Coffin Island has been on our list of must-see spots since we rolled into Puerto Rico four months ago. Every local we spoke to on the island made sure to mention this gem of an island located off the southern coast of Puerto Rico.
After our most recent regatta fun, we left the very industrial harbor in Ponce and made the easy seven-mile trip south to the beautiful nature reserve known as Coffin Island. The island, technically known as Isla Caja de Muertos, is known better to most as Coffin Island, but there is no apparent consensus on how the island got its name. Some say a Portuguese pirate embalmed his love in a glass case inside a copper coffin and buried her in a cave here. Others simply say the island got its name because it resembles someone lying down when seen from the main island. When translated, Caja de Muertos means “coffin” or “dead man’s chest”.
^^i don’t know, whaddya think? does the grim shape resemble someone lying in a coffin?^^
Anyhoo, as we motor-sailed closer and closer to the island, we were pleasantly surprised to find ourselves face to face with crystal clear turquoise water and a white sand ocean bottom — it almost felt like we were right back in the Bahamas, island hopping our way south. Man, have we missed that clear blue water the past few months!
We scoped out the west side of the island before deciding to forgo a very shallow Dept. of Natural Resources mooring ball in favor of a more secluded beachfront anchorage about a third of the way down the island.
Luckily, we planned our Coffin Island stay during the week since we heard the weekends can get pretty crowded with locals flocking to the island for an easy beach getaway. And what a great move that was! We were one of only two boats (the other on a mooring ball farther down the island), and we never technically spotted another human during our two-night stay. Talk about total utter peacefulness and relaxation. Well, that is until we got smacked in the face with a horrible storm the next morning. But more on that in a future post. ;))
We spent the rest of the day cannonballing off the boat, searching for sea glass, playing with Oliver on the beach, and finally busting out my gorillapod camera mount so I could snap the rarest of photos — ya know, all three of us in one image! ;)) I’m happy to report the gorillapod worked perfectly with my little Canon G12 point and shoot. I just attached the entire setup to a mast cleat, set the camera to self timer mode, and voila!…complete family photo. ;))
^^haha, love Jer’s “making impact” face!^^
>>Thanks for visiting LAHOWIND sailing blog! We’d love for you to get to know us and follow our story as we attempt to navigate a whole new world of sailing, as we cruise the Caribbean. …Learn more about us and our sailing + cruising adventures.
Posted in Boat Life, Puerto Rico, Sailing Blog, Sailing Love, TravelTags: Boat Life, Caja De Muertas, Caribbean, Coffin Island, Cruising, LahoWind, Photos, Puerto Rico, Sailboat, Sailing Blog
As much as we hate planning anything around here, it sure must seem like we do since we somehow always manage to roll into different ports when there are fun events taking place. So much can be said for our stellar Ponce arrival timing as we sailed into the Ponce harbor last Friday morning…just in time to kick off the weekend’s Regatta festivities at the Ponce Yacht + Fishing Club.
^^Our Marina Pescaderia friends on s/v Julepe^^
We had the inside scoop on this particular regatta from some of our local friends back at Marina Pescaderia in Puerto Real who happened to be participating in the three-day event. Thankfully, they invited us to join in on the weekend’s festivities, basically granting us (nearly) full access to the yacht club since we were only anchored in the harbor out front. And luckily for us, the trip to shore was nothing but a quick 20-second dinghy ride from our boat to the yacht club’s docks where there were festive nightly events, food, drinks, and more!
And who are we to turn down any of that awesomeness? ;))
^^Quite the view of the regatta racing action, huh?!^^
Without the regatta going on, the Ponce Harbor is quite industrial looking and not all too exciting since it is the island’s main international shipping port. There is however (on one side of the anchorage) a more touristy spot known as La Guancha. …Basically a long boardwalk overlooking the harbor with a lookout tower, ferry pick-up (taking passengers to and from Coffin Island), about 15 or so different food spots — mostly all fried local Puerto Rican fair — and loud music blasting from each of the different restaurants. We had already visited La Guancha by car so we just dinghied over once while we were anchored in the harbor to check it out again.
So, if having our “in” to the yacht club and regatta wasn’t bonus enough during our time in Ponce, we also ran into two local Puerto Ricans and fellow sailors/bloggers who recognized Oliver (go figure!) at the Halloween kickoff party on Friday night. :)))
Our new friends Melissa and Alex were in Ponce for the regatta too. While Alex was out racing, Melissa treated me to a free trip to the Ponce Super-Walmart on Sunday where I stocked up on fresh food since it had been about 2.5 weeks since Jer and I’s last trip to a supermarket. It is especially nice to meet fellow cruisers who totally “get” our lifestyle and how grateful we are to be offered free rides to and from town to get chores like grocery shopping done. Thanks guys! We can’t wait to meet up again in the Virgin Islands in December!!!
PS – I was utterly shocked and beyond thrilled to finally find our favorite Tandori naan flatbreads available in Puerto Rico! Yay to that!!!
With the best seat in the anchorage for the weekend-long regatta races, we soaked up the racing fun as all of the boats whizzed past little ole LAHO in the harbor! Oliver, of course, enjoyed barking at each one that came near. ;))
^^That’s Jereme on the dinghy getting in the mix of the regatta boats. Well actually, he was just schlepping a few jerry cans of water back to our boat from the fuel dock. Ahhh…the joys of boat life.^^
>>Thanks for visiting LAHOWIND sailing blog! We’d love for you to get to know us and follow our story as we attempt to navigate a whole new world of sailing, as we cruise the Caribbean. …Learn more about us and our sailing + cruising adventures.
Posted in Puerto Rico, Sailing Blog, Sailing LoveTags: Caribbean, Cruising, La Guancha, LahoWind, Ponce, Ponce Yacht Club, Puerto Rico, Regatta, Sailing Blog
As much as I loooooooovvveee bright colorful photos, sometimes a good strong black and white conversion is just what the doctor ordered.
Most digital cameras these days can actually create black and white images on their own; however, the best monochrome results are still produced by converting a color image using Photoshop or another editing software.
^^I love this photo SO much — it was taken by Jer’s mom (edit by me) on one perfect day at the beach back in Naples in early 2013.^^
By starting with a color photo and then converting it to black and white in Photoshop, you have complete control over the conversion. And there are more than a handful of ways to convert a photo to black and white, but today I’ll just walk through one of the best and simplest ways available — one that still affords you the additional control of fine-tuning your conversion.
Using a Black and White Adjustment Layer in Photoshop
Using Photoshop’s black and white adjustment layer is an easy and effective way to achieve professional quality results with monochrome conversions. The black and white adjustment layer gives you more control and flexibility by using six color sliders to “tweak” your conversion.
Simply go to Layer >> New Adjustment Layer >> Black and White. The toolbox that appears in the Adjustments Palette is where you can move the six color sliders right or left to brighten or darken respective tones in your photo. Sliding a control to the left darkens that color, while sliding to the right brightens it. You can also choose from the presets in the drop-down menu.
You can make very targeted adjustments to your photo by selecting the finger icon in the upper left corner. It allows you to make targeted adjustments withouth having to think about the color sliders. Simply click on the image wherever you believe that it should be darker and drag to the left (brighten to the right).
Simple, right??? :)))
I recommend playing around with this method or any others you already know of to really evoke the true magic of monochrome.
Happy Photo Friday!
*I’ve started a regular “PHOTO FRIDAY” series on the blog. You can find all of my photography series posts >> here.
>>Thanks for visiting LAHOWIND sailing blog! We’d love for you to get to know us and follow our story as we attempt to navigate a whole new world of sailing, as we cruise the Caribbean. …Learn more about us and our sailing + cruising adventures.
I’m not sure whether it was the four-pack of dolphin that joyfully greeted us upon entry or the free Dept. of Natural Resources mooring ball, or maybe just the gorgeous surroundings and perfect sunset that we soaked in last week, but the La Parguera anchorage (right smack dab next to Cayo Enriquee to be exact) definitely ranks right up there with some of our favorite anchorages to date.
It was downright perfect.
And our dolphin welcome committee was one for the record books for sure. There’s nothing quite like a cute little family of dolphin who swim out to greet you that helps brighten the mood as you’re rolling into port. ;))
We got one of those “once in a lifetime” type of dolphin encounters as we were sailing into La Parguera after making the 11-mile trip from Cabo Rojo. Three adult dolphin and one baby swam beside our boat for a good 10 minutes, twirling and jumping at the bow of our boat and playing in our wake.
What made this experience so downright unbelievable was the clarity of the water at the time of this little dolphin welcome party. It was so unusually glass-like and perfectly calm. I mean sooooooo insanely crystal clear and smooth that you could see every little detail on each dolphin, almost as if we were seeing them in an aquarium. It was seriously unreal!
(We posted two different iPhone videos last Wednesday on instagram and facebook for anyone wanting to see quick 15-second clips.)
On a high from our morning dolphin greeting, we did a quick tour of the different anchorage options in Parguera before opting to pick up a DNRA mooring ball a bit offshore next to Cayo Enriquee. Since we had already visited the town of Parguera by car, we knew we didn’t really need to come to shore so we didn’t mind being a bit far away from land (and happily away from the noise of some construction going on at the moment).
And what a great decision that was! We had our pick of the litter from about 10 mooring balls and easily scooped up a good-looking ball before jumping in the clear water to cool off. We dinghied around the small mangrove covered cays and let Oliver explore one beachy/rocky cay…the perfect poodle potty ground.
Aside from the beauty of the area, this particular anchorage scored high marks for comfort too with not a roll to be had, yet plenty of breeze to keep us from baking inside the boat.
We spent the rest of the day kicking back, fishing off the boat, and enjoying a killer sunset where the sun looked like it was literally melting into the sea.
And if all of ^^that^^ wasn’t good enough, our little boat TV and rabbit ears picked up the final game of the World Series. In HD no less! Talk about icing on the cake! ;))
>>Thanks for visiting LAHOWIND sailing blog! We’d love for you to get to know us and follow our story as we attempt to navigate a whole new world of sailing, as we cruise the Caribbean. …Learn more about us and our sailing + cruising adventures.
Posted in Boat Life, Puerto Rico, Sailing Blog, Sailing LoveTags: Boat Dog, Boat Life, Caribbean, Cayo Enriquee, Cruising, Dolphin, Dolphin Swimming Sailboat, La Parguera, LahoWind, Living Aboard, Living on the Hook, Puerto Rico, Sailing Blog
We’re back baby! Back in the cruising groove. Back in the swing of things. Back in the saddle, some would say.
And it feels downright AMAZING to be cruising once again! As much as we loved living a cozy air-conditioned marina life during a good chunk of hurricane season, it feels so so great to be back sailing and living on the hook.
^^cannonballs (with flippers on, of course) at our first anchorage to celebrate!^^
We waved goodbye to Marina Pescaderia first thing last Tuesday morning and set sail for the Cabo Rojo Lost Morillos Lighthouse and anchorage on the southwest tip of Puerto Rico.
We knew leaving Puerto Real that the southern coast of Puerto Rico could quite possibly give us our roughest sail yet. And since we really don’t love being subjected to miserable sailing conditions and are in absolutely no hurry to get anywhere fast, we’ve opted for somewhat short, leisurely morning sails, basically hopping from one town to the next as we head east towards the Spanish Virgin Islands.
Short, early morning passages, in essence, take the thorns right out of the path east. We leave around sunrise each morning and arrive at our next destination before the trade winds kick up (usually around 10am or so) and before we find ourselves beating into the wind.
We’ve lovingly started referring to these quick and easy morning sails as “Kalm for Kim” sails because comfortable, casual passages are certainly my fav!
The only part about ^^our plan^^ that stinks is that we are basically stuck motor-sailing along the southern coast of Puerto Rico since there is not a lick of wind to be had that early in the morning. It’s certainly not ideal, but our hands are kinda tied in this case.
After painlessly pulling out of the marina at 7:45AM last Tuesday, we were pulling into our first anchorage before we knew it, and dropping hook by 9:45AM. Our first stop was the quaint anchorage on the western side of the Cabo Rojo Los Morillos Lighthouse and Playa Sucia. We had scoped out the lighthouse back in July while we had a rental car and a long list of sight-seeing to-do’s…and now we got to see it from the water!
Since we had already hiked to the lighthouse, we spent the day just soaking up typical cruising life…jumping off the boat and swimming and snorkeling, dinghy-ing around the mangrove-lined anchorage, spotting tons of photo-worthy sea life in the area (including a huge school of spotted rays), taking naps (because, why not), and enjoying a gorgeous sunset in the cockpit with a sundowner or two in hand.
Not too shabby of a Tuesday, eh?!
Now that we’ve experienced this particular anchorage, I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it for much longer than a day or two stay since it was a bit stinky-stanky from the mangroves nearby and decently rolly from swell rounding the lighthouse point. But overall, not terrible for our quick overnight.
Let me just tell ya, it feels so freaking great to be back cruising!
>>Thanks for visiting LAHOWIND sailing blog! We’d love for you to get to know us and follow our story as we attempt to navigate a whole new world of sailing, as we cruise the Caribbean. …Learn more about us and our sailing + cruising adventures.
Posted in Boat Life, Puerto Rico, Sailing Blog, Sailing Love, TravelTags: Anchorage, Boat Life, Cabo Rojo Lighthouse, Caribbean, Cruising, LahoWind, Life on the hook, Living Aboard, Puerto Rico, Sailing Blog
|
[…] That all changed one fateful day in Puerto Rico while we were anchored off the beautiful secluded nature reserve known to most as Coffin Island. […]
[…] and snorkeling the island during our time anchored at Isla Caja de Muerta. Okay, fine…on day one, we were. But on day two, we were hunkered down and holding our breath through what was maybe one […]