Should I stay or should I go now???

The Gulf of Tehuantepec

We have arrived at the first significant challenge of our trip -- The Gulf of Tehuantepec.

The picture you see above is what my nav screen looked like this morning.  We are the little green boat in the upper left corner.  We were actually sailing along in 6 knots of wind at the time, but obviously if we continued things were going to change.  By the way, those little red triangle flags show 50 knots of wind!!  That's basically hurricane force!

The Gulf of Tehuantepec is the huge open bay that spreads across 260 miles of shoreline.  The Gulf of Tehuantepec i sthe South side of the great Isthmus of Mexico, the lowest land at the narrowest width.  Before the Panama Canal was complete, many engineers considered digging a transcontinental canal across this isthmus.

This region experiences gale force winds on average 140 days per year.

The trick getting across here is to wait for the best possible forecast, and then follow the beach as closely as you dare from one side to the other in order to avoid the possible large seas that build up if you are surprised by heavy winds.  We think we have pretty good weather forecasting data these days, and Gibb Kane is helping us as our shoreside weather expert so....we think we will be fine.

However it does look like we are "stuck" here in Huatulco for a few days until the weather shown above changes enough to let us through....

Standing by....