Day 118, Year 1: A Quiet Day
Date: Sunday, February 12, 2006
Weather: Sunshine Mixed with Rain, Winds From All Directions
Location: Panama Canal Zone, San Cristobal, Panama (near Panama Canal Yacht Club)

Not much to report today. I did as much as I could to prepare the boat for the Canal transit. Mark is having a bit of a back problem and spent much of the day sitting and lying down. Despite that, we got a lot accomplished, plus I had time to bake bread. We had dinner at the Yacht Club with Patrick and Margaret and two other couples from the Blue Water Rally that are transiting tomorrow morning. Patrick and Margaret are going along as line handlers and we will look forward to their report of that experience.

Tomorrow morning we go into the city to the bank to pay our transit fee and to do some grocery shopping. We will then wait for Ellington to call the Canal Authority at 6 PM to find out what our transit date will be. I’ll wait to post tomorrow’s log until after I know the date and can report that to you.

Weather here is strange. It can be raining one minute and then beautiful and sunny the next. The winds have been shifting direction every few hours. Not sure if it is always that way here, but I know I will be glad to move on. I just hope we get an early transit date.

There are maybe a hundred sailboats here in the anchorage and in the marina, all awaiting transit through the Canal. It is hard to believe we are one of them; that we have actually sailed here and are approaching the next big leg of our adventure. And it is both comforting and somewhat unbelievable that so many others are doing what we set out to do – to sail across the South Pacific Ocean and perhaps on around the world. When we began our trip it was hard to actually comprehend that we might sail around the world. We could plan for it and prepare ourselves and our boat for it, but it was all theoretical. Now, as we have completed one passage after another and visited so many exciting and interesting places, it is becoming real. We just take it one step at a time. We don’t have to sail around the world this week; we just have to get ready for a transit of the Panama Canal.

060212 Day 118 PCYC Anchorage and Marina