Sunrise on the Caribbean sea

Our cabin stowed

Our route has been thought out after talking with many people experienced with this passage. Basically when we first began talking about going from Panama to USA, years ago, it was commonly said that no matter what direction you choose there will be difficult passages, it’s just not easy to sail from here to there. We chose this route because we wanted to see Jamaica, the Bahamas and possibly some other islands along the way, figuring that we would get the biggest hunk done with first jump to Jamaica. General opinion is that the further east you are when you start the easier it will be, due to the prevailing wind direction, so Cartegena is a starting point for many. We didn’t want to sail the 200 miles to Cartegena so we left from the San Blas islands.
Going around the Hollandes keys was the first excitement of the day, there is a shallow area that extends east for a mile or 2 off the actual island. Combine that with the incoming swell and you have breaking waves. I cut the corner a bit short and saw 20ft on my depth meter, not shallow in calm water, but very shallow coming off the 10 ft breaking waves.
OK away from the reef and into deeper water, I can now breathe normally. I didn’t need that excitement to start this journey but it was done. We did have 10-15 knot winds with a 7-10ft swell, not much in the way of other waves which can give the washing machine effect and make things very uncomfortable so for now we just needed to get ourselves accustomed to the movement of the boat with this ocean. We headed off in a NE direction about 70 degrees due to the wind we had and tacked back and forth every 3-4 hours for the first 24. Because of this tacking back and forth we were not able to make our easting but Larry was ‘comfort’ tacking as he calls it, Vicki was sick even after taking Stugeron. I just hope that I will not be sick the entire 5 days, Jeanna was thinking she should have brought the LR at this point.
I am of no help for the first 18 hours and we have set up our watch schedule every 4 hours with 2 crew on at a time, Larry and I would be on with our friends since they didn’t have ocean sailing experience, which isn’t the biggest factor because sailing is sailing and they did have sailing experience. The biggest factor is that they are unfamiliar with our boat and how she handles in certain situations, when to reef, when to be concerned when not to be so we like one of us to be with them on watch.
Larry of course is exhausted being the only one of ‘us’ able to stand watch, it is 0500 and I have started taking Meclazine. He doesn’t typically sleep the first 24 hours of our trips anyway but with me being sick he wants to support our friends on their watch. At 0700 I am able to pick my head up without feeling worse, and at 0900 I am actually able to stay in the cockpit to do my watch. I offer to stay on watch for 4 hours to try to get ourselves back on a schedule, knowing that may not be the best idea since I haven’t been feeling well for so long, but the boys took me up on my offer, Jeanna understood and asked if I would be OK with that, I told her that if I wasn’t I would let her know. Oh my it is wonderful having another woman on the boat. Thank you Jeanna for being here for me on this trip! I know I have said that before and I will repeat it often during our passage.
So during this first 24 hours we have developed a leak, Larry has been dismantling the boat in search of this leak, the bilge pump has been coming on every few seconds to constantly, that is what triggered the search in the first place. We had a problem with the bilge pipe creating a siphon and bringing water into the boat at a prior time but this was the first time in several months that the boat has been on such a heel to port and Larry thinks that is the situation which causes this. Besides the boat looking like it had rolled over down below, we were having to tack back and forth to see if we were taking on more water on a certain tack. When I was sick I hadn’t had the presence of mind to ‘help’ Larry investigate this ‘taking on water’ situation but I now was. He continued saying he had to work on finding the leak, he was sweaty, and was just a bit crazy, even telling our friends back in the San Blas that we were ‘still taking on water’ but that it was under control.
At this point I had to see for myself just how much water we were taking on and if it warranted the frantic antics of the captain. I sat on the floor with the engine compartment door open, with a flashlight looking into the bilge. I did not see water pouring from the ledge where water from the forward of the boat would come in. I asked Larry ‘Any water coming from the forward part of the boat would come over this ledge right?’ Reluctantly he said yes. ‘Well I don’t see much if any at all, it is wet so we must have had some come in at some time.’ Next I asked ‘this rounded slope on the port side would be where I would see the water from the bilge drain right?’ Right he said. ‘Well I don’t see any water coming over it either, it is wet also so there must have been water there too.’ At this point I am looking at the level of the water in the bottom of the bilge, it is not rising at an alarming rate, in fact it is not rising much that I can discern at all.
My assessment at this point is to stop what I see as crazy-sleep deprived behavior and take a break, periodically assessing the water level and pumping if necessary. I told my husband that he needed to take a break, get a cold drink, wash off and relax and let it go, he was making himself crazy. He looked skeptical when I informed him I was going to wait an 2 hours before checking the bilge, asking all kinds of questions about how I would check it, warning me to be careful about the wires in the bilge….but finally he obeyed my directive and got a coke, freshened up and seemed to be OK for the moment that I would check the level.
After an hour, I sensed that 2 would be too long for Larry, I checked the bilge, found it had raised about 1 inch. Informed all and said I would re-check in another hour. After another hour it had raised about double the original mark, making it 2 inches. At this point I switched on the bilge and it ran about 9 seconds before it was empty. My suggestion at this point was that at the 2 hour mark, which was the change of shift, we would check the bilge and/or just switch the bilge pump on. I am not sure how Larry felt about this, my feeling is that he wasn’t 100% comfortable with the situation but all the rest of us were. We know that there is a certain amount of water that will come into the bilge from waves crashing over the bow for hours and hours, there is just no way around it, seal as we might you just can’t stop that force completely. We were not at any risk whatsoever, at this point I began to question just how much water originally came in or was this just the automatic pump getting overloaded with amount of movement of the boat. It is my intuition that an automatic bilge pump works great at the dock or at anchor and needs to be switched to manual on a passage, but what do I know I’m just a girl:)
So we are into our second day of the passage, at this point it feels like we will be at sea a lifetime. We made a whopping 60 miles toward our destination, oh not actual miles traveled that was about 110, but all the tacking put us well behind our friends on Kokomo, by about 20 miles. Today would be better all around, I was feeling pretty good, we were starting to get into a rhythm, sleeping when we could and staying hydrated and snacking mostly for meals. We were sailing except for a bit of engine time to make water, wow almost 24 hours of pure sailing. A little after midnight Steve and Larry were on watch and the engine came on. When I came on my watch, I would be with Steve relieving Larry, they gave me report which informed me that they were ‘getting off course’ which meant we were west of a line we had made from a point earlier where the boat was to a point where Chris Parker had said ‘go to this lat/long and then east to Jamaica’.
I worked out the calculations for them, at this point and speed 3-3.5 we would make 10 miles in about 4 hours. On our tack from before (Jeanna was at the helm) we were making 5.5-6 NW, just slightly W. The prediction was that the wind would clock more south meaning we would be able to turn toward the east without adjusting the sails but we would make 15 more miles in the same time. No amount of reasoning would sway their conviction that we needed to continue to bash into this swell. As Steve went off watch, Jeanna came on. I gave it another hour on their course and then decided to cut the engine and sail, we had 14-18 knots of NE wind and the swell was much more comfortable. Thank you Jeanna for being on this journey with us, you are my sounding board, girls rock:).
Stay tuned, part 3

So I thought that it might be fun for you all to read about our passage of 565 nm to Jamaica on Rocinante. There is much to document though so I have broken it up into 3 parts. Enjoy

Along with our friends on Kokomo, we have been planning to make this trip to the USA via Jamaica and the Bahamas for many months. Spending the past few months in the San Blas islands, hanging out, sailing to anchorages as we desired, enjoying the sun, water and the very chill lifestyle has been quite an experience for many of us very ‘connected’ Americans, but we managed. It takes a while to let go of the desire to have all the ‘conveniences’ at your fingertips, stores only blocks away, nightlife, freeways to take you wherever you may want to go. There is none of that here and we have been enjoying the simple beauty for many months.
Jeanna and Steve Taylor joined us to spend some time in the islands and then to make the 500+ mile trip to Jamaica, knowing that there could be mother nature events that might prevent them from actually getting to Jamaica and their pre-arranged return flight plan, but they were willing to take the chance and we were more than willing to have them spend some time with us, hoping that they would be able to cross the Caribbean with us. Getting them here did take some fast talking, as I recall there were no bribes involved, but close. An offshore adventure is not something that just anyone would do, go ahead ask yourself: 5 days minimum on a boat in the middle of the ocean, no change of mind once the journey has begun, it may be uncomfortable, it might even get a little scary, very little sleep…
Larry and I made the journey into Panama City, it is quite the adventure and interesting for the first time or two, I was ready never to make this slog again. 1 hour on a panga(boat) to get from Rocinante to shore, 4 Wheel drive 2 ½ hours over a mountainous washed out road to the B and B. Then repeat above with 10 additional bags of provisioning. Anyway here we are in Panama city and our friends flight was delayed so they wouldn’t be getting in midday as expected. We would have to provision the next day right before going back to the boat. It was wonderful to greet them when they did arrive, just another validation that we were actually going to do this adventure!
So we are back at the boat waiting for our weather window while enjoying the islands, yes we were able to bar hop but that’s another story. What is a weather window? Well, that is a period of time, the amount of time that it will take you to get to your destination, and the weather that is forecast for that amount of time. On long passages such as this the weather can and will change depending on your location so the weather forecasting takes into account how many miles your boat will travel and what the weather will be at that point on the first day, then the second and so on. We opted this time to take advantage of a weather forecaster who is well known for pretty accurate forecasting and who also does individual forecasting, for a fee, his name is Chris Parker.
The first few days our friends were here the weather did not look too promising for making their crossing, there were forecasted very high winds and waves, something we would not head into. Our conversation had to include what is your drop dead date? When will you say-‘nope can’t take the chance of returning after this date’. Of course we had to ask it, I was hoping that the answer would be, ‘we are with you no matter what, but of course they had their obligations and couldn’t risk not meeting them. I understood and then went on to hope for the best.
The high winds/waves that had been predicted was a week out and we all know that especially weather changes, sometimes for the better in this case less wind and sometimes for the worse, meaning more wind, that is what I was listening for as the days progressed. Sure enough as I listened to the forecast everyday it seemed that the high wind and waves predicted didn’t get as high as expected nor last as long, this was the question that I continued to pose to our many friends, most with more sailing experience than I. ‘Are you hearing the same thing?’ I would ask. The answer was yes so my hopes began to rise that we would be able to leave during the window that would get our friends, and us to Kingston, Jamaica safely and in time to catch their flight.
Anticipation was building as we neared the possible date, funny how this works. It’s not like taking a regular vacation, you ask your boss for definite dates off, book your flight or hotel or plan some outing, pack your bags or meet up with friends or family on the appointed day and there you have it some good ole R and R. No how this works is that you think that, well today is the 30th of March and there may be a chance we can leave this week, hmmm in this case travel plans were in the mix but we never let that push us when it isn’t safe, we have learned that lesson.
Then that night we discuss the possibilities a little more, bounce around ideas and what we expect for the first 24 hours and decide that we could leave on the 3rd. The next day, 1st of April, and after getting the weather and again discussing the possibilities it looks like maybe we can leave the evening of the 2nd, and then that moves up to the morning of the 2nd, mostly due to not hearing that there would be any difference leaving 24 hours later, we would still have a tough time the first 24 hours out and then things would calm.
So the 2nd arrives, we have all slept a little restlessly turning over in our heads all the preparation needed for a safe crossing. We are all up early getting our cup of java or tea to listen to the weather and get another individual report for the area we will be in, getting just this last minute information before making the final call that indeed we will depart today. Another check with Kokomo and yes we are all on the same page, It will be 15-25k NE winds, 7-9 ft NE swell as we start out and 24hours later will calm to 15-20k ENE and 5-7 NE swell. Calming the rest of the way both seas and swell to make the first part the roughest and the last the easiest, in theory. Yes we are ready to go.
All the last minute stowing done, gear lashed and checked, engine levels checked, medication taken and at 1130 we will pull our anchor for the last time here in the San Blas and head around the corner out the reef to the wide open Caribbean sea headed for Jamaica.

One of the great things about cruising is all the wonderful people you meet and get to know. We spend time doing fun things like tours, snorkeling, walking the beach, yoga, playing music, making food, doing our nails (the girls that is) or just sitting in one of our cockpits talking about life, plans and life on the boat.
One of the difficult things about cruising is saying good bye to these great people. It happens with regularity and when you meet someone new chances are that you will be saying goodbye to them at some point in the future, just where that point lies is undetermined.
Today was one of those difficult days,we had to say goodbye to two of the boats we have had great times with. Today we will travel to the east lemons, tomorrow we plan to check out of the San Blas and out of Panama anticipating that we will get a good weather window for heading to Jamaica. We are hoping to the get the weather which will give us 15 K wind, and as our good friends on Diva said ‘I hope you have FF seas’. ‘What’s that?’ I said, Debi said ‘FF means F…ing Flat’! Those are the times I will remember, all the laughter.
Our plans in the next few days consist of making sure the boat will be in good working order for the offshore trip, picking up our friends in Panama who will be making the trip for us, provisioning and then waiting for that weather window. We are planning on a 5 day trip to the southeast end of Jamaica. Our hope is that our friends can spend a few days here in paradise, having fun but also becoming comfortable with the boat, before taking off. I am getting excited, this will be our longest offshore trip but not by much and I am much more at ease with the plan than I was say 4 years ago when we started this adventure. I know Rocinante and what a great sailing boat she is, how comfortable in weather she is and that we will make good speed depending of course on the direction and velocity of the wind. We played around the other day to see how we would point with the wind from the NNE and so with that information we would like wind from the ESE or better!
Today as we are sailing along we have 12 miles to go, with these light winds we should get to our destination about 4pm, oh well what else do we have to do. Larry is at the helm today, seems I have been at the helm, having fun hand steering for the past 2 weeks as we have moved from anchorage to anchorage so he can have a turn at playing with adjusting the sails and our direction. I get to play first mate and write a blog. I will miss sailing in the San Blas.
Vicki

We are back to Rocinante after spending a day in Panama city with our friends and a day shopping and provisioning. The boat is fine and we are getting into some of our projects however we would rather be doing midnight swims and noodle parties with our family and friends.
Thanks for sharing such a special time with us.
Vicki and Larry

Daphne, Me and Larry on ‘one palm’

There are times in your life when things just work out the way they are supposed to, well usually they do but sometimes they are just magical.
Having our granddaughter and our friends aboard in the San Blas was one of these magical moments. Once we learned when Marykay and her husband Scott and daughter Caryn were coming to visit I realized that Daphne would have her mid winter break the same time and could not think of a better place to have her experience than the San Blas islands. Like I said it all just worked out, her mother, my daughter agreed to the plan, I was able to get the same flight that our friends had made and the opportunity for our friends to bring her with them was just the universe making room for our plans.
Larry met them all at the Cruiser Casa in Panama City after their arrival. Once they made the trek in the 4 wheel drive out to Carti and the Panga ride to the boat I greeted them at our boat with more excitement than I recall having in a very long time. This would be an opportunity for us to share one of the more special areas that we have cruised.

Arrival in Carti, Panga in background

As per usual for this time of the year there was a nice breeze blowing through the anchorage, I was on deck as the panga arrived after making lunch for everyone who I expected to be hungry. Our granddaughter Daphne was as excited as I was when they arrived, I knew this when she said ‘Nice hair Grandma’.

‘Great hair Grandma’

Marykay, Scott and their daughter Caryn were amazed that the day arriving to Rocinante had arrived and there were many squeals of delight as we unloaded their luggage and our provisions from the panga to our boat.
After filling up on some tasty morsels and stowing their gear we donned swimming attire and snorkel gear and proceeded to snorkel to Banedup, one of the islands near our anchorage. Doing a little miscalculation we ended up snorkeling over some VERY shallow spots but ended up on the beach at Banedup and showed everyone the island.

Sand Spit, San Blas

On our way back from the island we went to Kokomo and asked Becky and Denny over for happy hour. It’s always fun with Kokomo but our guests were tired and so after our appetizers and visit we had dinner and retired early.

Oh, and the Lobster appetizers

We stayed in the E lemons on Sunday, traditionally there is a pot luck at the larger anchorage just East of us and there are 20-30 boats anchored at this time. We chose to have a potluck on Yansalerdup with just a few of the other boats anchored near us, it was a bit more intimate and not so overwhelming for our friends. The Kuna family on the island had caught a small Lemon shark and called us over to see it. Not knowing my sharks well I commented that it was a baby nurse shark, the Kuna elder man, the only person who spoke Spanish, said that it was a Lemon shark. In my best spanish I explained that I liked nurse sharks because Marykay and I are nurses.
Later that evening the whole Kuna family came back to where we were gathered to talk with Marykay and I. He showed us his 9 month old grandson who had sores/bites all over his body. We questioned as to what it could possibly be, could not come up with a solution at the moment but promised that we would come back the next day to help. After returning to the boat the discussion continued and I even spent many hours that night thinking about what we could do that would at the very least ‘do no harm’
The next morning over our coffee Marykay and I discussed our thoughts. The only thing we came up with was that it was Chicken pox, admittedly one of the worst cases either of us has seen. We came up with bathing 3 times a day with baking soda and oatmeal, which I had blended to a flour consistency. Applying a tea tree oil infused oil on the skin, as tea tree oil is reputed to be beneficial to every skin problem. The grandfather understood all the instructions and we were happy to have been of some assistance.
We pulled the anchor up to motor to dog island to snorkel the wreak which lies off the beach. There is a very small anchorage only suitable in calm conditions and only for a few hours. We finally maneuvered the boat to pretty good holding and were off to enjoy the beauty that this reef had to offer. Larry stayed behind to make water, this is very labor intensive so I am thankful that he is willing to do this for us.
The girls found the jewelry and molas for sale first and when we couldn’t find them in the water we looked toward the island and saw Scott holding all the snorkeling gear under a palm tree and the girls ogling over the handmade items. Of course Daphne and I joined them, I found a bracelet, Daphne found several. We hauled our treasures back to the boat, stopping once more over the wreak, getting pictures of Daphne finding her own.

Looking at Lisa’s molas

After lunch we headed over to Salurdup, it was Monday and we planned to have Lisa take us up the Sidra river for the tour on Tuesday. The winds were up a bit to about 21 knots, the seas had been stirred up as well so we had a wild ride as Scott helmed Rocinante across the channel, Caryn was at her favorite spot on the bow and as it got rougher she decided to make her way to the cockpit just as a big wave came over the bow to soak her.

Scott at the helm

Thankfully we were not the only ones laughing as she got to the cockpit with a big smile on her face. After sailing several hours, our snorkeling in the morning, and anchoring we were content to swim around the boat a bit, take the dinghy to the island of Salurdup for a little exploration and hang on the boat for a wild game of Uno. Daphne was the victor for the evening and we were in bed again before 10 pm, resting for another adventure.
Tuesday we went to the river, Lisa came to get us right from the boat and we made the slow trip to the river.

‘Red Flower’ lipstick
we is beautiful

Our hike to the top only took about an hour so we were a bit sweaty and couldn’t wait to take the plunge into the cool, fresh water. Some of us bravely jumped from the 10 foot rock into the pool, and some were a bit more chicken and jumped from a rock quite a bit lower, hey we all got into the water to cool off and that’s what counts. Lunch was satisfactory and filled our stomachs, enjoyed the rest sunning on the rocks and then began the return trip which takes us through the river, another high jump which we ALL jumped from, a slide or 2, continued trekking through the jungle past several Kuna gravesites and back to the panga where the adventure of the day began. This day was thoroughly enjoyed by all and we were ready to relax on the boat.

Daphne trekking rio Sidra

Our first thought when we were planning the time was that we would sail to another anchorage called Gunboat island, it is only a 5 mile or so sail but we knew that changing anchorage would take at least 3 hours and the anchorage was reported to be a bit rolly so we decided to stay where we were to explore the area. Waking up at about the time to listen to the ‘net’ which comes on at 0830 every morning on the SSB, leisurely enjoying our coffee and breakfast and chatting about our experiences from the day before we prepared to go on our outing. We piled our gear into the dinghy and I took everyone to see what reefs we could find. Our first stop was disappointing as we only found one coral head so we jumped back in the dinghy and headed a bit further. Between two of the islands I could easily see the breaking waves of the reefs that extended off each island, I found a sandy spot to drop the dinghy anchor and we jumped in. First look told us we had found a special place. Snorkeling right next to the breaking waves was a bit surgy but once we were out a bit from the sand the visibility was wonderful. Before we got caught on the outside of the second set of breaking waves I suggested we return to the dinghy and explore 3 palm island.
3 palm island is a bit of a takeoff from 1 palm island, which there are several of these so named islands scattered around the San Blas. We anchored the dinghy off of the island a bit and snorkeled the reef all the way to the island. The girls found many treasures on the island to show us, pictures to remind us what a treasures we have found and explored together were taken and we headed back to the boat.
Surprised that we had been gone 2½ hours we showered thanks to Larry filling our solar showers and had a late lunch. We knew that a rematch at UNO would be in order that evening and the Ausenhus’s were hot to take the crown from Daphne. I knew that there was one experience they could not leave the islands without and that was the famous ‘noodle happy hour’. Having enjoyed a mojito with our fresh mint the night before I set out to make enough for the younger women to have their version and share in the festivities.
Once the mojitos were made everyone got their ‘noodle’, which are the Styrofoam straw-like water toys and I gave an example of how you get into the water with your noodle and drink in the glass to enjoy our ‘noodle hour’ floating in the cool Caribbean sea. Marykay said she is going to tell her mom that this is the way she wants to have pupu hour from now on. We laughed about when we come back to Seattle they will have us over for ‘pupus’ and have noodles on the couch or in the bathtub and we will remember their time with us.

Marykay at the helm

The next day was Thursday, we headed back to our original anchorage at Salurdup, the wind was 12-15 knots, main and jib were set by Larry and Scott and Mary Kay was at the helm for the great sail. The girls were a bit nauseus but they quickly recovered once we were out of the channel. Safely anchored we got a visit from our Kuna family, the grandfather happily reported that the baby was much better and thanked us for our ‘medicine’. The girls contributed to the islands economy by purchasing some of their beaded bracelets and we waved goodbye as they paddled away in their ulu.

Road from Carti

Enjoying Ceviche

Marykay, Caryn and Scott in Panama

Soooo good when it’s hot

Shopping

Caryn at Casco Viejo

Friday morning came early as we had to take the return trip to Panama City for their flight on Saturday. The panga came as expected, we piled in, they said their goodbyes to Rocinante and we arrived at the Cruiser Casa before noon. This day was spent exploring some of the sites of Panama City, the canal and Miraflores locks, the fishermans wharf, and Casco Viejo. We ended the day enjoying dinner and a traditional dance demonstration at a nearby restaurant. It has been such a wonderful adventure.
Thanks to Marykay, Scott and Caryn for visiting us, allowing us to share this magical place called San Blas with them, thanks for the unforgettable memories and laughter they have shared with us, we will relive this time over and over. But most of all thanks to them for allowing our granddaughter Daphne to have an adventure of a lifetime. For this we are eternally grateful.