Isla Isabela Part 2

We are still on Isabela after 8 days and enjoying it so much.

The lava tunnels snorkelling trip was a highlight. We spent a good part of a day with some the crew from Lisa Kay, Jack from Cat Weazle as well as a couple of fly in tourists on a small boat exploring the marine life and the geology of the lava tunnels in the water nearby. Our dead-ringer-for-John-Travolta-skipper, Leonardo, expertly gunned the boat over the reef into the calmer waters beyond. We spotted very cute penguins and blue footed boobies immediately.  In the water with our snorkelling gear on, we swam amongst a school of yellow tailed surgeon fish and saw numerous other fish. The day just got better and better as Leonardo manoeuvred the boat through the narrowest of channels in the lava rock, passing bridges of black rock and cactus growing out of fissures and cracks. We looked down on aqua coloured pools and saw green turtles and spotted eagle rays rays swimming to and fro. I spotted a shark from above and others saw them while snorkelling. We snorkelled all around; swimming into gloomy caves to find an opening at the end to take us back out into the sunlight and another stunning pool. (Oh Dan, you would have loved it so much) Back on the boat we shot back out through the reef and over to another area to swim with turtles. They are so very gentle and really don’t seem fazed when humans get close to them. Finally, back out in the ocean and heading for home, Leonardo slowed the boat when he spotted a huge manta ray. Those who wanted to quickly donned snorkelling gear and swam over to it. I stayed in the boat and it was funny to hear the hooting and honking noises coming from people’s snorkels as they got so excited about being so close to the huge creature.

The next day we went on a trip to Sierra Negra, the volcano on the island that is second only in size to the largest in the world which is in Tanzania. Its caldera is 12 miles by 10 miles, and I can tell you it looks huge! Steam rises in places and the surface that you look down on from above looks somewhat like cracked and crusted bitumen after an earthquake. To get to the volcano we walked about 10km from where the bus dropped us off. We also saw Volcan Chico, and were able to walk on its surface, in some places feeling warm air venting through cracks from way down below. As we walked the 10km back to the bus, it bucketed rain on us and turned some of the track to mud, but Lisa Kay’s Tootsie Roll Pops kept morale high!

We do of course also have days where we don’t play tourist. There are always jobs to do on Brio, whether it’s putting a coat of paint on rust spots, getting the bar under the boom repaired, sweeping up the hair that just seems to fall everywhere or cleaning the algae off the hull. Ivan has spent some time making a centreboard and rudder for our Walker Bay dinghy so he can use it as a sailing boat (aaagh! Another one!). It’s still not quite right yet, but soon….

We were up early this morning and walked to where the pink flamingos are known to hang out and there they were. They were lovely to watch going through their morning routine of feeding and grooming. They are amazing to see in flight as they are so big.

We expect we will leave this lovely island on Wednesday. PS. Sorry, no pics – way too slow to upload.

Galapagos, Isla Isabela

We ended up staying 3 days in Santa Cruz and while the swell was never as bad as the first night we were there, it never got much better. Again, we used water taxis to get to and from the dock, which was rather exciting with all the pitching and rolling, when one had to leap from boat to boat. When bringing aboard 10 gallon containers of fuel it was all the more exciting!

Having replenished our fuel, water and food supply and gone through the formal checkout procedures, we left just after sunrise on a Saturday morning for our final Galapagos destination: Isla Isabela about 45 nm away. It was a sunny day with a breeze of about 10-12 kts for most of the way, allowing us to average 6-7 kts. Coming in to Puerto Villamil on the island wasn’t too tricky once we spotted the 2 channel markers to guide us away from the reefs. There were about 13 other yachts and a couple of big cruisers at anchor in the snug, narrow anchorage. We were delighted to see a couple of penguins swimming around Brio as we set the anchor – already we liked this place. The town of Puerto Villamil is very small and the place has the feel of somewhere like Mallacoota 40 years ago – there are a few sandy roads, a bakery, some small hotels and restaurants. The giant tortoise breeding facility is a short walk out of town via a boardwalk built through international funds and as is the case with a lot of externally funded projects, it doesn't look like any funds are being put towards ongoing maintenance. The boardwalk passes a number of lagoons, in one of which we spotted a pink flamingo and in another marine iguanas. As we were to discover, there are thousands of marine iguanas sunning themselves on the jet black volcanic rock that has flowed in times past down to the beach. With their spiky, reptilian, slightly grotesque features, they make excellent photographic models.

We expect to spend a week here, perhaps more as the wind is forecast to drop out later in the week and we will need to wait for good wind to set off for the Marquesas as 3,000 nm is way too far to motor.

Galapagos Islands

Daniel, Ivan’s son, arrived from Canada to do the Panama to Galapagos Islands  passage with us. After a few days at La Playita anchorage in Panama, making final preparations to get away, we set sail for Las Perlas, the Pearl Islands 31 nautical miles south of Panama. We were all keen to leave the hustle and bustle of Panama and get to somewhere where the water was clean enough to swim in. Many people have this idea that cruising is all sunsets and gin and tonics, but I’ve found that especially when in a port, it’s all paperwork and hardware shops. Or, as someone said to me recently cruising is just boat maintenance in nice places J.

Dinner!

We sailed and motor sailed 4.5 – 5 knots to our first anchorage in Las Perlas, dropping the anchor at 9.25pm. The next morning started with scrambled eggs and tomatoes with freshly squeezed orange juice, courtesy of Carlos’ father. Carlos was the taxi driver we used while in Panama. He was a bit of a dude and eagerly interpreted for us in (hardware!) shops, took us to a huge fruit and veggie market and negotiated with the stall holders and carried our bags for us and then he invited us to his home to meet his family and share some food. Coming back to the orange juice – I was going to buy some oranges, but he said “momento” and rang his father and asked him to drop off a bag of oranges to his house which he then gave us. He was very generous and helpful.

Las Perlas was nice and relaxing and we were able to get some swimming in and Daniel caught three fish while we were sailing. After a few days in the sun, salt and sand we set off for the Galapagos Islands. To cut a long story short, it took us 11 days to make the passage. During that time we used the motor a lot because the winds were mainly light and against us. It was good to see that Brio is very  economical on fuel. Our days were spent watching flying fish (sadly no more fish were to be caught), dolphins, birds trying to catch a ride on our spreaders, eating, reading and playing scrabble. We saw more life in this ocean in the first couple of days than we did the whole time we were in the Caribbean. We didn't experience much rain at all, although others ahead of us were reporting on the radio continual downpours. On day 10 we had enough rain to justify stripping 'nekked' and having a wash. We certainly needed it by then!

We motored into Wreck Bay, Isla San Christobal early on Thursday morning. What a lovely anchorage and a lovely little town. We spent 5 days on the anchorage there catching water taxis into town. Very few people put there dinghys in the water there because the sea lions treat them as their personal bathing platforms. The shore and waters edge is teeming with sea lions - they seem to be a mixture of a puppy, a sloth and a slug :)

A slugfest of sealions

We spent a day with others from yachts on a snorkelling tour. We snorkelled around Kicker Rock which is an amazing rock towering out of the water. It was wonderful to be swimming amongst a huge variety of fish, turtles, hammerhead sharks (!), marine iguanas and of course sea lions. We also saw a bit of birdlife incluing the gorgeous blue footed boobys, brown noddies and the very pre-historic looking frigate birds.

Marine Iguana

The next day we joined a couple off another yacht a did a tour of the island. It included visiting the giant tortoise sanctuary where we got to see these giant creatures from young to very old.

The San Jose BBQ restaurant was our favourite place to eat as the meals were enourmous, tasty and huge. We had a very social time with other cruisers on San Christobal and went to restaurant twice with various people.

Bearded Dan at San Jose BBQ

Daniel left us here to fly home to Canada. It was sad to see him go as we had had a great time together and he was really great on the boat during our passage.

I was hoping to be able to swim withthe sea lions at Playa Lobaria, however they weren't in the water the afternoon we went there. Ivan got to swim with a turtle though.

We have now moved on to Isla Santa Cruz, the most populated island of the group. We are anchored in Academy Bay which is just off the township. The swell here is very uncomfortable and we are worried our anchor rope will chafe so we may not stay here very long.

When we leave I susect Gordon Gecko, our resdient gecko I discovered the other day, will come with us. He tends to hide amongst the fruit in the fruit hammock!

Shelter Bay Part 2 & Panama Canal Transit

Not a Howler monkey, but a Capucin I believe

We left the howler monkeys of Shelter Bay last Thursday to make our transit of the Panama Canal. We had spent about a week and a half there getting Brio ready for the next leg of her journey and doing the administration required for the Canal transit. The marina at Shelter Bay is a very comfortable place to be – the restaurant has excellent food at equally excellent prices, there is a very good grocery shop there, they have a swimming pool (which unfortunately we didn’t have time to use) and the marina is bordered by national park. We met some wonderful people during our stay there and the place is teeming with Aussies making the trek back home.

We had Brio hauled out so we could clean and antifoul her bottom and do some other ‘out-of-the-water’ jobs including the biggest head job I’ve done in my life. For those not familiar with nautical terms, the head is the toilet, so I will spare you the details of what the job actually involved.

To transit the Panama Canal several things are required: first you need to hand over your wallet! We used an agent, Erick, to make our transit arrangements which felt worth it to us so we didn’t have to run around to the various offices getting bits of paper copied, stamped and signed. They just love paperwork in Panama! Every boat needs to have a Skipper and four line handlers. John, our Canadian friend, and I (Louise) were two and we had a German couple with us as our other two line handlers. Dani and Jens had left their yacht in Cartegena, Columbia while waiting for a new tiller pilot to arrive and were seeking a transit to get some practice before they transit themselves. They were really great and it was a pleasure to have them aboard.

I (Louise) did a transit as a line handler with another boat a few days before we did our own transit. This is recommended and I found it really beneficial to do. I went aboard Cornelia that is skippered by a lovely young Dutchman Marc, and his girlfriend Vanessa. Marc casually mentioned that when he was 28 he decided he wanted to do something ‘a bit special’ so he circumnavigated the globe solo, non-stop in Cornelia. It took him 7 ½ months. That’s what I call a bit special!

Every Canal transit is different it seems. Whether you raft up with other yachts in a lock, hug a sidewall or get put next to a huge sports fishing boat depends as much on the speed of your boat, as it does  the weather and the frame of mind of your Advisor! Our transit began with us motoring from Shelter Bay Marina across the channel to an area called The Flats to wait for our Advisor to board. Every boat transiting the Canal must have an Advisor on board. Advisors know the Canal and lock procedures intimately. They issue instructions to the skipper and line handlers to ensure we manoeuvre correctly and quickly. Our Advisor (another Ivan!) boarded at 4.15pm and we upped anchor and motored off towards the Gatun locks – a series of 3 locks through which we would rise up 26 metres - about 2 miles away. Two other yachts followed us and we had a huge refrigerated cargo ship in front and other huge ships coming up behind. There is a constant stream of traffic in the Canal.

Waiting to go into the Gatun Locks

We had quite a long wait before we could enter the locks which meant we had to keep motoring around in circles to make sure that we didn’t get ahead of the carrier in front of us. There is quite a current there and we had a breeze blowing from behind. It was a bonus to spot a crocodile on the shore. Finally we were instructed to raft up with the other two yachts – Brio on the port side, an enormous French catamaran in the middle and a large monohull on the starboard side. For protection (from each other and the lock walls) we all had a dozen or more car tyres hanging against our hulls as well as our own fenders. It all happens very quickly in the lock with men high up on the wall throwing lines down to our boat which we, the line handlers have to attach to our lines so they can be hoisted back up and placed on bollards. Then the gates closed behind us and the water started swelling in. Ivan was constantly instructed to motor forward and reverse in order to keep our raft of yachts straight while we line handlers had to bring in the lines as they slackened. All went well for the 3 locks.

We then motored as fast as our little Brio could across the 38 km (20 nm) of the man made Gatun Lake. By this time it was well and truly dark so mostly what we saw was a very pretty row of red and green lights marking the channel, and the occasional eerie looming black mass of a ship passing us. Yacht transits in the Canal have recently changed, so rather than spending the night moored in the Lake and then descending the locks into the Pacific the next day, pleasure craft are now required to complete the transit all in one go. It certainly takes the tourism element out of the transit as we don’t get to see the famed forests, sloths, birds and crocodiles of the Lake. On the plus side though, it’s not hot - a very good thing for Brio as our shade arrangements are not the best.

Well wouldn't we all love that!

The Lake narrows into the Culebra (or Gaillard) Cut; arguably the most well known part of the Canal due to its black history of deaths through landslides and other accidents, malaria and yellow fever while its 14km (7 nm) length was being cut. Transiting here we passed a number of dredges in operation and caught glimpses of work proceeding on the excavation of the new Canal. At this point we knew we were going to be able to complete our transit (and not have to stay the night in the Lake and be fined a huge amount for doing so) because there was a bulk carrier somewhere behind us that we could go through the descending locks with. Being a relatively small vessel with a small engine, the other yachts had left us for dead in the Lake and we therefore needed to make sure there was at least one other vessel that we could go through the locks with as the canal authority will not open the locks for pleasure craft only.

entering the Miraflores Locks

We entered the Pedro Miguel Lock ahead of the dry bulk carrier Sujitra Naree. As we were the only other vessel in this and the next 2 locks apart from the Sujitra Maree, we did what they call a ‘centre chamber’ which as you might imagine is where we are attached by all four of our lines to the lock sides so that we descended each lock in the centre of the lock chamber. We descended the 9 metres of the Pedro Miguel Lock and motored the mile or so to the Miraflores Locks. All went relatively smoothly apart from the last lock, known for its strong currents as the fresh water of the canal mixes with the salt water of the Pacific. John and I were at the bow dealing with our lines so we missed seeing the events that led up to Brio skewing to one side and thumping her starboard stern against the lock wall. According to skipper Ivan what happened was that the man on the stern port side of the wall was too slow to throw us his rope to attach to our line and then when he drew our line back to himself he attached it to the wrong bollard. Because the line was too slack there the currents pushed Brio to the side and her stern connected with the wall. The only damage done was some paint removal and once again we knew there was a good reason Ivan had insisted he wanted a steel boat.

Where will John fit on Sapphire all the new gear he bought?

On exiting the last lock we did the fastest speed we had done all night due to the strong current – 8kts – for a couple of hundred metres anyway! It was then another hour or so of motoring, passing under the beautifully named Bridge of the Americas (which looks like a mini Sydney Harbour Bridge), before Ivan our advisor was spirited away by a speedy pilot boat and we finally dropped anchor at La Playita anchorage. It was 4.15am, exactly 12 hours since our transit began (or 15 if you want to count from when we left Shelter Bay Marina). We had a quick toast to the transit/canal/Pacific/good teamwork and great line handlers and then got some much needed shut eye.

John has now gone back to Sapphire in the San Blas Islands and Daniel, Ivan's son, has joined us for the trip to the Galapagos Islands.

Shelter Bay

We bid a fond farewell to our friends and helpers at Marina Carenero on Saturday afternoon, leaving somewhat later than we had anticipated as we discovered the engine's alternator had seized and needed replacing. Not a huge problem as we had a spare alternator available, but a hot and sweaty job for Ivan as access to our engine is verrrry squeezy. Anyway, a few hours and many curses later we were on our way.

Leaving Marina Carenero, Bocas del Toro

We hadn't planned on going too far anyway, just a little closer to the open sea to be able to leave reasonably early the next morning. We motored over to Isla Bastimentos and spent the night anchored off the village there. For dinner we hiked up the hill by torchlight to the Thai restaurant only to find they were ully booked. So we hiked back down the (very muddy) hill and ate in Ca Venice, a place that focussed on Italian style food because that's where the proprietors are from.

We left Isla Bastimentos at around 9.30am the following morning heading towards Shelter Bay at the Caribbean side of the Panama Canal. We had a "jolly lively time of it" as Dick from the Famous Five might say as the winds were fair and there was a bit of swell. I think we were averaging 6 knots over the 130 mile passage. We arrived at Shelter Bay somewhat bleary eyed as we had to hand steer all the way because the tiller pilot and the wind moitor both decided not to work.

Tomorrow we haul Brio out of the water to remove the seafood salad that has grown on her in the past 6 months, put a new coat of anti-foul on her and do a few other out-of-the-water jobs.

Back to Bocas

Well it's been a long time between posts, but as most of you know anyway, we have been back home in Australia enjoying the summer with family and friends. It all went too quickly and now here we are again in Bocas del Toro aboard Brio.

John & Marilyn with Cole and Huck the dog

We arrived here a week ago, having spent a lovely few days on the way over with our friends John and Marilyn who live in Los Angeles. As always, they were incredibly welcoming and we were lucky enough to be with them while they were babysitting their grandson, Cole, for a few days. He is just a magic little bundle of energy and laughs.

We arrived at Marina Carenero in Bocas just as the weekly 'pot luck' was happening (this is the saturday night communal dinner for people staying at the marina where everybody brings a dish to share). It didn't matter that we had just stepped off the plane and had nothing to offer, we were made to feel extremely welcome and got to say hello again to some folk who were here when we left 6 months ago, and got to meet lots of new people too. Since then, our Canadian friend John has joined us and we have been working at getting the boat ready to sail over to Shelter Bay marina at the Carribean entrance of the Panama Canal. Brio seems to have sat contentedly in her berth while we were away, so most of the work has been trying to remember what sails and sheets go where...oh and the small matter of evicting a few pets (weevils!).

John hamming it up in the main st of Bocas

The weather during the past week has been unseasonally wet and windy so no boats have been moving anywhere, but it looks like there is a break in it and we may even be able to get going tomorrow.

Our little dinghy finally has her name 'Miss Allie' put on

Canada

Our best laid plans for getting to Bowmanville, Ontario to spend 2 weeks with Daniel, Tanya and Baby Knight, went somewhat awry with Baby Knight’s arrival. However, as I said to Ivan, if I can spend 10 days on a yacht with hardly any sleep, I can sleep one night in an airport! And so we did, before catching the early morning bus to Toronto.

The reason we are here!

Baby Knight now named Zaden Troy Gnarly Knight with his gorgeous parents