Our Beautiful Girl Starts a New Adventure

When we bought Arione 16 years ago, I don't think we fully realized what a huge impact she'd have on our lives. Over the years, she's been our home, our weekend getaway, and our magic carpet. We've had some of the most amazing (and a few of the most terrifying) experiences in our lives aboard her. I can't imagine a better cruising boat for a couple.

We've had Arione on and off (mostly off) the market for the past year. A few weeks ago, we were contacted via the Mason owners' mailing list by a potential buyer in Florida. He flew out and spent a few hours with us going over the boat. We agreed on a price and he came out again for a sea trial and survey. The transaction closed yesterday, and she's currently at KKMI getting decommissioned to go on a truck to her new home in Florida. 

It's weird to look out behind the house and not see a mast back there. It was a great 16 years of cruising and living aboard, but we're ready to move on - our long distance cruising days are behind us, and she deserves to be actively cruised. Her new owner, Scott, plans to do just that in the Caribbean and beyond. We hope he gets as much joy from her as we have. Ourselves, we're starting the hunt for a much smaller, simpler boat for daysailing on the bay. 

Goodbye, beautiful girl, we'll miss you!

Arione is for Sale

We've been back in the Bay Area for nearly a year now, and our cruising days are done. Arione is waiting patiently on her end tie at Marina Village for someone to buy her and take her out cruising again - is that person you?  See her here:

Arione is for sale

She has, obviously, been a fantastic boat for us, and we have mixed feelings about letting her go. That said, she's a lot of boat for the bay, and we're no longer living aboard. So it's time.

(The photos in the yachtworld ad are of her old cushions. New ones are currently under construction at West Coast Canvas - the should be in in a couple of weeks.)

New cockpit table

Arione's cockpit table has been sub-optimal since the day we bought her. For starters, it was too high - we always felt like we were at the kids' table when we used it. It swings down to store on the front of the binnacle, so mounting it higher up meant it could be longer. However, it made it fairly useless for eating. The yard in Seattle designed a sort of Rube Goldberg setup that allowed us to lower the table once it was set up, but a cockpit table that takes two people and swearing in at least one language to set up doesn't get used a lot. And the leaves opened from the bottom which meant their remaining level with the table depended on hardware that was just screwed to the table's underside. Better hope no one leans on a leaf - everything will go flying as the screw pulls out of the wood (why, yes, we've had that happen).

So we had a new one made. With cupholders. And leaves that open from the top. Reggie, the same guy who did our teak decks built us this. I love it.

Barrancas del Cobre - Last Leg

Our bus back to Mazatlán left at 9:30. This time, instead of Primera Clase, we had tickets for Servicio Confort. The main difference, as far as I could tell, was that as we boarded the bus we were each handed a bag with a sandwich, a cookie, chips, water and a soda. This bus also made fewer stops - our only stop between Los Mochis and Mazatlán was in Culiacán. We were back at the boat by 3:00.

There are a few things we will do differently if we make this trip again.

• Build in an extra day at Posada Barrancas. The altitude change was really noticable, and it would have been better to have a day to acclimate. We could also have gone down into the canyon from here.
• Do at least one trip down into the canyon. You can do this via ATV, jeep donkey or horse. Batopilas and Urique two towns at the bottom that are both supposed to be quite worth visiting.
• Go right after the rainy season. Apparently there are a lot of waterfalls - many visible from the train - if you go in November or December.

All in all it was an absolutely fantastic trip, and I am very glad we decided to do it.

Back to Los Mochis

Sunday, it was time to take the train back to Los Mochis. Since our train didn't leave until 11:00, we had time to visit the local museum, which Gail and Murray had gone to the previous afternoon. It was pretty interesting, but unfortunately no pictures were allowed, so you'll have to take my word for it.

The train ride back was at least as spectacular as the trip up.

There is a little market area at Divisadero, and each time we were there, we got gorditas, which are thick corn tortillas that are split and filled with cheese and the meat of your choice. Delicious!

The rock formations that erosion has caused are often quite spectacular.

By the time we reached El Fuerte, it was dark. We grabbed a bite in the dining car and then slept the rest of the way back to Los Mochis.

Barrancas del Cobre - Back to the Canyon

Since we had some extra time, and since Art had missed going to the canyon the previous day, we decided to use the second half of our last day in Creel to go back to the cable car. The weather was also much better, so i was hoping that I'd get some better photos. I wasn't disappointed. It takes about an hour to drive from Creel to the cable car - on a surprisingly good road that criscrosses the train tracks several times.












There's a river way down in the bottom there:



Art standing on a viewing platform the juts out over the canyon. In the wind, which there thankfully was little of this day, the platform feels a little, well, mobile.

Before we went back over to Divisadero, we watched this guy climb out on the balancing rock. It wobbles quite a lot. Jose told us that he used to go out on it, but about six years ago, a Canadian woman went on it, freaked out while she was standing up, and fell. She died. Jose doesn't go out on the rock anymore. Neither did we.



Then we went back over to Divisadero, for some more fabulous views:






This little bridge is called the swinging bridge. And yes, it does. I tried to time my crossing of it so that I would be the only person on it, but of course, failed. I was actually amazed I managed to go across it and didn't wind up wimping out and going around on the side of the road.

We went back to Creel from here, and met up with Gail and Murray to listen to Jose play the guitar at the Best Western, which actually had a pretty nice bar. We tried to have dinner at the same place as the night before, but they seemed to be out of everything we wanted to order - I guess we spent a little to much time listening to music and having drinks. So we went to a place a couple of doors down and had a nice dinner with musicians that were good enough to get a couple of people up and dancing.

Barrancas del Cobre - Day 4: Tamahumara

We met our tour guide, Jose, at 10:00 on Saturday morning. Gail and Murray would come with us for the first part of the day, and then Jose would take us back to the tram that Art had missed the day before. I was looking forward to getting some pictures of the canyon while the sun was shining, too.

Our first stop was a Tarahumara settlement in a valley. The Tarahumara are indians that fled into the Sierra Madre to avoid the Spanish. They are know for running crazy long distances, barefoot. Many of them still live in their traditional cave dwellings, although there's been quite a bit of effort expended to get them proper houses, with heat. Apparently the winter of 2011-12 was extremely cold, and several people froze to death in the caves. The women weave beautiful baskets out of pine needles and grasses. We came home with several baskets.







There were quite a few more conventional houses scattered around as well.




















The Tarahumara are subsistence farmers - they grow mostly corn and beans. The season at these altitudes must be incredibly short - we saw nothing growing while we were there. We did see an irrigation canal - the water is diverted to various places by moving the piles of rocks around.



There is a church here, but the tarahumara have sort of adapted Catholicism to their traditional beliefs. The white stones in the facade of the mission represent the sun, moon and stars.







After the town, Jose took us to a very pretty lake. Again, we were strongly reminded of the Sierra Nevada.





We dropped Murray and Gail off at the museum in town, and headed back to Divisadero and the tram.

Barrancas Del Cobre - Day 3, Pt 2

The ride from Posada Barrancas to Creel is a short one - about two hours. We boarded the train at about 2:00.





On the way to Creel, we passed a small forest fire.

To say that we were underwhelmed when we got to Creel would be a bit of an understatement. There's not much there, and I immediately started to wonder if I'd made a mistake booking us here for two nights.








 We dropped our stuff at the hotel and met up with Murray and Gail, who were staying at a different place, for dinner. Managed to find a good restaurant on the recommendation of their driver, and made an early night of it in anticipation of a busy day in the morning. Our hotel included a tour of the local area, and Murray and Gail decided to go with us.