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.
Panama City skyline.
Take the bananas to the beach and make a fire. Make a long slice in the banana peel, insert a wee bit of chocolate into the banana. Place on coals for a few minutes. Open and eat your banana choc pudding with a spoon. Throw biodegradable wrapper into bushes ;)
Oh wait, that was a rhetorical question?!