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Entering Bahia Sante Elena
We were ready for a respite from the splashing and the short choppy waves. Hello everyone. Well, it's been about 12 days since we left Bahia de Sol, in El Salvador. Crossing over the bar there was a little intimadating, but we did it, and then headed out some miles from shore, and turned a slight left (port) towards Costa Rica. This area of Central America is known for Papagayo winds .they weren't kidding. We actually didn't get a true Papagayo wind, but it was blustery enough for us. It started out sweet, mellow, then we turned a cape, and it came right at us, a Southeast wind, right in the direction we wanted to go. We ended up hugging the coast, in case it got too strong, and we were too tired or uncomfortable, we could tack into a cove , throw anchor and rest. But we didn´t. We just kept going for a couple days and an overnight. By the next day in the evening we were getting close to Bahia Santa Elena, a small nature preserve in Costa Rica the borders with Nicaragua.
Ahhh, it was nice to enter that little bay at the end of about 24 hours of hard on the nose (close hauled) and short seas. It was
Robin fishing, fishing
We had all this fishing equipment for deep sea trawling, and nothing for off the boat, but we did try. beautiful and no one was there. As soon as we dropped anchor, we dropped in the water for a nice refreshing swim...NOT! Refreshing, yes, for a short time, then we felt something stinging us. Little, little jellyfish, or their tentacles, were in the water....AURG! We did a little refreshing swim, then out we climbed. Our handy-dandy weed sprayer/body mister worked wonders. We would simply spray fresh water over ourselves, and the salt would be gone, and we didn't use too much fresh water.
We kyaked a few days there, not much to see, and not much hiking, as it´s all jungle around there. The next day we have visitors..The fisherman came. The only place to hang on a little spit of beach in front of the boat, was where the fisherman hang out. They would set their nets in the evening, sleep on the beach, then pull them up early in the morning. They did this for a couple days, then after they left another group of fishermen came in. At first I thought, bummer, our own little secluded beach...then I thought, heh, fresh fish...hmmmm. Robin did try fishing, and there was tons, I mean tons of fish all
Beautiful Sunset
Again, one of many...I know there are alot of these around us. I am putting on some small video clips of all the fish boils every morning, and just all the fish always around us in the water. The tides were pretty strong, as they are the nearer we get towards the equator, and those nasty little jellyfish would disappear with the outgoing tide, so that is when we would swim. We mostly swam with our fins and stayed close to the boat, as we didn´t want to get swept out to sea, the currents were strong.
It was a nice place to stay. We were only going to stay for a couple days, but it was howling outside, and the fisherman told us to wait for 3 more days, then it will calm down somewhat, so we did.
Finally on Friday evening we took off around 4pm. It had calmed down somewhat in the evenings, so we thought that would be a good time to go around this cape of rocks and corals, which extend out pretty far into the ocean. Before we head out the entrance to the bay, we turn on the engine and got main up, and I check that the temp is OK,
Kyakes on the beach
Checking out the fisherman camp, lots of vultures and no paths to hike but noooo. It´s extremely hot!!! (Remember Anne, my jeep going down to Mexico, and the temp arrowo was WAY OVER?? ) I immediately turn off the engine, and Robin realizes that he had closed the valve that lets in water to cool the engine, instead of opening it. YIKES! Now we have to sail out of the opening (about 1/2 mi wide9. That little boat did just wonderful, sails very well close hauled. We came out just fine, then turned towards the cape. We had a nice sail out to the cape and around it, as the wind was behind us, sweet..ahhh! Then the wind started to die and get a little fluky as we began to cross the Gulfo de Papagayo (which is , yes, another very windy area to be concerned about). We thought the engine would be cooled by then, so we started it up again, but it got hot again!! Robin checked the engine, and the impeller (that pumps the water) had cracked. Luckily he had extras, and replaced it, and then the engine began to work normal, whew!
We motor-sailed that night, and the wind never came up like before. It was pretty light.
Let´s get a good fish for dinner
They sold us this horrible black tuna fish, that we found out later mostly is used for bait!! We took a couple bites, then threw it in the ocean or fish food too! YUCK The night went pretty uneventful, saw a lot of lightning out to sea, and we had only one little squall come upon us with rain,, no lightning. That afternoon we were reaching out next anchoring destination, Bahia Ballena in the Gulf of Nicoya, Costa Rica. We were hoping we would reach before dark to anchor easily. If we had to we could anchor with our radar and depth sounder in the dark, but prefer not too, especially in an unknown area (which they all are, actually).
We kept watching the time, and the sky and pushing the boat as fast as we could. As we rounded the cape (Cabo Blanco), we had about 12 miles to go, luckily the tide was coming in and that helped with our speed. As we turned into the bay we could just barely see a couple sailboats over to the left side in the bay aways. We headed towards them, of course darkness decended, and that was that. We got close enough, so that we were out of the ocean swell, but that was as far as we were going that night. We would move in closer tomorrow morning.
In the morning
Entering the Gulf of Nicoya
Cabo Blanco, and this is the White Rock, Piedra Blanco, which was very majestic, and long awaited. as we are getting up, we see the other two sailboats, and it looks like they are hauling up their anchors and leaving. Usually we pick their brains for info about the area, as they are there and know something (anything is more than we know). As they get their boats going, one comes by us and asks if we know a Jan Larsen in Leucadia??? That name was familiar, but it didn´t hit me yet, then I looked at the name of the boat, Che Bella, and I remembered my sister telling me about her friend, Jan, who went to the Galapagos with a guy in his boat called Che Bella...It slowly motored next to us for a little bit and we talked. He was heading out to Cocos Island, then down to Ecuador. He was by himself, a single hander (impressive to say the least), and the other boat (didn´t catch the name) was also another single hander. We waved them off, and got our dingy ready to go ashore to ¨check it out¨.
The area around here is nice, the dingy dock leaves a lot to be desired. Big tidal surges and not too safe for
Walking to Tambor
Small path we walked most everyday to Tambor (small village) or to catch the bus. >Lot of sweating going on on these walks, I tell you. our little boat. We had to rig up a stern anchor and pully system to pull us to the steps, then pull the boat back out towards the stern achor. We had much trouble with this system for many days, but other than that, and the hideous heat, it´s a nice place.
We traveled to a few small towns in the area for supplies, and stopped at this one town called Montezuma, very backpacker type, hippie , young people, arts and crafty, etc. We went there to go to this waterfalls that you can walk to outside of the town. It was soooo nice to swim in fresh water, you wouldn´t believe how we enjoyed that!!! Costa Rica has a lot to offer, but it´s quite expensive here too, some stuff is more expensive than in the states. Most of our money went to buying deisel for the boat. We are ready to leave and come and explore the islands of Costa Rica next season. Rain is upon us and it´s time to get south.
Hope you enjoy the photos, and the little video clips.
Next will be Ecuador, South America.
Hugs and love to all our family
Bahia Ballena Bar/Resturant
This is the infamous place that we struggled to keep out dingy tied up to and not blown out with scrapping on these old pilings.
and friends, Robin & Jean
I have some errors on this page and when I went back to correct, the editing is off, and it´s all in spanish I don´t know how to change the editing shema on this blog, so please get the jest of the story, and sorry for the errors in grammar.
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Margaret
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Where do you hope to end up? Don't think I know.