTW, Sterens is an electronics store with all kinds of cables, connectors, and electronics doo-dads. More like a Radio Shack than a Frye’s, but better than the Radio Shack’s here and cheaper too! I paid \$89 MXN for 2 6ft serial cables.

Once I had the serial cable in hand, I cut one end off the end I wouldn’t be connecting to the computer. I then used the continuity test on my multimeter to label all the wires so I knew which wire went to which pin on the DB9 connector I would be plugging into my computer. You need to label each wire to its proper DB9 RS232 cable pinout because later you’re going to need to connect Pin X with the Red wire on the NGW-1-ISO, etc. This is not hard at all. Your digital multimeter has a continuity test. You stick one of the probes into Pin 1 and test each wire, when it beeps you label that wire as #1 and so on.

With all the wires labeled, I was ready to connect the NGW-1-ISO’s wires to the Serial Cable as specified in the NGW-1-ISO manual for connection to a PC. Once that was done, I ran Actisenses’s upgrade utility, selected the COM port the serial cable was connected to and performed the upgrade. I offer all that detail in case one of you needs to do it too. There currently is no other way to upgrade the non-USB Actisense gateways.

After all that, I connect everything back up to my ICOM M504 and the position is now being displayed correctly. This is VERY important in case we ever need to use the DSC Distress call on our VHF which transmits an alert and our position. Without this fix the position would have been wrong!

Crisis averted. The world is now safe for eating delicious homemade cupcakes which Dawn made last night. Its good here. Its very good here!

Dawn has been providing some travel log entries so I though it was time to give you some more geek info!

When we were a few months out from leaving Seattle I broke the screen on my aging iPhone 3G. I was tempted to get an Android phone because they are cheaper, but I loved all my iPhone apps. So, I broke down and decided to get the then newly released unlocked iPhone 4. Coughing up the small fortune for the unlocked iPhone 4 allows me to use the phone with any carrier in the world.

The other day, I finally had some free time to take my iPhone 4 to the local TelCel support center here in La Paz and bought a new sim card (\$150 MXN) and signed up for a month to month 3Gb data plan (\$500 MXN). They were having computer problems and it took HOURS to get my sim card setup so they even gave me 6GB for the first month and said I’d probably get 6GB again next month too!

You can refill your account at any OXXO store (like 7-11) or TelCel store or franchisee. By the way, everyone here in La Paz says you do not want to buy 3G modems or Sim cards from the franchisees or other stores.

Now that I have the data plan, I can tether the iPhone 4 to my laptops, ship’s computer, iPad, etc via WiFi, Bluetooth or with a USB cable and use the cell phone to access the internet from any device! Apple calls this iPhone Personal Hotspot. It works great and I still have an iPhone I can carry around and look at maps, etc while we are roaming around the town!!

I’d highly recommend using a phone that supports tethering. You could use other phones which are cheaper than the iPhone, I’m not sure which ones though. Getting the 3G USB modem is also great but it doesn’t give you the freedom of using a handheld mobile device in your pocket.

This morning we headed out early with the hopes of making it to Ensenada de Los Muertes before the forecasted winds would build to 20kts around noon, according to the GRIB. Well noon was apparently at 0700 today. We made good time until then we were driving into 20kts at 2-3kts and pounding seas. So we turned tail back to Los Frailles as did three other boats.

I just went over the Sonrisa Net, Buoy Weather and a new source I found Stan’s Weather Pages. Only Stan had it correct. His forecasts are available on Saildocs, here’s a link to his home page: http://www.weather.solmatesantiago.com/

We’ll be cross-comparing more but its nice to see one guy who got it right.

<click through to see the video>

I love to do me some research and as I was figuring out what to do about our fishing setup, I read The Cruiser's Handbook of Fishing by Scott and Wendy Bannerot. I even had a couple of one on one email exchanges with Scott about our setup. Some of the advice is a bit outside our budget the general advice in the book is awesome and I highly recommend it.

I did end up following some of his advice and bought a really big Penn 12/0 Senator  reel (used on EBAY). I originally had planned to mount this in a fixed fashion without a pole on the stern pulpit. I couldn't figure out how to make that happen and others advised me I'd never be able to reel in any sizeable fishes that way. Now if you get an Alvey Deck Winch which is mentioned in the book (>\$1000 not available in the US) then yes you can do this. We made a last minute purchase of a pole in West Marine in San Diego. And now that we've caught and landed two 15" bonitos and two 36"+ Dorado I can tell you yep, without being able to "pump the rod" to get slack line form the fish, there is no way we could reel in those suckers without the rod.

The rest of our gear includes several lures which were recommended by Outdoor Emporium in Seattle. I forget the guys name, but he was awesome! Our lures break down into the "Mexican flag" colored feather looking squid things, a purple and black cedar plug and a red\white cedar plug. We caught bonito with the Mexican flag and we caught the Dorado with the purple\black plug. My assumption was the Dorado eat the bonito and the purple\black looked more like a bonito. Throughout the Baja Fleet boats were fishing with similar gear and caught similar to us as well as a 67" Wahoo and some squid of various sizes. One boat was even using homemade lures made from Heineken cans with good success!

In order to land the fish, you need a gaff to haul it on deck. The retail gaffs were too short to pull a fish onto our boat or too expensive so, we made our own. The gaff hook itself is the same as the commercial ones. We bought it at the chandlery in Newport, OR. For the pole, we used a broom handle.

When we bring the fish alongside the boat we gaff it, haul it on deck and hold it down and use cheap vodka to subdue the fish by spraying it on its gills and in the mouth. This makes the trashing stop pretty quick. We then bleed the fish and clean it on the side deck. The fillets are then soaked in salt water and taken below. Dawn does the final filleting and skin removal in the galley while I wash down the boat. The whole process can be a bit messy!

Our system has worked pretty well so far for fishing while on passage.

Not many updates from us in a while, too much fun, too little wifi. I did want to take a second and throw up the link to the Baja Ha-Ha XVIII Flickr group I created. https://www.flickr.com/groups/bajahahaxviii/

This has nothing to do with Latitude 38. If you want your pics published you need to follow the link Andy Turpin sent out to Smug Mug.

If you don’t care about that, don’t want to upload 5 photos at a time, or just prefer Flickr, then the group is a great way to do bulk uploads and share your pics. The group is public anyone can join. I tried to tag all my photos with names of people and boats and the locations are mapped in Flickr or in the EXIF data on the images.

More stories about the trip to come…

We have had several very busy days in San Diego, trying to wrap up projects, do some basic maintenance items, etc. We really needed to be here weeks ago and had planned to, but things happen (aka Charleston, OR). The weather here been cloudy and warm, or what Dawn calls… crappy! I thought San Diego was the land of eternal sunshine, ah phooey!

Every boat that wants to anchor in San Diego gets a permit from the Harbor Patrol. We first grabbed a slip at the Harbor Patrol’s transient doc for a couple of days. This dock is no longer \$10.50 a night, so call around. You can probably get a slip in a marina for the same price with better amenities. You definitely want to be on or nearby Shelter Island if at all possible. We left there and moved to the La Playa Anchorage (A1 on your charts) which is only open on the weekends. Its right next to the prestigious San Diego Yacht Club. You can land your dinghy at the beach just off of the anchorage. We did so, unlocked, tied to a rock, had no issues. A better spot for dingy landing is to not go straight in to shore, but to go to the right as you approach shore, look for a fence that goes into the water. You can land your dinghy on the rocky sand and tie it to the fence and you’re basically right at the street by the SDYC. Form there you can walk to everything. Downwind Marine, West Marine, etc. The Trader Joes and Von’s are about a 1.5 mile walk, or grab the number 28 Bus. The number 28 bus up to Sports Arena Blvd gets you to the Home Depot, Target, Big Five and Sports Chalet. Google Maps’ walking and bus directions are awesome!

On our first night at the transient dock we installed the Xantrex LinkPro battery monitor. OH MY GAWD it is awesome. My favorite thing is to watch the amp meter if its negative you can see how much power you using. If the number is positive you can see how much charging your getting from your alternator, solar panels, shore power, etc. You can turn everything off in the boat and see what each little electrical toy is costing you power wise. Being able to see what is going on with the batteries is not only helpful but gives us way more peace of mind.

Matty got us our last batch of mail. Downwind Marine takes packages for cruisers and holds them for you to pick up. Such an awesome, nice and free thing they do for cruisers! Matty’s services are available to a select few, but he’s damn good!

I’m going to take a nap in like five seconds, but I just had to out this up… that is pretty awesome!

I edited the video from pulling the engine, the picture is a bit cloudy because the Go Pro fogged up in its waterproof case. (still learning how to use it) Its not that fascinating to watch, but its here just the same, so watch it you will!

Updated 2022: We no longer post to YouTube