whale sharks

Our search for the largest fish in the sea, the whale shark, has been very successful the past few days. We had many snorkeling encounters with these gentle giants and they are impressive. They can grow up to 60 feet, but the ones we saw varied between 20-30 feet in length.
The whale shark is covered with light-colored spots, bands and stripes. Its mouth is large enough to take in a person, and there are 300 rows of tiny (2-3mm), hooked teeth in each jaw. However, these sharks are perfectly harmless to humans, and those we witnessed seemed curious and swam close to investigate. They are filter feeders, roaming the ocean following seasonal food concentrations of zookplankton. They may also remain stationary and vacuum up larger, more dynamic prey such as sardines and anchovies.
Paddleboarding and kayaking rounded out the day today.
We also received our visa extensions for French Polynesia, so we should be headed out into the big blue in the next week. There is a northern blow in the forecast and we plan to take advantage of that on our sail south to Cabo San Lucas.
More to come....

La Paz

After a week in Los Muertos and La Ventana, we headed north and reached La Paz this morning. It's been a cool couple days, at least for us, but the sun shone today. Tomorrow, we'll go in search for the world's largest fish, whale sharks. They typically find refuge in this harbor during the winter months, and there have been countless sightings in the area, so we're pretty excited for an awesome diving and snorkeling encounter.

Los Frailes

I have to say, although we left from San Diego nine days ago, today was our first true day of cruising! We officially settled into this awesome boat life when we anchored up at Los Frailes on the East Cape of Baja Mexico. The paddleboard hit the water, the hammock stretched across the foredeck and life is good...no, no, no - actually it's great!
Chris, Dan and I have had an exceedingly easy trip to date. We plan to be anchored here for an undetermined amount of time, great plan huh?
-Team Namaste

arrival in Cabo

Namaste has arrived in Cabo San Lucas, after a very uneventful and beautiful trip.
We anchored off the beach last night around 5 p.m. and dinghyed into town for a lovely dinner with an old friend and her family. Our permit to visit the Revillagigedos is in the works, although we were extremely disappointed to learn that both islands we visited last year are closed for the months of January and February for Mexican Navy training exercises. So we will only be able to anchor and dive at Clarion, the furthest south island in the archipelago. We will sorely miss the San Benedicto mantas and the Socorro whales, but are looking forward to exploring a whole new place. After stocking up on fresh veggies and seafood, we plan to head north into the Sea of Cortez tomorrow morning, headed for Los Freilles.
Much more to come...
Team Namaste-Chris, Jess and Dan

hola from Namaste

Bienvenidos amigos y familia! (Welcome friends and family)

It's a new year and Namaste and her crew are again headed south for another amazing adventure. As many of you already know, we've changed our sailmail address to KJ6KNU@winlink.org and are no longer using the WCV9862@sailmail.com email address, so scratch that one out of your address books...does anyone still have an address book? :)
Please, please, please email us whenever you want, and maybe sometimes when you don't. We love, love, love (are you getting my subtle encouragement here?) to get updates from everyone on everything and anything that's going on in their lives, or the world! While we treasure this cruising lifestyle, we miss all our people all the time, so please don't hesitate to drop us a note. Also, a quick reminder...please delete any of our email text we sent you after hitting the reply button, no sense in us downloading it over the radio. Make sure not to send any attachments, or forward anything, to our winlink email. And send any pictures to our gmail accounts.
We've also upgraded and added a blog to our communication repertiore, namastesail.blogspot.com, if you just can't get enough. We'll be emailing updates to this regularly, including during our passage to French Polynesia, as well as posting video and pictures whenever we have wi-fi! I hope it's as cool as I'm making it out to be. If you become a "follower" on the blog, the website will email you every time we post anything.
That's enough of the administrative stuff, now onto the sailing...Namaste is currently about halfway down the coast of Baja, headed to Cabo San Lucas. We dragged our longtime family friend, Dan Tibbe, away from Alameda and convinced him he should do this trip with us so we could get more sleep. Just kidding, but we actually are, and it's pretty sweet!
We'll be pulling into Bahia Santa Maria sometime this morning and will spend the day anchored so we can finally get some play time. We left San Diego in the early morning hours on Monday, and cleared into Mexico the following day at Ensenada. After some good grub, we caught the college championship game and threw back some $1 Tecates.
We found ourselves in the middle of a dozen or so whales on Tuesday morning, and based on their huge blows (20-25 feet) they appeared to be blue whales. Unfortunately, we weren't able to get a very close look. Later on that afternoon, a huge pod of striped dolphins (I think) descended upon us in a great wave. When you looked out, you could see them all swimming quickly, their energetic bodies skimming over the water in a race to ride in our bowwake. It was an awesome sight.
We pulled into Bahia de Tortugas Thursday morning for a short respite. After fueling up with El Gordo, with the cheapest prices in all of Baja, and a quick dinghy ride, we pulled anchor at sunset. It was a beautiful evening and we sailed most of the night and into the morning. The motorsailing on Friday has been fine.
We have a Mexico calling plan with a super cheap rate, as well as free weekend minutes, so please don't hesitate to call us on Chris' cell (530) 277-8155. But don't send us any texts, they cost us quite a bit, even if we don't open them!
More to come....
-Team Namaste
Chris, Jess & Dan

Sail down Baja

We reached Ensenada and were able to watch the college football championships...booo Auburn!
Team Namaste left the port at 5:30 a.m. on Tuesday and have been sailing and motoring ever since. It's been uneventful with small swells and lighter winds. We will likely pull into Bahia de Tortuga early on Thursday morning.

Cabo or Bust!

We are really excited about getting south! Namaste is in all here glory here at the dock in San Diego, full fuel & water tanks, all systems are working. She is fully operational. Filled to brim with food and supplies. Changes in latitudes, Changes in attitudes!!

Thanks to everyone for all your support.

Team Namaste,

Chris, Jess & Dan Tibbe

sailing south

After an awesome holiday season, which lasted a long, great time, we're setting sail for Baja Mexico early tomorrow morning. Namaste swallowed up an insane amount of food for our upcoming journey, and we're ready for our trip. Next stop - Ensenada.