Its time to head home. I had two choices. Bash my way up the coast for 1200 miles or write a check. Since I did not want to sail to weather for six weeks, I decided to write the check and have the boat trucked home. This makes my Mom happy since she envisioned me being eaten by sea monsters.

I heard a few stories about San Carlos. First, I heard about boats falling over in the yard, Also, I heard about the yacht Northstar getting holes drilled into her crossing the US border. The first rumor was not true. One boat fell over when some painters (not the yards) moved the supports. The second was. My understanding about Northstar was that it was an isolated incident. No other boats have ever been drilled.

Getting the boat ready was a lot of work. I took every thing off the outside. Boom, sails, canvas, etc. were all tucked inside. Also, I made sure that things were tied down and secure. Also, since I could not take much booze back I made lots of friends in the marine giving the stuff away.

First, the boat was hauled out of the water by a special boat trailer. This trailer had hydraulic arms that were positioned under the boat and provided support for when the boat was pulled out of the water. Once on the trailer Michi was trucked 1 mile to the dry storage yard.

The trip to Tucson took about 11 hours. We left San Carlos about 4:30. The first stop was to get some diesel. We had to wait while the service attendant 'serviced' one of the professional local women. Once on the road, Francisco stopped a number of times to check on the boat. We also encountered a number of check points along the way.

The first check point was manned by the Mexican Army. The 'inspectors', went into the boat to check it out. Mostly these 'inspectors' wanted to gawk at the Yacht. My understanding is that they were looking for Mexicans looking to be transported into the US. This stop took about 10 minutes.

The next stop was at the US boarder. Our guys are a little tougher. Here, We were stopped by US customs. Francisco stayed in the truck while I talked with the boarder guys. Mostly they asked innocent questions. I spent some time shooting the breeze with on agent while we waited for 'The Dog'. This was the main event at the boarder. They bring the dog into the boat to sniff around. During this process I was not allowed to be on board. This also took about 10 minutes but for some reason it seemed longer. Anyway, no problems except for the dog drooling on the cushions. I did see guys walking around with big drills, but they never came near my boat.

The rest of the trip from the boarder to Tucson went went without incident. Michi was taken to a yard near the Tucson airport where she was left for another truck to pick her up and take her the rest of the way to Alameda. Tucson kinda acts as a 'hub' for boats moving out of Mexico. The yard belongs to Marco Crane. Here they have huge cranes that move the boat from one truck to another. Michi sat here for a week until she was picked up and taken the final way to Alameda where she got new bottom paint and new standing rigging.