We are officially cleared out of the country, have our exit zarpe and our next official port of call is the Galapagos Islands!!!
Tonight should be our last night in Panama City. We plan to stop for a day or two in the Perlas islands just to get the city off of us and chill out. We have been running around like crazy for the last week or so, trying to get the boat ready to go. And she is, but it will be nice to spend a couple days snorkeling and laying about on beaches for a day or two.
We will be out of internet range till we get there. My best guess puts us there sometime around the 15-17th of March. We are looking at a 8-10 day passage if all goes well and the wind holds. Otherwise it could take longer. Right now, my money is on longer than shorter.
As always we will have the Delorme tracker on, so you can follow us along in near real time at share.delorme.com/kevinmidkiff
I have the website set up so I can post blog post via email from my SSB/HAM radio. And will try to do that at least once a day while under way. No pictures, just text. They will most likely be short and boring, but at least it’s something. Also, I might not do it at all…so…..
It’s just we sorta forget to write blog post sometimes…..a lot.
We are currently in Panama City. Big town, lots to do. Lots to spend money on….holy crap are we spending money. Mostly stocking up on food and boat parts. Once we leave here and head out into the Pacific Islands everything gets very expensive. So we are stocking up now.
Before we got here to Panama City, we spent a month in western Panama. All very remote islands. Incredibly clear water. Unbelivable beaches. Unfortunately, 2 of our 3 cameras have broken and we are down to our big SLR, which we do not like to take on the more adventurous trips.
We do have some pictures to share though.
Tawn testing out our new dinghy/emergency liferaft. :)
One nice thing is the telephoto lens we got for the camera. That is a howler monkey. The white spots?………his balls! Hell yeah!
This one is a white faced Capuchin monkey. Unfortunately, you cannot see his balls.
A bird
Classic picture of the boat at anchor.
Oh look! How very cool. A bunch of Bananas stung up and swinging in the cockpit.
We traded some local Panamaian a couple D cell batteries, 1/2 a gallon of gas and a little bit of fishing line for that bunch of bananas, a basket of oranges and limes and 4 coconuts. Wanna know what is not cool about bananas. They all go ripe at the same time. What the hell are you supposed to do with a shit load of ripe bananas?
The remote islands of western Panama were awesome but as much as we would have liked to spend more time exploring them. We needed to get to Panama City so we could get some boat projects done before we took off for the Galapagos and the South Pacific Islands.
Mother nature however had different plans for us. The first day we attempted to round the point, we were having a great sail. Sailing in company with our friends on Papillion. About 30 mile from the point, the wind cranked up on the nose and we ran into a little current running a knot or two against us. Then the wind cranked up a little more. We were getting no where, so we turned on the motor and tried motor sailing. We were running lower on fuel than we thought and since we were healed so far over, we ended up sucking air into the fuel lines. So, Tawn kept sailing while I went below to bleed the fuel lines.
After that bit of fun we continued on and things mellowed out a bit. Started making good progress again…..until we weren’t. Punta Mala (Bad Point) is just that. It can be quite mellow. That day it was not.
We were getting 25-30 knots of wind on the nose with an adverse current of 2-3 knots pushing us away from where we wanted to go. We were getting a VMG of less than 1 knot. And big steep waves hitting us every 4-5 seconds. It sucked ass. So in order to save some very unnecessary wear and tear on the boat and rigging we fell off and headed 15 miles back to an anchorage called Bahia Benao.
So glad we did. We ended up staying there for a week. Surfing, hiking, getting stitches. We had a blast.
When the weather finally decided to cooperate we took off. By then there were 5 boats in the anchorage waiting to go. We all took off at the same time. Not gonna give you a blow by blow description of the crossing, but we did make it around the second time.
And in case you are wondering what it looks like. Here is the a picture from about 3 miles away.
We spent a quick couple days in the Las Perlas Islands and have been here in Panama City since getting ready to sail out to the Galapagos.
I used to have a lot of them. Alarm clocks, hangovers, well meaning but annoying managers (Sorry, to any ex-managers reading this), the Ballard bridge…..the list goes on.
My current nemesis is a small crab. No bigger than a Chicken McNugget (the round one) only not as thick. Actually, I don’t know if it is one single, insanely tenacious crab or a series of crabs that are networked together and have some sort of crab jihad against me and my knot meter.
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::Definition::
Knot Meter: Small, ridiculously delicate paddle wheel that spins as water rushes past it as the boat moves though the water. The RPMs of the paddle wheel are then transferred to a chart plotter to let us know how fast we are moving through the water. Crabs or no crabs, they never really work very well or for very long. Which explains why they are so expensive.
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The fact that it is not working is not really a big deal, since we also get our speed from the GPS. But the GPS gives us speed over the ground, which is usually different than our speed through the water. In other words, it doesn’t really fuckin matter. But it’s there, and I want it to work. And it would work if not for these pesky freedom hating crabs.
The problem is the small hole that the knot meter is mounted in is almost exactly the same size and shape as a thin Chicken McNugget (the round one). Which unfortunately is also the same size as this goddamn crab(s).
At each anchorage, one of us will dive overboard and swim under the boat to free up the knot meter. Each time a little crab will scurry out of the Nugget hole (scaring the shit out me). I try to smash it, but it is to fast. It will then disappear. I never see it again. Each time I think, “HA, that got it”, and go about the rest of my day. And each time we haul up the anchor to go to the next place the knot meter is not working because the crab has crawled back in the hole and jammed up the knot meter.
I do get a little pleasure imagining the little bastard pinned down in the little Nugget hole by one of the paddle wheels. But it’s fleeting….
Maybe i’m over thinking this. Maybe these little crabs are just stupid and have no idea about me or anything outside their little world. They may just see the Nugget hole and think, “Hole. I fit. Eat stuff”
Anyway, we are in Panama. Should be in Panama City in about a week. Will have some internet then and will post some pictures. Hopefully one of a dead crab…and maybe one of some Chicken McNuggets. I’m sorta craving them now.
As it turns out….alot! This is mostly a picture post.
Spent a month or so surfing and hanging out in Nicaragua. Mostly in San Juan del Sur.
Yeah, these places actually exist. Our boat is furthest one to the left.
We spent a few days in a couple remote out of the anchorages too. And as we are known to do, we found a great bar to hangout in after some jungle hiking.
After leaving San Juan del Sur, Nicaruagua. We headed into Costa Rica. Our first stop was Bahia Selena to do some kiteboarding. Correction…..try to do some kiteboarding. It’s tricky buisness, but we are slowly getting the hang of it.
We also did some more jungle hiking. And as I”m sure you all would agree, one never swims in jungle pools without beer and a machete.
Our buddy Danno was coming down to visit and we still had not clear into the country so we decided to bust a move down to Playa del Coco to get official and pick up Danno.
Before that though we made a few stops along the way. One was to catch up with some cruising friends that were anchored in an achorage on the way to Cocos. I wrote a blog post about it a few weeks ago.
We also stopped and did a little more exploring at an anchorage called Huevos.
I love sea caves!
Danno got here the day before Thanksgiving. Eric and Ali, showed up 5 days later. So the boat was a little crowded, but not too bad. We had an absolute blast with Eric, Ali and Danno all here. Alot of just hanging out doing nothing. Some poor attempts at fishing. A little scuba diving and hiking to awesome waterfalls.
Bad ass rent-a-cars
Little known fact. Danno is a hobby botanist. He was able to, without any doubt, tell us that the plant he is eating in the picture below was….and I quote “Definitely NOT fucking sugar cane”.
Why he thought a giant weed growing in a ditch would be sugar cane I cannot tell you. He’s the botanist, not I.
We also violated every single rule mentioned in the rental agreement. How we got that car up that 4wd rode to the top of the volcano is anyone’s guess.
After dan left and we had the car for one more day so we decided to make the most of it so we went and did some zip lining. FUN AS HELL!
I could not decide which zip lining pic to put up. They are all cool, but this one sums them all up.
GO Tawn!!
Fancy dinner with Tawn and Ali after zip lining.
And Eric.
We spent Ali’s b-day in a little cove and had a beach bonfire for Ali, then headed to Tamarindo.
Rented some ATV and rode them a beach. That too was fun as hell.
After Eric and Ali left me and Tawn hungout in Tamarindo for a few more days and did some surfing. Tawn bought a new (to her) surfboard.
Now we each have one and don’t have to share!!
We’ve been bouncing down the coast stopping different places and hiking, surfing, chasing water falls….whatever.
And on one occasion, there was no surf, so we took turns towing each other and friends behind the dinghy on my surfboard.
I have no witty way to end this post……feels awkward.
