As we cleared the dishes, guess who showed up? The dredge passed, we swung, the anchors....held....for a minute. Utterly frustrated, we hauled them in, fired the engine, and fled to the east end of the harbor. Here, at last, we found undisturbed tranquility.
Well, that is, until morning.
Once again we were in the way. "You have to move your boat!" it was like an anthem playing for us all over Madero. This time it was a small tanker that had some sort of shoreline modifying function needing to get to the gas dock. We were blocking it and would have to shift twenty yards over. No problem, but it was somewhat disconcerting to watch the locals walking on the emerging shore a few feet away as the tide went out. We hoped we wouldn't find ourselves dropped right onto the bottom and stuck until high tide...but in this we lucked out. The navy was our only problem now: not their presence but their conspicuous absence. The Maritime folks had told us they'd arrange to have the navy come inspect us out of port at 7:00 am � and we were ready. But by 9:00 they still hadn't shown. We radioed with no response (we made sure to charge the radio beforehand). We noticed a pair of navy pangas doing exercises in their little bay. We waved and yelled until they sped over. "Can you check us out?" we asked. "No. We'll go tell them." Back they went. Another hour. Nothing. Well, we'd gotten their attention before....maybe it could work again....
Anchors up! We must have looked like the most ridiculous attack force in Mexican history, steaming up to the hill overlooking their bay with me on the bow calling for an inspection. Several officers seated under a tree looked back in startled surprise. One man in black came puffing up the hill, waving us back to our anchorage, "We're coming!" he called. "Want us to wait HERE?" I yelled back, trying to be helpful, maybe save them some time. "NO! Go back to the anchor! We'll be right over!" I swear I saw the officers' shoulders shaking as we returned to our tiny section of safe, out of the way water. True to word, it was moments before a launch was pulling up to us. We greeted them ecstatically, inviting them aboard, filling out the ream of paperwork (you could tell the sailor had never done it before, I had to figure out most of what he needed from me by translating the now familiar words on his forms), and having John the drug dog sniff around. Satisfied, they wished us well and set us free to go. Whew!!! Puerto Madero: the only port on the ocean we've been too big for! You could certainly say we were moved! Adios!