by Judy Handley | Feb 18, 2006 | Panama, Sailing Logs Year 1 |
Day 124, Year 1: A Trip to Panama City
Date: Saturday, February 18, 2006
Air Temperature: 78 degrees F
Water Temperature: 76 degrees F
Location: Balboa Yacht Club, Balboa, Panama
We are still here in the Balboa Yacht Club mooring field. We are at the end of the mooring field closest to the Panama Canal and our “front porch” view is of the Puentes de Las Americas or Bridge of the Americas. I think I’ve mentioned that there really isn’t a Balboa “Yacht Club” but just a dock with an office and a walking bridge to the mainland. At the end of that walkway there is a bar. Both the bar and the yacht club office have wireless internet available at no cost and this is a real plus here. Add to that the fact that we have nightly fireworks, I assume as a part of Carnival, and we have quite a delightful temporary home here.
We headed to Panama City by taxi this morning just to see what it is like. It is a big city and there is plenty of poverty there, but it does appear safe to walk in the main shopping district. We were looking for a wireless antenna for our computer so that we can boost the wi-fi signal in the mooring field. We are too far away to get a good connection on the boat, but after searching all of Panama City and the Albrook Mall, we decided that ordering one from the states is the only option.
There are different parts of Panama City, but today’s visit was to the shopping area. Things appear to be very cheap here. Many of the same brands that we would find in the US are much cheaper here. On the outskirts of town, the Albrook Mall is just like any mall in the US. We found a Super 99 store there-like a Super Walmart–and it has most anything you might want at cheaper prices as well. I will return there to do a final stocking up before leaving here.
We continue to meet more people who are heading into the South Pacific. Monday afternoon we are going to a meeting of those boats heading our way that are not part of the organized Blue Water Rally. We will share e-mail addresses so that we will be able to stay in contact. Some of the people arrived here this time last year and have a wealth of information to share with us. I am looking forward to that meeting.
On Monday morning, we have to visit the French Embassy. We have learned that we need to go there to apply for a 3-month Visa to French Polynesia. We thought we could do that once we arrived there, but evidently it is a really good idea to get it done here. Many people we meet are also applying for cruising permits for the Galapagos. We have already done that, so at least we are ready for the next leg of this journey.
Tomorrow morning we head to Aqua Magic to help them with water maker and engine repairs. What better way to spend a Sunday!
by Judy Handley | Feb 17, 2006 | Panama, Sailing Logs Year 1 |
Day 123, Year 1: A Different World
Date: Friday, February 17, 2006
Weather: Sunny and Warm
Water Temperature: 76 degrees F
Latitude: 08 degrees 56 minutes
Longitude: 79 degrees 33 minutes
Location: Balboa Yacht Club, Balboa, Panama
We have not just come through the Panama Canal; we have arrived in a place very different from where we have been for the past couple of months. The water temperature has dropped about 6 degrees from the Caribbean side of Panama, and as the port captain said to us today, we have just “come from Africa and arrived in Miami.” I would not characterize Cristobal and Colon on the other side of the Canal as Africa. It was simply an area that has self-destructed. There were no nice parts of town. The entire area was like the worst slum that you can imagine. On this side of the Canal, it is a very different story. There is a T.G.I. Friday’s not far from the dock and there is a party boat blaring music as it travels through the waterway. I hear the shopping in Panama City is fantastic (good things cheap), and the people here are very friendly. Plus, you can actually walk around without the fear of being robbed. There was no wireless internet at the Panama Canal Yacht Club, but here there is wireless in the mooring field as well as at the bar at the end of the dock here. We are finding this a very comfortable place to be and will probably stay here for another ten days. The Carnival finale is February 24th through the 27th, so we will probably stay to experience that before traveling on. We have been moving so fast that there has been no time for boat maintenance. We are really hoping to slow ourselves down, get a lot of boat work done, and still have time to enjoy the area.
We are still in awe of how smoothly our Canal transit went. It went like clockwork. We were up and going by 0300, picked up our advisor by 0400, rafting up with our partner boats by 0430, and headed into the first Gatun Lock by 0500. There are three adjacent locks, and we stayed rafted to our two buddy boats until 0730 when we had cleared the third lock. We then untied from our “buddies” and started the motor race across the 25 miles of the Gatun Lake, under the Centennial Bridge, and rafted with our buddy boats again around 1130. We cleared the Pedro Miguel Lock and entered the Miraflores Locks around noon. By 1330, we were in the Pacific. Quick and easy. We were very lucky to be able to transit with only sailboats-no super tankers. The Canal is back to its regular schedule today, so our timing was just right.
Tomorrow we will head into Panama City to check things out.
by Judy Handley | Feb 16, 2006 | Panama, Sailing Logs Year 1 |
Day 122, Year 1: We Are In The Pacific!!!
Date: Thursday, February 16, 2006
Weather: Perfect Passage Day, Sunny, Warm and Calm
Latitude: 08 degrees 56 minutes
Longitude: 79 degrees 33 minutes
Location: Balboa Yacht Club, Balboa, Panama
It is just a little hard for us to comprehend, but here we are in the Pacific. Today’s Panama Canal Transit went so smoothly and we had fantastic crew. Victor, from Barcelona, Spain, spent the night with us and we got up at 0245. Kim from Australia, and Lee Ann and David from Canada, joined up at 0300 and off we went. We waited in the anchorage until about 0400 when our advisor, Jorge, arrived. We then motored to the Gatun Locks and were rafted up with Encore from Detroit, Michigan (middle position), and Aqua Magic from Portsmouth, England (starboard). We were in the port position. We transited the Gatun Locks, traveled the ~25 miles to the next set of locks and then entered the Miraflores Locks at about 1230. We arrived here-in the Pacific Ocean-around 1400. After all of the preparation and fear of Canal transiting, today was a real treat. Thanks to a great advisor and crews, we transited with no problems. Thanks to all.
We had dinner on Aqua Magic tonight, and tomorrow we start planning our trip from here to the Galapagos. I’ll write more detail tomorrow, but tonight it is important to get some rest.
by Judy Handley | Feb 15, 2006 | Panama, Sailing Logs Year 1 |
Day 121, Year 1: Tomorrow is Passage Day
Date: Wednesday, February 15, 2006
Weather: VERY Windy
Location: Panama Canal Zone, San Cristobal, Panama (near Panama Canal Yacht Club)
The excitement is building. I thought today that taking your boat through the Panama Canal is a bit like the Super Bowl, except that instead of viewing, you are actually playing. There is so much preparation-getting crew, getting lines, reading the books on passage, preparing the boat, preparing food. And in the process you meet so many new people. We moved from the anchorage in what is called The Flats today into the marina. We are rafted with Aqua Magic and will be leaving at 3 AM with them and another boat from Germany. We will head back into The Flats and wait there for the arrival of our advisors, and then head to the Gatun Locks. All crew arrived early this evening, so we are ready to go. We have David and Lee Ann from Ontario, Canada, who are here in the marina and will join us at 3 AM, Victor from Barcelona, Spain, who is onboard tonight, and a young woman named Kim from Western Australia who will join us in the AM. Rented lines are onboard, tires we bought to serve as fenders are hung over the side, quiches for breakfast are already baked, the tacos and Coronas for past passage celebration are on ice, and I think we are as ready as we will ever be. So here goes.
The advisor will board our boat between 3:30 and 4:00 and we will head to the Gatun Locks. There is actually a webcam at that lock, so if you happen to be up at 5 AM, you might check the www.pancanal.org website and take a peek. The next webcam is at the Miraflores lock and we will be there between noon and 2:00 PM-much better timing. We also hear that there is a webcam at the Centennial Bridge and we should be there just after 2 PM. We will wave in case you are watching!
After we transit, we will end up on the other side in Balboa. We will pick up a mooring or anchor there for the next week or so. We hope to have time to catch up on the many things we have on that To Do list. I will definitely check in tomorrow after our transit and let you know how things go tomorrow. The weather here is VERY windy, but they say that shouldn’t be a problem in the Canal. Until tomorrow . . .
by Judy Handley | Feb 14, 2006 | Panama, Sailing Logs Year 1 |
Day 120, Year 1: Happy Valentine’s Day
Date: Tuesday, February 14, 2006
Weather: Sun Mixed with Tropical Downpours, Windy
Location: Panama Canal Zone, San Cristobal, Panama (near Panama Canal Yacht Club)
We’ve been so busy getting ready for the Canal transit that we almost forgot that it was Valentine’s Day. We have a Canadian couple from the boat, Mystic Jade, who are going to go with us as line handlers, as well as a young man from Barcelona, Spain, who is visiting here. His name is Victor. If no one backs out, we do have our crew. We went to the supermarket again today to stock up on drinks for the Pacific voyage. We thought we would do that in Balboa once we transit, but we hear that even though it is safer on that side, getting caseloads of drinks onboard is harder. So all day today, we watched cases of beer, wine, water, and soft drinks getting loaded on to boats in the marina. Since we are out in the anchorage, we have to transport everything by dinghy, but we are getting there. We will need to make one more trip to the store tomorrow and we should be all set.
The weather here has been very unusual. It continues to rain during the night and a few times each day. Normally there is no rain this time of year, but today while we were waiting for a taxi at the store, we had a tropical downpour. It has also been very windy and the anchorage is choppy. This means getting wet every time we go into the marina. No fun, but at least it is warm and we dry out quickly.
We are told that friends and family that want to watch the transit can do so on the internet. I still have not found an internet café where I can download our g-mail account, but that is on the agenda for first thing in the morning. When I do that, I will also check out the Canal website. At this point, my knowledge is second hand. I believe you go to a Panama Canal website and look for the Mira Flores Lock webcam live video. We will be in the Mira Flores Lock sometime between 1200 noon and 1400 (2 PM) as best as we can guess. It is at the end of our transit and we are told we should be through by 1500 (3 PM). So if you are interested, you can try to find the site and get a glimpse of us as we transit. If I get more specific information, I’ll post that tomorrow afternoon.
Tomorrow will be another busy day. You have to prepare all of the food ahead of time as there is not much time once the transit begins. We will take our boat into the marina tomorrow evening and stay there the night with the crew onboard. Then we have to come back out here to the anchorage around 0300 (3 AM) to wait for the advisor to board. We then head to the Canal, get rafted with two other boats, and start the trip through the first lock at 0500 (5 AM). I think I’m tired just thinking about it!
If things get too crazy tomorrow, it is possible that I won’t get to post a log, but I will certainly let you know once we are safely through the Panama Canal.
by Judy Handley | Feb 13, 2006 | Panama, Sailing Logs Year 1 |
Day 119, Year 1: Canal Transit on Thursday
Date: Monday, February 13, 2006
Weather: Continued Sunshine Mixed with Rain
Location: Panama Canal Zone, San Cristobal, Panama (near Panama Canal Yacht Club)
Yippee! We do have our Panama Canal transit date and it is this Thursday, February 16. Ellington, the cabbie, took us to the bank this morning to pay the fee and was supposed to return at 1800 to call to get our transit date. Either we missed him or he didn’t show up, so we went ahead and called and found out the rumor we had heard yesterday was true. Since the Canal Authority had to find 12 advisors to go through with the Blue Water Rally boats today and tomorrow, they decided to keep the advisors for a couple of extra days and get some of the backlogged boats out of here. Since we just arrived, we are not part of the backlog, but we called today and there was room, so we have a slot. Of course, things change here from day to day, but I do think we will go through this week, and it will most likely be on Thursday. After Friday of this week, things return to normal, so we feel very lucky to have arrived when we did. Even though we will have extra time on the Pacific side, we are glad that we hurried here and are getting to take advantage of the extra personnel hired for this one week.
By going this week, there will be only sailboats in the locks, no big cargo ships, and this makes for a safer passage. We will also get to go through in one day. The Advisor will arrive at 0400 and we will move out of the anchorage and line up in front of the first lock. Three sailboats will then be rafted or tied together and the middle boat, which will be the biggest of the 3, will act as the pilot boat. Once in the Canal, line handlers on the outer 2 boats will catch the lines thrown down by Canal personnel, tie the125 foot lines we are all required to carry to the Canal lines, and then these lines are hoisted by the Canal personnel and tied to the sides of the lock. With this rafting or nesting of boats, actually only 4 line handlers are needed, one fore and aft on the two outside boats, but each boat is still required to have four line handlers onboard. The boats stay rafted through the three up locks, and then you are untied and race the 24 miles to the down locks. There you raft again and by about 1400 on Thursday we will be one of 48 sailboats that have gone through the Canal this week and are ready for the next stage of the journey.
As soon as we got our date tonight, we started scrambling to find crew to go through with us. The Canal Authority requires that one of their advisors goes through the Canal with each boat and that in addition to the boat’s captain, there are four line handlers onboard. We have enough possibilities that I am certain we will have the four people needed. We are required to feed everyone during the transit and then make sure everyone gets back to Cristobal safely. There are busses that run every half hour, so we will put the crew on busses and they will then take a taxi from the bus station back here to the marina. They will bring back the lines that we have rented for this canal transit and we will sell the tires we bought to use as heavy duty fenders to someone on the Balboa side transiting this direction. You pay $3.00 a tire and they come wrapped in black garbage bags with packing tape wrapped around to hold the covering in place. We have four of these tires on each side of the boat, along with two of our fenders on each side. The garbage bag wrap protects the boat from black tire smudges.
Margaret and Patrick of Aqua Magic returned from their day as line handlers and reported that all went smoothly. We met another couple from the US today, Tom and
Betty Lee Walker from Mobile, Alabama. They are on a 48-foot catamaran called Quantum Leap. A young woman from New Zealand, Kathleen, travels with them. We will be in Taihiti and Bora Bora at the same time, so we will see them again. They are also planning on wintering in New Zealand. We met Gary of Heart Beat today and he is also from New Zealand. He will be moving faster than us and Quantum Leap as he plans to get back to Kiwi land mid-summer.
