Saturday, January 28, 2012

Surprise!

This morning, we once again went into the salmonera (fish farm) facility of Mainstream III to say goodbye to everyone and check the weather. José, the boss man, said it was to be nasty out and gave Jordan a great website for Chilean weather, but it's in Spanish! (http://meteoarmada.directemar.cl)

Sea Turtle's only bruise from yesterday was black smudges on her hull from large tire bumpers where we were tied up to the facility dock and could not use our bumpers.

As the day's outlook was not good, we motored a short distance up the sunny and protected inlet behind Mainstream III and dropped anchor (S45°11.467' W073°41.579'). We also stern and bow tied to shore in case the wind also became nasty up here later.

Early afternoon, we hopped in the dinghy to see what was farther up the inlet but it became even too shallow for the outboard. Perhaps at high tide it would have been possible. So we turned around and dinghied towards Mainstream so we could see how the outer channel looked (Canal Moraleda). It was still pretty miserable. Back to Sea Turtle. A day to spend relaxing, watching movies...

I heard a boat motor and went up top to see who was around. We were surprised to see 3 of the crew from Mainstream. Even more surprised when they held up 2 huge salmon for us! We accepted only 1 which Jordan estimated as a 12-pounder. The kindness and thoughtfulness of these folks was unbelievable. Later that evening, when cooked, the salmon was so very tender and delicious.

That was an easy catch!

It rained sporadically throughout the night. What happened? Our entire passage from Puerto Montt all the way south to the glacier at San Rafael was so sunny and warm. But now on our way north back to Puerto Montt the weather has become mostly cloudy with rain and has turned rather chilly!

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