(To view Album click here)After almost 4 months in Costa Rica, on August 8th 2000, we rounded Punta Burica, into Panama. All the cruisers ahead of us say, that northern Panama is even more beautiful then Costa Rica. In the northern part are mainly huge rivers, mangroves and off shore hundreds of small islands, which are very inviting for cruisers to spend a long, long time. Since we made ourselves a deadline to haul the boat out in Balboa before the real rain started, in September (it can rain up to 28 days straight), we decided to move a bit faster as it isn’t expected from the Turtle-Express. Punta Balsa, just around Burica, was our first stop in Panama, a bit further lays ISLA GAMEZ, which is a little island off Isla Parida. Little means, you can drive around by dingy in less than 5 minutes. Gamez is a very tropical looking island, overgrown with all the tropical trees and plants. In the middle of the island is a beautiful white sandy beach with coco palm trees and a beautiful view to the other side of the island, kind of like a window in the middle of the island. You know the kind of stuff you say looks tropical. We spent four very relaxing days here accompanied by Reliance and Blondie and shared a fun BBQ on the beach. A really memorable awaking in the morning by the most beautiful scent of orchids. It smelled almost like when you enter the airport in Hawaii, except no jet fuel.
On August 13th, we left Gamez relatively early in the morning. Since the weather had been nothing but good, we decided to tow the dingy for the 35 miles to ISLA BRINCANCANOS (Brincanski, suggested by Reliance, so Sid could pronounce and remember the name better! Sid is polish background). All was great, had a beautiful sail, doing 6 knots, which is rather rare these days. About 10 miles from Brincanski, the sky to east went very dark, really dark almost black. Great, we’ll get some rain, maybe even enough to fill the water tank. Sid fixed our water catcher, not to interfere with our sailing. Six miles from the island, the wind completely died down and we pulled the jib in. Not many minutes later, we saw a huge wind line approach, white water everywhere, just enough time to reef the main. As Sid was reefing the main in a sudden 30 knots of wind, there was the big bzzzzzzzzzzz of the fishing pole, nooooo not now!!!. We usually like to hear that sound, but this definitely wasn’t the right time under these circumstances, it was the sound of a nightmare. By the time Sid was done reefing the main, it blew 40 and we still had to deal with the fish, it better be a good one. Sid rushed back, picked up the pole and let some %&(*#$ words out. We were hooked on a pelican, which was sadly dragging behind us, poor bird. The line finally broke and the bird got loose, hopefully he made it, he was dragged in the water for quite a while. We didn’t get much rain, but the wind sure was howling, we clocked it at 40 plus, plus. Not much fun, especially when being to beam of it. The way the storm was going, it was blowing straight into the anchorage, we were headed for. Sid decided to head for the west part of the island, where we arrived one long and strenuous hour later. With even the reefed main we did over 6 knots! The dingy got tossed around and at one point hit the BBQ and almost jumped into the cockpit. I tell you, the one and only time we tow the dingy, hell breaks loose.
We hunkered down behind the island as the storm blew over us. This part of the island isn’t charted as an anchorage, but we did find some good holding in sandy bottom, there was a slight swell rolling in and refracting off the sides, but all in all it was a pleasant few hours. Sid immediately got to work. The relay for the fuel pump refused to shut off. Plus the alarm buzzer for the oil pressure went out as well. This whole day turned into an interesting passage. After the storm had settled down, things were fixed and we drove around to the east side, where we nestled Paradise down in the now very calm and pretty anchorage. The weather seemed to be OK the next day, so we decided to stay and do some exploring. The water visibility was pretty good, 20 plus feet, which we’ve haven’t seen in a long, long time. You didn’t have to tell us twice to jump in and go snorkeling. I think we spent about three hours in the clear water and saw many creatures, from several different kind of moray eels and of course all the pretty colored tropical fish. Sid shot us two nice hawk fish and we also gathered 29 scallops, which turned into a wonderful dinner. We found a little stream, on one of the four little beaches. It had deep enough pools, for us to take a refreshing bath in cool water, what a treat.
Later that day, the sky turned ever dark again, not as dark as the previous day, but dark enough to alarm us. With the binos we kept a close eye on the horizon and as heavy white caps started showing, Sid decided to move into deeper water, just in case it would blow again as it did the previous day. The storm was heading from the mainland directly into our anchorage. We just had the hook set, when the first couple of gusts struck. Luckily they didn’t exceed 25 knots and we staid relatively calm. Obviously this anchorage is not too well protected from the local thunderstorms, which made the decision easier to leave the following day.
18 miles later, we anchored in absolutely gorgeous, calm and tranquil BAHIA HONDA. This big bay offers several well protected and smooth anchorages. Within the bay are several little island, surrounded by beautiful green covered mountains with a beautiful scenic view. It reminds me a bit of the pretty mountain lakes in Switzerland. It does feel to be on a lake rather then in a bay. Unfortunately many years ago, this area was stripped, the massive jungle was all cut down for lumber and since then it has had a long and hard time growing back and will never really recover. We anchored along the northern shore, by a facility, called the Yacht Club, which provides fuel for the cruisers.
We didn’t care much for the owner, he was talking so negative about the locals and Panama, he really didn’t make an impression on as. Not even there for one hour a young guy, Kennedy, approached us in his home made cayuca, offering some juicy grapefruits. After talking to him for a while, he told us that he had a very bad cough and that he needed medication. I gave him some Nyquil and Hals tablets. He asked us for many other things, like Batteries for his flash light, Baby cloths, (which reminded me of the baby food Sue brought down for the cats, so I gave him that as well for his 1 year old). Right after he left another cayuca, which turned out to be his father Domingo, greeted us as well. What a nice man, he is Sid’s age but looks 85. He brought us some fruits as well and invited us to visit his house. I went through the whole boat and found items which we don’t need or never needed and made a care package for the two families (Baby powder, Q-tips, toothbrush and paste, soaps, aspirin, canned goods, T-shirts, perfumes, purses, glass pitcher, arthritis medication for Domingo’s wife. etc. If you’re planning to visit this area, these are things they need plus: laundry soap, antibiotics, canned tuna, D-batteries, fish hooks, baby clothes, T-shirts. Domingo is very good at trading these items for fresh fruits and incredible fresh cilantro. He also made us a lamp out of a goard. We did visit them both and showered them with all kind of gifts and had many friendly visit by Domingo. Domingo’s house is in the mangroves and in a very beautiful setting. It was really neat to see how these people live and I tell you, they have just the necessities. At Kennedy’s house we saw that he was working on a dugout canoe, which takes about one year to build, very impressive.
As of yet, there is no road connected to Bahia Honda from the rest of Panama and people use trails on horseback to travel over land. The other way is by boat, but most of them have only the dugout canoes. The live on the bare minimum and hunt for rabbits and other animals. I guess after everybody found out that we had given Domingo and Kennedy some stuff that started the village to come by. The funny thing was, it was different people in the same canoe over and over, guess it must have been the same family, father first, then the two older sisters, then the little brother with little sister and on and on. But you can give only so much, as a matter of fact we gave it all and had nothing more to give. Other then the begging, this is one of the most peaceful places we’ve found and wished we could spend some more time here. Did I say peaceful? On our last afternoon, we got into the midst of the biggest bowling tournament ever held in heaven. Man I tell you, it was scary, for about 25 minutes every couple of seconds lightning hit very, very close as in right next to us. It was so bad, that Sid believed that we got hit. I’ve never been in anything worse than this and sure hope not to be in one ever again. Paradise Village was absolutely nothing compared to this. Luckily we had turned the main power off and when the storm finally was in the far distance and the thunder far away, we turned the power back on, holding our breath. We were fine, everything worked, even the anchor light on top of the mast. Can you imagine too, when this hit, we both were taking a shower in the cockpit. With that we had some fun too, Sid hung a funnel up to the sunshade and attached a hose to it. We had the best shower in a long time. It was raining so hard, it was overflowing the funnel. I love any of Sid’s new inventions.
We left the he next day and headed 21 miles south east to Isla Catalina, where we only staid over night. The next morning early we headed to Isla Gobernadora, didn’t like the anchorage, went another few miles further to Isla Cebaco and anchored just south of Punta el Divorcio (wonder how this got it’s name). This also was just an overnighter. Next stop was 24 miles further at Ensenada Naranjo. We enjoyed some incredible snorkeling here. We found some clear water again. The snorkeling was quite interesting, we saw the most incredible coral heads. They were huge and looked like a giant cauliflower. Some of them had a tunnel, where you could see and wave each other from one side to the other. Lots of tropical fish, especially the neon blue parrot fish. The fan scallops where of incredible size as well. We also did a snorkel over on the island, which is one mile of shore. The water there was like the water in a swimming pool, crystal clear, about 30-40 feet visibility. The third day we tried to leave, but we had some kind of weird weather system coming through. First the wind came out of the south with 25 knots and of course by dusk, a very loud thunderstorm approached from the north. The wind whipped around and started howling right into the anchorage. Heavy rain fell for about one hour and it took for most of the night to calm the water down for a comfortable sleep. The one thing we learned so far in Panama, the thunderstorms approach with 25 to 40 knots of wind, kind of like the Jubascos in the Sea of Cortez, just not as forceful.
August 24th, on the road again. On the morning net Willie, who announces weather, mentioned about hurricane Debbie in the Caribbean and that we could expect some rainfall. We sure did, it rained during our entire passage to PUNTA GUANICO. Again we only spent one night here and rounded Punta Mala the next day. We still had some overcast and light drizzle at times. The water was flat, no wind, in other words, no sailing, but it was a very pleasant day. The highlight of the passage was a baby gray whale and mama playing in the water. The baby couldn’t have been older then a few weeks. We also saw several sea snakes.
Arriving at ISLA IGUANA required quite a bit of time to find the perfect anchor spot. This anchorage is foul and one can or should only anchor from 50 feet plus deeper on. We did anchor in 40 plus and since it was a nice day went ashore and also did some snorkeling. It was an interesting snorkel, the whole anchorage is a giant coral cemetery, nothing to hold an anchor in. There are a very few fish to see, but it mainly looks all dead. We did see a big stone fish though, our first one. The anchorage itself was pretty calm, until Sid had to mention: “I hope we don’t get a northerly”! Then the wind turned around and started to blow out of the North, so we prepared, just incase we had to abandon anchorage that night.
All went well and early, early the next morning we left for ISLA BONA. We had three hours before sunrise and it seemed to be a good sailing day. But as the sun finally came up, we were surrounded by huge, ugly clouds, which turned darker and darker. There was no way getting out of a thunderstorm, it was all around us. Sid dodged us through two of them. The first one we had to get 45 degrees of course, since lightening was headed straight for us. Then we had to turn completely around the other way, to avoid some heavy winds, which seemed to approach. Towards noon we finally had clear sky again and sailed the rest of the 20 miles with the spinnaker up.
In Isla Bona, we spent again only one night, gave the bottom a last scrubbing, pulled the anchor and headed for Flamingo. This was indeed a very beautiful day, crystal clear sky, calm seas, beautiful scenery and then approaching the Canal Zone, just incredible. Looking on the radar was something else, there was so much stuff on it. Freighters and Tankers were everywhere to be seen. There must have been at least 50 anchored out and waiting for their turn to go through the canal. In the background high rise buildings rose in to the sky. The City of Panama, nestled in between some soft hills and a snow white thunder cloud above it throwing glowing darts into the City. It was a very beautiful sight and of course even more so exciting to know we’re at our final destination on the Pacific side, THE PANAMA CANAL! For the first night we anchored at Isla Flamingo and watched all the big ships come by, either going or coming from the canal. This anchorage was kind of a culture shock as well, cars and people everywhere.
On August 28th we arrived at the Balboa Yacht Club, which is just before the Bridge of the Americas, the beginning of the Canal. Paradise at this point had exactly 5000 miles under her keel, a real good reason to bring a bottle a champagne out and celebrate.
Photo album is in the Panama Canal report (to see it click here)
