SailingKnitter: We're FAMOUS!

Tuesday, February 27, 2007

We're FAMOUS!

Now that we're in a big city (Manzanillo) again, we rode the cheap mexican bus and went shopping today in the old central market downtown. The sights and smells were overwhelming. Delicious fruity guava aromas, then in the next aisle, warm and heavy raw meat odors. Here's a couple of pictures of Jonesy shopping. No, we didn't buy any of the meat hanging in this stall. Just too "real" for us. Tomorrow, we'll be coming back into the city to apply for our Temporary Import Permit for the boat. This is one of the few cities where we can do this transaction, and we understand that it will take 2 full days! I'll be sure to bring my knitting along...

And speaking of knitting...
What do YOU do with all of those little wads of leftover sock yarn? I'm knitting up a "Memories Vest" with the bits of yarn left after I knit up socks for my husband, sons, friends and of course myself! Now, I can look down and be reminded of not only the socks, but of the people who are wearing them.

These are just simple "Domino" knitting squares from the basic pattern in Vivian Hoxboro's book. So far I've almost completed the left front, then I'll just continue around the back and on to the right front. Add a little of EZ's applied I-cord, and voila! Got Memories Vest. Way too much fun.

Also on the knitting front, I completed the olive green socks for my older son Ryan. As he is a big guy with wide feet and high arches (just like his mommy) I had to increase the number of stitches. But, his ankles are narrow - so I used a snugger rib (3x3 versus 5x1 on the calf) to pull in the sock so it won't be baggie there. Here's the picture - note the black yarn on the toes. I figured that I would run out of the olive green yarn, so I put the toe stitches of the first sock on waste yarn, knit the second sock to the same spot using the other end of the yarn ball. Then I just knit both socks until I ran out of yarn switching to some leftover black & gray varigated stuff for the toes.

For my serious knitting, I'm working on Evelyn A. Clark's "Estonian Garden Wrap" in baby alpaca for my s

ister. I've decided to lengthen the center section to make it longer so she can throw one end (casually, of course) over her shoulder. So that I could determine how much more I should increase the center, I jumped ahead and knit one of the borders. Also, I couldn't wait to knit the nupps! I LOVE knitting nupps - they add a whole other dimension to lacework. This is a lousy picture, as the wind was blowing, the sun was setting, and the lace isn't blocked yet, but it's all I have right now.

And just so you don't think that all I do is laze about knitting all the time, here's a picture of me scrapping the nasty barnacles off of the bottom of

our dinghy. This was a GROSS task! Those are live critters in those sharp shells and they "gooed" all over the place. We kept putting off this chore because we knew it would be unpleasant, but finally in Barra de Navidad, we took the dink ashore and went at it. Lesson learned. Don't leave the dink in the water so much.

WE'RE FAMOUS! Check out the February 2007 issue of Latitude 38 magazine for our TWO, yes, count them, 2 articles/letters about us! The first is in the "Letters" section and talks about our encounter with the Mexican Navy, and the 2nd is in the "Changes in Latitudes" section and is a synopsis of what we've been doing. Remember, you heard these stories here on the blog first!

Just a few more pictures from our first anchorage after leaving Banderas Bay - Ipala Bay and

the darling little village of Tehuamixtle. This picture was taken from the dirt road up the hill that leads into town. See the fantastic dinghy landing ramp? Super easy to land your dink here. If you look closely you can see some fishermen in the plaza working on their nets. In the harbor, there are submerged cages where oysters are grown and stored, and bait fish are kept.

If you walk the other direction, you can take a trail down to a rocky beach that faces the Pacific Ocean, and be all alone listening to the pounding of the surf.

Along the beach we found some men working on tiny oysters under a thatched palapa. They were very carefully sorting, cutting, and stacking baby oysters. We wish we knew more about this form of aquaculture.

After spending a couple of days at this idyllic anchorage, we knew we had to move south. So we got up before the crack of dawn, and were sailing again down to the next stop - Chamela Bay.

Sunrise Adios Ipala Bay & Tehuanamixtle!!! We'll be back!!!